THE AGES DIGITAL LIBRARY

HISTORY

MILLER’S CHURCH HISTORY

by Andrew Miller

B o o k s Fo r Th e A g e s
AGES Software • Albany, OR USA
Hartland Publications • Rapidan, VA USA
Version 1.0 © 1997
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MILLER’S CHURCH HISTORY

BY

ANDREW MILLER

Including the Original “Last Chapter”written by Andrew Miller.

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PREFACE
As all we know of history comes to us through books, I have examined, with
some care, the authors which are most esteemed in this country and
considered the most reliable. And although there is frequent reference to
volume and page, this by no means indicates all that has been gathered from
those histories. It would be impossible to say how many thoughts, words,
and sentences, are interwoven with my own. The references have been
generally given, not so much to verify what has been written, as to induce the
reader to study them or whatever works may now be available as he may
have opportunity. The materials are so varied and abundant, that the
difficulty lies in making a selection, so as to maintain a continued historic line,
and yet leave out what would now be neither profitable nor interesting.
Some of my earliest and valued friends, such as Greenwood, Milman, and
Craigie Robertson, conclude their histories about the fourteenth century;
Waddington, D’Aubigne, and Scott, about the middle of the sixteenth; and
Wylie closes his history of Protestantism with its establishment under the
reign of William and Mary. Dr. M’Crie’s special histories and biographies are
extremely valuable; and so is the history of Protestantism in France by Felice,
the history of the Reformation in the Low Countries by Brandt, the brief
history of the Middle Ages and the Reformation by Hardwick, and also
Cunningham’s history of the Scotch Church; but good general histories from
the early part of the sixteenth to the present century are indeed scarce.
I have aimed at more than mere history. It has been my desire to connect
with it Christ and His Word, so that the reader may receive the truth and
blessing, through grace, to his soul. And it will be observed that I
commence with the Lord’s revealed purpose concerning His Church in
Matthew 16. Other parts of the New Testament have been carefully
examined as to the first planting of the Church, but its actual history I
have endeavored to trace in the light of the addresses to the seven
Churches in Asia. This, of course, must be in a very general way, as I have
been desirous to give the reader as broad a view of ecclesiastical history as
possible, consistently with my plan and brevity.
May the Lord’s blessing accompany the volume that now goes forth.
LONDON
ANDREW MILLER
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CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION

The Seven Churches of Asia

CHAPTER 1

The Rock Foundation

Foundation of the Church
Opening of the Kingdom of Heaven
Church Government
CHAPTER 2

The Day of Pentecost

Resurrection and Ascension of Christ
Descent of the Holy Ghost
Calling in of the Gentiles
First Christian Martyr
CHAPTER 3

The Disciples Persecuted and Scattered

Jerusalem and Samaria United by the Gospel
Conversion of Saul of Tarsus
CHAPTER 4

The First Missionaries of the Cross

The Twelve Apostles
Herodian Line of Kings
CHAPTER 5

The Apostle Paul

First Visit to Jerusalem
First Missionary Journey
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Third Visit to Jerusalem
Visit to Athens
CHAPTER 6

Paul’s Third Missionary Journey

Departure for Macedonia
Fifth Visit to Jerusalem
Before the Sanhedrin
Martyrdom of Paul
CHAPTER 7

The Burning of Rome

First Persecution Under the Emperors
Downfall of Jerusalem
The Real Cause of Persecution
Persecutions in France
CHAPTER 8

The Internal History of the Church

Apostolic Fathers
Origin of Clergy and Laity
Origin of Dioceses
CHAPTER 9

From Commodus till the Accession of Constantine

Persecution in Africa
Altered Position of Christianity
The General State of Christianity
The Condition of the Church
CHAPTER 10

Constantine the Great

Church as Constantine Found It
Effects of Royal Fayour
Baptism and Death of Constantine
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CHAPTER 11

The Council of Nice

The Council of Tyre
The Barbaric Invaders
CHAPTER 12

The Internal History of the Church

Infant Baptism
First Society of Ascetics
Calamities of Rome
CHAPTER 13

The Epistle to the Church in Thyatira

Leo the First, Surnamed the Great
Missionary Zeal of Gregory
Romish Hierarchy in England
CHAPTER 14

The Spread of Christianity Over Europe

First Preachers in Ireland
First Preachers in Scotland
Foreshadowing of the Man of Sin
CHAPTER 15

Mohammed, the False Prophet of Asia

Religion of Islam
Successors of Mohammed
Second Council of Nicaea
CHAPTER 16

The Silver Line of Sovereign Grace

Origin of the Paulicians
Religious Wars of Charlemagne
Feudal Hierarchical System
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CHAPTER 17

The Propagation of Christianity

Louis the Pious
The Slavonians Receive the Gospel
England, Scotland, and Ireland
CHAPTER 18

The Church-Building Spirit Revived

Learning of the Arabs Imported into Christendom
Traces of the Silver Line of God’s Grace
CHAPTER 19

The Pontificate of Gregory VII

Gregory and Clerical Independence
Celibacy and Simony
The Emperor Deposed by the Pope
Effects of the Papal Policy
Burning of Ancient Rome
CHAPTER 20

The Crusades
The First Crusade
The Second Crusade
The Third Crusade
The Remainder of the Crusades
CHAPTER 21

Henry V and Gregory’s Successors

St. Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux
The Great Council of the Lateran
Arnold of Brescia
CHAPTER 22

The Encroachments of Rome in England

The Introduction of Canon Law into England
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Thomas a Becket and Henry II
The “Constitutions of Clarendon”
CHAPTER 23

The Theology of the Church of Rome

Transubstantiation
Mary — Worship
Saint — Worship
Relic — Worship
Purgatory
Extreme Unction
Auricular Confession
Indulgences
CHAPTER 24

Innocent III and His Times

Innocent’s Views of Popedom
Philip and Otho
Innocent and England
England Surrendered to Rome
CHAPTER 25

Innocent and the South of France

Peter Waldo
Raymond a Spiritual Outlaw
The Real Object of the Catholics
CHAPTER 26

The Inquisition Established in Languedoc

The Application of Torture
The Auto de Fe
St. Benedict
New Orders — St. Dominic and St. Francis
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CHAPTER 27

The Approaching Dawn of the Reformation

Christianity in Ireland
Christianity in Scotland
Popery as a System
CHAPTER 28

The Decline of Papal Power

Gregory IX and Frederick II
The Overruling Hand of God
The Humiliation of the Pontiff
CHAPTER 29

The Forerunners of the Reformation

Literary Men
The Theologians
The Waldenses
The Dark Year of 1560
CHAPTER 30

John Wycliffe
England and the Papacy
Wycliffe and the Bible
The Lollards
CHAPTER 31

The Reformation Movement in Bohemia

The Imprisonment of John Huss
The Arrest and Imprisonment of Jerome
The United Brethren or Moravians
CHAPTER 32

The Capture of Constantinople

The First Printed Bible
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The Immediate Precursors of Luther
Reflections on the Life of Savonarola
CHAPTER 33

The Reformation in Germany

Popery and Mankind
The First Period of Luther’s Life
Luther’s Conversion
CHAPTER 34

The First Papal Jubilee

Luther’s Public Appeal
Distinguished Men of the Sixteenth Century
The Diet of Worms
CHAPTER 35

Luther at Wartburg
Luther and the German Bible
The Hundred Grievances
The First Diet of Spires
CHAPTER 36

Protestantism
The Lutheran Churches
Meetings of the Protestants
CHAPTER 37

The Sacramentarian Controversy

The Conference at Marburg
A Proposal for Toleration and Unity
CHAPTER 38

The Council at Bologna

The Diet of Augsburg
The Articles of Faith
The Letters of Melanchthon and Luther
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CHAPTER 39

The Popish Refutation

The Final Decree
The League of Smalcald
The Peace of Ratisbon
CHAPTER 40

The Reformation in Switzerland

Zwingle, Pastor of Glaris
The Rising Storm
CHAPTER 41

The Leaders of the Reformation in Switzerland

The Progress of the Reformation — Zurich
Zwingle and His Brothers
The Disputations at Zurich
CHAPTER 42

The Results of the Disputations

The Answer of Zurich to Lucerne
The Swiss and German Reformation
The Weapons of Rome’s Warfare
CHAPTER 43

The General Progress of Reform

The Reformation in Berne
The Conference at Baden
The Great Conference at Berne
The Reformation of Basle
CHAPTER 44

The Extension of Reform in Switzerland

The Five Cantons Form a League with Austria
The Treaty of Cappel
War Declared Against Zurich
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CHAPTER 45

The Reformation in Gemany

The Great Actors Passing Off the Scene
The Death of Luther
Reflections on the Life of Luther
CHAPTER 46

The Opening of the Council of Trent

The Smalcald War
The Treachery of Maurice
The German’s Treated as a Conquered People
CHAPTER 47

“The Interim”
The Revolution in Germany
The Calamities of the Protestants
The Rise of the Jesuits
CHAPTER 48

The Effect of the Reformation in Germany on the Nations of Europe

Sweden and Denmark
Italy
Spain
The Netherlands
CHAPTER 49

The Reformation in French Switzerland

Early History of William Farel
The Arrival of Calvin in Geneva
Calvin and Calvinism
CHAPTER 50

The Reformation in France

The Bible in French at Meaux
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Commencement of Persecution in France
The Year of the Placards
CHAPTER 51

The Great Progress of the Reformation

The First Planting of the Reformed Church in France
The Saint Bartholomew Massacre
The Council of Trent
CHAPTER 52

The Waldenses
The Wars of Extermination
The Sympathy of England
The Persecution and Expulsion of the Waldenses
CHAPTER 53

The Reformation in the British Isles

Ireland
Scotland
The Fiery Zeal of Cardinal Beaton
George Wishart
John Knox
CHAPTER 54

The Reformation in England

The Reformation Begun
The Persecution Begins
Ridley, Latimer, and Cranmer
CHAPTER 55

The Reign of Elizabeth

The Puritans
John Wesley
Sunday Schools
Foreign Missions
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CHAPTER 56

Philadelphia
Laodicea
Church Truth
The Spread of the Truth
Conclusion
GENERAL INDEX

INDEX TO PERSONS

INDEX OF PLACES
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SHORT PAPERS ON CHURCH

HISTORY
INTRODUCTION

Many of our readers, we know, have neither the time nor the opportunity
for reading the voluminous works that have been written from time to time
on the history of the church. Still, that which has been the dwelling-place
of God for the last eighteen hundred years, must be a subject of the
deepest interest to all His children. We speak not now of the church as it
is often represented in history, but as it is spoken of in scripture. There it
is seen in its true spiritual character, as the body of Christ, and as the
“habitation of God through the Spirit.” (Ephesians 2.)
We must always bear in mind, when reading what is called a history of the
church, that, from the days of the apostles until now, there have been two
distinct and widely different, classes of persons in the professing church:
the merely nominal, and the real — the true, and the false. This was
predicted.
“For I know this,” says the apostle, “that after my departure shall
grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of
your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw
away disciples after them.” (Acts 20.)
His Second Epistle to Timothy is also full of warnings and directions as to
the various forms of evil which were then but too plainly manifest. A
rapid change for the worse had taken place from the time that his first
epistle was written. He exhorts the truly godly to walk in separation from
those who had a form of godliness, but who denied the power thereof.
“From such,” he says, “turn away.” Such exhortations are always needed,
always applicable — as much now as then. We cannot separate ourselves
from Christendom without giving up Christianity; but we can and ought to
separate ourselves from what the apostle calls “vessels to dishonor.” The
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promise is, that, “if a man... purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel
unto honor, sanctified and meet for the master’s use, and prepared unto
every good work.”
It is interesting — though painfully so — to mark the difference on this
point between the First and the Second Epistles to Timothy. In the first,
the church is spoken of according to its true character and blessed position
on the earth. There it is seen as the house of God — the depositary and
display of truth to man. In the Second Epistle, it is spoken of as what it
had become through the failure of those into whose hands it had been
entrusted.
Take one passage from each Epistle in illustration.
1. “These things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly;
but if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to
behave thyself in the house of God... the pillar and ground of the
truth.”
2. “But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver,
but also of wood and of earth; and some to honor, and some to
dishonor.”
Here all is changed — sadly changed. In place of divine order there is
hopeless confusion; in place of “the house of God, the pillar and ground of
truth,” there is “a great house” — practically “the mystery of iniquity.” In
place of the house being kept according to the will of God and suitable for
Him, it was arranged and ordered according to the will of man, and for his
own personal advantage and exaltation. Thus early had the evils, which
have been the sin and the disgrace of Christendom ever since, made their
appearance. But this was overruled for good. The Spirit of God, in great
mercy, has supplied us with the plainest directions for the darkest day of
the church’s history, and has pointed out the way of truth for the worst of
times; so that we are left without excuse. Times and circumstances change,
not the truth of God.

THE MISTAKES OF HISTORIANS IN GENERAL

Some historians, it is sorrowful to say, have not taken into account this
sad mixture of evil vessels with the good — of true Christians and false.
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They have not themselves been spiritually minded men. Hence they have
rather made it their chief object to record the many unchristian and wicked
ways of mere professors. They have dwelt at great length, and with great
minuteness, on the heresies that have troubled the church, on the abuses
that have disgraced it, and on the controversies that have distracted it.
Much rather would we endeavor to trace, all down through the long dark
pages of history, the silver line of God’s grace in true Christians; though
at times the alloy so predominates that the pure ore is scarcely
perceptible.
God has never left Himself without a witness. He has had His loved and
cherished though hidden ones in all ages and in all places. No eye but His
could see the seven thousand in Israel who had not bowed the knee to the
image of Baal, in the days of Ahab and Jezebel. And tens of thousands, we
doubt not, even from the darkest ages of Christianity, will be found at last
in the “glorious church,” which Christ will present to Himself, on the long-
looked-for day of His nuptial joy. Many precious stones from the rubbish
of the “middle ages” will reflect His grace and glow on that crowning day.
Blessed thought! even now it fills the soul with ecstasy and delight. Lord,
hasten that happy day for Thine own name’s sake!
The truly godly are instinctively humble. They are generally retiring, and
for the most part but little known. There is no humility so deep and real as
that which the knowledge of grace produces. Such lowly and hidden ones
find but a small place on the historic page. But the insinuating or zealous
heretic, and the noisy or visionary fanatic, are too clamorous to escape
notice. Hence it is that the historian has so carefully recorded the foolish
principles and the evil practices of such men.
We will now turn for a little, and take a general view of the first part of our
subject, namely

THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA

These seven Epistles, so far, will guide our future studies. We believe they
are not only historical, but also prophetical. Doubtless they are strictly
historical, and this fact must be allowed its full weight in studying their
prophetic character. Seven churches actually existed in the seven cities
here named, and in the condition here described. But it is equally clear, that
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they were intended, by Him who knows the end from the beginning, to
bear a prophetic meaning, as well as a historical application. They were
selected from amongst many, and so arranged and described as to
foreshadow what was to come. To limit their application to the seven
literal churches then in Asia would be to mar the unity of the Apocalypse,
and to lose the promised blessing. “Blessed is he that readeth, and they
that hear the words of this prophecy.” The character of the whole book is
prophetic and symbolic. The second and third chapters are no exception to
this. They are introduced by the Lord Himself in their mystic character.
“The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in My right hand, and
the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels of the seven
churches: and the seven candlesticks which thou sawest are the seven
churches.”
The number seven is characteristic. It marks a complete circle of the
thoughts or ways of God as to time. Hence the seven days of the week —
the seven feasts of Israel — the seven parables of the kingdom of heaven
in mystery. It is often used throughout this book, which takes up Jew,
Gentile, and the church of God, as responsible on the earth. Hence we
have seven churches, seven stars, seven candlesticks, seven angels, seven
seals, seven trumpets, seven vials or the seven last plagues. Only in
chapters 2 & 3 is the church seen as responsible on the earth, and the
object of divine government. From chapter 4-19 she is seen in heaven.
Then she appears in full manifested glory with her Lord. “And the armies
which were in heaven followed Him upon white horses, clothed in fine
linen, white and clean.”
In the body of the book, especially from chapter 6, the Jews and Gentiles
come before us, and are judicially dealt with from the throne of God in
heaven. But this will not take place till after the church — the true bride of
the Lamb — is caught up to heaven, and the merely nominal corrupt thing
finally rejected.
The threefold division of the book, as given by the Lord Himself, makes
the order of events quite plain, and ought to have immense weight as a
principle of interpretation in the study of the Apocalypse. In chapter 1:19
He gives us the contents and plan of the whole book: “Write the things
which thou hast seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall
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be hereafter,” — or, literally, “after these things.” “The things which thou
hast seen” refer to the revelation of Jesus as seen by John in chapter 1;
“the things which are,” to the time-condition of the professing body as
presented in chapters 2 & 3. “The things which shall be hereafter” are
from chapter 4 to the end. The third division begins with chapter 4. A
door is opened in heaven, and the prophet is called to come up. “Come up
hither, and I will show thee things which must be hereafter,” or “after
these things.” It is the same phrase in chapter 4:1 as in chapter 1:19. The
things which are, and the things which shall be after these things, cannot
possibly be concurrent. The one must end before the other begins.
When the number seven is used, not in a literal but in a symbolic sense, it
always signifies completeness. It is evidently thus used in chapters 2 & 3.
There were other churches, we know, besides those named; but seven are
selected and associated to present a complete picture of what would
afterwards be developed in the church’s history on earth. The more
important moral elements which then existed, the Lord foresaw, would
reappear in course of time. Thus we have a sevenfold or divinely perfect
picture of the successive states of the professing church during the entire
period of her responsibility on the earth.
We will now take a rapid glance at the outline of the seven churches; and
give a general idea of the different periods in history to which they apply.

OUTLINE OF THE SEVEN CHURCHES

Ephesus. In Ephesus the Lord detects the root of all declension. “Thou
hast left thy first love.” It is threatened with the removal of the candlestick
unless there be repentance. Period — from the apostolic age to the close of
the second century.
Smyrna. The message of Ephesus is general, to Smyrna it is specific. And
though it applied at that time to the assembly there, it shadowed forth, in
the most striking way, the repeated persecutions through which the church
passed under the heathen emperors. Yet God may have used the power of
the world to arrest the progress of evil in the church. Period — from the
second century to Constantine.
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Pergamos. Here we have the establishment of Christianity by
Constantine as the religion of the State. Instead of persecuting the
Christians, he patronized them. From that moment the downward course
of the church is rapid. Her unholy alliance with the world proved her
saddest and deepest fall. It was then that she lost the true sense of her
relationship to Christ in heaven, and of her character on earth as a pilgrim
and a stranger. Period — from the beginning of the fourth to the seventh
century, when popery was established.1
Thyatira. In Thyatira we have the popery of the middle ages, Jezebel-
like, practising all kinds of wickedness, and persecuting the saints of God,
under the disguise of religious zeal. Nevertheless there was a God-fearing
remnant in Thyatira, whom the Lord comforts with the bright hope of His
coming, and with the promise of power over the nations, when He Himself
shall reign. But the word of exhortation to the remnant is, “That which ye
have already, hold fast till I come.” Period — from the establishment of
popery to the Lord’s coming. It goes on to the end, but is characterised by
the dark ages.
Sardis. Here we see the Protestant part of Christendom that which
followed the great work of the Reformation. The foul features of popery
disappear, but the new system itself has no vitality. “Thou hast a name
that thou livest and art dead.” But there are true saints in these lifeless
systems, and Christ knows them all. “Thou hast a few names even in
Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with Me
in white: for they are worthy.” Period — from the eventful sixteenth
century onwards. Protestantism after the Reformation.
Philadelphia. The church of Philadelphia presents a feeble remnant, but
they are faithful to the word and name of the Lord Jesus. That which
characterised them was keeping the word of Christ’s patience, and not
denying His name. Their condition was not marked by any outward
display of power; nor of anything externally great, but of close, intimate,
personal communion with Himself. He is in their midst as the Holy One
and the True, and is represented as having charge of the house. He has “the
key of David.” The treasures of the prophetic word are unlocked for those
inside. They are also in the sympathies of His patience, and in the
expectation of His coming. “Because thou hast kept the word of My
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patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall
come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth.” Period —
especially from an early part of this century; but activity on all hands is
now rapidly developing the last phases of Christendom.
Laodicea. In Laodicea we have lukewarmness — indifference —
latitudinarianism; but with high pretensions, a boastful spirit, and great
self-sufficiency. This is the last state of that which bears the name of
Christ on the earth. But alas! it is intolerable to Him. Its final doom has
come. Having separated every true believer from the corruptions of
Christendom to Himself, He spues it out of His mouth. That which ought
to have been sweet to His taste has become nauseous, and it is cast off for
ever. Period — beginning after Philadelphia, but especially the closing
scene.
Having thus taken a general view of the seven churches, we would now
endeavor, through the Lord’s help, briefly to trace these different periods
of the church’s history. And we purpose examining more fully, each of the
seven Epistles as we go along, that we may ascertain what light is shed on
the different periods by these addresses; and how far the facts of church
history illustrate the scripture history of these two chapters. May the
Lord guide for the refreshment and blessing of His own beloved ones.
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CHAPTER 1
THE ROCK FOUNDATION

In commencing the study of any subject, it is well to know its beginnings

— the original intention or plan, and the first step in its history. These we
have in the clearest, fullest way, as to the church, in holy scripture. There
we have not only the original intention, but the plans and specifications of
the great Builder, and the early history of the work under His own hand.
The foundation had been laid, and the work was going on; but the Lord
Himself was still the only Builder: therefore, up to this time all was real
and perfect.
At the close of the Jewish dispensation the Lord added the saved remnant
of Israel to the newly formed church: but, at the close of the present or
christian dispensation, He will take all who believe in His name up to
heaven in glorified bodies. Not one belonging to the church will be added to
the congregation of millennial saints.
“For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout,
with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the
dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain
shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the
Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” (1
Thessalonians 4:16-17.)
This will be the happy close of the history of the church on earth — the
true spouse of Christ: the dead raised, the living changed, and all, in their
bodies of glory, caught up together in the clouds to meet the Lord in the
air. Thus we have the entire limits of the church defined, and the whole
period of her history before us. But we return to the dawn of her day on
the earth.
Under the figure of a building the Lord first introduces the subject of the
church. And so infinitely precious are His words, that we may adopt them
as the text or motto of its whole history. They have sustained the hearts
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and the hopes of His people in all ages, and in all circumstances; and they
will ever be the stronghold of faith. What can be more blessed, more
assuring, more peace-giving, than these words? — “UPON THIS ROCK
I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH; AND THE GATES OF HELL SHALL
NOT PREVAIL AGAINST IT.”
In Matthew 16 the Lord questions His disciples as to the sayings of men
concerning Himself. This leads to the confession of Peter, and also to the
gracious revelation of the Lord concerning His church. It may be well to
transfer the whole conversation to our pages — it all bears so directly on
our subject.
“When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His
disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am? And they
said, Some say that Thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others,
Jeremias, or one of the prophets. He saith unto them, But whom say ye
that I am? And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the
Son of the living God. And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed
art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto
thee, but My Father which is in heaven. And I also say unto thee, That
thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I will build My church; and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it.” (Matthew 16:13-18.)
Here we have the two main things connected with the proposed building
— the Rock-foundation, and the divine Builder. “Upon this rock I will
build My church.” But who is, or what is, “this rock”? some may inquire.
Clearly, we answer, the confession of Peter; not Peter himself, as the
apostasy teaches. True, he was a stone — a living stone in the new
temple; “Thou art Peter” — thou art a stone. But the Father’s revelation,
by Peter, of the glory of the Person of His Son, is the foundation on which
the church is built — “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” But
the glory of the Person of the Son in resurrection is the unveiled truth here.
“Flesh and blood hath not revealed this unto thee, but My Father which is
in heaven.” Immediately on the confession by Peter, the Lord intimates
His intention to build His church, and asserts its eternal security. “Upon
this Rock I will build My church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail
against it.”
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He Himself, the fountain of life, could not be conquered by death; but, in
dying as the great Substitute for sinners, He triumphed over death and the
grave, and is alive for evermore, as He said to His apostle John after His
resurrection:
“I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive
forevermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.”
(Revelation 1:18.)
What majestic, what triumphant words are these! They are the words of a
conqueror — of One who has power; but of power over the gates of hades
— the place of separate spirits. The keys — symbol of authority and
power — hang at His girdle. The stroke of death may fall upon a
Christian, but the sting is gone. It comes as a messenger of peace to
conduct the weary pilgrim home to eternal rest. Death is no longer the
master, but the servant of the Christian.
“For all things are yours; whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the
world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours:
and ye are Christ’s; and Christ is God’s.” (1 Corinthians 3:21-23.)
The Person of Christ, then, the Son of the living God — in His
resurrection-glory — is the foundation, the solid and imperishable
foundation, on which the church is built. As alive from the dead He
communicates life in resurrection to all who are built on Him as the true
foundation-stone. This is plain from what Peter says in his first Epistle.
“To whom coming, as unto a living stone... ye also, as living stones, are
built up a spiritual house.” And further down in the same chapter he says,
“Unto you therefore which believe, He is precious,” or “an honor.” (See
margin.) May both reader and writer note well these two most precious
truths in connection with our “Rock-foundation” — divine life and divine
preciousness. These are communicated to, and become the possession of,
all who put their trust in Christ. “To whom coming,” not to what coming;
it is the Person of Christ we come to, and have to do with. His life — life
in resurrection — becomes ours. From that moment He is our life. “To
whom coming, as unto a living stone... ye also, as lively [living] stones, are
built up a spiritual house.” Christ’s own life, as the risen Man, and all that
He is heir to is ours. Oh, wondrous, marvellous, blessed truth! Who would
not desire, above all things, this life, and this life beyond the power of
 25
death — the gates of hades? Eternal victory is stamped on the risen life of
Christ, it can never more be tested, and this is the believer’s life.
But there is more than life for every living stone in this spiritual temple.
There is also Christ’s preciousness. “Unto you therefore which believe He
is precious;” literally, “the preciousness.” That is, just as the life of Christ
becomes ours when we believe in Him, so does His preciousness. The
principle in both is the same. The life may be viewed as our capacity to
enjoy; and the preciousness, as our title to possess our inheritance on high.
His honors, titles, dignities, privileges, possessions, glories, are ours — all
ours in Him. “To them that believe He is the preciousness.” O wondrous
thought! “He loved the church and gave Himself for it.” Such then is our
Rock-foundation, and such the blessedness of all who are on the Rock.
Like Jacob of old, when a pilgrim and a stranger he rested on the stone in
the desert, the whole panorama of heaven’s riches in grace and glory
passed before him. (Genesis 28.)

CHRIST THE ONLY BUILDER OF HIS CHURCH

But Christ is also the Builder of His church. The building against which no
craft or power of the enemy can ever prevail is Christ’s own work, though
we read of other builders. “Upon this Rock I will build My church.” It is
well to be clear on this point, so that we may not confound what man
builds with what Christ builds. There must be the greatest confusion of
mind, both as to the truth of God, and the present state of Christendom,
unless this distinction is seen. Nothing is more important to note here than
that Christ is the only Builder of His church; though Paul and Apollos,
and all true evangelists, are preachers by whom sinners believe. The Lord’s
work in the souls of believers is perfect. It is a real, spiritual, personal
work. Through His grace in their hearts they come to Himself, as unto a
living stone, and are built upon Him who is risen from among the dead.
They have tasted that the Lord is gracious. Such are the living stones with
which the Lord builds His holy temple; and the gates of hell can never
prevail against it. Thus Peter himself, and all the apostles, and all true
believers, are built up a spiritual house. When Peter speaks of this building
in his First Epistle, he says nothing of himself as a builder. Here Christ is
the Builder. It is His work, and His only. “I will build My church,” He
says.
 26
Let us now see from the word of God what man builds, what materials he
uses, and the way he goes to work. In 1 Corinthians 3 and 2 Timothy 2 we
have these things brought before us. “A great house” is raised by human
instrumentality: which, in a certain sense, is also the church, and the house
of God: as in 1 Timothy 3:15 we read of “the house of God, which is the
church of the living God.” It is also spoken of as Christ’s house in
Hebrews 3, “whose house we are.” But the house soon became sadly
corrupted through human infirmity and positive wickedness. The
authority of God’s word by many was set aside, and man’s will became
supreme. The effect of human philosophy on the simple institutions of
Christ was soon painfully manifest. But wood, hay, and stubble, can never
be “fitly framed together” with gold, silver, and precious stones. The
house became great in the world; like the mustard tree, in the branches of
which many find a convenient lodging. Connection with the “great house”
gives man a status in the world, in place of being like the Master, despised
and rejected. The archbishop stands next to royalty. But the professing
church is not only outwardly great, it is most pretentious, and seeks to
put the stamp of God on its own unhallowed work. This is its greatest
wickedness, and the source of its blindness, confusion, and worldliness.
Paul, as one chosen of the Lord to do His work, laid the foundation of
“God’s building” in Corinth, and others built upon it. But they did not all
build with divine materials. The right foundation was laid, and every man
was to take heed how he builded thereon. In connection with the true
foundation, some might build gold, silver, and precious stones, and others
wood, hay, and stubble. That is, some might teach sound doctrine, and
look for living faith in all who applied for communion: others might teach
unsound doctrine, and receive into the fellowship of the church persons in
whom was no faith — the mere outward observance of ordinances taking
the place of faith and eternal life. Here man’s instrumentality,
responsibility, and failure came in. Nevertheless, the builder himself may
be saved, having faith in Christ, though his work is destroyed.
But there is another and a worse class of builders, who corrupt the temple
of the Lord, and are themselves destroyed. We give, for the convenience of
the reader, the entire passage. Nothing can be plainer.
 27
“According to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise
master-builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth
thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For
other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus
Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver,
precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man’s work shall be made
manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by
fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. If any
man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a
reward. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he
himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire... If any man defile the temple
of God, him shall God destroy.” (Verses 10-17.)
We may further observe on the Lord’s words, “upon this Rock I will build
My church,” that He had not begun to build it yet: He is telling them what
He is going to do. He does not say, I have built it, or I am building it, but I
will build it; and this He began to do at Pentecost.
But there is another truth most intimately connected with the history of
the church, and linked up with its condition and character, on the earth,
that we must notice, before proceeding with its actual history. We refer to
the truth contained in the expression,

THE KEYS OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN

This leads to the “great house” — already referred to — of outward
profession. At the same time we must bear in mind, that though intimately
connected, the kingdom of heaven and the great house are quite distinct. In
title the world belongs to the King. “The field is the world.” His servants
are to go on sowing. In result we have “a great house,” or Christendom.1
But when all that which is merely nominal in Christendom shall be swept
away by judgment, the kingdom will be established in power and glory.
This will be the millennium.
While still speaking to Peter about the church, the Lord added, “And I will
give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” The church as built by
Christ, and the kingdom of heaven as opened by Peter, are widely different
things. It is one of the great but common mistakes of Christendom, to use
the terms interchangeably as if they meant the same thing. And theological
 28
writers in all ages, from assuming as a basis that they are the same, have
written in the most confused way, both as to the church and the kingdom.
The expression is dispensational, just as the similar phrase, “the kingdom
of God,” is moral. But unless we have some acquaintance with the
dispensational ways of God, we can never rightly divide His word. That
which Christ Himself builds, and that which man instrumentally, by
means, it may be, of preaching and baptizing, must not be confounded.
The church which is Christ’s body is built upon the confession that He is
the Son of the living God, glorified in resurrection. Every truly converted
soul has to do with Christ Himself before it can have anything to say to
the church. The kingdom is a wider thing, and takes in every baptized
person — the whole scene of christian profession, whether true or false.
Christ does not say to Peter that He will give him the keys of the church
or the keys of heaven. Had He done so, there might have been some show
of reason for the evil system of popery. But He merely says, “I will give
unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven” — i.e. of the new
dispensation. Keys, it has been said, are not for building temples, but for
opening doors; and the Lord honored Peter to open the door of the
kingdom, first to the Jews, and then to the Gentiles. (Acts 2.) But the
language of Christ about His church is of another order. It is simple,
beautiful, emphatic, and unmistakable. “My church.” What depth, what
fullness there is in these words: “My church!” When the heart is in
fellowship with, Christ about His church, there will be an apprehension of
His-affections towards it, which we have no power of expressing. As it is,
we love to linger over these two words, ‘My church!’ but who can speak
of the measure of Christ’s heart that is therein revealed? Again, think of
these other two words, “This rock.” As if He had said, The glory of My
Person, and the power of My life in resurrection, form the solid
foundation of “My church.” And again, “I will build.” Thus we see in
these seven words, that everything is in Christ’s own hands, as “to the
church which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all.”

THE OPENING OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN

The administration of the kingdom the Lord, in an especial manner,
committed to Peter, as we see in the early chapters of the Acts. The term
is taken from the Old Testament. (See Daniel 2 & 7.) In chapter 2 we have
 29
the kingdom; in chapter 7 we have the King. The phrase, kingdom of
heaven, occurs only in the Gospel of Matthew, where the evangelist
writes chiefly for Israel.
The bringing in of the kingdom of heaven in power and glory on the earth,
in the Person of the Messiah, was the natural expectation of every godly
Jew. John the Baptist, as the Lord’s forerunner, came preaching, The
kingdom of heaven is at hand. But, in place of the Jews receiving their
Messiah, they rejected and crucified Him; consequently the kingdom,
according to Jewish expectations, was set aside. Nevertheless, it was
introduced in another form. When the rejected Messiah ascended to
heaven, and took His place at God’s right hand, triumphant over every
foe, the kingdom of heaven began. Now the king is in heaven, and as Daniel
says, “the heavens do rule,” though not openly. And from the time that
He ascended until He return, it is the kingdom in mystery. (Matthew 13.)
When He comes back again in power and great glory, it will be the
kingdom in manifestation.
The new economy Peter was privileged to open to both Jew and Gentile.
This he did in his address to the Jews, Acts 2, and in his address to the
Gentiles, Acts 10. But again we would draw attention to the fact, that the
church, or the assembly of God, and the kingdom of heaven, are not the
same thing. Let us be clear, in starting, as to this fundamental point. The
identifying the two things has produced great confusion of thought and
may be viewed as the origin of Puseyism, popery, and every human
system in Christendom. The following remarks on “the tare-field,” from a
recent publication, bear directly on this subject, though they refer to a later
period than the early chapters of the Acts.2

THE PARABLE OF THE TARES

“Matthew 13:24, 25. ‘Another parable put He forth unto them, saying,
The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed
in his field: but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares
among the wheat, and went his way’

exactly what is become of the profession of Christ. There are two things
necessary for the inroad of evil among Christians. The first is the
unwatchfulness of the Christians themselves. They get into a careless
state, they sleep, and the enemy comes and sows tares. This began at an
 30
early epoch in Christendom. We find the germs even in the Acts of the
Apostles, and still more so in the Epistles. 1 Thessalonians is the first
inspired Epistle that the Apostle Paul wrote; and the second was written
shortly after. And yet he tells them that the mystery of iniquity was
already at work; that there were other things to follow, such as the
apostasy and the man of sin, and that when the lawlessness should be
fully manifest, (instead of working secretly), then the Lord would put an
end to the lawless one and all concerned. The mystery of iniquity seems
akin to the sowing of tares spoken of here. Some time after
‘when the blade was sprung up and brought forth fruit’
— when Christianity began to make rapid strides in the earth —
‘then appeared the tares also.’
But it is evident the tares were sown almost immediately after the good
seed. No matter what the work of God is, Satan is always close upon its
heels. When man was made, he listened to the serpent and fell. When God
gave the law, it was broken even before it was committed into the hands of
Israel. Such is always the history of human nature.
“So the mischief is done in the field, and never repaired. The tares
are not for the present taken out of the field: there is no judgment
of them. Does this mean that we are to have tares in the church? If
the kingdom of heaven meant the church, there ought to be no
discipline at all: you ought to allow uncleanness of flesh or spirit
there. Here is the importance of seeing the distinction between the
church and the kingdom. The Lord forbids the tares to be taken out
of the kingdom of heaven: ‘Let both grow together until the
harvest’ (ver. 30), that is, till the Lord comes in judgment. Were the
kingdom of heaven the same as the church, it would, I repeat,
amount to no less than this: that no evil, let it be ever so flagrant or
plain, is to be put out of the church till the day of judgment. We
see, then, the importance of making these distinctions, which too
many despise. They are all-important for truth and holiness. Nor is
there a single word of God that we can do without.
“What then is the meaning of this parable? It has nothing to do
with the question of church communion. It is the ‘kingdom of
 31
heaven’ that is spoken of — the scene of the confession of Christ,
whether true or false. Thus Greeks, Copts, Nestorians, Roman
Catholics, as well as Protestants, are in the kingdom of heaven; not
believers only, but also bad people professing the name of Christ.
A man, who is not a Jew or a pagan, and who outwardly professes
Christ’s name, is in the kingdom of heaven. He may be ever so
immoral or heretical; but he is not to be put out of the kingdom of
heaven. But would it be right to receive him at the table of the
Lord? God forbid! If a person falling into open sin were in the
church, he ought to be put out of it; but you ought not to put him
out of the kingdom of heaven. In fact this could only be done by
taking away his life; for this is meant by the rooting up of the
tares. And this is what worldly Christianity did fall into, in no
very long space of time after the apostles were departed from the
earth. Temporal punishments were brought in for discipline: laws
were made for the purpose of handing over the refractory to the
subservient civil power. If they did not honor the so-called church,
they were not to be suffered to live. In this way the very evil our
Lord had been guarding the disciples against came to pass; and the
Emperor Constantine used the sword to repress ecclesiastical
offenders. He and his successors introduced temporal punishments
to deal with the tares, to try and root them up. Take the church of
Rome, where you have so thoroughly the confusion of the church
with the kingdom of heaven: they claim, if a man is a heretic, to
hand him over to the courts of the world to be burnt, and they
never confess or correct the wrong, because they pretend to be
infallible. Supposing that their victims even were tares, this is to
put them out of the kingdom. If you root a tare from the field, you
kill it. There may be men outside profaning the name of God; but
we must leave them for God to deal with.
“This does not destroy christian responsibility towards those who
surround the Lord’s table. You will find instructions as to all this
in what is written about the church. ‘The field is the world;’ the
church only embraces those believed to be members of Christ’s
body. Take 1 Corinthians, where we have the Holy Ghost showing
the true nature of ecclesiastical discipline. Supposing there are
 32
professing Christians, guilty of any sin you please; such persons
are not to be owned, while they are going on in that sin, as
members of Christ’s body. A real saint may fall into open sin, but
the church, knowing it, is bound to intervene for the purpose of
expressing God’s judgment about the sin. Were they deliberately to
allow such a one to come to the Lord’s table, they would in effect
make the Lord a party to that sin. The question is not whether the
person be converted or not. If unconverted, men have no business
in the church; if converted, sin is not to be winked at. The guilty
are not to be put out of the kingdom of heaven, they are to be put
out of the church. So that the teaching of the word of God is most
plain as to both these truths. It is wrong to use worldly
punishments to deal with a hypocrite, even when he is detected. I
may seek. the good of his soul; but this is no reason for punishing
him thus. But if a Christian is guilty of sin, the church, though
called to be patient in judgment, is never to suffer it; but we are to
leave guilty people, who are unconverted, to be judged by the Lord
at His appearing.
“This is the teaching of the parable of the tares; and it gives a very
solemn view of Christianity. As sure as the Son of man sowed
good seed, His enemy would sow bad, which would spring up
along with the rest; and this evil cannot for the present be got rid
of. There is a remedy for evil which enters the church, but not yet
for evil in the world.”
It is perfectly clear, both from scripture and history, that the great mistake
into which the professing body fell was the confounding of these two
things — tares with wheat; or, those who were admitted by the
administration of baptism to all the official and temporal privileges of the
professing church, with those who were truly converted and taught of
God. But the vast difference between what we may call the sacramental
and the vital systems, must be clearly understood and carefully
distinguished, if we would study church history aright.
Another mistake, equally serious, followed as a consequence. The great
outward or professing body became, in the eyes and in the language of men
— the church. Godly men were drawn into this snare, so that the
 33
distinction between the church and the kingdom was early lost sight of. All
the most sacred places and privileges, in the professing body, were thus
held in common by godly and ungodly men. The Reformation utterly
failed to clear the church of this sad mixture. It has been handed down to
us in the Anglican, Lutheran, and Presbyterian systems, as the form of
baptism and admission clearly shows. In our own day, the sacramental
system prevails to an alarming extent, and is rapidly on the increase. The
real and the formal, the living and the dead, are undistinguished in the
various forms of protestantism. But alas! most solemn reflection! there are
many in the professing church — in the kingdom of heaven — who will
never be in heaven itself. Here we find tares as well as wheat, evil servants
as well as faithful ones, and foolish virgins as well as wise ones. Though all
who have been baptized are reckoned in the kingdom of heaven, only those
who are quickened and sealed with the Holy Ghost belong to the church of
God.
But there is another thing connected with the professing church which
demands a brief notice here. We refer to

THE DIVINE PRINCIPLE OF CHURCH GOVERNMENT

Not only did the Lord give the keys to Peter that he might open the doors
of the new dispensation, but He intrusted to him its internal
administration. This principle is all-important in its bearing on the church
of God. The words of the commission are these, “And whatsoever thou
shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt
loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” The question is, What do they
mean? Clearly, we believe, authority and power from the Lord, to be
exercised in and by the church, but limited, in result, to this world. There
is no thought in the Lord’s words about the church deciding anything as to
heaven. This is the false interpretation and the deceiving power of the
apostasy. The church on earth can have nothing to say or do with what is
done in heaven as to binding or loosing. The sphere of its action is within
its own limits, and, when it so acts according to the commission of Christ,
it has the promise of ratification in heaven.
Neither is there any thought here, we may add, of the church, or of any of
its officials, coming in between the soul and God, as to eternal forgiveness
 34
or eternal judgment. This is the daring blasphemy of Rome. “Who can
forgive sins but God only?” He reserves this power to Himself alone.
Besides, the subjects of church government are pardoned, or, at least, are
on that ground. “Do not ye judge them that are within?” It will only apply
to them that are within the pale of the church. “But them that are without
God judgeth.” Of every believer in the wide field of Christendom it is said,
“For by one offering He hath perfected for ever them
that are sanctified.” (Hebrews 10.)
Hence, the retaining or the remission of sins by the church is only for the
present time, and strictly administrative in its character. It is the divine
principle of receiving persons into the assembly of God, on the ground of
adequate testimony to their conversion, soundness in doctrine, and
holiness of life; and also of putting away impenitent offenders until
restored by true repentance.
But some of our readers may have the common impression, that this
power was only given to Peter and the rest of the apostles, and
consequently ceased with them. This is a mistake. True, it was given to
Peter only in the first instance, as we have seen; and no doubt greater
power was exercised during the days of the apostles than has been since,
but not greater authority. The church has the same authority now as then
as to discipline in the assembly, though it lacks the power. The word of
the Lord remains unchanged. Only an apostle, we believe, could speak as
Paul does in 1 Corinthians 5.
“In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered
together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ,
to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh,
that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.”
This was spiritual power in an individual, not the judgment of the church.3
The same apostle, in reference to the same case, says to the assembly,
“Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person.” The act
of putting away was the act, not merely of the apostle, but of the whole
assembly. In this case, and in this way, the excommunicated person’s sins
were retained, though evidently a converted man. In the Second Epistle,
chapter 2, we find him fully restored. His repentance is accepted by the
 35
assembly — his sins are remitted. The overflowing of the apostle’s heart
on this occasion, and his exhortations to the church, are valuable lessons
for all who have to do with church government, and are intended to remove
that cold suspicion with which an erring brother is too often received back
to the privileges of the assembly. “Sufficient to such a man is this
punishment [or censure] which was inflicted of many. So that contrariwise
ye ought rather to forgive him, and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one
should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow. Wherefore, I beseech you
that ye would confirm your love toward him.” Here we have a case in
point, illustrative of the government of the assembly according to the will
of Christ. “Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven,
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

THIS PRINCIPLE OF CHURCH GOVERNMENT STILL APPLICABLE

But “how can these principles be carried out now?” is still the question
and difficulty with many. Well, we must just go back to the word of God.
We ought to be able and willing to say,
“We can do nothing against the truth, but for the truth.”
(2 Corinthians 13:8.)
The administrative authority and power of which we speak was given not
only to Peter and the other apostles, but also to the church. In Matthew
18 we have the working out of the principle laid down in chapter 16,
“Tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him
be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican. Verily I say unto
you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven;
and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven...
For where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am
I in the midst of them.” Matthew 18
Thus we learn that the acts of the two or three, gathered together in
Christ’s name, have the same divine sanction as the administration of
Peter. And again, in John 20, the Lord delivers the same principle of
government to the disciples, not merely to the apostles, and that too on
resurrection ground, where the assembly is livingly united to Christ as the
risen Man. This is all important. The spirit of life in Jesus Christ makes
 36
the disciples free — every disciple free — from the law of sin and death.
The church is built upon “this rock” — Christ in resurrection, and the
gates of hades shall not prevail against it. “Then the same day at evening,
being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the
disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the
midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. And when He had so said,
He showed unto them His hands and His side. Then were the disciples
glad, when they saw the Lord. Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be
unto you: as My Father hath sent Me, even so send I you. And when He
had said this, He breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the
Holy Ghost: Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and
whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.”
Here the Lord sets up, we may say, and fairly starts, the new creation.
The disciples are filled and clothed with peace, and with the Spirit of life
in Christ Jesus. They are to go forth as His messengers, from the
resurrection side of His empty grave, bearing the blessed message of peace
and eternal life to a world bowed down with sin, sorrow, and death. The
principle of their own internal government is also clearly laid down: and its
due administration will always give to the christian assembly a distinctive
and heavenly character, in the presence of both God and man.

THE PRINCIPLE OF RECEPTION AT THE BEGINNING

But as this principle is the proper basis of all christian congregations, it
may be well to look for a moment at its operation in the days of the
apostles. Surely they understood its meaning and how to apply it.
On the day of Pentecost, and for some time after, it does not appear that
the young converts were subjected to any examination as to the reality of
their faith, either by the apostles or others. “Then they that gladly
received His word were baptized, and the same day there were added unto
them about three thousand souls.” Thus receiving the word was the ground
of baptism, and fellowship; but the work was then entirely in Christ’s
own hands. “And the Lord added to the churchdaily such as should be
saved.” The attempt to deceive by Ananias and Sapphira was at once
detected. Peter acts in his right place, but the Holy Ghost was there in
 37
ungrieved majesty and power, and Peter owns it. Hence he says to
Ananias, “Why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost?”
But this virgin state of things soon passed away. Failure set in — the
Holy Ghost was grieved, and it became necessary to examine the
applicants, as to whether their motives, objects, and state of soul were
according to the mind of Christ. We are now in the condition of things
described in 2 Timothy 2. We are only to have fellowship “with them that
call on the Lord out of a pure heart.”
After the church became so mixed with merely nominal professors, great
care was necessary in receiving persons to communion. It was not enough
that a person said he was converted and claimed admission into the church
on the ground of his own statements: he must submit to be examined by
experienced Christians. When one professes to be awakened to a sense of
sin, and to be brought to repentance before God, and faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ, his confession must be examined by those who have gone
through the same kind of experience themselves. And even where
conversion is manifestly genuine, godly care, with tenderness, must be
exercised in reception; something dishonoring to Christ, injurious to
themselves, weakening to the assembly, may be entertained, even
unconsciously. Herein spiritual discernment is needed. And this is the
truest kindness to the applicant, and nothing more than a necessary care
for the honor of Christ and the purity of communion. Christian fellowship
would be at an end if persons were received on the sole ground of their
own opinion of themselves.
In Acts 9 we see the practical working of this principle in the case of the
great apostle himself. And surely, if he could not be accredited without
adequate testimony, who need complain? True, his case was peculiar, still
it may be taken as a practical illustration of our subject.
We find both Ananias at Damascus, and the church at Jerusalem
questioning the reality of Saul’s conversion, though it was a miraculous
one. Of course he had been an open enemy to the name of Christ, and this
would make the disciples still more careful. Ananias hesitates to baptize
him until fully satisfied of his conversion. He consults the Lord on the
subject, but after hearing His mind, he goes directly to Saul; assures him
that he has been sent by the same Jesus that appeared to him on his way
 38
to Damascus; and confirms the truth of what had taken place. Saul is
greatly comforted; he receives his sight, and is baptized.
Then as to the action of the church at Jerusalem we read,
“And when Saul was come to Jerusalem, he assayed to join himself
to the disciples: but they were all afraid of him, and believed not
that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him, and brought him to
the apostles, and declared unto them how he had seen the Lord in
the way, and that he had spoken to him, and how he had preached
boldly at Damascus in the name of Jesus.”
Paul is a model man to the church in many things, and in this also. He is
received into the assembly — as all applicants should be received — on
the ground of adequate testimony to the genuineness of his Christianity.
But while all godly care must be taken that the Simon Maguses may be
detected, all tenderness and patience must be exercised with the timid and
doubting ones. Still, life in Christ and consistency therewith must be
looked for. (See Romans 14, 15; 1 Corinthians 5 and 2 Corinthians. 2.) The
church’s path is always a narrow one.
Popery has shown its desperate wickedness in the evil use it has made of
the church’s prerogative to retain or remit sins, hence all the abominations
of priestly absolution. Protestantism has gone to the other extreme —
probably fearing the very appearance of popery — and has well-nigh set
aside discipline altogether. The path of faith is to follow the word of the
Lord.
The ground being thus cleared as to the great fundamental principles of the
church and kingdom, we come to the day of Pentecost — the first moment
of the church’s history on earth. Unless we understand the principles of
Christianity, we can never understand its history.
 39

CHAPTER 2
THE DAY OF PENTECOST FULLY COME

The Jewish feast of Pentecost may be called the birthday of the

Christian church. It was also the anniversary of the giving of the law on
Mount Sinai, though it does not appear that a day was observed by the
Jews in commemoration of the event. Fifty days after our Lord’s
resurrection the church was formed — its history commenced. The Old
Testament saints form no part of the New Testament church. It had no
existence in fact until the day of Pentecost.
All saints, from the beginning, have the same eternal life, they are the
children of the same God and Father, and the same heaven will be their
home for ever; but the Old Testament saints belong to another
dispensation, or to the different dispensations which ran their course
before Christ came. Each dispensation has its own rise, progress, decline,
and fall, in scripture; and will have its own reflection in heaven. Neither
persons nor dispensations will be undistinguished there.
Hence the Apostle in Hebrews 11, when speaking of the ancient worthies,
says,
“And these all, having obtained a good report through faith,
received not the promise: God having provided some better thing
for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.”
Surely if God has provided a better thing for us, it must also be a different
thing. Let us not object to God’s own word. Besides, our Lord in
Matthew 16 says, “On this Rock I will build My church.” And at the
same time, He gave the keys to Peter to open the doors of the new
dispensation. Then He had not begun to build His church, and the doors of
the kingdom were not opened. But the difference between the old and the
new will be more distinctly seen when we speak of the great events of the
day of Pentecost. We begin with the types of Leviticus, chapter 23.
 40
The children of Israel were commanded to bring a sheaf of the first-fruits
of their harvest to the priest, that he might wave it before the Lord, to be
accepted for them. This rite, we believe, shadowed forth our Lord’s
resurrection on the morning after the Jewish sabbath, the ground of the
Christian’s acceptance before God in the risen Christ.
“Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be
come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the
harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the first-fruits of
your harvest unto the priest: And he shall wave the sheaf before
the Lord, to be accepted for you: on the morrow after the sabbath
the priest shall wave it.” (See Matthew 28 and Mark 16.)
Seven full weeks after the waving of the sheaf, the feast of Pentecost was
celebrated. The former was reckoned to be the first day of the harvest in
Judea; the latter supposed the corn to be fully gathered in. Then they had
a solemn festival of thanksgiving. Two loaves of bread, baken with the
flour of the new harvest, characterised this festival. They were to be baken
with leaven, and brought out of their habitations. Some have thought that
the two loaves prefigured the out-calling of the church as composed of
Jew and Gentile. Be this as it may, the number is significant. Two
witnesses were necessary for a testimony in Israel. The leaven indicates,
we doubt not, indwelling sin in the believer, and, of course, in the church,
viewed in its time condition.
With the wave sheaf — beautiful type of the risen Christ, pure and holy
— sacrifices of a sweet savor were offered, but no sacrifice for sin. With
the two wave loaves — type of those who are Christ’s — a sin-offering
was presented. Sin, being there, a sin-offering was needed to cover it.
Though the one perfect sacrifice of Christ answered to God for both
indwelling sin, and the many actual sins of the life; still, as a matter of fact
and experience, sin dwells in us, and will do so as long as we are in this
world. All acknowledge this, though all may not see the completeness of
the work of Christ. The Christian has by one offering been perfected for
ever, though he may humble himself and make confession to God for every
failure.
The typical significance of Pentecost was remarkably fulfilled in the
descent of the Holy Ghost. He came down to gather together the children
 41
of God that were scattered abroad. (John 11:52.) By this great event the
system of Judaism was set aside, and the new vessel of testimony — the
church of God — was introduced. And now, observe, the order of events.
First,

THE RESURRECTION AND ASCENSION OF CHRIST

Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection, are the great facts, or
foundation truths, of the church — of Christianity. Incarnation was
necessary to crucifixion, and both to resurrection. It is blessedly true that
Christ died on the cross for our sins; but it is equally true, that the believer
died in His death. (See Romans 6; Colosians 2.) The Christian’s life is life
in resurrection. The church is built on the risen Christ. No truths can be
more blessed and wonderful than incarnation and crucifixion; but the
church is associated with Him who is risen and glorified.
In Acts 1 we have that which is connected with the Lord’s resurrection
and ascension; and also with the actions of the apostles before the descent
of the Holy Ghost. The blessed Lord, though in resurrection, still speaks
and acts by the Holy Ghost. It was “through the Holy Ghost” that He
gave commandments unto the apostles whom He had chosen. This is
worthy of special note as teaching us two things.
1. The character of our union with Christ; the Holy Ghost in the
Christian, and in the risen Lord, joins them together. “He that is joined
unto the Lord is one spirit.” By the “one Spirit” they are united.
2. This important fact points out the blessed truth of the Holy Ghost
dwelling and acting in the Christian also after he is actually in
resurrection. Then He will not have — as He has now — the flesh in
us to contend against, but will, ungrieved and unhindered, lead us on to
the full joys of heaven — the happy worship, the blessed service, and
the whole will of God.
The risen Lord next exhorts the apostles to wait in Jerusalem for “the
promise of the Father,” which, saith He, ye have heard of Me. “For John
truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost
not many days hence.” It is no longer a question of temporal promises to
Israel; that field must be left till a future day. The Father’s promise of the
 42
Holy Ghost was an entirely distinct thing, and widely different in its
results.
Several things “pertaining to the kingdom of God” having been spoken of
between the Lord and His apostles, He ascends to heaven, and a cloud
receives Him out of their sight. The Lord’s return is also most plainly and
distinctly taught at the same time. “And when He had spoken these
things, while they beheld, He was taken up; and a cloud received Him out
of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly towards heaven as He
went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; Which also
said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same
Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like
manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.” It is quite evident from these
words, that He ascended personally, visibly, bodily, and that He shall so
come again in like manner — that He will again appear beneath the
heavens, and be manifested to people on the earth, personally, visibly, and
bodily; but then it will be in power and great glory.
The apostles and disciples had now learnt two things:
1. That Jesus was taken up out of this world into heaven:
2. That He was coming back again into this world. On these two great
facts their testimony was founded. But Jerusalem was to be the
starting-point of their ministry, and they were to wait for power from
above. We now come to the second great event, important beyond all
others, with respect to man’s condition in this world — the gift of the
Holy Ghost. Now, it is to be, not only God for us, but God in us. This
took place on the day of Pentecost.

THE DESCENT OF THE HOLY GHOST

The time was now fully come. Redemption was finished — God was
glorified — Christ at His right hand in heaven, and the Holy Ghost come
down to earth. God inaugurates the church; and this He does in a way
suitable to His own wisdom, power and glory. A mighty miracle is
wrought, an outward sign is given. The great event is thus recorded.
Acts 2. “And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they
were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a
 43
sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the
house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them
cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And
they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with
other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.”
It may be well here to pause for a moment, and note a few things
connected with the descent of the Holy Ghost and the display of His
power on this important day.
There was, in the first place, the accomplishment of the Father’s promise;
the Holy Ghost Himself was sent down from heaven. This was the great
truth of Pentecost. He came from above to dwell in the church — the place
prepared for Him by the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. There
was also the fulfillment of the word of the Lord to the apostles, “Ye shall
be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence.” Not that the
disciples then knew the meaning of this word, but the fact was now
accomplished. The full revelation of the doctrine of the “one body”
awaited the ministrations of Paul; as he elsewhere says,
“For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we
be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all
made to drink into one Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12.)
But further, besides the various gifts dispensed for the work of the Lord,
we have something most blessedly personal, and quite new on the earth.
The Holy Ghost Himself came down to dwell, not in the church only, but
also in each individual who believed in the Lord Jesus. And, thank the
Lord, this most blessed fact is as true today as it was then. He dwells now
in every believer who rests on the finished work of Christ. The Lord had
said, looking forward to this day, “For He dwelleth with you, and shall be
in you.” These two grand aspects of the Spirit’s presence were fully
accomplished on the day of Pentecost. He came to dwell in each Christian
and in the church; and now, blessed truth, we know that God is not only
for us, but in us, and with us.
When “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with
power,” He appeared in the form of a dove — beautiful emblem of the
immaculate purity, of the meekness and lowliness, of Jesus. He was not to
 44
make His voice heard in the streets, or break the bruised reed, or quench
the smoking flax. But in the case of the disciples who were waiting at
Jerusalem, it was altogether different. He descended on them in cloven
tongues — tongues of fire; and sat upon each of them. This was
characteristic. It was the power of God in testimony — a testimony that
was to go forth, not only to all Israel, but to all the nations of the earth.
The word of God was also to judge all that came before it — it was as
tongues of fire. God’s judgment on man because of sin had been judicially
expressed in the cross; and now the solemn fact is to be made known, far
and wide, by the power, of the Holy Ghost. Nevertheless, grace reigns —
reigns through righteousness, unto eternal life, by Christ Jesus. Pardon is
proclaimed to the guilty, salvation to the lost, peace to the troubled, and
rest to the weary. All that believe are, and ever shall be, blessed in and with
a risen and glorified Christ.
The astonishment and consternation of the Sanhedrim and the Jewish
people must have been great indeed at the re-appearance, in such power,
of the followers of the crucified Jesus. They had doubtless concluded that,
as the Master was now gone, the disciples could do nothing of themselves.
For the most part, they were plain uneducated men. But what must have
been the people’s amazement, when they heard that these plain men were
preaching boldly in the streets of Jerusalem, and making converts by
thousands to the religion of Jesus! Even historically viewed, the scene is
full of the most thrilling interest, and has no parallel in the annals of time.
Jesus had been crucified; His claims to be the Messiah, in popular
estimation, had been buried in His grave. The soldiers, who guarded His
sepulcher, had been bribed to spread a false report as to His resurrection;
the popular excitement had no doubt passed away, and the city, and
temple worship, had returned to their former course, as if no great event
had taken place. But on God’s part things were not to be thus quietly
passed over. He was awaiting the appointed time to vindicate His Son, and
to vindicate Him in the very scene of His humiliation. This took place
early in the morning on the day of Pentecost. Suddenly, and unexpectedly,
His scattered followers reappeared in miraculous power. They boldly
charged the rulers and the people with the guilt of His apprehension, trial,
and crucifixion — that they had killed their own Messiah; but that God
had raised Him up, to be a Prince and a Savior, and to set Him at His own
 45
right hand in heaven. “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.”
(Romans 5:20.)
The sentence of Babel, we may also say, was reversed on that wonderful
day. In the different languages, to which man had been doomed in God’s
just displeasure, salvation is proclaimed. This mighty marvellous work of
God attracts the multitude. They are amazed, and speculate as to this
strange thing. Each one, in the language of the country from whence he
came, hears from the lips of poor Galileans the wonderful works of God.
The Jews who dwelt at Jerusalem, not understanding these foreign
languages, mocked. Then Peter stood up, and declared to them in their own
tongue, and proved from their own scriptures, the true character of what
had taken place.

PETER’S FIRST APPEAL TO THE JEWS

Thus we read:
“And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of
every nation under heaven. Now when this was noised abroad, the
multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every
man heard them speak in his own language. And they were all
amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all
these which speak Galilaeans? And how hear we every man in our
own tongue, wherein we were born? Parthians, and Medes, and
Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and
Capadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt,
and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome,
Jews and proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak
in our tongues the wonderful works of God. And they were all
amazed, and were in doubt, saying one to another, What meaneth
this? Others mocking said, These men are full of new wine. But
Peter, standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice, and said
unto them, Ye men of Judaea, and all ye that dwell at Jerusalem, be
this known unto you, and hearken to my words: for these are not
drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day,”
or, as we should reckon, nine in the morning — the hour of prayer in the
temple.
 46
Thus Peter takes the lead, and explains to the Jews, that the wonderful
things they had seen and heard that morning, were not the result of
excitement, but rather that which ought to have been looked for according
to their own prophetic scriptures. “This is that which was spoken by the
prophet Joel.” But mark the ground on which Peter stands and preaches
with such boldness. He stands on the ground of the resurrection and
exaltation of Christ. This is carefully to be noted, as showing the
foundation on which the church rests, and when and where her history
commences. This was the first day of her existence, the first page of her
history, and the first triumphs of God’s ineffable gift to man.
“This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses.
Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having
received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, He hath
shed forth this, which ye now see and hear. For David is not
ascended into the heavens: but he saith himself, The LORD said
unto my Lord, Sit thou on My right hand, until I make Thy foes
Thy footstool. Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly,
that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both
Lord and Christ.”
We quote the words of another, on the blessed effects of Peter’s first
sermon, and of the presence of the Holy Ghost on the earth.
“It was not merely a moral change, but a power which set aside all
the motives which individualized those who had received it, by
uniting them as one soul, and in one mind. They continued
stedfastly in the apostles’ doctrine, they were in communion with
each other, they broke bread, they spent their time in prayer: the
sense of God’s presence was powerful among them; and many
signs and wonders were wrought by the hands of the apostles.
They were united in the closest bonds, no man calling anything his
own, but all divided their possessions with those that needed.
They were daily in the temple, the public resort of Israel for
religious exercises, whilst having their own, apart, breaking bread at
home daily. They ate with joy and gladness of heart, praising God,
and having favor with all the people around them. Thus the
assembly was formed, and the Lord added daily to it the remnant
 47
of Israel, who were to be saved from the judgments which should
fall on a nation which had rejected the Son of God, their Messiah.
God brought into the assembly — thus owned of Him by the
presence of the Holy Ghost — those whom He spared in Israel. A
new order of things had commenced, marked by the presence of the
Holy Ghost. Here was found the presence and the house of God,
although the old order of things still existed until the execution of
the judgment.
“The assembly was formed, therefore, by the power of the Holy
Ghost come down from heaven, on the testimony that Jesus, who
had been rejected, was raised up to heaven, being made of God
both Lord and Christ. It was composed of the Jewish remnant who
were to be spared, with the reserve of bringing in Gentiles
whenever God should call them.”1
This, then, is the church of God; a gathering together of those whom God
has called to the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of God. Love
rules and characterizes the newly formed assembly. The mighty victories
which grace achieved on that memorable day fully attested the power of
the exalted Lord, and the presence of the Holy Ghost on earth. Three
thousand souls were converted through one sermon. Those who had been
the avowed enemies of the Lord, and who had participated in the guilt of
His murder, agonised under the power of Peter’s word. Alarmed at the
awful thought of having killed their own Messiah, and that God, in whose
presence they now were, had exalted Him to His own right hand in heaven,
they cried out, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?”
Peter now seeks to deepen the good work in their souls — He seeks to
humble the once proud and scornful Jews. “Repent,” he says, “and be
baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of
sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” He does not say
simply, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved;”
though, of course, faith and repentance must go together wherever the
work is genuine. But Peter, in this case, presses repentance. Their guilt had
been great, and a deep moral work in their conscience was needful for their
humbling. They must see their guilt in the sight of God, and receive the
remission of their sins at the feet of Him whom they had rejected and
 48
crucified. Nevertheless, all was grace. Their hearts were touched. They
sided with God against themselves — they truly repented, were pardoned,
and received the gift of the Holy Ghost. Now they are the children of God
and have eternal life: the Holy Ghost dwells in them.
The reality of the change was made manifest by a complete change of
character. “Then they that gladly received His word were baptized: and
the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls. And
they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, and in
breaking of bread, and in prayers.”
Baptism, on the confession of faith; reception into the assembly; the
Lord’s supper; the fellowship of saints, and prayer; were their
distinguishing observances. For the moment, the Lord’s prayer, “that they
may all be one,” was answered, as we read in Chapter 4. “And the
multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither
said any of them that aught of the things which he possessed was his own;
but they had all things common.” We will now turn for the sake of
connection to chapter 10.

THE CALLING IN OF THE GENTILES

Cornelius, the centurion, a devout man, and those that were with him, are
now received into the assembly of God. Peter had intimated their call in
his first discourse. He is now summoned of God in a special way and with
special indications of His purpose, to open the door to those God-fearing
Gentiles. Up to this time the assembly consisted chiefly, if not solely, of
Jews. But God dealt tenderly with His ancient people considering their
national prejudices. “Cornelius was a devout man, and one that feared God
with all his house, which gave much alms to the people, and prayed to
God alway.” They could have no objection, personally, to receive such a
one. Thus God is gracious, tender and merciful. But no doubt was left on
Peter’s mind as to the divine will. God graciously silenced his reasonings,
and overcame his unwillingness, with the mild reproof, “What God hath
cleansed, that call not thou common.”
Peter now proceeds, though slowly; it was a new kind of work for him.
But nothing seems more surprising to Peter, than that the Gentiles should
be brought into blessing, without either becoming Jews, or submitting to
 49
any Jewish ordinances. This to Peter, to the Gentiles, and in itself, was an
immense step. It strikes at the very root of Popery, Puseyism, Apostolic
Succession, and every system of ordinances. In this fact a flood of light is
shed on the character of the present dispensation. “Then Peter opened his
mouth and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons;
but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is
accepted with Him.” Clearly, it was no longer necessary to become a Jew,
or submit to external rites and ceremonies, in order to enjoy the richest
blessings of heaven. Without the imposition of apostolic hands — though
Peter himself, in divine power and authority was present — and before
being baptized with water, they were baptized with the Holy Ghost.
While the word of God was falling from Peter’s lips, the Holy Ghost fell
on all who heard it. Before this, however, a blessed work, through God’s
grace, had been going on in the heart of Cornelius: he was a divinely
quickened soul.
The quickening operations of the Spirit are quite distinct from being sealed
with the Spirit. Before the Holy Ghost can seal, there must be something
for Him to seal. He cannot seal our old nature; there must be a new nature
for Him to seal. So that there must be a moment in every Christian’s
history, when he is quickened and not sealed; but sooner or later the work
will be completed. (Ephesians 1:13.) For example, the prodigal son was
quickened, or converted, when he left the far country, but he was a
stranger to the Father’s love and grace; and, consequently, had not yet the
faith that calmly rests in Christ as the source of all blessing. He was legal if
not unbelieving, though quickened. Certainly he was not sealed of the
Spirit, as to his pardon and acceptance, until he received the kiss of
reconciliation, or the ring, the symbol of eternal love. The gospel of
salvation is more than concern for the soul, however real. Christ-
dishonoring unbelief may accompany, for a while, a genuine work of
God’s Spirit in the soul. The prodigal had a certain belief, that there was
something good in his Father’s heart, therefore he ventures to draw near.
But surely this is short of evangelic fullness of faith. “He that hath
received His testimony hath set to his seal that God is true.” Wherever
there is faith in Christ and His work, there is the seal of God. Paul himself
was at least three days in the deepesot exercise of soul, without the peace
 50
and rest which the sealing of the Holy Spirit gives. “And he was three
days without sight, and neither did eat nor drink.” (Acts 9.)
But we return to the main point before us.

THE SEALING OF THE GENTILES

Notice, then, this important fact connected with the bringing in of the
Gentiles — they receive the gift of the Holy Ghost simply through the
preaching of the word. At Jerusalem the Jews were baptized before they
received the Holy Ghost. At Samaria the Samaritans were not only
baptized, but had the apostles’ hands laid on them with prayer, before
they received the Holy Ghost. But at Caesarea, without baptism, without
the laying on of hands, without prayer, the richest christian blessing was
given to the Gentiles; though the doctrine of the church as the body of
Christ was not yet revealed.
The grace of God, thus shown to the Gentiles at the commencement of the
dispensation, has characterised it ever since. We are Gentiles; we are
neither Jews nor Samaritans. Therefore God’s ways in grace, and His order
of things with the Gentiles, have a special application to us. There is no
instance recorded by the inspired historians of one being baptized without
professing faith in Christ; but if we are to follow the pattern of things at
Caesarea, we must look for sealing as well as quickening — for peace with
God as well as faith in Christ before baptism. The case of Cornelius stands
at the very head of our dispensation; it was the first direct expression of
grace to the Gentiles; and surely it ought to be a model for Gentile
preachers and disciples. When the word of God which was then preached
to Cornelius is now believed, the same effects, as to peace with God, we
may rest assured, will follow.
Preaching, believing, sealing, baptizing, is the divine order of things here.
God and His word never change; though “times change,” as men say, and
human opinions change, and religious observances change; but the word of
God — never. Jews, Gentiles, and Samaritans, professed faith in Christ
before they were baptized. Indeed baptism supposed eternal life
possessed through faith, not communicated by its observance, as Anglican
catholics teach. “Grace is communicated, life is communicated, by
sacraments,” they say, “and is only effected through these means;
 51
irrespective of any exercise of the intellect on the part of the person
brought into union. Holy baptism is the means of conferring on the
recipient a new and spiritual life.”2
Such notions, we need scarcely say, are utterly opposed to scripture.
Baptism, we affirm, confers nothing. Life is conferred by other means, as
the scriptures plainly teach. Conversion, or “being born again,” is effected,
in all cases, without exception, by the Holy Spirit. As we read in 1 Peter,
“Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit
unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a
pure heart fervently: being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of
incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.”
Here the truth of the Gospel is viewed as the means, and the Holy Spirit
as the power, in conversion. Christ, or God in Christ, is the new object of
the soul. It is by the Spirit and truth of God that this blessed change is
effected. Those who trust to water baptism as the means of effecting it
trust, alas! to a great and fatal delusion.3
In the case of the Gentiles, now under consideration, even more than life
was possessed before baptism was administered. They had the seal of
God. Baptism is the sign of full deliverance and salvation as secured for
the believer by the death and resurrection of Christ. Cornelius had life, was
a devout man, but he must send for Peter, and hear words whereby he
would be saved or fully delivered. The Old as well as the New Testament
teaches this blessed truth most plainly. Israel, as a typical people, after
being brought to God and sheltered by the blood of the lamb in Egypt,
were baptized to Moses in the cloud and in the sea. Thus they were
delivered out of Egypt, and saw the salvation of Jehovah. Again, Noah and
his family were saved through the flood — not by it. They left the old
world, passed through the waters of death, and landed in a new condition
of things altogether.
“The like figure, [or antitype,] whereunto even baptism doth also now
save us... by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” (Exodus 14; 1 Peter 3:21.)
But what was the word, some may inquire, that Peter pi-eached, which
was accompanied with such remarkable blessing? He preached peace by
Jesus Christ, as Lord of all. Christ risen, exalted, and glorified, was the
grand object of his testimony. He sums up with these words:
 52
“To Him give all the prophets witness that through His name
whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins.”
The blessing follows. The Jews present were astonished; but they bow,
and own God’s goodness to the Gentiles.
“While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all
them that heard the word. And they of the circumcision which
believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because that
on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost.
For they heard them speak with tongues, and magnify God. Then
Peter answered, Can any man forbid water, that these should not
be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as
we?And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the
Lord. Then prayed they him to tarry certain days.”
We now retrace our steps a little way, and notice some of the leading
events, which, in order, precede chapter 10.

THE FIRST CHRISTIAN MARTYR

Stephen, the deacon and evangelist, is the first to receive the crown of
martyrdom for the name of Jesus. He stands at the head of “the noble
army of martyrs.” He is perfect as a type o as the proto-martyr. Firm and
unwavering in his faith; bold and undaunted before his accusers; pointed
and faithful in his defense before the Sanhedrim; free from malice in his
strongest statements; full of charity towards all men, he seals his
testimony with his blood, and falls asleep in Jesus.
In some respects Stephen resembles the blessed Lord Himself. “Lord
Jesus, receive my spirit,” is like “Father, into Thy hands I commit My
spirit;” and again, “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge,” resembles
“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do;” only Stephen
does not plead their ignorance.
Already we see that troubles both within and without assail the young
assembly. True, the word of God increased, multitudes were converted,
and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith. But the
Grecians, or Hellenists (Jews of Greek origin), murmured against the
Hebrews (natives of Judaea), because their widows were neglected in the
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daily ministration. This led to the appointment of seven deacons. (Acts
6.) From their names here given it would appear that the seven chosen
were “Grecians” — all from the side of the murmurers. Thus the Spirit of
God ruled in grace. Stephen was one of the number; and in his case the
word of the apostle was exemplified: Those who “have used the office of
deacon well, purchase to themselves a good degree, and great boldness in
the faith which is in Christ Jesus2’ He was full of faith and power, and did
great wonders and miracles among the people. The energy of the Holy
Spirit was especially manifested in Stephen.
There were different synagogues in Jerusalem appropriated to the different
races of Jews. It was the synagogue of the Libertines, Cyrenians, etc., that
opposed Stephen. But “they were not able to resist the wisdom and the
spirit by which he spake.” Then followed that which has usually been the
case with the confessors of Jesus in all ages: unable to answer him, they
accuse him before the council. False witnesses are suborned, who swear
that they had heard him speak “blasphemous words against Moses, and
against God,” and that Jesus of Nazareth would destroy this place, and
change the customs delivered to them by Moses. The case was now before
the Sanhedrim — the trial commences. But what must his judges have
thought when they saw his face radiant, as the face of an angel?
We have the noble address of Stephen to the heads of the nation before
us. To them it was convincing, perplexing, overwhelming. Doubtless, it
was the testimony of the Holy Ghost to the Jews, from the mouth of
Stephen; and all the more humbling to the proud Jews to hear their doom
from the lips of a Hellenist. But the Spirit of God, when unhindered by
man’s arrangements, works by whomsoever He will.
Stephen recapitulates in bold language the chief points in their national
history. He refers especially to the history of Joseph and of Moses. The
former their fathers sold to the Gentiles; the latter they despised as a ruler
and a judge. He also charges them with always resisting the Holy Ghost —
with always disobeying the law; and now with having been the betrayers
and murderers of the Just One. Here Christ’s faithful witness was
interrupted. He was not allowed to finish his address: — a picture, too
true, of the treatment of martyrs from that day even until now. The
murmurs, the indignation, the fury of the Sanhedrim, were beyond control.
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“When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they
gnashed on him with their teeth.” But in place of pursuing his discourse,
he turns in ecstasy of heart to the Lord, and fixes his eyes on heaven —
the home and center of gathering for all His people.
“I see,” said Stephen, “the heavens opened.” He is full of the Holy Ghost
as he looks on high, and he sees the Son of man standing there ready to
receive his spirit. “Such, then,” as another has said, “is the position of the
true believer — heavenly upon the earth — in presence of the world that
rejected Christ, the murderous world. The believer, alive in death, sees by
the power of the Holy Ghost into heaven, and the Son of man at the right
hand of God. Stephen does not say, ‘Jesus.’ The Spirit characterises Him
as ‘the Son of man.’ Precious testimony to man! It is not to the glory that
he testifies, but to the Son of man in the glory, heaven being open to him...
As to the object of faith and the position of the believer, this scene is
definitively characteristic.”
“Foremost and nearest to His throne,
By perfect robes of triumph known,
And likest Him in look and tone,
The holy Stephen kneels,
With steadfast gaze, as when the sky
Flew open to his fainting eye,
Which like a fading lamp flashed high,
Seeing what death conceals.
“He, though he seem on earth to move,
Must glide in air like gentle dove,
From you unclouded depths above
Must draw his purer breath:
Till men behold his angel face
All radiant with celestial grace,
Martyr all o’er, and meet to trace
The lines of Jesus’ death.”

We have now gone over, with some care, the first section of the
church’s history. And we have been the more careful, as church histories
in general commence at a later period. Most of them begin where scripture
ends, at least as to details. None that we have yet seen refer to Matthew
16, and few attempt a critical examination of the Acts of the Apostles,
which, after all, is the only part of her history which commands our faith,
and has an absolute claim upon our obedience.
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In chapter 8 we find the Holy Ghost in Samaria working by Philip. He
has, as it were, left Jerusalem. This marks a distinct epoch in the history
of the church; and especially in her connection with Jerusalem. We leave,
for the present, the enraged and persecuting Jews, and follow the path of
the Spirit to the city of Samaria. But we must glance for a moment at what
some have called the third persecution.
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CHAPTER 3
THE DISCIPLES PERSECUTED AND SCATTERED

After the death of Stephen a great persecution broke out. (Acts 8.) The
Jewish leaders appear to have gained a victory over the disciples, and they
determined to pursue their apparent triumph with the utmost violence.
But God, who is above all, and who knows how to restrain the rising
passions of men, overruled their opposition for the accomplishment of His
own will.
Man had not yet learnt the truth of the proverb, that “The blood of the
martyrs is the seed of the church.” In the case of the first and the noblest
of martyrs, the proverb was fully verified. But all these eighteen hundred
years, men have been slow to learn, or believe, this plain historical fact.
Persecution, generally speaking, has advanced the cause which it sought to
repress. This will be found true in the main, under every form of
opposition and persecution. Resistance, decision, and firmness are created
by such treatment. True, timid minds may be driven to apostasy for a time
by persecution; but how often have such, with the deepest repentance,
and in order to regain their former position, endured with cheerfulness the
keenest sufferings, and displayed in their last moments the greatest
fortitude! But persecution, in one form or another, is to be expected by the
followers of Jesus. They are exhorted to take up their cross daily and
follow Him. It tests the sincerity of our faith, the purity of our motives,
the strength of our affection for Christ, and the measure of our confidence
in Him.
Those who are not true in heart for Christ will be sure to fall away in a
time of sharp persecution. But love can endure for its object, when it can
do nothing else. We see this perfectly in the blessed Lord Himself. He
endured the cross — that was of God: He despised the shame — that was
of man. It was amidst the shame and sufferings of the cross that the full
strength of His love appeared, and that He triumphed over everything.
Nothing could turn His love aside from its object; it was stronger than
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death. In this, as in all things, He has left us an example, that we should
walk in His steps. May we ever be found following hard after Him!
From the history of the church in the Acts we learn, that the effect of the
martyrdom of Stephen was the immediate spread of the truth, which his
persecutors were seeking to hinder. The impressions produced by such a
witness, and such a death, must have been overwhelming to his enemies,
and convincing to the unprejudiced and the thoughtful. The last resort of
human cruelty is death: but, wonderful to say Christian faith, in its first
trial, was proved to be stronger than death, and that in its most frightful
form. This the enemy witnessed, and would ever after remember. Stephen
was on the Rock, and the gates of hell could not prevail against Him.
The whole church at Jerusalem, on this occasion, were scattered abroad;
but they went everywhere preaching the word. Like the cloud that flies
before the wind, bearing its refreshing rain to thirsty lands, so the disciples
were driven from Jerusalem by the storm of persecution, bearing the living
waters to thirsty souls in distant lands. “And at that time there was a great
persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all
scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the
apostles.” Some historians have thought that the fact of the apostles
remaining in Jerusalem, when the disciples fled, proves their greater
firmness and faithfulness in the cause of Christ; but we are disposed to
judge differently, and to consider it failure rather than faithfulness. The
Lord’s commission to them was, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost.” And they had been told before, “When they persecute you in one
city, flee into another.” As far as scripture history informs us, the
commission was never carried out by the twelve. Nevertheless, God was
mighty in Paul towards the Gentiles, and in Peter towards the Jews.
The Holy Spirit now leaves Jerusalem as to outward manifest power —
most solemn truth! But that guilty city preferred the patronage of Rome
to the resurrection-power of their own Messiah. “What do we?” said the
Jews, “for this man doeth many miracles. If we let Him thus alone, all men
will believe on Him; and the Romans shall come and take away both our
place and our nation.” They rejected the Messiah in His humiliation, and
now they reject the testimony of the Holy Ghost to His exaltation. Their
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iniquity was full, and wrath was coming on them to the uttermost. But, for
the present, our happier place, in tracing the history of the church, is to
follow the Holy Spirit on His way to Samaria. His path is the silver line of
saving grace to precious souls.

THE TRIUMPHS OF THE GOSPEL IN SAMARIA

Philip, the deacon, evidently next to Stephen in zeal and energy, goes
down to Samaria. The Holy Spirit works with him. In the wisdom of the
Lord’s ways, despised Samaria is the first place, outside of Judaea, where
the Gospel was preached by His chosen witnesses. “Then Philip went
down to the city of Samaria, and preached Christ unto them. And the
people with one accord gave heed unto those things which Philip spake,
hearing and seeing the miracles which he did. And there was great joy in
that city.” A great many believed and were baptized, both men and
women. Even Simon Magus, the sorcerer, owned the presence of a power
far above his own, and bowed to the force and current of the Spirit’s work
in others, though the truth had not penetrated his own heart or conscience.
But as we have now traveled to another part of the country, this may be
the fitting place to say a word as to its history.
The Holy Land, interesting beyond all other nations of the earth, both
morally and historically, is in size very small. “It is but a strip of country,
about the size of Wales, less than 140 miles in length, and barely 40 in
average breadth.”1 The northern portion is Galilee; the center, Samaria; the
south, Judaea. But though physically so small, it has been the theater of
the most momentous events in the world’s history. There the Savior was
born, lived and was crucified — and there He was buried and rose again.
And there too, His apostles and martyrs lived, testified and suffered; and
there the first gospel sermon was preached, and there the first church was
planted.
The land originally occupied by Israel, lay between the ancient empires of
Assyria and Egypt. Hence the frequent reference in the Old Testament to
“the king of the North,” and the “king of the South.” Owing to this
position, it was often the battle field of these mighty empires; and we
know it will yet be the scene of their last and deadly conflict. (Daniel 11.)
So superstitious have men been about the Holy Land, that it has been the
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object of national ambition, and the occasion of religious wars, almost ever
since the days of the apostles. Who could estimate the blood that has been
shed, and the treasure that has been wasted, on these sacred plains? — and
all, we may add, under the fair name of religious zeal, or rather, under the
banners of the cross and the crescent. Thither the pilgrims in every age
have traveled, that they might worship at the holy sepulcher, and fulfill
their vow. It has also been the great attraction for travelers of all characters
and of all nations; and the great emporium for miracle-working relics. The
Christian, the historian, and the antiquarian have searched it diligently, and
made known their discoveries. Ever since the days of Abraham, it has been
the most interesting and attractive spot on the earth’s surface. And to the
student of prophecy, its future history is even more interesting than its
past. He knows that the day is coming, when the whole land shall be
peopled by the twelve tribes of Israel, and filled with the glory and
majesty of their Messiah. Then shall they be owned as the metropolitan
people of the earth. We now return to Samaria, with its new life and joy.
The Samaritans through God’s blessing readily believed the Gospel, as
preached by Philip. The effects of the truth, thus received in simplicity,
were immediate and of the most blessed character. “There was great joy in
that city,” and many were baptized. Such must ever be the effects of the
Gospel, when believed, unless there be some hindrance in connection with
ourselves. Where there is genuine simplicity of faith, there must be genuine
peace and joy, and happy obedience. The power of the Gospel, over a
people who had for ages resisted the claims of Judaism, was thus
displayed. What the law could not do, in this respect, the Gospel
accomplished. “Samaria was a ‘conquest,’” as one has said, “which all the
energy of Judaism had never been able to make. It was a new and splendid
triumph of the Gospel. The spiritual subjugation of the world appertained
to the church.”

JERUSALEM AND SAMARIA UNITED BY THE GOSPEL

The bitter jealousy that existed between Jews and Samaritans had long
been proverbial; hence we read, “The Jews have no dealings with the
Samaritans.” But now, in connection with the Gospel of peace, this root of
bitterness disappears. Nevertheless in the wisdom of God’s ways, the
Samaritans must wait for the highest blessing of the Gospel, until the
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Jewish believers — the apostles from the church at Jerusalem — lay their
hands on them, and offer up prayer for them. Nothing can be more deeply
interesting than this fact, when we take into consideration the religious
rivalry that had been so long manifested by both. Had not Samaria received
this timely lesson of humility, she might have been disposed, once more,
to maintain her proud independency of Jerusalem. But the Lord would not
have it so. The Samaritans had believed, rejoiced, and were baptized, but
they had not received the Holy Ghost. “Now when the apostles which
were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they
sent unto them Peter and John; who, when they were come down, prayed
for them that they might receive the Holy Ghost. Then laid they their
hands on them, and they received the Holy Ghost.”
Identification is the great idea of the laying on of hands, and unity is the
consequence of the gift of the Holy Ghost. These are immense facts in
connection with the progress of the church. Samaria is thus brought into
happy association with her ancient rival, and made one with the church at
Jerusalem. There is no thought in God’s mind of the one assembly being
independent of the other. Had they been each blessed separately and
independently, their rivalry might have been greater than ever. But it was
to be no longer: “Neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem,” but one
Head in heaven, one body on earth, one Spirit, one redeemed family
worshipping God in spirit and in truth, for the Father seeketh such to
worship Him.” 2
For the origin of the mixed people and worship of Samaria, see 2 Kings
17. They were but half Jews, though they boasted of their relation to
Jacob. They received the five books of Moses as sacred, but undervalued
the rest of the Bible. They were circumcised, kept the law after a sort, and
were expecting a Messiah to come. The personal visit of the blessed Lord
to Samaria is of the deepest and most touching interest. (John 4.) The well
at which He rested, it is said, “lay in a valley between the two famous
mountains, Ebal and Gerizim, on which the law was read. On the latter
height stood the rival temple of the Samaritans, which had so long afflicted
the more zealous Jews by its daring opposition to the one chosen
sanctuary on Mount Moriah.”
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THE ETHIOPIAN EUNUCH RECEIVES THE GOSPEL
Philip is now called to leave his happy and interesting work at Samaria,
and go down to Gaza — a wilderness — and preach the gospel there to a
single person. Surely there is in this fact a lesson for the evangelist of the
deepest importance, and one that must not be passed over without a brief
notice.
The preacher, in such a scene of awakening and conversion as there was at
Samaria, necessarily becomes greatly interested in the work. God is setting
His seal on the ministry of the word, and sanctioning the meetings with
His presence. The work of the Lord prospers. The evangelist is
surrounded with respect and affection, and his children in the faith
naturally look up to him for further light and instruction as to their path.
How can he leave such a field of labor? many will inquire, Would it be
right to leave it? Only, we reply, if the Lord called His servant to do so, as
He did in the case of Philip. But how is one to know now, seeing that
angels and the Spirit do not speak to him as they did to Philip? Though
not spoken to in this way, he ought to look for and expect divine guidance.
Faith must be his guide. Circumstances are unsafe as a guide; they may
rebuke and correct us in our path, but the eye of God must be our guide. “I
will guide thee with Mine eye” is the promise;
“I will instruct thee, and teach thee in the way
which thou shalt go.” (Psalm 32.)
The Lord only knows what is best for His servant and for His work. The
evangelist in such a scene would be in danger of feeling his own personal
importance. Hence the value, if not the necessity, of changing the place of
service.
“Arise,” said the angel of the Lord to Philip, “and go toward the
south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza,
which is desert. And he arose and went; and, behold, a man of
Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under Candace, queen of the
Ethiopians, who had the charge of all her treasure and had come to
Jerusalem for to worship, Was returning, and sitting in his chariot
read Esaias the prophet. Then the Spirit said unto Philip, Go near,
and join thyself to this chariot.” (Acts 8:26-29.)
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The immediate and unquestioning obedience of Philip at this time is
beautiful. He raises no question as to the difference between Samaria and
Gaza — between leaving a wide field of labor, and going away to a desert
place, to speak to one person about salvation. But the Spirit of God was
with Philip. And the one desire of the evangelist should ever be to follow
the leading of the Spirit. From the want of spiritual discernment a preacher
may remain in a place after the Spirit has ceased to work in it, and so labor
in vain.
God, in His providence, takes care of His servant; He sends an angel to
direct him as to the road he is to take. But when it is a question of the
gospel and dealing with souls, the Spirit takes the direction. “Then the
Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thyself to this chariot.” We know
of nothing, in the whole history of the church, more interesting than this
scene on the way to Gaza. The angel and the Spirit of God accompany the
evangelist: the former representing the providence of God in marking out
the very road he is to take; the latter representing spiritual power in direct
dealing with souls. As it was then, so is it now; though we are more in the
habit of thinking of the guidance of the Spirit, than of the direction of
providence. May we trust God for everything! He changes not!
The gospel now finds its way, in the person of the queen’s treasurer, to
the center of Abyssinia. The eunuch believes, is baptized, and goes on his
way rejoicing. What he sought for in vain in Jerusalem, and had taken a
long journey to seek there, he finds in the desert. Beautiful instance of the
grace of the gospel! The lost sheep is found in the wilderness, and living
waters spring up in the desert. He is also a beautiful instance of an anxious
soul. When alone and unemployed, he reads the prophet Isaiah. He muses
on the prophecy of the suffering, unresisting, Lamb of God. But the
moment of light and deliverance had come. Philip explains the prophet: the
eunuch is taught of God — he believes: immediately desires baptism, and
returns to his home, filled with the new joys of salvation. Would he be
silent there as to what he had found? Certainly not; a man of such
character and influence would have many opportunities of spreading the
truth. But as both scripture and history are silent, as to the results of his
mission, we venture not further.
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The Spirit is still seen in company with Philip and carries him far away.
He is found at Azotus, and evangelizes all the cities unto Caesarea.
But a new era in the church’s history begins to dawn. A new workman
enters the scene, and the most remarkable in many ways that ever served
the Lord and His church.

THE CONVERSION OF SAUL OF TARSUS

No event in the progress of the church so deeply, or so blessedly, affects
her after history, as the conversion of Saul of Tarsus. From being the chief
of sinners, he became the chief of saints — from being the most violent
opposer of Christ, he became the most zealous defender of the faith — as
a hater and persecutor of the name of Jesus on the earth, he was “chief;”
all others, compared with him, were subordinate. (Acts 9; 1 Timothy 1.)
It is quite evident, from what he says of himself, that he believed Judaism
to be not only divine, but God’s perpetual and unchangeable religion to
man. It would be difficult to account for the strength of his Jewish
prejudices on any other principle. Therefore all attempts to set aside the
Jews’ religion, and to introduce another, he considered to be of the enemy,
and to be strenuously opposed. He had heard the noble speech of Stephen
— he had witnessed his triumphant death; but his subsequent persecution
of the Christians showed that the moral glory of that scene had made no
serious impression on his mind. He was blinded by zeal; but zeal for
Judaism now was zeal against the Lord. At this very time he was
“breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the diseiples of the
Lord.”
Hearing that some of the persecuted saints had found a shelter in
Damascus, an ancient city of Syria, he made up his mind to go there, and
bring them back to Jerusalem as criminals. For this purpose he received
letters from the high priest and the estate of the elders, that he might bring
them bound to Jerusalem to be punished. (Acts 22, 26.) He thus became
the very apostle of Jewish malice against the disciples of Jesus; ignorantly,
no doubt, but he made himself their willing missionary.
With his mind wrought up to the most violent pitch of persecuting zeal, he
sets forth on his memorable journey. Unshaken in his ardent attachment to
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the religion of Moses, and determined to punish the converts to
Christianity, as apostates from the faith of their ancestors, he approaches
Damascus. But there, in the full energy of his mad career, the Lord Jesus
stops him. A light from heaven, above the light of the sun, shines around
him, and overwhelms him in its dazzling brightness. He fails to the earth
— broken in will, subdued in mind, humbled in spirit, and altogether
changed. His heart is now subject to the voice that speaks to him; he owns
its power and authority. Reasoning, extenuation, self-justification, have no
place in the presence of the Lord.
A voice from the excellent glory had said unto him, “Saul, Saul, why
persecutest thou Me? And he said, Who art Thou, Lord? And the Lord
said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest.” Thus the Lord Jesus, though in
heaven, declares Himself to be still identified with His disciples on the
earth. The oneness of the church with Christ, its Head in heaven, the germ
of the blessed truth of the “one body,” is folded up in these few words,
“Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?... I am Jesus whom thou
persecutest.” To be at war with the saints is to be at war with the Lord
Himself. Blessed truth for the believer, but how solemn for the persecutor!
The vision Saul had seen, and the terrible discovery he had made,
completely engross him. He is blind for three days, and can neither eat nor
drink. Thus he enters Damascus, blind, broken, humbled, beneath the
solemn judgment of the Lord! How different from what he had intended!
He now joins himself to the company which he had resolved to
exterminate. Nevertheless he enters in by the door, and humbly takes his
place with the disciples of the Lord. Ananias, a godly disciple, is sent to
comfort him. He receives his sight, he is filled with the Holy Ghost, he is
baptized, he receives meat and is strengthened.
It is the thought of some, that the Lord gives in the conversion of Saul, not
only a sample of His long-suffering, as in every sinner that is saved, but as
a sign of the future restoration of Israel. Paul tells us himself, that he
obtained mercy because he did it ignorantly in unbelief; and this is the very
ground of mercy for Israel in the latter day. As our Lord Himself prayed
for them: — “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
Peter also, says
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“And now, brethren, I wot that through ignorance ye did it,
as did also your rulers.” (Acts 3:17.)
But as the apostleship of Paul differs in many respects from that of the
twelve, it will be necessary to notice it briefly. Unless this difference is
understood, the true character of the present dispensation will be but
feebly apprehended.

THE APOSTLESHIP OF PAUL

The LAW and the PROPHETS were until JOHN ; after John the LORD
Himself, in His own Person, offers the kingdom to Israel; but “His own
received Him not.” They crucified, the Prince of life; but God raised Him
from the dead, and seated Him at His own right hand in heavenly places.
We have next THE T WELVE APOSTLES. They are endued with the Holy
Ghost, and bear witness to the resurrection of Christ. But the testimony
of the twelve is despised, the Holy Ghost is resisted, Stephen is martyred,
the final offer of mercy is rejected, and now the Lord’s dealings with Israel
as a people close for a season. The scenes of Shiloh are enacted over again,
Ichabod is written on Jerusalem, and a new witness is called out, as in the
days of Samuel.
T HE GREAT APOSTLE of the Gentiles now comes before us. He is as one
born out of due time and out of due place. His apostleship had nothing to
do with Jerusalem, or with the twelve. It was outside of both. His call was
extraordinary and direct from the Lord in heaven. He is privileged to bring
out the new thing, the heavenly character of the church — that Christ and
the church are one, and that heaven is their common home. (Ephesians 2.)
So long as God was dealing with Israel these blessed truths were kept a
secret in His own mind.
“Unto me,”
says Paul,
“who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I
should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of
Christ; And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the
mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in
God, Who created all things by Jesus Christ.” (Ephesians 3.)
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There could be no doubt, from the character of the apostle’s call, as to its
divine authority. “Not of men, neither by man,” as he says in his Epistle
to the Galatians, “but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, Who raised
Him from the dead.” That is, it was “not of men,” as to its source, not of
any synod of official men. “Neither by man” was it, as to the medium
through which his commission came. He was not only a saint, but an
apostle, by calling: and that call was by Jesus Christ, and God the Father
Who raised Him from the dead. In some respects his apostleship was even
of a higher order than that of the twelve. They had been called by Jesus
when on the earth; he had been called by the risen and glorified Christ in
heaven. And, his call being thus from heaven, he wanted neither the
sanction nor the recognition of the other apostles.
“But when it pleased God... to reveal His Son in me, that I might
preach Him among the heathen, immediately I conferred not with
flesh and blood: neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were
apostles before me; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto
Damascus.” (Galatians 1:15, 17. )
The manner of Saul’s call to be an apostle is worthy of special note, as
it struck at the root of Jewish pride, and may also be viewed as the
deathblow to the vain notion of apostolic succession. The apostles, whom
the Lord had chosen and appointed when He was on the earth, were
neither the source nor the channel, in any way, of Saul’s appointment.
They did not cast lots for him, as they did in the case of Matthias. Then
they were scarcely off Jewish ground, which may account for their
deciding by lot. It was an ancient form in Israel of discovering the divine
will in such matters. But these emphatic words, “Paul, an apostle, not of
men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ,” completely exclude the
intervention of man in every shape and way. Apostolic succession is set
aside. We are saints by calling and servants by calling. And that call must
come from heaven. Paul stands before us, as the true pattern for all
preachers of the gospel, and for all ministers of the word. Nothing can be
more simple than the ground he takes as a preacher, great apostle though
he was.
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“We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I
believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and
therefore speak. (2 Corinthians 4:13.)
Immediately after he was baptized and strengthened, he began to confess
his faith in the Lord Jesus, and to preach in the synagogues, that He is the
Son of God. This is a new thing. Peter preached that He had been exalted
to the right hand of God — that He had been made both Lord and Christ;
but Paul preaches the higher doctrine of His personal glory — “that He is
the Son of God.” In Matthew 16, Christ is revealed by the Father to the
disciples, as “the Son of the living God.” But now He is revealed, not only
to Paul, but in Paul. “It pleased God to reveal His Son in me,” he says.
But who is sufficient to speak of the privileges and blessings of those to
whom the Son of God is thus revealed? The dignity and security of the
church rest on this blessed truth; and also the gospel of the glory, which
was especially entrusted to Paul, and which he calls “my gospel.”
“On the Son thus revealed within,” as one has sweetly said, “hangs
everything that is peculiar to the calling and glory of the church — her
holy prerogatives — acceptance in the Beloved, with forgiveness of sins
through His blood — entrance into the treasures of wisdom and
knowledge, so as to have made known to us the mystery of the will of
God — future inheritance in and with Him in whom all things in heaven
and earth are to be gathered — and the present seal and earnest of this
inheritance is the Holy Ghost. This bright roll of privileges is inscribed by
the apostle, thus — ‘spiritual blessings in the heavenlies;’ and so they are;
blessings through the Spirit flowing from and linking us with Him who is
the Lord in the heavens.”3 (Ephesians 1:3-14.)
But the doctrine of the church — this mystery of love, and grace, and
privilege — was not revealed until Paul declared it. The Lord had spoken
of it as that which the presence of the Comforter was to effect, saying,
“At that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and I in
you.” And again, when He said to the disciples after the resurrection, “I
ascend unto My Father and your Father, unto My God and your God.”
Of this “bright roll” of blessing Paul was especially and characteristically
the apostle.
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We must now leave the history of Saul for a little, and turn to Peter, who
occupies the field until Saul commences his public ministry in Acts 13.
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CHAPTER 4
THE MISSIONARIES OF THE CROSS

In place of going over consecutively the remaining chapters of the Acts,

we think it may be more interesting and equally instructive to our readers,
to consider them in connection with the history of the apostles, especially
with the history of the two great apostles. The book of the Acts is almost
entirely occupied with the acts of Peter and of Paul, though of course
under the guidance of the Holy Ghost: the one, as the great apostle of the
Jews; the other, as the great apostle of the Gentiles. But we would also
embrace the present opportunity, briefly to notice the first personally
chosen companions and missionaries of our blessed Lord — the twelve
apostles.
But before attempting an outline of these interesting lives, it may be well
to state the object we have in view in doing so. We are stepping a little out
of the usual course. In none of the Church Histories that we know are the
lives of the apostles presented in a regular form; and we think it strange
that the great founders of the church should have no place in its history.
We have also noticed with some surprise that most of the histories close
with the commencement of the Reformation. Surely this is the brightest
day in her history — at least since the days of Constantine — and the one
above all others in which the Spirit of God wrought mightily; and thus
ought to be the most special part of her history.
At the same time, with regard to the apostles, we have to bear in mind,
that beyond the sacred narrative, there is very little known that can be
relied upon. The traditional and the scriptural, the certain and the
uncertain, are almost helplessly blended together in the writings of the
Fathers. Every distinct ray of historical light we greatly value, but it is
only to the scriptures that we can turn with certainty. Still, the few
scattered notices which we have there, of some of the apostles, with what
may be gathered elsewhere, when brought together may give the reader a
view of the person and individuality of the apostle, which he never had
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before. Others, of note, besides the apostles, will come before us in
connection with them, especially with Paul; so that our readers will have,
in a convenient form, a brief outline of nearly all the noble preachers,
teachers, confessors, and martyrs of the Lord Jesus spoken of in the New
Testament.

THE TWELVE APOSTLES

were Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John (sons of Zebedee), Philip,
Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James (the son of Alphaeus),
Thaddeus, Simon Zelotes, and Matthias, who was chosen in place of
Judas Iscariot. See Matthew 10; Luke 6; Mark 3, and Acts 1.
Paul was also an apostle by the Lord’s direct call, and that in the highest
sense, as we have seen. There were others who were called apostles, but
soon were more especially the apostles of the churches. The twelve and
Paul were pre-eminently the apostles of the Lord. Compare 2 Corinthians
8:23; Philippians 2:25; Romans 16:7.
The official name, “apostle,” signifies one “sent forth.” “These twelve
Jesus sent forth.” This name was given to the twelve by the Lord Himself.
“He called unto Him His disciples; and of them He chose twelve, whom
also He called apostles.” A personal acquaintance with the whole
ministerial course of the Lord, was the original and a necessary
qualification of an apostle. This was stated by Peter before the election of
a successor to the traitor Judas. “Wherefore of these men which have
companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among
us, Beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he was
taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of the
resurrection.” By this close personal intercourse with the Lord, they were
particularly suited to be the witnesses of His earthly path. He describes
them Himself as “they which have continued with Me in My
temptations.” (Luke 22:28.)
The number twelve, we believe, distinctly marks their relation to the
twelve tribes of Israel. The fancies of the Fathers, as to the meaning of
the number here chosen, show how little their minds were governed by the
immediate context. St. Augustine “thinks our Lord herein had respect to
the four quarters of the world, which were to be called by the preaching of
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the gospel, and which, being multiplied by three, as denoting the Trinity,
make twelve.” From not seeing the distinction between Israel and the
church, there is much confusion in such writers.
The number twelve in scripture we understand to mean administrative
completeness in man. Hence the twelve tribes, and the twelve apostles,
and the promise to the latter, that they should sit upon twelve thrones,
judging the twelve tribes of Israel. (Matthew 19:28.) But here, in plainest
terms, the Lord limits the mission of the twelve to the lost sheep of the
house of Israel. They were not even to visit the Samaritans, nor to go in
the way of the Gentiles. The mission was strictly Jewish. “These
twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, Go not into the
way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: But
go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Surely nothing could
possibly be plainer. The calling out of the church is not here referred to.
This took place after, when another and an extraordinary apostle was
chosen, with a special view to the Gentiles. Then the twelve would have
their own place in the church, but Paul was its divinely called and qualified
minister.
The general notion that the twelve were altogether illiterate, we cannot
agree with. The expression “unlearned and ignorant men,” as used by
the council in Acts 4:13, we understand as simply denoting persons in
private stations of life, who had not been taught in the rabbinical learning
and traditions of the Jews. Our term “laymen” would convey the same
idea; that is, men of ordinary education, as contrasted with those who have
been specially trained in the schools of the learned; or men not in “holy
orders.” Thus Peter and John may have been thoroughly acquainted with
the holy scriptures, and with the history of their country and people, and
yet be considered by the council as “unlearned and ignorant men.” James
and John at least had all the advantages of a godly and devoted mother’s
training, which has often done great things for the church of God.
We will now glance briefly at the twelve, and first in order is the apostle
Peter. There can be no doubt that Peter held the first place among the
twelve. The Lord gave him this position. He is first named in every list of
the apostles. This precedence, we know, did not arise from his having
known the Lord first, for he was neither first nor last in this respect.
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Andrew, and probably John, knew the Lord before Peter. Let us here note,
with deepest interest, the first meeting of those friends who were to be
united for ever. See John 1:29-51.
John the Baptist bears testimony to Jesus as the Lamb of God who was
to take away the sin of the world. Two of John’s disciples leave him and
go with Jesus. “One of the two which heard John speak, and followed
him, was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first findeth his own brother
Simon, and saith unto him, We have found the Messias, which is, being
interpreted, the Christ. And he brought him to Jesus.” This was Peter’s
first introduction to the Lord — to one who was to be the source of his
happiness for ever. And how significant their first interview! “And when
Jesus beheld him, He said, Thou art Simon, the son of Jona: thou shalt be
called Cephas, which is by interpretation, a stone.” Naturally impulsive,
quick in seizing an object, but too ready to relinquish it by the force of
another impression, he has in the Lord’s grace firmness given him; though
every now and then his natural character shines out.
The first thing that brings Peter into great prominence is his noble
confession of Christ, as the Son of the living God. (Matthew 16.) The
Lord then honored him with the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and gave
him the chief place among his brethren. But this part of Peter’s history,
with some of the early chapters of the Acts, we have already considered;
therefore we will only refer to what has not been touched upon.
The fourth chapter of the Acts we have not alluded to; though we are
disposed to think that it presents the brightest day in the apostle’s
history, as the baptism of Cornelius presents the crowning day in his
ministry. As there is often displayed in the great apostle a mixture of
strength and weakness, of excellencies and defects, it is deeply interesting
to trace his path through the first storms which assailed the infant church.
But we must not forget that the grand secret of the boldness, wisdom, and
power of the apostles, was not owing to their natural character, but to the
presence of the Holy Ghost. He was with them and in them, and working
by them. The Holy Ghost was the strength of their testimony.
Notice in particular the blessed effects of His presence in four distinct
aspects.
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1. In the courage displayed by Peter and the others. “Then Peter, filled
with the Holy Ghost, said unto them, Ye rulers of the people, and elders
of Israel, if we this day be examined of the good deed done to the impotent
man, by what means he is made whole, Be it known unto you all, and to
all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth,
whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by Him doth
this man stand here before you whole. This is the stone which was set at
nought of you builders, which is become the Head of the corner. Neither is
there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven
given among men, whereby we must be saved.” The great and solemn
question between God and the rulers of Israel is here formally stated.
Nothing can be plainer. The testimony of God is no longer with the rulers
of the temple, but with the apostles of the exalted Messiah.
2. In His presence with the disciples as an assembly. “And when they had
prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together, and
they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God
with boldness.” This verse clearly teaches what has been so often said, as
to the Spirit being with the disciples and in them. The place was shaken
where they were assembled together; this proves His presence with them.
But they were also filled with the Holy Ghost — so filled, we believe, that
for the time being, there was no room for the flesh to act.
3. In great power as to service. “And with great power gave the apostles
witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus; and great grace was upon
them all.” Readiness and energy now characterize the apostles.
4. In whole-hearted devotedness. “As many as were possessors of lands
or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold,
And laid them down at the apostles’ feet.” In chapter two the rich gave to
the poor themselves: a thing which can scarcely be done without adding
importance to the giver. But in chapter four the rich laid their money at the
apostles’ feet. This fact we would accept as a sure sign of increased
humility, and of greater devotedness.
It is also in this full and instructive chapter that we have the famous
answer of Peter and John to the council. “Whether it be right in the sight
of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye.” From that
day until now, the true confessors of the name of Jesus have found in
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these words a suitable answer to their inquisitors and oppressors. What a
difference, we may exclaim, between the man who sat by the fire in the
hall of the high priest, and the man who takes the lead in Acts 4 —
between the man who fell before the assault of a maid, and the man who
makes a nation tremble with his appeals! But how is the difference to be
accounted for? some may ask. The presence and power of an ungrieved,
unquenched Holy Spirit explains it fully. And the weakness or power of
many in our day is to be accounted for on the same principle. The Spirit of
God alone is power in the Christian. May we know the blessedness of
living, walking, working, in the saving and sanctifying power of the Holy
Spirit!
“And grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby
ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.” (Ephesians 4:30.)
We are now come to the last section in the sacred narrative of the history
of Peter. From verse 32 of chapter 9 to verse 18 of chapter 11 we have an
account of his preaching and working miracles. There we see him once
more in full apostolic authority, and the Holy Ghost working with him.
His mission at this time was greatly blessed, both in the towns of Israel,
and at Caesarea. The whole town of Lydda and the district of Saron
appear to have been awakened. The miracles which Peter wrought, and the
gospel which he preached, were used of God for the conversion of many.
Thus we read, “And all that dwelt at Lydda and Saron turned to the Lord.”
The blessing was general. “Turning to the Lord” is the scriptural idea of
conversion. And at Joppa also, through the raising of Dorcas, there was
a great stir and great blessing. “And it was known throughout all Joppa,
and many believed in the Lord.”
In chapter 10 — which we have already considered — the Gentiles are
brought into the church. And now, Peter having finished his mission in
these quarters, he returns to Jerusalem. After the account of his
deliverance from the power of Herod in chapter 12, we have no continuous
history of the apostle of the circumcision.
As Herod Agrippa, the Idumean king, comes so prominently before us
here, it may be well to notice the part he takes. He professed great zeal for
the law of Moses, and maintained a certain respect towards its outward
observance. He was therefore ready with a pretended pious zeal to side
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with the Jews against the disciples of Christ. This was his policy. He was
a type of the adversary king.
It was about A .D . 44, that Herod sought to ingratiate himself with his
Jewish subjects, by persecuting the unoffending Christians. Not that there
was any love between Herod and the Jews, for they hated each other
heartily; but here they united, as both hating the heavenly testimony.
Herod killed James with the sword and cast Peter into prison. It was his
wicked intention to keep him there till after the passover, and then, when a
great many Jews from all parts would be in Jerusalem, to make a public
spectacle of his execution. But God preserved and delivered His servant in
answer to the prayers of the saints. They have weapons of warfare which
the governments of this world know nothing of. God allowed James to seal
his testimony with his blood; but Peter He preserved for further
testimony on the earth. Thus our God rules over all. He is the Governor
among the nations, whatever the pride and will of man may be. Power
belongeth unto Him. Feeble indeed is the power of every enemy when He
interferes, lierod, being baffled and confounded by the manifestations of a
power which he could not understand, condemns the keepers of the prison
to death, and leaves Jerusalem. But he little thought that his own death
was to precede that of his prisoners.
At Caesarea, the Gentile seat of his authority, he ordered a splendid
festival in honor of the Emperor Claudius. Multitudes, we are informed, of
the highest rank flocked from all quarters. On the second morning of the
festivities the king appeared in a silver robe of great splendor, which
glittered with the rays of the sun, so as to dazzle the eyes of the whole
assembly, and excite general admiration. When making an oration to the
people from his throne, some of his flatterers raised a shout, “It is the
voice of a god!” In place of repressing this impious adulation, which
spread through the theater, Herod accepted it. But a sense of God’s
judgment at that very moment pierced the heart of the king. In tones of
deep melancholy he said, “Your god will soon suffer the common lot of
mortality.” In the forcible language of scripture, it is said, “And
immediately the angel of the Lord smote him, because he gave not God the
glory: and he was eaten of worms, and gave up the ghost.” He was then
seized with violent internal pains, and carried from the theater to his
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palace. There he lingered five days, and died in the greatest agony, and in
the most humiliating and loathsome state of body.

THE HERODIAN LINE OF KINGS

As it may not be out of place here, or uninteresting to our readers, we
would notice for a moment the Herodian line of kings. They frequently
come before us, both in the life of our Lord, and in the early history of the
church. We have associated in our minds, from early youth, the massacre
of the infants of Bethlehem and Herod, king of Judaea; though it is
somewhat remarkable that Josephus, the principal historian of Herod,
takes no notice of this event. It is generally thought, that the murder of a
few children, in an obscure village, compared with Herod’s other deeds of
blood, was too unimportant in the eyes of Josephus to be recorded. But
not so in the mind of God: both the deceit and cruelty of the treacherous
heart of the king are recorded in the sacred narrative. The eye of God
watched over the “Child born” unto Israel — the only source of hope for
all nations. The cruel design of Herod was thus defeated.
Herod the Great, the first Idumean king over Israel, received the kingdom
from the senate of Rome through the influence of Mark Antony. This took
place about thirty-five years before the birth of Christ, and about thirty-
seven before his own death. These Idumeans were a branch of the ancient
Edomites, who, while the Jews were in the Babylonish captivity, and their
land lay desolate, took possession of as much of the southern part of it, as
contained what had been the whole inheritance of the tribe of Simeon, and
also half of that which had been the inheritance of the tribe of Judah; and
there they dwelt ever after. In course of time, the Idumeans were
conquered by John Hyrcanus, and brought over to Judaism. After their
conversion, they received circumcision, submitted to the Jewish laws, and
became incorporated with the Jewish nation. In this way they became
Jews, though not of the ancient stock of Israel. This happened about one
hundred and twenty-nine years before Christ. They were bold, crafty, and
cruel as princes: they had great political foresight, courted the favor of
Rome, and cared only for the establishment of their own dynasty. But, as
God would have it, with the destruction of Jerusalem, the Idumean
dynasty passed away, and even the very name of Herod seems to have
perished from among the nations.
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Besides the slaughter of the children in Bethlehem, which took place
shortly before Herod’s death, he had deeply imbrued his hands in the
blood of his own family, and in the blood of many noble persons of the
Asmonean line. His cruel jealousy towards that heroic family never
slumbered. But one of his last acts was to sign the death warrant of his
own son. When dying under the signal judgment of God, like his grandson,
Herod Agrippa, he raised himself up in his bed, gave the mandate for the
execution of Antipater, named Archelaus as his successor to the throne,
fell back, and expired.
Thus, alas! have monarchs often died, dispensing death on the one hand,
and kingdoms on the other. But, what then? In the naked reality of their
own moral condition they must stand before the tribunal of God. The
purple can no longer shield them. Inflexible righteousness rules on that
throne. Judged according to the deeds done in the body, they must be
banished beyond the “gulf” which God’s judgment has “fixed” for ever.
But, oh! there to remember, in torment, every moment of their past
history — the privileges they have abused, the opportunities they have
lost, and all the evil they have done. May the Lord save every soul that
glances at these pages, from the awful weight of these words —
remember- tormented — fixed. They describe and characterise the future
state of impenitent souls. (Luke 16.)
The sect of the Herodians may have been the partisans of Herod, and
chiefly political in their character; their main object being the maintenance
of the national independence of the Jews, in the face of Roman power and
ambition. They may have thought to use Herod for the accomplishing of
this end. In the Gospel history they are represented as acting craftily
towards the blessed Lord, and in concert with the Pharisees. (Matthew
22:15, 16; Mark 12:13, 14.)
But we must now return to the history of our apostle.
In Acts 15 after an absence of about five years, Peter again appears; but
during that time we know nothing of his abode or of his work. He takes an
active part in the assembly at Jerusalem, and seems to have retained his
original place among the apostles and elders.
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PETER AT ANTIOCH
Soon after this, as we learn from Galatians 2, he paid a visit to Antioch.
But notwithstanding the decision of the apostles and church at Jerusalem,
a characteristic weakness of Peter’s betrays him into an act of
dissimulation. It is one thing to settle a question in principle, it is quite
another to carry it out in practice. Peter had actually stated in the
assembly before them all, that the gospel which Paul had preached, by the
revelation given to him, was no less a blessing to the Jew than to the
Gentile. And while alone at Antioch, he acted on this principle, walking in
the liberty of the heavenly truth and eating with the Gentiles. But when
certain Jewish-minded Christians came down from James, he no longer
dared to use this liberty: “He withdrew and separated himself, fearing
them which were of the circumcision. And the other Jews dissembled
likewise with him; insomuch that Barnabas also was carried away with
their dissimulation.” “What a poor thing is man!” exclaims one. “And we
are weak in proportion to our importance before men; when we are
nothing, we can do all things, as far as human opinion is concerned... Paul,
energetic and faithful, through grace, alone remains upright; and he rebukes
Peter before them all.”
From this time, A .D . 49 or 50, his name does not again appear in the Acts
of the Apostles; and we have no certain knowledge of the sphere of his
labors. But, as he inscribes his first Epistle to the Hebrew Christians,
“scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,”
he is supposed to have labored in these countries. His second Epistle is of
a much later date, and must have been written shortly before his death.
This we learn from what he says in the first chapter:
“Knowing that shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as
our Lord Jesus Christ hath showed me.” (See John 21:18, 19.)
The exact date of Peter’s visit to Rome has been a subject of great
controversy between Catholic and Protestant writers in all ages. But it
may now be considered as a settled point, that he did not visit that city till
near the end of his life. The date of his martyrdom is also uncertain. Most
probably it took place about A .D . 67 or 68, and about the seventieth year
of his age. The burning of Rome by Nero is dated by Tacitus about the
month of July, 64. The persecution against the Christians broke out soon
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after; and it was under this persecution that our apostle was honored with
the crown of martyrdom.
He was sentenced to be crucified, as the most severe and shameful
death. But when he looked on the cross, he entreated the favor of the
officers that he might not be crucified in the ordinary way, but that he
might suffer with his head downwards: affirming that he was unworthy to
suffer in the same posture as his blessed Lord and Master had done before
him. His request being granted, he was crucified with his head downwards.
Whether this be a fact or a mere legend, it well agrees with the fervent
temperament and the deep humility of the great apostle.1
In following the catalog already given, we next notice the apostle —
Andrew. The sacred historian has been very full and copious in describing
the acts of Peter, but very sparing in his accounts of his brother Andrew.
He was brought up with Peter to his father’s trade, and continued at his
occupation until he was called by the Lord to become a “fisher of men.”
Andrew, like other young men of Galilee, had become a disciple of John
the Baptist. But on hearing his master a second time speak of Jesus as the
Lamb of God, he left John to follow Jesus. He was, immediately after this,
the means of bringing his brother Peter to his new Master. So far, he has
the honor of being the first of the apostles who pointed to Christ. (John
13 He comes before us in the sixth and in the twelfth of John, and in the
thirteenth of Mark; but, beyond these few scattered notices, scripture
relates nothing concerning him. His name does not appear in the acts of the
Apostles, except in the first chapter.
Conjecture and tradition have said many things about him, but it is only of
fairly established facts that we would speak. He is said to have preached
in Scythia, and to have traveled over Thrace, Macedonia, Thessaly, and to
have suffered martyrdom at Patrae in Achaia. His cross, it is said, was
formed of two pieces of wood crossing each other in the middle, in the
form of the letter X, hence usually known by the name of St. Andrew’s
cross. He died praying and exhorting the people to constancy and
perseverance in the faith. The year in which he suffered is uncertain.
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From the two brothers, Peter and Andrew, we now proceed to the two
brothers, James and John. The four had also been partners in business.
And first in order we notice
James. Zebedee and his two sons, James and John, were following their
usual occupation on the sea of Galilee, when Jesus passed that way.
Seeing the two brothers, “He called them; and they left their father
Zebedee in the ship with the hired servants, and went after him.” Peter and
Andrew were also there. It was on this occasion that the Lord desired
Peter to launch out into deeper water, and try another cast for fish. Peter
inclines to reason: they had been very unsuccessful the previous night.
Nevertheless, at the Lord’s word, the net was let down. “And when they
had this done, they enclosed a great multitude of fishes; and their net
brake.” Astonished and overwhelmed at this draught, Peter beckoned to
his partners to come and help in landing the fish caught.
Full conviction was now wrought in the minds of those four young men,
that Jesus was the true Messiah. They may have had doubts before, they
have none now. At the call of Jesus they leave all, and become, once and
for ever, His disciples. Henceforward they were to become “fishers of
men.” In every list we have of the apostles, these four noble men are
placed first; they stand at the head of the twelve throughout. (Matthew
4:17-20; Mark 1:16-20; Luke 5:1-11.)
This is the call of James to the discipleship; about a year after this he is
called to the apostleship with his eleven brethren. (Matthew 10; Mark 3;
Luke 6; Acts 1.)
Peter, James and John, and occasionally Andrew, were always and
most intimate companions of the blessed Lord. The first three only were
admitted to the raising of Jairus’ daughter. (Mark 5; Luke 8.) The same
three apostles were alone permitted to be present at the transfiguration.
(Matthew 17; Mark 9; Luke 9.) It was the same three that witnessed His
agony in Gethsemane. (Matthew 26; Mark 14; Luke 22.) But the four,
Peter, James, John and Andrew, are joined together when they ask the
Lord privately about the destruction of the temple. (Mark 13.)
Like the change in Peter’s name, or the addition to it, the sons of Zebedee
are surnamed Boanerges, or “the sons of thunder.” Great boldness and
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faithfulness may have singled out James to Herod, as the first to be seized
and silenced. It is not a little remarkable that “the son of thunder” and the
“rock-man” are the first to be apprehended. But James has the honor to be
the first of the apostles that received the crown of martyrdom, A .D . 44.
Peter was rescued by a miracle.
A mother’s jealousy and her sons’ ambition lead Salome to ask for very
distinguished places in the kingdom for her two sons. The Lord allowed
the petition to pass with a very mild reproof, but told the brothers that
they should drink of His cup, and be baptized with His baptism. James
was early called upon to realize this prediction. After the ascension he is
seen in company with the other apostles in Acts 1. Then he disappears
from the sacred narrative until his apprehension and death in Acts 12. And
there we are simply told, in the brief language of the inspired historian,
that Herod the king killed James the brother of John with the sword.
Clement of Alexandria relates a tradition concerning James’s
martyrdom, which is not an unlikely thing to have occurred. As he was
led forth to the place of execution, the soldier or officer that had guarded
him to the tribunal, or rather his accuser, was so moved by the courage and
bold confession of James at the time of his trial, that he repented of what
he had done, and came and fell down at the apostle’s feet, and begged
forgiveness for what he had said against him. James, after a little surprise
at the thing, raised him up, embraced and kissed him; and said, “Peace, my
son, peace be to thee, and the pardon of thy faults.” Whereupon, before
all, he publicly professed himself to be a Christian, and so both were
beheaded at the same time. Thus fell James, the apostolic proto-martyr,
cheerfully taking that cup which he had long since told his Lord that he
was ready to drink of.2
John was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and the younger brother of
James. Though his father was a fisherman, it appears from the Gospel
narrative that they were in good circumstances. Some of the ancients speak
of the family as wealthy, and even as nobly connected. But these
traditions are not reconcilable with the facts of scripture. We read,
however, of their “hired servants,” and they may have owned more vessels
than one. And Salome, we doubt not, was one of those honored women
who ministered to the Lord of her substance. And John had a house of his
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own. (Luke 8:3; John 19:27.) We may safely infer from these facts, that
their position was considerably above poverty. As many have gone to
extremes in speaking of the apostles as poor and illiterate, we think it well
to notice the few hints of scripture on these subjects.
Of the character of Zebedee we know nothing. He made no objection to his
sons leaving him at the call of the Messiah. But we hear no more of him
afterwards. We frequently find the mother in company with her sons, but
no mention of the father. The probability is that he died soon after the call
of his sons.
The evangelist Mark, in enumerating the twelve apostles (chap. 3:17),
when he mentions James and John, says that our Lord “surnamed them
Boanerges, which is, Sons of Thunder.” What our Lord particularly
intended to convey in this title, is not easily determined. Conjectures there
have been many. Some suppose that it was because these two brothers
were of a more furious and resolute disposition, and of a more fierce and
fiery temper than the rest of the apostles. But we see no ground for such a
conjecture in the Gospel history. Doubtless, on one or two occasions their
zeal was intemperate, but that was before they understood the spirit of
their calling. More probably our Lord so surnamed them, as prophetic of
their burning zeal in openly and boldly proclaiming the great truths of the
gospel, after they became fully acquainted with them. Certain we are, that
John in company with Peter, in the early chapters of the Acts, displayed a
courage that feared no threatenings, and was daunted by no opposition.
John is supposed to have been the youngest of all the apostles; and,
judging from his writings he appears to have been possessed of a
disposition singularly affectionate, mild, and amiable. He was characterised
as “the disciple whom Jesus loved.” On various occasions he was
admitted to free and intimate intercourse with the Lord. (John 13.)
“What distinguished John,” says Neander, “was the union of the
most opposite qualities, as we have often observed in great
instruments of the advancement of the kingdom of God — the
union of a disposition inclined to silent and deep meditation, with
an ardent zeal, though not impelling to great and diversified activity
in the outward world; not a passionate zeal, such as we suppose
filled the breast of Paul before his conversion. But there was also a
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love, not soft and yielding, but one seizing with all its might, and
firmly retaining the object to which it was directed — vigorously
repelling whatever would disgrace this object, or attempt to wrest
it from its possession; and this was his leading characteristic.”
As the history of John is so intimately connected with the histories of
Peter and James, which we have already gone over, we may now be very
brief. These three names are seldom separated in the Gospel history. But
there is one scene in which John stands alone, and which ought to be
noted. He was the only apostle who followed Jesus to the place of His
crucifixion. And there he was specially honored with the regard and
confidence of his Master.
“When Jesus therefore saw his mother and the disciple standing
by, whom He loved, He saith unto His mother, Woman, behold
thy Son! then saith He to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And
from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.”
(John 19:26, 27.)
After the ascension of Christ, and the descent of the Holy Ghost on the
day of Pentecost, John became one of the chief apostles of the
circumcision. But his ministry goes down to the end of the first century.
With his death the apostolic age naturally closes.
There is a widely spread and generally received tradition, that John
remained in Judaea till after the death of the virgin Mary. The date of this
event is uncertain. But soon after he proceeded to Asia Minor. Here he
planted and watched over several churches in different cities, but made
Ephesus his center. Thence he was banished to the Isle of Patmos
towards the close of Domitian’s reign. There he wrote the Revelation.
(Chap. 1:9.) On his liberation from exile, by the accession of Nerva to the
imperial throne, John returned to Ephesus, where he wrote his Gospel and
Epistles. He died about A .D . 100, in the third year of the emperor Trajan,
and about one hundred years of age.3
From the many traditions about John himself, we select only one, which
we think the most interesting, and the most likely to be true. As one who
was unwearied in his love and care for the souls of men, he was deeply
grieved by the apostasy of a young man in whom he had taken a special
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interest. When revisiting the place where he left him, he heard that he had
joined a band of robbers and had become their captain. His love for him
was so great that he determined to find him out. He hastened to the retreat
of the robbers, suffered himself to be seized, and begged to be taken into
their captain’s presence. When he saw the venerable appearance of the
aged apostle, his conscience was awakened. The recollection of earlier days
was more than he could stand, and he fled in consternation from his
presence. But John, full of paternal love, hastened after him. He entreated
him to repent and return to the church, and encouraged him by the
assurance of the forgiveness of his sins in the name of the Lord Jesus. His
marvellous affection for the young man and his deep concern for his soul,
completely overcame him. He repented, returned, was restored, and
afterwards became a worthy member of the christian community. May we
seek to do likewise in restoring backsliders!
We now come to what we may call the second group of four apostles; and,
just as Peter heads the first group, the second is headed by the apostle
Philip. In the first three Gospels he is placed in this order. He is
mentioned as being of Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. (John
1:44.) It is more than probable that he was among the Galileans of that
district who flocked to hear the preaching of John the Baptist. Though no
part of Palestine was spoken of in such terms of reproach as Galilee, it
was from these despised but simple, earnest, and devoted Gallleans that
our Lord chose His apostles. “Search and look,” said the Pharisees, “for
out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.” But sweeping statements, generally
speaking, are untrue. “Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?” is
a sample of their character.
Nothing is said in the Gospel history of Philip’s parents or occupation.
Most likely he was a fisherman, the general trade of that place. From the
similarity of language used by Philip and Andrew, and their being
repeatedly mentioned together, we may conclude that our apostle, and the
sons of Jonas and Zebedee, were intimate friends, and that they were all
looking and waiting for the expected Messiah. But in the whole circle of
our Lord’s disciples Philip has the honor of being first called. The first
three had come to Christ, and conversed with Him before Philip, but
afterwards they returned to their occupation, and were not called to follow
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the Lord for about a year after. But Philip was called at once. “The day
following,” we read, “Jesus would go forth into Galilee, and findeth Philip,
and saith unto him, Follow me.” These words, so full of meaning and rich
blessing to the soul, “Follow me,” (we believe) were first said to Philip.
When the twelve were specially set apart for their office, he was numbered
among them.
Immediately after his call, he finds Nathanael and leads him to Jesus. It is
evident, from the glad surprise which breathes in his information, that they
had spoken together of these things before. His heart was now well
assured of their truth; hence the joy expressed in these words, “We have
found Him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus
of Nazareth, the Son of Joseph.” There is an evident earnest-
heartedness about Philip, though little is said of him in the Gospels. Our
last interview with him, like the first, is deeply interesting. Having heard
the Lord repeatedly refer to His Father in John 12, 13, & 14, He
manifested a strong desire to know more of the Father. The pathetic words
of our Lord about His Father appear to have made a deep impression on
His heart; and little wonder. “Father, save Me from this hour”; “Father,
glorify Thy name”; “In My Father’s house are many mansions;” are
sayings which, we doubt not, sank deep in all the disciples’ hearts. But
there is a beautiful simplicity about Philip, though lacking in intelligence.
“Philip saith unto Him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.”
There is evident reproof, if not reproach, in the Lord’s reply to Philip.
“Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast
thou not known Me, Philip? he that hath seen Me hath seen the
Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father? Believe Me that I
am in the Father, and the Father in Me; or else believe Me for the very
works’ sake.” There had been the revelation of the Father in His own
Person, and He ought to have known Him. He had now been a long time
with His disciples, and they ought to have seen that He was in the Father,
and the Father in Him, and thus have known where He was going, for He
was going to the Father. They had both the “words” and the “works” of
the Son, to convince them that the Father dwelt in Him. They had heard
His words, they had seen His works, they had witnessed His character;
and these things were fitted and intended to bring the Father before them.
His own Person was the answer to every question. “I am the way, the
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truth, and the life.” He was the way — the only way to the Father. He
was the truth; the truth as to every one and everything, as they are, is only
known by Him. He is the life — “that eternal life, which was with the
Father, and was manifested unto us.” But it is only by the teaching and
power of the Spirit that He who is “the way, the truth, and the life,” is
known and enjoyed. And there must be subjection of heart to Christ, if we
would know the teaching of the Spirit.
After this deeply interesting and instructive conversation with the Lord,
all is uncertain as to Philip’s history — his name disappears from the
Gospel narrative. He has his own place in the catalog, Acts 1:13. Tradition
has so frequently confounded Philip the evangelist with Philip the apostle,
that all is uncertain. No doubt his remaining years were spent in devoted
service to his Lord and Savior, but where it is difficult to say. Some think
that Upper Asia was the scene of his early labors, and that in the latter
period of his life he came to Hierapolis in Phrygia, where he suffered a
cruel martyrdom.
Bartholomew. It has been very generally believed both by ancients and
moderns, that the history of Bartholomew lies concealed under another
name. That he was one of the twelve apostles is perfectly clear from the
Gospel narrative, though nothing more is said of him than the bare mention
of his name. In the first three Gospels Philip and Bartholomew are
mentioned together; in John’s Gospel, it is Philip and Nathanael. This
circumstance has given rise to a very common conjecture, that these are
but different names for the same person. Nothing was more common than
this among the Jews. For example, Simon Peter is called “Bar-jona,” which
simply means — the son of Jona. “Bar-timeus” again, means the son of
Timeus; and “Bar-tholomew” is a name of the same class. These are
merely relative, not proper, names. From this custom being so general
among the Jews, it is often extremely difficult to identify persons in the
Gospel history.
Assuming, then, that Nathanael of John is the Bartholomew of the
synoptical Gospels, we proceed with what we know of his histow. Like
the rest of the apostles, he was a Galilean; he was “of Cana in Galilee.” We
have seen in a former paper, that he was first conducted by Philip to
Christ. On his approach, he was greeted by the Lord with the most
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honorable distinction, “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile.”
He was, no doubt, a man of true simplicity and integrity of character; and
one that “waited for redemption in Israel.” Surprised at our Lord’s most
gracious salutation, and wondering how He could know him at first sight,
“Nathanael saith unto Him, Whence knowest Thou me? Jesus answered
and said unto him, Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under
the figtree, I saw thee.” Solemn, yet blessed thought! he stood before One
— a man — in this world, who knew the secrets of his heart and ways.
Nathanael was now fully convinced of the absolute deity of the Messiah,
and owns Him in His higher glow as “the Son of God” as well as “the king
of Israel.”
The character of Nathanael and his call are considered by many as
typical of the remnant of Israel without guile in the latter day. The
allusion to the fig-tree — the well-known symbol of Israel — confirms
this view of the passage; and so does his beautiful testimony, “Rabbi,
Thou art the Son of God; Thou art the King of Israel.” The spared
remnant, seen and known by the Lord, will thus confess their faith in Him,
as the prophets most fully show. And all those who thus own the
Messiah shall see His universal glow as the Son of man, according to
Psalm 8. That coming day of widespread glow is anticipated by our Lord
in His concluding remarks to Nathanael: “Verily, verily, I say unto you,
Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and
descending upon the Son of man.” Then will the heavens and the earth be
joined together, as if by Jacob’s ladder. But we must now return to the
direct histow of our apostle.
The most distinct and conclusive passage as to his apostleship is John 21.
There we find him in company with the other apostles, to whom our Lord
appeared at the Sea of Tiberias after His resurrection. “There were
together Simon Peter, and Thomas called Didymus, and Nathanael of Cana
in Galilee, and the sons of Zebedee, and two other of His disciples,” who
probably were Andrew and Philip.
There is a generally received tradition, that Bartholomew traveled as far
as India preaching the gospel — probably to that part of India which
lies nearest to Asia. After travelling in different places, seeking to spread
Christianity, he at last reached Albanople in Armenia the Great, a place
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overgrown with idolatry. There he was arrested in the midst of his labors
by the governor of the place, and condemned to be crucified. The date is
not certainly known.
Matthew — called also Levi, the son of Alpheus; but not the same
person, we believe, as Alpheus the father of James. (Matthew 10:3; Mark
2:14; Luke 5:27-29.) Though a Roman officer, he was “a Hebrew of the
Hebrews,” and probably a Galilean, but of what city or tribe we are not
informed. Before his call to follow the Messiah, he was a publican, or tax-
gatherer, under the Romans. He seems to have been stationed at
Capernaum, a maritime town on the Sea of Galilee. He was what we
should call a custom-house officer. It was in this capacity that Jesus
found him. When He passed by, He saw him “sitting at the receipt of
custom, and said unto him, Follow Me. And he arose and followed Him.”
But before proceeding with the history of Matthew, we would say a few
words on the character of his occupation, as it is so frequently mentioned
in the New Testament, and is really a generic term.
Publicans, properly so called, were persons who farmed the Roman taxes
or revenue. They were, usually, persons of wealth and credit. It was
considered among the Romans an honorable position, and generally
conferred on Roman knights. Sabinus (it is said, father of the Emperor
Vespasian), was the publican of the Asiatic provinces. They employed
under them inferior officers, and these, generally, were natives of the
provinces in which the taxes were collected; to this class Matthew no
doubt belonged.
These petty officers were everywhere notorious for their fraudulent
exactions; but to the Jews they were especially odious. The Jews looked
upon themselves as a freeborn people, and that they had this privilege
direct from God Himself. “We be Abraham’s seed,” was their boast, “and
were never in bondage to any man.” Consequently, the Roman tax
gatherers were the visible proofs of their slavery, and of the degraded
state of their nation. This was the chain that galled them, and betrayed
them into many acts of rebellion against the Romans. Hence it was that
publicans were abhorred by the Jews. They looked upon them as traitors
and apostates, and as the ready tools of the oppressor. Besides, they were
most arbitrary and unjust in their taxations; and having the law on their
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side, they could enforce payment. It was in their power to examine each
case of goods exported or imported, and to assess the alleged value in the
most vexatious way. We may gather, from what John said to them, that
they overcharged whenever they had an opportunity. “And He said unto
them, Exact no more than that which is appointed you.” (Luke 3:13.) See
also the case of Zaccheus. (Luke 19:9.)
Surely these things were more than enough to bring the whole class into
the greatest detestation everywhere. But we will confine ourselves to what
we learn of them in the New Testament. The spirit of truth never
exaggerates. There we find them classed with sinners (Matthew 9:11;
11:19); with harlots (Matthew 21:31, 32); with heathen. (Matthew
18:17.) As a class, they were regarded as outside, not only from the
privileges of the sanctuary, but from the privileges of civil society. And
yet, notwithstanding all these disadvantages, their ranks furnished some of
the earliest disciples both of John and of our Lord. They had less
hypocrisy than those who were esteemed better; they had no conventional
morality; and they had no false religion to unlearn. These things may be
fairly argued from the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican. (Luke 18.)
Conventional goodness is a great hindrance to the soul’s salvation. It is
difficult for such to take the place of a lost, ruined sinner, that grace may
have a free course and do her blessed, saving, gracious work. He who
would be justified of God, must take the publican’s place, and offer up
the publican’s prayer, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” We now
return to the history of our apostle.
With great readiness Matthew obeyed the call of Jesus. His lucrative
situation was at once given up; and his conversion, so thorough and
manifest, was accompanied with much blessing to others. There was a
great awakening and interest among his own class. “And Levi made a great
feast in his own house: and there was a great company of publicans and
others that sat down with them.” A feast is the symbol of joy and
rejoicing — the immediate effect of a hearty surrender to Christ. It is
worthy of note that in his own Gospel he gives his well-known name, but
neither of the other evangelists speaks of “Matthew the publican.” Along
with the others he was chosen one of the twelve. From that time he
continued with the Lord like the rest of the apostles. Blessed privilege! —
“a familiar attendant on His person, a spectator of His public and private
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life, a hearer of His sayings and discourses, a beholder of His miracles, a
witness of His resurrection and ascension to glory.” This he does not
testify, though he saw it. Matthew was with the other apostles on the day
of Pentecost, and received the gift of the Holy Ghost. How long he
continued in Judaea after that event, we are not informed. His Gospel is
supposed to be the first that was written, and has a special reference to
Israel.
Ethiopia is generally assigned as the scene of his apostolic labors. There,
some say, by preaching and miracles, he mightily triumphed over error and
idolatry, was the means of the conversion of many, appointed spiritual
guides and pastors to confirm and build them up, and to bring others over
to the faith; and there finished his course. But the sources of information
on these points cannot be trusted.
Thomas. The apostle Thomas was duly called by our Lord to the
apostleship, and he is duly mentioned in the various apostolic lists. Of his
birthplace or parents we are not informed in scripture; but tradition says
he was born at Antioch. All that we know of him with certainty is related
by John. But though our knowledge of Thomas be thus limited, there is no
character among the apostles more distinctly marked than his. In fact, his
name has become, both in the church and in the world, a synonym for
doubting and unbelieving. It is said of a famous artist, when asked to
produce a portrait of the apostle Thomas, that he placed a rule in his hand
for the due measuring of evidence and argument. His mind was
thoughtful, meditative, slow to believe. He looked at all the difficulties
of a question and inclined to take the dark side of things. But we will
glance for a moment at the portrait which the pen of inspiration has drawn
of him in the three following passages.
1. In John 11 his true character distinctly appears. He evidently viewed
the proposed journey of our Lord into Judaea with the darkest
forebodings. “Then said Thomas, which is called Didymus, unto his
fellow-disciples, Let us also go that we may die with Him.” In place of
believing that Lazarus would be raised from the dead, he feared that both
the Lord. and His disciples would meet their own death in Judaea. He
could see nothing arising from such a journey but complete disaster.
Nevertheless, he does not seek to hinder the Lord from going, like the
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other disciples. This too is characteristic. He had deep affection for the
Lord, and such was his devo-tedness that, though the journey should cost
all of them their ].ives, he was willing to go.
2. The second time referred to was after the Last Supper. [John 14.]
Our Lord had been speaking of going away, and of the home He would
prepare for them in heaven; and that He would come again and receive
them unto Himself, so that where He was they should be also. “And
whither I GO YE KNOW,” He added, “and the way ye know.” But to our
apostle’s mind these beautiful promises only awaken dark thoughts of the
unseen, unknown, future. “Thomas saith unto Him, Lord, we know not
whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?” Evidently he was
eager to go, and earnest in his inquiries, but he wanted to be sure of the
way before taking the first step. “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the
truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but by Me.” So long as
the eye is fixed on Christ, we cannot make a false step. It is the single eye
that receives the light of heaven, which sheds its radiance over the whole
path.
3. The third time was after the resurrection. [John 20.] He was absent
when the Lord appeared the first time to the disciples. When they told
him that they had seen the Lord, he obstinately refused to believe what
they said. From what he says, we may fairly gather, that he had seen the
Lord on the cross, and that the overwhelming sight had produced a deep
impression on his mind. “Except I shall see in His hands the print of the
nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into
His side, I will not believe.” The following Lord’s day, when the disciples
were assembled, Jesus appeared, and stood in the midst of them-His own
place as the center of the assembly. He again saluted them in the same
words of peace, “Peace be unto you.” But He at once turned to Thomas,
as if he had been the main object of His appearing that day. “Then saith
He to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold My hands; and reach
hither thy hand, and thrust it into My side; and be not faithless, but
believing.” The effect on Thomas was immediate: all his doubts were
removed, and in true orthodox faith he exclaimed, “My Lord and my
God.” “Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou
hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”
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Some have thought that the faith of Thomas in this instance rises far above
all the other disciples, and that nothing higher in testimony ever dropped
from apostolic lips. This opinion, though a common one, cannot be
founded on the general context. Christ, in reply to Thomas, pronounces
those more blessed who saw not, and yet believed. It can scarcely be
called even Christian faith, as our Lord evidently hints. Christian faith is
believing in Him whom we have not seen — walking by faith, not by sight.
Thomas, we have no doubt, represents the slow, unbelieving mind of
the Jews in the last days, who will believe when they see. [Zechariah
12.] He was not present at the first gathering of the saints after the
resurrection. The reason why we are not told. But who can estimate the
blessing that may be lost because of absence from the sanctioned meetings
of the saints? He missed the blessed revelations of Christ as to
relationship, “My Father, and your Father; my God, and your God.” His
faith is not connected with the position of sonship. “He has not the
communications of the efficacy of the Lord’s work,” as one has said, “and
of the relationship with His Father into which Jesus brings His own, the
church. He has peace, perhaps, but he has missed all the revelation of the
church’s position. How many souls-saved souls, even-are there in these
two conditions!”
The future apostolic labors of Thomas, and the end of his life, are so filled
with traditions or legends, that we know nothing certainly. Some say he
labored in India and some in Persia. His martyrdom, it is said, was
occasioned by a lance, and is still commemorated by the Latin church on
December 21, by the Greek church on October 6, and by the Indians on
July 1.
James — the son of Alpheus. The identification of the Jameses, the
Marys, and the Lord’s brethren, has long been a difficult point with
critics. This would not be the place even to refer to their theories and
arguments. But after looking at different sides of the question, we still
believe that our apostle is the James who was a principal man in the
church at Jerusalem — who is the author of “The General Epistle of
James” — who is also called the Lord’s brother and surnamed “the just,”
and “the less,” probably because he was low in stature. Identification of
persons is extremely difficult in such histories, from the habit, so common
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among the Jews, of calling near relations, brothers and sisters, and from
nearly all of them having two or more names.
In the four lists of the apostles James holds the same place. He heads the
third class. They appear to be in fours. Peter heads the first, Philip the
second, and James the third. Very little is known of James until after the
resurrection. From what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:7, it is evident that
the Lord, before His ascension, honored James with a personal interview.
This was before the day of Pentecost, and may have been for the special
encouragement, guidance, and strengthening of the apostle. We will now
notice the principal passages, from which we gain our knowledge of James.
In the first chapter of the Acts we find him, with the others, waiting for
the promise of the Father, the gift of the Holy Ghost. After this we lose
sight of him, until he is visited by Paul (Galatians 1:18, 19), which would
be about the year A .D . 39. Now we find him equal with Peter as an
apostle. He was at this time the overseer of the church at Jerusalem, and
on a level with the very chiclest apostles. The place he held in Peter’s
estimation appears from the fact, that when he was delivered from prison,
he desires that information of his escape may be sent to “James, and to the
brethren.” (Acts 12:17.)
In A .D . 50 we find him in the apostolic council, where he seems to deliver
the judgment of the assembly.
“Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from
among the Gentiles are turned to God.” (Acts 15.)
None of the other apostles speak in this manner. It would appear that he
had risen greatly in apostolic position and authority. About the year 51,
when Paul paid another visit to Jerusalem, he recognizes James as one of
the “pillars” of the church, and places his name before both Cephas and
John. (Galatians 2:9.) Again, about the year 58, Paul paid a special visit to
James in the presence of all the elders.
“And the day following Paul went in with us to James;
and all the elders were present.” (Acts 21:18.)
It is easily seen from these few notices, that James was held in the very
highest esteem by the other apostles, and that he filled a most important
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position in the church at Jerusalem. His attachment to Judaism was deep
and earnest, and his advancement in Christianity appears to have been
slow and gradual. He was a perfect contrast to Paul; Peter forms a link
between them.
The martyrdom of James is placed at about 62, close upon thirty years
after Pentecost. The testimony of antiquity is universal, as to his
distinguished piety and sanctity. His humility, too, appears great: though
he was the Lord’s brother, or near relation, he styles himself the servant of
Jesus Christ, and does not so much as give himself the title of an apostle.
For the reputation of his holy and righteous life, he was universally styled,
“James the Just.” And as he conformed to Jewish customs with a measure
of regularity, he was by no means so offensive in the eyes of his
unbelieving countrymen, as the apostle of the Gentiles. But
notwithstanding the high opinion that was entertained of his character, his
life was prematurely ended by martyrdom.
For an account of the life, character, and death of James, we are chiefly
indebted to Hegesippus, a Christian of Jewish origin, who lived in the
middle of the second century. He is generally received as a credible
historian. His narrative of the martyrdom of James is given fully, and in
his own words, in Smith’s “Dictionary of the Bible.” We can only give it
in substance.
As many of the rulers and people of the Jews became believers in Jesus,
through the labors of James, the scribes and Pharisees were greatly stirred
up against him. The whole of the people, they said, will believe in Christ.
Therefore they came together to James, and said, “We pray thee, stop the
people, for they have gone astray after Jesus as though He were the
Christ. We pray thee to persuade all that come to the Passover concerning
Jesus. Persuade the people not to go astray about Jesus; for the whole
people, and all of us, give heed unto thee. Stand, therefore, on a pinnacle of
the temple that thou mayest be visible, and that thy words may be heard
by all the people; for all the tribes and even the Gentiles are come together
for the Passover.” But in place of saying what he was told, he proclaimed
with a loud voice in the ears of all the people that Jesus was the true
Messiah, that he firmly believed in Him, that Jesus was now in heaven at
God’s right hand, and that He would come again in power and great glory.
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Many were convinced through the preaching of James and gave glory to
God, crying, “Hosannah to the Son of David.”
When the scribes and Pharisees heard this, they said to each other, “We
have done wrong in bringing forward such a witness to Jesus; let us go up
and throw him down, that the people may be terrified and not believe in
Him.” And they cried out, saying, Even James the Just has gone astray,
and they threw him down. But as he was not killed with the fall, they
began to stone him. Then one of them, who was a fuller, took the club
with which he pressed the clothes, and brought it down on the head of
James. Thus the apostle died, and, like the proto-martyr Stephen, he died
praying for them in a kneeling posture. It was almost immediately after
this that Vespasian commenced the siege of Jerusalem, and the Roman
army turned the whole scene into desolation, blood, and ruin.
Simon Zelotes — also called “Simon the Canaanite.” He seems to be a
different person from Simon the brother of James. We have no account of
him in the Gospel history. He is duly named in the Gospels and in the
Acts, and then disappears from the sacred page.
It is generally supposed that, before his call to be an apostle, he belonged
to a sect among the Jews called “The Zealots.” They were conspicuous
for their fierce advocacy of the Mosaic ritual. They looked upon
themselves as the successors of Phinehas, who, in zeal for the honor of
God, slew Zimri and Cozbi. (Numbers 25.) In pretending to follow the
zeal of the priest of old, they assumed to themselves the right of putting
to death a blasphemer, an adulterer, or any notorious offender, without the
ordinary formalities of the law. They maintained that God had made an
everlasting covenant with Phinehas, and with his seed after him, “because
he was zealous for his God, and made an atonement for Israel.” These high
sounding claims and pretensions deceived both rulers and people for a
time. Besides, their fury and zeal for the law of Moses, and for the
deliverance of the people from the Roman yoke, gave them favor in the
eyes of all the nation. But, as must ever be the case under similar
circumstances, their zeal soon degenerated into all manner of licentiousness
and wild extravagance. They became the pests of every class of society.
Under a pretended zeal for the honor of God, they, charged whom they
would with being guilty of blasphemy, or of some other grievous sin, and
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immediately slew them and seized their property. Josephus tells us that
they failed not to accuse some of the “prime nobility,” and when they had
succeeded in turning everything into confusion, they meantime “fished in
the troubled waters.” He bewails them as the great plagues of the nation.
Attempts were made at different times to suppress the society, but it does
not appear that they were ever much reduced until, with the unbelieving
nation, they were swept away in the fatal siege.
Simon is frequently styled “Simon the Zealot,” and is supposed to have
belonged to this troublesome faction. There may have been true and
sincere men among them, but good and bad alike passed under the odious
name of “Zealots.” Nothing is certainly known of the future labors of our
apostle. Some say that, after travelling for a while in the East, he turned to
the West, and penetrated as far as Britain, where he preached, wrought
miracles, endured many trials, and at last suffered martyrdom.
Judas — the brother of James. This apostle is also called Jude, Thaddeus,
and Lebbeus. These different names have different shades of meaning, but
the examination of such niceties comes not within the range of our “Short
Papers.” Judas was the son of Alpheus, and one of our Lord’s kindred, as
we read in Matthew 13:55,
“Is not His mother called Mary, and His brethren, James, and
Joses, and Simon, and Judas?”
When, or how, he was called to the apostleship we are not informed; and
there is scarcely any mention of him in the New Testament, except in the
different catalogues of the twelve apostles. His name only occurs once in
the Gospel narrative, and that is when he asks the following question,
“Judas saith unto Him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that Thou wilt
manifest Thyself unto us, and not unto the world?” (John 14:22.)
It is quite evident from this question, that he was still entertaining, like his
fellow-disciples, the idea of a temporal kingdom, or the manifestation of
Christ’s power on the earth, such as the world could perceive. But they
understood not yet the dignity of their own Messiah. They were strangers
to the greatness of His power, the glory of His Person, and the spirituality
of His kingdom. His subjects are delivered, not only from this present evil
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world, but from the power of Satan, and from the realm of death and the
grave:
“Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath
translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son.” (Colossians 1:13.)
The answer of Christ to the question of Judas is all-important. He speaks
of the blessings of obedience. The truly obedient disciple shall surely
know the sweetness of fellowship with the Father and the Son, in the light
and power of the Holy Ghost. It is not here a question of the love of God
in sovereign grace to a sinner, but of the Father’s dealings with His
children. Therefore it is in the path of obedience that the manifestation of
the Father’s love and the love of Christ are found. (See verses 23-26.)
But we must bear in mind, when remarking on the questions or sayings of
the apostles, that the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus
was not yet glorified. The thoughts, feelings, and expectations of the
apostles, after that event were altogether changed. Hence we find our
apostle, like his brother James, styling himself, “Jude, the servant of Jesus
Christ, and brother of James.” He neither calls himself an apostle, nor the
Lord’s brother. This was true humility, and founded on a true sense of the
altered relations between them and the exalted Lord. On the day of
Pentecost it was proclaimed, “Therefore let all the house of Israel know
assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified,
both Lord and Christ.”
Nothing is certainly known of the later history of our apostle. Some say
that he first preached in Judaea and Galilee, then through Samaria into
Idumea, and to the cities of Arabia. But towards the end of his course
Persia was the field of his labors, and the scene of his martyrdom.
From 1 Corinthians 9:5 it may be fairly inferred that he was one of the
married apostles.
“Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as other
apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?”
There is a tradition about two of his grandsons, which is both interesting
and apparently true. It has been handed down by Eusebius from
Hegesippus, a converted Jew. Domitian, the Emperor, having heard that
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there were some of the line of David, and kindred of Christ still alive,
moved with jealousy, ordered them to be seized and brought to Rome.
Two grandsons of Jude were brought before him. They frankly confessed
that they were of the line of David, and kindred of Christ. He asked them
about their possessions and estates. They told him they had but a few
acres of land, out of the fruits of which they paid him tribute and
maintained themselves. Their hands were examined, and were found rough
and callous with labor. He then inquired of them concerning the kingdom
of Christ, and when and where it would come. To this they replied, that it
was a heavenly and spiritual, not a temporal kingdom; and that it would
not be manifested till the end of the world. The Emperor, being satisfied
that they were poor men and harmless, dismissed them unbound, and
ceased from his general persecution of the church. When they returned to
Palestine, they were received by the church with great affection, as being
nearly allied to the Lord, and as having nobly confessed His name — His
kingdom, power, and glory.
Matthias — the apostle elected to fill the place of the traitor Judas. He
was not an apostle of the first election — immediately called and chosen
by the Lord Himself. It is more than probable that he was one of the
seventy disciples, and had been a constant attendant upon the Lord Jesus
during the whole course of His ministry. This was a necessary
qualification, as declared by Peter, of one who was to be a witness of the
resurrection. So far as we know, the name of Matthias occurs in no other
place in the New Testament.
According to some ancient traditions, he preached the gospel and suffered
martyrdom in Ethiopia; others believe that it was rather in Cappadocia.
Thus the great founders of the church were allowed to pass away from
earth to heaven without a reliable pen to chronicle their labors — their last
days — their last sayings, or even the resting-place of the body. But all are
chronicled in heaven, and will be held in everlasting remembrance. How
marvellous are the ways of God, and how unlike they are to the ways of
men!
The manner of this apostle’s election was by lot — an ancient Jewish
custom. The lots were put into the urn, Matthias’ name was drawn out,
and thereby he was the divinely chosen apostle. “And they appointed
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two, Joseph, called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias.
And they prayed, and said, Thou, Lord, which knowest the hearts of all
men, show whether of these two Thou hast chosen... And they gave forth
their lots; and the lot fell upon Matthias; and he was numbered with the
eleven apostles.” The solemn mode of casting lots was regarded as a way
of referring the decision to God. “And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two
goats; one lot for the Lord, and the other lot for the scapegoat.” “The lot is
cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord.”
(Leviticus 16:8; Proverbs 16:33.) The apostles, it will be remembered, had
not yet received the gift of the Holy Ghost. The lot was never repeated
after the day of Pentecost.
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CHAPTER 5
THE APOSTLE PAUL

Having briefly sketched the lives of the twelve apostles, we naturally come
to what may be called the thirteenth — the Apostle Paul.
In chapter three 1 we have spoken of the “conversion,” and of the
“apostleship” of Paul. We will now endeavor to trace his wonderful path,
and note some of the prominent features of his labors. But, first of all, we
would gather up what we know of him

BEFORE HIS CONVERSION

It is very evident, from the few hints that we have in the sacred narrative
of the early life of Paul, that he was formed in a remarkable manner by the
whole course of his education for what he was to become, and for what he
was to accomplish. This was of God, who watched over the development
of that wonderful mind and heart, from the earliest period. (Galatians
1:16.) Then he was known as “Saul of Tarsus” — this being his Jewish
name — the name given him by his Jewish parents. Paul was his Gentile
name; but we will speak of him as “Saul” until he is named “Paul” by the
sacred historian.
Tarsus was the capital of Cilicia, and, as Paul says, “no mean city.” It
was renowned as a place of commerce, and as a seat of literature. The
tutors of both Augustus and Tiberius were men, of Tarsus. But it will be
chiefly famous to all time as the birthplace and early residence of the great
apostle.
But, though born in a Gentile city, he was “an Hebrew of the Hebrews.”
His father was of the tribe of Benjamin, and of the sect of the Pharisees,
but settled at Tarsus. By some means he had acquired the Roman
franchise, as his son could say to the chief captain, “But I was free-born.”
At Tarsus he learned the trade of tent-making. It was a wholesome custom
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among the Jews, to teach their sons some trade, though there might be
little prospect of their depending upon it for their living.
When Paul made his defense before his countrymen, (Acts 22) he tells
them that though born in Tarsus, he had been brought up “at the feet of
Gamaliel, and taught according to the perfect manner of the law of the
fathers.” History speaks of Gamaliel as one of the most eminent of the
doctors of the law; and from the scriptures we learn that he was moderate
in his opinions, and possessed of much worldly wisdom. But the
persecuting zeal of the pupil soon appears in strong contrast with the
master’s counsels for toleration.
At the time of Stephen’s martyrdom, Saul is spoken of as yet a young
man, but as consenting to Stephen’s death, and as keeping the clothes of
them that stoned him. His conversion is supposed to have taken place
about two years after the crucifixion; but the exact date is unknown.
From Acts 9 we learn that he made no delay, after his conversion, in
confessing his faith in Christ to those that were around him. “Then was
Saul certain days with the disciples which were at Damascus. And
straightway he preached Christ in the synagogue, that He is the Son of
God.” This new testimony is specially worthy of notice. Peter had
proclaimed Him as the exalted Lord and Christ; Paul proclaims Him in His
higher and personal glory, as the Son of God. But the time for his public
ministry had not yet come; he had many things to learn, and, led of the
Spirit, he retires into Arabia, remains there for three years, and returns to
Damascus. (Galatians 1:17.)
Strengthened and confirmed in the faith during his retirement, he preaches
with increased boldness, proving that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.
The Jews, his unrelenting enemies henceforward, are stirred up against
him. And they watched the gates day and night to kill him. But the
disciples took him by night, and let him down by the wall in a basket. (2
Corinthians 11:32, 33.) He then found his way to Jerusalem; and through
the friendly testimony of Barnabas he found his place among the disciples.
Wonderful, blessed triumph of sovereign grace!
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SAUL’S FIRST VISIT TO JERUSALEM ABOUT A.D. 39
The apostle is now at Jerusalem — the holy city of his fathers — the
metropolis of the Jews’ religion, and the acknowledged center of
Christianity. But how changed his own position since he started on his
memorable journey to Damascus!
We may here pause for a moment, and notice in passing the hoary city of
Damascus. It is intimately connected with the conversion, ministry, and
history of our apostle. Besides, it is conspicuous all through scripture.
Damascus is supposed to be the oldest city in the world. According to
Josephus (Ant. 1.6, 4) it was founded by Uz, the son of Aram, and
grandson of Shem. It is first mentioned in scripture in connection with
Abraham, whose steward was a native of the place: “The steward of my
house is this Eliezer of Damascus.” (Genesis 15:2.) It is thus a connecting
link between the patriarchal age and modern times. Its beauty and richness
have been proverbial for full four thousand years. The kings of Nineveh,
Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome have conquered it, and it has
prospered under every dynasty, and outlived them all; but it owes its chief
lustre and its everlasting memorial to the name of the Apostle Paul.2
We now return to Jerusalem. After spending fifteen days with Peter and
James, and reasoning with the Grecians, the brethren
“brought him down to Caesarea, and sent him forth to Tarsus. Then
had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria,
and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the
comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.” (Acts 9:30, 31.)
For the moment the adversary is silenced. Peace reigns, through the
goodness of God. Persecution has accomplished the purposes of His grace.
The two great elements of blessing — the fear of the Lord, and the comfort
of the Holy Ghost — prevail in all the assemblies. Walking in the fear of
the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, they are edified, and their
numbers greatly increase.
While Saul was at Tarsus, his native place, the good work of the Lord was
making great progress at Antioch. Among those that were scattered abroad
through the persecution which arose about Stephen, there were
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“men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which, when they were come to
Antioch, spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus. And
the hand of the Lord was with them; and a great number believed
and turned unto the Lord.” (Acts 11:19-21.)
A new order of things commences here. Up to this time, the gospel had
been preached to “none but unto the Jews only.” When the report of this
blessed work of God among the Gentiles reached Jerusalem, Barnabas was
sent by the church on a special mission to Antioch.
“When he came, and had seen the grace of God, was glad and
exhorted them all, that with purpose of heart they would cleave
unto the Lord. For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost
and of faith: and much people was added unto the Lord.”
As the work increased, Barnabas — no doubt, feeling the need of help —
thought of Saul; and, led of the Lord, he departed at once in search of him.
Having found him, he brought him to Antioch; and there they labored
together for a “whole: year,” both in the assemblies of believers, and
among the people. Barnabas still takes the lead. Hence we read of
“Barnabas and Saul.” Afterwards the order changes, and we read of “Paul
and Barnabas.”
An opportunity soon occurred for the young converts at Antioch to show
their affection for their brethren at Jerusalem. A prophet, “named Agabus,
signified by the Spirit that there should be a great dearth throughout all the
world: which came to pass in the days of Claudius Caesar. Then the
disciples, every man according to his ability, determined to send relief unto
the brethren which dwelt at Judaea; which also they did, and sent it to the
elders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul.”

SAUL’S SECOND VISIT TO JERUSALEM ABOUT A.D. 44

Charged with this service Barnabas and Saul go up to Jerusalem. As yet,
Jerusalem is owned as the center of the work, though now rapidly
extending to the Gentiles. But union is preserved, and the link with the
metropolis is strengthened by means of the collection now sent.
Nevertheless a new center, a new commission, a new character of power,
in connection with the history of the church, now come before us.
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Barnabas and Saul, having fulfilled their ministry, return again to Antioch,
bringing with them John, whose surname was Mark.
Acts 13 opens up before us an entirely new order of things in connection
with apostolic work, and we shall do well to mark the mighty change. The
great fact here to be noted is the place that the Holy Ghost takes in calling
out and sending forth Barnabas and Saul. It is no longer Christ upon earth
by His personal authority sending forth apostles; but the Holy Ghost.
“Separate me,” He says, “Barnabas and Saul for the work
whereunto I have called them... So they, being sent forth by the
Holy Ghost, departed unto Seleucia; and from thence they sailed to
Cyprus.”
Not, of course, that there could be any change as to the authority or power
of either the Lord or the Spirit, but their mode of action was now changed.
The Holy Ghost on earth, in connection with a glorified Christ in heaven,
now becomes the source and power of the work that opens before us, and
which is committed to Barnabas and Saul. Hence we now come to

SAUL’S FIRST MISSIONARY JOURNEY ABOUT A.D. 48

And here, further remark, before setting out with the apostles on their
journey, how changed everything is. They start, observe, not from the old
center, Jerusalem, but from Antioch, a city of the Gentiles. This is
significant. Jerusalem and the twelve have lost position as to outward
authority and power. The Holy Ghost calls Barnabas and Saul to the
work, fits them for it, and sends them forth, without the jurisdiction of the
twelve.
It will not be expected that, in papers of such a brief character, we can
notice the many incidents in Paul’s journeys. The reader will find them in
the Acts and in the Epistles. We purpose merely to trace their outline, and
to give prominence to certain landmarks, by which the reader will be able
to trace for himself the various journeyings of the greatest apostle — the
greatest missionary — the greatest laborer that ever lived, the blessed Lord
excepted. But in the first place, we would notice his companions and their
starting-point.
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Barnabas has been for some time the close companion of Saul. He was a
Levite of the island of Cyprus. He had been early called to follow Christ,
and “having land, sold it, and brought the money and laid it at the
apostles’ feet.” Comparing his liberality with the fine testimony which the
Holy Ghost renders to him, he stands before us as a lovely and an
exquisite character. And, from his early attachment to Saul, and from his
heartiness in introducing him to the other apostles, we judge that he was
more frank and larger-hearted than those who had been trained in the
narrowness of Judaism; but, he lacked in service the thoroughness and
determination of his companion Saul.
John Mark was nearly related to Barnabas — “his sister’s son.”
(Colossians 4:10.) His mother was a certain Mary who dwelt at Jerusalem,
and whose house seems to have been a meeting place for the apostles and
first Christians. When Peter was delivered from prison, he went straight to
“the house of Mary the mother of John whose surname was Mark.” (Acts
12.) It is supposed that on this occasion he was converted through Peter’s
means, for he afterwards speaks of him as “Marcus my son.” (1 Peter
5:13.)
From these notices we learn, that he was neither an apostle nor one of the
seventy — that he had not companied with the blessed Lord during His
public ministry. But we may suppose he was anxious to work for Christ,
and so joined Barnabas and Saul; though it afterwards appeared that his
faith was not equal to the hardships of a missionary life.
“Now when Paul and his company loosed from Paphos, they came
to Perga in Pamphylia: and John departing from them: returned to
Jerusalem.” (Acts 13:13.)
Mark is supposed to have written his Gospel about A .D . 63.
Antioch, the ancient capital of the Seleucidae, was founded by Seleucus
Nicator about B.C. 300. It was a city only second to Jerusalem in the early
history of the church. What Jerusalem had hitherto been to the Jews,
Antioch now became to the Gentiles. It was a central point. From this
time it occupied a most important place in the propagation of Christianity
among the heathen. Here the first Gentile church was planted. (Acts 11:20,
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21.) Here the disciples of Christ were first called Christians. (Chap.
11:26.) And here our apostle commenced his public ministerial work.
We now return to the mission.
Barnabas and Saul, with John Mark as their ministering attendant, are thus
sent forth by the Holy Ghost. The Jews in virtue of their connection with
the promises, have the gospel first preached to them; but the conversion of
Sergius Paulus marks, in a special manner, the beginning of the work
amongst the Gentiles. It also marks a crisis in the history of the apostle.
Here his name is changed from Saul to Paul; and now — save in Jerusalem
(Acts 15:12-22) — it is no longer “Barnabas and Saul,” but “Paul and his
company.” He takes the lead; the others are only those who are with Paul.
But the scene has also a typical character.
The Pro-consul was evidently a thoughtful, prudent man, and felt the need
of his soul. He sends for Barnabas and Saul, and desires to hear the word
of God. But Elymas the sorcerer withstands them. He knew well that, if
the governor received the truth that Paul preached, he would lose his
influence at court. He therefore seeks to turn away the deputy from the
faith. But Paul, in the conscious dignity and power of the Holy Ghost,
“set his eyes on him,” and, in words of the most withering indignation,
rebuked him in the presence of the governor. “O full of all subtilty and all
mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness, wilt thou
not cease to pervert the right ways of the Lord? And now, behold, the
hand of the Lord is upon thee, and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun
for a season... Then the deputy, when he saw what was done, believed,
being astonished at the doctrine of the Lord.” The mighty power of God
accompanies the word of His servant, and the sentence pronounced is
executed at the moment. The deputy is overwhelmed with the moral glory
of the scene, and submits to the gospel.
“I do not doubt,” says one, “that in this wretched Bar-jesus we see
a picture of the Jews at the present time, smitten with blindness
for a season, because jealous of the influence of the gospel. In order
to fill up the measure of their iniquity, they withstood its being
preached to the Gentiles. Their condition is judged; their history
given in the mission of Paul. Opposed to grace and seeking to
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destroy its effect upon the Gentiles — they have been smitten
with blindness; nevertheless, only for a season.”3
During this first mission among the Gentiles, a great and blessed work was
done. Compare Acts 13 & 14. Many places were visited, churches were
planted, elders were appointed, the hostility of the Jews manifested, and
the energy of the Holy Ghost displayed in the power and progress of the
truth. At Lystra, Christianity was confronted, for the first time, with
paganism; but in every place the gospel triumphs, and the various gifts of
Paul as a workman, most blessedly appear. In addressing either the Jews
who knew the scriptures, or ignorant barbarians, or cultivated Greeks, or
enraged mobs, he proves himself to be a chosen vessel divinely fitted for
his great work.
Antioch in Pisidia deserves a special notice from what took place in the
synagogue. Though there is a strong resemblance in Paul’s discourse to
those of Peter and of Stephen in the earlier chapters of the Acts, yet we
discover certain touches strictly Pauline in their character. His conciliatory
style of address, the way he introduces Christ, and his bold proclamation
of justification by faith alone, may be considered as typical of his after
addresses and Epistles. None of the sacred writers speaks of justification
by faith as Paul does. His closing appeal has been a favorite gospel text
with all preachers in all ages. In a few words he states the blessedness of
all who receive Christ, and the awful doom of those who reject Him;
thereby proving that there can be no middle or neutral ground, when Christ
is in question. “Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that
through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: and by
Him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not
be justified by the law of Moses. Beware therefore, lest that come upon
you, which is spoken of in the prophets: Behold, ye despisers, and
wonder, and perish: for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall
in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you.” (Acts 13:38-41.)
Their mission being fulfilled, they return to Antioch in Syria. When the
disciples heard what the Lord had done, and that the door of faith was
opened to the Gentiles, they could only praise and bless His holy name.
We must now turn for a moment to Jerusalem.
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The effect of Paul’s first mission on the disciples at Jerusalem led to a
great crisis in the history of the church. The jealousy of the pharisaic mind
was so aroused, that a division between Jerusalem and Antioch was
threatened at that early period of the church’s history. But God ruled in
grace, and the matter as to Antioch was happily settled. But the bigotry of
the believing Jews was unquenchable. In the church at Jerusalem they still
connected with Christianity the requirements of the law, and these
requirements they sought to impose on the believing Gentiles.
Some of the more strictly Jewish-minded Christians came down to
Antioch, and assured the Gentiles that, unless they were circumcised after
the manner of Moses, and kept the law, they could not be saved. Paul and
Barnabas had no small dissension and disputation with them; but as it was
too weighty a question to be settled by the apostolic authority of Paul, or
by a resolution of the church at Antioch, it was agreed that a deputation
should go up to Jerusalem, and lay the matter before the twelve apostles
and the elders there. The choice naturally fell on Paul and Barnabas, as
they had been the most active in the propagation of Christianity among
the Gentiles.
And now we come to

PAUL’S THIRD VISIT TO JERUSALEM ABOUT A.D. 50.

When they arrived at Jerusalem, they found the same thing, not only in the
minds of a few restless brethren, but in the very bosom of the church. The
source of the trouble was there, not among unbelieving Jews, but among
those who professed the name of Jesus. “But there rose up certain of the
sect of the Pharisees which believed saying, That it was needful to
circumcise them [the Gentiles], and to command them to keep the law of
Moses.” This plain statement brought the whole question fairly before the
assembly, and their important deliberations commenced. Chapter 15
contains the account of what took place and how the question was settled.
The apostles, elders, and the whole body of the church at Jerusalem were
not only present with one accord, but took part in the discussion. The
apostles neither assumed nor exercised exclusive power in the matter. It is
usually called “The first Council of the Church;” but it may also be called
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the last council of the church which could say, “It seemed good to the
Holy Ghost, and to us.”
Many, according to modern notions of “essentials, and nonessentials,” will
no doubt say, that the mere ceremony of circumcising or not circumcising a
child was rather unimportant. But not so, according to the mind of God. It
was a vital question. It affected the very foundations of Christianity, the
deep principles of grace, and the whole question of man’s relations with
God. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians is a commentary on the history of
this question.
There was no rite or ceremony that the converted Jew was so unwilling to
give up as circumcision. It was the sign and seal of his own relationship
with Jehovah, and of the hereditary blessings of the covenant to his
children. It has been the opinion of some in all ages, that “infant baptism”
was introduced by the church to meet this strong Jewish prejudice. But
had it been so intended by the Lord, the council at Jerusalem was the very
place to announce it. It would have fully met the difficulty, and settled the
question before them, and restored peace and unity between the two
parent churches. But none of the apostles or others allude to it.
Before leaving this important and suggestive part of our apostle’s history,
it may be well just to notice certain facts which he brings out in Galatians
2, but which are not mentioned in the Acts. It was on this occasion that
Paul went up by revelation, and took Titus with him. In the Acts we
have the outward history of Paul yielding to the motives, desires, and
objects of men; in the Epistle we have something deeper — that which
governed the apostle’s heart. But God knows how to combine these
outward circumstances and the inward guidance of the Spirit. Christian
liberty or legal bondage was the question at issue: whether the law of
Moses — in particular the rite of circumcision — ought to be imposed
upon the Gentile converts. Paul, led of God, goes up to Jerusalem, and
takes Titus with him. In the face of the twelve apostles, and of the whole
church, he brings in Titus who was a Greek, and who had not been
circumcised. This was a bold step — to introduce a Gentile, and
uncircumcised, into the very center of a bigoted Judaism! But the apostle
went up by revelation. He had positive communications from God on the
subject. It was the divine way of deciding the question, once and for ever,
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between himself and the Judaizing Christians. This step was needful, as he
says, “Because of false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily
to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might
bring us into bondage: to whom we gave place by subjection, no, not for an
hour; that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.”
The apostle, then, having attained his main object, and having
communicated his gospel to them at Jerusalem, leaves, with Barnabas, and
returns to the Gentile Christians at Antioch. The two delegates, Judas and
Silas, bearing the decrees of the council, accompany them. When the
multitude of the disciples came together and heard the epistle read, they
rejoiced and were comforted.
Thus closed the first apostolic council, and the first apostolic controversy.
And, from what we learn of these matters in the Acts, we might conclude
that the division between the Jewish and Gentile Christians had been
completely healed by the decision of the assembly; but we know from the
Epistles, that the opposition of the Judaizing party, against the liberty of
Gentile Christians, never even slumbered. It soon broke out afresh, and
Paul had constantly to meet it and to contend against it.

PAUL’S SECOND MISSIONARY JOURNEY ABOUT A.D. 51

After Paul and Barnabas had spent some time with the church at Antioch,
another missionary journey was proposed.
“Let us go again,”
said Paul,
“and visit our brethren in every city where we have preached the
word of the Lord and see how they do. And Barnabas determined
to take with them John whose surname was Mark. But Paul
thought not good to take him with them, who departed from them
from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work. And the
contention was so sharp between them, that they departed asunder
one from the other: and so Barnabas took Mark and sailed unto
Cyprus; and Paul chose Silas, and departed, being recommended by
the brethren unto the grace of God. And he went through Syria and
Cilicia, confirming the churches.” (Chapter 15:36-41.)
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With a journey so important, so full of trials, and so requiring courage and
steadfastness — before the mind of our apostle — he could not trust
Mark as a companion; he could not easily excuse one whose home
attachments rendered him unfaithful in the Lord’s service. Paul himself
gave up all personal considerations and feelings when the work of Christ
was concerned, and he wished others to do the same. Natural affection on
this occasion may have betrayed Barnabas into again pressing his nephew
into the service; but a severe earnestness characterised Paul. The ties of
natural relationship and human attachments had still great influence over
the mild christian character of Barnabas. This is evident from his conduct
at Antioch on the occasion of Peter’s weak compliance with the Judaizers
from Jerusalem. (Galatians 2.) The spread of the gospel in the hostile
world was too sacred in Paul’s eyes to admit of experiments. Mark had
preferred Jerusalem to the work, but Silas preferred the work to Jerusalem.
This decided Paul as to his choice; though, no doubt, he was guided by the
Spirit.
Barnabas takes Mark his kinsman, and sails to Cyprus his native
country. And here we part with Barnabas, that beloved saint and precious
servant of Christ! His name is not again mentioned in the Acts. These
words “kinsman” and “native country” must be left to speak for
themselves to the heart of every disciple who reads these pages. Were we
meditating on this painful scene, in place of giving a mere outline of a great
history, we might say much on the subject; but we leave it with two
happy reflections.
1. That it was overruled for blessing to the heathen; the waters of life
now flow in two streams in place of one. This, however, is God’s
goodness, and gives no sanction to the divisions of Christians.
2. That Paul afterwards speaks of Barnabas with entire affection; and
desires that Mark should come to him, having found him profitable for
the ministry. (1 Corinthians 9:6; 2 Timothy 4:11.) We have no doubt
that Paul’s faithfulness was made a blessing to them both. But the
honey of human affections can never be accepted on the altar of God.
Having been recommended by the brethren unto the grace of God, they
start on their journey. All is beautifully simple. No parade is made by
their friends in seeing them off, and no great promises are made by them,
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as to what they were determined to do. “Let us go again and visit our
brethren,” are the few, simple, unpretending words, which lead to Paul’s
second and great missionary journey. But the master was thinking of His
servants and providing for them. They had not to go far before finding a
new companion in Timotheus of Lystra; and one who was to supply the
void caused by the difference with Barnabas. If Paul lost the fellowship of
Barnabas as a friend and brother, he found in Timothy, as his own son in
the faith, a sympathy and a fellowship which only closed with the
apostle’s life. “Him would Paul have to go forth with him,” but before
they go, Paul “circumcised him because of the Jews which were in those
quarters; for they knew all that his father was a Greek.” Paul, on this
occasion, stoops to the prejudice of the Jews, and circumcises Timothy to
set it aside.
Timotheus, or Timothy, was the son of one of those mixed marriages,
which have ever been strongly condemned both in the Old and in the New
Testament. His father was a Gentile, but his name is never mentioned; his
mother was a pious Jewess. From the absence of any reference to the
father, either in the Acts or in the Epistles, it has been supposed that he
may have died soon after the child was born. Timothy was evidently left
in infancy to the sole care of his mother Eunice and his grandmother Lois,
who taught him from a child to know the Holy Scriptures. And from the
many allusions in Paul’s Epistles to the tenderness, the sensitiveness, and
the tears of his beloved son in the faith, we may believe that he retained
through life the early impressions of that gentle, loving, holy, household.
Paul’s wonderful love for Timothy, and his tender recollections of his
home at Lystra, and his early training there, have dictated some of the
most touching passages in the writings of the great apostle. When an old
man — in prison, in want, and martyrdom before him — he writes,
“To Timothy, my dearly beloved son: Grace, mercy, and peace,
from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. I thank God,
whom I serve from my forefathers with pure conscience, that
without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night
and day; greatly desiring to see thee, being mindful of thy tears,
that I may be filled with joy; when I call to remembrance the
unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother
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Lois, and thy mother Eunice: and I am persuaded that in thee also.”
(2 Timothy 1:2-5.)
He urges, and repeats his urgent invitation to Timothy to come and see
him. “Do thy diligence to come shortly unto me” — “to come before
winter.” We may be permitted to believe, that a son so tenderly loved, was
allowed to arrive in time to soothe the last hours of his father in Christ, to
receive his last counsel and blessing, and to witness him finish his course
with joy.
Silas, or Silvanus, first comes before us as a teacher in the church at
Jerusalem; and probably he was both a Hellenist and a Roman citizen like
Paul himself. (Acts 16:37.) He was appointed as a delegate to accompany
Paul and Barnabas on their return to Antioch with the decrees of the
council. But as many details both in the life of Timothy and of Silas will
naturally come before us in tracing the path of the apostle, we need say
nothing more of either at present. We will now proceed with the journey.
Paul and Silas, with their new companion, go through the cities, enjoining
them to keep the decrees ordained by the apostles and elders at Jerusalem.
The decrees were left with the churches, so that the Jews had the decision
of Jerusalem itself, that the law was not binding on the Gentiles. After
visiting and confirming the churches already planted in Syria and Cilicia,
they proceeded to Phrygia and Galatia. They traveled “throughout Phrygia
and the region of Galatia.” Here we pause for a moment and wonder as we
transcribe such words as these, “throughout Phrygia and the region of
Galatia.” Phrygia and Galatia were not towns merely, but provinces, or
large districts of country. And yet the sacred historian only uses these few
words in recording the great work done there. How different is the
condensed energy of the Spirit, from the inflated style of man! We learn
from Neander’s history, that in Phrygia alone, in the sixth century, there
were sixty-two towns. And it would appear that Paul and those who were
with him had gone through all then existing.
The same remarks as to labor would apply to Galatia. And we learn from
Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians, that at this very time he was suffering in
body. “Ye know how through infirmity of the flesh I preached the gospel
unto you at the first.” But the power of his preaching so strikingly
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contrasted with the infirmity of his flesh, that the Galatians were moved
even to extravagance in sympathy and generous feeling.
“And my temptation which was in my flesh ye despised not, nor
rejected; but received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.
Where is then the blessedness ye spake of? for I bear you record,
that, if it had been possible, ye would have plucked out your own
eyes and have given them to me.” (Chap 4:13-15.)
We learn from history that the Galatians were Celtic in their origin,
impulsive and changeable in their character.4 The whole Epistle is a
sorrowful illustration of their instability, and of the sad effects of the
Judaizing element amongst them. “I marvel,” says Paul, “that ye are so
soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto
another gospel: which is not another; but there be some that trouble you,
and would pervert the gospel of Christ.” But to return to the history in the
Acts.
The character and effects of Paul’s ministry, as related in chapters 16-20
are truly marvelous. They must ever stand alone on the page of all history.
Every servant of Christ, and especially the preacher, should study them
most carefully and read them frequently. “The vessel of the Spirit,” as one
has beautifully said, “shines with a heavenly light throughout the whole
work of the gospel; he condescends at Jerusalem; thunders in Galatia when
souls are being perverted, leads the apostles to decide for the liberty of the
Gentiles, and uses all liberty himself to be as a Jew to the Jews, and as
without law to those who had no law, as not under law, but always
subject to Christ. He was also ‘void of offense.’ Nothing within hindered
his communion with God, whence he drew his strength to be faithful
among men. He could say, and none but he, ‘Be ye imitators of me as I am
of Christ.’ Thus also he could say, ‘I endure all things for the elect’s sake,
that they may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal
glory.’”5
The way of the Spirit with the apostle in these chapters is also
remarkable. He alone directs him in his wonderful course, and sustains him
amidst many trials and opposing circumstances. For example, He forbids
Paul to preach the word in Asia — He will not suffer him to go into
Bithynia, but directs him by a vision of the night to go into Macedonia.
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“And a vision appeared to Paul in the night; There stood a man of
Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia and
help us. And after he had seen the vision, immediately we endeavored
to go into Macedonia, assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us
for to preach the gospel unto them. Therefore loosing from Troas, we
came with a straight course to Samothracia, and the next day to
Neapoils. And from thence to Philippi, which is the chief city of that
part of Macedonia, and a colony.” (Chapter 16:9-12.)

PAUL CARRIES THE GOSPEL INTO EUROPE

This marks a distinct epoch in the history of the church-the history of
Paul, and the progress of Christianity. Paul and his companions now carry
the gospel into Europe. And here we may be forgiven if we rest for a
moment and recall the many interesting historical associations of
Macedonian conquerors and conquests; and to dwell a little on the plain of
Philippi, famous also in Roman history. Here the great struggle between
the republic and the empire was terminated. To commemorate that event,
Augustus founded a colony at Philippi. This was the first city at which
Paul arrived on his entrance into Europe. It is called “the chief’ city of that
part of Macedonia, and a colony.” A Roman colony, we are told, was
characteristically a miniature resemblance of Rome; and Philippi was more
fit than any other in the empire to be considered the representative of
Imperial Rome.
To many of our young and inquiring readers, this short digression, we feel
sure, will not be uninteresting. Besides, a knowledge of such histories is
useful to the student of prophecy, as they are the fulfillment of Daniel’s
visions, especially of chapter 7. The city of Philippi was itself the
monument of the rising power of Greece, that was to crush the declining
power of Persia. Alexander the Great, son of Philip, was the conqueror of
the great king Darius; when the “Leopard” of Greece overcame the “Bear
of Persia.6
In looking back from the time that Paul sailed from Asia to Europe, nearly
four hundred years had passed away since Alexander sailed from Europe
to Asia. But how different their motives and their objects — their conflicts
and their victories! The enthusiasm of Alexander was aroused by the
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recollection of his great ancestors, and by his determination to overthrow
the great dynasties of the East; but, though unconsciously and
unintentionally, he was accomplishing the purposes of God. Paul had
girded on his armor for another purpose, and to win greater and more
enduring victories. He was sent forth by the Holy Spirit, not only to
subdue the West, but to bring the whole world into captivity to the
obedience of Christ. Christianity is not for one nation or one people only,
but for man universally; even as Paul himself expresses it in Colossians l,
“For every creature which is under heaven.” This is the mission of the
gospel, and this is its sphere.
But there is another thing we must notice here before proceeding with
Paul’s journey.
Luke, the “beloved physician,” historian, and evangelist, appears to have
joined Paul at this particular time. From verse 10 he writes in the first
person plural: “We endeavored to go into Macedonia.” It is supposed that
he was a Gentile by birth and converted at Antioch. He seems to have
remained the faithful companion of the apostle till the close of his labors
and his afflictions. (2 Timothy 4:11.)

THE EFFECT OF PAUL’S PREACHING AT PHILIPPI

The number of Jews at Philippi appears to have been small, as there was
no synagogue in the place. But the apostle, as usual, goes first to them,
even when it is only a few women come together by the river side. (Acts
16.) Paul preaches to them, Lydia is converted, the door is opened, and
others also believe. It was in this unpretending place, and to those few
pious women, that the gospel was first preached in Europe, and the first
household baptized.7 But its quiet beginnings, and its peaceful triumphs,
were soon to be disturbed by the malice of Satan and the covetousness of
man. The gospel was not to be advanced in the midst of heathenism with
ease and comfort, but with great opposition and suffering.
As the apostle and his companion were going to the oratory, or place of
prayer, a damsel possessed of an evil spirit followed them, and cried,
saying, “These men are the servants of the most high God, which show
unto us the way of salvation.” At first, Paul took no notice of her. He
went on with his own blessed work of preaching Christ, and winning souls
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for Him. But the poor possessed slave persisted in following them, and in
uttering the same exclamation. It was a malicious attempt of the enemy to
hinder the work of God by bearing a testimony to the ministers of the
word. It will be observed that she does not bear testimony to “Jesus,” or
to the “Lord,” but to His “servants,” and to “the most high God.” But
Paul did not want a testimony to himself, nor a testimony from an evil
spirit, and he, “being grieved, turned and said to the spirit, I command thee
in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And he came out the same
hour.”
As the damsel could no longer practice her arts of soothsaying, her masters
saw themselves deprived of the gains which they had hitherto derived
from that source. Enraged at the loss of their property, and moving the
multitude to side with them, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them
before the magistrates. As they were well aware that they had no real
charge to bring against them, they raised the old cry of “troubling the
peace” — that they were attempting to introduce Jewish practices into the
Roman colony, and to teach customs which were contrary to the Roman
laws. And, as it has often been since, the clamor of the multitude was
accepted in the place of evidence, examination, and deliberation. The
magistrates, without further inquiry, commanded them to be publicly
scourged and cast into prison. And thus it was; these blessed servants of
God, wounded, bleeding, and faint, were handed over to a cruel jailor to
keep them safely, and he added to their sufferings by making their feet fast
in the stocks. But in place of Paul and Silas being depressed by their
bodily sufferings and the gloomy walls of a prison, they rejoiced that they
were counted worthy to suffer shame and pain for the sake of Christ; and
in place of the silence of midnight being broken with the sighs and groans
of the prisoners, they “prayed and sang praises to God: and the prisoners
heard them.”
If Satan is not without resources to carry on his evil work, God is not
without resources to carry on His good work. He now makes use of all
that has happened to direct the progress of the work of the gospel, and to
accomplish the purposes of His love. The jailor is to be converted, the
church is to be gathered out, and a witness set up for the Lord Jesus
Christ, in the very stronghold of heathenism. At midnight, while Paul and
Silas were singing, and the prisoners listening to the unusual sound, there
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was a great earthquake. God enters the scene in majesty and grace. He
utters His voice, and the earth trembles: the prison walls are shaken; the
doors fly open, and every man’s fetters fall off. And now, what are chains
and prisons? — what are Roman legions? — what is the whole power of
the enemy? God’s voice is heard in the storm: but the violence of the
tempest is succeeded by the still small voice of the gospel and the peace of
heaven.
Awakened in a moment by the earthquake, the jailor’s first thoughts were
of his prisoners. Alarmed at seeing the prison doors open, and supposing
that the prisoners were fled, he drew his sword and would have killed
himself. “But Paul cried with a loud voice, saying, Do thyself no harm: for
we are all here.” These words of love broke the jailer’s heart. The calm
serenity of Paul and Silas — their refusing to avail themselves of the
opportunity to escape — their tender concern for him — all combined to
make them appear in the eyes of the astonished jailor, as beings of a higher
order. He laid aside his sword, called for a light, sprang into the prison;
and, trembling, fell down at the apostle’s feet. His conscience was now
reached, his heart was broken, and there was something like the violence of
an earthquake agitating his whole soul. He takes the place of a lost sinner,
and cries, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” He does not say, like the
lawyer in Luke 10, “Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” It was
no question with the jailor of doing something for life, but of salvation for
the lost. The lawyer, like many others, did not know himself as a lost
sinner, therefore he does not speak about salvation.
In reply to the most important inquiry that human lips can ever make,
“What must I do to be saved?” the apostle directs the mind of the jailor to
Christ — “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, and
thy house.” God gave the blessing, and the whole house believed, rejoiced,
and were baptized. And now all is changed; the jailor takes the prisoners
into his own house — his cruelty is changed into love, sympathy, and
hospitality. In the same hour of the night he washed their stripes — set
meat before them — rejoiced, believing in God with all his house. What an
eventful night! What a change in a few hours! and what a joyful morning
dawned on that happy house! The Lord be praised!
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Like Darius of old, the magistrates appear to have been disturbed during
the night. The news of the earthquake might have reached them, or that
Paul and Silas were Romans. But as soon as it was day, they sent word to
the jailor to “let those men go.” He immediately made known the order to
Paul and Silas, and wished them to depart in peace. But Paul refused to
accept his liberty without some public acknowledgement of the wrong he
had suffered. He also now made known the fact that he and Silas were
Roman citizens. The famous words of Cicero had passed into a proverb,
and had immense weight everywhere: “To bind a Roman citizen is an
outrage, to scourge him is a crime.” The magistrates had evidently violated
the Roman laws; but Paul only demanded that, as they had been publicly
treated as guilty, the magistrates should come and publicly declare that
they were innocent. This they readily did, seeing what wrong they had
done. “And they came and besought them, and brought them out, and
desired them to depart out of the city.” The apostles readily complied
with the magistrates’ request, left the prison, and openly entered the
house of Lydia; and when they had seen the brethren, they comforted
them and departed.8
We would only further add before leaving this memorable chapter, that it
is very pleasant to find, in Paul’s Epistle to the Philippians, the proofs of
an attachment which bound them together, and which continued from “the
first day” even until Paul’s imprisonment at Rome. His affection for his
beloved Philipplans was wonderful. He addressed them as — “my
brethren dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in
the Lord, my dearly beloved.” And he acknowledges, with no small joy,
their unwearied fellowship with him in the gospel, and the many practical
proofs of their loving care and tender sympathy for himself. As early as
his residence at Thessalonica they thought of his need.
“For even in Thessalonica ye sent once and again unto my
necessity.” (Philippians 4:15-19.)

PAUL AT THESSALONICA AND BEREA

Paul and Silas now directed their course to Thessalonica. Timothy and
Luke appear to have remained behind in Philippi for a short time. Having
passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, Paul and Silas arrived at
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Thessalonica. Here they found a synagogue. It was a commercial town of
great importance, where many Jews resided. “Paul, as his manner was,
went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned With them out of the
scriptures.” The hearts of many were touched by his preaching; and a great
multitude of devout Greeks, and women of high station, believed. But
Paul’s old enemy again appears. “The Jews which believed not, moved
with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and
gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the
house of Jason, and sought to bring them out to the people. And when
they found them not, they drew Jason and certain brethren unto the rulers
of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are
come hither also; whom Jason hath received: and these all do contrary to
the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, one Jesus.” These
verses may suffice to give us the character of the universal enmity of the
Jews against the gospel and against Paul its chief minister.
The apostle had evidently preached to the Thessalonians the truth
respecting the exaltation of Christ, and His coming again in glory: “Saying
that there is another king, one Jesus.” Hence the constant allusion to the
coming of the Lord,” and to “the day of the Lord,” in Paul’s Epistles to
that church. From what Paul says in his first Epistle we learn that his
labors were most abundant and greatly owned and blessed of the Lord to
many souls, 1 Thessalonians 1:9, 10; 2:10, 11.
The apostle now proceeded to Berea. Here the Jews were more noble.
They examined what they heard by the word of God. There was great
blessing here also. Many believed; but the Jews, like hunters after their
prey, hastened from Thessalonica to Berea, and raised a tumult which
forced Paul to leave the place almost immediately. Accompanied by some
of the Berean converts, he directed his course to Athens. Silas and
Timotheus were left behind.

PAUL’S VISIT TO ATHENS

The appearance of the apostle in Athens is an event in his history of great
importance. It was, in some respects, the capital of the world, and the seat
of Grecian culture and philosophy; but it was also the central point of
superstition and idolatry.
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It is very interesting to observe, that the apostle was in no haste to enter
upon his work here. He allowed time for reflection. Deep thoughts, and
how to weigh up everything in the presence of God, and in the light of the
death and resurrection of Christ, filled his mind. It was his first intention
to wait for the arrival of Silas and Timotheus. He had sent back a message
to Berea, that they were to come to him with all speed. But when he saw
himself surrounded with temples, and altars, and statues, and idolatrous
worship, he could keep silence no longer. As usual, he begins with the
Jews, but also disputes daily with the philosophers in the market place,
Christianity and paganism thus openly confront each other; and, be it
observed, the apostle of Christianity was alone in Athens; but the place
swarmed with the apostles of paganism; and so numerous were the objects
of worship, that a satirist observed, “It is easier to find a god than a man in
Athens.”
Some scornfully derided What they heard, others listened and wished to
hear more. “Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the
Stoicks encountered him. And some said, What will this babbler say? other
some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods; because he preached
unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.” Thus we learn what Paul in his
daily conversation had been pressing on the attention of the people, and
the different classes of philosophers. It was “Jesus, and the resurrection.”
These words had made the greatest impression, and remained the most
distinctly in their minds. What a new thing, and what a blessed reality for
souls! The Person of Christ; not a theory: the fact of the resurrection; not
a gloomy uncertainty as to the future. The minister of Christ lays bare to
the learned Athenians their fearful condition in the sight of the true God.
Nevertheless, they sought to have a fuller and more deliberate exposition
of these mysterious subjects, and they brought Paul unto Areopagus.
This place, we are told, was the most convenient and appropriate for a
public address. The most solemn court of justice had sat from time
immemorial on the hill of Areopagus. The judges sat in the open air, upon
seats hewn out in the rock. On this spot many solemn questions had been
discussed, and many solemn cases decided: beginning with the legendary
trial of Mars, which gave to the place the name of “Mars’ hill.”
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It was in this scene that Paul addressed the multitude. There is no moment
in the apostle’s history, or in the history of the first planting of
Christianity, more deeply interesting or better known than this. Inspired
by feelings for the honor of God, and filled with the knowledge of man’s
condition in the light of the cross, what must he have felt as he stood on
Mars’ hill? Wherever he turned his eyes, the signs of idolatry in its
thousand forms rose up before him. He might have been betrayed, under
the circumstances, into speaking strongly; but he mastered his feelings, and
refrained from intemperate language. Considering the fervency of his spirit,
and the greatness of his zeal for truth, it was a remarkable instance of self-
denial and self-command. But his Lord and Master was with him, though
to the human eye he stood alone before the Athenians, and the many
foreigners who flocked to that university of the world.
For wisdom, prudence, sound reasoning, and consummate skill, Paul’s
address stands alone in the annals of mankind. He did not begin by
attacking their false gods, or by denouncing their religion as a Satanic
delusion, and the object of his utter detestation. Zeal without knowledge
would have done so, and been pleased with its own faithfulness. But in the
address before us we have an example of the best way of approaching the
minds and hearts of ignorant and prejudiced persons in every age. May the
Lord give wisdom to all His servants to follow it!
His opening words are both winning and reproving. “Ye men of Athens, I
perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.” He thus begins by
acknowledging that they had religious feelings, but that they were wrongly
directed; and then speaks of himself as one who was ready to lead them to
the knowledge of the true God. “Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship,
Him declare I unto you.” He wisely selects for his text, the inscription,
“To the unknown God.” This gives him an opportunity to commence at
the lowest step in the ladder of truth. He speaks of the oneness of God the
Creator, and the relationship of man to Him. But he soon leaves the
argument against idolatry, and proceeds to preach the gospel. And yet he
is careful not to introduce the name of Jesus in his public address. He had
done so fully in his more private ministrations: but, being now surrounded
by the disciples and admirers of such names as Socrates, Plato, Zeno, and
Epicurus, he sacredly guards the holy name of Jesus from the risk of a
comparison with such. He well knew that the name of the lowly Jesus of
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Nazareth was “to the Greeks foolishness.” Nevertheless it is easily seen
that towards the close of his address, the attention of the whole audience
is concentrated on the man Christ Jesus, though His name is not
mentioned in the whole speech. Thus he proceeds: “And the times of this
ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to
repent: because He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the
world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained; whereof He
hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the
dead.” Here the patience of his audience failed — his discourse was
interrupted. But the last impression left on their minds was one of eternal
weight and importance. The inspired apostle addressed himself to the
consciences, not to the intellectual curiosity, of the philosophers. The
mention of the resurrection of the dead, and the judgment of the world,
with such commanding power and authority, could not fail to trouble these
proud and self-indulgent men. The essential principle, or the highest aim of
the Epicurean philosopher, was to gratify himself; that of the Stoic, was a
proud indifference to good and evil, pleasure and pain.
Need we wonder then, that this remarkable assembly should have broken
up, amidst the scornful derision of some, and the icy indifference of
others? But, in spite of all, Christianity had gained its first and noble
victory over idolatry; and, whatever may have been the immediate results
of Paul’s speech, we know it has been blessed to many ever since, and that
it shall yet bring forth much fruit in many souls, and continue to bear fruit
to the glory of God for ever and for ever.
Paul now departs from among them. He does not appear to have been
driven away by any tumult or persecution. The blessed Lord gave him to
taste His own joy, and the joy of angels over penitent sinners; “Among
the which was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris,
and others with them.” But in the military city of Philippi, and the
mercantile cities of Thessalonica and Corinth, the number of conversions
seems to have been much greater than in the highly educated and polished
city of Athens. This is deeply humbling to the pride of man, and to the
boasted powers of the human mind. One Epistle was written to the
Philipplans, two to the Thessalonians, and two to the Corinthians: but we
possess no letter written by Paul to the Athenians, and we do not read
that he ever again visited Athens.
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PAUL’S VISIT TO CORINTH
The connection of Corinth with the history, teaching, and writings of our
apostle is almost as intimate and important as either Jerusalem or Antioch.
It may be considered as his European center. Here God had “much
people;” and here Paul “continued a year and six months, teaching the
word of God among them.” It was also when at Corinth that he wrote his
first apostolic letters — The two Epistles to the Thessalonians.
Corinth, the Roman capital of Greece, was a large mercantile city, in
immediate connection with Rome and the west of the Mediterranean, with
Thessalonica and Ephesus on the Aegean, with Antioch and Alexandria in
the East. Thus by means of its two noted harbors, it received the ships of
both Eastern and Western Seas.9
Paul appears to have traveled alone to Corinth. If Timotheus came to him
when at Athens (1 Thessalonians 3:1), he was sent back again to
Thessalonica; which place, as we shall soon see, was much on the
apostle’s heart at this time. Soon after his arrival he unexpectedly found
two friends and fellow laborers in Aquila and his wife Priscilla. At this
particular time there must have been a greater number of Jews in Corinth
than usual; “because that Claudius had commanded all Jews to depart from
Rome.” The Lord thus used the banishment of Aquila and Priscilla to
provide a lodging for His lonely servant. They were of his own country —
of his own trade — of his own heart and spirit. And being
“of the same craft, he abode with them, and wrought; for by their
occupation they were tent makers.” (Acts 18.)
Most gracious, and marvellous too, are the ways of the Lord with His
servant. In a city of wealth and commerce, surrounded by native Greeks,
Roman colonists, and Jews from all quarters, he quietly works at his own
trade that he may be burdensome to none of them. Here we have at any
rate one example of the deepest and loftiest spirituality, combined with
diligent labor in the common things of this life. What an example! and what
a lesson! His daily toil was no hindrance to his communion with God.
None ever knew so well, or felt so deeply, the value of the gospel he
carried with him: the issues of life and death were bound up with it; and
yet he could give himself up to ordinary labor. But this he did, as really as
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preaching, for the Lord and for His saints. He frequently refers to this in
his Epistles, and speaks of it as one of his privileges.
“And in all things I have kept myself from being burdensome unto you, and
so will I keep myself. As the truth of Christ is in me, no man shall stop me
of this boasting in the regions of Achaia.” (2 Corinthians 11:9, 10.10)
There is another thing connected with this feature of the apostle’s course
which adds great interest to it. It is generally believed that he wrote his
two epistles to the Thessalonians about this time; and some think the
Epistle to the Galatians also. These are still before us as the true witnesses
of his nearness to God and communion with Him, while he “labored
working with his own hands.” But the sabbath of rest comes, the
workshop is closed, and Paul goes to the synagogue. This was his habit.
“And he reasoned in the synagqgue every sabbath, hnd persuaded the
Jews and the Greeks.” But while Paul was thus employed, week-day and
sabbath-day, Silas and Timotheus arrived from Macedonia. It is evident
that they brought some assistance with them, which would meet the
apostle’s need at the time, and relieve him from such constant labor with
his hands.
The coming of Silas and Timotheus seems to have encouraged and
strengthened the apostle. His zeal and energy in the gospel are evidently
increased. He “was pressed in the spirit, and testified to the Jews that
Jesus was Christ;” but they opposed his doctrine and blasphemed. This
leads Paul to take his course with great boldness and decision. He shakes
his raiment, in token of being pure from their blood, and declares that now
he turns to the Gentiles. In all this he was led of God, and acted according
to His mind. So long as it was possible, he preached in the synagogue; but
when he could no longer go there, he was compelled to use the most
convenient place he could find. At Ephesus, he preached in the school of
one Tyrannus: at Rome, he “dwelt two whole years in his own hired
house;’ and here, in Corinth, a proselyte, named Justus, opened his house
to the rejected apostle.
At this particular crisis in the apostle’s history, he was favored with
another special revelation from the Lord Himself, “Then spake the Lord to
Paul in the night by a vision. Be not afraid, but speak, and hold not thy
peace: For I am with thee, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee; for I
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have much people in this city. And he continued there a year and six
months, teaching the word of God among them.” But again his unrelenting
enemies are astir. The great success of the gospel among the heathen
excited the rage of the Jews against Paul; and they sought to use the
coming of Gallio, a new governor, to accomplish their wicked intentions.
Gallio was the brother of Seneca the philosopher, and, like him, given to
much learning. He was wise, fair, and tolerant as a governor, though
contemptuous in his treatment of sacred things. But the Lord, who was
with His servant as He had said, used the unbelieving indifference of Gallio
to defeat the malicious designs of the Jews, and to turn their false
accusations against themselves. As they were frustrated in their evil
purposes, the apostle had greater liberty, and less annoyance, in carrying
on the work of the gospel. Its blessed fruits were soon manifest
throughout the whole province of Achaia. (1 Thessalonians 1:8, 9.)

PAUL’S PASSING VISIT TO EPHESUS

The time had now come when Paul thought it right to leave Corinth and
revisit Jerusalem. He had a great desire to be at the coming feast. But
before his departure, he took a solemn farewell of the young assembly,
promising (the Lord willing) to return.
Accompanied by Aquila and Priscilla, he leaves Corinth in peace. But
when at the harbour before sailing, a ceremony was performed which has
given rise to much discussion. Paul, being under a vow, shaves his head
at Cenehrea. In his own mind, and as led by the Spirit, we feel sure that
he was far above and beyond a religion of feasts and vows; but he stooped
in grace to the customs of his nation. To the Jew he becomes a Jew. Their
constant opposition to his doctrine, and their violent persecution of
himself, never weakened his affections for his beloved people: surely this
was of God. While he sought in the energy of the Spirit to preach the
gospel to the Gentiles, he never forgot, in faithfulness to the word of God,
to preach to the Jews first. He thus stands before us, as the bright
expression of God’s grace to the Gentiles, and of his lingering affections
towards the Jews.
The missionary band land at Ephesus. Paul goes to the synagogue and
reasons with the Jews. They seem inclined to hear him, but he has a strong
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desire to go up to Jerusalem, and keep the approaching feast. So he “bade
them farewell, saying, I must by all means keep this feast that cometh in
Jerusalem; but I will return again unto you, if God will. And he sailed from
Ephesus.”

PAUL’S FOURTH VISIT TO JERUSALEM

We are not supplied with any information by the sacred historian of what
occurred in Jerusalem on this occasion. We are merely told that when Paul
had “gone up and saluted the church, he went down to Antioch.” But his
intense desire to pay this visit may assure us of its great importance. He
may have felt that the time had come when the Jewish Christians,
assembled at the feast, should hear a full account of the reception of the
gospel among the Gentiles. Roman colonies and Greek capitals had been
visited, and a great work of God had been accomplished. All this would be
perfectly natural and right, but we need not seek to remove the veil which
the Holy Ghost has drawn over this visit.
Paul goes down from Jerusalem to Antioch, visiting all the assemblies he
had first formed; and thus, as it were, binds his work together- Antioch
and Jerusalem. So far as we know, Paul’s visit to Antioch was his last. We
have already seen how new centres of christian life had been established
by him in the Greek cities of the Aegean. The course of the gospel is
further and further towards the West, and the inspired part of the
apostle’s biography, after a short period of deep interest in Judea, finally
centers in Rome.

THE RETURN OF PAUL TO ANTIOCH

After a journey which had extended over the space of three or four years,
our apostle returns to Antioch. He had traveled over a wide circuit, and
disseminated Christianity in many flourishing and populous cities, and
almost entirely by his own exertions. If the reader would keep up his
interest in Paul’s history, he must mark distinctly and keep clearly before
him the great epochs in Paul’s life, and the main points in his different
journeys. But before starting with Paul on his third missionary journey, it
may be well to notice another great preacher of the gospel, who suddenly
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comes before us just at this time, and whose name, next to that of the
apostle, is perhaps the most important in the early history of the church.
Apollos was a Jew by birth-a native of Alexandria. He was “an eloquent
man, and mighty in the scriptures:…but knowing only the baptism of
John.” He was devoted, earnest, and upright, publicly confessing and
preaching that which he knew; and the power of the Holy Ghost was
manifested in him. It does not appear that he had received any
appointment, ordination, or sanction of any kind, from either the twelve or
Paul. But the Lord who is above all had called him, and was acting in him
and by him. We thus see, in the case of Apollos, the manifestation of the
power and liberty of the Holy Spirit, without human intervention. It is
well to note this. The idea of an exclusive clericalism is the practical denial
of the liberty of the Spirit to act by whom He will. But though burning
with zeal and a powerful speaker, Apollos knew only what John had
taught his disciples. This the Lord knew, and provided teachers for him.
Among those who were listening to his earnest appeals, two of Paul’s
well-instructed disciples were led to take a special interest in him. And
though he was both learned and eloquent, he was humble enough to be
instructed by Aquila and Priscilla. They invited him to their house, and,
no doubt in a lowly spirit, “expounded unto him the way of God more
perfectly.” How simple! how natural! and how beautiful! All is of the
Lord. He ordered that Aquila and Priscilla should be left at Ephesus —
that Apollos should come and stir up the people at Ephesus before the
arrival of Paul; and, after being instructed, that he should go on to Corinth,
and help on the good work there, which Paul had begun. Apollos watered
what Paul had planted, and God gave abundant increase. Such are the
blessed ways of the Lord in His thoughtful love and tender care of all His
servants, and of all His assemblies.
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CHAPTER 6
PAUL’S THIRD MISSIONARY JOURNEY A.D. 54

Having “spent some time” in Antioch, Paul leaves that Gentile center, and
commences another missionary journey. Nothing is said of his companions
on this occasion. He “went over all the country of Galatia and Phrygia in
order, strengthening all the disciples;” and also giving directions for the
collection on behalf of the poor saints at Jerusalem. (1 Corinthians 16:1,
2.) In a short time he reached the center of the work in Asia.
Ephesus. At this time it was the greatest city in Asia Minor, and the
capital of the province. Owing to its central position, it was the common
meeting-place of various characters and classes of men. By this time
Apollos had departed to Corinth, but the remaining twelve of John’s
disciples were still in Ephesus. Paul speaks to them about their state or
position. We must give a passing notice of what occurred.
John’s baptism required repentance, but not separation from the Jewish
synagogue. The gospel teaches that Christianity is founded on death and
resurrection. Christian baptism is the significant and expressive symbol of
these truths.
“Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him
through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised Him
from the dead.” (Colossians 2:12.)
As these men were entirely unacquainted with the foundation truths of
Christianity, we suppose they had never mingled with Christians. The
apostle, no doubt, explained to them the efficacy of the death and
resurrection of Christ, and the descent of the Holy Ghost. They believed
the truth and received christian baptism. Then Paul, in his apostolic’
capacity, laid his hands on them; and they were sealed with the Holy
Ghost, and “spake with tongues and prophesied.”
Immediately after the mention of this important occurrence, our attention
is directed to the apostle’s labors in the synagogue. During three months
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he preached Christ boldly there, reasoning and endeavoring to convince his
hearers of all “the things concerning the kingdom of God.” The hearts of
some “were hardened,” while others repented and believed; but as many of
the Jews took the place of adversaries, and “spake evil of that way before
the multitude,” Paul acts in the most definite way. He “separated the
disciples” from the Jewish synagogue, and formed them into a distinct
assembly, and met with them “daily in the school of one Tyrannus.” This
is a deeply interesting and instructive action of the apostle; but he acts in
the consciousness of the power and truth of God. The church in Ephesus
is now perfectly distinct from both Jews and Gentiles. Here we see what
the apostle elsewhere refers to in his exhortation, “Give none offense,
neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God.” (1
Corinthians 10:32.) Where this important distinction is not seen, there
must be great confusion of thought as to both the word and ways of God.
The apostle now appears before us as the instrument of the power of God
in a remarkable and striking way. He communicates the Holy Ghost to the
twelve disciples of John; and he separates the disciples of Jesus and
formally founds the church in Ephesus. His testimony to the Lord Jesus is
heard in all Asia, both by Jews and Greeks; special miracles are wrought
by his hands, diseases departing from many if they but touch the border of
his garment. The power of the enemy disappears before the power that is
in Paul, and the name of Jesus is glorified. The evil spirits acknowledge his
power, and put his enemies to shame and loss; the consciences of the
heathen are reached, and the enemy’s dominion over them is gone. Fear
falls on many who “used curious arts,” and they burn their books of
magic, the cost of which amounts to nearly two thousand pounds in
English money. “So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed.” (See
Acts 19:1-20.) Thus the power of the Lord was displayed in the person
and mission of Paul, and his apostolate established beyond a question.
The apostle had now spent about three years of incessant labor in
Ephesus. And he says himself when addressing the elders at Miletus,
“Therefore watch, and remember, that by the space of three years I ceased
not to warn every one night and day with tears.” It is also supposed by
some, that during this time he paid a short visit and wrote his First
Epistle to the Corinthians.
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THE TUMULT AT EPHESUS
A great and blessed work had now been accomplished by the mighty
energy of God’s Spirit, through the instrumentality of His chosen servant
Paul. The gospel had been planted in the capital of Asia, and it had spread
throughout the whole province. The apostle now felt as if his work had
been done there, and he longs to go to Rome, the capital of the West, and
the metropolis of the world. Greece and Macedonia had already received
the gospel, but there was yet Rome.
“After these things were ended, Paul putposed in the spirit,
when he had passed through Macedonia and Achaia, to go to
Jerusalem, saying, After I have been there, I must also see Rome.”
(Acts 19:21.)
But while Paul was thus making arrangements for another journey, the
enemy was planning a fresh attack. His resources were not yet exhausted.
Demetrius excites the thoughtless multitude against the Christians. A great
tumult is raised, the passions of men being stirred up against the
instruments of the testimony of God. The workmen of Demetrius raise the
cry, not only that their craft is in danger, but that the temple of the great
goddess Diana is in danger of being despised. When the multitude heard
these things, they were filled with wrath, and cried, saying, “Great is
Diana of the Ephesians!” The whole city was now filled with confusion;
but Paul was mercifully preserved — by his brethren, and by some of the
chief rulers in Asia, who were his friends — from showing himself in the
theater.
The Jews evidently began to fear, that the persecution might be turned
against themselves; for the majority of the people knew not for what
purpose they had come together. They therefore put forth a certain
Alexander, probably with the intention of shifting the blame from
themselves upon the Christians; but the moment the heathen discovered
that he was a Jew, their fury was increased: the rallying cry was again
raised, and for two whole hours the people shouted “Great is Diana of the
Ephesians.” Fortunately for all parties, the town clerk was a man of great
tact and admirable policy. He flattered, calmed, soothed, and dismissed the
assembly. But to faith it was God using the persuasive eloquence of a
heathen official to protect His servant and His many children there.
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The far-famed temple of Diana was reckoned by the ancients as one of the
wonders of the world; the sun, it was said, saw nothing in his course more
magnificent than Diana’s temple. It was constructed of the purest marble,
and was two hundred and twenty years in building. But with the spread of
Christianity it sank into decay, and scarcely anything of it now remains to
show us even where it stood. The trade of Demetrius was to make small
models in silver of the shrine of the goddess. These were set up in houses,
kept as memorials, and carried about on journeys. But as the introduction
of Christianity necessarily affected the sale of these models, the heathen
artisans were instigated by Demetrius to raise a popular cry in favor of
Diana and against the Christians.

PAUL’S DEPARTURE FROM EPHESUS FOR MACEDONIA

Acts 20. After the cessation of the tumult, the danger being over and the
rioters dispersed, Paul sends for the disciples, embraces them, and departs
for Macedonia. Two of the Ephesian brethren, Tychicus and Trophimus,
seem to have accompanied him, and to have remained faithful to him
through all his afflictions. They are frequently mentioned, and have a place
in the last chapter of his last epistle, 2 Timothy 4.
The sacred historian is exceedingly brief in his record of Paul’s proceedings
at this time. All the information which he gives us is compressed in the
following words: — “He departed to go into Macedonia: and when he had
gone over those parts, and had given them much exhortation, he came into
Greece, and there abode three months.” It is generally supposed that these
few words embrace a period of nine or ten months — from the early
summer of A .D . 57 to the spring of A .D . 58. But this lack of information is
happily supplied by the apostle’s letters. Those that were written on this
journey supply us with many historical details, and, what is more and
better, they give us from his own pen a living picture of the deep and
painful exercises of mind and heart, through which he was then passing.
It appears that Paul had arranged to meet Titus at Troas, who was to bring
him tidings direct from Corinth of the state of things there. But week after
week passed, and Titus came not. We know something of the workings of
that great mind and heart at this time, from what he says himself:
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“Furthermore, when I came to Troas to preach Christ’s gospel, and
a door was opened unto me of the Lord, I had no rest in my spirit,
because I found not Titus my brother; but taking my leave of them,
I went from thence into Macedonia.” (2 Corinthians 2:12, 13.)
His personal anxiety, however, did not hinder him from going on with the
great work of the gospel. This is evident from verses 14-17.
At length the long-expected Titus arrived in Macedonia-probably at
Philippi. And now Paul’s mind is relieved and his heart is comforted.
Titus brings him better tidings from Corinth than he had expected to hear.
The reaction is manifest: he is filled with praise;
“Great is my boldness of speech toward you,” he says; “great is
my glowing of you: I am filled with comfort, I am exceeding joyful
in all our tribulation. For, when we were come into Macedonia, our
flesh had no rest, but we were troubled on every side; without
were rightings, within were fears. Nevertheless God, that
comforteth those that are cast down, comforted us by the coming
of Titus.” (2 Corinthians 7:4-6.)
Soon after this, Paul writes his Second Epistle to the Corinthians;
which we find addressed not to them only, but to all the churches in all
Achaia. They may have all been more or less affected by the condition of
things at Corinth. Titus is again the apostle’s willing servant, not only as
the bearer of his second letter to the church at Corinth, but as taking a
special interest in the collections then making for the poor. Paul not only
gives Titus strict charges about the collections, but writes two chapters on
the subject (chaps. 8 and 9), though it was more deacons’ than apostles’
work. But, as he had said in answer to the suggestion of James, Cephas,
and John, that he should remember the poor — “The same,” he replied,
“which I was also forward to do.”
The space which the apostle devotes to subjects connected with
collections for the poor is remarkable, and deserves our careful
consideration. It may be that some of us have overlooked this fact and
suffered loss in our own souls thereby. Notice, for example, what he says
of one church. We have good reason to believe that the Philipplans from
the very beginning cared for the apostle — they pressed him to accept
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their contributions for his support, from his first visit to Thessalonica,
down to his imprisonment in Rome, besides their liberality to others. (2
Corinthians 8:1-4.) But some may imagine from this, that they were a
wealthy church. Just the opposite. Paul tells us “How that, in a great trial
of affliction, the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded
unto the riches of their liberality.” It was out of their deep poverty that
they gave so liberally.
What the Philipplans are in the Epistles, the poor widow is in the Gospels
— two mites were her all. She could have given one and kept one; but she
had an undivided heart, and she gave both. She, too, gave out of her
poverty; and, wherever the gospel is preached throughout the whole
world, these things shall be told as a memorial of their liberality.
After Paul had sent off Titus and his associates with the Epistle, he
remained himself in “those parts” of Greece, doing the work of an
evangelist. His mind, however, was set on paying the Corinthians a
personal visit; but he allowed time for his letter to produce its own effects
under the blessing of God. One of the objects of the apostle was to
prepare the way for his personal ministry among them. It is generally
thought that it was during this period of delay that he fully preached the
gospel of Christ round about unto Illyricum. (Romans 15:19.) It is
probable that he reached Corinth in winter, according to his expressed
intention. “It may be that I will abide, yea, and winter with you.” (1
Corinthians 16:6.) There he abode three months.
All are agreed, we may say, that it was during these winter months, that he
wrote his great Epistle to the Romans. Some say, that he also wrote his
Epistle to the Galatians at the same time. But there is great diversity of
opinion amongst the chronologists on this point. From the absence of
names and salutations, such as we have in the Epistle to the Romans, it is
difficult to ascertain its date. But if it was not written at this particular
time, we must place it earlier, not later. The apostle was surprised at their
early departure from the truth. “I marvel,” he says, “that ye are so soon
removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another
gospel.” His great disappointment is manifest in the warmth of spirit in
which he writes this Epistle.
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But we must return to the history of our apostle: the niceties of
chronology we cannot enter upon in our “short papers.” But after
comparing the latest authorities, we give what seem to us the most reliable
dates.

PAUL LEAVES CORINTH

The apostle’s work was now done at Corinth, and he prepares to leave it.
His mind was bent upon going to Rome; but there was this mission of
charity on his heart, to which he must attend first. We are favored with his
own words on these different points.
“But now having no more place in these parts, and having a great
desire these many years to come unto you; Whensoever I take my
journey into Spain, I will come unto you: for I trust to see you in
my journey, and to be brought on my way thitherward by you, if
first I be somewhat filled with your company. But now I go unto
Jerusalem to minister unto the saints. For it hath pleased them of
Macedonia and Achaia to make a certain contribution for the poor
saints which are at Jerusalem.” (Romans 15:23-26.)
The array of names in Acts 20:4; Sopater, Aristarchus, Secundus, Gaius,
Tychicus, and Trophimus, are supposed to be brethren with the
collections which had been made at the different places named. Instead of
sailing straight to Syria, he goes round by Macedonia, because of the Jews
who were lying in wait for him. His companions tarried for him at Troas.
There he spent a Lord’s day, and even a whole week, in order to see the
brethren.
We must notice briefly what took place at this stage of his journey. Two
things, all important to the Christian, are connected with it — the Lord’s
day, and the Lord’s supper. The historian, who was with Paul at this time,
enters with unusual minuteness on the details of that day.
It is evident from this incidental notice, that it was the established custom
of the early Christians to come together on “the first day of the week” for
the understood purpose of “breaking bread.” We have here the main object
and the ordinary time of their coming together. “And upon the first day of
the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul preached
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unto them.” (See also 1 Corinthians 16:2; John 20:19; Revelation 1:10.)
Even the apostle’s discoursing, precious as it was, is spoken of as a
secondary thing. The remembrance of the Lord’s love in dying for us, and
all that into which He has brought us as risen again, was, and is, the first
thing. If there be an opportunity for so ministering the word, as to gather
up the thoughts and affections of the worshippers to Christ, it is well to
embrace it; but the breaking of bread ought to be the first consideration,
and the main object of the assembly. The celebration of the Lord’s supper
on this ioccasion was after sunset. In early times, it was observed in some
places before daylight; in others, after sunset. But here the disciples were
not obliged to meet in secret. “There were many lights in the upper
chamber where they were gathered together.” And Paul continued his
speech until midnight, ready to depart on the morrow. It was an
extraordinary occasion, and Paul avails himself of the opportunity to
speak to them all night. The time had not come, as some one has said,
when the warm earnest utterances of the heart were measured by the
minute — when the burning agony of the preacher over lost souls was
timed by the icy coldness of the mere professor, or the careless
indifference of the worldly Christian. Eutychus, a young man, overcome
with sleep, “fell down from the third loft, and was taken up dead.” This
has been viewed by some as a penalty for inattention; but a miracle was
wrought; the young man was raised from a state of death by the power
and goodness of God through His servant Paul, and the friends were not a
little comforted.

PAUL AT MILETUS
The most important stage of this journey is Miletus, though the different
places they pass or call at are carefully noted by the sacred historian. Paul,
being filled with the Spirit, gives directions for the journey. His
companions willingly obey him, not as a master, but as one who directs in
the humility of love and in the wisdom of God. He arranges not to go to
Ephesus, though that was a central place, for he had purposed in his heart
to be at Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost. But as the vessel was to be
detained some time at Miletus, he sends for the elders of the church at
Ephesus to meet him. The distance between the two places is said to be
about thirty miles, so that two or three days would be required to go and
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come, but they had sufficient time for their meeting before the ship sailed.
Thus the Lord thinks of His servants and makes everything work together
for their good and His own glow.
Paul’s farewell address to the elders of Ephesus is characteristic and
representative. It demands our most careful study. It sets before us the
deep and touching affection of the apostle, the position of the church at
that time, and the work of the gospel among the nations. He exhorts them
with unusual earnestness and tenderness; he felt he was addressing them
for the last time; he reminds them of his labors among them in “serving the
Lord with all humility of mind, and with many tears.” He warns them
against false teachers and herestes — the grievous wolves who would enter
in among them, and the men of themselves that would arise, speaking
perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them. “And when he had
thus spoken, he kneeled down, and prayed with them all. And they all
wept sore, and fell on Paul’s neck, and kissed him, sorrowing most of all
for the words which he spake, that they should see his face no more. And
they accompanied him unto the ship.”
As this testimony of Paul’s is of the highest importance, and marks a
distinct epoch in the history of the church, besides shedding divine light on
all ecclesiastical systems, we give the thoughts of another on its wide and
comprehensive bearing.
“The church was consolidated over a pretty large extent of
country, and the church, in divers places at least, had taken the
form of a regular institution. Elders were established and
recognised. The apostle could send for them to come to him. His
authority also was acknowledged on their part. He speaks of his
ministry as a past thing — solemn thought!... Thus, what the Holy
Ghost here sets before us is, that now, when the detail of his work
among the Gentiles to plant the gospel is related as one entire scene
among Jews and Gentiles, he bids adieu to the work; in order to
leave those whom he had gathered together, in a new position, and,
in a certain sense, to themselves. It is a discourse which marks the
cessation of one phase of the church — that of apostolic labors —
and the entrance into another; its responsibility to stand fast now
that these labors had ceased; the service of the elders, whom ‘the
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Holy Ghost had made overseers,’ and, at the same time, the
dangers and difficulties that would attend the cessation of apostolic
labor, and complicate the work of the elders, on whom the
responsibility would now more especially devolve.
“The first remark that flows from the consideration of this
discourse is, that apostolic succession is entirely denied by it.
Owing to the absence of the apostle, various difficulties would
arise, and there would be no one in his place to meet or to prevent
these difficulties. Successor, therefore, he had none. In the second
place, the fact appears that this energy, which bridled the spirit of
evil, once away, devouring wolves from without, and teachers of
perverse things from within, would lift up their heads and attack
the simplicity and the happiness of the church; which would be
harassed by the efforts of Satan, without possessing apostolic
energy to withstand them. In the third place, that which was
principally to be done for the hindrance of evil was to feed the
flock; and to watch, whether over themselves or over the flock, for
that purpose. He then commends them — neither to Timothy nor
to a bishop, but in a way that sets aside all official resources — to
God and to the word of His grace. This is where he left the church.
The free labors of the apostle of the Gentiles were ended. Solemn
and affecting thought! He had been the instrument chosen of God
to communicate to the world His counsels respecting the church
and to establish in the mind of the world this precious object of
His affections, united to Christ at His right hand. What would
become of it down here?”1
Acts 21. With a fair wind, Paul and his companions sailed out from
Miletus, while the sorrowing elders of Ephesus prepared for their journey
homewards. With a straight course they sailed to Coos, Rhodes, and
thence to Patara and Tyre. From what took place there — so similar to the
scene at Miletus — it is evident that Paul soon found his way to the heart
of the disciples. Though he had been only one week at Tyre, and
previously unacquainted with the Christians there, he had gained their
affections. “And they all brought us on our way,” says Luke, “with wives
and children, till we were out of the city; and we kneeled down on the
shore and prayed.” It seems too, as if a spirit of prophecy had been
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poured out on these affectionate Tyrians, for they warned the apostle
against going up to Jerusalem. After waiting there seven days, they came
to Ptolemais, where they abode one day. At Caesarea, they lodged in the
house of Philip the evangelist, which was one of the seven. He is already
well known to us; but it is not a little interesting to meet him again, after
an interval of more than twenty years. Now he has four daughters, virgins,
who prophesy. Here Agabus the prophet predicted Paul’s imprisonment,
and besought him not to go up to Jerusalem. All the disciples said the
same thing, and entreated him with tears not to go. But however much
Paul’s tender and sensitive heart must have been moved by the tears and
the entrearies of his friends and of his own children in the faith, he suffered
nothing to alter his resolution or move him from his purpose. He felt
bound in spirit to go, and ready to leave all consequences with the will of
the Lord.
We now come to

PAUL’S FIFTH VISIT TO JERUSALEM A.D. 58.

The apostle and his companions were gladly welcomed on their arrival at
Jerusalem. “When we were come to Jerusalem,” Luke observes, “the
brethren received us gladly.” The day following, Paul and his company
visited James, at whose house the elders were present. Paul, as chief
speaker, declared particularly what things God had wrought among the
Gentiles by his ministry. But though they were greatly interested, and
praised the Lord for the good news, they evidently felt uneasy. They at
once called Paul’s attention to the fact, that a great number of Jews who
believed in Jesus as the Messiah were zealous observers of the law of
Moses, and were strongly prejudiced against himself.
How to satisfy the prejudices of these Jewish Christians was now the
important question between Paul and the elders. Multitudes of Jews, both
converted and unconverted, they knew would come together when they
heard of Paul’s arrival. They had long believed the most serious and
weighty charges against him — “that thou teachest all the Jews which are
among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought not to
circumcise their children, neither to walk after the customs.” What was
now to be done? The elders proposed that Paul should publicly show
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himself obedient to the law. This was the painful and perplexing position
of the apostle of the Gentiles. What can he now do? Will the messenger of
the gospel of the glory — the minister of the heavenly calling-stoop to the
rules of Nazarite vows? This is the solemn and serious question. If he
refuses compliance with their wish, the lurking suspicion of the Jews will
be confirmed; if he acts according to their desires, he must humble himself
— forget for the moment his high calling, yield to the ignorance, prejudice,
and pride of the Judaizers. But what else can he do? He is in the very
center of a bigoted Judaism; and if mistaken, he honestly desires to win
over the church at Jerusalem to a purer and loftier Christianity.
Many have been very free in their criticisms on the apostle’s course at this
time. But though it is our privilege humbly to examine all that the sacred
historian has written, some, we fear, have ventured too far in saying hard
things of the apostle. We may reverently inquire, how far the will and the
affections of Paul influenced him on this occasion, apart from the warnings
of the Spirit through his brethren; but surely it becomes us to keep within
the limits of what the Holy Spirit Himself has said. Let us now carefully
view the outward facts which led the apostle to this eventful epoch in his
life.
Rome had been long on his mind. He had a great desire to preach the
gospel there. This was right — this was according to God — this was not
of self: he was the apostle of the Gentiles. God had been working there
most blessedly without Paul or Peter, for as yet no apostle had visited
Rome. Paul had been privileged to write an epistle to the Romans, and in
that letter he expresses the most earnest desire to see them, and to labor
among them. “For I long to see you,” he says, “that I may impart unto
you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established.” This was his
state of mind and the object which he had before him; which we also must
keep in view when studying this part of his history. Compare Romans
1:7-15; 15:15-33.

THE END OF PAUL’S FREE LABORS

We have now come to the important question, and to the point on which
Paul’s future history turns. Will he go straight west to Rome, or will he go
round by way of Jerusalem? All depends on this. Jerusalem was also on
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his heart. But if Christ had sent him far hence to the Gentiles, could the
Spirit, on Christ’s part, lead him to Jerusalem? It was just here, we
believe, that the great apostle was permitted to follow the desires of his
own heart; which desires were right and beautiful in themselves, but not
according to the mind of God at the time. He loved his nation dearly, and
especially the poor saints at Jerusalem; and, having been greatly
misrepresented there, he wished to prove his love for the poor of his
people by bringing to them in person the offerings of the Gentiles. “When
therefore,” he says, “I have performed this, and have sealed to them this
fruit, I will come by you into Spain.” Surely, some will say, this was
loving and praiseworthy! Yes, but on one side only, and that side alas!
was the side of nature, not of the Spirit. “And finding disciples, we tarried
there seven days; who said to Paul through the Spirit, that he should not go
up to Jerusalem.” This seems plain enough; but Paul inclined for the
moment to the side of his affections “for the poor of the flock” in
Jerusalem. Could there have been, we ask, a more pardonable mistake?
Impossible! It was his love to the poor, and the pleasure of carrying to
them the offerings of the Gentiles, that led him to go round by Jerusalem
on his way to Rome. Nevertheless, it was a mistake, and a mistake which
cost Paul his liberty. His free labors end here. He allowed the flesh its
liberty, and God allowed the Gentiles to bind it with a chain. This was the
Master’s expression of truest love to His servant. Paul was too precious
in His sight to be allowed to pass without His righteous dealings at such a
time; and he was also made to prove, that neither Jerusalem nor Rome
could be the metropolis of Christianity. Christ the Head of the church was
in heaven, and there only could the metropolis of Christianity be.
Jerusalem persecuted the apostle; Rome imprisoned and martyred him.
Nevertheless, the Lord was with His servant for his own good, the
advancement of the truth, the blessing of the church, and the glory of His
own great name.
Here may we be permitted to offer one reflection. On how many histories,
since Paul’s fifth visit to Jerusalem, has this solemn scene been engraved!
How many saints have been bound with chains of different kinds, but who
can say for what, or why? All of us would have said — unless enlightened
by the Spirit — that the apostle could not have been actuated by a more
worthy motive in going round by Jerusalem on his way to Rome. But the
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Lord had not told him to do so. All hinges on this. How needful then to
see, at every stage of our journey, that we have the word of God for our
faith, the service of Christ for our motive, and the Holy Spirit for our
guide. We will now return to the history of events.
We left Paul sitting with the elders in the house of James. They had
suggested to him a mode of conciliating the Jewish believers, and of
refuting the accusations of his enemies. Disloyalty to his nation and to the
religion of his fathers was the chief charge brought against him. But under
the surface of outward events, and especially having the light of the
epistles shed upon them, we discover the root of the whole matter in the
enmity of the human heart against the grace of God. In order to understand
this, we must notice that Paul’s ministry was twofold.
1. His mission was to preach the gospel “to every creature which is
under heaven” — it not only went far beyond the limits of Judaism,
but it was in perfect contrast with that system.
2. He was also the minister of the church of God, and preached its
exalted position, and its blessed privileges, as united with Christ the
glorified Man in heaven.
These blessed truths, it will be seen, lift the soul of the believer far above
the religion of the flesh, be it ever so painstaking — ever so abounding in
rites and ceremonies. Vows, fasts, feasts, offerings, purifications,
traditions, a’nd philosophy, are all shut out as nothing worth before God,
and opposed to the very nature of Christianity. This exasperated the
religious Jew with his traditions, and the uncircumcised Greek with his
philosophy; and the two united to persecute the true witness-bearer of
this twofold testimony. And so it has been ever since. The religious man
with his ordinances, and the merely natural man with his philosophy, by a
natural process, readily unite in opposing the witness of a heavenly
Christianity. See Colossians 1 & 2.
If Paul had preached circumcision, the offense of the cross would have
ceased; for this would have given them a place, and the opportunity of
being something and doing something, and even of taking part with God in
His religion. This was Judaism, and this gave the Jew his pre-eminence.
But the gospel of the grace of God addresses man as already lost-as “dead”
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in trespasses and sins” — and has no more respect to the Jew than to the
Gentile. Like the sun in the firmament, it shines for all. No nation, kindred,
tongue, or people, is excluded from its heavenly rays. “Preach the gospel
to every creature which is under heaven” is the divine commission and the
wide sphere of the evangelist; to teach those who believe this gospel their
completeness in Christ is the privilege and duty of every minister of the
New Testament.
Having thus cleared the ground as to the motives, objects, and position of
the great apostle, we will now briefly trace the remainder of his eventful
life. The time has come when he is to be brought before kings and rulers,
and even before Caesar himself, for the name of the Lord Jesus.

PAUL IN THE TEMPLE

In accordance with the proposal of James and the elders, Paul now
proceeds to the temple with “the four men which had a vow.” Thus we
read: “Then Paul took the men, and the next day, purifying himself with
them, entered into the temple, to signify the accomplishment of the days
of purification, until that an offering should be offered for every one of
them.” On the completion of the Nazarite’s vow the law required that
certain offerings should be presented in the temple. These offerings
involved considerable expense, as we may see from Numbers 6; and it was
considered an act of great merit and piety for a rich brother to provide
these offerings for a poor brother, and thereby enable him to complete his
vow. Paul was not rich, but he had a large and tender heart, and he
generously undertook to pay the charges of the four poor Nazarites. Such
readiness on Paul’s part to please some and help others, ought to have
pacified and con-ciliated the Jews, and probably it would, had there only
been present such as were associated with James; but it had the opposite
effect with the inveterate zealots: they were only more incensed against
him. The celebration of the feast had attracted multitudes to the holy city,
so that the temple was thronged with worshippers from every land.
Among these foreign Jews were some from Asia, probably some of Paul’s
old antagonists from Ephesus, who were glad of an opportunity to be
revenged on him who had formerly defeated them. Towards the end of the
seven days wherein the sacrifices were to be offered, these Asiatic Jews
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saw Paul in the temple, and immediately fell upon him, “crying out, Men
of Israel, help: This is the man that teacherb all men everywhere against
the people, and the law, and this place; and further brought Greeks also
into the temple, and hath polluted this holy place... And all the city was
moved, and the people ran together: and they took Paul, and drew him out
of the temple: and forthwith the doors were shut.” The whole city being
now in an uproar, the crowd rushed furiously to the point of attack; the
multitude were excited to madness, and but for their sacred care not to
shed blood in the holy place, Paul would have been instantly torn to
pieces. Their object now was to hurry him outside the sacred enclosure.
But before their murderous plans were executed, help from the Lord
arrived, and they were unexpectedly interrupted.
The sentries at the gates no doubt communicated at once to the Roman
garrison, situated over against the temple, that there was a tumult in the
court. The chief captain, Claudius Lysias, immediately ran to the spot in
person, taking soldiers and centurions with him. When the Jews saw the
chief captain and the Roman soldiers approaching, they left off beating
Paul. The governor, perceiving that he was the occasion of all this
excitement, promptly secured him, and bound him with two chains, or
chained him by each hand to a soldier. See Acts 12:6.
This being done, Lysias proceeded to make inquiry as to the real cause of
the disturbance, but, as no certain information could be obtained from the
ignorant and excited crowd, he ordered Paul to be carried into the castle.
The disappointed mob now made a tremendous rush after their victim.
They saw him taken out of their hands, and so violently did they press
upon the soldiers, that Paul was borne in their arms up the stairs of the
castle; meanwhile deafening shouts arose from the enraged multitude
below, as they had done nearly thirty years before, “Away with him,
away with him.”
At this moment of overwhelming interest, the apostle preserved great
presence of mine, and perfectly controlled the agitation of his feelings. He
acts prudently without any compromise of truth. Just as they had reached
the entrance to the castle, Paul most courteously addressed himself to the
chief captain, and said, “May I speak unto thee? Who said, Canst thou
speak Greek? Art not thou that Egyptian, which before these days madest
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an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four thousand men that
were murderers? But Paul said, I am a man which am a Jew of Tarsus, a
city in Cilicia, a citizen of no mean city: and, I beseech thee, suffer me to
speak unto the people.” Marvellous to say, this request was granted. Paul
had already gained the respect of the Roman governor, if not great
influence over his mind. But the hand of the Lord was in it; He was
watching over His servant. Paul had thrown himself into the hands of his
enemies, by seeking to please the believing Jews; but God was with him,
and knew how to deliver him out of their power, and to use him for the
glory of His own great name. (Acts 21:26-40.)

PAUL’S SPEECH ON THE STAIRS OF THE CASTLE

To the chief captain he had spoken in Greek; to the Jews he speaks in
Hebrew. These little attentions and considerations are the beautiful
blendings of love and wisdom, and ought to serve as a lesson for us. He
was always ready to win, by “becoming all things to all men, that he might
gain the more.” We see the marvellous effects of his influence over the
infuriated mob, as well as over the commanding officer. The moment he
spoke to them, the whole scene was changed. He calmed the tumultuous
sea of human passion by the sound of their sacred language. It fell like oil
on the troubled waters; and there was immediately “a great silence.” We
have his noble defense, addressed to his brethren and fathers, given at
length in Acts 22:1-21.
It will be observed in reading the address, that his countrymen listened
with great attention, while he spoke to them of his early life, his
persecution of the church, his mission to Damascus, his miraculous
conversion, his vision in the temple, and his interview with Ananias; but
the moment he mentioned his mission to the Gentiles, an outburst of
unbounded indignation arose from the crowded area below, and silenced
the speaker. They could not endure the thought of God’s grace to the
Gentiles. That hated name stung them to fury. Their national pride
rebelled against the thought of uncircumcised heathen being made equal to
the children of Abraham. They cried down with scornful contempt every
argument, human or divine, that could have influenced their minds. In vain
did the apostle lay great stress on what had taken place between himself
and the devout Ananias. Every appeal was in vain, so long as the Gentiles
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were to be thus owned. A scene of the wildest confusion now followed.
They cast off their outer garments, threw dust into the air, and “lifted up
their voices, and said, Away with such a fellow from the earth; for it is not
fit that he should live.”
The chief captain, seeing the frantic violence of the people, and not
understanding what it meant, was thrown into new perplexity. He saw the
results of a speech in the Hebrew tongue — which he probably did not
understand — and, naturally concluding that his prisoner must be guilty of
some enormous crime, he ordered him to be bound and scourged to make
him confess his guilt. But this proceeding was instantly arrested by Paul
making known the fact that he was a Roman citizen.
The soldiers who were engaged in binding him withdrew in alarm, and
warned the governor as to what he was doing. Lysias came at once, “and
said unto him, Tell me, art thou a Roman? He said, Yea. And the chief
captain answered, With a great sum obtained I this freedom. And Paul
said, But I was free born.” Lysias was now in a difficulty; he had violated
a Roman law. To expose a citizen to such indignity was treason against the
majesty of the Roman people. But the only way of saving Paul’s life was
by keeping him in custody; and he happily thought of another and a milder
way of ascertaining the nature of his prisoner’s offense.

PAUL BEFORE THE SANHEDRIM

On the following day he “commanded the chief priests and all their council
to appear, and brought Paul down and set him before them.” The policy of
Lysias here is interesting. He is active in suppressing the tumult; he
protects a Roman citizen; he shows deference to the religion and customs
of the Jews. This blending of policy and courtesy in the haughty Roman,
under such circumstances, is worthy of a moment’s reflection; but we pass
on.
Paul addresses the council with dignity and gravity; but with an evident
expression of conscious integrity. “And Paul, earnestly beholding the
council, said, Men and brethren, I have lived in all good conscience before
God until this day.” This unflinching sense of uprightness so enraged
Ananias, the high priest, that he commanded those who stood near to
strike him on the mouth. This arbitrary violation of the law on the part of
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the chief of the council so roused the apostle’s feelings, that he fearlessly
exclaimed, “God shall smite thee, thou whited wall; for sittest thou to
judge me after the law, and commandest me to be smitten contrary to the
law?” It is evident that the high priest was not so clothed as to be
recognised; therefore Paul excuses himself by his ignorance of the fact, and
quotes the formal prohibition of the law: “Thou shalt not speak evil of the
ruler of thy people.”
The apostle soon perceived, we are told, that the council was divided into
two parties, the Sadducees and the Pharisees, and therefore he cried
out, “Men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee; of the hope
and resurrection of the dead I am called in question.” This declaration,
whether so intended or not, had the effect of dividing the assembly, and
setting the one party against the other. And so fierce did their dissensions
become, that some of the Pharisees actually took Paul’s side, saying, “We
find no evil in this man: but if a spirit or an angel hath spoken to him, let
us not fight against God.” The judgment hall immediately became the scene
of the most violent contention, and the presence of Claudius Lysias was
absolutely necessary. Paul is once more lodged in the castle.
So passed this eventful morning in the history of our apostle. In the
evening, when alone, can we wonder if his heart was prone to sink within
him? From what had taken place, and from the gloomy appearance of
everything around him, the apostle never stood in greater need of the
consolation and strength which the Master’s presence always gives. But
who knew this so well, or could feel so deeply for the lonely prisoner as
the Master Himself? And so He appears in richest grace to comfort and
cheer the heart of His servant. It was divinely timed comfort. The Lord
stood by him, as He had clone at Corinth, and as He afterwards did on his
voyage to Rome;
“and said, Be of good cheer, Paul; for as thou hast testified of Me
in Jerusalem, so must thou bear witness also at Rome.”
(Acts 18:9, 10; 23:11; 27:23, 24.)
A conspiracy of more than forty men to assassinate Paul having been
discovered, and all their wicked schemes confounded, Claudius Lysias
immediately summoned his centurions and soldiers, and gave strict orders
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to have Paul conveyed safely to Caesarea. The details of this matter are
related by Luke with singular fullness. (Acts 23:12-25.)

PAUL APPEARS BEFORE FELIX

As some of our readers may have observed, the character of God’s
dealings with His servant somewhat changes here. It may be well to pause
for a moment, and reverently inquire into the apparent causes of this
change. And, as many have freely given their opinions on this difficult
point, we will here quote a few lines from one who seems to give the mind
of the Spirit.
“I believe, then, that the hand of God was in this journey of Paul’s;
that in His sovereign wisdom He willed that His servant should
undertake it, and also have blessing in it: but that the means
employed to lead him into it according to that sovereign wisdom,
was the apostle’s human affection for the people who were his
kinsmen after the flesh; and that he was not led into it by the Holy
Ghost acting on the part of Christ in the assembly. This
attachment to his people, this human affection, met with that
among the people which put it in its place. Humanly speaking, it
was an amiable feeling; but it was not the power of the Holy Ghost
founded on the death and resurrection of Christ. Here, there was no
longer Jew nor Gentile... Paul’s affection was good in itself, but as
a spring of action it did not come up to the height of the work of
the Spirit, who, on Christ’s part, had sent him afar from Jerusalem
to the Gentiles in order to reveal the assembly as His body united
to Him in heaven.
“He was the messenger of the heavenly glory, which brought out
the doctrine of the assembly composed of Jews and Gentiles,
united without distinction in the one body of Christ, thus blotting
out Judaism; but his love for his nation carried him, I repeat, into
the very center of hostile Judaism — Judaism enraged against the
spiritual equality.
“Nevertheless, the hand of God was doubtless in it: Paul,
individually, found his level.
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“That which Paul said raises a tumult, and the chief captain takes
him from among them. God has all things at His disposal. A
nephew of Paul’s, never mentioned elsewhere, hears of an ambush
laid for him and warns him of it. Paul sends him to the chief
captain, who expedites the departure of Paul under a guard to
Caesarea. God watched over him, but all is on the level of human
and providential ways. There is not the angel as in Peter’s case, nor
the earthquake as at Philippi. We are sensibly on different
ground.” 2
The accusers of Paul were not long in finding their way to Caesarea. “And
after five days Ananias the high priest descended with the elders, and with
a certain orator named Tertullus, who informed the governor against Paul.”
(Acts 24:1.) In a short speech, full of flattery and insinuating art, Tertullus
accuses Paul of sedition, heresy, and the profanation of the temple.
Felix then signified to Paul that he had an opportunity of answering for
himself. And now, we may say, the apostle of the Gentiles is once more in
his right place. However humiliating his circumstances, he is still God’s
messenger to the Gentiles, and God is with His beloved servant. The Jews
were silent; and Paul, in his usual straightforward manner, met the charges.
Felix, it appears, knew a good deal about these things, and it is evident that
a strong impression was made on his mind. Many years before this,
Christianity had found its way into the Roman army at Caesarea (Acts
10), so that he probably knew something about it, and was convinced of
the truth of Paul’s statements; but he trifled with his convictions, and with
his prisoner. He “deferred” further inquiry for the present, making some
excuse about the coming of Lysias. Meanwhile however, he gave orders,
that Paul should be treated with kindness and consideration, and that his
friends should be allowed free access to him.
Not many days after this, Felix entered the audience chamber with his wife
Drusilla, and sent for Paul. They were evidently curious to hear him
discourse “concerning the faith of Christ.” But Paul was not the one to
gratify the curiosity of a Roman libertine, and a profligate Jewish princess.
The faithful apostle, in preaching Christ, spoke plainly and boldly to the
conscience of his hearers. He had now an opportunity in his bonds which
he could otherwise scarcely have obtained. “And as he reasoned of
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righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled.” And
little wonder. If we are to believe the historians of his own day, Josephus
and Tacitus, a more unprincipled or dissolute couple never sat before a
preacher. But, though conscience-stricken, Felix remained impenitent.
Fearful condition! “Go thy way,” said he, “for this time; when I have a
convenient season, I will call for thee.” But that convenient season never
came, though he frequently saw the apostle afterwards, and, we doubt not,
gave him to understand that a bribe would procure his release. Little did
the Roman governor think that his venal justice was to be recorded in the
book of God, and handed down to all succeeding generations. His character
is represented as mean, cruel, and dissolute; that in the indulgence of all
kinds of wickedness he exercised the power of a king with the temper of a
slave. “But after two years, Porcius Festus came into Felix’ room; and
Felix, willing to show the Jews a pleasure, left Paul bound.”

PAUL APPEARS BEFORE FESTUS AND AGRIPPA

Immediately after the arrival of Festus in the province he visited
Jerusalem. There the leading Jews seized the opportunity to demand
Paul’s return. Their plea, doubtless, was that he should be tried again
before the Sanhedrim, but their real purpose was to kill him on the way.
Festus refused their petition. He invited them, however, to go down with
him to Caesarea and accuse him there. The trial took place and resembles
that before Felix. It is quite evident that Festus saw clearly enough, that
Paul’s real offense was connected with the religious opinions of the Jews,
and that he had committed no offense against the law; but at the same
time, being desirous to ingratiate himself with the Jews, he asks Paul
whether he would go to Jerusalem to be tried there. This was little better
than a proposal to sacrifice him to Jewish hatred. Paul, being well aware of
this, at once appealed to the Emperor — “I appeal unto Caesar.”
Festus was no doubt surprised at the dignity and independence of his
prisoner. But it was his privilege as a Roman citizen, to have his cause
transferred to the supreme tribunal of the Emperor at Rome. “Then
Festus, when he had conferred with the council, answered, Hast thou
appealed unto Caesar? unto Caesar shalt thou go.”
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So far as the eye of man can see, this was Paul’s only resource under the
circumstances. But the hand and purpose of the Lord were in it. Paul must
bear witness for Christ and the truth in Rome also. Jerusalem had rejected
the testimony to the Gentiles; Rome too must have its share in rejecting
the same testimony, and in becoming the prison of the witness. But in all
this Paul is highly favored of the Lord. His position resembles that of his
blessed Master, when He was given up to the Gentiles by the hatred of
the Jews; only the Lord was perfect in it all, and He was in His true place
before God. He came to the Jews — this was His mission: Paul was
delivered from the Jews — such was the difference. Christ gave Himself
up, as we read, “Who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without
spot to God.” Part of Paul’s commission runs thus: — “Delivering thee
from the people and from the Gentiles, unto whom now I send thee.” But
Paul returned to “the people” in the energy of his human affections, after
he had been placed outside of them in the energy of the Holy Ghost. (Acts
26:17.) Jesus had taken him out from both Jew and Gentile, to exercise a
ministry that united the two in one body in Christ. As Paul himself says,
“Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh.” In Christ Jesus
there is neither Jew nor Greek.
We now resume the history of the great apostle.

PAUL APPEARS BEFORE AGRIPPA AND BERNICE

It happened about this time that Agrippa, king of the Jews, and his sister
Bernice, came to pay a complimentary visit to Festus. And as Festus
knew not how to state Paul’s case to the Emperor, he took the
opportunity of consulting Agrippa, who was better informed than himself
on the points in question. The Jewish prince, who must have known
something of Christianity, and had no doubt heard of Paul himself,
expressed a desire to hear him speak. Festus readily acceded to the
request. “Tomorrow,” said he, “thou shalt hear him.”
The apostle is now to have the privilege of bearing the name of Jesus
before the most dignified assembly he has ever addressed. Jewish kings,
Roman governors, military officers, and the chief men of Caesarea
assembled “with great pomp” to hear the prisoner give an account of
himself to Agrippa. It was no mean audience, and it is perfectly clear that
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they regarded the prisoner as no mean person. Festus, having
acknowledged the difficulty in which he found himself, referred the matter
to the better knowledge of the Jewish king. Agrippa courteously signified
to Paul that he was permitted to speak for himself. We have now come to
one of the most interesting moments in the whole history of our
apostle.
The dignity of his manner before his judges, though he stretched out a
hand that was chained to a soldier, must have deeply impressed his
audience. The depth of his humiliation only manifested more strikingly the
moral elevation of his soul. He thought neither of his chain nor of his
person. Perfectly happy in Christ, and burning with love to those around
him, self and circumstances were completely forgotten. With a dignified
deference to the position of those who surrounded him, he rose, in the
honest declarations of a good conscience, infinitely above them all. He
addresses himself to the conscience of his audience, with the boldness and
uprightness of a man accustomed to walk with God, and to act for Him.
The character and conduct of the governors are thrown into painful
contrast with the character and conduct of the apostle, and show us what
the world is when unmasked by the Holy Ghost.
“I pass over in silence,” says one, “the worldly egotism which
betrays itself in Lysias and Festus, by the assumption of all sorts
of good qualities and good conduct — the mixture of awakened
conscience and the absence of principle in the governors — the
desire to please the Jews for their own importance, or to facilitate
their government of a rebellious people. The position of Agrippa
and all the details of the history have a remarkable stamp of truth,
and present the various characters in so living a style that we seem
to be in the scene described; we see the persons moving in it. This,
moreover, strikingly characterises the writings of Luke.”
Chapter 26. Paul addresses king Agrippa as one well versed in the customs
and questions prevailing amongst the Jews; and he so relates his
miraculous conversion and his subsequent career as to act on the
conscience of the king. By the clear and straight-forward narrative of the
apostle, he was not far from being convinced; his conscience was
awakened; but the world and his own passions stood in the way. Festus
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ridiculed. To him it was nothing more than wild enthusiasm — a
rhapsody. He interrupted the apostle abruptly, and “said with a loud
voice, Paul, thou art beside thyself; much learning doth make thee mad.”
The apostle’s reply was dignified and self-possessed, but intensely
earnest; and, with great wisdom and discernment, he appeals at last to
Agrippa. “I am not mad, most noble Festus; but speak forth the words of
truth and soberness. For the king knoweth of these things, before whom
also I speak freely; for I am persuaded that none of these things are hidden
from him; for this thing was not done in a corner.”
Then turning to the Jewish king, who sat beside Festus, he made this
direct and solemn appeal to him —
“King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets? I know that thou
believest.” “Then Agrippa said unto Paul, Almost thou persuadest
me to be a Christian.”
For the moment, the king was carried away by the power of Paul’s
address, and by the sharpened sting of his appeals. Then Paul made his
reply — a reply which stands alone. It is characterised by godly zeal,
christian courtesy, burning love for souls, and great personal joy in the
Lord.
“And Paul said, I would to God, that not only thou, but also all
that hear me this day, were both almost, and altogether such as I
am, except these bonds.”
With the expression of this noble wish, the conference closed. The meeting
was dissolved. Agrippa had no desire to hear more. The appeals had been
too pointed, too personal, yet so mingled with dignity, affection, and
solicitude, that he was overcome. Then “the king rose up, and the
governor, and Bernice, and they that sat with them.” After a brief
consultation, Festus, Agrippa, and their companions came to the
conclusion that Paul was guilty of nothing worthy of death or even
imprisonment. “This man,” said Agrippa, “might have been set at liberty,
if he had not appealed unto Caesar.”
This was the Lord’s care of His beloved servant. He would have his
innocence proved and acknowledged by his judges, and fully established
before the world. This being accomplished, the king and his companions
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resume their places in the world and its gateties, and Paul returns to his
prison. But never was his heart more happy or more filled with the spirit
of his Master than at that moment.

PAUL’S VOYAGE TO ROME A.D. 60

Acts 27. The time was now come for Paul’s journey to Rome. No formal
trial of the apostle had yet taken place. And, no doubt, wearied with the
unrelenting opposition of the Jews — with two years’ imprisonment at
Caesarea — with repeated examinations before the governors and Agrippa,
he had claimed a trial before the imperial court. Luke, the historian of
the Acts, and Aristarchus of Thessalonica, were favored to accompany
him. Paul was committed to the charge of a centurion named Julius, of the
imperial band; an officer, who, upon all occasions, treated the apostle with
the greatest kindness and consideration.
It was then “determined” that Paul should be sent along with “certain
other prisoners,” by sea to Italy. “And entering into a ship of
Adramyttium, we launched,” says Luke, “meaning to sail by the coast of
Asia. And the next day we touched at Sidon. And Julius courteously
entreated Paul, and gave him liberty to go unto his friends to refresh
himself.” Loosing from Sidon they were forced to sail under the lee of
Cyprus, because the winds were contrary, and come to Myra, a city of
Lycia. Here the centurion had his prisoners transferred to a ship of
Alexandria on her voyage to Italy. In this vessel, after leaving Myra,
“they sailed slowly many days,” the weather being unfavorable from the
first. But running to the leeward of Crete, they safely reached “the Fair
Havens.”
Winter was now near, and it became a serious question what course should
be taken — whether they should remain at Fair Havens for the winter, or
seek some better harbor.
Here we must pause for a moment and notice the wonderful position of
our apostle in this serious consultation. As before Festus and Agrippa, he
appears before the captain, the owner, the centurion, and the whole crew,
as having the mind of God. He counsels, directs, and acts, as if he were
really the master of the vessel, in place of being a prisoner in the custody
of soldiers. He advised that they should remain where they were. He
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warned them that they would meet with violent weather if they ventured
out to the open sea — that much injury would be done to the ship and
cargo, and much risk of the lives of those on board. But the master and the
owner of the ship, who had the greatest interest in her, were guided by
circumstances and not by faith; they were willing to run the risk of seeking
a more commodious harbour to winter in, and the centurion naturally
deferred to their judgment. All were against the judgment of the man of
faith — the man of God — the man who was speaking and acting for God.
Even the circumstances in the scene around them seemed to favor the
opinion of the sailors rather than that of the apostle. But nothing can
falsify the judgment of faith. It must be true in spite of every
circumstance.
It was therefore resolved by the majority that they should leave Fair
Havens, and sail to Port Phenice as a more secure winter harbor. The
wind changed just at this moment. Everything seemed to favor the sailors.
“The south wind blew softly;” so sanguine were they, Luke tells us, that
they supposed their purpose was already accomplished. (Ver. 13.) They
accordingly weighed anchor and with a soft breeze from the south, the
vessel, with her “two hundred threescore and sixteen souls” on board, left
the port of Fair Havens. But scarcely had she rounded Cape Matala, a
distance of only four or five miles, when a violent wind from the shore
caught the vessel, and tossed her in such a manner that it was no longer
possible for the helmsman to make her keep her course. And as Luke
observes, “We let her drive;” that is, they were compelled to let her run
before the wind.
But our chief concern here is with Paul as the man of faith. What must
have been the thoughts and feelings now of his fellow-passengers? They
had trusted to the wind, and they must now reap the whirlwind. The
solemn counsels and warnings of faith had been rejected. Many, alas!
heedless of the warning here recorded, and under the flattering wind of
favorable circumstances, have launched on the great voyage of life, utterly
regardless of the voice of faith. But like the fawning wind that betrayed the
vessel from the harbour, all soon changed into a furious tempest on the
troubled sea of life.
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THE STORM IN THE SEA OF ADRIA
The Term “Euroclydon” given to this tempestuous wind indicates, we are
told, a storm of the utmost violence. It was accompanied by the agitation
and whirling motion of the clouds, and by great commotion in the sea,
raising it in columns of spray. The sacred historian now proceeds to give
an accurate account of what was done with the vessel in these perilous
circumstances. Having run to the leeward of Clauda, they may have
escaped for a little the violence of the tempest. This would give them an
opportunity to make every preparation for weathering the storm.
The day after they left Clauda — the violence of the storm continuing —
they began to lighten the ship by throwing overboard whatever could be
spared. All hands seem to have been at work. “And we being exceedingly
tossed with a tempest, the next day they lightened the ship; and the third
day we cast out with our own hands the tackling of the ship. And when
neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, and no small tempest lay on
us, all hope that we should be saved was then taken away.”
“His race performed, the sacred lamp of day
Now dipt in western clouds his parting ray;
His languid fires, half lost in ambient haze,
Refract along the dusk a crimson blaze:
Till deep emerged the sinking orb descends,
And cheerless night o’er heaven her reign extends;
Sad evening’s hour, how different from the past!
No flaming pomp, no blushing glories cast,
No ray of friendly light is seen around;
The moon and stars in hopeless shade are drown’d.”

Nothing could be more dreadful to ancient mariners than the continued

over-clouded sky, as they were accustomed to be guided by their
observation of the heavenly bodies. It was at this moment of perplexity
and despair that the apostle “stood forth” and raised his voice amidst the
storm. And from his word of sympathy we learn, that all their other
sufferings were aggravated by the difficulty of preparing food.
“But after long abstinence Paul stood forth in the midst of them,
and said, Sirs, ye should have hearkened unto me, and not have
loosed from Crete, and to have gained this harm and loss. And now
I exhort you to be of good cheer: for there shall be no loss of any
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man’s life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by me this
night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve, saying, Fear
not, Paul; thou must be brought before Caesar: and, lo, God hath
given thee all them that sail with thee. Wherefore, sirs, be of good
cheer: for I believe God, that it shall be even as it was told me.
Howbeit we must be cast upon a certain island.” (Verses 21-26.)

THE SHIPWRECK
The shipwreck was not far distant. “When the fourteenth night was come,
as we were driven up and down in Adria, about midnight the shipmen
deemed that they drew near to some country; and sounded, and found it
twenty fathoms: and when they had gone a little further, they sounded
again, and found it fifteen fathoms.” Fourteen days and nights this heavy
gale continued without abatement; during which time their sufferings must
have been great beyond description.
At the close of the fourteenth day, “about midnight,” the sailors heard a
sound which indicated that they were nearing land. The sound, no doubt,
was the roar of the breakers on the unknown shore. No time was to be
lost; so they immediately cast four anchors out of the stern, and anxiously
wished for day. Here a natural but ungenerous attempt was made by the
sailors to save their own lives. They lowered the boat with the professed
purpose of laying out anchors from the bow, but intending to desert the
sinking ship. Paul, seeing this, and knowing their real design, immediately
“said to the centurion and to the soldiers, Except these abide in the ship,
ye cannot be saved. Then the soldiers cut the ropes of the boat, and let her
fall off.” Thus the divine counsel of the apostle was the means of saving all
on board. “Except these abide in the ship, ye cannot be saved.” It is no
longer the ship’s captain or the ship’s crew that are looked to for wisdom
and safety. Every eye is turned to Paul the prisoner — the man of faith
— the man who believes and acts according to the revelation of God.
Circumstances often mislead when looked to for direction; the word of
God is our only sure guide, whether in fair or in foul weather.
During the anxious interval which remained till the dawn of day, Paul had
an opportunity of lifting up his voice to God, and for the encouragement
of the whole company. What a scene of intensified interest it must have
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been! The night dark and stormy — the shattered vessel in danger of going
down at her anchors, or of being dashed to pieces on the rocky shore. But
there was one on board who was perfectly happy amidst it all. The state
of the ship — the shallow water-the alarming sound of the breakers, had
no terror for him. He was happy in the Lord, and in full communion with
His very thoughts and purposes. Such is the Christian’s place in the midst
of every storm, though comparatively few rise to it; faith only can reach it.
This was Paul’s last exhortation to the ship’s company.
“And while the day was coming on, Paul besought them all to take
meat, saying, This day is the fourteenth day that ye have tarried
and continued fasting, having taken nothing. Wherefore I pray you
to take some meat: for this is for your health: for there shall not an
hair fall from the head of any of you. And when he had thus
spoken, he took bread, and gave thanks to God in presence of them
all; and when he had broken it, he began to eat. Then were they all
of good cheer, and they also took some meat.” (Verses 33-36.)
Their only hope now was to run the ship on shore and so escape to land.
Though ignorant of the coast, “they discovered a certain creek with a
shore,” or, a smooth beach; and determined to run the ship aground there.
So they cast away the anchors, unloosed the rudder bands, hoisted the
mainsail to the wind, and made for the shore. The ship thus driven, her
bow stuck fast in the beach and remained unmoved, but the stern was
broken to pieces by the violence of the waves.
Paul’s ship has now reached the shore; and once more the man of faith is
the means of saving the lives of all the prisoners. The centurion, greatly
influenced by the words of Paul, and anxious at least for his safety,
prevents the soldiers from killing the prisoners, and gave orders that those
who could swim should cast themselves first into the sea and get to land;
and that the rest should follow on such boards or broken pieces of the ship
as were available. “And so it came to pass, that they escaped all safe to
land.” Their deliverance was as complete as Paul had predicted it would
be.
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PAUL AT MELITA — NOW MALTA
Acts 28. The inhabitants of the island received the shipwrecked strangers
with no small kindness, and immediately lighted a fire to warm them. The
sacred historian gives us a living picture of the whole scene. We see the
persons described moving in it: the apostle gathering sticks for the fire —
the viper fastening on his hand — the barbarians thinking him first a
murderer, and then a god from the sting being harmless. Publius, the chief
man of the island, lodged them courteously three days; and his father, who
lay sick of a fever, was healed by Paul laying his hands on him and praying
for him. The apostle was enabled to work many miracles during his stay
on the island; and the whole company, for his sake, were loaded with
many honors. We see God is with His beloved servant, and he exercises
his accustomed power among the inhabitants. As the concluding part of
Paul’s journey to Rome is so prosperous, that scarcely any incident in it is
recorded, we will only notice it briefly.
After a three months’ stay in Malta, the soldiers and their prisoners left in
a ship of Alexandria for Italy. They touched at Syracuse, where they
tarried three days: and at Rhegium, from which place they had a fair wind
to Puteoli. Here they “found brethren,” and while they were spending a
few days with them, enjoying the ministry of brotherly love, the news of
the apostle’s arrival reached Rome. The Christians at once sent forth some
of their number, who met Paul and his friends at Appii Forum and the
Three Taverns. A beautiful instance and illustration of the fellowship of
saints. What must have been the feelings of our apostle on this first
introduction to the Christians from the church at Rome! His long cherished
desire was at last accomplished; his heart was filled with praise; “He
thanked God,” as Luke says, “and took courage.”

PAUL’S ARRIVAL AT ROME

Along the Appian Road most probably, Paul and his company traveled to
Rome. On their arrival, “the centurion delivered the prisoners to the
captain of the guard:3 but Paul was suffered to dwell by himself with a
soldier that kept him.” Though he was not released from the constant
annoyance of being chained to a soldier, every indulgence compatible with
his position was allowed him.
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Paul was now privileged “to preach the gospel to them that were at Rome
also;” and proceeded without delay to act upon his divine rule — “to the
Jew first.” He sends for the chief of the Jews and explains to them his true
position. He assures them that he had committed no offense against his
nation, or the customs of the fathers; but that he was brought to Rome to
answer certain charges made against him by the Jews in Palestine: and so
unfounded were the charges, that even the Roman Governor was ready to
set him free, but the Jews opposed his liberty. In fact it was, as he said,
“for the hope of Israel I am bound with this chain.” His only crime has
been his firm faith in the promises of God to Israel through the Messiah.
The Roman Jews, in reply, assured Paul that no report to his prejudice
had reached. Rome, and that they desired to hear from himself a statement
of his faith; adding, that the Christians were everywhere spoken against. A
day was therefore fixed for a meeting at his own private lodgings. At the
appointed time many came, “to whom he expounded and testified the
kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of
Moses and out of the prophets, from morning till evening.” But the Jews
at Rome, as at Antioch and Jerusalem, were slow of heart to believe. “And
some believed the things which were spoken and some believed not.” But
how earnestly and unweariedly he labored to win their hearts for Christ!
From morning till evening he not only preached Christ, but sought to
persuade them concerning Him. He sought, we may be sure, to persuade
them concerning His Godhead and manhood — His perfect sacrifice —
His resurrection, ascension, and glory. What a lesson and what a subject
for the preacher in all ages! Persuading men concerning Jesus from morning
till evening.
The condition of the Jews is now set before us for the last time. The
judgment pronounced by Esaias was about to fall on them in all its
withering power — a judgment under which they lie to this day — a
judgment which shall continue until God interposes to give them
repentance, and to deliver them by His grace to the glory of His own
name. But, in the meantime, “the salvation of God is sent to the Gentiles,
and they will hear it;” and, as we know, blessed be His name, they have
heard it, we ourselves being witnesses of it.4
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“And Paul dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and
received all that came unto him; preaching the kingdom of God, and
teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all
confidence, no man forbidding him.” (Acts 28:30, 31.)
These are the last words of the Acts. The scene on which the curtain falls
is most suggestive — the opposition of Jewish unbelief to the things
which concerned their souls’ salvation, suggestive alas! of what soon befell
them. And here, too, ends the history of this precious servant of God, so
far as it has been directly revealed. The voice of the Spirit of truth on this
subject becomes silent. Our further knowledge of Paul’s subsequent
history must be gathered almost exclusively from his later Epistles; and
from these we learn more than mere history: they give us a blessed insight
into the feelings, conflicts, affections, and sympathies of the great apostle,
and of the condition of the church of God generally, down to the period of
his martyrdom.

THE BOOK OF THE ACTS TRANSITIONAL

But here we must pause and contemplate for a moment our apostle as a
prisoner in the imperial city. The gospel had now been preached from
Jerusalem to Rome. Great changes had taken place in the dispensational
ways of God. The book of the Acts is transitional in its character. The
Jews, we see, are now set aside, or rather they have set themselves aside
by their rejection of that which God was setting up. The counsels of His
grace towards them, no doubt, abide for ever sure; but in the meantime they
are cast off, and others come in and take the place of blessed relationship
with God. Paul was a witness of God’s grace to Israel; he was himself an
Israelite, but also chosen of God to introduce something entirely new —
the Church, the body of Christ,
“Whereof I was made a minister... that I should preach among the
Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see
what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of
the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus
Christ.” (Ephesians 3:7-9.)
This new thing set aside all distinction between Jew and Gentile, as
sinners and in the oneness of this body. The hostility of the Jews to these
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truths never abated, as we have fully seen; and the results of this enmity
we have also seen. The Jews disappear from the scene entirely; and the
church becomes the vessel of God’s testimony on the earth, and His
habitation by the Spirit. (Ephesians 2:22.) Individual Jews, of course, who
believe in Jesus, are blessed in connection with a heavenly Christ and the
“one body;” but Israel for a time is left without God, and without present
communication with Him. The Epistles to the Romans and to the
Ephesians fully set forth this doctrine (especially Romans chapters 9, 10,
11). We now return to

PAUL’S OCCUPATION DURING HIS IMPRISONMENT

Though a prisoner, he was allowed the freest intercourse with his friends,
and he was then surrounded by many of his oldest and most faithful
companions. From the Epistles we learn that Luke, Timothy, Tychicus,
Epaphras, Aristarchus, and others, were with the apostle at this time. Still,
we must remember that he was, as a prisoner, chained to a soldier and
exposed to the rude control of such. Owing to the long delay of his trial, he
was in this condition for two years; during which time he preached the
gospel and opened up the scriptures to the congregations which came to
hear him; and wrote several epistles to churches in distant places.
Having fully and faithfully discharged the duty which he owed to the
Jews, the favored people of God, he addressed himself to the Gentiles,
though not, of course, to the exclusion of the Jews. His door was open
from morning till night to all who would come and hear the great truths of
Christianity. And in some respects he never had a better opportunity; for
as he was under the protection of the Romans, the Jews were not allowed
to molest him.
The effects of Paul’s preaching through the Lord’s blessing, were soon
manifest. The Roman guards, the household of Caesar, and “all other
places” were blessed through his means. “I would ye should understand,
brethren,” he writes to the Philippians, “that the things which happened
unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel; so that
my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace [or, Caesar’s court, see
margin], and in all other places.” And again, the apostle says,
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“All the saints salute you, chiefly they that are of Caesar’s
household.” (Philippians 1:12, 13; 4:22.)
The blessing appears to have been first manifested in the praetorium, or
amongst the praetorian guards. “My bonds in Christ are manifest in all
Caesar’s court” — the quarters of the guards and household troops. The
gospel of the glow which Paul preached was heard by the whole camp.
Even the kind prefect Burrhus, with his intimate friend Seneca, Nero’s
tutor, may have heard the gospel of the grace of God. Paul’s courteous
manners, and great abilities, both natural and acquired, were well fitted to
attract both the statesman and the philosopher. His being there two whole
years gave them many opportunities.
With nearly the whole of the guards, we may say, he must have been
personally acquainted. With every change of guard the door for the gospel
opened wider and wider. Being constantly chained to one of the soldiers as
his keeper, and having the guard duly relieved, he thus became acquainted
with many; and with what love and earnestness and burning eloquence, he
must have spoken to them of Jesus and of their need of Him! But we must
wait till the morning of the first resurrection to see the results of Paul’s
preaching there: the day will declare it, and God shall have all the glory.
The apostle gives us also to know that the gospel had penetrated into the
palace itself. There were saints in Caesar’s household. Christianity was
planted within the imperial walls; “and in all other places.” Yes, in “all
other places,” says the sacred historian. Not only was Paul thus laboring
within the imperial precincts, but his companions, whom he styles his
“fellow-laborers,” were no doubt preaching the gospel in “all other
places,” in and around the imperial city; so that the success of the gospel
must be ascribed to the efforts of others, as well as to the unwearied
exertions of the great apostle in his captivity.

THE RUNAWAY SLAVE, ONESIMUS

But of all the converts whom the Lord gave to the apostle in his bonds,
none of them seems to have so entirely won his heart as the poor runaway
slave, Onesimus. Beautiful picture of the strength, the humility, and the
tenderness of divine love in the heart, which works by the Spirit, and
sweetly shines in all the details of individual life! The apostle’s success in
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the imperial palace weakens not his interest in a young disciple from the
lowest condition of society. No portion of the community were more
depraved than the slaves; but what must have been the associates of a
fugitive slave in that profligate city? Yet from these lowest depths
Onesimus is drawn forth by the unseen hand of eternal love. He crosses
the path of the apostle, hears him preach the gospel, is converted, devotes
himself at once to the Lord and to His service, and finds in Paul a friend
and brother, as well as a leader and teacher. And now shine forth the
virtues and the value of Christianity; and the sweetest applications of the
grace of God to a poor, friendless, destitute, fugitive slave.
What is Christianity? we may inquire; and whence its origin, in the view of
such a new thing in Rome — in the world? Was it at the feet of Gamaliel
that Paul so learnt to love? No, my reader, but at the feet of Jesus. Would
to God that the eloquent historian of “The Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire” had entered into this scene, and learnt to value, in place of
scornfully ridiculing, divine Christianity! If we think for a moment of the
apostle’s labors at this time — of his age — of his infirmities — of his
circumstances (to say nothing of the lofty subjects, and the immense
foundation truths, that were then occupying his mind); we may well
admire the grace that could enter into every detail of the relationships of
master and slave, and that with such delicate consideration of every claim.
The letter he sent with Onesimus to his injured master Philemon, is surely
the most touching ever written. Looking at it simply as such, we are at a
loss whether most to admire the warmth and earnestness of his affections,
the delicacy and justness of his thoughts, or the sublime dignity which
pervades the whole epistle.
We now refer for a moment to the

EPISTLES THAT WERE WRITTEN DURING HIS IMPRISONMENT

There can be no reasonable doubt, that The Epistles to Philemon, to the
Colossians, to The Ephesians, and to the Philippians were written
towards the latter part of Paul’s imprisonment at Rome. He refers to his
“bonds” in them all, and repeatedly to the expectation of his release.
(Compare Philemon 22; Colossians 4:18; Ephesians 3:1; 4:1; 6:20;
Philippians 1:7, 25; 2:24; 4:22.) Besides he must have been long enough at
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Rome for the news of his imprisonment to have reached his affectionate
Philippians, and for them to have sent him relief.
The first three are supposed to have been written some time before that to
the Philippians. An immediate issue of his cause is more distinctly spoken
of in his Epistle to them. “Him therefore I hope to send presently, so soon
as I shall see how it will go with me. But I trust in the Lord that I also
myself shall come shortly.” (Philippians 2:23, 24.) The first three may
have been written about the spring of A .D . 62, and sent by Tychicus and
Onesimus; the last, in the autumn and sent by Epaphroditus.
The Epistle to the Hebrews is also supposed by some to have been
written about the same time, and every just consideration leads to the
conclusion that Paul was the writer. The expression at the close of the
epistle, “they of Italy salute you,” seems decisive as to where the writer
was when he wrote it. And the following passages seem decisive as to the
time: “Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty: with whom, if
he come shortly, I will see you.” Compare this with what Paul wrote to
the Philippians — “I trust in the Lord Jesus to send Timotheus shortly
unto you... so soon as I shall see how it will go with me. But I trust in the
Lord that I also myself shall come shortly.” We can scarcely doubt that
these passages were written by the same pen about the same time, and
that they refer to the same intended movements. But we do not press this
point. One thing, however, is evident — that the epistle was written
before the destruction of Jerusalem in A .D . 70, as the temple was standing,
and the temple worship going on undisturbed. Compare chapters 8:4; 9:25;
10:11; 13:10-13.

PAUL’S ACQUITTAL AND RELEASE

After fully four years’ imprisonment, partly in Judea and partly at Rome,
the apostle is once more at liberty. But we have no particulars as to the
character of his trial, or the ground of his acquittal. The sacred historian
tells us that he dwelt two whole years in his own hired house; but he does
not say what followed at the close of that period. Was it followed by the
apostle’s condemnation and death, or by his acquittal and liberation? This
is the question, and the only certain answer to this question must be
gathered chiefly from the Pastoral Epistles. The First to Timothy and
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that to Titus appear to have been written about the same time; and the
Second to Timothy somewhat later.
It is now admitted, we believe, by nearly all who are competent to decide
on such a question, that Paul was acquitted, and that he spent some years
in travelling, at perfect liberty, before he was again imprisoned and
condemned. And though it is difficult to trace the footsteps of the apostle
during that period, still we may draw certain conclusions from his letters
without encroaching on the domain of conjecture. Most likely he traveled
rapidly and visited many places. During the lengthened period of his
imprisonment, much mischief had been done by his enemies in the
churches which he had been the means of planting. They required his
presence, his counsel, and his encouragement. And from what we know of
his energy and zeal, we are well assured that no labor would be spared in
visiting them.

PAUL’S DEPARTURE FROM ITALY

1. When writing to the Romans, before his imprisonment, Paul expressed
his intention of passing through Rome into Spain.
“Whensoever I take my journey into Spain,” he says, “I will come
to you.” Again, “When therefore I have performed this, and have
sealed to them this fruit, I will come by you into Spain.” (Romans
15:24, 28.)
Some have thought that he did go to Spain immediately after his release.
The principal evidence adduced in favor of this hypothesis is supplied by
Clement, a fellow-laborer, mentioned in Philippians 4:3, said to be
afterwards Bishop of Rome. The writer speaks of Paul as having preached
the gospel in the east and in the west: — that he instructed the whole world
(meaning, no doubt, the Roman Empire); and that he had gone to the
extremity of the west, meaning Spain. As Clement was Paul’s own disciple
and fellow-laborer, his testimony is worthy of our respect; still it is not
scripture, and therefore not in itself conclusive.
2. From Paul’s more recent letters, he seems to have altered his plans, and
to have given up the idea of going to Spain, at least for a time. This we
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gather chiefly from the Epistles to Philemon and to the Philippians. To the
former he writes,
“But withal prepare me also a lodging: for I trust that through your
prayers I shall be given unto you.” (Verse 22.)
He here gives Philemon to expect that he may soon be with him in person.
To the Philippians he writes, and speaking of Timothy he adds,
“Him therefore I hope to send presently, so soon as I shall see
how it will go with me. But I trust in the Lord that I also myself
shall come shortly.” Again, “But I trust in the Lord Jesus to send
Timotheus shortly unto you, that I also may be of good comfort
when I know your state.” (Chapter 2:19, 23, 24.)
The intended movements of the apostle and his beloved Timothy seem
quite clear from these passages. It was evidently the purpose of the
apostle to dispatch Timothy to Philippi as soon as the trial was over, and
to remain in Italy himself until Timothy returned with the report of their
state.
3. It may reasonably be expected that Paul fulfilled the intention which he
so lately expressed; and that he visited the churches in Asia Minor, some
of which as yet had not seen his face in the flesh. Having accomplished the
objects of his mission to Asia Minor, some have thought that then he may
have undertaken his long-meditated journey into Spain; but of this we
have no reliable information, and mere conjecture is of no value.
4. Another theory is, that he went straight from Italy to Judea, and thence
to Antioch, Asia Minor, and Greece. This scheme is founded chiefly on
Hebrews 13:23, 24.
“Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty; with whom,
if he come shortly, I will see you... They of Italy salute you.”
It is also supposed that, while he was waiting at Puteoli for embarkation,
immediately on the return of Timothy, tidings reached the apostle that a
great persecution had broken out against the Christians in Jerusalem. This
sad intelligence so filled the heart of Paul with sorrow, that he wrote at
once his famous letter to them — The Epistle To The Hebrews. Shortly
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after this Timothy arrived, and Paul and his companions sailed from
Judea.5

THE PLACES VISITED BY PAUL DURING HIS LIBERTY

Having stated these different theories for the reader’s examination, we will
now notice the places mentioned in the Epistles as visited by Paul.
1. At some time after leaving Rome, Paul and his companions must have
visited Asia Minor and Greece.
“As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into
Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no
other doctrine.” (1 Timothy 1:3.)
Feeling, it may be, somewhat anxious about his son Timothy, and the
weight of the responsibilities of his position at Ephesus, he sends him a
letter of encouragement, comfort, and authority from Macedonia-The
First Epistle To Timothy.
2. Some time after this, Paul visited the island of Crete in company with
Titus, and left him there. He also very soon after sent him a letter of
instruction and authority, The Epistle To Titus. Timothy and Titus may
be considered as delegates or representatives of the apostle.
“For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order
the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city, as I had
appointed thee.” Titus 1:5.
3. Paul was intending to spend the winter at a place called Nicopolis.
“When I shall send Artemas unto thee, or Tychicus, be diligent to come
unto me to Nicopolis; for I have determined there to winter.” (Titus 3:12.)
4. He visited Troas, Corinth, and Miletum.
“The cloke that I left at Troas with Carpus, when thou comest,
bring with thee, and the books, but especially the parchments...
Erastus abode at Corinth; but Trophimus have I left at Miletum
sick.” (2 Timothy 4:13, 20.)
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PAUL’S SECOND IMPRISONMENT AT ROME
It is supposed by some that the apostle was arrested at Nicopolis (where
he intended to spend the winter) and thence carried a prisoner to Rome.
By others it is supposed that, after wintering at Nicopolis, and visiting the
places above mentioned, he returned to Rome in a state of personal liberty,
but was arrested during the Neronian persecution and thrown into prison.
The precise charge now made against the apostle, and for which he was
arrested, we have no means of ascertaining. It may have been simply on
the charge of being a Christian. The general persecution against the
Christians was now raging with the utmost severity. It was no longer
about certain questions of the law, and under the mild and humane prefect
Burrhus; but he was now treated as an evil-doer — as a common criminal:
“wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil-doer even unto bonds” — and very
difficult from the bonds of his first imprisonment, when he dwelt in his
own hired house.
Alexander — of Ephesus, we believe — had evidently something to do
with his arrest. He was either one of his accusers, or, at least, a witness
against him. “Alexander the coppersmith,” he writes to Timothy, “did me
much evil” [“exhibited much evil-mindedness towards me.”] Ten years
before this, he had stood forward as the open antagonist of the apostle in
Ephesus. (Acts 19.) He may now have sought his revenge by laying
information against the apostle before the prefect. That it was the same
Alexander of Ephesus seems clear from the charge to Timothy; “of whom
be thou ware also.” (2 Timothy 4:14, 15.)
During the apostle’s first and lengthened imprisonment, he was
surrounded by many of his oldest and most valued companions, whom he
styles “fellow-laborers and fellow-prisoners.” By means of these, his
messengers, though chained to a single spot himself, he kept up a constant
intercourse with his friends throughout the empire, and with Gentile
churches which had not seen his face in the flesh. But his second
imprisonment was a perfect contrast to all this. He had parted from all
his ordinary companions. Erastus abode at Corinth; Trophimus had been
left at Miletum sick; Titus had gone to Dalmatia; Crescens to Galatia;
Tychicus had been dispatched to Ephesus; and the lukewarm Demas had
forsaken him, “having loved this present world.”
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The apostle was now almost entirely alone. “Only Luke is with me,” he
says. But the Lord thought of His deserted and solitary servant. A bright
beam, as from the fountain of love, shines amidst the darkness and
dreariness of his prison. There was one faithful amidst the general
defection, and one who was not ashamed of the apostle’s chain. How
peculiarly sweet and refreshing to the heart of the apostle must the
ministry of Onesiphorus have been at this time! It can never be forgotten.
Onesiphorus and his house — which Paul links with himself — shall be
held in everlasting remembrance; and shall reap the fruit of his courage and
devotedness to the apostle for ever and for ever. “I was in prison, and ye
came unto me.” (Matthew 25:31-46.)
Concerning the circumstances of Paul’s trial we have no certain
information. Most probably in the spring of A .D . 66 or 67 Nero took his
seat on the tribunal, surrounded by his jurors, and the imperial guard; and
Paul was brought into the court. We have reason to believe that the large
space was filled with a promiscuous multitude of Jews and Gentiles. The
apostle stood once more before the world. He had again the opportunity
of proclaiming to all nations that for which he had been made a prisoner —
“That all the Gentiles might hear.” Emperors and senators, princes and
nobles, and all the great ones of the earth, must hear the glorious gospel of
the grace of God. All that the enemy had done becomes a testimony to the
name of Jesus. Those who were otherwise inaccessible hear the gospel
preached with power from on high.
Fain would we dwell on this wonderful scene for a few moments. Never
before had there been such a witness, and such a testimony, in Nero’s
judgment-hall. The wisdom of God in turning all the efforts of the enemy
into such a testimony is most profound; while His love and grace in the
gospel shine ineffable and alike to all classes. The apostle himself
commands our devout admiration. Though at this moment his heart was
broken by the unfaithfulness of the church, he stood forth strong in the
Lord and in the power of His might. Though he had been forsaken by men,
the Lord stood by him and strengthened him. He boldly confronted his
enemies, pleading in his own cause and the cause of the gospel. He had an
opportunity to speak of Jesus, of His death and resurrection, so that the
heathen multitude might hear the gospel. His age, his infirmities, his
venerable form, his lettered arm, would all tend to deepen the impression
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of his manly and straightforward eloquence. But, happily, we have an
account from his own pen of the first hearing of his defense. He writes
thus to Timotheus immediately after:
“At my first answer [when I was heard in my defense] no man
stood with me, but all men forsook me: I pray God that it may not
be laid to their charge. Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me,
and strengthened me; that by me the preaching might be fully
known, and that all the Gentiles might hear: and I was delivered out
of the mouth of the lion.” (2 Timothy 4:16, 17.)
“Look, now, and see Christ’s chosen saint
In triumph wear his Christ-like chain;
No fear lest he should swerve or faint:
His life is Christ, his death is gain.”

THE MARTYRDOM OF PAUL

Although we have no record of the second stage of his trial, we have
reason to believe that it soon followed the first, and that it ended in his
condemnation and death. But The Second Epistle To Timothy is the
divine record of what was passing in his deeply exercised mind at this
solemn moment. His deep concern for the truth and church of God; his
pathetic tenderness for the saints, and especially for his beloved son
Timothy; his triumphant hope in the immediate prospect of martyrdom,
can only be told in his own words.
“I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at
hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have
kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of
righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at
that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his
appearing.” (Chapter 4:6-8.)
The tribunal of Nero here fades from his sight. Death in its most violent
form has no terror for him. Christ in glory is the object of his eye and of
his heart — the source of his joy and of his strength. His work was
finished; and the toils of his love were ended. Though a prisoner and poor
— though aged and rejected — he was rich in God; he possessed Christ,
and in Him all things. The Jesus whom he had seen in glory at the
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commencement of his course, and who had brought him into all the trials
and labors of the gospel, was now his possession and his crown. The
unrighteous tribunal of Nero, and the blood-stained sword of the
executioner, were to Paul but as the messengers of peace, who had come to
close his long and weary path, and to introduce him into the presence of
Jesus in glory. The time was now come for the Jesus that loved him to
take him to Himself. He had fought the good fight of the gospel to the end;
he had finished his course; it only remained for him to be crowned, when
the Lord, the righteous Judge, appears in glory.
“In all things more than conquerors
Through Him that loved us —
We know that neither death nor life,
Nor angels, rulers, powers,
Nor present things, nor things to come,
Nor even height, nor depth,
Nor any other creature-thing
Above, below, around,
Can part us from the love of God,
In Jesus Christ our Lord.”

We have the concurrent testimony of antiquity that Paul suffered

martyrdom during the Neronian persecution, and most probably in A .D .
67. As a Roman citizen, he was beheaded in place of being scourged and
crucified or exposed to the frightful tortures then invented for the
Christians. Like his Master he suffered “without the gate.” There is a spot
on the Ostian Road, about two miles beyond the city walls, where it is
supposed his martyrdom took place. There the last act of human cruelty
was executed, and the great apostle was “absent from the body, and
present with the Lord.” His fervent and happy spirit was released from his
feeble and suffering body; and the long cherished desire of his heart was
fulfilled — “to depart and to be with Christ; which is far better.”
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CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF PAUL’S LIFE

A.D. Events in Paul’s Life

(about)

36 Conversion of Saul of Tarsus (Acts 9).

36-39 At Damascus preaches in the synagogue, goes into Arabia,

returns to Damascus, flight from Damascus. His First Visit
to Jerusalem, three years after his conversion. Thence to
Tarsus (Acts 9:23-26; Galatians 1:18).

39-40 Rest of the Jewish Churches (Acts 9:31).

40-43 Paul preaches the Gospel in Syria and Cilicia (Galatians

1:21). A period of uncertain length. During this time he
probably undergoes the chief part of the perils and
sufferings which he recounts to the Corinthians (2
Corinthians 11). He is brought from Tarsus to Antioch by
Barnabas; and stays there a year before the famine (Acts
11:26).

44 Paul’s Second Visit to Jerusalem, with the collection (Acts

11:30).

45 Paul returns to Antioch (Acts 12:25).

46-49 Paul’s First Missionary Journey with Barnabas goes to Cyprus,

Antioch in Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, Derbe, and back through the
same places to Antioch They remain a long time in Antioch.
Dissention and disputation about circumcision (Acts 13; 14; 15:1,
2).

50 Paul’s Third Visit to Jerusalem with Barnabas, fourteen

years after his conversion (Galatians 2:1). They attend the
council at Jerusalem (Acts 15). Return of Paul and Barnabas
to Antioch,
with Judas and Silas (Acts 15:32-35).
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51 Paul’s Second Missionary Journey with Silas and Timothy.

He goes from Antioch to Syria, Cilicia, Derbe, Lystra,
Phrygia, Galatia, Troas. Luke joins the apostolic band (Acts
16:10).

52 Entrance of the Gospel into Europe (Acts 16:11-13). Paul visits

Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, Athens, Corinth. Spends a year
and six months at Corinth (Acts 18:11). First Epistle to the
Thessalonians written.

53 Second Epistle to the Thessalonians written. Paul leaves

Corinth and sails to Ephesus (Acts 18:18, 19).

54 Paul’s Fourth Visit to Jerusalem at the feast. Returns to

Antioch.

54-56 Paul’s Third Missionary Journey. He departs from Antioch

visits Galatia, Phrygia, and reaches Ephesus, where he stays two
years and three months. Here Paul separates the disciples from
the Jewish synagogue (Acts 19:8, 10). Epistle to the Galatians
written.

57 (Spring.) First Epistle to the Corinthians written. The tumult at

Ephesus Paul leaves for Macedonia (Acts 19:23; 20:1). [Autumn.]
Second Epistle to the Corinthians written (2 Corinthians 1:8;
2:13, 14; 7:5; 8:1; 9:1). Paul visits Illyricum goes to Corinth
winters there (Romans 15:19; 1 Corinthians 16:6).

58 [Spring.] The Epistle to the Romans written (Romans

15:25-28; 16:21-23; Acts 20:4). Paul leaves Corinth passes
through Macedonia sails from Philippi preaches at Troas
addresses the elders at Miletus vists Tyre and Caesarea
(Acts 20; 21:1-14).

58-60 Paul’s Fifth Visit to Jerusalem before Pentecost. He is arrested in

the Temple brought before Ananias and the Sanhedrim sent by
Lysias to Caesarea, where he is kept in bonds two years.

60 Paul heard by Felix and Festus. He appeals unto Caesar preaches

before Agrippa, Bernice, and the men of Caesarea. [Autumn]. Paul
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sails for Italy. [Winter.] Shipwrecked at Malta (Acts 27).

61 [Spring.] Arrives at Rome dwells two years in his own hired

house.

62 [Spring.] Epistles to Philemon, Colossians, and Ephesians

written. [Autumn.] Epistle to the Philippians written.

63 [Spring.] Paul acquitted and released. Epistle to the

Hebrews written. Paul takes another journey, intending to
visit Asia Minor and Greece (Philemon 22; Philippians
2:24).

64 Visits Crete and leaves Titus there exhorts Timothy to abide at

Ephesus. First Epistle to Timothy written. Epistle to Titus
written.

64-67 Intends to winter at Nicopolis (Titus 3:12). Visits Troas,

Corinth, Mileturn (2 Timothy 4:13-20). Paul arrested and
sent to Rome. Deserted and solitary having only Luke, of
his old associates, with him. Second Epistle to Timothy
written, probably not long before his death. These journeys
and events are generally supposed to cover a period of about
three years.

67 Paul’s martyrdom.
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CHAPTER 7
THE BURNING OF ROME

As our two great apostles Peter and Paul suffered martyrdom during the
First imperial persecution, it may be interesting to many of our readers to
know something of the particulars which led to this cruel edict.
But here, however reluctantly, we must turn from the sure word of God to
the uncertain writings of men. We pass, just at this point, from the firm
and solid ground of inspiration to the insecure footing of Roman historians
and ecclesiastical history. Nevertheless, all historians, both ancient and
modern, pagan and christian, are agreed as to the main facts of the burning
of Rome, and the persecution of the Christians.
In the month of July A .D . 64 a great fire broke out in the Circus, which
continued to spread until it laid in ruins all the ancient grandeur of the
imperial city. The flames extended with great rapidity, and Rome being a
city of long narrow streets, and of hills and valleys, the fire gathered force
from the winds, and soon became a general conflagration. In a short time
the whole city seemed wrapped in one sheet of burning flame.
Tacitus, a Roman historian of that day, and considered one of the most
accurate of his time, tells us: — “Of the fourteen quarters into which
Rome was divided four only were left entire, three were reduced to ashes,
and the remaining seven presented nothing better than a heap of shattered
houses half in ruins.” The fire raged furiously for six days and seven
nights. Palaces, temples, monuments, the mansions of the rich, and the
dwellings of the poor perished in this fatal fire. But these were nothing
compared with the sufferings of the inhabitants. The infirmities of age, the
weakness of the young, the helplessness of the sick, the wild screams and
lamentations of women, added to the miseries of this dreadful scene. Some
endeavored to provide for themselves, others to save their friends, but no
place of safety could be found. Which way to turn, or what way to do, no
one could tell; the fire raged on every side, so that numbers fell prostrate in
the street, embraced a voluntary death, and perished in the flames.
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The important question, as to how the fire originated, was now discussed
everywhere. That the city was set on fire by incendiaries, and by the
orders of Nero himself, nearly all believed. It was certain that a number of
men were seen extending instead of extinguishing the flames; and they
boldly affirmed that they had authority for doing so. It was also generally
reported that, while Rome was in a blaze, the inhuman monster Nero
stood on a tower where he could watch its progress, and amused himself
by singing the fall of Troy to his favorite guitar.
Many of our readers will no doubt wonder what object he could have in
burning down the greater part of Rome? His object we believe was that he
might rebuild the city on a scale of greater magnificence, and call it by his
own name. And this he attempted immediately in the grandest way. But
everything he did failed to restore him to popular favor, or remove the
infamous charge of having set the city on fire. And when all hope was gone
of propitiating either the people or the gods, he fell upon the plan of
shifting the imputation from himself to others. He knew enough of the
unpopularity of the Christians, both with the Jews and the heathen, to fix
on them as his sin-bearers. A rumor was soon spread that the incendiaries
had been discovered, and that the Christians were the criminals. Numbers
were immediately arrested, that they might be brought to condign
punishment, and satisfy the popular indignation. And now we arrive at

THE FIRST PERSECUTION UNDER THE EMPERORS

But here we may pause for a moment, and contemplate the progress of
Christianity, and the state of the church in Rome at this time. At a very
early period, and without the aid of any apostle, Christianity had found its
way to Rome. It was no doubt first carried thither by some who had been
converted under Peter’s preaching on the clay of Pentecost. Amongst his
hearers we have expressly mentioned “strangers of Rome, Jews, and
proselytes.” And Paul, in his Epistle to that church, thanks God that their
“faith was spoken of throughout the whole world.” And in his salutations
he speaks of “Andronicus and Junia,” his kinsmen and fellow-prisoners,
who were chief men among the apostles, and whose conversion was of an
earlier date than his own. But great wonders had been wrought by the
gospel in the course of thirty years. Christians had become a marked, a
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separate, a peculiar people. They were now known as perfectly distinct
from the Jews, and bitterly disclaimed by them.
The labors of Paul and his companions, during the two years of his
imprisonment, were no doubt blessed of the Lord to the conversion of
great numbers. So that the Christians were by this time no secret or
inconsiderable community, but were known to embrace in their numbers
both Jews and Gentiles of all ranks and conditions, from the imperial
household to the runaway slave. But their present suffering, as we have
seen, was not for their Christianity. They were really sacrificed by Nero
to appease the popular fury of the people, and to reconcile their offended
deities.
This was the first legal persecution of the Christians; and in some of its
features it stands alone in the annals of human barbarity. Inventive cruelty
sought out new ways of torture to satiate the blood-thirsty Nero — the
most ruthless Emperor that ever reigned. The gentle, peaceful, unoffending
followers of the Lord Jesus were sewn in the skins of wild beasts, and torn
by dogs; others were wrapped in a kind of dress smeared with wax, with
pitch, and other combustible matter, with a stake under the chin to keep
them upright, and set on fire when the day closed, that they might serve as
lights in the public gardens of popular amusements. Nero lent his own
gardens for these exhibitions, and gave entertainments for the people. He
took an active part in the games himself; sometimes mingling with the
crowd on foot, and sometimes viewing the awful spectacle from his
chariot. But, accustomed as these people were to public executions and
gladiatorial shows, they were moved to pity by the unexampled cruelties
inflicted on the Christians. They began to see that the Christians suffered,
not for the public good, but to gratify the cruelty of a monster. But fearful
as their death was, it was soon over; and to them, no doubt, the happiest
moment of their existence. Long, long before the lights were quenched in
Nero’s garden, the martyrs had found their home and rest above — in the
blooming garden of God’s eternal delights. This precious truth we learn
from what the Savior said to the penitent thief on the cross — “Today
shalt thou be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23.)
Although historians are not agreed either as to the extent or the duration of
this terrible persecution, there is too good reason to believe that it spread
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throughout the empire, and lasted till the end of the tyrant’s life. He
died by his own hand in utter wretchedness and despair, in A .D . 68, about
four years after the burning of Rome, and one year after the martyrdom of
Peter and Paul. Towards the end of his reign the Christians were required,
under the heaviest penalties, even that of death, to offer sacrifices to the
emperor and to the heathen gods. While such edicts were in force the
persecution must have continued.
After the death of Nero the persecution ceased, and the followers of Jesus
enjoyed comparative peace until the reign of Domitian, an emperor little
behind Nero in wickedness. But meanwhile we must turn aside for a
moment and notice the accomplishment of the Lord’s most solemn
warnings, in

THE DOWNFALL OF JERUSALEM A.D. 70

The dispersion of the Jews, and the total destruction of their city and
temple, are the next events of consideration in the remainder of the first
century, though, strictly speaking, that fearful catastrophe is no part of
church history; it belongs to the history of the Jews. But as it was a literal
fulfillment of the Savior’s prophecy, and immediately affected those who
were Christians, it deserves a place in our history.
The disciples, before the death and resurrection of Christ, were strongly
Jewish in all their thoughts and associations. They connected the Messiah
and the temple together. Their thought was that He should deliver them
from the power of the Romans, and that all the prophecies about the land,
the tribes, the city and the temple would be accomplished. But the Jews
rejected the Messiah Himself, and, consequently, all their own hopes and
promises in Him. Most significant and weighty are the opening words of
Matthew 24, “And Jesus went out and departed from the temple.” It was
now empty indeed in the sight of God. All that gave it value to Him was
gone. “Behold your house is left unto you desolate.” It was now ripe for
destruction.
“And his disciples came to Him for to show Him the buildings of the temple.”
They were still occupied with the outward greatness and glory of these
things.
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“And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say
unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that
shall not be thrown down.”
These words were literally accomplished by the Romans about forty years
after they were spoken, and in the very way that the Lord predicted.
“For the days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a
trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on
every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy
children within thee; and they shall not leave in thee one stone
upon another; because thou knewest not the time of thy
visitation.” (Luke 19:43, 44.)
After the Romans had experienced many disappointments and defeats in
attempting to make a breach in the walls, through the desperate
resistance of the insurgent Jews, even until little hope was left of taking
the city, Titus summoned a council of war. Three plans were discussed: to
storm the city immediately; to repair the works and rebuild the engines; or
to blockade and starve the city to surrender. The last was preferred, and
the whole army was set to work “to cast a trench” around the city. But
the siege was long and difficult. It lasted from the spring till September.
And during all that time, the most unexampled miseries of every kind were
experienced by the besieged. But at last the end came, when both the city
and the temple were in the hands of the Romans. Titus was anxious to
save the magnificent temple and its treasures. But, contrary to his orders, a
soldier, mounting on the shoulders of one of his comrades threw a blazing
brand into a small gilded door in the outer building or porch. The flames
sprang up at once. Titus, observing this, rushed to the spot with the
utmost speed; he shouted, he made signs to his soldiers to quench the fire;
but his voice was drowned, and his signs unnoticed in the fearful
confusion. The splendor of the interior filled him with wonder. And as the
flames had not yet reached the holy place, he made a last effort to save it,
and exhorted the soldiers to stay the conflagration; but it was too late.
Blazing brands were flying in all directions, and the fierce excitement of
battle, with the insatiable hope of plunder had reached its highest pitch.
Titus little knew that a greater than he had said, “There shall not be left
here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.” The word of
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the Lord, not the commands of Titus, must be obeyed. The whole was
thoroughly levelled, and razed to the foundations, according to the word of
the Lord.
For nearly every particular of this terrible siege, we are indebted to
Josephus, who was in the Roman camp, and near the person of Titus at
the time. He acted as interpreter when terms were talked of between Titus
and the insurgents. The walls and bulwarks of Zion seemed impregnable to
the Roman, and he felt most anxious to come to terms of peace; but the
Jews rejected every proposal, and the Romans at length triumphed. On
entering the city, Josephus tells us, Titus was struck with wonder at its
strength; indeed when he contemplated the solid altitude of the towers, the
magnitude of the several stones, and the accuracy of their joinings, and saw
how great was their breadth, how vast their height, “Surely,” he exclaimed,
“we fought with God on our side; and God it was who brought the Jews
down from these bulwarks; for what could human hands or engines avail
against these towers?” Such were the confessions of the heathen general. It
certainly was the most terrible siege that the whole history of the world
records.
The accounts given by Josephus of the sufferings of the Jews during the
siege are too awful to be transferred to our pages. The numbers that
perished under Vespasian in the country, and under Titus in the city, from
A .D . 67-70, by famine, internal factions, and the Roman sword, were one
million three hundred and fifty thousand four hundred and sixty, besides
one hundred thousand sold into slavery. 1 Such alas! alas! were the awful
consequences of disbelieving and disregarding the solemn, earnest, and
affectionate entrearies of their own Messiah. Need we wonder at the
Redeemer’s tears, shed over the infatuated city? And need we wonder at
the preacher’s tears now, as he appeals to infatuated sinners, in view of
coming and eternal judgments? Surely the wonder is that so few tears are
shed over thoughtless, careless, perishing sinners. Oh, for hearts to feel as
the Savior felt, and eyes to weep like His!
The Christians, with whom we have more especially to do, remembering
the Lord’s warning, left Jerusalem in a body before the siege was formed.
They journeyed to Pella, a village beyond the Jordan, where they remained
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till Hadrian permitted them to return to the ruins of their ancient city. And
this brings us to The Close of the First Century.
During the milder reigns of Vespasian and his son Titus, the number of
Christians must have increased exceedingly. This we learn, not from any
direct account that we have of their prosperity, but from incidental
circumstances that prove it, and which we shall meet with immediately.

THE CRUEL REIGN OF DOMITIAN

Domitian, the younger brother of Titus, ascended the throne in A .D . 81.
But he was of a temper totally different from his father and brother. They
tolerated the Christians, he persecuted them. His character was cowardly,
suspicious, and cruel. He raised a persecution against the Christians,
because of some vague and superstitious fear that he entertained of the
appearance of a person born in Judea of the family of David, who was to
obtain the empire of the world. But neither did he spare Romans of the
most illustrious birth and station who had embraced Christianity. Some
were martyred on the spot, others were banished to be martyred in their
exile. His own niece, Domitilla, and his cousin, Flavius Clemens, to whom
she had been given in marriage, were the victims of his cruelty for having
embraced the gospel of Christ. Thus we see that Christianity, by the
power of God, in spite of armies and emperors, fire and sword, was
spreading, not only amongst the middle and lower, but also amongst the
higher classes.
“Domitian,” says Eusebius, the father of ecclesiastical history, “having
exercised his cruelty against many, and unjustly slain no small number of
noble and illustrious men at Rome, and having, without cause, punished
vast numbers of honorable men with exile and the confiscation of their
property, at length established himself as the successor of Nero in his
hatred and hostility to God.” He also followed Nero in deifying himself.
He commanded his own statue to be worshipped as a god, revived the law
of treason, and put in fearful force its terrible provisions: under these
circumstances, surrounded as he was with spies and informers, what must
this second persecution of the Christians have been!2
But the end of this weak, vain, and despicable tyrant drew near. He was in
the habit of writing on a roll the names of those persons whom he designed
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to put to death, keeping it carefully in his own possession. And in order to
throw such off their guard, he treated them with the most flattering
attention. But this fatal roll was one day taken from under a cushion on
which he was reclining asleep, by a child who was playing in the
apartment, and who carried it to the Empress. She was struck with
astonishment and alarm at finding her own name on the dark list, together
with the names of others apparently high in his favor. To such the
Empress communicated the knowledge of their danger, and
notwithstanding all the precaution that cowardice and cunning could
suggest, he was dispatched by two officers of his own household.

THE SHORT BUT PEACEFUL REIGN OF NERVA

On the very day of Domitian’s death, Nerva was chosen by the Senate to
be Emperor, September 18th, A .D . 96. He was a man of blameless
reputation. The character of his reign was most favorable to the peace and
prosperity of the church of God. The Christians who had been banished
by Domitian were recalled, and recovered their confiscated property. The
Apostle John returned from his banishment in the isle of Patmos, and
resumed his place of service among the churches in Asia. He survived till
the reign of Trajan, when, at the advanced age of about 100 years, he fell
asleep in Jesus.
Nerva commenced his reign by redressing grievances, repealing iniquitous
statutes, enacting good laws, and dispensing favors with great liberality.
But feeling unequal to the duties of his position, he adopted Trajan as his
colleague and successor to the empire, and died in 98.

THE CONDITION OF CHRISTIANS DURING

THE REIGN OF TRAJAN A.D. 98-117
As the outward history of the church was then affected by the will of one
man, it will therefore be necessary to notice, however briefly, the
disposition or ruling passion of the reigning prince. Thus it was that the
condition of the Christians everywhere depended to a great extent, on him
who was master of the Roman world, and in a certain sense of the whole
world. Still, God was and is over all.
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Trajan was an emperor of great renown. Perhaps none more so ever sat
on the throne of the Caesars. The Roman earth or world, it is said, reached
its widest limits by his victories. He caused the terror of the Roman arms
and the Roman discipline to be felt on the frontier as none before him had
done. He was thus a great general and a military sovereign; and being
possessed of a large and vigorous mind, he was an able ruler, and Rome
flourished under his sway. But in the history of the church his character
appears in a less favorable light. He had a confirmed prejudice against
Christianity, and sanctioned the persecution of Christians. Some say that
he meditated the extinction of the name. This is the deepest stain which
rests on the memory of Trajan.
But Christianity, in spite of Roman emperors, and Roman prisons, and
Roman executions, pursued its silent steady course. In little more than
seventy years after the death of Christ, it had made such rapid progress in
some places as to threaten the downfall of paganism. The heathen temples
were deserted, the worship of the gods was neglected, and victims for
sacrifices were rarely purchased. This naturally raised a popular cry
against Christianity, such as we had at Ephesus: “This our craft is in
danger to be set at nought, and the temple of the great goddess Diana to be
despised.” Those whose livelihood depended on the worship of the
heathen deities, laid many and grievous complaints against the Christians
before the governors. This was especially so in the Asiatic provinces
where Christianity was most prevalent.
About the year 110 many Christians were thus brought before the tribunal
of Pliny the younger, the governor of Bithynia and Pontus. But Pliny,
being naturally a wise, candid, and humane man, took pains to inform
himself of the principles and practices of the Christians. And when he
found that many of them were put to death who could not be convicted of
any public crime, he was greatly embarrassed. He had not taken any part
in such matters before, and no settled law on the subject then existed. The
edicts of Nero had been repealed by the Senate, and those of Domitian by
his successor, Nerva. Under these circumstances, Pliny applied for advice
to his master, the Emperor Trajan. The letters which then passed between
them, being justly considered as the most valuable record of the history of
the church during that period, deserve a place in our “Short Papers.” But
we can only transcribe a portion of Pliny’s celebrated epistle, and chiefly
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those parts which refer to the character of Christians, and the extension of
Christianity.

C. PLINY TO TRAJAN EMPEROR

“Health. — It is my usual custom, sire, to refer all things, of which
I harbor any doubt, to you. For who can better direct my judgment
in its hesitation, or instruct my understanding in its ignorance? I
never had the fortune to be present at any examination of
Christians before I came into this province. I am therefore at a loss
to determine what is the usual object either of inquiry or of
punishment, and to what length either of them is to be carried In
the meantime this has been my method with respect to those who
were brought before me as Christians. I asked them whether they
were Christians: if they pleaded guilty, I interrogated them — a
second and a third time — with a menace of capital punishment. In
case of obstinate perseverance, I ordered them to be executed...An
anonymous ‘Libel’ was published, containing the names of many
who denied that they were, or had been, Christians, and invoked
the gods, as I prescribed, and prayed to your image, with incense
and wine, and moreover reviled Christ — none of which things I
am told a real Christian can ever be compelled to do. So I thought
proper to dismiss them... The whole of the crime or error of the
Christians lay in this — they were accustomed on a certain day to
meet before daylight, and to sing among themselves a hymn to
Christ, as a god; and to bind themselves by an oath not to commit
any wickedness; not to be guilty of theft, or robbery, or adultery;
never to falsify their word, nor to deny a pledge committed to
them when called upon to return it. When these things were
performed, it was their custom to separate, and then to come
together again to a harmless meal, of which they partook in
common without any disorder; but this last practice they have
ceased to attend to since the publication of my edict, by which,
according to your commands, I prohibited assemblies.
“After this account, I judged it the more necessary to examine, and
that by torture, two females, who were said to be deaconesses; but
I have discovered nothing except a bad and excessive superstition.
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Suspending, therefore, all judicial proceedings, I have recourse to
you for advice. The number of the accused is so great as to call for
serious consultation. Many persons are informed against, of every
age and rank, and of both sexes; and many more will be accused.
Nor has the contagion of this superstition seized cities only, but
the lesser towns also, and the open country: nevertheless, it seems
to me that it may be restrained and corrected. It is certain that the
temples which were almost forsaken begin to be more frequented;
and the sacred solemnities, after a long intermission, are revived.
Victims likewise are everywhere bought up, whereas for a time
there were few purchasers. Whence it is easy to imagine what
numbers of them might be reclaimed if pardon were granted to
those who repent.”

TRAJAN TO PLINY
“You have done perfectly right, my dear Pliny, in the inquiry
which you have made concerning Christians. For truly no one
general rule can be laid down which will apply itself to all cases.
These people must not be sought after: if they are brought before
you and convicted, let them be capitally punished; yet with this
restriction, that if any one renounce Christianity, and evidence his
sincerity by supplicating our gods, however suspected he may be
for the past, let him on his repentance obtain pardon. But
anonymous libels in no case ought to be attended to: for it is a very
dangerous precedent, and perfectly incongruous with the maxims
of our age.”
The clear and unsuspected testimony of these two letters awakens
thoughts and feelings of the deepest interest in the Christian’s mind of
today. The First Epistle of St. Peter was addressed to the fathers of these
holy sufferers, and possibly to some of themselves then alive; and it is not
unlikely that Peter labored amongst them personally. Thus were they
taught and encouraged beforehand to give to the Roman governor “a reason
for the hope that was in them with meekness and fear.” Indeed the whole
of the first Epistle seems divinely fitted to strengthen these unoffending
Christians against the unjust and unreasonable course of Pliny.
“Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm
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yourselves likewise with the same mind.” Peter contemplates in his epistle
the family of faith as on a journey through the wilderness, and God as the
supreme Governor ruling over all — believers and unbelievers. “For the
eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open unto their
prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil.” With such a
scene before us, and such witnesses, making allowance for the position of
Trajan and Pliny as heathen statesmen, it may be well to inquire at this
early stage of our history, What was and is

THE REAL CAUSE OF PERSECUTION

Although different reasons may be given by different persons and
governments for persecuting Christians, yet we believe that the real cause
is the heart’s enmity against Christ and His truth, as seen in the godly
lives of His people. Besides, their light makes manifest the darkness
around, and exposes and reproves the inconsistencies of false professors,
and the godless lives of the wicked. The enemy, taking occasion by these
things, stirs up the cruel passions of those in power to quench the light by
persecuting the light-bearer. “For every one that doeth evil hateth the
light.” Such has been the experience of all Christians, in all ages, both in
times of peace and in times of trouble. There is no exemption from
persecution, secretly or openly, if we live according to the Spirit and truth
of Christ. Amongst the last words that the great apostle wrote were these:
“Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer
persecution.” (2 Timothy 3:12.)
These divine truths, given for the instruction and guidance of the church in
all ages, were strikingly illustrated in the case of Pliny and the Christians
of Bithynia. He is spoken of by all historians as one of the most
enlightened, virtuous, and accomplished men of antiquity. He was also
possessed of great wealth, and he had the reputation of being most liberal
and benevolent in private life. Why then, it may be asked, as a Roman
statesman and governor, did he become such a persecutor of the
Christians? This question he answers in his own letter. It was simply for
their faith in Christ — nothing else. It had been proved to him, both by
friends and foes, that the Christians were guilty of no evil, either morally,
socially, or politically. Having thrice asked the question, “Are you
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Christians?” if they stedfastly affirmed that they were, he condemned
them to death. The only pretext which he gave to cover the injustice of his
conduct as a governor, was the fact that the Christians were obstinate
professors of a religion not established by the laws of the empire.
Many, from private malice and other reasons, were at this time
anonymously accused of being Christians, who were not really so. These
were tested by being called upon to deny the faith, offer incense to the
gods, worship the image of the emperor, and revile Christ. All who
complied with these terms were dismissed. But none of those things, Pliny
is made to witness, can those who are true Christians ever be compelled to
do. He next had recourse to the brutal custom of examining innocent
persons by torture. Two females, noted servants of the church, were thus
examined. But, instead of the expected disclosures as to the rumoured
seditious and licentious character of their meetings, nothing unfavorable to
the christian community could be tortured out of them. The governor
could detect nothing by every means he tried, except what he calls “a
perverse and extravagant superstition.”
It must also be born in mind, both to the credit and also to the deeper guilt
of Pliny, that he did not proceed against the Christians from mere popular
prejudice — unlike his friend Tacitus, who allowed himself to be carried
away by prevailing rumors, and without further inquiry, to write against
Christianity in the most unreasonable and disgraceful manner. But Pliny
considered it his duty to enter into a careful investigation of the whole
matter before giving his judgment. How then can we account for such a
man, apparently desirous of acting impartially, persecuting to death a
blameless people? To answer this question, we must inquire into the
outward, or ostensible causes of persecution.

THE OSTENSIBLE CAUSES OF PERSECUTION

The Romans professed to tolerate all religions, from which the
commonwealth had nothing to fear. This was their boasted liberality. Even
the Jews were allowed to live according to their own laws. What was it
then, we may well ask, that could have caused all their severity to the
Christians? Had the commonwealth anything to fear from them? Had it
anything to fear from those whose lives were blameless, whose doctrines
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were the pure truth of heaven, and whose religion was conducive to the
people’s welfare, both publicly and privately?
The following may be considered as some of the unavoidable causes of
persecution, looking at both sides of the question:
1. Christianity, unlike all other religions that preceded it, was aggressive
in its character. Judaism was exclusive; the religion of one nation;
Christianity was proclaimed as the religion of mankind or the whole world.
This was an entirely new thing on the earth. “Go ye into all the world, and
preach the gospel to every creature,” was the Lord’s command to the
disciples. They were to go forth and make war with error, in every form
and in all its workings. The conquest to be made was the heart for Christ.
“The weapons of our warfare,” says the apostle, “are not carnal, but
mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down
imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the
knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the
obedience of Christ.” (2 Corinthians 10:4, 5.) In this war of aggression
with existing institutions, and with the corrupt habits of the heathen, the
disciples of Jesus had little to expect but resistance, persecution, and
suffering.
2. The pagan religion, which Christianity was rapidly undermining and
destined to overthrow, was an institution of the State. It was so closely
interwoven with the entire civil and social systems, that to attack the
religion was to be brought into conflict with both the civil and the social.
And this was exactly what took place. Had the primitive church been as
accommodating to the world as Christendom is now, much persecution
might have been avoided. But the time had not come for such lax
accommodation. The gospel which the Christians then preached, and the
purity of doctrine and life which they maintained, shook to the very
foundation the old and deeply rooted religion of the State.
3. The Christians naturally withdrew themselves from the pagans. They
became a separate and distinct people. They could not but condemn and
abhor polytheism, as utterly opposed to the one living and true God, and
to the gospel of His Son Jesus Christ. This gave the Romans the idea that
Christians were unfriendly to the human race, seeing they condemned all
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religions but their own. Hence they were called “Atheists,” because they
did not believe in the heathen deities, and derided the heathen worship.
4. Simplicity and humility characterised the Christians’ worship. They
peaceably came together before sunrise or after sunset, to avoid giving
offense. They sang hymns to Christ as to God; they broke bread in
remembrance of His love in dying for them; they edified one another and
pledged themselves to a life of holiness. But they had no fine temples, no
statues, no order of priests, and no victims to offer in sacrifice. The
contrast between their worship and that of all others in the empire became
most manifest. The heathen, in their ignorance, concluded that the
Christians had no religion at all, and that their secret meetings were for
the worst of purposes. The world now, as then, would say of those who
worship God in spirit and in truth, that “these people have no religion at
all.” Christian worship, in true simplicity, without the aid of temples and
priests, rites and ceremonies, is not much better understood now by
professing Christendom than it was then by pagan Rome. Still it is true,
“God is a Spirit; and they that worship Him must worship Him in
spirit and in truth.” (John 4:24.)
5. By the progress of Christianity the temporal interests of a great
number of persons were seriously affected. This was a fruitful and bitter
source of persecution. A countless throng of priests, image-makers,
dealers, soothsayers, augurs, and artisans, found good livings in connection
with the worship of so many deities.
6. All these, seeing their craft in danger, rose up in united strength against
the Christians, and sought by every means to arrest the progress of
Christianity. They invented and disseminated the vilest calumnies against
everything christian. The cunning priests and the artful soothsayers easily
persuaded the vulgar, and the public mind in general, that all the calamities,
wars, tempests, and diseases that afflicted mankind, were sent upon them
by the angry gods, because the Christians who despised their authority
were everywhere tolerated.3
Many other things might be mentioned, but these were everywhere the
daily causes of the Christians’ sufferings, both publicly and privately. Of
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the truth of this a moment’s reflection will convince every reader. But
faith could see the Lord’s hand and hear His voice in it all:
“Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves:., they
will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in
their synagogues; and ye shall be brought before governors and
kings for My sake, for a testimony against them and the
Gentiles...Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came
not to send peace, but a sword.” (Matthew 10.)
This much having been said as to the great opposition which the early
church had to contend against, it will be necessary to glance for a moment
at the real cause of causes and means of

THE RAPID PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY

Doubtless the causes and the means were divine. They proved themselves
to be so. The Spirit of God, who descended in power on the day of
Pentecost, and who had taken up His abode in the church and in the
individual Christian, is the true source of all success in preaching the
gospel, in the conversion of souls, and in testimony for Christ against evil.
“Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, saith the Lord.” Besides,
the Lord has promised to be with His people at all times. “Lo, I am with
you alway, even unto the end of the world.” (Zechariah 4:6, 7; Matthew
28:18-20.) But our object at present is to look at things historically, and
not merely according to the assurance of faith.
1. One great cause of the rapid spread of Christianity is its perfect
adaptation to man in every age, in every country, and in every
condition. It addresses all as lost, and supposes a like want in all. Thus it
suits the Jew and the Gentile, the king and the subject, the priest and the
people, the rich and the poor, the young and the old, the learned and the
ignorant, the moral and the profligate. It is God’s religion for the heart, and
there asserts His sovereignty, and His only. It announces itself as the
“power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” It proposes to
raise man from the deepest depths of degradation to the loftiest heights of
eternal glory. Who can estimate, in spite of every prejudice, the effect of
the proclamation of such a gospel to miserable and benighted heathen?
Thousands, millions, tired of a worthless and worn-out religion, responded
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to its heavenly voice, gathered around the name of Jesus, took joyfully the
spoiling of their goods, and were ready to suffer for His sake. Love ruled
in the new religion, hatred in the old.
2. Its sanction and maintenance of all earthly relations, according to
God, were other reasons for the acceptance of the gospel among the
heathen. Each one was exhorted to remain in these relationships, and seek
to glorify God therein. The blessings of Christianity to wives, children and
servants, are unspeakable. Their love, happiness, and comfort were an
astonishment to the heathen, and a new thing amongst them. Yet all was
n,~tural and orderly. A Christian, who is said to have lived about this time
— the early part of the second century — thus describes his
contemporaries: “The Christians are not separated from other men by
earthly abode, by language, or by customs. They dwell nowhere in cities
by themselves, they do not use a different language, or affect a singular
mode of life. They dwell in the cities of the Greeks, and of the barbarians,
each where his lot has been cast: and while they conform to the usages of
the country, in respect to dress, food, and other things pertaining to the
outward life, they yet show a peculiarity of conduct wonderful and
striking to all. They obey the existing laws, and conquer the laws by their
own living.”4
3. The blameleas lives of the Christians; the divine purity of their
doctrines; their patient, cheerful endurance of sufferings worse than death,
as well as death itself; their disregard for all the objects of ordinary
ambition; their boldness in the faith at the risk of life, credit and property,
were chief means in the rapid spread of Christianity. “For who,” says
Tertullian, “that beholds these things, is not impelled to inquire into the
cause? And who, when he has inquired, does not embrace Christianity; and
when he has embraced it, does not himself wish to suffer for it?”
These few particulars will enable the reader to form a more definite
judgment as to what it was that tended on the one hand to hinder, and on
the other to further the progress of the gospel of Christ. Nothing can be
more interesting to the christian mind than the study of this great and
glorious work. The Lord’s workmen, for the most part, were plain
unlettered men; they were poor, friendless and destitute of all human aid;
and yet, in a short time, they persuaded a great part of mankind to
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abandon the religion of their ancestors, and to embrace a new religion
which is opposed to the natural dispositions of men, the pleasures of the
world, and the established customs of ages. Who could question the
inward power of Christianity with such outward facts before them? Surely
it was the Spirit of God who clothed with power the words of these early
preachers! Surely their force on the minds of men was divine. A complete
change was produced: they were born again — created anew in Christ
Jesus.
In less than a hundred years from the day of Pentecost the gospel had
penetrated into most of the provinces of the Roman empire, and was
widely diffused in many of them. In our brief outline of the life of St. Paul,
and in the chronological table of his missions, we have traced the first
planting of many churches, and the propagation of the truth in many
quarters. In large central cities, such as Antioch in Syria, Ephesus in Asia,
and Corinth in Greece, we have seen Christianity well established, and
spreading its rich blessings among the surrounding towns and villages.
We also learn from ecclesiastical antiquity, that what these cities were to
Syria, Asia, and Greece, Carthage was to Africa. When Scapula, the
president of Carthage, threatened the Christians with severe and cruel
treatment, Tertullian, in one of his pointed appeals, bids him bethink
himself. “What wilt thou do,” he says, “with so many thousands of men
and women of every age and dignity as will freely offer themselves? What
fires, what swords, wilt thou stand in need of! What is Carthage itself
likely to suffer if decimated by thee: when every one there shall find his
near kindred and neighbors, and shall see there matrons, and men perhaps
of thine own rank and order, and the most principal persons, and either the
kindred or friends of those who are thy nearest friends? Spare then,
therefore, for thy sake, if not for ours.”5
We now resume the narrative of events, and the next in order to be related
is

THE MARTYRDOM OF IGNATIUS

There is no fact in early church history more sacredly preserved than the
martyrdom of Ignatius the bishop of Antioch; and there is no narrative
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more celebrated than his journey, as a prisoner in chains, from Antioch to
Rome.
According to the general opinion of historians, the Emperor Trajan, when
on his way to the Parthian war in the year 107, visited Antioch. From
what cause it is difficult to say, but it appears that the Christians were
threatened with persecution by his orders. Ignatius, therefore, being
concerned for the church in Antioch, desired to be introduced to Trajan’s
presence. His great object was to prevent, if possible, the threatened
persecution. With this end in view, he set forth to the Emperor the true
character and condition of the Christians, and offered himself to suffer in
their stead.
The details of this remarkable interview are given in many church histories,
but there is such an air of suspicion about them that we forbear inserting
them. It ended, however, in the condemnation of Ignatius. He was
sentenced by the Emperor to be carried to Rome, and thrown to the wild
beasts for the entertainment of the people. He welcomed the severe
sentence, and gladly submitted to be bound, believing it was for his faith in
Christ and as a sacrifice for the saints.
Ignatius was now committed to the charge of ten soldiers, who appear to
have disregarded his age and to have treated him with great harshness. He
had been bishop of Antioch for nearly forty years, and so must have been
an old man. But they hurried him over a long journey, both by sea and
land, in order to reach Rome before the games were ended. He arrived on
the last day of the festival, and was carried at once to the amphitheater,
where he suffered according to his sentence in the sight of the assembled
spectators. And thus the weary pilgrim found rest from the fatigues of his
long journey in the blessed repose of the paradise of God.
It has been asked, Why was Ignatius taken all the way from Antioch to
Rome to suffer martyrdom? The answer can only be conjecture. It may
have been with the intention of striking fear into other Christians, by the
spectacle of one so eminent, and so well-known, brought in chains to a
dreadful and degrading death. But if this was the Emperor’s expectation he
was entirely disappointed. It had just the opposite effect. The report of
his sentence and of his intended route spread far and wide, and
deputations from the surrounding churches were sent to meet him at
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convenient points. He was thus cheered and greeted with the warmest
congratulations of his brethren; and they, in return, were delighted to see
the venerable bishop and to receive his parting blessing. Many of the
saints would be encouraged to brave, if not desire, a martyr’s death and a
martyr’s crown. Among the number who met him by the way was
Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, who, like Ignatius, had been a disciple of St.
John, and was destined to be a martyr for the gospel. But besides these
personal interviews, he is said to have written seven letters on this
journey, which have been preserved in the providence of God and handed
down to us. Great interest has ever been, and still is attached to these
letters.

THE WRITINGS OF THE FATHERS AND SCRIPTURE

But however worthy of all honor Ignatius may be as a holy man of God,
and as a noble martyr for Christ, we must ever remember that his letters
are not the word of God. They may interest and instruct us, but they
cannot command our faith. This can only stand on the solid ground of the
word of God, never on the infirm ground of tradition. “Scripture stands
alone,” as one has said, “in majestic isolation, preeminent in instruction,
and separated by unapproachable excellence from everything written by
the apostolic fathers: so that those who follow close to the apostles have
left us writings which are more for our warning than our edification.” At
the same time these early christian writers have every claim to the respect
and veneration with which antiquity invests them. They were the
contemporaries of the apostles, they enjoyed the privilege of hearing their
instruction, they shared with them the labors of the gospel, and freely
conversed with them from day to day. Paul speaks of a Clement — a so-
called apostolic father — as his “fellow-laborer, whose name is in the book
of life;” and what he says of Timothy may have been at least partly true
of many others,
“But thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose,
faith, long-suffering, charity, patience, persecutions, and
afflictions.” (Philippians 4:3; 2 Timothy 3:10, 11.)
From those who were so highly privileged, we should naturally expect
sound apostolic doctrine — a faithful repetition of the truths and
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instructions which were delivered to them by the inspired apostles. But
such alas! is not the case. Ignatius was one of the earliest of the apostolic
fathers. He became bishop of Antioch, the metropolis of Syria, about the
year 70. He was a disciple of the apostle John, and survived him only
about seven years. Surely from such a one we might have expected a close
resemblance to the apostle’s teaching; but it is not so. The definite and
absolute statements of scripture, as coming direct from God to the soul,
are widely different from the writings of Ignatius and of all the Fathers.
Our only safe and sure guide is the word of God. How seasonable then is
that word in the First Epistle of John,
“Let that therefore abide in you, which ye have heard from the
beginning. If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall
remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son, and in the Father.”
(1 John 2:24.)
This passage evidently refers more especially to the person of Christ, and
consequently to the scriptures of the New Testament, in which we have
the display of the Father in the Son, and made known to us by the Holy
Spirit. In Paul’s Epistles, we have more fully revealed the counsels of God
concerning the church, Israel, and the Gentiles, so that we must go further
back than “the Fathers” to find a true ground of faith; we must go back to
that which existed from “The Beginning.” Nothing has direct divine
authority for the believer, but that which was from “the beginning.” This
alone secures our continuing “in the Son and in the Father.”
The Epistles of Ignatius have been long esteemed by Episcopalians as the
chief authority for the system of the English church; and this must be our
excuse for referring so fully to this “Father.” Nearly all their arguments in
favor of episcopacy are founded on his letters. So strongly does he press
submission to the episcopal authority, and so highly does he extol it, that
some have been induced to question their genuineness altogether, and
others have supposed that they must have been largely interpolated to
serve the prelatical interest. But with the controversy on these points we
have nothing to do in our “Short Papers.”6
We will now resume our history from the death of Trajan in the year 117,
and briefly glance at the condition of the church during
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THE REIGNS OF HADRIAN AND THE ANTONINES
FROM A.D. 117 TO 180
Although it would be unjust to class Hadrian and the first Antonine with
the systematic persecutors of the church, nevertheless Christians were
often exposed to the most violent sufferings and death during their
dominion. The cruel custom of ascribing all public calamities to the
Christians, and of calling for their blood as an atonement to the offended
deities, still continued, and was generally yielded to by the local governors,
and unchecked by the indifferent emperors. But under the reign of the
second Antonine, Marcus Aurelius, the evil spirit of persecution greatly
increased. It was no longer confined to the outbursts of popular fury, but
was encouraged by the highest authorities. The slender protection which
the ambiguous edicts of Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus afforded the
Christians was withdrawn, and the excited passions of the idolatrous
pagans were unrestrained by the government. It is most interesting to the
student of scripture history to see how this could take place under the
reign of a prince who was distinguished for learning, philosophy, and
general mildness of character.
The past sixty years of comparative peace had opened a wide field for the
propagation of the gospel. During that period it made rapid progress in
many ways. Christian congregations increased in numbers, influence, and
wealth throughout every quarter of the Roman dominions. Many of the
rich, being filled with divine love, distributed their substance to the poor,
traveled into regions which as yet had not heard the sound of the gospel,
and, having planted Christianity, passed on to other countries. The Holy
Spirit could not thus work without awakening the jealousy and stirring up
all the enmity of the supporters of the national religion. Aurelius saw with
an evil eye the superior power of Christianity over men’s minds compared
with his own heathen philosophy. He then became an intolerant
persecutor, and encouraged the provincial authorities to crush what he
considered a contumacious spirit of resistance to his authority. But the
gospel of the grace of God was far beyond the reach of Aurelius; and
neither his sword nor his lions could arrest its triumphant career. In spite
of the bloody persecutions which he excited or sanctioned, Christianity
was propagated throughout the known world.
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But here we must pause for a little, and look around us. There is
something deeper far in the change of government towards the church than
the merely historical eye can discern. We believe that we are now come to

THE CLOSE OF THE FIRST PERIOD

AND THE OPENING OF THE SECOND
The Ephesian condition of the church, looking at it in this light, may be
said to have ended with the death of Antoninus Plus, in the year 161; and
the Smyrnean condition to have commenced with the reign of Marcus
Aurelius. The persecution in Asia broke out with great violence in the year
167, under the new edicts of this Emperor; and Smyrna especially suffered
greatly: the justly esteemed Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, suffered
martyrdom at this time. But in order to prove the view we have taken, it
will be necessary to glance briefly at the addresses to the churches of
Ephesus and Smyrna. And first,

THE ADDRESS TO THE CHURCH OF EPHESUS

REVELATION 2:1-7
The grand object of the church in this world was to be “the pillar and
ground of the truth.” It was set up to be a light-bearer for God. It is thus
symbolised by a “golden candlestick” — a vessel which bears the light. It
ought to have been a true witness of what God had manifested in Jesus on
the earth, and of what He is now when Christ is in heaven. We further
learn from this address, that the church, as a vessel of testimony in this
world, is threatened with being set aside unless its first estate is
maintained. But alas! it fails, as the creature always does. The angels,
Adam, Israel, and the church, kept not their first estate. “Nevertheless I
have somewhat against thee,” saith the Lord, “because thou hast left thy
first love. Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent,
and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly; and will
remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.”
There was still, however, much that He could praise, and He does praise
all that He can. As an assembly, they had patience; they had labored and
not fainted; they could not bear “evil men,” or those who were seeking the
highest place in the church. Nevertheless He feels the departure from
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Himself. “Thou hast left thy first love.” He speaks as one disappointed.
They had ceased to delight in His love to them, and hence their own love
to Him declined. “First love” is the happy fruit of our appreciation of the
Lord’s love to us. “Outward testimony might go on,” as one has said, “but
that is not what the Lord most values, though value it He does, so far as it
is simple, genuine, and faithful. Still He cannot but prize most of all hearts
devoted to Himself, the fruit of His own personal, self-sacrificing, perfect
love. He has a spouse upon earth, whom He desires to see with no object
but Himself, and kept pure for Him from the world and its ways. God has
called us for this: not only for salvation, and for a witness to Himself in
godliness, though this is most true and important, but beyond all for
Christ — a bride for His Son! Surely this should be our first and last, and
constant and dearest thought; for we are affianced to Christ, and He at
least has proved the fullness and faithfulness of His love to us! But what
of ours!”7
It was this state of things in Ephesus, and in the church at large, that called
for the intervention of the Lord in faithful discipline. The church, as
planted by Paul, had already fallen from its first estate. “All seek their
own,” he says, “not the things of Jesus Christ’s,” And again, “All they
which are in Asia be turned away from me.” Hence the tribulation spoken
of in the address to the church in Smyrna. Though the Lord is full of grace
and love in all His ways towards His fallen and failing church, still He is
righteous withal, and must judge evil. He is not seen in these addresses as
the Head in heaven of the one body, nor as the Bridegroom of His church;
but in His judicial character, walking in the midst of the candlesticks,
having the attributes of a judge. See chapter 1.
It will be observed by the reader, that there is a measured distance and
reserve in the style of His address to the church at Ephesus. This is in
keeping with the place He takes in the midst of the golden candlesticks. He
writes to the angel of the church, not to “the saints which are at Ephesus,
and to the faithful in Christ Jesus,” as in the Epistle by Paul.
There have been many disputes about “who is meant by the angel.” He
was a person, we believe, so identified morally with the assembly, that he
represented it, and characterised it. The Lord addresses the angel, not the
church immediately. “The angel,” therefore, gives the idea of
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representation. For example, in the Old Testament we have the angel of
Jehovah; the angel of the covenant; and in the New we have the angels of
the little children; and so of Peter in Acts 12, they said, “It is his angel.”
We will now briefly glance at

THE ADDRESS TO THE CHURCH AT SMYRNA

REVELATION 2:8-11
Our interest in the history of the church is greatly increased when we see
that the Lord has distinctly marked its successive epochs. The outward
condition of the church down to the death of the first Antoninc — so far
as it can be ascertained from the most authentic histories — answers in a
remarkable way to what we learn from scripture, and especially from the
address to Ephesus. There was outward consistency and zeal; they were
unwearied. It is also evident that there was charity, purity, devotedness,
holy courage, even to the greatest readiness to suffer in every way for the
Lord’s sake. At the same time it is clear, from both scripture and history,
that false doctrine was making its way, and that many were manifesting a
most unworthy zeal for official pre-eminence in the church. That
forgetfulness of self, and that care for Christ and His glory, which are the
firstfruits of His grace, were gone. Historically we now come to the
Smyrnean period. For the convenience of the reader we will give the
address entire.
“And unto the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things
saith the First and the Last, which was dead, and is alive; I know
thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and I
know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not,
but are the synagogue of Satan. Fear none of those things which
thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall east some of you into
prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days:
be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. He
that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches,
he that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.”
Here the Lord meets the declension by sore tribulation. Milder means had
not answered the end. This is no uncommon case; though they may have
thought that some strange thing had happened to them. But all their
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afflictions were known to the Lord, measured by Him, and ever under His
control.
“Ye shall have tribulation ten days.”
The period of their sufferings is exactly specified. And He speaks to them
as one that had known the depths of tribulation Himself.
“These things saith the First and the Last, which was dead, and is alive.”
He had gone through the deepest sorrow, and through death itself — He
had died for them, and was alive again. They had this blessed One to flee
to in all their trials. And as He looks on, and walks in the midst of His
suffering ones, He says,
“Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.”
Thus He holds in His hand the martyr’s crown, ready to place it on the
head of His faithful overcomer.
We will now turn to our history, and mark its resemblance to the above
Epistle.

THE SECOND PERIOD OF THE CHURCH’S HISTORY

COMMENCED ABOUT A.D. 167
The reign of Aurelius is marked, under the providence of God, by many
and great public calamities. We see the hand of the Lord in faithful love
chastening His own redeemed and beloved people, but His anger was
kindled against their enemies. The eastern army, under Verus, returning
from the Parthian war, brought with it to Rome the infliction of a
pestilential disease which was then raging in Asia, and which soon spread
its ravages through almost the whole of the Roman empire. There was also
a great inundation of the Tiber, which laid a large part of the city under
water, and swept away immense quantities of grain from the fields and
public storehouses. These disasters were naturally followed by a famine,
which consumed great numbers.
Such events could not fail to increase the hostility of the heathen against
the Christians. They ascribed all their troubles to the wrath of the gods,
which the new religion was supposed to have provoked. Thus it was that
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the persecution of the Christians in the Roman empire began with the
populace. The outcry against,them rose up from the people to the
governors. “Throw the Christians to the lions!” “Throw the Christians
to the lions!” was the general outcry: and the names of the most prominent
in the community were demanded with the same uncontrollable hostility.
A weak or superstitious magistrate would tremble before the voice of the
people, and lend himself as the instrument of their will.
But we will now take a nearer view, under the guidance of the various
histories that are before us, of the manner of these persecutions, and of the
behavior of the Christians under them.

THE PERSECUTION IN ASIA A.D. 167

In Asia Minor the persecution broke out with great violence, such as had
never been before. Christianity was now treated as a direct crime against
the State. This changed the face of everything. Contrary to the rescript of
Trajan, and the conduct of still milder emperors, Hadrian and Antonine,
the Christians were to be sought for as common criminals. They were torn
from their homes by the violence of the people, and subjected to the
severest tortures. If they obstinately refused to sacrifice to the gods, they
were condemned. The wild beast, the cross, the stake, and the axe were the
cruel forms of death that met the Lord’s faithful ones everywhere.
The prudent and dignified Melito, bishop of Sardis, was so moved by
these unheard-of-barbarities, that he appeared before the emperor as the
Christians’ advocate. His address throws much light both on the law and
on the conduct of the public authorities. It is as follows: — “The race of
God’s worshippers in this country are persecuted, as they never were
before, by new edicts; for the shameless sycophants, greedy of the
possessions of others — since they are furnished by these edicts with an
opportunity of so doing — plunder their innocent victims day and night.
And let it be right, if it is done by your command, since a just emperor will
never resolve on any unjust measure; and we will cheerfully bear the
honorable lot of such a death. Yet we would submit this single petition,
that you would inform yourself respecting the people who excite the
contention, and impartially decide whether they deserve punishment and
death, or deliverance and peace. But if this resolve, and this new edict —
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an edict which ought not so to be issued even against hostile barbarians —
comes from yourself, we pray you the more not to leave us exposed to
such public robbery.”8
There is, we fear, no ground to believe that this noble appeal brought any
direct relief to the Christians. The character and ways of Aurelius have
perplexed the historians. He was a philosopher of the sect of the Stoics,
but naturally humane, benevolent, gentle and pious, even childlike in his
disposition, some say, from the influence of his mother’s training; yet he
was an implacable persecutor of the Christians for nearly twenty years.
And the perplexity is increased when we look to Asia, for the proconsul at
this time was not personally opposed to the Christians. Still he yielded to
the popular fury and the demands of the law. But faith sees beyond the
emperors, governors, and people; it sees the prince of darkness ruling
these wicked men, and the Lord Jesus overruling all.
“I know thy works and tribulation... Fear none of these things
which thou shalt suffer…Be thou faithful unto death, and I will
give thee a crown of life..He that overcometh shall not be hurt of
the second death.”
Aurelius, with all his philosophy, was an utter stranger to the sweetness
and power of that Name which alone can meet and satisfy the longings of
the human heart. All the speculations and boastings of philosophy have
never done this. Hence the enmity of the human heart to the gospel. Self-
sufficiency, which leads to pride and self-importance, is the principal part
of the Stoic’s religion. With these views there could be no humility, no
sense of sin, and no idea of a Savior. And the more earnest he was in his
own religion, the more bitter and vehement would he be against
Christianity.
In a circular-letter addressed by the church of Smyrna to other christian
churches, we have a detailed account of the sufferings of the faithful unto
death. “They made it evident to us all,” says the church, “that in the midst
of those sufferings they were absent from the body; or rather, that the
Lord stood by them, and walked in the midst of them; and, staying
themselves on the grace of Christ, they bid defiance to the torments of the
world.” Some, with a strange momentary enthusiasm, rushed in self-
confidence to the tribunal, declared themselves to be Christians; but when
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the magistrate pressed them, wrought upon their fears, showed them the
wild beasts, they yielded and offered incense to the gods. “We therefore,”
adds the church, “praise not those who voluntarily surrendered
themselves; for so are we not taught in the gospel.” Nothing less than the
presence of the Lord Jesus could strengthen the soul to endure with
tranquillity and composure the most agonising torments, and the most
frightful deaths. But thousands did bear with meekness, cheerfulness, and
even with joyfulness, the utmost that the power of darkness and the
fourth beast of Daniel could do. The pagan bystanders were often moved
to pity by their sufferings, but never could understand their calmness of
mind, love to their enemies, and willingness to die.
We will now conclude this general account of the persecution in Asia, and
notice particularly the two most eminent persons who suffered death at
this time; namely, Justin and Polycarp.

THE MARTYRDOM OF JUSTIN, SURNAMED MARTYR

Justin was born at Neapoils, in Samaria, of Gentile parents. He carefully
studied in his youth the different philosophical sects; but not finding the
satisfaction which his heart longed for, he was induced to hear the gospel.
In it he found, through God’s blessing, a perfect rest for his soul, and
every desire of his heart fully met. He became an earnest Christian, and a
celebrated writer in defense of Christianity.
Early in the reign of Aurelius, Justin was a marked man. Information
was laid against him by one Crescens. He was apprehended with six of his
companions, and all were brought before the prefect. They were asked to
sacrifice to the gods. “No man,” replied Justin, “whose understanding is
sound, will desert true religion for the sake of error and impiety.” “Unless
you comply,” said the prefect, “you shall be tormented without mercy.”
“We desire nothing more sincerely,” he replied, “than to endure tortures
for our Lord Jesus Christ.” The rest assented, and said, “We are
Christians, and cannot sacrifice to idols.” The governor then pronounced
sentence — “As to those who refuse to sacrifice to the gods, and to obey
the imperial edicts, let them be first scourged, and then beheaded,
according to the laws.” The martyrs rejoiced, and blessed God, and being
led back to prison, were scourged, and afterwards beheaded. This took
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place at Rome about the year 165. Thus slept in Jesus one of the early
Fathers, and earned the glorious title, “Martyr,” which usually
accompanies his name. His writings have been carefully examined by
many, and great importance is attached to them.

LINES ON THE MARTYRDOM OF A ROMAN CENTURION

“Give the Christian to the lion!’
Wildly cry the Roman throng;
“Yes, to Afric’s tawny lion!’
Shout the warriors bold and strong.
“Let the hungry lion tear him!’
Echoed glad the laughing crowd;
“Fling him — fling him to the lion!’
Shrieked the noble matron loud.
“Give the Christian to the lion!’
Spake in accents grave and slow,
From their curule seats of honor,
Senators in goodly row.
Then from flight to flight, redouble
Shout, and cheer, and laughter peal,
Till the giant Colosseum
Neath the tumult seemed to reel;
And the clamours of the people
Through the Arch of Titus roll,
All adown the Roman forum,
To the towering Capitol,
Then a pause — but hush, and listen,
Whence that wild and savage yell?
Tis the lion of Sahara,
Raging in his grated cell!
Fierce with famine and with fetter,
Shaketh he his tawny mane!
For his living prey impatient,
Struggling ‘gainst his bar and chain.
But a voice is stealing faintly
From the next cell, chill and dim;
Tis the death-doomed Christian, chanting
Soft and low his dying hymn!
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With uplifted hands he prayeth
For the men that ask his blood!
With a holy faith he pleadeth
For that shouting multitude.
They are waiting! Lift the grating —
Comes he forth, serene to die:
With a radiance around his forehead,
And a lustre in his eye.
Never! when hidst Roman legions,
With the helmet on his brow,
PressU he to the front of battle
With a firmer step than now.
Lift the grating! He is waiting.
Let the savage lion come!
He can only rend a passage
For the soul to reach her home!

THE MARTYRDOM OF POLYCARP

The behavior of the venerable bishop of Smyrna, in view of his
martyrdom, was most christian and noble in its bearing. He was prepared
and ready for his persecutors, without being rash or imprudent, as some at
times, through excitement, had been. When he heard the shouts of the
people demanding his death, it was his intention to remain quietly in the
city, and await the issue which God might ordain for him. But, by the
entreaties of the church, he suffered himself to be persuaded to take refuge
in a neighboring village. Here he spent the time, with a few friends,
occupied, night and day, in praying for all the churches throughout the
world. But his pursuers soon discovered his retreat. When told that the
public officers were at the door, he invited them in, ordered meat and drink
to be set before them, and requested that they would indulge him with one
hour of quiet prayer. But the fullness of his heart carried him through two
hours. His devotions, age, and appearance greatly affected the pagans. He
must have been over ninety years of age. The time being now come, he
was conveyed to the city. The proconsul does not appear to have been
personally hostile to the Christians. He evidently felt for the aged
Polycarp, and did what he could to save him. He urged him to swear by
the genius of the emperor, and give proof of his penitence. But Polycarp
was calm and firm, with his eyes uplifted to heaven. The proconsul again
urged him, saying, “Revile Christ, and I will release thee.” The old man
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now replied, “Six and eighty years have I served Him, and He has done me
nothing but good; and how could I revile Him, my Lord and Savior?” The
governor finding that both promises and threatenings were in vain, he
caused it to be proclaimed by the herald in the circus, “Polycarp has
declared himself to be a Christian.” The heathen populace, with an
infuriated shout, replied, “This is the teacher of atheism, the father of the
Christians, the enemy of our gods, by whom so many have been turned
away from offering sacrifices.” The governor having yielded to the
demands of the people, that Polycarp should die at the stake, Jews and
pagans hastened together to bring wood for that purpose. As they were
about to fasten him with nails to the stake of the pile, he said, “Leave me
thus: He who has strengthened me to encounter the flames, will also enable
me to stand firm at the stake.” Before the fire was lighted he prayed,
“Lord, Almighty God, Father of Thy beloved Son, Jesus Christ, through
whom we have received from Thee the knowledge of Thyself; God of
angels, and of the whole creation; of the human race, and of the just that
live in Thy presence; I praise Thee that Thou hast judged me worthy of
this day and of this hour, to take part in the number of Thy witnesses, in
the cup of Thy Christ.”
The fire was now kindled, but the flames played around the body, forming
the appearance of a sail filled with wind. The superstitious Romans,
fearing that the fire would not consume him, plunged a spear into his side:
and Polycarp was crowned with victory.
These are but short extracts from the accounts that have been handed
down to us of the martyrdom of the revered and venerable bishop. The
martyrologies are full of particulars. But the Lord greatly blessed the
Christlike way in which he suffered for the good of the church. The rage of
the people cooled down, as if satisfied with revenge; and their thirst for
blood seemed quenched for the time. The proconsul, too, being wearied
with such slaughter, absolutely refused to have any more Christians
brought before his tribunal. How manifest is the hand of the Lord in this
wonderful and sudden change! He had limited the days of their tribulation
before they were cast into the furnace, and now they are accomplished:
and no power on earth or in hell can prolong them another hour. They had
been faithful unto death, and received the crown of life.
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THE PERSECUTIONS IN FRANCE A.D. 177
We will now turn to the scene of the second persecution under this
emperor’s reign. It took place in France, and exactly ten years after the
persecution in Asia. There may have been other persecutions during these
ten years, but, so far as we know, there are no authentic records of any till
177. The source from which we derive our knowledge of the details of this
latter persecution is a circular letter from the churches of Lyons and
Vienne to the churches in Asia. Whether there be any allusion to these ten
historical years in the words of the Lord to the church at Smyrna, we
cannot say. Scripture does not say there is. Comparing the history with
the epistle, the thought is likely to be suggested. “Ye shall have tribulation
ten days.” In other parts of this mystical book, a day being taken for a
year, so it may be in the Epistle to Smyrna. History gives us the beginning
and the end as to time, and the east and west as to breadth of scene. But
we will now look at some of the details, in which the resemblance may be
more manifest.
Imprisonment was one of the main features of their sufferings. Many
died from the suffocating air of the noisome dungeons. In this respect it
differed from the persecution in Asia. The popular excitement rose even
higher than at Smyrna. The Christians were insulted and abused whenever
they appeared abroad, and even plundered in their own houses. As this
popular fury burst forth during the absence of the governor, many were
thrown into prison by the inferior magistrates to await his return. But the
spirit of persecution on this occasion, though it sprang from the populace,
was not confined to them. The governor, on his arrival, seems to have been
infected with the fanaticism of the lower classes. To his dishonor as a
magistrate, he began the examination of the prisoners with tortures. And
the testimony of slaves, contrary to an ancient law in Rome, was not only
received against their masters but wrung from them by the severest
sufferings. Consequently they were ready to say what they were required,
to escape the whip and the rack. Having proved, as they said, that the
Christians practiced the most unnatural and worst of crimes in their
meetings, they now believed that it was right to indulge themselves in
every cruelty. No kindred, no condition, no age, nor sex was spared.
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Vettius, a young man of birth and rank, and of great charity and fervency
of spirit, on hearing that such charges were laid against his brethren, felt
constrained to present himself before the governor as a witness of their
innocence. He demanded a hearing; but the governor refused to listen, and
only asked him if he too was a Christian? When he distinctly affirmed that
he was, the governor ordered him to be thrown into prison with the rest.
He afterwards received the crown of martyrdom.
The aged bishop, Pothinus, now over ninety years of age, and probably
the one who had brought the gospel to Lyons from Asia, was of course
good prey for the lion of hell. He was afflicted with asthma and could
scarcely breathe, but notwithstanding he must be seized and dragged
before the authorities. “Who is the God of the Christians?” asked the
governor. The old man quietly told him that he could only come to the
knowledge of the true God by showing a right spirit. Those who
surrounded the tribunal strove with each other in giving vent to their rage
against the venerable bishop. He was ordered to prison, and after receiving
many blows on his way thither, he was cast in among the rest, and in two
days fell asleep in Jesus, in the arms of his suffering flock.
What a weight of comfort and encouragement the words of the blessed
Lord must have been to these holy sufferers! “Fear none of these things
which thou shalt suffer” had been addressed to the church in Smyrna, and
probably carried to the French churches in Lyons and Vienne by Pothinus.
They were experiencing an exact fulfillment of this solemn and prophetic
warning: “Behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye
may be tried.” They knew who was the great enemy — the great
persecutor — though emperors, governors, and mobs might be his
instruments. But the Lord was with His beloved suffering ones. He not
only sustained and comforted them, but He brought out, in the most
blessed way, the power of His own presence in the feeblest forms of
humanity. This was, we venture to say, a new thing on the earth. The
superiority of the Christians to all the inflictions of tortures, and to all the
terrors of death, utterly astonished the multitude, stung to the quick their
tormentors, and wounded the stoic pride of the Emperor. What could be
done with a people who prayed for their persecutors, and manifested the
composure and tranquillity of heaven, in the midst of the fires and wild
beasts of the amphitheater? Take one example of what we affirm — an
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example worthy of all praise, in all time and in all eternity — divine power
displayed in human weakness.
Blandina, a female slave, was distinguished above the rest of the martyrs
for the variety of tortures she endured. Her mistress, who also suffered
martyrdom, feared lest the faith of her servant might give way under such
trials. But it was not so, the Lord be praised! Firm as a rock, but peaceful
and unpretending, she endured the most excruciating sufferings. Her
tormentors urged her to deny Christ and confess that the private meetings
of the Christians were only for their wicked practices, and they would
cease their tortures. But, no! her only reply was, “I am a Christian, and
there is no wickedness amongst us.” The scourge, the rack, the heated iron
chair, and the wild beasts, had lost their terror for her. Her heart was fixed
on Christ, and He kept her in spirit near to Himself. Her character was
fully formed, not by her social condition, of course — that was the most
debased in those times — but by her faith in the Lord Jesus Christ,
through the power of the indwelling Holy Ghost.
Day after day she was brought forth as a public spectacle of suffering.
Being a female and a slave, the heathen expected to force her to a denial of
Christ, and to a confession that the Christians were guilty of the crimes
reported against them. But it was all in vain. “I am a Christian, and there is
no wickedness amongst us,” was her quiet but unvarying reply. Her
constancy wearied out the inventive cruelty of her tormentors. They were
astonished that she lived through the fearful succession of her sufferings.
But in her greatest agonies she found strength and relief in looking to Jesus
and witnessing for Him. “Blandina was endued with so much fortitude,”
says the letter from the church at Lyons, written seventeen hundred years
ago, “that those who successively tortured her from morning to night were
quite worn out with fatigue, and owned themselves conquered and
exhausted of their whole apparatus of tortures, and amazed to see her still
breathing whilst her body was torn and laid open.”9
Before narrating the closing scene of her sufferings, we would notice what
appears to us to be the secret of her great strength and constancy.
Doubtless the Lord was sustaining her in a remarkable way as a witness
for Him, and as a testimony to all ages of the power of Christianity over
the human mind, compared with all the religions that then were or ever had
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been on the earth. Still, we would say particularly, that her humility and
godly fear were the sure indications of her power against the enemy, and
of her unfaltering fidelity to Christ. She was thus working out her own
salvation — deliverance from the difficulties of the way — by a deep
sense of her own conscious weakness, indicated by “fear and trembling.”
When on her way back from the amphitheater to the prison, in company
with her fellow-sufferers, they were surrounded by their sorrowing friends
when they had an opportunity, and in their sympathy and love addressed
them as “martyrs for Christ.” But this they instantly checked; saying,
“We are not worthy of such an honor. The struggle is not over; and the
dignified name of Martyr properly belongs to Him only who is the true
and faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, the Prince of life; or, at
least, only to those whose testimony Christ has sealed by their constancy
to the end. We are but poor humble confessors.” With tears they besought
their brethren to pray for them that they might be firm and true to the end.
Thus their weakness was their strength, for it led them to lean on the
mighty One. And so it always is, and ever has been, in small as well as in
great trials. But a fresh sorrow awaited them on their return to the prison.
They found some who had given way through natural fear, and had denied
that they were Christians. But they had gained nothing thereby; Satan had
not let them off. Under a charge of other crimes they were kept in prison.
With these weak ones Blandina and the others prayed with many tears,
that they might be restored and strengthened. The Lord answered their
prayers; so that, when brought up again for further examination, they
stedfastly confessed their faith in Christ, and thus passed sentence of
death on themselves, and received the crown of martyrdom.
Nobler names, as men would say, than Blandina’s had passed off the
bloody scene; and honored names too that had witnessed with great
fortitude, such as Vettius, Pothinus, Sanctus, Naturus, and Attalius; but
the last day of her trial was come, and the last pain she was ever to feel,
and the last tear she was ever to shed. She was brought up for her final
examination with a youth of fifteen, named Ponticus. They were ordered
to swear by the gods; they firmly refused, but were calm and unmoved.
The multitude were incensed at their magnanimous patience. The whole
round of barbarities was inflicted. Ponticus, though animated and
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strengthened by the prayers of his sister in Christ, soon sank under the
tortures, and fell asleep in Jesus.
And now came the noble and blessed Blandina, as the church styles her.
Like a mother who was needed to comfort and encourage her children, she
was kept to the last day of the games. She had sent her children on before,
and was now longing to follow after them. They had joined the noble army
of martyrs above, and were resting with Jesus, as weary warriors rest, in
the peaceful paradise of God. After she had endured stripes, she was
seated in a hot iron chair; then she was enclosed in a net and thrown to a
bull; and having been tossed some time by the animal, a soldier plunged a
spear into her side. No doubt she was dead long before the spear reached
her, but in this she was honored to be like her Lord and Master. Bright
indeed will be the crown, amidst the many crowns in heaven, of the
constant, humble, patient, enduring Blandina.
But the fierce and savage rage of the heathen, instigated by Satan, had not
yet reached its height. They began a new war with the dead bodies of the
saints. Their blood had not satiated them. They must have their ashes.
Hence the mutilated bodies of the martyrs were collected and burned, and
thrown into the river Rhone, with the fire that consumed them, lest a
particle should be left to pollute the land. But rage, however fierce, will
finally expend itself: and nature, however savage, will become weary of
bloodshed; and so, many Christians survived this terrible persecution.
We have thus gone, more than usual, into details in speaking of the
persecutions under Marcus Aurelius. So far, they are a fulfillment, we
believe, of the solemn and prophetic warnings of the address to Smyrna;
and also, in a remarkable manner, of the Lord’s promised grace. The
sufferers were filled and animated by His own Spirit. “Even their
persecutors,” says Neander, “were never mentioned by them with
resentment; but they prayed that God would forgive those who had
subjected them to such cruel sufferings. They left a legacy to their
brethren, not of strife and war, but of peace and joy, unanimity and love.”
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Thou art home at last, each waymark past,
Thou hast sped to the goal before me;
And oh, my tears fall thick and fast,
Like the hopes that had blossomed o’er thee.
My lips refuse to say, Farewell,
For our life-link nought can sever;
Thou’rt early gone with Christ to dwell,
Where we both shall be for ever.

THE POWER OF PRAYER

In tracing the silver line of God’s grace in His beloved people, we have
now to notice a report which was widely spread among the Christians
after the beginning of the third century. It occurred towards the close of
the reign of Aurelius, and led him, it is said, to change the course of his
policy towards the Christians. In one of his campaigns against the
Germans and Sarmatians he was thrown into a situation of extreme peril.
The burning sun shone full in the faces of his soldiers; they were hemmed
in by the barbarians; they were exhausted by wounds and fatigue, and
parched with thirst: while, at the same time, the enemy was preparing to
attack them. In this extremity the twelfth legion, said to be composed of
Christians, stepped forward and knelt down in prayer; suddenly the sky
was overspread with clouds, and the rain began to fall heavily. The Roman
soldiers took off their helmets to catch the refreshing drops; but the
shower speedily increased to a storm of hail, accompanied with thunder
and lightning, which so alarmed the barbarians that the Romans gained an
easy victory.
The Emperor, so struck with such a miraculous answer to prayer,
acknowledged the interposition of the God of the Christians, conferred
honors on the legion, and issued an edict in favor of their religion. After
this, if not before, they were called “the thundering legion.” Historians,
from Eusebius down, have noticed this remarkable occurrence.
But, like a tale that is often told, many things have been added to it. There
is good reason to believe, however, that a providential answer in favor of
the Romans was given to prayer. This much seems quite evident. And to
faith there is nothing incredible in such an event; though some of the
circumstances related are questionable. For example, a Roman legion at
that time would probably number five thousand men: while there may
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have been a great many Christians in the twelfth, which was a
distinguished legion, yet it would be hard to believe that they were all
Christians.
On their return from the war, they no doubt related to their brethren the
merciful intervention of God in answer to prayer, which the church would
record and spread amongst the Christians to His praise and glory. But the
facts are even more fully confirmed by the Romans. They also believed
that the deliverance came from heaven, but in answer to the prayers of the
Emperor to the gods. Hence the event was commemorated, after their
usual manner, on columns, medals, and paintings. On these the Emperor is
represented as stretching forth his hands in supplication; the army as
catching the rain in their helmets; and Jupiter as launching forth his bolts
on the barbarians, who lie slain on the ground.
A few years after this remarkable event Marcus Aurelius, the philosopher
and the persecutor, died. Great changes quickly followed. The glory of the
empire, and the effort to maintain the dignity of the old Roman religion,
expired with himself; but Christianity made great and rapid advancement.
Men of ability and learning were raised up about this time, who boldly and
powerfully advocated its claims with their pens. These are called
Apologists. Tertullian, an African, who is said to have been born in A .D .
160, may be considered as the ablest and the most perfect type of this
class.
The more enlightened of the heathen now began to feel that, if their religion
was to withstand the aggressive power of the gospel, it must be defended
and reformed. Hence the controversy commenced; and one Celsus, an
Epicurean philosopher, said to have been born in the same year as
Tertullian, stood forth as the leader on the controversial side of paganism.
From about this period — the closing years of the second century —
church records become more interesting, because more definite and reliable.
But before proceeding farther with the general history, it may be well to
retrace our steps and glance briefly at the internal history of the church
from the beginning. We shall thus see how some of the things which are
still observed, and with which we are familiar, were first introduced.
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CHAPTER 8
THE INTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH

Here we step once more on sure ground. We have the privilege and
satisfaction of appealing to the sacred writings. Before the canon of
scripture was closed, many of the errors, both in doctrine and practice,
which have since troubled and rent in pieces the professing church, were
allowed to spring up. These were, in the wisdom and grace of God,
detected and exposed by the inspired apostles. If we keep this in mind, we
shall not be surprised to meet with many things in the internal history of
the church entirely contrary to scripture. Neither need we have any
difficulty in withstanding them. We have been armed by the apostles. The
love of office and preeminence in the church was manifested at an early
period, and many observances of mere official invention were added. The
“grain of mustard seed” became a great tree — the symbol of political
power on the earth: this was and is the outward aspect of Christendom;
but inwardly the leaven did its evil work, “till the whole was leavened.”
Those who have carefully studied Matthew 13 with other passages in the
Acts and the Epistles relating to the profession of the name of Christ,
should have a very correct idea of both the early and later history of the
church. It embraces the entire period, from the sowing of the seed by the
Son of man, until the harvest, though under the similitude of the kingdom
of heaven. This is a great relief to the mind, and prepares us for many a
dark and distressing scene, wickedly perpetrated under the fair name and
cloak of Christianity. We will now turn to some of these passages.
1. Our blessed Lord, in the parable of the wheat and tares, predicts what
would take place. “The kingdom of heaven,” He says, “is likened unto a
man which sowed good seed in his field: but while men slept, his enemy
came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.” In course of
time the blade sprang up and brought forth fruit. This was the rapid
spread of Christianity in the earth. But we also read “then appeared the
tares also.” These were false professors of Christ’s name. The Lord Jesus
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sowed good seed. Satan, through the carelessness and infirmity of man,
sowed tares. But what was to be done with them? Were they to be rooted
out of the kingdom? The Lord says, No; “lest while ye gather up the tares,
ye root up also the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the
harvest;” that is, till the end of the age or dispensation when the Lord
comes in judgment.
But here, some may inquire, Does the Lord mean that the wheat and the
tares are to grow together in the church? Certainly not. They were not to
be rooted out of the field, but to be put out of the church when manifested
as wicked persons. The church and the kingdom are quite distinct, though
the one may be said to be in the other. The field is the world, not the
church. The limits of the kingdom stretch far beyond the limits of the true
church of God. Christ builds the church; men have to do with extending
the proportions of Christendom. If the expression, “the kingdom of
heaven,” meant the same as “the church of God,” there ought to be no
discipline at all. Whereas the apostle, in writing to the Corinthians,
expressly says, “Put away from among yourselves that wicked person.”
But he was not to be put out of the kingdom, for that could only be done
by taking away his life. The wheat and the tares are to grow together in the
field until the harvest. Then the Lord Himself, in His providence, will deal
with the tares. They shall be bound in bundles and cast into the fire.
Nothing can be plainer than the Lord’s teaching in this parable. The tares
are to be put away from the Lord’s table, but not rooted out of the field.
The church was not to use worldly punishments in dealing with
ecclesiastical offenders. But alas! the very thing which the Lord is here
guarding His disciples against came to pass, as the long list of martyrs so
painfully shows. Pains and penalties were brought in as discipline, and the
refractory were handed over to the civil power to be punished with fire
and sword.
2. In Acts 20 we read that “grievous wolves” would make their appearance
in the church after the departure of the apostle. In Paul’s Epistles to the
Thessalonians — supposed to be his first inspired Epistles — he tells
them that the mystery of iniquity was already at work, and that other evil
things would follow. In writing to the Philippians he tells them, weeping,
that many walk as “the enemies of the cross of Christ; whose end is
destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame,
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who mind earthly things.” Many were calling themselves Christians, but
minding earthly things. Such a state of things could not escape the spiritual
eye of him whose one object was Christ in glory, and practical conformity
to His ways when on earth. In his Second Epistle to Timothy — probably
the last he ever wrote — he compares Christendom to “a great house,” in
which are all manner of vessels, “some to honor and some to dishonor.”
This is a picture of the outward universal church. Nevertheless, the
Christian cannot leave it, and individual responsibility can never cease. But
he is to clear himself from all that is contrary to the name of the Lord. The
directions are most plain and precious for the spiritually minded in all
ages. The Christian must have no association with that which is untrue.
Such is the meaning of purging himself from the vessels to dishonor. He is
to clear himself from all that is not to the Lord’s honor. John and the other
apostles speak of the same things, and give the same divine directions; but
we need not here pursue them farther. Enough has been pointed out to
prepare the reader for what we must meet with in that which calls itself
Christian.

THE IMMEDIATE FOLLOWERS OF THE APOSTLES

Here an important question arises, and one that has been often asked, At
what time, and by what means, did clericalism — the whole system of
clergy — gain so firm a footing in the professing church? To answer this
question fully would be to write in detail the internal history of the
church. Its constitution and character were wholly changed by the
introduction of the clerical system. But its growth and organization was
gradual. Arguments were drawn from the Old Testament, and, in a short
time, Christianity was recast in the mould of Judaism. The distinction
between bishops and presbyters, between a priestly order and the
common priesthood of all believers, and the multiplication of church
offices, followed rapidly as consequences. But however difficult it may be
now to trace the inroads of clericalism, the synagogue was its model.
We learn from the whole of the New Testament that Judaism was the
unwearied and unrelenting enemy of Christianity in every point of view. It
labored incessantly, on the one hand to introduce its rites and ceremonies;
and on the other to persecute unto the death all who were faithful to
Christ and to the true principles of the church of God. This we see
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especially from the Acts and the Epistles. But when the extraordinary
gifts in the church ceased, and when the noble defenders of the faith, in the
persons of the inspired apostles, passed away, we may easily imagine
how Judaism would prevail. Besides, the early churches were chiefly
composed of converts from the Jewish synagogue, who long retained their
Jewish prejudices.
Clericalism, then, we firmly believe sprang from Judaism. From the days
of the apostles until now the root of the whole fabric and dominion of
clericalism is there. Philosophy and heterodoxy, no doubt, did much to
corrupt the church and lead her to join hands with the world: but the order
of the clergy and all that belongs to it must be founded on the Jews’
religion. It is more than probable, however, that many may have been
persuaded then, as many have been since, that Christianity is a
continuation of Judaism, in place of being its perfect contrast. The
Judaizing teachers boldly affirmed that Christianity was merely a graft on
Judaism. But throughout the epistles we everywhere learn that the one
was earthly and the other heavenly; ‘that the one belonged to the old, and
the other to the new creation; that the law was given by Moses, but grace
and truth came by Jesus Christ.
We will now return to the immediate followers of the apostles.
The Apostolical Fathers, as they are called, such as Clement, Polycarp,
Ignatius, and Barnabas, were the immediate followers of the inspired
apostles. They had listened to their instructions, labored with them in the
gospel, and probably had been familiarly acquainted with them. But,
notwithstanding the high privileges which they enjoyed as scholars of the
apostles, they very soon departed from the doctrines which had been
committed to them, especially as to church government. They seem to
have completely forgotten — judging from the Epistles which bear their
names — the great New Testament truth of the Holy Spirit’s presence in
the assembly. Surely both John and Paul speak much of the presence,
indwelling, sovereign rule, and authority of the Holy Spirit in the church.
John 13-16; Acts 2:1, 1 Corinthians 12:14, Ephesians 1-4 give plain
directions and instructions on this fundamental truth of the church of God.
Had this truth been maintained according to the apostle’s exhortation,
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“Endeavoring to keep” not to make — “the unity of the Spirit,” clericalism
could never have found a place in Christendom.
The new teachers of the church seem also to have forgotten the beautiful
simplicity of the divine order in the church. There were only two orders of
office-bearers — elders and deacons. The one was appointed to attend to
the temporal, the other to the spiritual need of the assembly of the saints.
Elder, or bishop, simply means overseer, one who takes a spiritual
oversight. He may have been “apt to teach,” or he may not; he was not an
ordained teacher, but an ordained overseer. And as for the institutions of
divine appointment, we only find in the New Testament, Baptism and the
Lord’s Supper. Nothing could be more simple, more plain, or more easily
understood, as to all the directions given for faith and practice; but there
was no room left for the exaltation and glory of man in the church of God.
The Holy Ghost had come down to take the lead in the assembly,
according to the word of the Lord, and the promise of the Father; and no
Christian, however gifted, believing this, could take the place of leader, and
thus practically displace the Holy Spirit. But, from the moment that this
truth was lost sight of, men began to contend for place and power, and of
course the Holy Spirit had no longer His right place in the assembly.
Scarcely had the voice of inspiration become silent in the church, than we
hear the voice of the new teachers crying loudly and earnestly for the
highest honors being paid to the bishop, and a supreme place being given
to him. Not a word about the Spirit’s place as sovereign ruler in the church
of God. This is evident from the Epistles of Ignatius, said to have been
written A .D . 107. Many great names, we are aware, have questioned their
authenticity; and many great names contend that they have been
satisfactorily proved to be genuine. The proofs on either side lie outside of
our line. The Church of England has long accepted them as genuine, and
considers them as the basis, and as the triumphant vindication, of the
antiquity of episcopacy. The following are a few specimens of his
admonitions to the churches.
Ignatius, in the course of his journey from Antioch to Rome,1 wrote
seven Epistles. One to the Ephesians, Magnesians, Traillians, Romans,
Philadelphians, Smyrneans, and one to his friend Polycarp. Being written
on the eve of his martyrdom, and with great earnestness and vehemence,
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and having been the disciple and friend of St. John, and at that time bishop
of Antioch, probably the most renowned in Christendom, his Epistles
must have produced a great impression on the churches; besides the way
to office, authority, and power has always a great charm for vain human
nature.
In writing to the church at Ephesus he says, “Let us take heed, brethren,
that we set not ourselves against the bishop, that we may be subject to
God... It is therefore evident that we ought to look upon the bishop even
as we do upon the Lord Himself.” In his Epistle to the Magnesians he
says, “I exhort you that ye study to do all things in a divine concord; your
bishops presiding in the place of God; your presbyters in the place of the
council of the apostles; and your deacons, most dear to me, being
entrusted with the ministry of Jesus Christ.” We find the same strain in
his letter to the Traillians: “Whereas ye are subject to your bishop as to
Jesus Christ, ye appear to me to live, not after the manner of men, but
according to Jesus Christ who died for us... Guard yourselves against such
persons; and that you will do if you are not puffed up: but continue
inseparable from Jesus Christ our God, and from your bishop, and from
the commands of the apostles.” Passing over several of his letters to the
churches, we only give one more specimen from his Epistle to the
Philadelphians: “I cried whilst I was among you, I spake with a loud voice,
Attend to the bishop, and to the presbytery, and to the deacons. Now
some supposed that I spake this as foreseeing the division that should
come among you. But He is my witness for whose sake I am in bonds,
that I knew nothing from any man; but the Spirit spake, saying on this
wise: Do nothing without the bishop; keep your bodies as the temples of
God: love unity; flee divisions; be the followers of Christ, as He was of
His Father.”2
In the last quotation it is very evident that the venerable father wishes to
add to his theories the weight of inspiration. But, however extravagant and
unaccountable this idea may be, we must give him credit for believing what
he says. That he was a devout Christian, and full of religious zeal, no one
can doubt; but that he greatly deceived himself in this and in other matters
there can be as little doubt. The leading idea in all his letters is the perfect
submission of the people to their rulers, or of the laity to their clergy. He
was, no doubt, anxious for the welfare of the church, and fearing the effect
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of the “divisions” which he refers to, he probably thought that a strong
government, in the hands of rulers, would be the best means of preserving
it from the inroads of error. “Give diligence,” he says, “to be established in
the doctrine of our Lord and the apostles, together with your most worthy
bishop, and the well-woven spiritual crown of your presbytery, and your
godly deacons. Be subject to your bishop and to one another, as Jesus
Christ to the Father, according to the flesh; and as the apostles to Christ,
and to the Father, and to the Spirit; that so there may be a union among
you both in body and in spirit.” Thus the mitre was placed on the head of
the highest dignitary, and henceforth became the object of ecclesiastical
ambition, and not unfrequently of the most unseemly contention, with all
their demoralizing consequences.

CLERICALISM, MINISTRY, AND INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY

It is assumed that these Epistles were written only a few years after the
death of St. John, and that the writer must have been intimately acquainted
with his mind, and was only carrying out his views. Hence it is said, that
episcopacy is coeval with Christianity. But it matters comparatively little
by whom they were written, or the precise time; they are not scripture,
and the reader must judge of their character by the word of God, and of
their influence by the history of the church. The mind of the Lord,
concerning His church, and the responsibility of His people, must be
learnt from His own word, and not from the writings of any Father,
however early or esteemed. And here, it may be well, before leaving this
point, to place before our readers a few portions of the word, which they
will do well to compare with the above extracts. They refer to christian
ministry and individual responsibility. Thus learn the mighty difference
between ministry and office; or, between being esteemed for your work’s
sake, not merely office’ sake.
In the Gospel of St. Matthew, from verse 45 of chapter 24 to verse 31 of
chapter 25, we have three parables, in which the Lord addresses the
disciples as to their conduct during His absence.
1. The subject of the first is the responsibility of ministry within the
house — in the church. “Whose house are we.” Thus we read, “Who then
is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his
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household, to give them meat in due season? Blessed is that servant, whom
his lord when he cometh shall find so doing. Verily I say unto you, That
he shall make him ruler over all his goods.” Real ministry is of the Lord
and of Him alone. This is what we have to note in view of what took place
on the very threshold of Christianity. And He makes much of faithfulness
or unfaithfulness in His house. His people are near and dear to His heart.
Those who have been humble and faithful during His absence will be made
rulers over all His goods when He returns. The true minister of Christ has
to do directly with Himself. He is the hireling of no man, or of any
particular body of men. “Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he
cometh shall find so doing.” Failure in ministry is also spoken of and dealt
with by the Lord Himself.
“But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his
coming; and shall begin to smite his fellow servants, and to eat and drink
with the drunken.” This is the other and sad side of the picture. The
character of ministry is greatly affected by holding or rejecting the truth of
the Lord’s coming. In place of devoted service to the household, with his
heart set on the master’s approval on his return, there is assumption,
tyranny, and worldliness. The doom of such, when the Lord comes, will
be worse than that of the world. He shall “appoint him his portion with
the hypocrites” — Judas’ place — where “there shall be weeping and
gnashing of teeth.” Such are the fearful consequences of forgetfulness of
the Lord’s return. But this is more than a mere doctrinal mistake, or a
difference of opinion, about the coming of the Lord. It was “in his heart,”
his will was concerned in it. He wished in his heart that his Lord would
stay away, as His coming would spoil all his schemes, and bring to a close
all his worldly greatness. Is not this too true a picture of what has
happened? and what a solemn lesson for those who take to themselves a
place of service in the church! The mere appointment of the sovereign, or
the choice of the people, will not be enough in that day, unless they have
also been the chosen of the Lord and faithful in His house.
2. In the second parable, professing Christians, during the Lord’s absence,
are represented as virgins who went out to meet the Bridegroom and light
Him to His house. This was the attitude of the early Christians. They
came out from the ‘ world, and from Judaism, to go forth and meet the
Bridegroom. But we know what happened. He tarries: they all slumbered
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and slept. “And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom
cometh; go ye out to meet him.” From the first till the beginning of the
present century, we hear very little about the coming of the Lord. Now
and then, here and there, a feeble voice may be heard on the subject; but
not until the early part of the present century did the midnight cry go
forth. Now we have many tracts and volumes on the subject, and many are
preaching it in nearly all lands under heaven. The midnight is past, the
morning cometh.
The revival of the truth of the Lord’s coming marks a distinct epoch in the
history of the church. And, like all revivals, it was the work of the Holy
Spirit, and that by instruments of His own choosing, and by means which
He saw fitting. And how like the Lord’s long-suffering, that in this great
movement there should be time given between the cry and the arrival of
the Bridegroom to prove the condition of each. Five of the ten virgins had
no oil in their lamps — no Christ, no Holy Spirit dwelling in them. They
had only the outward lamp of profession. How awfully solemn the
thought, if we look at Christendom from this point of view! Five of every
ten are unreal, and against them the door will be shut for ever. How this
thought should move to earnestness and energy in evangelising! May we
wisely improve the time thus graciously given between the going forth of
the midnight cry, and the coming of the Bridegroom.
3. In the first parable, it is ministry inside the house; in the third, it is
ministry outside the house — evangelising. In the second parable, it is the
personal expectation of the Lord’s coming, with the possession of that
which is requisite to go in with Him to the marriage supper of the King’s
son.
“The kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country,
who called his own servants, and delivered unto them his goods.
And unto one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another
one; to every man according to his several ability; and straightway
took his journey.”
Here the Lord is represented as leaving this world and going back to
heaven; and while He is gone there, His servants are to trade with the
talents committed to them.
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“Then he that had received the five talents went and traded with
the same, and made them other five talents. And likewise he that
had received two, he also gained other two.”
Here we have the true principle and the true character of christian
ministry. The Lord Himself called the servants, and gave them the talents,
and the servant is responsible to the Lord Himself for the fulfillment of his
calling. The exercise of gift, whether inside or outside the house, although
subject to the directions of the word, and always to be exercised in love
and for blessing, is in no wise dependent on the will of sovereign, priest, or
people, but on Christ only, the true Head of the church. It is a grave and
solemn thing for any one to interfere with Christ’s claims on the service of
His servant. To touch this is to set aside responsibility to Christ, and to
overthrow the fundamental principle of Christian ministry.
Priesthood was the distinguishing characteristic of the Jewish
dispensation; ministry, according to God, is characteristic of the Christian
period. Hence the utter failure of the professing church, when it sought to
imitate Judaism in so many ways, both in its priesthood and its ritualism.
If a priestly order, with rites and ceremonies, be still necessary, the
efficacy of the work of Christ is called in question. In fact, though not in
words, it strikes at the root of Christianity. But all is settled by the word
of God.
“But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat
down at the right hand of God; from henceforth expecting till his
enemies be made his footstool. For by one offering He hath perfected
for ever them that are sanctified... Now where remission of these is,
there is no more offering for sin.” (see Hebrews 10:1-25.)
Ministry, then, is a subject of the highest dignity and the deepest interest.
It testifies to the work, the victory, and the glory of Jesus, that the lost
may be saved. It is the activity of God’s love going out to an alien and
ruined world, and earnestly beseeching souls to be reconciled to Him.
“God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not
imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us
the word of reconciliation.” (2 Corinthians 5:19-21.)
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Jewish priesthood maintained the people in their relations with God:
christian ministry is God in grace by His servants delivering souls from sin
and ruin, and bringing them near to Himself, as happy worshippers in the
most holy place.
To return to our parable, there is one thing specially to be noticed here, as
showing the Lord’s sovereignty and wisdom in connection with ministry.
He gave differently to each, and to each according to his ability. Each one
had a natural capacity which fitted him for the service in which he was
employed, and gifts bestowed according to the measure of the gift of
Christ for its fulfillment.
“He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some,
evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers.” (Ephesians 4.)
The servant must have certain natural qualifications for his work, besides
the power of the Spirit of God. If the Lord calls a man to preach the
gospel, there will be a natural ability for it. Then the Lord may create in
his heart by the Holy Spirit a real love for souls, which is the best gift of
the evangelist. Then he ought to stir up and exercise his gift according to
his ability, for the blessing of souls and the glory of God. May we
remember that we are responsible for these two things — the gift
graciously bestowed, and the ability in which the gift is to be exercised.
When the Lord comes to reckon with His servants, it will not be enough to
say, I was never educated for, or appointed to, the ministry. The question
will be, Did I wait on the Lord to be used by Him according to what He
had fitted me for? or did I hide my talent in the earth? Faithfulness or
unfaithfulness to Him will be the only thing in question.
That which distinguished the faithful from the unfaithful servant was
confidence in their master. The unfaithful servant knew not the Lord: he
acted from fear, not from love, and so hid his one talent in the earth. The
faithful knew the Lord, trusted Him, and served from love, and was
rewarded. Love is the only true spring of service for Christ, either in the
church or in the outside world. May we never be found making excuses for
ourselves, like the “wicked and slothful” servant, but be ever reckoning on
the love, grace, truth, and power of our blessed Savior and Lord.
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THE EFFECT OF THE NEW ORDER OF CLERGY
It may be only fair to suppose that those good men, by whose means a
new order of things was brought into the church, and the free ministry of
the Holy Spirit in the members of the body excluded, had the welfare of
the church at heart. It is evident that Ignatius, by this arrangement, hoped
to avoid “divisions.” But, however good our motives may be, it is the
height of human folly — if not worse — to interfere with, or seek to
change, the order of God. This was Eve’s mistake, and we all know the
consequences too well. It was also the original sin of the church, from
which it has suffered these eighteen hundred years.
The Holy Ghost sent down from heaven is the only power of ministry;
but the Lord must be left free to choose and employ His own servants.
Human arrangements and appointments necessarily interfere with the
liberty of the Spirit. They quench the Holy Spirit: He only knows where
the ability is, and where, when, and how to dispense the gifts. Speaking of
the church as it was in the days of the apostles, it is said, “But all these
worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally
as He [the Holy Ghost] will.” And again, we read, “There are diversities of
gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but
the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same
God which worketh all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to
every man to profit withal,” or for the profit of all. (1 Corinthians 12.)
Here all is in divine hands. The Holy Spirit dispenses the gift. It is to be
exercised in acknowledgement of the Lordship of Christ; and God gives
efficacy to the ministry. What a ministry — Spirit, Lord, and God — its
source, power and character! How great, how sad, the change to king,
prelate, or people! Is not this apostasy? But while we object to mere
human appointment to office, qualified or not qualified, we would contend
most earnestly for the ministry of the word to both saints and sinners.
The church alas! soon found that to hinder ministry, as it is set before us
in the word of God, and to introduce a new order of things, did not hinder
divisions, herestes, and false teachers springing up. True, the flesh, in the
most real and gifted Christian, may manifest itself; but when the Spirit of
God is acting in power, and the authority of the word owned, the remedy
is at hand: the evil will be judged in humility and faithfulness to Christ.
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From this time — the beginning of the second century, and before it — the
church was greatly disturbed by herestes; and as time rolled on, things
never grew better, but always worse.
Irenaeus, a Christian of great celebrity, who succeeded Pothinus as
bishop of Lyons, A .D . 177, has left us much information on the subject of
the early herestes. He is supposed to have written about the year 183. His
great book “against heresies” is said to contain a defense of the holy
catholic faith, and an examination and refutation of the false doctrines
advocated by the principal heretics. 3

THE ORIGIN OF THE DISTINCTION BETWEEN CLERGY AND LAITY

Christianity at the beginning had no separate priestly order. Its first
converts went everywhere preaching the Lord Jesus. They were the first
to spread abroad the glad tidings of salvation, even before the apostles
themselves had left Jerusalem. (Acts 8:4.) In course of time, when
converts were found sufficient in any place to form an assembly, they
came together in the name of the Lord on the first day of the week to break
bread, and to edify one another in love. (Acts 20:7.) When the
opportunity came for an apostle to visit such gatherings, he chose elders
to take the oversight of the little flock; deacons were chosen by the
assembly. This was the entire constitution of the first churches. If the
Lord raised up an evangelist, and souls were converted, they were baptised
unto the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. This was, of
course, outside the assembly, and not a church act. After due examination
by the spiritual as to the genuineness of the evangelist’s work, the
assembly being satisfied, they were received into communion.
It will be seen, from this brief sketch of the divine order of the churches,
that there was no distinction such as “the clergy,” and “the laity.” All
stood on the same ground as to priesthood, worship, and nearness to God.
As the apostles Peter and John say, “Ye also, as lively stones, are built up
a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices
acceptable to God by Jesus Christ.” And thus could the whole assembly
sing, “Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own
blood; and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father; to
Him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.” The only
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priesthood, then, in the church of God is the common priesthood of all
believers. The humblest menial in the palace of the archbishop, if washed
in the blood of Christ, is whiter than snow, and fitted to enter the most
holy place, and worship within the veil.
There is no outer court worship now. The separation of a privileged class
— a sacerdotal order — is unknown in the New Testament. The
distinction between clergy and laity was suggested by Judaism, and human
invention soon made it great; but it was episcopal ordination that
established the distinction, and widened the separation. The bishop
gradually assumed the title of Pontiff. The presbyters, and at length the
deacons, became, as well as the bishops, a sacred order. The place of
mediation and of greater nearness to God was assumed by the priestly
caste, and also of authority over the laity. In place of God speaking direct
to the heart and conscience by His own word, and the heart and conscience
brought direct into the presence of God, it was priesthood coming in
between them. Thus the word of God was lost sight of, and faith stood in
the opinions of men. The blessed Lord Jesus, as the Great High Priest of
His people, and as the one Mediator between God and men, was thus
practically displaced and set aside.4
Thus alas! we see in the church what has been true of man from Adam
downwards. Everything that has been entrusted to man has failed. From
the time that the responsibility of maintaining the church as the pillar and
ground of the truth fell into man’s hands, there has been nothing but
failure. The word of God, however, remains the same, and its authority
can never fail, blessed be His name. One of the main objects of these
“Short Papers” is to recall the reader’s attention to the principles and
order of the church, as taught in the New Testament. “God is a Spirit; and
they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” That is,
we must worship and serve Him according to the truth, and under the
guidance and unction of the Holy Spirit, if we would glorify His name, and
worship and serve Him acceptably.
Almost all ecclesiastical writers affirm that neither the Lord Himself nor
His apostles gave any distinct precepts as to the order and government of
the church — that such things were left to the wisdom and prudence of her
office-bearers, and the character of the times. By this assumption the
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widest range was given to the human will. We know the consequences.
Man sought his own glory. The simplicity of the New Testament, the
lowly path of the Lord and His apostles, the zeal and self-denial of a Paul,
all were overlooked, and worldly greatness soon became the object and
ambition of the clergy. A brief sketch of the bishop’s office will set these
things in a clear light, and, we doubt not, will greatly interest our readers.

WHAT WAS A BISHOP IN EARLY TIMES?

The humblest peasant is familiar with the grandeur and worldly greatness
of a bishop; but he may not know how a minister of Christ, and a
successor of the humble fishermen of Galilee, came to such dignity. In the
days of the apostles, and for more than a hundred years after, the office of
a bishop was a laborious but “good work.” He had the charge of a single
church, which might ordinarily be contained in a private house. He was not
then as a “lord over God’s heritage,” but in reality its minister and servant,
instructing the people, and attending on the sick and poor in person. The
presbyters, no doubt, assisted in the management of the general affairs of
the church, and also the deacons; but the bishop had the chief part of the
service. He had no authority, however, to decree or sanction anything
without the approval of the presbytery and people. There was no thought
then of “inferior clergy” under him. And at that time the churches had no
revenues, except the voluntary contributions of the people, which,
moderate as they doubtless were, would leave a very small emolument for
the bishop after the poor and needy were attended to.
But in those early times office-bearers in the church continued, in all
probability, to carry on their former trades and occupations, supporting
themselves and their families in the same manner as before. “A bishop,”
says Paul, “must be given to hospitality.” And this he could not have
been, had he depended for his income on the earnings of the poor. It was
not until about the year 245 that the clergy received a salary, and were
forbidden to follow their worldly employments; but towards the close of
the second century circumstances arose in the history of the church, which
greatly affected the original humility and simplicity of its overseers, and
which tended to the corruption of the priestly order. “This change began,”
says Waddington, “towards the end of the second century; and it is certain
that at this period we find the first complaints of the incipient corruption
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of the clergy.” From the moment that the interests of the ministers became
at all distinguished from the interests of Christianity, many and great
changes for the worse may be considered to have begun. We will notice
some of these circumstances; and first,

THE ORIGIN OF DIOCESES

The bishops who lived in cities, were either by their own preaching, or by
the preaching of others — presbyters, deacons, or people — the means of
gathering new churches in the neighboring towns and villages. These young
assemblies, very naturally, continued under the care and protection of the
city churches by whose means they had received the gospel, and were
formed into churches. Ecclesiastical provinces were thus gradually formed,
which the Greeks afterwards denominated dioceses. The city bishops
claimed the privilege of appointing office-bearers to these rural churches;
and the persons to whom they committed their instruction and care were
called district bishops. These formed a new class, coming in between the
bishops and the presbyters, being considered inferior to the former, and
superior to the latter. Thus were distinctions and divisions created, and
offices multiplied.

THE ORIGIN OF THE METROPOLITAN BISHOP

Churches thus constituted and regulated rapidly increased throughout the
empire. In the management of their internal affairs every church was
essentially distinct from every other, though walking in spiritual
fellowship with all others, and considered as part of the one church of
God. But, as the number of believers increased, and churches were
extended, diversities in doctrine and discipline sprang up, which could not
always be settled in the individual assemblies. This gave rise to councils,
or synods. These were composed chiefly of those who took part in the
ministry. But when the deputies of the churches were thus assembled, it
was soon discovered that the control of a president was required. Unless
the sovereign action of the Holy Spirit in the church be owned and
submitted to, there must be anarchy without a president. The bishop of
the capital of the province was usually appointed to preside, under the
lofty title of the Metropolitan. On his return home it was hard to lay aside
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these occasional honors, so he very soon claimed the personal and
permanent dignity of the Metropolitan.
The bishops and presbyters, until about this time, were generally viewed
as equal in rank, or the same thing, the terms being used synonymously;
but now the former considered themselves as invested with supreme
power in the guidance of the church, and were determined to maintain
themselves in this authority. The presbyters refused to concede to them
this new and self-assumed dignity, and sought to maintain their own
independence. Hence arose the great controversy between the presbyterian
and the episcopalian systems, which has continued until this day, and of
which we may speak more particularly hereafter. Enough has been said to
show the reader the beginning of many things which still live before us in
the professing church. In the consecrated order of clergy he will find the
germ out of which sprang at length the whole mediaeval priesthood, the sin
of simony, the laws of celibacy, and the fearful corruptions of the dark
ages.5
Having thus glanced at what was going on inside the church from the
beginning, and especially amongst her rulers, we will now resume the
general history from the death of Marcus Aurelius.
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CHAPTER 9
FROM COMMODUS TILL THE ACCESSION
OF CONSTANTINE A.D. 180-313

Christianity under the successors of Aurelius enjoyed a season of

comparative repose and tranquillity. The depravity of Commodus was
overruled to subserve the interests of the Christians after their long
sufferings under his father; and the brief reign of many of the emperors left
them no leisure to war against the aggressions of Christianity. “During
little more than a century,” says Milman, “from the accession of
Commodus to that of Diocletian, more than twenty emperors flitted like
shadows along the tragic scene of the imperial palace. The empire of the
world became the prize of bold adventure, or the precarious gift of a
lawless soldiery. A long line of military adventurers, often strangers to the
name, to the race, to the language of Rome — Africans, Pyreans, Arabs,
and Goths — seized the quickly shifting scepter of the world. The change
of sovereign was almost always a change of dynasty, or, by some strange
fatality, every attempt to re-establish a hereditary succession was
thwarted by the vices or imbecility of the second generation.”
Thus the Christians had about a hundred years of comparative rest and
peace. There were, no doubt, many cases of persecution and martyrdom
during that period; but such cases were more the result of personal
hostility in some individual than from any systematic policy pursued by
the government against Christianity. The first and commanding object of
each succeeding emperor was to secure his contested throne. They had no
time to devote to the suppression of Christianity, or to the social and
religious changes within the empire. Thus the great Head of the church —
who is also “head over all things to the church” — made the weakness and
insecurity of the throne the indirect means of the strength and prosperity
of the church.
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But although the reign of Cornmodus was generally favorable to the
progress of Christianity, there was one remarkable instance of persecution
which we must note.
Apollonius, a Roman senator, renowned for learning and philosophy, was
a sincere Christian. Many of the nobility of Rome, with their whole
families, embraced Christianity about this time. The dignity of the Roman
senate felt itself lowered by such innovations. This led, it is supposed, to
the accusation of Apollonius before the magistrate. His accuser, under an
old and unrepealed law of Antoninus Pius, which enacted grievous
punishments against the accusers of Christians, was sentenced to death
and executed. The magistrate asked the prisoner, Apollonius, to give an
account of his faith before the senate and the court. He complied, and
boldly confessed his faith in Christ; in consequence of which, by a decree
of the senate, he was beheaded. It is said by some to be the only trial
recorded in history where both the accused and the accuser suffered
judicially. But the Lord’s hand was in it, and high above both the accuser
and the magistrate, Perennius, who condemned them both. From this
period many families of distinction and opulence in Rome professed
Christianity, and sometimes we meet with Christians in the imperial
family.
After a reign of about twelve years the unworthy son of Aurelius died
from the effects of a poisoned cup of wine.
Pertinax, immediately upon the death of Commodus, was elected by the
senate to the throne; but after a brief reign of sixty-six days, he was killed
in an insurrection. A civil war followed, and Septimius Severus ultimately
obtained the sovereign power in Rome.

CHRISTIANITY UNDER THE REIGN OF SEVERUS A.D. 194-210

In the early part of the reign of Severus he was rather favorable to the
Christians. A christian slave, named Proculus, was the means of restoring
the Emperor to health, by anointing him with oil. This remarkable cure —
no doubt in answer to prayer — gave the Christians great favor in the eyes
of Severus. Proculus received an honorable position in the imperial family,
and a christian nurse and a christian tutor were engaged to form the
character of the young prince. He also protected from the popular
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indignation men and women of the highest rank in Rome — senators, their
wives and families — who had embraced Christianity. But alas! all this
favor towards the Christians was merely the result of local circumstances.
The laws remained the same, and violent persecutions broke out against
them in particular provinces.

PERSECUTIONS UNDER SEVERUS A.D. 202

It was not till about the tenth year of his reign that the native ferocity of
his dark and relentless mind was manifested against the Christians. In 202,
after his return from the East, where he had gained great victories, and no
doubt lifted up with pride, he put forth his hand, and impiously dared to
arrest the progress of Christianity — the chariot of the gospel. He passed
a law, which forbade, under severe penalties, that any of his subjects
should become either Jews or Christians. This law, as a matter of course,
kindled a severe persecution against young converts and Christians in
general. It stimulated their enemies to all kinds of violence. Large sums of
money were extorted from timid Christians by some of the venal
governors as the price of peace. This practice, though yielded to by some
for the sake of life and liberty, was strongly denounced by others. It was
considered by the more zealous as degrading to Christianity, and an
ignominious barter of the hopes and glories of martyrdom. Still the
persecution does not appear to have been general. It left its deepest traces
in Egypt and Africa.
At Alexandria, Leonides, father of the famous Origen, suffered
martyrdom. Young people at schools, who were receiving a christian
education, were subjected to severe tortures, and some of their teachers
were seized and burned. The young Origen distinguished himself at this
time by his active and fearless labors in the now almost deserted schools.
He longed to follow in his father’s footsteps, and rather sought than
shunned the crown of martyrdom. But it was in Africa-a place we only
think of now as a dark, miserable, and thinly peopled desert — that the
silver line of God’s marvellous grace was most distinctly marked in the
heavenly patience and fortitude of the holy sufferers. We must indulge our
readers with a few brief details.
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THE PERSECUTION IN AFRICA
Historians say that in no part of the Roman Empire had Christianity taken
more deep and permanent root than in the province of Africa. Then it was
crowded with rich and populous cities. The African type of Christianity
was entirely different from what has been called the Egyptian. The former
was earnest and impassioned, the latter dreamy and speculative through
the evil influence of Platonism. Tertullian belongs to this period, and is a
true type of the difference we have referred to; but more of this farther on.
We will now notice some of the African martyrs.

PERPETUA AND HER COMPANIONS

Amongst others who were apprehended and martyred in Africa during this
persecution, Perpetua and her companions, in all histories, hold a
distinguished place. The history of their martyrdom not only bears
throughout the stamp of circumstantial truth, but abounds with the most
exquisite touches of natural feeling and affection. Here we see the beautiful
combination of the tenderest feelings and the strongest affections, which
Christianity recognises in all their rights, and makes even more profound
and tender, but yet causes all to be sacrificed on the altar of entire devoted-
ness to Him who died entirely devoted to us. “Who loved me,” as
appropriating faith says, “and gave Himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20.)
At Carthage, in the year 202, three young men, Revocatus, Saturnius,
and Secundulus, and two young women, Perpetua and Felicitas, were
arrested, all of them being still catechumens, or candidates for baptism and
communion. Perpetua was of a good family, wealthy and noble, of liberal
education, and honorably married. She was about twenty-two years of age,
and was a mother, with her child at the breast. Her whole family seem to
have been Christians, except her aged father who was still a pagan.
Nothing is said of her husband. Her father was passionately fond of her,
and greatly dreaded the disgrace that her sufferings for Christ would bring
on his family. So that she had not only death in its most frightful form to
struggle with, but every sacred tie of nature.
When she was first brought before her persecutors, her aged father came
and urged her to recant and say she was not a Christian. “Father,” she
calmy replied, pointing to a vessel that lay on the ground, “can I call this
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vessel anything else than what it is?... No,” he replied. “Neither can I say
to you anything else than that I am a Christian.” A few days after this the
young Christians were baptized. Though they were under guard, they
were not yet committed to prison. But shortly after this, they were
thrown into the dungeon. “Then,” she says, “I was tempted, I was
terrified, for I had never been in such darkness before. Oh what a dreadful
day! The excessive heat occasioned by the number of persons, the rough
treatment of the soldiers, and, finally, anxiety for my child, made me
miserable.” The deacons, however, succeeded in purchasing for the
christian prisoners a better apartment, where they were separated from the
common criminals. Such advantages could usually be purchased from the
venal overseers of prisons. Perpetua was now cheered by having her child
brought to her. She placed it at her breast, and exclaimed, “Now, this
prison has become a palace to met”
After a few days there was a rumor that the prisoners were to be
examined. The father hastened to his daughter in great distress of mind.
“My daughter,” he said, “pity my grey hairs, pity thy father, if I am still
worthy to be called thy father. If I have brought thee up to this bloom of
thy age, if I have preferred thee above all thy brothers, expose me not to
such shame among men. Look upon thy child — thy son-who, if thou
diest, cannot long survive thee. Let thy lofty spirit give way, lest thou
plunge us all into ruin. For if thou diest thus, not one of us will ever have
courage again to speak a free word.” Whilst saying this, he kissed her
hands, threw himself at her feet, entreating her with terms of endearment,
and many tears. But, though greatly moved and pained by the sight of her
father, and his strong and tender affection for her, she was calm and firm,
and felt chiefly concerned for the good of his soul. “My father’s grey
hairs,” she said, “pained me, when I considered that he alone of my family
would not rejoice in my martyrdom.” “What shall happen,” she said to
him, “when I come before the tribunal, depends on the will of God; for we
stand not in our own strength, but only by the power of God.”
On the arrival of the decisive hour — the last day of their trial — an
immense multitude was assembled. The aged father again appeared, that he
might for the last time try his utmost to overcome the resolution of his
daughter. On this occasion he brought her infant son in his arms, and stood
before her. What a moment! what a spectacle! Her aged father, his grey
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hairs, her tender infant; to say nothing of his agonising importunities: what
an appeal to a daughter — to a young mother’s heart! “Have pity on thy
father’s grey hairs,” said the governor, “have pity on thy helpless child,
offer sacrifice for the welfare of the Emperor.” Thus she stood before the
tribunal, before the assembled multitude, before the admiring myriads of
heaven, before the frowning hosts of hell. But Perpetua was calm and firm.
Like Abraham of old, the father of the faithful, her eye was not now on her
son, but on the God of resurrection. Having commended her child to her
mother and her brother, she answered the governor, and said, “That I
cannot do.” “Art thou a Christian?” he asked. “Yes,” she replied, “I am a
Christian.” Her fate was now decided. They were all condemned to serve
as a cruel sport for the people and the soldiers, in a fight with wild beasts,
on the anniversary of young Geta’s birthday. They returned to their
dungeon, rejoicing that they were thus enabled to witness and suffer for
Jesus’ sake. The gaoler, Pudas, was converted by means of the tranquil
behavior of his prisoners.
When led forth into the amphitheater, the martyrs were observed to have a
peaceful and joyful appearance. According to a custom which prevailed in
Carthage, the men should have been clothed in scarlet like the priests of
Saturn, and the women in yellow as the priestesses of Ceres; but the
prisoners protested against such a proceeding. “We have come here,” they
said, “of our own choice, that we may not suffer our freedom to be taken
from us; we have given up our lives that we may not be forced to such
abominations.” The pagans acknowledged the justice of their demand, and
yielded. After taking leave of each other with the mutual kiss of
christian love, in the certain hope of soon meeting again, as “absent from
the body and present with the Lord,” they came forward to the scene of
death in their simple attire. The voice of praise to God was heard by the
spectators. Perpetua was singing a psalm. The men were exposed to lions,
bears, and leopards; the women were tossed by a furious cow. But all were
speedily released from their sufferings by the sword of the gladiator, and
entered into the joy of their Lord.
The interesting narrative, which is here abridged, and said to have been
written by Perpetua’s own hand, breathes such an air of truth and reality
as to have commanded the respect and confidence of all ages. But our main
object in writing it for our readers is to present to them a living picture, in
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which many of the finest features of christian faith are beautifully blended
with the warmest and tenderest christian feelings; and that we may learn,
not to be complainers, but to endure all things for Christ’s sake, that so
His grace may shine, our faith triumph, and God be glorified.
A few years after these events, Severus turned his attention to Britain,
where the Romans had been losing ground. The Emperor, being at the head
of a very powerful army, drove back the independent natives of Caledonia,
and regained the country south of the wall of Antoninus, but lost so many
troops in the successive battles which he was obliged to fight, that he did
not think proper to push his conquests beyond that boundary. Feeling at
length his end approaching, he retired to York, where he soon expired, in
the eighteenth year of his reign, A .D . 211.

THE ALTERED POSITION OF CHRISTIANITY

After the death of Septimius Severus — except during the short reign of
Maximin — the church enjoyed a season of comparative peace till the
reign of Decius, A .D . 249. But during the favorable reign of Alexander
Severus, a considerable change took place in the relation of Christianity to
society. He was through life under the influence of his mother, Mammaea,
who is described by Eusebius as “a woman distinguished for her piety and
religion.” She sent for Origen, of whose fame she had heard much, and
learnt from him something of the doctrines of the gospel. She was
afterwards favorable to the Christians, but there is not much evidence that
she was one herself.
Alexander was of a religious disposition. He had many Christians in his
household; and bishops were admitted even at the court in a recognised
official character. He frequently used the words of our Savior,
“As ye would that men should do to you,
do ye also to them likewise.” (Luke 6:31.)
He had them inscribed on the walls of his palace and on other public
buildings. But all religions were nearly the same to him, and on this
principle he gave Christianity a place in his eclectic system.
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THE FIRST PUBLIC BUILDINGS FOR CHRISTIAN ASSEMBLIES
An important point in the history of the church, and one that proves its
altered position in the Roman Empire, now comes before us for the first
time. It was during the reign of this excellent prince that public buildings
were first erected for the assemblies of Christians. A little circumstance
connected with a piece of land in Rome shows the true spirit of the
Emperor and the growing power and influence of Christians. This piece of
land, which had been considered as a common, was selected by a
congregation as a site for a church; but the Company of Victuallers
contended that they had a prior claim. The case was judged by the
Emperor. He awarded the land to the Christians, on the ground that it was
better to devote it to the worship of God in any form than apply it to a
profane and unworthy use.
Public buildings — christian churches, so-called — now begun to rise in
different parts of the empire, and to possess endowments in land. The
heathen had never been able to understand why the Christians had neither
temples nor altars. Their religious assemblies, up till this time, had been
held in private. Even the Jew had his public synagogue, but where the
Christians met was indicated by no separate and distinguished building.
The private house, the catacombs, the cemetery of their dead, contained
their peaceful congregations. Their privacy, which had often been in those
troublous times their security, was now passing away. On the other hand,
it must also be observed that their secrecy was often used against them.
We have seen from the first, that the pagans could not understand a
religion without a temple, and were easily persuaded that these private and
mysterious meetings, which seemed to shun the light of day, were only for
the worst of purposes.
The outward condition of Christianity was now changed — wonderfully
changed — but alas! not in favor of spiritual health and growth, as we shall
soon see. There were now well-known edifices in which the Christians
met, and the doors of which they could throw wide open to all mankind.
Christianity was now recognised as one of the various forms of worship
which the government did not prohibit. But the toleration of the Christians
during this period rested only on the favorable disposition of Alexander.
No change was made in the laws of the empire in favor of Christians, so
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that their time of peace was brought to a close by his death. A conspiracy
was formed against him by the demoralised soldiery, who could not endure
the discipline which he sought to restore; and the youthful Emperor was
slain in his tent, in the twenty-ninth year of his age and the thirteenth of
his reign.

THE LORD’S DEALINGS WITH THE CLERGY

Scarcely had the new churches been built, and the bishops, received at
court, when the hand of the Lord was turned against them. It happened in
this way.
Maximin, a rude Thracian peasant, raised himself to the imperial throne.
He had been the chief instigator, if not the actual murderer of the virtuous
Alexander. He began his reign by seizing and putting to death all the
friends of the late Emperor. Those who had been his friends he reckoned
as his own enemies. He ordered the bishops, and particularly those who
had been the intimate friends of Alexander, to be put to death. His
vengeance fell more or less on all classes of Christians, but chiefly on the
clergy. It was not, however, for their Christianity that they suffered on
this occasion, for Maximin was utterly regardless of all religions, but
because of the position they had reached in the world. What can be more
sorrowful than this reflection?
About the same time destructive earthquakes in several provinces
rekindled the popular hatred against the Christians in general. The fury of
the people under such an emperor was unrestrained, and, encouraged by
hostile governors, they burnt the newly-built churches and persecuted the
Christians. But happily the reign of the savage was of short duration. He
became intolerable to mankind. The army mutinied and slew him in the
third year of his reign; and a more favorable season for the Christians
returned.
The reign of Gordian, A .D . 238-244, and that of Philip, A .D . 244-249,
were friendly to the church. But we have repeatedly found that a
government favorable to the Christians was immediately followed by
another which oppressed them. It was particularly the case at this time.
Under the smiles and patronage of Philip the Arabian the church enjoyed
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great outward prosperity, but she was on the eve of a persecution more
terrible and more general than any she had yet passed through.
One of the causes which may have contributed to this was the absence of
the Christians from the national ceremonies which commemorated the
thousandth year of Rome, A .D . 247. The secular games were celebrated
with unexampled magnificence by Philip; but as he was favorable to the
Christians, they escaped the fury of the pagan priests and populace. The
Christians were now a recognised body in the State, and however carefully
they might avoid mingling in the political factions or the popular festivities
of the empire, they were considered the enemies of its prosperity and the
cause of all its calamities. We now come to a complete change of
government — a government that afflicts the whole church of God.

THE GENERAL PERSECUTION UNDER DECIUS

Decius, in the year 249, conquered Philip and placed himself on the
throne. His reign is remarkable in church history for the first general
persecution. The new Emperor was unfavourable to Christianity and
zealously devoted to the pagan religion. He resolved to attempt the
complete extermination of the former, and to restore the latter to its
ancient glory. One of the first measures of his reign was to issue edicts to
the governors, to enforce the ancient laws against the Christians. They
were commanded, on pain of forfeiting their own lives, to exterminate all
Christians utterly, or bring them back by pains and tortures to the religion
of their fathers.
From the time of Trajan there had been an imperial order to the effect, that
the Christians were not to be sought for; and there was also a law against
private accusations being brought against them, especially by their own
servants, as we have seen in the case of Apollonius; and these laws had
been usually observed by the enemies of the church, but now they were
wholly neglected. The authorities sought out the Christians, the accusers
ran no risk, and popular clamor was admitted in place of formal evidence.
During the two succeeding years a great multitude of Christians in all the
Roman provinces were banished, imprisoned, or tortured to death by
various kinds of punishments and sufferings. This persecution was more
cruel and terrible than any that preceded it. But the most painful part of
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those heart-rending scenes was the enfeebled state of the Christians
themselves — the sad effect of worldly ease and prosperity.

THE EFFECTS OF WORLDLINESS IN THE CHURCH

The student of church history now meets with the manifest and appalling
effect of the world in the church. It is a most sorrowful sight, but it ought
to be a profitable lesson to the christian reader. What then was, is now,
and ever must be. The Holy Spirit, who dwells in us, is not now less
sensitive to the foul and withering breath of the world than He was then.
What the enemy could not do by bloody edicts and cruel tyrants, he
accomplished by the friendship of the world. This is an old stratagem of
Satan. The wily serpent proved more dangerous than the roaring lion. By
means of the favor of great men, and especially of emperors, he threw the
clergy off their guard, led them to join hands with the world, and deceived
them by his flatteries. The Christians could now erect temples as well as
the heathen, and their bishops were received at the imperial court on equal
terms with the idolatrous priests. This unhallowed intercourse with the
world sapped the very foundations of their Christianity. This became
painfully manifest when the violent storm of persecution succeeded the
long calm of their worldly prosperity.
In many parts of the empire the Christians had enjoyed undisturbed peace
for a period of thirty years. This had told unfavorably on the church as a
whole. With many it was not now the faith of an ardent conviction, such
as we had in the first and second centuries, but of truth instilled into the
mind by means of christian education — just what prevails in the present
day to an alarming extent. A persecution breaking out with great violence,
after so many years of tranquillity, could not fail to prove a sifting process
for the churches. The atmosphere of Christianity had become corrupted.
Cyprian in the West, and Origen in the East, speak of the secular spirit
which had crept in — of the pride, the luxury, the covetousness of the
clergy — of the careless and irreligious lives of the people.
“If,” says Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, “the cause of the disease is
understood, the cure of the affected part is already found. The Lord would
prove His people; and because the divinely-prescribed regimen of life had
become disturbed in the long season of peace, a divine judgment was sent
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to reestablish our fallen, and, I might almost say, slumbering faith. Our
sins deserve more; but our gracious Lord has so ordered it that all which
has occurred seems rather like a trial than a persecution. Forgetting what
believers did in the times of the apostles, and what they should always be
doing, Christians labored with insatiable desire to increase their earthly
possessions. Many of the bishops who, by precept and example, should
have guided others, neglected their divine calling, to engage in the
management of worldly concerns.” Such being the condition of things in
many of the churches, we need not wonder at what took place.
The Emperor ordered rigorous search to be made for all suspected of
refusing compliance with the national worship. Christians were required to
conform to the ceremonies of the pagan religion. In case they declined,
threats, and afterwards tortures, were to be employed to compel
submission. If they remained firm, the punishment of death was to be
inflicted, especially on the bishops, whom Decius hated most bitterly. The
custom was, wherever the dreadful edict was carried into execution, to
appoint a day when all the Christians in the place were to present
themselves before the magistrate, renounce their religion, and offer incense
at the idol’s altar. Many, before the dreadful day arrived, had fled into
voluntary banishment. The goods of such were confiscated, and
themselves forbidden to return, under penalty of death. Those who
remained firm, after repeated tortures, were cast into prison, when the
additional sufferings of hunger and thirst were employed to overcome their
resolution. Many who were less firm and faithful were let off without
sacrificing, by purchasing themselves, or allowing their friends to
purchase, a certificate from the magistrate. But this unworthy practice was
condemned by the church as a tacit abjuration.
Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, in describing the effect of this terrible
decree, says, “that many citizens of repute complied with the edict. Some
were impelled by their fears, and some were forced by their friends. Many
stood pale and trembling, neither ready to submit to the idolatrous
ceremony, nor prepared to resist even unto death. Others endured their
tortures to a certain point, but finally gave in.” Such were some of the
painful and disgraceful effects of the general relaxation through tampering
with this present evil world. Still it would ill become us, who live in a time
of great civil and religious liberty, to say hard things of the weakness of
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those who lived in such sanguinary times. Rather let us feel the disgrace as
our own, and pray that we may be kept from yielding to the attractions of
the world in every form. But all was not defective, thank the Lord. Let us
look for a moment at the bright side.

THE POWER OF FAITH AND CHRISTIAN DEVOTEDNESS

The same Dionysius tells us that many were as pillars of the Lord, who
through Him were made strong, and became wonderful witnesses of His
grace. Among these he mentions a boy of fifteen, Dioscurus by name,
who answered in the wisest manner all questions, and displayed such
constancy under torture, that he commanded the admiration of the
governor himself, who dismissed him, in the hope that riper years would
lead him to see his error. A woman, who had been brought to the altar by
her husband, was forced to offer incense by some one holding her hand;
but she exclaimed, “I did it not: it was you that did it;” and she was
thereupon condemned to exile. In the dungeon at Carthage the Christians
were exposed to heat, hunger, and thirst, in order to force them to comply
with the decree; but although they saw death by starvation staring them in
the face, they continued stedfast in their confession of Christ. And from
the prison in Rome, where certain confessors had been confined for about
a year, the following noble confession was sent to Cyprian: “What more
glorious and blessed lot can, by God’s grace, fall to man than, amidst
tortures and the fear of death itself, to confess God the Lord — than, with
lacerated bodies and a spirit departing but yet free, to confess Christ, the
Son of God — than to become fellow-sufferers with Christ in the name of
Christ? If we have not yet shed our blood, we are ready to shed it. Pray
then, beloved Cyprian, that the Lord would daily confirm and strengthen
each one of us, more and more, with the power of His might; and that He,
as the best of leaders, would finally conduct His soldiers, whom He has
disciplined and proved in the dangerous camp, to the field of battle which
is before us, armed with those divine weapons which never can be
conquered.”
Among the victims of this terrible persecution were Fabian, bishop of
Rome, Babylas of Antioch, and Alexander of Jerusalem. Cyprian, Origen,
Gregory, Dionysius, and other eminent men, were exposed to cruel
tortures and exile, but escaped with their lives. The hatred of the Emperor
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was particularly directed against the bishops. But in the Lord’s mercy the
reign of Decius was a short one; he was killed in battle with the Goths,
about the end of 251.1

THE MARTYRDOM OF CYPRIAN UNDER VALERIAN

As the name of Cyprian must be familiar to all our readers, and a name
most famous in connection with the government and discipline of the
church, it may be well to notice particularly the serene fortitude of this
Father in the prospect of martyrdom.
He was born at Carthage about the year 200; but he was not converted till
about 246. Though in mature age, he possessed all the freshness and ardor
of youth. He had been distinguished as a teacher of rhetoric, he was now
distinguished as an earnest devoted Christian. He was early promoted to
the offices of deacon and presbyter; and in 248 he was elected bishop by
the general desire of the people. His labors were interrupted by the
persecution under Decius; but his life was preserved till the year 258. On
the morning of the 13th of September, an officer with soldiers was sent by
the proconsul to bring him into his presence. Cyprian then knew his end
was near. With a ready mind and a cheerful countenance he went without
delay. His trial was postponed for a day. The intelligence of his
apprehension drew together the whoie city. His own people lay all night
in front of the officer’s house with whom he was lodged.
In the morning he was led to the proconsul’s palace surrounded by a great
multitude of people and a strong guard of soldiers. After a short delay the
proconsul appeared. “Art thou Thascius Cyprian, the bishop of so many
impious men?” said the proconsul. “I am,” answered Cyprian. “The most
sacred Emperor commands thee to sacrifice.” “I do not sacrifice,” he
replied. “Consider well,” rejoined the proconsul. “Execute thy orders,”
answered Cyprian, “the case admits of no consideration.”
The governor consulted with his council, and then delivered his sentence.
“Thascius Cyprian, thou hast lived long in thy impiety, and assembled
around thee many men involved in the same wicked conspiracy. Thou hast
shown thyself an enemy alike to the gods and to the laws of the empire;
the pious and sacred emperors have in vain endea-voured to recall thee to
the worship of thy ancestors. Since then thou hast been the chief author
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and leader of these guilty practices, thou shalt be an example to those
whom thou hast deluded to thy unlawful assemblies. Thou must expiate
thy crime with thy blood.” “God be praised!” answered Cyprian; and the
crowd of his brethren exclaimed, “Let us too be martyred with him.” The
bishop was carried into a neighboring field and beheaded. It was
remarkable that but a few days afterwards the proconsul died. And the
Emperor Valerian, the following year, was defeated and taken prisoner by
the Persians, who treated him with great and contemptuous cruelty — a
calamity and disgrace without example in the annals of Rome.
The miserable death of many of the persecutors made a great impression
on the public mind, and forced on many the conviction that the enemies of
Christianity were the enemies of heaven. For about forty years after this
outrage, the peace and prosperity of the church were not seriously
interrupted; so that we may pass over these years for the present, and
come to the final contest between paganism and Christianity.

THE GENERAL STATE OF CHRISTIANITY

Before attempting a brief account of the persecution under Diocletian, it
may be well to review the history and condition of the church as the final
struggle drew near. But in order to form a correct judgment of the progress
and state of Christianity at the end of three hundred years, we must
consider the power of the enemies with which it had to contend.
1. Judaism. We have seen at some length, and especially in the life of St.
Paul, that Judaism was the first great enemy of Christianity. It had to
contend from its infancy with the strong prejudices of the believing, and
with the bitter malice of the unbelieving, Jews. In its native region, and
wherever it traveled, it was pursued by its unrelenting foe. And after the
death of the apostles the church suffered much from yielding to Jewish
pressure, and ultimately remodelling Christianity on the system of
Judaism. The new wine was put into old bottles.
2. Orientalism. Towards the close of the first and the beginning of the
second century, Christianity had to wend its way through the many and
conflicting elements of eastern philosophy. Its first conflict was with
Simon Magus, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. Though a
Samaritan by birth, he is supposed to have studied the various religions of
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the East at Alexandria. On returning to his native country, he advanced
very high pretensions to superior knowledge and power; and bewitched
the people of Samaria, giving out that himself was some great one: to
whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, “This man
is the great power of God.” From this notice of Simon we may learn what
influence such men had over the minds of the ignorant and the
superstitious, and also what a dreadful power of Satan the early church
had to contend with in these evil workers. He assumed not merely the
lofty title of “the great power of God,” but that he combined in himself
the other perfections of Deity. He is spoken of by writers generally as the
head and father of the whole host of impostors and heretics.
After being so openly and shamefully defeated by Peter, he is said to have
left Samaria, and traveled through various countries, choosing especially
those which the gospel had not reached. From this time he introduced the
name of Christ into his system, and thus endeavored to confound the
gospel with his blasphemies, and confuse the minds of the people. As to
his miracle and magic working, his marvellous theories about his own
descent from heaven, and other emanations, we say nothing, only that
they proved, especially in the East, a mighty hindrance to the progress of
the gospel.
The successors of Simon, such as Cerinthus and Valentinus, so
systematised his theories as to become the founders of that form of
gnosticism with which the church had to contend in the second century.
The name implies pretensions to some superior knowledge. It is generally
thought that St. Paul refers to this meaning of the word when warning his
son Timothy against “science,” or knowledge, “falsely so called.”
Although it would be out of place in these “Short Papers” to attempt
anything like an outline of this wide-spread orientalism or gnosticism,
yet we must give our readers some idea of what it was. It proved for a
time the most formidable opponent of Christianity. But as the facts and
doctrines of the gospel prevailed, gnosticism declined.
Under the head of the gnostics may be included all those in the first ages of
the church who incorporated into their philosophical systems the most
obvious and suitable doctrines of both Judaism and Christianity. Thus
gnosticism became a mixture of oriental philosophy, Judaism, and
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Christianity. By means of this Satanic confusion the beautiful simplicity
of the gospel was destroyed, and for a long time, in many places, its real
character was obscured. It was a deep-laid plan and a mighty effort of the
enemy, not only to corrupt, but to undermine and subvert, the gospel
altogether. No sooner had Christianity appeared than the gnostics began to
adopt into their systems some of its sublimest doctrines. Judaism was
deeply tinged with it before the christian era, probably from the captivity.
But gnosticism, we must remember, was not a corruption of Christianity,
though the whole school of gnostics are called heretics by ecclesiastical
writers. As to its origin, we must go back to the many religions of the
East, such as Chaldean, Persian, Egyptian, and others. In our own day
such philosophers would be viewed as infidels and utter aliens from the
gospel of Christ; but in early times the title heretic was given to all who in
any way whatever introduced the name of Christ into their philosophical
systems. Hence it has been said, “If Mahomet had appeared in the second
century, Justin Martyr or Irenaeus would have spoken of him as a
heretic.” At the same time we must own that the principles of the Greek
philosophy, especially the Platonic, forced their way at a very early
period into the church, corrupted the pure stream of truth, and threatened
for a time to change the design and the effects of the gospel upon mankind.
Origen, who was born at Alexandria — the cradle of gnosticism — about
the year 185, was the Father who gave form and completeness to the
Alexandrian method of interpreting scripture. He distinguished in it a
threefold sense — the literal, the moral, and the mystical — answering
respectively to the body, soul, and spirit in man. The literal sense, he held,
might be understood by any attentive reader; the moral required higher
intelligence; the mystical was only to be apprehended through the grace of
the Holy Spirit, which was to be obtained by prayer.
It was the great object of this eminent teacher to harmonize Christianity
with philosophy; this was the leaven of the Alexandrian school. He sought
to gather up the fragments of truth scattered throughout other systems,
and unite them in a christian scheme, so as to present the gospel in a form
that would not offend the prejudices, but insure the conversion, of Jews,
gnostics, and of cultivated heathen. These principles of interpretation, and
this combination of Christianity with philosophy, led Origen and his
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followers into many grave and serious errors, both practical and doctrinal.
He was a devoted, earnest, zealous Christian himself, and truly loved the
Lord Jesus; but the tendency of his principles has been, from that day to
this, to weaken faith in the definite character of truth, if not to pervert it
altogether by means of spiritualizing and allegorizing, which his system
taught and allowed.
The Malignity of Matter was a first principle in all the sects of the
gnostics; it pervaded all the religious systems of the East. This led to the
wildest theories as to the formation and character of the material universe,
and all corporeal substances. Thus it was, that persons believing their
bodies to be intrinsically evil, recommended abstinence and severe bodily
mortifications, in order that the mind or spirit, which was viewed as pure
and divine, might enjoy greater liberty, and be able the better to
contemplate heavenly things. Without saying more on this subject —
which we do not much enjoy — the reader will see that the celibacy of the
clergy in later years, and the whole system of asceticism and monasticism,
had their origin, not in the scriptures, but in oriental philosophy.2
Paganism. Not only had the church to contend with Judaism and
Orientalism, it also suffered from the outward hostility of Paganism.
These were the three formidable powers of Satan with which he assailed
the church during the first three hundred years of her history. In carrying
out her Lord’s high commission — “Teach all nations”... “preach the
gospel to every creature” — she had these enemies to face and overcome.
But these could not have hindered her course, had she only walked in
separation from the world, and remained true and faithful to her heavenly
and exalted Savior. But alas! alas! what Judaism, Orientalism, and
Paganism could not do, the allurements of the world accomplished. And
this leads us to a close survey of the condition of the church when the
great persecution broke out.

A SURVEY OF THE CONDITION OF THE CHURCH A.D. 303

Diocletian ascended the throne in 284. In 286 he associated with himself
Maximian, as Augustus; and in 292 Galerius and Constantius were added
to the number of the princes, with the inferior title of Caesar. Thus, when
the fourth century began, the Roman empire had four sovereigns. Two
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bore the title of Augustus; and two, the title of Caesar. Diocletian, though
superstitious, indulged no hatred towards Christians. Constantius, the
father of Constantine the Great, was friendly to them. At first the face of
christian affairs looked tolerably bright and happy; but the pagan priests
were angry, and plotting mischief against the Christians. They saw in the
widespreading triumphs of Christianity their own downfall. For fully fifty
years the church had been very little disturbed by the secular power.
During this period Christians had attained an unexampled degree of
prosperity; but it was only outward: they had deeply declined from the
purity and simplicity of the gospel of Christ.
Churches had arisen in most of the cities of the empire, and with some
display of architectural splendor. Vestments and sacred vessels of silver
and gold began to be used. Converts flocked in from all ranks of society;
even the wife of the Emperor, and his daughter Valeria, married to
Galerius, appear to have been among the number. Christians held high
offices in the state, and in the imperial household. They occupied
positions of distinction, and even of supreme authority, in the provinces
and in the army. But alas! this long period of outward prosperity had
produced its usual consequences. Faith and love decayed; pride and
ambition crept in. Priestly domination began to exercise its usurped
powers, and the bishop to assume the language and the authority of the
vicegerent of God. Jealousies and dissensions distracted the peaceful
communities, and disputes sometimes proceeded to open violence. The
peace of fifty years had corrupted the whole christian atmosphere: the
lightning of Diocletian’s rage was permitted of God to refine and purify it.
Such is the melancholy confession of the Christians themselves, who,
according to the spirit of the times, considered the dangers and the
afflictions to which they were exposed in the light of divine judgments.3

THE ACTS OF DIOCLETIAN AND THE CLOSE

OF THE SMYRNEAN PERIOD
Already the church has passed through nine systematic persecutions. The
first was under Nero, then Domitian, Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, Severus,
Maximin, Decius, Valerian, Aurelian. And now the fearful moment has
arrived when she must undergo the Tenth, according to the prophetic
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word of the Lord: “Ye shall have tribulation Ten days.” And it is not a
little remarkable that not only should there be exactly ten government
persecutions, but that the last should have continued exactly Ten years.
And, as we saw at an earlier part of the Smyrnean period, exactly Ten
years elapsed from the beginning of the persecution, under Aurelius, in the
East, till its close in the West. The christian student may trace other
features of resemblance: we would rather suggest such features than press
their acceptance upon others, though we surely believe they are
foreshadowed in the Epistle to Smyrna.
The reign of Diocletian is one of great historical importance. First, it was
rendered conspicuous by the introduction of a new system of imperial
government. He virtually removed the capital from ancient Rome to
Nicomedia, which he made the seat of his residence. There he maintained a
court of eastern splendor, to which he invited men of learning and
philosophy. But the philosophers who frequented his court, being all
animated with extreme hatred against Christianity, used their influence
with the Emperor to exterminate a religion too pure to suit their polluted
minds. This led to the last and greatest persecution of the Christians. It is
only with the latter we have to do. And as all histories of this period are
gathered chiefly from the records of Eusebius and Lactantius, who wrote
at this time, and witnessed many executions, we can do little more than
select and transcribe from what has been already written, consulting the
various authors already named.
The pagan priests and philosophers above referred to, not succeeding well
in their artifices with Diocletian to make war against the Christians, made
use of the other Emperor, Galerius, his son-in-law, to accomplish their
purpose. This cruel man, impelled partly by his own inclination, partly by
his mother, a most superstitious pagan, and partly by the priests, gave his
father-in-law no rest until he had gained his point.
During the winter of the year 302-303 Galerius paid a visit to Diocletian
at Nicomedia. His great object was to excite the old Emperor against the
Christians. Diocletian for a time withstood his importunity. He was
averse, from whatever motive, to the sanguinary measures proposed by
his partner. But the mother of Galerius, the implacable enemy of the
Christians, employed all her influence over her son to inflame his mind to
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immediate and active hostilities. Diocletian at length gave way, and a
persecution was agreed to: but the lives of the Christians were to be
spared. Previously to this, Galeflus had taken care to remove from the
army all who refused to sacrifice. Some were discharged, and some were
sentenced to death.

THE FIRST EDICT

About the 24th of February the first edict was issued. It ordained that all
who refused to sacrifice should lose their offices, their property, their
rank, and civil privileges; that slaves persisting in the profession of the
gospel should be excluded from the hope of liberty; that Christians of all
ranks should be destroyed; that religious meetings should be suppressed;
and that the scriptures should be burnt. The attempt to exterminate the
scriptures was a new feature in this persecution, and, no doubt, was
suggested by the philosophers who frequented the palace. They were well
aware that their own writings would have but little hold on the public
mind if the scriptures and other sacred books were circulated. Immediately
these measures were resolved upon, the church of Nicomedia was
attacked, the sacred books were burnt, and the building entirely
demolished in a few hours. Throughout the empire the churches of the
Christians were to be levelled to the ground, and the sacred books were to
be delivered to the imperial officers. Many Christians who refused to give
up the scriptures were put to death, while those who gave them up to be
burnt were considered by the church as traitors to Christ, and afterwards
caused great trouble in the exercise of discipline towards them.4
No sooner had this cruel edict been affixed in the accustomed place than a
Christian of noble rank tore it down. His indignation at injustice so flagrant
hurried him into an act of inconsiderate zeal — into a violation of that
precept of the gospel which enjoins respect towards all in authority.
Welcome was the occasion thus furnished to condemn a Christian of high
station to death. He was burnt alive at a slow fire, and bore his sufferings
with a dignified composure which astonished and mortified his
executioners. The persecution was now begun. The first step against the
Christians having been taken, the second did not linger.
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Not long after the publication of the edict, a fire broke out in the palace of
Nicomedia, which spread almost to the chamber of the Emperor. The
origin of the fire appears to be unknown; but, of course, the guilt was
charged on the Christians. Diocletian believed it. He was alarmed and
incensed. Multitudes were thrown into prison, without discrimination of
those who were or were not liable to suspicion, the most cruel tortures
were resorted to for the purpose of extorting a confession; but in vain.
Many were burnt to death, beheaded and drowned. About fourteen days
after, a second fire broke out in the palace. It now became evident that it
was the work of an incendiary. The heathen again accused the Christians,
and loudly cried for vengeance; but as no proof could ever be found that
the Christians had any hand in any way with these fatal conflagrations, a
strong, and, we believe, truthful suspicion rested on the Emperor Galerius
himself. His great object from the first was to criminate the Christians, and
alarm Diocletian by his own more violent measures. As if fully aware of
the effect of these events on the dark, timid, and superstitious mind of the
old Emperor, he immediately left Nicomedia, pretending that he could not
consider his person safe within the city.
But the end was gained; and that to the utmost extent which even Galerius
or his pagan mother could have desired. Diocletian, now thoroughly
aroused, raged ferociously against all sorts of men and women who bore
the christian name. He compelled his wife Prisca, and his daughter Valeria,
to offer sacrifice. Officers of the household, of the highest rank and
nobility, and all the inmates of the palace, were exposed to the most cruel
tortures, by the order, and even in the presence, of Diocletian himself. The
names of some of his ministers of state have been handed down who
preferred the riches of Christ to all the grandeur of his palace. One of the
chamberlains was brought before the Emperor and was tortured with great
severity, because he refused to sacrifice. As if to make an example of him
to the others, a mixture of salt and vinegar was poured on his open
wounds, but it was all to no purpose. He confessed his faith in Christ as
the only Savior, and would own no other God. He was then gradually
burnt to death. Dorotheus, Gorgonius, and Andreas, eunuchs who served
in the palace, were put to death. Anthimus, the bishop of Nicomedia, was
beheaded. Many were executed, many were burnt alive; but it became
tedious to destroy men singly, and large fires were made to burn many
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together; others were rowed into the midst of the lake, and thrown into the
water with stones fastened to their necks.
From Nicomedia, the center of the persecution, the imperial orders were
despatched, requiring the cooperation of the other emperors in the
restoration of the dignity of the ancient religion, and the entire suppression
of Christianity. Thus the persecution raged throughout the whole Roman
world, excepting Gaul. There the mild Constantius ruled, and, though he
made a show of concurring in the measure of his colleagues, by the
demolition of the churches, he abstained from all violence against the
persons of the Christians. Though not himself a decided Christian, he was
naturally humane, and evidently a friend to Christianity and its professors.
He presided over the government of Gaul, Britain, and Spain. But the
fierce temper of Maximian, and the savage cruelty of Galerius, only
awaited the signal to carry into affect the orders from Nicomedia. And
now the three monsters raged, in the full force of the civil power, against
the defenceless and unoffending followers of the meek and lowly Jesus,
the Prince of Peace.
“Grace begun shall end in glory;
Jesus, He the victory won;
In His own triumphant story
Is the record of our own,”

THE SECOND EDICT

Not long after the first edict had been carried into execution throughout the
empire, rumors of insurrections in Armenia and Syria, regions densely
peopled with Christians, reached the Emperor’s ears. These troubles were
falsely attributed to the Christians, and afforded a pretext for a second
edict. It was intimated that the clergy, as leaders of the Christians, were
particularly liable to suspicion on this occasion, and the edict directed that
all of the clerical order should be seized and thrown into prison. Thus in a
short time prisons were filled with bishops, presbyters, and deacons.

THE THIRD EDICT

A third edict was immediately issued prohibiting the liberation of any of
the clergy, unless they consented to offer sacrifice. They were declared
enemies of the State; and wherever a hostile prefect chose to exercise his
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boundless authority, they were crowded into prisons intended only for the
basest criminals. The edict provided that such of the prisoners as were
willing to offer sacrifice to the gods should be set free, and that the rest
should be compelled by tortures and punishments. Great multitudes of the
most devout, godly, and venerable in the church, either suffered capitally,
or were sent to the mines. The Emperor vainly thought, that if the bishops
and teachers were once overcome, the churches would soon follow their
example. But finding that the most humiliating defeat was the result of his
measures, he was goaded on by the united influence of Galerius, the
philosophers, and the pagan priesthood, to issue another and a still more
rigorous edict.

THE FOURTH EDICT

By a fourth edict the orders which applied only to the clergy were now to
be extended to the whole body of Christians. The magistrates were
directed to make free use of torture for forcing all Christians — men,
women, and children — into the worship of the gods. Diocletian and his
colleagues were now committed to the desperate but unequal contest. The
powers of darkness — the whole Roman empire — stood, armed,
determined, pledged, to the defense of ancient polytheism, and to the
complete extermination of the christian name. To retreat would be the
confession of weakness; to be successful the adversary must be
exterminated; as to victory there could be none, for the Christians made no
resistance. Historically, it was the final and fearful struggle between
paganism and Christianity; the contest was now at its height, and drawing
to a crisis.
Public proclamation was made through the streets of the cities, that men,
women, and children, were all to repair to the temples of the gods. All
must undergo the fiery ordeal — sacrifice or die. Every individual was
summoned by name from lists previously made out. At the city gates all
were subjected to rigid examination, and such as were found to be
Christians were immediately secured.
Details of the sufferings and martyrdoms that followed would fill volumes.
As edict followed edict, in rapid succession and in wrathful severity, the
spirit of martyrdom revived; it rose higher and higher, until men and
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women, in place of being seized and dragged to the funeral piles, leaped
into the burning flames, as if ascending to heaven in a chariot of fire. Whole
families were put to various kinds of death; some by fire, others by water,
after enduring severe tortures; some perished by famine, others by
crucifixion; and some were fastened with their heads downwards, and
preserved alive, that they might die a lingering death. In some places as
many as ten, twenty, sixty, and even a hundred men and women, with
their little ones, were martyred by various torments in one day.5
In almost every part of the Roman world such scenes of pitiless barbarity
continued with more or less severity for the long period of ten years.
Constantius alone, of all the emperors, contrived to shelter the Christians
in the west, especially in Gaul, where he resided. But in all other places
they were given up to all sorts of cruelties and injuries, without the liberty
to appeal to the authorities, and without the smallest protection from the
State. Free leave was given to the heathen populace to practice all sorts of
excesses against the Christians. Under these circumstances the reader may
easily imagine what they were constantly exposed to, both in their
persons and estates. Each one felt sure of never being called to account for
any violence he might be guilty of towards the Christians. But the
sufferings of the men, however great, seemed little compared with those of
the women. The fear of exposure and violence was more dreaded than mere
death.
Take one example. “A certain holy and devout female,” says Eusebius,
“admirable for her virtue, and illustrious above all in Antioch for her
wealth, family, and reputation, had educated her two daughters — now in
the bloom of life, noted for their beauty — in the principles of piety.
Their concealment was traced, and they were caught in the toils of the
soldiery. The mother, being at a loss for herself and her daughters,
knowing what was before them, suggested that it was better to die,
betaking themselves to the aid of Christ, than fall into the hands of the
brutal soldiers. After this, all agreeing to the same thing, and having
requested the guards for a little time, they cast themselves into the flowing
river, to escape a greater evil.” Although this act cannot be fully justified,
it must be judged with many considerations. They were driven to despair.
And sure we are that the Lord knows how to forgive all that is wrong in
the action, and to give us full credit for all that is right in our motives.
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For a moment the persecutors vainly imagined that they would triumph
over the downfall of Christianity. Pillars were raised, and medals were
struck, to the honor of Diocletian and Galerius, for having extinguished
the christian superstition, and for restoring the worship of the gods. But
He who sits in heaven was at that very moment overruling the very wrath
of these men for the complete deliverance and triumph of His people, and
the acknowledged defeat and downfall of their enemies. They could martyr
Christians, demolish churches, and burn books; but the living springs of
Christianity were beyond their reach.

THE HAND OF THE LORD IN JUDGMENT

Great and important changes began to take place in the sovereignty of the
empire. But the Head of the church watched over everything. He had
limited and defined the period of her sufferings, and neither the hosts of
hell, nor the legions of Rome, could extend these one hour. The enemies of
the Christians were smitten with the direst calamities. God appeared to be
making requisition for blood. Galerius, the real author of the persecution,
in the eighteenth year of his reign and the eighth of the persecution, lay
expiring of a most loathsome malady. Like Herod Agrippa and Philip II of
Spain, he was “eaten of worms.” Physicians were sought for, oracles were
consulted, but all in vain; the remedies applied only aggravated the
virulence of the disease. The whole palace was so infected from the nature
of his affliction, that he was deserted by all his friends. The agonies which
he suffered forced from him the cry for mercy, and also an earnest request
to the Christians to intercede for the suffering Emperor in their
supplications to their God.
From his dying bed he issued an edict, which, while it condescended to
apologise for the past severities against the Christians, under the specious
plea of regard for the public welfare and unity of the state, admitted to the
fullest extent the total failure of the severe measures for the suppression of
Christianity; and provided for the free and public exercise of the christian
religion. A few days after the promulgation of the edict Galerius expired.
For about six months the merciful orders of this edict were acted upon,
and great numbers were liberated from the prisons and the mines; but, alas!
bearing the marks of bodily torture only short of death. This brief
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cessation of the persecution showed at once its fearful character and
alarming extent.
But Maximin, who succeeded Galerius in the government of Asia, sought
to revive the pagan religion in all its original splendor, and the suppression
of Christianity, with renewed and relentless cruelty. He commanded that
all the officers of his government, from the highest to the lowest, both in
the civil and military service; that all free men and women, all slaves, and
even little children, should sacrifice, and even partake of what was offered
at heathen altars. All vegetables and provisions in the market were to be
sprinkled with the water or the wine which had been used in the sacrifices,
that the Christians might thus be forced into contact with idolatrous
offerings.
New tortures were invented, and fresh streams of christian blood flowed in
all the provinces of the Roman empire, with the exception of Gaul. But the
hand of the Lord was again laid heavily both on the empire and on the
Emperor. Every kind of calamity prevailed. Tyranny, war, pestilence, and
famine depopulated the Asiatic provinces. Throughout the dominions of
Maximin the summer rains did not fall; a famine desolated the whole East;
many opulent families were reduced to beggary, and others sold their
children as slaves. The famine produced its usual accompaniment,
pestilence. Boils broks out all over the bodies of those who were seized
with the malady, but especially about the eyes, so that multitudes became
helplessly and incurably blind. All hearts failed, and all who were able fled
from the infected houses; so that myriads were left to perish in a state of
absolute desertion. The Christians, moved by the love of God in their
hearts, now came forward to do the kind offices of humanity and mercy.
They attended the living, and decently buried the dead. Fear fell upon all
mankind. The heathen concluded their calamities to be the vengeance of
heaven for persecuting its favored people.
Maximin was alarmed, and endeavored, when too late, to retrace his steps.
He issued an edict, avowing the principles of toleration, and commanding
the suspension of all violent measures against the Christians, and
recommending only mild and persuasive means to win back these
apostates to the religion of their forefathers. Having been defeated in battle
by Licinius, he turned his rage against the pagan priests. He charged them
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with having deceived him with false hopes of victory over Licinius, and of
universal empire in the East, and now revenged his disappointment by a
promiscuous massacre of all the pagan priests within his power. His last
imperial act was the promulgation of another edict, still more favorable to
the Christians, in which he proclaimed an unrestricted liberty of
conscience, and restored the confiscated property of their churches. But
death came and closed the dark catalogue of his crimes, and the dark line of
persecuting emperors, who died of the most excruciating torments, and
under the visible hand of divine judgment. Many names, of great celebrity
both for station and character, are among the martyrs of this period; and
many thousands, unknown and unnoticed on earth, but whose record is on
high, and whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
Thus closed the most memorable of all the attacks of the powers of
darkness on the christian church, and thus closed the last hope of
paganism to maintain itself by the authority of the government. The
account of the most violent, most varied, most prolonged, and most
systematic attempt to exterminate the gospel ever known, well deserves
the space we have given to it, so that we offer no apology for its length.
We have seen the arm of the Lord lifted up in a gracious but solemn
manner to chastise and purify His church, to demonstrate the imperishable
truth of Christianity, and to cover with everlasting shame and confusion
her daring but impotent foes. Like Moses, we may exclaim, “Behold, the
bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I
will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.
And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him
out of the midst of the bush.” Thus we see why the bush was not burned,
or Israel in Egypt not consumed, or the church in this world not
exterminated: God was in the midst of the bush — He is in the midst of
His church — it is the habitation of God through the Spirit. Besides,
Christ hath plainly said, referring to Himself in His risen power and glory,
“Upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall
not prevail against it.” (Exodus 3; Matthew 16.)
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CHAPTER 10
CONSTANTINE

The reign of Constantine the Great forms a most important epoch in the
history of the church. Both his father Constantius and his mother Helena
were religiously inclined, and always favorable to the Christians. Some
years of Constantine’s youth were spent at the court of Diocletian and
Galerius, in the character of a hostage. He witnessed the publication of the
persecuting edict at Nicomedia in 303, and the horrors which followed.
Having effected his escape, he joined his father in Britain. In 306
Constantius died at York. He had nominated as his successor his son
Constantine, who was accordingly saluted Augustus by the army. He
continued and extended the toleration which his father had bestowed on
the Christians.
There were now six pretenders to the sovereignty of the empire-
Galerius, Licinius, Maximian, Maxentius, Maximin, and Constantine. A
scene of contention followed, scarcely paralleled in the annals of Rome.
Among these rivals, Constantine possessed a decided superiority in
prudence and abilities, both military and political. In the year 312
Constantine entered Rome victorious. In 313 a new edict was issued, by
which the persecuting edicts of Diocletian were repealed, the Christians
encouraged, their teachers honored, and the professors of Christianity
advanced to places of trust and influence in the state. This great change in
the history of the church introduces us to

THE PERGAMOS PERIOD A.D. 313-606

The Epistle to the church in Pergamos exactly describes, we believe, the
state of things in Constantine’s time. But we will quote the address entire
for the convenience of our readers, and then compare it:
“And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write; These things
saith he which hath the sharp sword with two edges; I know thy
works, and where thou dwellest, even where Satan’s seat is: and
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thou holdest fast My name, and hast not denied My faith, even in
those days wherein Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was
slain among you, where Satan dwelleth. But I have a few things
against thee, because thou hast there them that hold the doctrine
of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumbling-block before the
children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed unto idols, and to commit
fornication. So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the
Nicolaitanes, which thing I hate. Repent; or else I will come unto
thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of my
mouth. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto
the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the
hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a
new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth
it.” (Revelation 2:12-17.)
In Ephesus we see the first point of departure, leaving their “first love” —
the heart slipping away from Christ, and from the enjoyment of His love.
In Smyrna the Lord allowed the saints to be cast into the furnace, that the
progress of declension might be stayed. They were persecuted by the
heathen. By means of these trials Christianity revived; the gold was
purified; the saints held fast the name and the faith of Christ. Thus was
Satan defeated; and the Lord so ruled that the emperors, one after the
other, in the most humiliating and mortifying circumstances, publicly
confessed their defeat. But in Pergamos the enemy changes his tactics. In
place of persecution from without, there is seduction from within. Under
Diocletian he was the roaring lion; under Constantine he is the
deceiving serpent. Pergamos is the scene of Satan’s flattering power; he
is within the church. Nicolaitanism is the corruption of grace — the flesh
acting in the church of God. In Smyrna he is outside as an adversary, in
Pergamos he is inside as a seducer. This was exactly what took place under
Constantine.
Historically, it was when the violence of persecution had spent itself —
when men had grown weary of their own rage, and when they saw that
their efforts were to no purpose — that the sufferers ceased to care for the
things of the world, and became more devoted to Christianity; while even
the numbers of the Christians seemed to increase; Satan tries another and
an old artifice, once so successful against Israel. (Numbers 25.) When he
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could not obtain the Lord’s permission to curse His people Israel, he
allured them to their ruin, by unlawful alliances with the daughters of
Moab. As a false prophet he was now in the church at Pergamos, seducing
the saints into unlawful alliance with the world — the place of his throne
and authority. The world ceases to persecute; great advantages are held out
to Christians by the civil establishment of Christianity; Constantine
professes to be converted, and ascribes his triumphs to the virtues of the
cross. The snare alas! is successful; the church is flattered by his
patronage, shakes hands with the world, and sinks into its position “even
where Satan’s seat is.” All was now lost as to her corporate and proper
testimony, and the way to popery laid open. Every worldly advantage
was no doubt gained; but alas! alas! it was at the cost of the honor and
glory of her heavenly Lord and Savior.
The church, we must remember, is an outcalling (Acts 15:14) — called out
from Jew and Gentile to witness that she was not of this world, but of
heaven — that she is united to a glorified Christ, and not of this world,
even as He is not of this world. So He says Himself,
“They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify
them through Thy truth: Thy word is truth. As Thou hast sent Me into
the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.” (John 17.)
The Christian’s mission is on the same principle and of the same character
as was Christ’s. “As My Father hath sent Me,” He says, “even so send I
you.” They were sent, as it were, from heaven to the world by the blessed
Lord, to do His will, to care for His glory, and to return home when their
work was done. Thus the Christian should be the heavenly witness of the
truth of God, especially of such truths as man’s total ruin, and God’s love
in Christ to a perishing world; and thereby should seek to gather souls out
of the world, that they may be saved from the wrath to come. But when
we lose sight of our high calling, and associate with the world as if we
belonged to it, we become false witnesses; we do the world a great injury,
and Christ a great dishonor. This, we shall see by-and-by, was what the
church did as to her corporate position and action. Doubtless there were
many cases of individual faithfulness in the midst of the general
declension. The Lord Himself speaks of His faithful Antipas who was
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martyred. Heaven takes special notice of individual faithfulness, and
remembers the faithful by name.
But the eye and the heart of the Lord had followed His poor faithless
church to where she had fallen. “I know thy works,” He says, “and where
thou dwellest, even where Satan’s seat is.” What solemn words are these,
and from the lips of her dishonored Lord! Nothing was hidden from His
eye. I know, He says; I have seen what has happened. But what alas! had
now taken place? Why, the church as a body had accepted the Emperor’s
terms, was now united to the State, and was dwelling in the world. This
was Babylon spiritually — committing fornication with the kings of the
earth. But He who walks in the midst of the golden candlesticks judges her
action and her condition. “And to the angel of the church in Pergamos
write, These things saith He which hath the sharp sword with two edges.”
He takes the place of one who was armed with the divine sword — with
the all-searching, piercing, power of the word of God. The sword is the
symbol of that by which questions are settled; whether it be the carnal
sword of the nations of “the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of
God.”
It has been often said, that there is always a marked and instructive
connection between the way in which Christ presents Himself, and the
state of the church which He is addressing. This is most true in the present
address. The word of God evidently had lost its right place in the
assembly of His saints; it was no longer the supreme authority in divine
things. But the Lord Jesus takes care to show that it had not lost its
power, or place, or authority in His hands. “Repent;” He says, “or else I
will come unto thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of
My mouth.” He does not say, observe, I will fight against thee, but against
them. As exercising discipline in the church the Lord acts with
discrimination and with mercy. The public position of the church was now
a false one. There was open association with the prince of this world, in
place of faithfulness to Christ, the Prince of heaven. But he that had an ear
to hear what the Spirit said unto the church, had secret fellowship with
Him who sustains the faithful soul with the hidden manna.
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“To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna,
and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name
written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.”
The general defection would, no doubt, isolate the faithful few — a
remnant. To them the promise is given.
The manna, as we learn from John 6, represents Christ Himself, as He
came down from heaven to give life to our souls. “I am the living bread
which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live
for ever.” As the lowly One who took the place of humiliation in this
world, He is our provision for the daily walk through the wilderness. The
manna was to be gathered daily, fresh from the dewdrops every morning.
The “hidden manna” refers to the golden pot of manna that was laid up
in the ark as a memorial before the Lord. It is the blessed remembrance of
Christ, who was the humbled, suffering Man in this world, and who is the
eternal delight of God, and of the faithful in heaven. Not only has the true-
hearted saint communion with Christ as exalted on high, but with Him as
the once humbled Jesus here below. But this cannot be if we are listening
to the flatteries and accepting the favors of the world. Our only strength
against the spirit of the world is walking with a rejected Christ, and feeding
on Him as our portion even now. Our high privilege is to eat, not of the
manna only, but of the “hidden manna.” But who can speak of the
blessedness of such communion, or of the loss of those who slip away in
heart from Christ, and settle down in worldliness?
The “white stone” is a secret mark of the Lord’s special favor. As the
promise is given in the address to Pergamos, it may mean the expression of
Christ’s approval of the way the “overcomers” witnessed and suffered
for Him, when so many were led away by the seductions of Satan. It gives
the general idea of a secret pledge of entire approbation. But it is difficult
to explain. The heart may enter into its blessedness, and yet feel unable to
describe it. Happy they who so know it for themselves. There are joys
which are common to all; but there is a joy, a special joy, which will be our
own peculiar joy in Christ, and that for ever. This will be true of all. “And
in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that
receiveth it.” What an unknown source of calm repose, sweet peace, true
contentment, and divine strength, we find in the “white stone,” and in the
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“new name,” written by His own hand. Others may misunderstand us,
many may think us wrong; but He knows all, and the heart can afford to
be quiet, whatever may be passing around. At the same time we must
judge everything by the word of God — the sharp sword with two edges
— even as we ourselves are judged.
“There on the hidden bread
Of Christ — once humbled here —
God’s treasured store — for ever fed,
His love my soul shall cheer.
Called by that secret name
Of undisclosed delight —
Blest answer to reproach and shame —
Graved on the stone of white.”

Having thus briefly glanced at the Epistle to Pergamos, we shall be better

able to understand the mind of the Lord as to the conduct of Christians
under the reign of Constantine. The professing church and the world had
joined hands, and were now enjoying themselves together. As the world
could not rise to the high level of the church, she must fall to the low level
of the world. This was exactly what took place. Nevertheless the fair form
of Christianity was maintained, and there were doubtless many who held
fast the faith and the name of Jesus. We now return to the conversion and
history of Constantine the Great.

THE CONVERSION OF CONSTANTINE A.D. 312

The great event in the religious history of Constantine took place in 312.
He was marching from France to Italy against Maxentius. The
approaching contest was one of immense moment. It was likely either to
be his ruin or to raise him to the highest pinnacle of power. He was in
deep thought. It was known that Maxentius was making great
preparations for the struggle, by enlarging his army, and by scrupulously
attending to all the customary ceremonies of paganism. He consulted with
great pains the heathen oracles, and relied for success on the agency of
supernatural powers.
Constantine, though a wise and virtuous heathen, was a heathen still. He
knew what he had to give battle to; and while considering to what god he
should betake himself for protection and success, he thought on the ways
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of his father, the Emperor of the West. He remembered that he prayed to
the God of the Christians and had always been prosperous, while the
emperors who persecuted the Christians had been visited with divine
justice. He resolved therefore to forsake the service of idols, and to ask the
aid of the one true God in heaven. He prayed that God would make
Himself known to him, and that He would make him victorious over
Maxentius, notwithstanding all his magical arts and superstitious rites.
While engaged in such thoughts, Constantine imagined that he saw, soon
after mid-day, some extra-ordinary appearance in the heavens. It assumed
the sign of a glittering cross, and above it the inscription, “By This
Conquer.” The Emperor and the whole army, who were witnesses of this
wonderful sight, stood awestruck. But while the Emperor was gravely
meditating on what the vision could signify, night came on, and he fell
asleep. He dreamed that the Savior appeared to him, bearing in His hand
the same sign which he had seen in the heavens, and directed him to cause
a banner to be made after the same pattern, and to use it as his standard in
war, assuring him that while he did so he would be victorious.
Constantine, on awakening, described what had been shown to him while
asleep, and resolved to adopt the sign of the cross as his imperial standard.

THE BANNER OF THE CROSS

According to Eusebius, the workers in gold and precious stones were
immediately sent for, and received their orders from the lips of
Constantine. Eusebius had seen the standard, and gives a long account of
it. As the greatest interest has been thrown around this relic of antiquity
by all ecclesiastical writers, we will give our readers a brief but minute
sketch of it.
The shaft, or perpendicular beam, was long, and overlaid with gold. On its
top was a crown, composed of gold and precious stones, with the
engraving of the sacred symbol of the cross and the first letters of the
Savior’s name, or the Greek letter X intersected with the letter P. 1 Just
under this crown was a likeness of the Emperor in gold, and below that a
cross-piece of wood, from which hung a square flag of purple cloth,
embroidered and covered with precious stones. It was called the Labarum.
This resplendent standard was borne at the head of the imperial armies,
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and guarded by fifty chosen men, who were supposed to be invulnerable
from its virtues.
Constantine now sent for christian teachers, of whom he inquired
concerning the God that appeared to him, and the import of the symbol of
the cross. This gave them an opportunity of directing his mind to the word
of God, and of instructing him in the knowledge of Jesus and of His death
on the cross. From that time the Emperor declared himself a convert to
Christianity. The superstitious hopes and confidence of Constantine and
his army were now raised to the highest pitch. The decisive battle was
fought at the Milvian bridge. Constantine gained a signal victory over his
enemy, though his troops did not number one-fourth of the troops of
Maxentius.

THE EDICT OF CONSTANTINE AND LICINIUS A.D. 313

The victorious Emperor paid a short visit to Rome. Amongst other things
which he did, he caused to be erected in the forum a statue of himself,
holding in his right hand a standard in the shape of a cross, with the
following inscription: “By this salutary sign, the true symbol of valor, I
freed your city from the yoke of the tyrant.” Maxentius was found in the
Tiber the morning after the battle. The Emperor evidently felt that he was
indebted to the God of the Christians and to the sacred symbol of the
cross for his victories. And this, we dare say, was the extent of his
Christianity at that time. As a man he had not felt his need of it, if ever he
did; as a warrior he embraced it earnestly. Afterwards, as a statesman, he
owned and valued Christianity; but God only knows whether as a lost
sinner he ever embraced the Savior. It is difficult for princes to be
Christians.
Constantine now proceeded towards Illyricum to meet Licinius, with
whom he had formed a secret alliance before going to meet Maxentius. The
two emperors met at Milan, where their alliance was ratified by the
marriage of Licinius to Constantine’s daughter. It was during this quiet
moment that Constantine prevailed upon Licinius to consent to the repeal
of the persecuting edicts of Diocletian, and the issuing of a new edict of
complete toleration. This being agreed upon, a public edict, in the joint
names of Constantine and Licinius, was issued at Milan, A .D . 313, in
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favor of the Christians, and may be considered as the great charter of their
liberties. Full and unlimited toleration was granted to them; their churches
and property were restored without compensation; and, outwardly,
Christianity flourished.
But peace between the emperors, which seemed to be established on a firm
foundation, was soon interrupted. Jealousy, love of power, and ambition
for absolute sovereignty in the Roman empire, would not allow them to
remain long in peace. A war broke out in the year 314, but Licinius was
defeated with heavy losses, both in men and territory. A peace was again
concluded, which lasted about nine years. Another war became
unavoidable, and once more it assumed the form of a religious strife
between the rival emperors. Licinius attached the pagan priesthood to his
cause, and persecuted the Christians. Many of the bishops he put to
death, knowing they were special favourites at the court of his rival. Both
parties now made preparations for a contest, the issue of which should be
final. Licinius, before proceeding to war, sacrificed to the gods, and
extolled them in a public oration. Constantine, on the other hand, relied
upon the God whose symbol accompanied his army. The two hostile
armies met. The battle was fierce, obstinate, and sanguinary. Licinius was
no mean rival; but the commanding genius, activity, and courage of
Constantine prevailed. The victory was complete. Licinius survived his
defeat only about a year. He died, or rather was privately killed, in 326.
Constantine had now reached the height of his ambition. He was sole
master — absolute sovereign of the Roman empire, and continued so until
his death in 337. For a description of the political and military career of
this great prince we must refer the reader to civil history; we will briefly
glance at his religious course.

THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF CONSTANTINE

All that we know of the religion of Constantine up to the period of his
conversion, so-called, would imply that he was outwardly, if not
zealously, a pagan. Eusebius himself admits that he was at this time in
doubt which religion he would embrace. Policy, superstition, hypocrisy,
divine inspiration, have been in turn assigned as the sole or the
predominant influence, which decided his future religious history. But it
would surely be unjust to suppose that his profession of Christianity, and
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his public declarations in its favor, amounted to nothing more than
deliberate and intentional hypocrisy. Both his religious and ecclesiastical
course admit of a far higher and more natural explanation. Neither could we
believe that there was anything approaching to divine inspiration, either in
his midday vision or in his midnight dream. There may have been some
unusual appearance about the sun or in the clouds, which imagination
converted into a miraculous sign of the cross; and the other appearance
may have been the exaggeration of a dream from his highly excited state:
but the whole story may now be considered as a fable, full of flattery to
the great Emperor, and very gratifying to his great admirer and panegyrist,
Eusebius. Few will now be found to give it a place among the authentic
records of history.
Policy and superstition, we have no doubt, had a great deal to do with the
change that was wrought in the mind of Constantine. From his youth he
had witnessed the persecution of the Christians and must have observed a
vitality in their religion which rose above the power of their persecutors,
and survived the downfall of all other systems. He had seen one emperor
after another, who had been the open enemies of Christianity, die the most
fearful death. His father only — of all the emperors — the protector of
Christianity during the long persecution, had gone down to an honored and
peaceful grave. Facts so striking could not fail to influence the
superstitious mind of Constantine. Besides, he might appreciate with
political sagacity the moral influence of Christianity; its tendency to
enforce peaceful obedience to civil government; and the immense hold
which it obviously had on the mind of something like the one-half of his
empire.
The Emperor’s motives, however, are no part of our history, and need not
occupy us longer. But, in order to have this most important period or great
turning-point in church history clearly before our minds, it may be well to
look at the state of the church as he found it in 313, and as he left it in 337.

THE CHURCH AS CONSTANTINE FOUND HER

Up to this time the church had been perfectly free and independent of the
state. She had a divine constitution-direct from heaven — and outside the
world. She made her way, not by state patronage, but by divine power,
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against every hostile influence. In place of receiving support from the civil
government, she had been persecuted from the first as a foreign foe, as an
obstinate and pestilent superstition. Ten times the devil had been
permitted to stir up against her the whole Roman world, which ten times
had to confess weakness and defeat. Had she kept in mind the day of her
espousals, and the love of Him who says, “No man ever yet hated his own
flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church,” she
never would have accepted the protection of Constantine at the cost of her
fidelity to Christ. But the church as a whole was now much mixed up with
the world, and far away from her first love.
We have already seen, that since the days of the apostles there had been a
growing love of the world, and of outward display. This tendency, so
natural to us all, the Lord in love checked by allowing Satan to persecute.
But in place of the church accepting the trial as chastening from the hand
of the Lord, and owning her worldliness, she grew weary of the place and
path of rejection, and thinking she might still please and serve the Lord,
and walk in the sunshine of the world. This Satanic delusion was
accomplished by Constantine, though he knew not what he was doing.
“Whatever the motives of his conversion,” says Milman, “Constantine, no
doubt, adopted a wise and judicious policy, in securing the alliance, rather
than continuing the strife, with an adversary which divided the wealth, the
intellect, if not the property, and the population of the empire.”

THE UNION OF THE CHURCH AND STATE

In the month of March 313, the banns of the unholy alliance between the
Church and the State were published at Milan. The celebrated edict of that
date conferred on the Christians the fullest toleration, and led the way to
the legal establishment of Christianity, and to its ascendancy over all other
religions. This was publicly displayed on the new imperial standard —
the Labarum. Besides the initials of Christ,2 and the symbol of His cross,
there was also an image of the Emperor in gold. These signs, or mottoes,
were intended as objects of worship for both heathen and christian
soldiers, and to animate them to enthusiasm in the day of battle. Thus he
who is called the great christian Emperor publicly united Christianity to
idolatry.
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But if we have read the mind of Constantine aright, we should have no
hesitation in saying, that at this time he was a heathen in heart, and a
Christian only from military motives. It was only as a superstitious
soldier that he had embraced Christianity. At that moment he was ready to
welcome the assistance of any tutelar divinity in his struggles for universal
empire. We can see no trace of Christianity, far less any trace of the zeal
of a new convert: but we can easily trace the old superstition of
heathenism in the new dress of Christianity. Were it not for such
considerations, the Labarum would have been the display of the most
daring dishonor to the blessed Lord. But it was done in ignorance. He was
also anxious to meet the mind of his heathen soldiers and subjects, and to
dissipate their fears as to the safety of their old religion.
The earlier edicts of Constantine, though in their effects favorable to
Christianity, were given in such cautions terms as not to interfere with the
rights and liberties of paganism. But the Christians gradually grew in his
favor, and his acts of kindness and liberality spoke louder than edicts. He
not only restored to them the civil and religious rights of which they had
been deprived, the churches and estates which had been publicly
confiscated in the Diocletian persecution; but enabled them, by his own
munificent gifts, to build many new places for their assemblies. He
showed great favor to the bishops, and had them constantly about him in
the palace, on his journeys, and in his wars. He also showed his great
respect for the Christians, by committing the education of is son Crispus
to the celebrated Lactantius, a Christian. But with all this royal
patronage he assumed a supremacy over the affairs of the church. He
appeared in the synods of the bishops without his guards, mingled in their
debates, and controlled the settlement of religious questions. From this
time forward the term Catholic was invariably applied, in all official
documents, to the church.

CONSTANTINE AS HEAD OF THE CHURCH

AND HIGH PRIEST OF THE HEATHEN
After the total defeat of Licinius already referred to, the whole Roman
world was reunited under the scepter of Constantine. In his proclamation
issued to his new subjects in the East, he declares himself to be the
instrument of God for spreading the true faith; and that God had given him
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the victory over all the powers of darkness, in order that His own worship
by his means might be universally established. “Freedom,” he says, in a
letter to Eusebius, “being once more restored, and, by the providence of
the great God and my own ministry, that dragon driven from the
ministration of the State, I trust that the divine power has become
manifest to all, and that they, who through fear or unbelief have fallen into
many crimes, will come to the knowledge of the true God, and to the right
and true ordering of their lives.” Constantine now took his place more
openly to the whole world as the head of the church; but at the same time
retained the office of the Pontifex Maximus — the high priest of the
heathen; this he never gave up, and he died head of the church and high
priest of the heathen.
This unholy alliance, or unhallowed mixture of which we have spoken, and
which is referred to and mourned over in the address to Pergamos, meets
us at every step in the history of this great historical prince. But having
given some explanation of the address, we must leave the reader to
compare the truth and the history in a godly way. What a mercy to have
such a guide in studying this remarkable period in the history of the
church!
Among the first acts of the now sole Emperor of the world was the
repeal of all the edicts of Licinius against the Christians. He released
all prisoners from the dungeon or the mine, or the servile and humiliating
occupation to which they had been contemptuously condemned. All who
had been deprived of their rank in the army or in the civil service he
restored, and restitution was made for the property of which they had
been despoiled. He issued an edict addressed to all his subjects, advising
them to embrace the gospel, but pressed none; he wished it to be a matter
of conviction. He endeavored, however, to render it attractive by
bestowing places and honors on proselytes of the higher classes and
donations on the poor — a course which, as Eusebius acknowledges,
produced a great amount of hypocrisy and pretended conversion. He
ordered that churches should be everywhere built, of a size sufficient to
accommodate the whole population. He forbade the erection of statues of
the gods, and would not allow his own statue to be set up in the temples.
All state sacrifices were forbidden, and in many ways he exerted himself
for the elevation of Christianity and the suppression of heathenism.
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THE EFFECTS OF ROYAL FAVOR
We now come to the consideration of that which has been the great
historical problem to men of all creeds, nations and passions; namely,
whether the State which seeks to advance Christianity by the worldly
means at its command, or the earthly power which opposes it by legal
violence, does the greater injury to the church and people of God on the
earth? Much may be said, we admit, as to the great blessing of impartial
toleration, and of the great advantages to society of the legal suppression
of all wicked customs; but court favor has always been ruinous to the true
prosperity of the church of God. It is a great mercy to be unmolested, but
it is a greater mercy to be unpatronised by princes. The true character of
Christians is that of strangers and pilgrims in this world. The
possession of Christ, and of Christ in heaven, has changed everything on
earth to Christians. They belong to heaven, they are strangers on earth.
They are the servants of Christ in the world, though not of it. Heaven is
their home; here they have no continuing city. What has the church to
expect from a world that crucified her Lord? or rather, what would she
accept from it? Her true portion here is suffering and rejection; as the
apostle says, “For Thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are
accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” The Lord may spare His people,
but if trial should come, we are not to think that some strange thing has
happened to us. “In the world ye shall have tribulation.” (Romans 8:36;
John 16:33.)

THE WITNESS OF HISTORY

But even from history, we think it can be proved that it was better for
Christianity when Christians were suffering at the stake for Christ, than
when they were feasted in kings’ palaces and covered with royal favors.
By way of illustrating our question, we will give our readers a page from
the history of the great persecution under Diocletian, and one from the
brightest days of Constantine; and we will quote both from Milman, late
Dean of St. Paul’s, who will not be suspected of unfairness to the clergy.
We speak of the faithful only. It is well-known that in the later
persecutions, when the assemblies of Christians had greatly increased,
many proved unfaithful in the day of trial, though these were
comparatively few, and many of them afterwards repented.
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“The persecution had now lasted for six or seven years (309), but
in no part of the world did Christianity betray any signs of decay.
It was far too deeply rooted in the minds of men, far too
extensively promulgated, far too vigorously organized, not to
endure this violent but unavailing shock. If its public worship was
suspended, the believers met in secret, or cherished in the
unassailable privacy of the heart, the inalienable rights of
conscience. But of course the persecution fell most heavily upon
the most eminent of the body. Those who resisted to death were
animated by the presence of multitudes, who, if they dared not
applaud, could scarcely conceal their admiration. Women crowded
to kiss the hems of the martyrs’ garments, and their scattered
ashes, or unburied bones, were stolen away by the devout zeal of
their flocks.”
Under the edict issued from the dying bed of Galerius the persecution
ceased, and the Christians were permitted the free and public exercise of
their religion. This breathing-time lasted only a few months. But how
grand the sight which followed, and what a testimony to the truth and
power of Christianity! The Dean goes on to say:
“The cessation of the persecution showed at once its extent. The
prison doors were thrown open; the mines rendered up their
condemned laborers; everywhere long trains of Christians were
seen hastening to the ruins of their churches, and visiting the places
sanctified by their former devotions. The public roads, the streets,
and market places of the towns were crowded with long
processions singing psalms of thanksgiving for their deliverance.
Those who had maintained their faith under these severe trials
received the affectionate congratulations of their brethren; those
who had failed in the hour of affliction hastened to confess their
failure and seek for re-admission into the now joyous fold.”
We now turn to the altered state of things under Constantine, about
twenty years after the death of Galerius. Mark the mighty change in
the position of the clergy.
“The bishops appeared as regular attendants upon the court; the
internal dissensions of Christianity became affairs of state. The
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prelate ruled, not now so much by his admitted superiority in
christian virtue, as by the inalienable authority of his office. He
opened or closed the door of the church, which was tantamount to
an admission to or an exclusion from everlasting bliss; he uttered
the sentences of excommunication, which cast back the trembling
delinquent amongst the lost and perishing heathen. He had his
throne in the most distinguished part of the christian temple, and
though yet acting in the presence and in the name of his college of
presbyters, yet he was the acknowledged head of a large
community, over whose eternal destiny he held a vague but not
therefore less imposing and awful dominion.”3
Intellectual and philosophical questions took the place of the truth of the
gospel, and mere outward religion for faith, love, and heavenly-
mindedness. A crucified Savior, true conversion, justification by faith
alone, separation from the world, were subjects never known by
Constantine, and probably never introduced in his presence. “The
connection of the physical and moral world had become general topics;
they were, for the first time, the primary truths of a popular religion, and
naturally could not withdraw themselves from the alliance with popular
passions. Mankind, even within the sphere of Christianity, retrograded to
the sterner Jewish character; and in its spirit, as well as its language, the
Old Testament began to dominate over the gospel of Christ.”

THE TRUE CHARACTER OF THE CHURCH DISAPPEARS

However agreeable to mere nature the sunshine of the imperial favor might
be, it was destructive of the true character of the individual Christian and
of the church corporately. All testimony to a rejected Christ on earth, and
an exalted Christ in heaven was gone. It was the world baptised, in place
of believers only as dead and risen with Christ — as having died in His
death, and risen again in His resurrection. The word of God is plain: —
“Buried with Him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with Him
through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised Him
from the dead.” (Colossians 2:12.)
Baptism is here used as the sign both of death and resurrection. But to
whom was that solemn and sacred ordinance now administered? Again, we
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repeat, To the Roman world. Faith in Christ, the forgiveness of sins,
acceptance in the Beloved, were not looked for by the obsequious clergy.
The profession of Christianity being now the sure way to wealth and
honors, all ranks and classes applied for, baptism. At the Easter and
Pentecostal festivals, thousands, all clothed in the white garments of the
neophyte, crowded round the different churches, waiting to be baptized.
The numbers were so great, and the whole scene so striking, that many
thought these conspicuous neophytes must be the innumerable multitude
spoken of in the Revelation, who stood before the Lamb, clothed with
white robes. According to some writers, as many as twelve thousand men,
beside women and children, were baptised in one year in Rome; and a
white garment, with twenty pieces of gold, was promised by the Emperor
to every new convert of the poorer classes. Under these circumstances,
and by these venal means, the downfall of heathenism was accomplished,
and Christianity seated on the throne of the Roman world.

THE BAPTISM AND DEATH OF CONSTANTINE

The baptism of Constantine has given rise to almost as much
speculation as his conversion. Notwithstanding the great zeal he displayed
in favor of Christianity, he delayed his baptism, and consequently his
reception into the church, till the approach of death. Many motives, both
political and personal, have been suggested by different writers as reasons
for this delay; but the real one, we fear, was personal Superstition had by
this time taught men to connect the forgiveness of sins with the rite of
baptism. Under this dreadful delusion Constantine seems to have delayed
his baptism until he could no longer enjoy his imperial honors, and indulge
his passions in the pleasures of the world. It is impossible to conceive of
any papal indulgence more ruinous to the soul, more dishonoring to
Christianity, or more dangerous to every moral virtue. It was a licence for
such as Constantine to pursue the great objects of his ambition through the
darkest paths of blood and cruelty, as it placed in his hands the means of
an easy forgiveness, when convenient to himself. But on the other hand we
think it was a great mercy of the Lord, that one, whose private and
domestic life, as well as his public career, was so stained with blood,
should not have made a public profession of Christianity by receiving
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baptism and the Lord’s supper. Let us hope that he really repented on his
deathbed.
The bishops, whom he summoned in his last illness to the palace of
Nicomedia, heard his confession, were satisfied, and gave him their
blessing. Eusebius, bishop of Nicomedia, baptised him! He now
professed for the first time, that if God spared his life, he would join the
assembly of His people, and that, having worn the white garment of the
neophyte, he would never again wear the purple of the emperor. But these
resolutions were too late in coming: he died shortly after his baptism, in
the year 337.4
Helena, the Emperor’s mother, deserves a passing notice. She embraced
the religion professed by her son. Her devotion, piety, and munificence
were great. She traveled from place to place; visited the scenes which had
been hallowed by the chief events of scripture history; ordered the temple
of Venus to be demolished, which Hadrian had built on the site of the holy
sepulcher, and gave directions for a church to be built on the spot, which
should exceed all others in splendor. She died A .D . 328.
We have now seen, alas! too plainly, the sorrowful truth of the Lord’s
words, that the church was dwelling where Satan’s seat is. Constantine left
it there. He found it imprisoned in mines, dungeons, and catacombs, and
shut out from the light of heaven; he left it on the throne of the world. But
the picture is not yet complete; we must notice other features in the
history, answering to the likeness in the Epistle.
The reign of Constantine was marked, not only by the church being taken
out of her right place, through the deceptions of Satan, but by the bitter
fruits of that degrading change. The seeds of error, corruption, and
dissension sprang up rapidly, and now came publicly before the tribunals
of the world, and in some instances before the pagan world.

THE DONATISTIC AND ARIAN CONTROVERSIES

Two great controversies — the Donatistic and the Arian — had their
beginning in this reign: the former, arising in the West, from a disputed
appointment to the episcopal dignity at Carthage: the latter, of Eastern
origin, and involving the very foundations of Christianity. The latter was a
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question of doctrine, the former of practice. Both were now corrupted in
their very springs and essence, and may have been represented by the false
prophet and the Nicolaitanes; but more as to this afterwards. We will now
briefly notice the two schisms, as they throw light on the nature and
results of the union of church and State. The Emperor took part in the
councils of the bishops as head of the church.
On the death of Mensurius, bishop of Carthage, a council of neighboring
bishops was called to appoint his successor. The council was small —
through the management of Botrus and Celesius, two presbyters who
aspired to the office — but Caecilian, the deacon, who was much loved
by the congregation, was elected bishop. The two disappointed persons
protested against the election. Mensurius died when absent from Carthage
on a journey; but before leaving home he had entrusted some plate and
other property of the church to certain elders of the congregation, and had
left an inventory in the hands of a pious female. This was now delivered to
Caecilian, as he of course demanded the articles from the elders; but they
were unwilling to deliver them up, as they had supposed no one would
ever inquire for them, the old bishop being dead. They now joined the
party of Botrus and Celesius, in opposition to the new bishop. The
schism was also supported by the influence of Lucilla, a rich lady whom
Caecilian had formerly offended by a faithful reproof; and the whole
province assumed the right of interference.
Donatus, bishop of Cosae Nigrae, placed himself at the head of the
Carthaginian faction. Secundus, primate of Numidia, at the summons of
Donatus, appeared in Carthage at the head of seventy bishops. This self-
installed council cited Caecilian before them, alleging that he ought not to
have been consecrated except in their presence and by the primate of
Numidia; and inasmuch as he had been consecrated by a bishop who was a
Traditor,5 the council declared his election void. Caecilian refused to
acknowledge the authority of the council; but they proceeded to elect
Majorinus to the see, declared to be vacant by the excommunication of
Caecilian. But, unfortunately for the credit of the bishops, Majorinus was
a member of Lucilla’s household, who, to support the election, gave large
sums of money, which the bishops divided among themselves. A decided
schism was now formed, and many persons who before stood aloof from
Caecilian, returned to his communion.
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Some reports of these discords reached the ears of Constantine. He had
just become master of the West; and had sent a large sum of money for the
relief of the African churches. They had suffered greatly during the late
persecutions. But as the Donatists were considered sectaries, or
dissenters from the true Catholic church, he ordered that the gifts and
privileges conferred on the Christians by the late edicts should be confined
to those in communion with Cae-cilian. This led the Donatists to petition
the Emperor, desiring that their cause might be examined by the bishops of
Gaul, from whom it was supposed that impartiality might be expected.
Here for the first time we have an application to the civil power, to
appoint a Commission of Ecclesiastical Judges.
Constantine agreed: a council was held at Rome in 313, consisting of about
twenty bishops. The decision was in favor of Caecilian, who thereupon
proposed terms of reconciliation and reunion; but the Donatists disdained
all compromise. They prayed the Emperor for another hearing, declaring
that a synod of twenty bishops was insufficient to overrule the sentence
of seventy who had condemned Caecilian. On this representation
Constantine summoned another council. The number of bishops present
was very large, from Africa, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, but especially from
Gaul. This was the greatest ecclesiastical assembly which had yet been
seen. They met at Aries, in 314. Caecilian was again acquitted, and several
canons were passed with a view to the African dissensions.
In the meantime Majorinus died, and a second Donatus was appointed his
successor. He was surnamed by his followers “the Great,” for the sake of
distinction from the first Donatus. He is described as learned, eloquent, of
great ability, and as possessing the energy and fiery zeal of the African
temperament. The sectaries, as they were called, now assumed the name of
the Donatists, and took their character as well as their name from their
chief.

CONSTANTINE AS ARBITER
OF ECCLESIASTICAL DIFFERENCES
The Emperor was again entreated to take up their cause, and on this
occasion to take the matter entirely into his own hands; to which he
agreed, though offended by their obstinacy. He heard the case at Milan in
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the year 316; where he gave sentence in accordance with the councils of
Rome and Aries. He also issued edicts against them, which he afterwards
repealed, from seeing the dangerous consequences of violent measures. But
Donatism soon became a fierce, widespread, and intolerant schism in the
church. As early as 330 they had so increased that a synod was attended
by two hundred and seventy bishops; in some periods of their history
they numbered about four hundred. They proved a great affliction to the
provinces of Africa for above three hundred years — indeed down to the
time of the Mahometan invasion.

REFLECTIONS ON THE FIRST GREAT SCHISM IN THE CHURCH

As this was the first schism that divided the church, we have thought it
well to give a few details. The reader may learn some needed lessons from
this memorable division. It began with an incident so inconsiderable in
itself that it scarcely deserves a place in history. There was no question of
bad doctrine or of immorality, but only of a disputed election to the see
of Carthage. A little right feeling; a little self-denial; a true desire for the
peace, unity, and harmony of the church; and above all, a proper care for
the Lord’s glory, would have prevented hundreds of years of inward
sorrow and outward disgrace to the church of God. But pride, avarice, and
ambition — sad fruits of the flesh — were allowed to do their fearful
work. The reader will also see, from the place that the Emperor had in the
councils of the church, how soon her position and character were utterly
changed. How strange it must have appeared to Constantine that,
immediately on his adopting the cross as his standard, an appeal should be
made from an episcopal decision on ecclesiastical matters to his own
tribunal! This proved the condition of the clergy. But mark the
consequences which such an appeal involves; if the party against whom
the sentence of the civil power is given refuse to yield, they become
transgressors against the laws. And so it was in this case.
The Donatists were henceforth treated as offenders against the imperial
laws; they were deprived of their churches; many of them suffered
banishment and confiscation. Even the punishment of death was enacted
against them, although it does not appear that this law was enforced in any
case during the reign of Constantine. Strong measures, however, were
resorted to by the State, with the view of compelling the Donatisis to
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reunite with the Catholics; but, as is usual in such cases, and as experience
has taught ever since, the force that was used to compel them only served
to develope the wild spirit of the faction that already existed in the germ.
Aroused by persecution, stimulated by the discourses of their bishops,
and especially by Donatus who was the head and soul of his party, they
were hurried on to every species of fanaticism and violence.
Constantine, taught by experience, at length found that although he could
give the church protection, he could not give her peace; and issued an edict,
granting to the Donatists full liberty to act according to their own
convictions, declaring that this was a matter which belonged to the
judgment of God.6

THE ARIAN CONTROVERSY

Scarcely had the outward peace of the church been secured by the edict of
Milan, when it was distracted by internal dissensions. Shortly after the
breaking out of the Donatist schism in the province of Africa, the Arian
controversy, which had its origin in the East, extended to every part of the
world. We have already spoken of these angry contentions as the bitter
fruit of the unscriptural union of the church with the State. Not that they
necessarily sprang from that union, but from Constantine becoming the
avowed and ostensible head of the church, and presiding in her solemn
assemblies, questions of doctrine and practice produced an agitation
throughout the whole church, and not the church only, but they exercised a
powerful political influence on the affairs of the world. This was
unavoidable from the new position of the church. The empire being now
christian, at least in principle, such questions were of world-wide interest
and importance. Hence the Arian controversy was the first that rent
asunder the whole body of Christians, and arrayed in almost every part of
the world the hostile parties in implacable opposition.
Heresies, similar in nature to that of Arius, had appeared in the church
before her connection with the State; but their influence seldom extended
beyond the region and period of their birth. After some noisy debates and
angry words were discharged, the heresy fell into dishonor, and was soon
almost forgotten. But it was widely different with the Arian controversy.
Constantine, who sat upon the throne of the world, and assumed to be the
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sole head of the church, interposed his authority, in order to prescribe and
define the precise tenets of the religion he had established. The word of
God, the will of Christ, the place of the Spirit, the heavenly relations of
the church, were all lost sight of, or rather had never been seen, by the
Emperor. He had probably heard something of the numerous opinions by
which the Christians were divided; but he saw, at the same time, that they
were a community who had continued to advance in vigor and magnitude;
that they were really united in the midst of herestes, and strong under the
iron hand of oppression. But he could not see, neither could he
understand, that then, spite of her failure, she was looking to the Lord and
leaning on Him only in the world. Every other hand was against her, and
was led on by the craft and power of the enemy. But, professedly, she
was going up through the wilderness leaning on her Beloved, and no
weapon formed against her could prosper.
The Emperor, being entirely ignorant of the heavenly relation of the
church, may have thought that as he could give her complete protection
from outward oppression, he could also by his presence and power give
her peace and rest from inward dissensions. But he little knew that the
latter was not only far beyond his reach, but that the very security,
worldly ease, and indulgence, which he so liberally granted to the clergy,
were the sure means of fomenting discords, and of inflaming the passions
of the disputants. And so it turned out; he was continually assailed by the
complaints and mutual accusations of his new friends.

THE BEGINNING OF ARIANISM

Arianism was the natural growth of the Gnostic opinions; and Alexandria,
the hotbed of metaphysical questions and subtile distinctions, its
birthplace. Paul of Samosata, and Sabellius of Libya, in the third century,
taught similar false doctrines to Arius in the fourth. The Gnostic sects in
their different varieties, and the Manichean, which was the Persian religion
with a mixture of Christianity, may be considered rather as rival religions,
than as christian factions; nevertheless they did their evil work among
Christians as to the doctrine of the Trinity. Nearly all of these heresies, as
they are usually called, had fallen under the royal displeasure, and their
followers subjected to penal regulations. The Montanists, Paulites,
Novatians, Marcionites, and Valentinians were amongst the proscribed and
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persecuted sects. But there was another, a deeper, a darker, and a much
more influential heresy than had yet arisen, about to burst forth, and that
from the very bosom of the so-called holy Catholic church. It happened in
this way.
Alexander, the bishop of Alexandria, in a meeting of his presbyters,
appears to have expressed himself rather freely on the subject of the
Trinity; when Arius, one of the presbyters, questioned the truth of
Alexander’s positions, on the ground that they were allied to the Sabellian
errors, which had been condemned by the church. This disputation led
Arius to state his own views of the Trinity; which were substantially the
denial of the Savior’s Godhead — that He was, in fact, only the first and
noblest of those created beings whom God the Father formed out of
nothing — that, though immeasurably superior in power and in glow to
the highest created beings, He is inferior in both to the Father. He also
held, that though inferior to the Father in nature and in dignity, He is the
image of the Father, and the vicegerent of the divine power by whom He
made the worlds. What his views were of the Holy Spirit are not so
plainly stated.7
Alexander, indignant at the objections of Arius to himself, and because of
his opinions, accused him of blasphemy. “The impious Arius,” he
exclaimed, “the forerunner of Antichrist, had dared to utter his
blasphemies against the divine Redeemer.” He was judged by two councils
assembled at Alexandria, and cast out of the church. He retired into
Palestine, but in nowise discouraged by the disgrace. Many sympathised
with him, among whom were the two prelates named Eusebius: one of
Caesarea, the ecclesiastical historian; the other, bishop of Nicomedia, a
man of immense influence. Arius kept up a lively correspondence with his
friends, veiling his more offensive opinions; and Alexander issued warnings
against him, and refused all the intercessions of his friends to have him
restored. But Arius was a crafty antagonist. He is described in history as
tall and graceful in person; calm, pale, and subdued in countenance; of
popular address, and an acute reasoner; of strict and blameless life, and
agreeable manners; but that, under a humble and mortified exterior, he
concealed the strongest feelings of vanity and ambition. The adversary had
skilfully selected his instrument. The apparent possession of so many
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virtues fitted him for the enemy’s purpose. Without these fair
appearances he would have had no power to deceive.

CONSTANTINE’S FIRST IMPRESSION OF THE CONTROVERSY

The dissension soon became so violent, that it was judged necessary to
appeal to the Emperor. He at first considered the whole question as
utterly trifling and unimportant. He wrote a letter to Alexander and Arius
jointly, in which he reproves them for contending about idle questions and
imaginary differences, and recommends them to suppress all unhallowed
feelings of animosity, and to live in peace and unity.8 It is more than
probable that the Emperor had not thought of the serious nature of the
dispute, or he could not have spoken of it as trifling and unimportant: but
if the letter was drawn up by Hosius, bishop of Cordova, as is generally
believed, he could not plead ignorance of its character; and must have
framed the document according to the expressed feelings of Constantine,
rather than according to his own judgment. The letter has been highly
extolled by many as a model of wisdom and moderation; and, had the
matter been of no graver importance than fixing the time for the Easter
festival, it might have deserved that praise; but the Godhead and the glory
of Christ were in question, and consequently the salvation of the soul.
Hosius was sent to Egypt as the imperial commissioner, to whom the
settlement of the affair was committed. But he found that the dissensions
occasioned by the controversy had become so serious, that both parties
refused to listen to the admonitions of the bishop, though accompanied
with the authority of the sovereign.
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CHAPTER 11
THE COUNCIL OF NICE

Constantine was now obliged to look more closely into the nature of the
dispute. He began to understand that the question was not one of trifling,
but of the highest and most essential, importance; and resolved to convoke
an assembly of bishops, in order to establish the true doctrine, and to allay
for ever, as he vainly hoped, this propensity to hostile disputation.
Everything necessary for their journey was provided at the public charge,
as if it had been an affair of State.
In the month of June, A .D . 325, the first general council of the church
assembled at Nice in Bithynia. About three hundred and eighteen bishops
were present, besides a very large number of priests and deacons. “The
flower of the ministers of God,” as Eusebius says, “from all the churches
which abound in Europe, Africa and Asia, now met together.” The
spectacle was altogether new; and surely to none more so than to the
bishops themselves. Not many years had elapsed since they had been
marked as the objects of the most cruel persecution. They had been chosen
on account of their eminence, as the peculiar victims of the exterminating
policy of the government. Many of them bore in their bodies the marks of
their sufferings for Christ. They had known what it was to be driven into
exile; to work in the mines; to be exposed to every kind of humiliation and
insult; but now all was changed, so changed, that they could scarcely
believe that it was a reality and not a vision. The palace gates were thrown
open to them, and the Emperor of the world acted as moderator of the
assembly.
Nothing could so confirm and declare to the world the sad fall of the
church, and her subjection to the State, as the place which the Emperor
had in these councils. He did not arrive at Nice till the 3rd of July. On the
following day the bishops assembled in the hall of the palace, which had
been prepared for the purpose. We learn from Eusebius, that the assembly
sat in profound silence, while the great officers of State and other dignified
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persons entered the hall, and awaited in trembling expectation the
appearance of the Emperor. Constantine at length entered; he was
splendidly attired: the eyes of the bishops were dazzled by the gold and
precious stones upon his raiment. The whole assembly rose to do him
honor. He advanced to a golden seat prepared for him, and there stood, in
respectful deference to the spiritual dignitaries, till he was requested to sit
down. After a hymn of praise was sung, he delivered an exhortation on the
importance of peace and union. The council sat for rather more than two
months; and Constantine seems to have been present during the greater
part of the sittings, listening with patience, and conversing freely with the
different prelates.

THE NICENE CREED

The celebrated confession of faith usually called “The Nicene Creed,”
was the result of the long and solemn deliberations of the assembly. They
decided against the Arian opinions, and firmly maintained the doctrines of
the holy Trinity, of the true Godhead of Christ, and of His oneness with
the Father in power and glory. Arius himself was brought before the
council, and questioned as to his faith and doctrine; he did not hesitate to
repeat, as his belief, the false doctrines which had destroyed the peace of
the church. The bishops, when he was advancing his blasphemies, with
one accord stopped their ears, and cried out that such impious opinions
were worthy of anathema together with their author. St. Athanasius,
although at the time but a deacon, drew the attention of the whole council
by his zeal in defense of the true faith, and by his penetration in
unravelling and laying open the artifices of the heretics. But more of the
noble Athanasius by-and-by.
This famous creed was subscribed by all the bishops present, with the
exception of a few Arians. The decision of the council having been laid
before Constantine, he at once recognised in the unanimous consent of the
council the work of God, and received it with reverence, declaring that all
those persons should be banished who refused to submit to it. The Arians,
hearing this, through fear subscribed the faith laid down by the council.
They thus laid themselves open to the charge of being dishonest men. Two
bishops only, Secundus and Theonas, both Egyptians, continued to adhere
to Arius; and they were banished with him to Illyria. Eusebius of
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Nicomedia, and Theognis of Nice, were condemned about three months
later, and sentenced by the Emperor to banishment. Severe penalties were
now denounced against the followers of Arius: all his books were
sentenced to be burnt; and it was even made a capital offense to conceal
any of his writings. Their labors being completed, the bishops dispersed to
their respective provinces. Besides the solemn declaration of their opinion
of the doctrine in question, they finally set at rest the question respecting
the celebration of Easter;1 and settled some other matters which were
brought before them.

CONSTANTINE CHANGES HIS MIND

As the Emperor had no independent judgment of his own in ecclesiastical
matters, and certainly no spiritual discernment into these doctrinal
controversies, the continuance of his favor could not be relied upon. In
little more than two years his mind was completely changed. But these
two years were eventful in the domestic history of Constantine, in what
was much more serious than a change of mind as to Arianism. The same
year that he convened the council of Nice, he gave private orders for the
execution of Crispus, his eldest son, and for the suffocation of his wife,
Fausta, in a hot bath, who had been married to him for about twenty
years. History can find no better reasons for these deeds of darkness than
a mean and an unworthy jealousy. The wisdom and bravery of Crispus, in
the final overthrow of Licinius, is said to have excited his father’s jealousy,
and this was probably fomented by Fausta, who was his stepmother.
Knowing that he was bitterly reproached for his cruelty to his own son, he
ordered the death of Fausta in his remorse and misery. As we have
expressed a very decided judgment against the unhallowed nature of the
church’s connection with the State, we have said this much of the private
life of the Emperor, so that the reader may judge as to the fitness, or
rather, the unfitness, of one so polluted with blood, to sit as president in a
christian council. From that day to this the state church has been exposed
to the same defilement, in the person either of the sovereign or the royal
commissioner.
Constantia, the widow of Licinius, and sister of Constantine, possessed
great influence with her brother. She sympathized with the Arians, and
was under their influence. On her deathbed in 327, she succeeded in
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convincing her brother that injustice had been done to Arius, and prevailed
on him to invite Arius to his court. He did so, and Arius appeared,
presenting to the Emperor a confession of his faith. He expressed in a
general way his belief in the doctrine of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
and besought the Emperor to put a stop to idle speculations, so that
schism might be healed, and all, united in one, might pray for the peaceable
reign of the Emperor, and for his whole family. By his plausible
confession, and his fair speeches, he gained his point. Constantine
expressed himself satisfied, and Arius and his followers, in turn, stood
high in the imperial favor. The banished ones were recalled. A breath of
court air changed the outward aspect of the whole church. The Arian party
had now full possession of the Emperor’s weighty influence, and they
hastened to use it.

ATHANASIUS, BISHOP OF ALEXANDRIA

In the council of Nice Athanasius had born a distinguished part; his zeal
and abilities designated him at once as the head of the orthodox party, and
as the most powerful antagonist of the Arians. On the death of Alexander,
in the year 326, he was elevated to the see of Alexandria by the universal
voice of his brethren. He was then only thirty years of age, and knowing
something of the dangers as well as the honors of the office, he would have
preferred a less responsible position; but he yielded to the earnest desires
of an affectionate congregation. He held the see for nearly half a century.
His long life was devoted to the service of the Lord and His truth. He
continued stedfast in the faith, and inflexible in his purpose, according to
the noble stand which he made in the council of Nice, down to his latest
hour. The divinity of Christ was to him no mere speculative opinion, but
the source and strength of his whole christian life. And nowhere else is it
to be found by any one; as the apostle assures us.
“And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life; and
this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that
hath not the Son of God hath not life.” (1 John 5:11, 12.)
This life dwells in the only-begotten Son of the Father. He is “the eternal
life.” And this life, to the praise of the glory of God’s grace, is given to all
who believe in the true Christ of God. In receiving Christ, we receive
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eternal life, and become the sons of God — heirs of God — and joint heirs
with Christ. This life is not the property of any mere creature, however
exalted. The holy angels have a most blessed and an unceasing existence by
the power of God; but the Christian has eternal life through faith in Christ,
by the grace of God. Nothing could be more fatal to the well-being of the
human soul than the doctrine of Arius. But to return to our history.
While the advancement of Athanasius to the see of Alexandria gave great
joy and hope to his friends, it filled his enemies with the bitterest
resentment. They now saw the great leader of the Catholics 2 the bishop of
that church from which Arius had been expelled; and that he was
supported by the affections of his people and by a hundred bishops who
owned allegiance to the great see of Alexandria. They knew his power and
indefatigable zeal in defense of the decrees of the Nicene Council; and
might well judge, that if his influence had been so great when in a private
capacity, what might now be expected when he was placed in so eminent a
station? Wherefore, they laid their plans and united their powers to
overthrow him.

ATHANASIUS CONTESTS THE AUTHORITY OF

CONSTANTINE
Eusebius, of Nicomedia, first resorted to apparently friendly measures
with Athanasius, for the purpose of inducing him to re-admit Arius to the
fellowship of the church; but, failing completely in this, he influenced the
Emperor to command him. An imperial mandate was issued to receive
Arius and all his friends who were willing to connect themselves once
more with the catholic church; and informing him that, unless he did so, he
should be deposed from his station, and sent into exile. Athanasius,
however, was not to be intimidated by imperial edicts, but firmly replied,
that he could not acknowledge persons who had been condemned by a
decree of the whole church. “Constantine now found to his astonishment,”
says Milman, “that an imperial edict — which would have been obeyed in
trembling submission from one end of the Roman empire to the other, even
if he had enacted a complete political revolution, or endangered the
property and privileges of thousands — was received with deliberate and
steady disregard by a single christian bishop. During two reigns,
Athanasius contested the authority of the Emperor.”3 He endured
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persecution, calumny, exile; his life was frequently endangered in defense
of the one great and fundamental truth — the Godhead of the blessed
Lord; he confronted martyrdom, not for the broad distinction between
Christianity and heathenism, but for that one central doctrine of the
christian faith.
A succession of complaints against Athanasius was carried to the Emperor
by the Arian, or more properly the Eusebian, party. But it would be
outside our purpose to go into details: still we must trace the silver line a
little farther in this noble and faithful witness.
The most weighty charge was, that Athanasius had sent a sum of money
to a person in Egypt, to aid him in the prosecution of a design of
conspiracy against the Emperor. He was ordered to appear and answer the
charge. The prelate obeyed and stood before him. But the personal
appearance of Athanasius, a man of remarkable power over the minds of
others, seems for the moment to have overawed the soul of Constantine.
The frivolous and groundless accusations were triumphantly refuted by
Athanasius, before a tribunal of his enemies, and the unblemished virtue of
his character undeniably established. And such was the effect of the
presence of Athanasius on the Emperor, that he styled him a man of God,
and considered his enemies to be the authors of the disturbances and
divisions; but this impression was of short duration, as he continued to be
governed by the Eusebian party.

THE COUNCIL OF TYRE

In 334 Athanasius was summoned to appear before a council at Caesarea.
He refused on the ground that the tribunal was composed of his enemies.
In the following year he was cited before another council to be held at
Tyre by imperial authority; which he attended. Upwards of a hundred
bishops were present; a lay commission of the Emperor directed their
proceedings. A multitude of charges were brought against the undaunted
prelate; but the darkest, and the only one we will notice, was the twofold
crime of magic and murder. It was said that he had killed Arsenius, a
Miletian bishop — had cut off one of his hands, and had used it for
magical purposes; the hand was produced. But Athanasius was prepared
for the charge. The God of truth was with him. He calmly asked whether
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those present were acquainted with Arsenius? He had been well known to
many. A man was suddenly brought into the court, with his whole person
folded in his mantle. Athanasius first uncovered the head. He was at once
recognized as the murdered Arsenius. His hands were next uncovered; and
on examination he was proved to be Arsenius, alive, unmutilated. The
Arian party had done their utmost to conceal Arsenius, but the Lord was
with His guiltless servant, and the friends of Athanasius succeeded in
discovering him. The malice of the unprincipled Arians was again exposed,
and the innocence of Athanasius triumphantly vindicated.
But the implacable enemies of the bishop were yet fruitful in their
accusations against him. Once more he was commanded to appear in
Constantinople, and to answer for himself in the imperial presence.
The old charges on this occasion were dropped, but a new one was
skilfully chosen, with the view of arousing the jealousy of the Emperor.
They asserted that Athanasius had threatened to stop the sailing of the
vessels laden with corn from the port of Alexandria to Constantinople. By
this means a famine would be produced in the new capital. This touched
the pride of the Emperor; and whether from belief of the charge, or from a
wish to remove so influential a person, he banished him to Treves in Gaul.
The injustice of the sentence is unquestionable.

THE DEATH OF ARIUS

Neither Constantine nor Arius long survived the exile of Athanasius. Arius
subscribed an orthodox creed; Constantine accepted his confession. He
sent for Alexander, bishop of Constantinople, and told him that Arius
must be received into communion on the following day, which was
Sunday. Alexander, who had almost completed a hundred years, was
greatly distressed by the Emperor’s orders. He entered the church, and
prayed earnestly that the Lord would prevent such a profanation. On the
evening of the same day Arius was talking lightly, and in a triumphant
tone, of the ceremonies appointed for the morrow. But the Lord had
ordered otherwise; He had heard the prayer of His aged servant; and that
night the great herestarch died. His end is related with circumstances which
recall to mind that of the traitor Judas. What effect the event had on
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Constantine we are not informed; but he died soon after in his sixty-fourth
year.4

REFLECTIONS ON THE GREAT EVENTS IN CONSTANTINE’S REIGN

Before proceeding farther with our general history, we shall do well to
pause for a moment, and consider the bearings of the great changes which
have taken place, both in the position of the church and the world, during
the reign of Constantine the Great. It would not be too much to say, that
the church has passed through the most important crisis of her history;
and that the downfall of idolatry may be considered as the most important
event in the whole history of the world. From a period shortly after the
flood, idolatry had prevailed among the nations of the earth, and Satan, by
his craft, had been the object of worship. But the whole system of idolatry
was doomed throughout the Roman earth, if not finally overthrown, by
Constantine; it had, at any rate, received its deadly wound.
The church, doubtless, lost much by her union with the State. She no
longer existed as a separate community, and was no longer governed
exclusively by the will of Christ. She had surrendered her independence,
lost her heavenly character, and become inseparably identified with the
passions and interests of the ruling power. All this was sad in the extreme,
and the fruit of her own unbelief. But, on the other hand, the world gained
immensely by the change. This must not be overlooked in our
lamentations over the failure of the church. The standard of the cross was
now raised all over the empire; Christ was publicly proclaimed as the only
Savior of mankind; and the holy scriptures acknowledged to be the word
of God, the only safe and certain guide to eternal blessedness. The
professing church was no doubt in a low unspiritual state, before she was
connected with the civil power, so that she may have thought more of her
own ease than of her mission of blessing to others; nevertheless, God
could work by means of these new opportunities, and hasten the
disappearance from the face of the Roman world of the fearful
abominations of idolatry.
The general legislation of Constantine bears evidence of the silent under-
working of Christian principles; and the effect of these humane laws
would be felt far beyond the immediate circle of the christian community.
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He enacted laws for the better observance of Sunday; against the sale of
infants for slaves, which was common among the heathen; and also against
child-stealing for the purpose of selling them; with many other laws, both
of a social and moral character, which are given in the histories already
noted. But the one grand all-influential event of his reign was the casting
down of the idols, and the lifting up of Christ. The Ethiopians and Iberians
are said to have been converted to Christianity during his reign.

THE SONS OF CONSTANTINE A.D. 337-361

Constantine the Great was succeeded by his three sons, Constantine,
Constantius, and Constans. They had been educated in the faith of the
gospel, and had been named Caesars by their father, and on his death they
divided the empire among them. Constantine obtained Gaul, Spain, and
Britain; Constantius, the Asiatic provinces, with the capital,
Constantinople; and Constans held Italy and Africa. The beginning of the
new reign was characterized — as was usual in those times — by killing
the relatives who might one day prove rivals to the throne; but along with
the old and usual political jealousies and hostilities, a new element now
appears — that of religious controversy.
The eldest son, Constantine, was favorable to the catholics, and signalized
the commencement of his reign by recalling Athanasius, and replacing him
in his see at Alexandria. But in 340 Constantine was killed in an invasion
of Italy; and Constans took possession of his brother’s dominions, and
thus became the sovereign of two-thirds of the empire. He was favorable
to the decisions of the Nicene Council, and adhered with firmness to the
cause of Athanasius. Constantius, his Empress, and court, were partial to
Arianism. And thus the religious war began between the two brothers —
between the East and the West — and was carried on without either
justice or humanity, to say nothing of the peaceful spirit of Christianity.
Constantius, like his father, interfered much in the affairs of the church; he
pretended to be a theologian, and throughout his reign the empire was
incessantly agitated by religious controversy. The councils became so
frequent, that the public posting establishments were constantly
employed by the continual travelling of the bishops; on both sides
councils were assembled to oppose councils. But as the principal events of
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the period, as well as the silver line of God’s grace, are connected with
Athanasius, we will return to his history.

THE HISTORY OF ATHANASIUS

After a banishment of two years and four months Athanasius was restored
to his diocese by the younger Constantine, where he was received with a
joyful welcome by his flock. But the death of that prince exposed
Athanasius to a second persecution. Constantius, who is described as a
vain but weak man, soon became the secret accomplice of the Eusebians.
In the end of 340, or beginning of 341, a council met at Antioch for the
dedication of a splendid church which had been founded by Constantine
the elder. The number of bishops is said to have been about ninety-seven,
of whom forty were Eusebians. Amongst the number of canons which
were passed, it was decided, and with some appearance of equity, that a
bishop deposed by a synod should not resume his episcopal functions till
he had been absolved by the judgment of another synod equal in authority.
This law was evidently passed with a special reference to the case of
Athanasius; and the council pronounced, or rather confirmed, his
degradation. Gregory, a Cappadocian, a man of a violent character, was
appointed to the see, and Philagrius, the prefect of Egypt, was instructed
to support the new primate with the civil and military powers of the
province. Athanasius being the favorite of the people, they refused to have
a bishop thrust upon them by the Emperor: scenes of disorder, outrage,
and profanation followed. “Violence was found necessary to support
iniquity,” says Milner, “and an Arian prince was obliged to tread in the
steps of his pagan predecessors, to support what he called the church.”
Athanasius, oppressed by the Asiatic prelates, withdrew from Alexandria,
and passed three years in Rome. The Roman pontiff, Julius, with a synod
of fifty Italian bishops, pronounced him innocent, and confirmed to him
the communion of the church. No fewer than five creeds had been drawn
up by the Eastern bishops in assemblies convened at Antioch between 341
and 345, with the view of concealing their real opinions; but not one of
them was admitted to be free from an Arian element, though the more
offensive positions of Arianism were professedly condemned. The two
Emperors, Constantius and Constans, now became anxious to heal the
breach which existed between the Eastern and the Western churches; and
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accordingly they summoned a council to meet at Sardica, in Illyria, A .D .
347, to decide the disputed points. Ninety-four bishops of the West,
twenty-one of the East, having assembled, and duly considered the matter
on both sides, decided in favor of Athanasius: the orthodox party restoring
the persecuted primate of Alexandria, and condemning all who opposed
him as the enemies of the truth. In the meantime the intruder, Gregory,
died, and Athanasius, on his return to Alexandria, after an exile of eight
years, was received with universal rejoicing. “The entrance of the
archbishop into his capital,” says one, “was a triumphal procession:
absence and persecution had endeared him to the Alexandrians; and his
fame was diffused from Ethiopia to Britain over the whole extent of the
Christian world.”
After the death of Constans, the friend and protector of Athanasius, in
350, the cowardly Constantius felt that the time was now come to avenge
his private injuries against Athanasius, who had no longer Constans to
defend him. But how to accomplish his object was the difficulty. Had he
decreed the death of the most eminent citizen, the cruel order would have
been executed without any hesitation; but the condemnation and death of a
popular bishop must be brought about with caution, delay, and some
appearance of justice. The Arians set to work; they renewed their
machinations; more councils were convened.

THE COUNCILS OF ARLES AND MILAN

In the year 353 a synod was held at Arles; and in 355 another met at
Milan. Upwards of three hundred bishops were present at the latter. The
sessions of the council were held in the palace, Constantius and his guards
being present. The condemnation of Athanasius was artfully represented
as the only measure which could restore the peace and union of the
catholic church. But the friends of the primate were true to their leader and
the cause of truth. They assured the Emperor, in the most manly and
christian spirit, that neither the hope of his favor, nor the fear of his
displeasure, would prevail on them to join in the condemnation of an
absent, an innocent, an honored servant of Christ. The contest was long
and obstinate; the interest excited was intense, and the eyes of the whole
empire became fixed on a single bishop. But the Arian Emperor was
impatient, and before the council of Milan was dissolved, the archbishop
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of Alexandria had been solemnly condemned and deposed. A general
persecution was directed against all who favored him, and also for the
purpose of enforcing conformity to the Emperor’s opinion. And so sharp
did this persecution become, that the orthodox party raised the cry, that
the days of Nero and of Decius had returned. Athanasius himself found a
refuge in the deserts of Egypt.

THE DEATH AND SUCCESSORS OF CONSTANTIUS

In the year 361 Constantius, the patron of the Arians, died. Like his
father, he delayed his baptism till a short time before his death. The
prosperous days of the Arians were now ended.
Julian, commonly called the Apostate, succeeded to the throne, and
probably to show his utter indifference to the theological question in
dispute, he ordered the restoration of the bishops whom Constantius had
banished. After a brief reign of twenty-two months, and a vain attempt to
revive heathenism, he died suddenly of a wound in the breast from a
Persian arrow.
Jovian, who immediately succeeded Julian to the throne, professed
Christianity. He is the first of the Roman Emperors who gave anything
like clear evidence that he really loved the truth as it is in Jesus. He seems
to have been a sincere Christian before he came to the throne, as he told
the apostate Julian that he would rather quit the service than his religion;
nevertheless Julian valued him, and kept him near his person until his
death. The army declared itself Christian; the Labarum, which had been
thrown aside during the reign of Julian, was again displayed at its head.
Jovian, however, had learnt from the preceding times that religion could
not be advanced by outward force. Hence he allowed full toleration to his
pagan subjects; and, with respect to the divisions among Christians, he
declared that he would molest no one on account of religion, but would
love all who studied the peace and welfare of the church of God.
Athanasius, on hearing of the death of Julian, returned to Alexandria, to
the agreeable surprise and joy of his people. Jovian wrote to Athanasius,
confirming him in his office, and inviting him to his court. The bishop
complied; the Emperor desired instruction and advice; by personal
intercourse he gained an influence over Jovian which his enemies in vain
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attempted to disturb. But the reign of this christian prince lasted only
about eight months. He was found dead in his bed, on February 17th, 364,
having been suffocated, as was supposed, by charcoal.
Valentinian and Valens. Jovian was succeeded by two brothers —
Valentinian and Valens; the former governed in the West, the latter in the
East. In the affairs of the church Valentinian is said to have followed the
plan of Jovian. He declined all interference in questions of doctrines, but
adhered firmly to the Nicene faith. As a soldier and a statesman he was
possessed of many great abilities. Both brothers are said to have exposed
themselves to danger by the profession of Christianity in the reign of
Julian; but Valens was afterwards won over to Arianism by his wife, who
persuaded him to receive baptism from the Arian bishop of
Constantinople. It is said that the bishop exacted of him an oath to
persecute the catholics. Be this as it may, it is certain that soon after his
baptism he manifested great zeal in favor of the Arians, and bitterly
persecuted the ecclesiastics for their adherence to the Nicene faith, and the
exercise of their influence on its behalf.
Under the edict of Valens, A .D . 367, Athanasius was once more attacked
by the Arians — the enemies of christian piety; Tattan, governor of
Alexandria, attempted to drive him out of the city; but the feeling of the
people was so strong in favor of the venerable bishop, that he dared not
for some time to execute his orders. In the meantime, Athanasius, knowing
what was near at hand, quietly retired, and remained for four months
concealed in his father’s sepulcher. This was the fourth time he had fled
from Alexandria. Valens, however, from the dread he seems to have had of
the people, recalled him, and permitted him, without any further
hindrance, to prosecute his pastoral labors, until A .D . 373, when he was
summoned from his work on earth to his rest in heaven. Valens perished in
a battle with the Goths in the year 378, after having reigned fourteen
years.

WHAT SERVICE DID ATHANASIUS RENDER TO THE CHURCH?

We are disposed to believe that, under the blessing of God, he was the
means of preserving the church from the Arian heresy, which threatened to
extinguish from Christianity both the name and the faith of the Lord Jesus
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Christ. The enemy aimed at nothing short of a Christless system, which
might ere long issue in an utter abandonment of Christianity. But the
Nicene council was used of God to overthrow his wicked devices. The
assertion of the Godhead of Christ and of the Holy Ghost as equal with
God the Father, was greatly blessed of God then, and has been from that
day even until now. Though the church had been unfaithful, and drifted
into the world, “even where Satan’s seat is,” the Lord in mercy raised up a
great testimony to His holy name, and to the faith of His saints.
Historians, both civil and ecclesiastical, bear the most honorable testimony
to the ability, activity, constancy, self-denial, and unwearied zeal of
Athanasius in the defense of the great doctrine of the holy Trinity. “Thou
holdest fast My name, and hast not denied My faith,” are words that
refer, we doubt not, to the faithfulness of Athanasius and his friends, as
also to the faithful in other times.
The overcomers spoken of in the address were also there, without doubt;
but it is not permitted of the Lord that they should be seen or recorded by
the historian. They were God’s hidden ones who were nourished on the
hidden manna. They will have a place of great nearness to the Lord in the
glory.
“To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna,
and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name
written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.”
(Revelation 2:17.)

CHRISTIANITY UNDER THE REIGN OF GRATIAN

Valentinian was succeeded by his son, Gratian, in 375. He was then only
sixteen years of age. He admitted as a nominal colleague his half-brother,
the younger Valentinian; and soon after he chose Theodosius as an active
colleague, on whom he bestowed the sovereignty of the East. Graftan had
been educated in the Christian faith, and gave evidence of being a true
believer. He was the first of the Roman Emperors who refused the title
and robe of high priest of the ancient religion. How could a Christian, he
said, be the high priest of idolatry? It is an abomination to the Lord. Thus
we see in the early piety of this young prince the blessed effects of the
testimony of the faithful. What a new and strange thing in me; a pious
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prince to ascend the throne of Rothe Caesars at the age of sixteen! But he
was humble as well as pious.
Being conscious of his own ignorance in divine things, he wrote to
Ambrose, bishop of Milan, to visit him. “Come,” he said, “that you may
teach the doctrines of salvation to one who truly believes; not that we may
study for contention, but that the revelation of God may dwell more
intimately in my heart.” Ambrose answered him in an ecstasy of
satisfaction: “Most christian prince,” he says, “modesty, not want of
affection, has hitherto prevented me from waiting upon you. If, however, I
was not with you personally, I have been present with my prayers, in
which consists still more the duty of a pastor.”
The young Emperor was generally popular; but his attachment to the
orthodox clergy, the time he spent in their company, the influence they
gained over him (especially Ambrose) exposed him to the contempt of the
more warlike part of his subjects. The frontiers were sorely pressed at this
time by the barbarians, but Gratian was unable to undertake the conduct of
a war against them. Maximus, taking advantage of the disaffection of the
army, raised the standard of revolt. Graftan, seeing the turn things had
taken, fled, with about three hundred horse, but was overpowered and
killed at Lyons in the year 383. Maximus, the usurper and assassin, placed
himself on the throne of the West. He was afterwards overthrown and
slain by Theodosius, and the younger Valentinian placed upon the throne
of his father.

THEODOSIUS, SURNAMED THE GREAT

The measure of our interest in the history of the Roman Emperors must be
proportionate to their acknowledgement of the truth, and their treatment
of Christians. Did we not seek to discern God’s hand in their government,
it would be wearisome and profitless, at this distant period, to examine
what remains of them. But to see God’s hand, and to hear His voice, and
to trace the silver line of His grace, throughout those rude times, keeps us
in company with Himself, and our experience is increased. But almost
everything depends, as to service to God, or blessing to ourselves, in the
motive or object with which we study the history of the church, and that
which effects is. According to this principle of estimation, Theodosius
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claims an earnest and careful study. He was God’s minister, as well as the
Roman Emperor; was used of Him to subdue Arianism in the East, and to
abolish the worship of idols throughout the Roman world. Idolatry is the
boldest sin of man, and can never be exceeded until
“that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; who opposeth
and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is
worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God,
showing himself that he is God.” (2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4.)
The full expression of this blasphemy is still future, and will be the signal
for immediate judgment, and the dawn of the millennial day.
But the zeal of Theodosius was not merely negative. He supported
Christianity, according to his light, more vigorously than any of his
predecessors. He completed what Constantine commenced, and far
surpassed him in christian zeal and earnestness. Soon after his baptism he
assembled a council, which met at Constantinople on May 2nd, 381. The
principal objects for which this council was convoked were the following:
— To give greater fullness and definiteness to the Nicene creed; to
condemn heresies, such as those of the Arians, Eunomians, Eudoxians,
Sabellians, Apollinarians, and others; and to take measures for the union of
the church.

THE BARBARIC INVADERS

Most of our readers, even the youngest, have heard of “The Decline and
Fall of the Roman Empire” — the fourth great world-empire spoken of
by the prophet Daniel, and by St. John in the Apocalypse. It had been on
the decline for some time, and was rapidly approaching its fall, when
Theodosius was called to the throne. The frontiers were menaced on all
sides by the barbarians, who dwelt immediately outside the Roman earth.
“On the shores of each of the great rivers which bounded the empire,”
says Dean Milman, “appeared a host of menacing invaders. The Persians,
the Armenians, the Iberians, were prepared to pass the Euphrates or the
eastern frontier; the Danube had already afforded a passage to the Goths;
behind them were the Huns, in still more formidable and multiplying
swarms; the Franks and the rest of the German nations were crowding to
the Rhine.” This frightful array of barbaric invasion will show the reader at
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a glance the then position of the fourth empire; and that it is as easy for
God to break in pieces the iron, as the brass, the silver, or the gold.
Within the limits of the Roman earth idolatry still existed, and its worship
was undisturbed. Its thousands of temples, in all their ancient grandeur and
imposing ceremony, covered the land. Scarcely could the Christian turn
anywhere without seeing a temple and inhaling the incense offered to idols.
Christianity had only been raised to an equal toleration. Arianism and
semi-Arianism, in their many forms, greatly prevailed. In Constantinople
and the East they were supreme. Other herestes abounded. Such was the
state of things, both within and without the empire, on the accession of
Theodosius. But for the details of his civil history, we must refer the
reader to the authors already noted. We would only add, that he was used
of God in arresting for a time the progress of invasion; in demolishing the
images and some of the temples of heathen worship; in abolishing idolatry;
in suppressing superstition; in causing the decisions of the Nicene council
to prevail everywhere; and in giving triumph and predominance to the
profession of Christianity.

THE RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF THEODOSIUS

We will now glance at some of the leading events in the history of the great
Theodosius. In the circumstances of these events will be found the best
commentary on the life of the Emperor, the power of the priesthood, and
the character of the times.
Theodosius was a spaniard. Christianity, at an early period, had been
established in the Peninsula. It was famous for its firm adherence to the
Athanasian doctrines throughout the Trinitarian controversy. Hosius, a
Spanish bishop, was president of the Nicene council. Towards the end of
the first year of his reign, Theodosius was admonished by a serious illness
not to delay his baptism, as the practice then was. He sent for the bishop
of Thessalonica and was at once baptised. Some say that he was the first
of the Emperors baptised in the full name of the holy Trinity. His
admission to the church was immediately followed by an edict which
proclaimed his own faith, and prescribed the religion of his subjects. “It is
our pleasure that all the nations that are governed by our clemency and
moderation, should stedfastly adhere to the religion which was taught by
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St. Peter to the Romans... According to the discipline of the apostles, and
the doctrine of the gospel, let us believe the sole deity of the Father, the
Son, and the Holy Ghost, under an equal majesty, and a pious Trinity...
Beside the condemnation of divine justice they must expect to suffer the
severe penalties which our authority, guided by heavenly wisdom, shall
think proper to inflict upon them.”
Such was the stern and uncompromising orthodoxy of Theodosius. Still,
however mistaken, he believed it was his duty so to rule as a christian
Emperor, and the bishops that he consulted were more inclined to increase
than to soften its severity. On one occasion his sense of justice determined
him to order some Christians to rebuild at their own expense a Jewish
synagogue, which, in a tumult, had been pulled down. But the vigorous
bishop of Milan interfered and prevailed on him to set aside the sentence,
on the ground that it was not right for Christians to build a Jewish
synagogue. Herein the bishop evidently failed in a matter of common
justice. He was less righteous than his imperial master.

THE FAILINGS AND VIRTUES OF THEODOSIUS

The most prominent defect in the character of Theodosius was a
proneness to violent anger; yet he could be softened down and moved to
be most merciful after great provocation, if properly appealed to. We have
a remarkable instance of this in his forgiving the people of Antioch. It
happened in this way:
In the year 387 the inhabitants became impatient on account of a tax which
the Emperor had imposed upon them; and, as they were haughtily treated
by the rulers, to whom they had respectfully applied for relief, a great
tumult arose in the city. The statues of the imperial family were thrown
down and treated with contempt. But, a company of soldiers immediately
appearing, the sedition was suppressed. The governor of the province,
according to the duty of his office, dispatched a faithful narrative of the
whole transaction to the Emperor. But as eight hundred miles lay between
Antioch and Constantinople, weeks must elapse before an answer could be
received. This gave the Antiochtans leisure to reflect on the nature and
consequences of their crime. They were greatly and constantly agitated
with hopes and fears, as may be well supposed. They knew their crime
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was a serious one, but they had confessed it to Flavian their bishop, and to
other influential persons, with every assurance of genuine repentance. At
length, twenty-four days after the sedition, the imperial commissioners
arrived, bearing the will of the Emperor, and the sentence of Antioch. The
following imperial mandate will show the reader how much depended on
the will or temper of a single man in those times.
Antioch, the metropolis of the East, was degraded from the rank of a city;
stripped of its lands, its privileges, and its revenues; it was subjected,
under the humiliating denomination of a village, to the jurisdiction of
Laodicea. The baths, the circus, and the theaters were shut; and, that every
source of plenty and pleasure might at the same time be intercepted, the
distribution of corn was abolished. The commissioners then proceeded to
inquire into the guilt of individuals. The noblest and most wealthy of the
citizens of Antioch appeared before them in chains; the examination was
assisted by the use of torture, and their sentence was pronounced, or
suspended, according to the judgment of these extraordinary magistrates.
The houses of the criminals were exposed to sale, their wives and children
were suddenly reduced from affluence and luxury to the most abject
distress; and a bloody execution was expected to close the horrors of the
day, which the eloquent Chrysostom has represented as a lively image of
the final judgment of the world. But God, who has the hearts of all men in
His hand, and in the remembrance of what Antioch had been in the early
days of the church, moved the ministers of Theodosius to pity. They are
said to have shed tears over the calamities of the people; and they listened
with reverence to the pressing entrearies of the monks and hermits, who
descended in swarms from the mountains. The execution of the sentence
was suspended, and it was agreed that one of the commissioners should
remain at Antioch, while the other returned with all possible speed to
Constantinople.
The exasperated rage of Theodosius had cooled down. The deputies of the
distressed people obtained a favorable audience. The hand of the Lord was
in it: He had heard their cry. Grace triumphed in Theodosius. A free and
general pardon was granted to the city and citizens of Antioch; the prison
doors were thrown open; and senators, who despaired of their lives,
recovered the possession of their houses and estates; and the capital of the
East was restored to the enjoyment of her ancient dignity and splendor.
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Theodosius condescended to praise and reward the bishop of Antioch and
others who had generously interceded for their distressed brethren; and
confessed, that if the exercise of justice is the most important duty, the
indulgence of mercy is the most exquisite pleasure, of a sovereign.5

THE SIN AND REPENTANCE OF THEODOSIUS

The history of the tumult and massacre at Thessalonica, in 390, graves yet
deeper lines in the character of Theodosius. In studying this period of his
life, we are reminded of David, the king of Israel. In this sorrowful affair
the enemy gained a great advantage over the christian Emperor; but God
overruled it for the deeper blessing of his soul.
Botheric, commander in chief of the district, and several of his principal
officers, were killed by the populace on the occasion of a chariot-race. A
favorite charioteer had been thrown into prison for a notorious crime, and,
consequently, was absent on the day of the games. The populace
unreasonably demanded his liberty; Botheric refused, and thus the tumult
was raised and the dreadful consequences followed. The news exasperated
the Emperor, and he ordered the sword to be let loose upon them.
Ambrose interceded, and Theodosius promised to pardon the
Thessalonians. His military’ advisers, however, artfully insisted on the
heinous character of the crime, and procured an order to punish the
offenders; which was carefully kept secret from the bishop. The soldiers
attacked the people indiscriminately when assembled in the circus, and
thousands were slain, to avenge the death of their officers.
The mind of Ambrose was filled with horror and anguish on hearing of this
massacre. As the servant of God he rises to the place of separation from
evil, even in his imperial master. He retired into the country to indulge his
grief, and to avoid the presence of the Emperor. But he wrote a letter to
him, in which he set before him, in the most solemn manner, his fearful
guilt; and assuring him that he could not be allowed to enter the church of
Milan until satisfied of the genuineness of his repentance. The Emperor,
by this time, was deeply affected by the reproaches of his own
conscience, and by those of his spiritual father. He bitterly bewailed the
consequences of his rash fury in substituting barbarity for justice; and
proceeded to perform his devotions in the church of Milan. But Ambrose
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met him at the porch, and, laying hold of his robe, desired him to withdraw
as a man stained with innocent blood. The Emperor assured Ambrose of
his contrition; but he was told that private regrets were insufficient to
expiate public offenses. The Emperor referred to David, a man after God’s
own heart. “You have imitated him in his crime, imitate him in his
repentance,” was the reply of the undaunted bishop.
The Emperor submitted to the priest. For eight months he remained in
penitential seclusion; laying aside all his imperial ornaments, until at the
Christmas season he presented himself before the archbishop, and humbly
entreated re-admission into the church. “I weep,” said he, “that the temple
of God, and consequently heaven, is shut from me, which is open to slaves
and beggars.” Ambrose was firm, and required some practical fruit of his
repentance. He demanded that in future the execution of capital
punishment should be deferred until thirty days after the sentence, in
order that the ill effects of intemperate anger might be prevented. The
Emperor readily agreed, and was then allowed to enter the church. The
scene which followed was overwhelming. The Emperor, pulling off his
imperial robes, prayed prostrate on the pavement. “My soul cleaveth to
the dust,” he cried; “quicken thou me according to Thy word.” The people
wept and prayed with him, being moved with his grief and humiliation.
Ambrose mentions in his funeral oration, that from the time of the
Emperor’s deep anguish he never passed a day without recalling to mind
the crime into which he had been betrayed by his great failing — an
infirmity of temper.

REFLECTIONS ON THE DISCIPLINE OF AMBROSE, AND THE

PENANCE OF THEODOSIUS
There are few events in the annals of the church more deeply interesting
than the penance of the great Theodosius, and the rigorous conditions of
restoration demanded by Ambrose. Stripped of the superstition and
formalities peculiar to the times, we have a case before us of the most
genuine and salutary discipline. We must not suppose for a moment, that
the behavior of Theodosius was the result of weakness or pusillanimity,
but of a true fear of God; a real feeling of his guilt, a tender conscience, an
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acknowledgement of the claims of God, to whom all worldly greatness is
subject.
Ambrose was neither haughty nor hypocritical, as we find many of the
pontiffs became in later times. He cherished a strong affection for the
Emperor, and a sincere concern for his soul; but he acted towards him from
a solemn sense of his duty. He had a great idea, no doubt, of the dignity
with which his office invested him; and he felt himself bound to use it in
behalf of justice and humanity, and in controlling the power of earthly
sovereignty: a character of power, most certainly, never granted by God to
a christian minister; and which often proved in after ages to be a most
dangerous power, as the priest who holds in his hands the king’s
conscience may inflame or moderate his sanguinary passions. In the case
of Ambrose it was pure christian influence. He appeared, though
somewhat out of character, as the vindicator of outraged humanity, and as
exercising a judicial authority over the meanest and the mightiest of
mankind. But it is always disastrous to interfere with God’s order, even
when the best of objects seems to be thereby gained.
About four months after his victory over Eugenius, and the chastisement
of the assassins of Valentinian, Theodosius the Great died at Milan, in the
year 395, not exceeding fifty years of age; the last Emperor who
maintained the dignity of the Roman name. Ambrose did not long survive
his imperial friend. He died at Milan on Easter-eve, 397. He deepened and
strengthened the foundations of ecclesiastical power which was to
influence Christianity in all future ages. Basail, the two Gregories, and
Chrysostom flourished about this time.
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CHAPTER 12
THE INTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH

The century, which closes with the death of the great Theodosius and
Ambrose, has been full of the deepest interest to the christian reader.
Events, the most momentous — affecting the majesty and glory of God,
and the wellbeing of mankind — have transpired. From 303 till 313, the
church passed through her most trying ordeal under Diocletian. Ten years
she was in a fiery furnace; but in place of being consumed, as her enemies
vainly imagined, she seemed to increase in numbers as well as in purity
and power. Satan was permitted to do his utmost against her; and he so
moved and stirred up the heathen population, that in all parts of the
empire they arose in arms; first, to defend their ancient polytheism; and,
secondly, to root out Christianity, by persecuting the Christians, and
destroying their sacred books. Thus the century commenced with the great
and final struggle between paganism and Christianity, and closed with the
total ruin of the former, and the complete triumph of the latter. The
contest ended with the fourth century, and victory has rested with
Christianity ever since.
Such has been the external history of the church, and the accomplishment,
so far, of the word of the Lord in the Epistles to Smyrna and Pergamos.
But there are other things which most reasonably demand a little of our
attention before entering on the fifth century; and no part of the wide field
which lies before us seems to have a stronger claim than the sphere and
influence of the great prelates of the East and the West. It must also have
occurred to our readers from the necessary allusions to baptism, that the
observance of that rite had an immense place in the minds of those early
Christians. They believed that the waters of baptism purified the soul
completely. We have thought, then, of combining the two — of giving a
brief history of baptism from the writings of the Fathers; which will, at
the same time, give us an opportunity of seeing what views they held, not
only on baptism, but on the fundamental truths of the gospel.
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ECCLESIASTICAL VARIATIONS OF BAPTISM
In the New Testament there is perfect uniformity, both as to precept and
example, on the subject of baptism; but in our own day, and ever since the
beginning of the third century, we find in the professing church endless
variations both as to theory and practice on this important subject. Those
not Acquainted with ecclesiastical history naturally inquire, When, and by
what means, did such differences arise in the church?
As it has been our plan all through these “Short Papers” to find out the
beginnings of great questions which have affected the peace and
prosperity of the church, we will endeavor, very briefly, to point out the
beginning and early history of ecclesiastical baptisms. We use the term
ecclesiastical, as distinguished from scriptural. Nothing is of divine
authority, either in theory or practice, that was introduced after the days
of the inspired apostles. So that nothing can be christian baptism that
varies from the institution of Christ and the practice of His apostles. To
bring in alterations is to change the thing itself, and make it not the same,
but another baptism; hence we find in history there were baptisms many.
As the early history of these variations, and not controversy, is our object,
we will avoid giving any opinion on the long agitated question. For more
than sixteen hundred years the controversy has been maintained with great
determination, and by able men on both sides. No controversy in the
history of the church has been of such continuance, or conducted with
such confidence of victory by both parties. As there is no express mention
of infant baptism in scripture, the baptists think that their position is
beyond question: and the paedobaptists as firmly believe that it may be
inferred from several well-known passages that infant baptism was
practiced in the days of the apostles. There has not been so much
controversy as to the mode of baptism. The Greeks, Latins, Franks, and
Germans, appear to have baptised by immersion. “Baptism is a Greek
word,” says Luther, “and in Latin it may be rendered mersio, immersion;...
and though among the greater part of us this practice has fallen into disuse,
nevertheless they that are baptised ought to be entirely immersed, and
forthwith lifted out of the water, and this the etymology of the word
indicates, as also in the German language.” Neander’s testimony is to the
same effect: “Baptism was originally administered by immersion; and
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many of the comparisons of St. Paul allude to this form of its
administration. The immersion is a symbol of death, of being buried with
Christ; the coming forth from the water is a symbol of resurrection with
Christ; and both, taken together, represent the second birth, the death of
the old man, and a resurrection to a new life.”1 Cave, Tillorson, Wadding-
ton, etc., speak of the mode of baptism in a similar way. And as all these
testimonies are from paedobaptists, we may dismiss this part of the
subject as fairly proved in church history; nevertheless faith can only
stand on the word of God. We follow not the Fathers, but Christ.
Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, is the first of the Fathers that alludes to infant
baptism. He died about the year 200, so that his writings are placed
towards the close of the second century. The apostolical fathers never
mention it. By this time superstition, to a great extent, had taken the place
of faith, so that the reader must be prepared to hear some extravagant
notions advanced by some of the great doctors; yet many of them, we
doubt not, were true earnest Christians. “Christ came to save all persons
by Himself,” says Irenaeus, “all, I mean, who by Him are regenerated —
baptized — unto God: infants and little ones; children and youths, and
elder persons. Therefore He went through the several ages: for infants
being made an infant, sanctifying infants: to little ones He was made a little
one, sanctifying those of that age: and also giving to them an example of
godliness, justice, and dutifulness: to youths He was a youth,” etc.
Baptism was thus taught to be a complete lustration of the soul for all ages
and conditions of mankind. But the controversy soon resolved itself into
the one question — infant or adult. Regeneration, born again, baptism, are
used as interchangeable terms, and as meaning the same thing, in the
writings of the Fathers. 2
Here we have the origin, so far as ecclesiastical antiquity informs us, of
infant baptism. The passage is somewhat obscure and extremely fanciful;
but it is the first trace we have of the yet unsettled question, and probably
the root of all its variations ecclesiastically viewed. The effect of such
teaching on superstitious minds was immense. Anxious parents hastened
to have their delicate infants baptised lest they should die under the curse
of original sin, and the man of the world delayed his baptism until the near
approach of death to avoid any subsequent stain, and that he might emerge
from the waters of regeneration to the realms of pure and unmingled
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blessedness. The example and reputation of Constantine led many thus to
delay their baptism, though the clergy testified against the practice.
Tertullian. The testimony of this Father would prove that infants were
baptised in his day — he died about 240 — but that he was not favorable
to the practice: as he says, “But they whose duty it is to administer
baptism are to know that it must not be given rashly... Therefore according
to every man’s condition and disposition, and also their age, the delaying
of baptism is more profitable, especially in the case of little children. For
what need is there that the godfathers should be brought into danger?
because they either fail of their promises by death, or they may be
mistaken by a child’s proving of wicked disposition.”
Origen, in discoursing on the sin of our nature, alludes to baptism as the
appointed means for its removal. “Infants are baptised,” he says, “for the
forgiveness of sins. Of what sins? or when have they sinned? or how can
any reason of the laver in their case hold good, but according to that sense
that we mentioned even now: none is free from pollution, though his life
be but of the length of one day upon the earth? And it is for that reason,
because by the sacrament of baptism the pollution of our birth is taken
away, that infants are baptised.”
Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, about the year 253, received a letter from
one Fidus, a country bishop, inquiring whether an infant, before it was
eight days old, might be baptised if need required. The answer proves, not
only that infant baptism was then practiced, but the necessity of it in their
minds because of its efficacy. Cyprian, with sixty-six bishops in council,
says, “As to the case of infants; whereas you judge that they must not be
baptised within two or three days after they are born; and that the rule of
circumcision is to be observed, so that none should be baptised and
sanctified before the eighth day after he is born: we were all in our
assembly of the contrary opinion. For as for what you thought fitting to
be done, there was not one that was of your mind; but all of us, on the
contrary, judged that the grace and mercy of God is to be denied to no
person that is born. For whereas our Lord in His gospel says, ‘the Son of
man came not to destroy men’s lives, but to save them,’ so far as lies in
us, no soul, if possible, is to be lost,” etc.
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Gregory Nazianzen, bishop of Constantinople, was a Father of great
note about the year 380. He was the means of destroying the power of
Arianism in the Eastern capital, where it had been maintained in great
strength for nearly forty years. He had to encounter much opposition and
even persecution at first; but by degrees his eloquence, the practical and
serious tone of his teaching, and the influence of his godly life, began to
tell, and gained him a firm footing, though he never liked the imperial style
of the capital.
Dr. Wall quotes largely from Gregory on baptism; our extracts will be
brief. Like the rest of the Fathers, he is wild on this subject. “What say
you to those that are as yet infants, and are not in capacity to be sensible
of either the grace or the lack of it? Shall we baptise them too? Yes, by all
means, if any danger make it requisite. For it is better that they be
sanctified without their own sense of it, than that they should die unsealed
and uninitiated. And a ground of this to us is circumcision, which was
given on the eighth day, and was a typical seal, and was practiced on those
that had no use of reason.” Against the practice of delaying baptism till a
death-bed he speaks strongly and earnestly; comparing the service to the
washing of a corpse, rather than to christian baptism.
Basil, bishop of Caesarea, is constantly associated with the two
Gregories. Gregory of Nyssa was his brother; the other, his chief friend.
Cappadocia gave birth to the three Fathers. Basil was faithful to the
Athanasian creed during its days of depression and adversity, but did not
live to behold its final triumph. He died about 379. He was a great admirer
and a true example of monastic Christianity. He embraced the ascetic faith,
abandoned his property, and practiced such severe austerities as to injure
his health. He fled into the desert; his fame collected, as it were, a city
around him; he built a monastery, and monasteries sprang up on every
side.
His views of baptism are similar to those of his friend Gregory; he urges
the necessity of it from the same superstitious feeling that they all had. “If
Israel had not passed through the sea,” he says, “they had not got rid of
Pharaoh: and unless thou pass through the waters of baptism, thou shalt
not be delivered from the cruel tyranny of the devil,” etc. This he would
apply to all ages, and enforce it by the words of the Lord to Nicodemus,
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“Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the
Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”
Ambrose, bishop of Milan, like all the Fathers we have yet met with, is
thoroughly mistaken as to the meaning of John 3:5:
“Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit,
he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”
“You see,” he says, “that Christ excepts no person, not an infant, not even
one that is hindered by unavoidable accident.”
John, surnamed Chrysostom, which means the golden-mouthed; he
obtained this name from his smooth, flowing eloquence. He was such a
favourite of the people, that they used to say, “We had rather the sun
should not shine, than that John should not preach.” He was evidently in
favor of infant baptism, though it is not clear that he believed in original
sin. “For this cause we baptise infants also,” he says, “though they are not
defiled with sin; that there may be superadded to them saintship,
righteousness, adoption, inheritance, a brotherhood with Christ, and to be
made members with Him.” It would be difficult to say more as to the
alleged benefits of baptism than what we have here enumerated. But
extravagant as the whole sentence may seem, it has been the text of the
paedobaptists from that day to this. Most of our readers are familiar with
these words, “Baptism, wherein I was made a member of Christ, a child of
God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven.” These words are taken,
not from scripture, but from Chrysostom.
Dr. Wall is anxious to make it appear, that this great doctor was not
unsound as to original sin. He suggests that the meaning of his words may
be, “they are not defiled with their own actual sins.” But Chrysostom
does not say with their own, but that they are not defiled with sin. And
surely every child is defiled, as saith the Psalmist, “Behold, I was shapen
in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.” In vain do we look for
soundness on many of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity among
the Fathers; to say nothing of what they all overlooked, such as the
presence of the Holy Ghost in the assembly, the heavenly calling, and the
heavenly relations of the church, the difference between the house of God
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and the body of Christ, and the blessed hope, and the glorious appearing
of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ. (Titus 2:11-15.)

REFLECTIONS ON THE HISTORY OF INFANT BAPTISM

Enough, we believe, for our present purpose, has been said on the subject
of infant baptism. The reader has before him the testimony of the most
trustworthy witnesses for the first two hundred years of its history. The
practice seems to have taken its rise, and derived all its wondrous
influence, from a misinterpretation of John 3:5: “Except a man be born of
water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” It was
argued from this passage that baptism was necessary to salvation and all
the blessings of grace. The efficacy of the blood of Christ, the purifying
power of the word of God, and the gracious operations of the Holy Spirit,
were all attributed to the due observance of external baptism. And need we
wonder at the place it has held in the professing church these sixteen
hundred years, or at its mighty influence on all classes and all ages? though
many do not hold baptismal regeneration.
The ancient Christians, Dr. Wall afirms, without the exception of one man,
teach that these words of the Savior refer to baptism. Calvin, he believes,
was the first man that ever objected to this interpretation, or that refused
to accept it as teaching the necessity of baptism to salvation. Supposing
these statements to be correct, they prove, that the great ecclesiastical
fabric that arose out of baptism was founded on a misinterpretation. The
church of Rome, Lutherans, Greeks, and Anglicans, continue to follow the
Fathers in this misapplication of the truth. “Shall that,” says Hooker,
referring to Calvin’s new interpretation of John 3:5, “which hath always
received this and no other construction be now disguised with the toy of
novelty? God will have baptism embraced, not only as a sign or token of
what we receive, but also as an instrument or means whereby we receive
grace.” Bishop Burner also observes, speaking of the ancient times: “The
words of our Savior to Nicodemus were expounded so as to import the
absolute necessity of baptism in order to salvation. These words ‘the
kingdom of God,’ being taken to mean eternal glory, that expression of our
Savior’s was understood to import this, that no man could be saved unless
he were baptized,” etc. 3 Calvin taught, that the benefits of baptism were
limited to the children of the elect, and thus introduced the idea of
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hereditary Christianity. The Presbyterians follow Calvin; and, as a
consequence of his teaching, circumcision becomes both the warrant and
the rule of infant baptism. But some of our readers may be anxious to
know what we believe to be the true interpretation of John 3:5, seeing that
so much is built upon it.

WHAT IS THE TEACHING OF JOHN 3:5?

The expression “born of water,” we believe, in no way means baptism.
The new birth is the Savior’s theme; without which no man can see or
enter into the kingdom of God. It was not yet come visibly — “not with
observation” — but it was there among them, as God’s new sphere of
power and blessing. Flesh cannot even perceive this kingdom. Christ had
not come to teach and improve the flesh, as Nicodemus seemed to think;
but that man might be partaker of a divine nature which is imparted by the
Spirit. No mere external rite admits to the kingdom. There must be a new
nature or life suited to the new order of things. “And Jesus answered and
said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again,
he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Then the Lord shows Nicodemus the
only way of entering into the kingdom. “Except a man be born of water
and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” Water is here
used as the symbol of the cleansing and purifying power of the word of
God; as in Peter, “seeing that ye have purified your souls in obeying the
truth through the Spirit.” Here, the truth is spoken of as the instrument,
and the Spirit as the agent, in the new birth as he goes on to say, “Being
born again not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of
God.” Two things are necessary — the word and the Spirit. (1 Peter 1:22,
23.)
The passage obviously means the application of the word of God in the
power of the Spirit — operating in the heart, conscience, thoughts, and
actions; and thereby bringing in a new life from God, in which we have His
mind, and His thoughts about the kingdom. The following passages will
make it still plainer. “Of his own will begat He us with the word of truth.”
(James 1:18.) “That He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of
water by the word.” (Ephesians 5:26.) “Now ye are clean through the
word which I have spoken unto you.” (John 15:3.) Here we have the moral
cleansing or purifying of the soul, by the application of the word through
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the Spirit which judges all things, and which works in us new thoughts and
affections, suitable to the presence and glow of God.
As a question of interpretation, then, we see no allusion to baptism in
John 3:5: baptism may set forth that which is conveyed by it, but baptism
itself conveys nothing. On the other hand — according to the inspired
commentaries in the Epistles — baptism is the sign of death, not of giving
life, as the Fathers uniformly affirm. “Know ye not,” says the apostle,
“that so many of us as were baptised into Jesus Christ were baptised into
his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death.”
(Romans 6; Colossians 2; 1 Peter 3.) Besides it is perfectly plain that
Nicodemus could not possibly have known anything of proper christian
baptism, as it was not instituted by our Lord till after He arose from the
dead.

MODERN PAEDOBAPTISTS
The church of Rome and all who follow the Fathers confess that the origin
of their practice is tradition. But there are many in our day, as there have
been since the Reformation,4 who hold infant baptism from the writings of
the New Testament. The following are the principal passages they refer
to: “Suffer the little children to come unto Me, and forbid them not, for of
such is the kingdom of God.”…“Else were your children unclean; but now
are they holy.”... “For the promise is unto you, and to your children.”...
“Bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” And many
draw their arguments chiefly from the baptism of households, and from
the Abrahamic covenant: Mark 10; 1 Corinthians 7; Acts 2; Ephesians 6;
Acts 16; Genesis 17.
Anti-Paedobaptists, or “the Baptists,” as they call themselves, simply
affirm, that in all the allusions to baptism in the writings of the apostles, it
is uniformly coupled with faith in the gospel; and that such expressions as
“buried with Him by baptism,” and “planted together in the likeness of
His death,” etc., must mean, that the person so baptised has part with
Christ by faith. And, further, that as baptism is an ordinance of Christ, it
must of necessity be celebrated exactly as He appointed. Nothing, it is
said, but direct scripture ought to be the foundation of our faith and
practice in divine things. And since to the very being of baptism a subject
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to whom it must be administered is necessary, and a mode of
administering, without which it would only be a notion in the human mind,
these things, therefore, are as necessary as baptism itself. And hence it
follows that the true subjects, which are professed believers only, and the
true mode, which is immersion only, are necessary to true christian
baptism.5

THE ORIGIN OF INFANT COMMUNION

When superstition in general takes the place of faith, and human notions
the place of God’s word, where will even serious and enlightened men not
be carried! Augustine strongly advocated the practice of infant
communion. But it followed infant baptism as a necessary consequence.
The Fathers affirmed that the grace of God bestowed upon the subjects of
baptism was given without measure, and without any limitation as to age;
therefore, they reasoned, that the Lord’s supper might consistently be
administered to all who had been baptised, whether infants or adults. The
custom prevailed for many ages; it is still observed by the Greek church;
but we refrain from details. In general, the inward spiritual meaning and
true design of the Lord’s supper were greatly lost sight of; and the most
superstitious reverence was expressed for the external symbols of the
ordinance.

THE POSITION AND CHARACTER OF THE CLERGY

In studying the internal history of the church during the fourth century,
innumerable things crowd for a brief notice: but we can only refer to those
which characterise the period. The altered position of the clergy is an
important one, and will account for many changes that were introduced by
them. From the time of Constantine the members of the christian
ministry attained a new social position with certain secular advantages.
This led great numbers to join the sacred order from the most unworthy
motives. Hence the sorrowful influence of this unhallowed mixture on the
whole professing church. We constantly meet with it in the pride,
arrogance, luxury, and assumed dignity of the whole clerical order. Thus, it
is said that Martin of Tours, when at the court of Maximus, allowed the
Empress to wait on him at table; and that when the Emperor had desired
him to drink before him, and expected to receive the cup back after the
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bishop had drunk, Martin passed it to his own chaplain, as being higher in
honor than any earthly potentate. This circumstance shows us where the
clergy now were, what they thought of themselves and of spiritual dignity
in opposition to secular rank. The church had now become like “a great
house,” wherein “are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of
wood and of earth; and some to honor and some to dishonor.” And such it
has been ever since, and such it will be to the end; but the path of the
faithful is plain.
“If a man therefore purge himself from these, [the vessels to dishonor,]
he shall be a vessel unto honor, sanctified, and meet for the master’s
use, and prepared unto every good work.” (2 Timothy 2:20, 21.)

THE ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF MONASTICISM

Before we approach the period of “the Church of Thyatira,” it may be
well to notice the rise and growth of the early ascetic tendencies. The
influence of monasticism was indeed great during the dark ages, and
throughout the Western churches. Let us trace it to its source. It is well to
know the beginning of things, especially of important and influential
things.
During the violence of the Dectan persecution, about the year 251, many
Christians fled into voluntary exile. Among these was a young man named
Paul of Alexandria; who took up his abode in the desert of Thebais, or
Upper Egypt. By degrees he became attached to the mode of life he had
adopted from necessity; and is celebrated as the first christian hermit,
though without fame or influence at the time. Not so with his immediate
and great successor.
Antony, who is regarded as the father of monasticism, was born at Coma,
in Upper Egypt, about the year 251. In boyhood and youth, it is said, he
was thoughtful, serious, and of a retiring disposition. He cared little for
worldly learning, but desired earnestly the knowledge of divine things.
Before reaching the age of nineteen, he lost his parents, and came into
possession of considerable property. One day while in church, it so
happened that the gospel concerning the rich young man was read before
the assembly. Antony considered the words of the Savior as addressed
from heaven to himself:
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“Sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor and thou shalt
have treasure in heaven: and come, follow Me.” (Luke 18:22.)
He forthwith made over his land to the inhabitants of his village, turned
the rest of his estates into money, and gave all to the poor, except a small
portion which he reserved for the maintenance of his only sister. On
another occasion he was deeply impressed with the words of the Lord,
“Take therefore no thought for the morrow” (Matthew 6:25-34),
and taking these words in a literal sense, he parted with the remainder of
his property, placed his sister with a society of pious virgins, that he
might be free from all cares about earthly things and embraced a life of rigid
asceticism.
Antony is said to have visited Paul the hermit, and all the most famous
ascetics he could hear of, endeavoring to learn from each his distinguishing
virtue, and to combine all their graces in his own practice. He shut himself
up in a tomb, where he lived ten years. By excessive fastings, exhaustion,
and an over-excited imagination, he fancied himself beset by evil spirits,
with whom he had many and severe conflicts. Antony became famous.
Many visited the unnatural place of his abode in the hope of seeing him, or
of hearing the noise of his conflicts with the powers of darkness. But he
left his tomb, and dwelt in a ruined castle near the Red Sea for other
twenty years. He increased his mortifications with the view of overcoming
the evil spirits, but the same temptations and conflicts followed him.
Strange as it may seem, this remarkable and deluded man had a true heart
for Christ, and a tender heart for his people. The persecution under
Maximus (311) drew him from his cell to the public scenes in Alexandria.
His appearance produced a great effect. He attended on the sufferers,
exhorting them to unwavering confidence in their confession of Christ, and
manifested great love to the confessors in the prisons and in the mines. He
exposed himself in every way to danger, yet no one ventured to touch him.
A kind of inviolable sanctity was supposed to surround these unearthly,
ghostly-.looking men. When the fury of the persecution was past, he
escaped to a new place of solitude in the side of a lofty mountain. Here he
cultivated a small piece of ground; multitudes flocked to him; great
numbers imitated him. Mourners came to him to be comforted, the
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perplexed to be advised, and enemies to be reconciled. Miracles were
ascribed to him, his influence was boundless.
In the year 352, when he was a hundred years old, he appeared a second
time in Alexandria. This was to counteract the spread of Arianism, and
defend with all his influence the true orthodox faith. His appearance
produced a great sensation; multitudes thronged to see the monk — the
man of God, as he was called — and hear him preach; and many pagans
were converted to Christianity by his means. Antony and his monks were
steady and powerful supporters of the Nicene creed. He lived to the age of
a hundred and five, and died only a few days before Athanasius found a
refuge among the monks of the desert in 356.

THE VIRTUES AND FAILURES OF ANTONY

Antony was evidently sincere and honest, though utterly mistaken and
misled by the craft and power of Satan. In place of acting upon the
Savior’s commission to His disciples, “Go ye into all the world and preach
the gospel to every creature,” or following His example who went about
doing good, he thought to attain to a more elevated spirituality by
withdrawing from mankind, and devoting himself to austerity of life, and
to uninterrupted communion with heaven. He was a Christian, but utterly
ignorant of the nature and object of Christianity. Holiness in the flesh was
his one grand object; though the apostle had said, “In me — that is, in my
flesh — dwelleth no good thing.” Therefore all was failure, utter failure; as
it ever must be, if we think there is any good thing in human nature, or try
to become better in ourselves. In place of sanctifying his nature by fastings
and idleness, he found that every evil passion was excited to greater
activity.
“Hence, in his solitude,” says Neander, “he had to endure many
conflicts with sense, which, in some active vocation demanding the
exertion of all his powers, might perhaps have been avoided. The
temptations he had to battle with were so much the more
numerous and powerful, as he was given to idle self-occupation, as
he busied himself in fighting down the impure images that were
constantly coming in from the abyss of corruption within his heart,
instead of forgetting himself in worthier employments, or in
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looking away to the everlasting source of purity and holiness. At a
later period, Antony, with a conviction grounded on long years of
experience, acknowledged this, and said to his monks, ‘Let us not
busy our imaginations in painting spectres of evil spirits; let us not
trouble our minds as if we were lost. Let us rather be comforted
and cheerful at all times, as those who have been redeemed; and let
us be mindful that the Lord is with us who has conquered them and
made them nothing. Let us ever remember that, if the Lord is with
us, the enemy can do us no harm. The spirits of evil appear
different to us, according to the different moods of mind in which
they find us... But if they find us joyful in the Lord, occupied in
the contemplation of future blessedness and of the things of the
Lord, reflecting that everything is in the Lord’s hand, and that no
evil spirit can do any harm to the Christian, they turn away in
confusion from the soul which they see preserved by such good
thoughts.’”6
It is perfectly plain from these counsels to his monks, that Antony was
not only a sincere Christian, but that he had a good knowledge of the Lord
and of redemption, though so completely turned aside by a deceived heart.
We are never safe unless moving on the direct lines of the truth of God.
The system which this man introduced in his false dreams of perfection in
the flesh, became, in process of time, the very hot-bed of profligacy and
vice. And thus it continued for more than a thousand years. It was not
until the sixteenth century, that the divine light of the blessed
Reformation, bursting upon a scene of dense moral darkness, revealed the
deep-seated corruption and the flagrant enormities of the different
monastic orders. The monks at that time, like swarms of locusts, covered
all Europe; they proclaimed everywhere, as history informs us, the
obedience due to holy mother church, the reverence due to the saints, and
more especially to the Virgin Mary, the efficacy of relics, the torments of
purgatory, and the blessed advantages arising from Indulgences. But as the
monks lost their popularity and influence at the Reformation, a new order
was necessary to fill their place and do their evil work: and such was
found in the Society of Jesus founded by Ignatius Loyola — the Jesuits.
But we must take another glance at the early history of monasticism.
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THE FIRST SOCIETY OF ASCETICS
The earliest form in which the ascetic spirit developed itself in the
christian church was not in the formation of societies or communities, as
we find in later times, but in the seclusion of single individuals. They
believed, however mistaken, that they had a special call to strive after a
higher christian life; and in order to attain this eminent holiness, they
imposed upon themselves the most severe restraints. They retired to
desert places, that they might give themselves up to close meditation on
divine things, and that their minds might be entirely abstracted from all
natural objects, and from whatever delights the senses. Both men and
women supposed that they must emaciate their bodies with watchings,
fasting, toil, and self-torture. As the poor body was considered an
oppressive load and hindrance to their spiritual aspirations, they vied with
each other in the extent to which they could carry their self-mortifications.
They existed on the coarsest and most unwholesome diet: they sometimes
abstained from food and sleep till nature was almost wholly exhausted.
The contagion of this new device of Satan spread far and wide. The
mysterious recluse was regarded as necessarily invested with peculiar
sanctity. The hermit’s cell was visited by the noble, the learned, the
devout — all desirous to pay homage to the holy man of God; and thus
spiritual pride was engendered by the flattery of the world. From this time
the monastic life was held in such esteem, that many adopted it as a highly
honorable employment; and afterwards formed themselves into
communities, or monastic institutions.
Pachomius, who was, like Antony, a native of Thebais, was converted to
Christianity in the early part of the fourth century. After practising
austerities for some time, he was told by an angel in his dreams, that he
had made sufficient progress in the monastic life, and must now become a
teacher of others. Pachomius then founded a society on an island of the
Nile. Thus began ascetics to live in an association. The institution soon
extended, so that before the founder’s death it embraced eight monasteries,
with three thousand monks; and in the beginning of the following century
the number of monks was no less than fifty thousand. They lived in cells,
each of which contained three. They were under engagements of absolute
obedience to the commands of the Abbot, or father. They wore a peculiar
dress, the chief article of which was a goat-skin, in imitation of Elijah,
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who, with John the Baptist, was regarded as exemplifying the monastic
condition. They were never to undress; they slept with their clothes on,
and in chairs so constructed as to keep them almost in a standing posture.
They prayed many times a day, fasted on the fourth and sixth days of the
week, and communicated on the Sabbath and on the Lord’s day. Their
meals were eaten in silence, and with their hoods drawn over their faces, so
that no one could see his neighbor. They employed themselves in
agriculture and various forms of industry, and had all things in common, in
imitation of the first Christians after the day of Pentecost.7 Pachomius
founded similar societies for women.

THE MONASTERIES AND THE ROMAN PONTIFF

Until nearly the close of the fifth century, the monasteries were placed
under the superintendence of the bishops; the monks were regarded as
simply laymen, and had no claim to be ranked among the sacerdotal order.
Circumstances, however, in course of time, led the monks to assume a
clerical character. Many of them were occupied in the work of reading and
expounding the scriptures, and all of them were supposed to be engaged in
the cultivation of the higher spiritual life; so that they were in great favor
with the multitude, especially as they began to exercise their clerical
functions beyond the confines of their establishments. Jealousies soon
sprung up between the bishops and the abbots: the result was, that the
abbots, to deliver themselves from dependence upon their spiritual rivals,
made application to be taken under the protection of the Pope at Rome.
The proposal was gladly accepted, and very quickly all the monasteries,
great and small, abbeys, priories, and nunneries, were subjected to the
authority of the See of Rome. This was an immense step towards the
pontifical power of Rome.
The Pope could now establish in almost every quarter a kind of spiritual
police, who acted as spies on the bishops as well as on the secular
authorities. This event is carefully to be noted, if we would watch the
ways and means of the rising power, and ultimate supremacy, of the
Roman Pontiff.
The monastic system soon spread far beyond the borders of Egypt: and all
the great teachers of the age, both in the East and in the West, advocated
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the cause of celibacy and monasticism. St. Jerome, in particular, the most
learned man of his day, is regarded as the connecting link between the two
great divisions of the church — the Greek and the Roman, or the Eastern
and the Western. He was the means of powerfully forwarding the cause of
celibacy and monasticism, especially among females. Many Roman ladies
of rank became nuns through his influence. Ambrose so extolled virginity
in his sermons, that the mothers of Milan restrained their daughters from
attending his ministry; but crowds of virgins from other quarters flocked
to him for consecration. Basil introduced monastic life into Pontus and
Cappadocia; Martin, into Gaul; Augustine, into Africa; and Chrysostom
was prevented by the wisdom of his mother from retiring in his youth to a
remote hermitage in Syria.
Before leaving this subject it may be well, once for all, to notice the rise
and establishment of nunneries.

THE ORIGIN OF FEMALE RECLUSES

From an early period of the history of the church we read of devout
virgins, who professed religious chastity, and dedicated themselves to the
service of Christ. Their duties and devotions were self-imposed, so that
they might preserve their domestic relations, or enter without scandal into
the state of marriage. But the origin of communities of female recluses is
attributed to Pachomius, the great founder of the regular monastic
systems. Before his death, which took place about the middle of the fourth
century, no fewer than twenty-seven thousand females in Egypt alone had
adopted the monastic life. The rules which he formed for the convents of
nuns were similar to those which bound the monks. “They lived from
common funds, used a common dormitory, a table, and wardrobe. The
same religious services were prescribed; habitual temperance and
occasional fasting were enjoined with the same severity. Manual labor was
no less rigidly enforced; but instead of the agricultural toil imposed upon
their ‘brethren,’ to them were committed the easier tasks of the needle or
the distaff. By duties so numerous, by occupations admitting so great
variety, they beguiled the tediousness of the day, and the dulness of
monastic seclusion.”8
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It is certain that many such establishments were founded during the fourth
century, and that they were propagated throughout Egypt, Syria, Pontus,
and Greece, and that gradually they penetrated into every province where
the name of Christ was known; and even until now they abound in all
Roman Catholic countries, and form a strange and incongruous appendage
to the church.

THE CEREMONY OF TAKING THE VOW

The cruel and merciless spirit of popery is painfully felt, even by her own
members, at the consecration of a nun. It is unnatural, unscriptural, an
outrage on every feeling of our humanity, ruinous both to soul and body,
and could only be submitted to through the blinding power of Satan. What
a mercy to be far away from her unaccountable influence and fatal
delusions! The following description of the ceremonial of a novice taking
the vows, is from the pen of an eye-witness of the scene as it took place in
Rome; slightly abridged.
“By particular favor we had been furnished with billets for the best
seats, and, after waiting about half-an-hour, two footmen in rich
liveries made way for the young countess, who entered the
crowded church in full dress, her dark hair blazing with diamonds.
Supported by her mother she advanced to the altar. The officiating
priest was Vicario; the discourse from the pulpit was pronounced
by a Dominican monk, who addressed her as the affianced spouse
of Christ — a saint on earth, one who had renounced the vanities
of the world for a foretaste of the joys of heaven.
“The sermon ended, the lovely victim herself, kneeling before the
altar at the feet of the cardinal, solemnly abjured the world whose
pleasures and affections she seemed so well calculated to enjoy,
and pronounced those vows which severed her from them for ever.
As her voice softly chanted those fatal words, I believe there was
scarcely an eye in the whole of that vast church unmoistened with
tears. The diamonds that sparkled in her hair were taken off, and
her long and beautiful tresses fell luxuriantly down her shoulders.
“The grate that was to entomb her was opened. The abbess and her
black train of nuns appeared. Their choral voices chanted a strain
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of welcome. It said, or seemed to say, ‘sister spirit, come away!’
She renounced her name and title, adopted a new appellation,
received the solemn benediction of the cardinal, and the last
embraces of her weeping friends, and passed into that bourne from
whence she was never to return. A panel behind the other now
opened, and she appeared at the grate again. Here she was
despoiled of her ornaments and her splendid attire, her beautiful
hair was mercilessly severed from her head by the fatal shears of
the sisters; enough to make the whole congregation shudder. As she
was shorn of her natural covering, the sisters hastened to invest her
with the sober robes of the nun, the white coif and the noviciate
veil.
“Throughout the whole ceremony she showed great calmness and
firmness; and it was not till all was over that her eyes were
moistened with tears of natural emotion. She afterwards appeared
at the little postern gate of the convent, to receive the sympathy
and praise and congratulations of all her friends and acquaintances,
nay, even of strangers, all of whom are expected to pay their
compliments to the new spouse of heaven.”9
The description now given refers to the profession of a nun on the taking
of the white veil, a step which forms the commencement of the noviciate or
year of trial, and is not irrevocable. The ceremony of taking the black veil
at the end of the year is still more solemn and dreadful; but when it has
been gone through, she is a recluse for life, and can only be released from
her vow by death. In the eye of Roman law, both civil and ecclesiastical,
the step she has taken is beyond recall. Imprisonment, torture, death
temporal and eternal, are held out as the punishments of disobedience.
And who can tell, outside the convent walls, what refined and prolonged
cruelties may be practiced inside? The power is despotic; there is no
appeal; until the deceiver and the deceived, the persec~’tor and the
helpless victim, stand side by side before the righteous tribunal of God.

REFLECTIONS ON THE PRINCIPLES OF ASCETICISM

It is truly sorrowful to reflect on the many and serious mistakes, or rather
positive errors, of the great doctors, or early fathers as they are usually
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called. We know of nothing more grave and solemn than the fact, that they
greatly misled the people then, and that by their writings they have been
misleading the professing church ever since. Who can estimate the evil
consequences of such teaching for the last fourteen hundred years at least?
The misinterpretation or the misapplication of the word of God is
evidently the rule with these leaders; to teach sound doctrine, the
exception. And still they are the boast and the alleged authority of a large
portion of Christendom even until now.
On the subject of asceticism, any one having an ordinary acquaintance
with scripture may see their ignorance of the mind of God, and their
perversion of His word. We are exhorted, for example, to “mortify the
deeds of the body,” but never to mortify the body itself. The body is the
Lord’s, and to be cared for. “Know ye not,” says the apostle, “that your
bodies are the members of Christ?” True, they are to be kept under and
brought into subjection, but that is the wisest way of caring for the body.
(Romans 8:13; 1 Corinthians 6:15; 9:27.) Again, the apostle says,
“Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth;” and then he
states what these are: “fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil
concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” These are the deeds
of the body which we are to mortify — to put to death practically; and
this on the ground that the flesh was put to death on the cross. “They that
are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts;” not,
observe are crucifying it, or ought to crucify it, but have crucified it. God
has put it out of His sight by the cross, and we are to keep it out of sight
by self-judgment. The body, on the contrary, has in the New Testament a
most important place as the temple of the Holy Ghost; but the tendency
of asceticism is to starve the body, and feed the flesh.
“Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will-worship, and
humility, and neglecting of the body; not in any honor to the
satisfying of the flesh.” (Colossians 2:23.)
The Fathers seem to have overlooked that asceticism was the offspring of
heathen philosophy, and not in any way of divine Christianity; but they
never fairly looked into scripture for the mind of God on these subjects.
The total ruin of man in the flesh not being understood by them, they
vainly thought it might be improved, and were thus led astray in ways
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innumerable; especially as to the work of Christ, God’s judgment of the
flesh, the true principle of worship, and the whole path of christian
service.
Having now seen the foundation laid of the great monastic system, which
was to exert so powerful an influence in connection with Christianity,
literature, and civilization, throughout the dark ages, we may leave it for
the present, and return to our general history.

ARCADIUS AND HONORIUS, A.D. 395

Theodosius the Great left two sons, Arcadius, aged eighteen years, and
Honorius, who was only eleven. The elder succeeded to the sovereignty
of the East, the younger to that of the West. Nothing can be more striking
than the condition of the Roman world at this moment, or more fitted to
excite our compassion: two Emperors of such weakness as to be incapable
of conducting the administration of public affairs, and the whole empire in
a state of danger and alarm from the Gothic invaders. The hand of the Lord
is manifestly here. Where is now the genius, the glory, and the power of
Rome? They expired with Theodosius. At a moment when the empire
required the prudence, the martial skill, and the talents of a Constantine, it
was professedly governed by two imbecile princes. But its days were
numbered in the providence of God, it was fast passing away.
The fiercest storm that had ever assailed the empire was now ready to
burst upon it in its hour of weakness. The able general, Stilicho, the only
hope of Rome, was assassinated soon after the death of Theodosius, and
all Italy lay within the grasp of the barbarians. The Goths had yielded to
the arms and especially to the policy of Theodosius, but it needed only
the news of his death to arouse them to revolt and revenge. The famous
Alaric, the crafty and able leader of the Goths, only waited for a favorable
opportunity to carry out a scheme of greater magnitude and daring than
had entered into the mind of any of Rome’s enemies since the time of
Hannibal. He was, we doubt not, the minister of God’s righteous
judgments on a people so deeply stained with the blood of His saints,
besides having crucified the Lord of glory, and slain His apostles. Details
we must leave to the civil historian of Rome’s decline and fall: but we may
briefly say, that Alaric was now followed, not only by the Goths, but by
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tribes of almost every name and race. The fury of the desert was now to
be poured out on the mistress and corrupter of the world. He led his forces
into Greece without opposition; he devastated its fruitful land, and
plundered Athens, Corinth, Argos, and Sparta; and that which was
impiously called “the eternal city,” he besieged and sacked. For six days
she was given up to remorseless slaughter and universal pillage. Thus fell
the guilty, the devoted, city by the judgment of God: no hand held out to
help: no man lamenting her fate. The richest provinces of Europe too,
Italy, Gaul, and Spain, were laid waste by the immediate successors of
Alaric, especially Attila, and new kingdoms set up by the barbarians.
Thus the history of the fourth great world-empire closes about A .D . 478,
and in the twelve hundred and twenty-ninth year from the foundation of
Rome.
Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, a prince alike excellent in the arts of
war and of government, restored an age of peace and prosperity, swept
away all vestiges of the imperial government, and formed Italy into a
kingdom.10

REFLECTIONS ON THE CALAMITIES OF ROME

The christian reader may here find it profitable to pause for a moment and
contemplate the overthrow of the Western empire, and the division of its
territory amongst the various hordes of the barbarians. It is our privilege
and for our edification in all this, to see the fulfillment and harmony of
scripture, the overruling providence of God, and the accomplishment of
His purposes. We can also afford to drop the tear of compassion over the
miseries of our deluded fellow-men. This would be nothing more than the
tender compassion of Him who wept over the devoted city Jerusalem. It is
our duty to study history by the sure light of scripture; not scripture —
as some have attempted — by the uncertain light of history. Thus we may
be happy in the presence of God with the page of history open before us,
and our faith strengthened by the mighty contrast between the kingdom of
God and all earthly glory. “Wherefore,” says the apostle,
“we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace,
whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly
fear.” (Hebrews 12:28.)
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The superiority of Christianity to the most powerful of Pagan institutions
was now manifest to all. When the overwhelming judgments of God fell
upon Italy, and broke in pieces the iron rule of the empire, the church
suffered no harm. It was rather shielded, and the means of shielding others,
than exposed to danger. Like the ark which rose above the dark waters of
the deluge, the church was preserved from the fury of the invader. There
was no instance of the barbarians embracing the old religion of Greece and
Rome; they either adhered to the superstitions of their ancestors, or
adopted some form of Christianity. There is no sure footing for the sinner
amidst the convulsions of earth, the rise and fall of empires, but the Rock
of Ages-the risen and exalted Christ of God. “Blessed are all they that put
their trust in Him.” (Psalm 2:12.) The Lord provided for the safety of His
people by the previous conversation of those who subverted the empire.

THE CONVERSION OF THE BARBARIANS

It is always interesting and edifying to trace the hand of the Lord in
turning the wrath of man to His own praise, and in bringing the greatest
good to His own people out of that which appears to be their heaviest
calamity. In the reign of Gallienus, about 268, a great number of Roman
provincials had been led away into captivity by the Gothic bands; many
of these captives were Christians, and several belonged to the ecclesiastical
order. They were dispersed by their masters as slaves in the villages; but
as missionaries by the Lord. They preached the gospel to the barbarous
people, and numbers were converted. Their increase and order may be
inferred from the fact that they were represented at the Nicene council by
a bishop, named Theophilus.
Ulphilas, who is commonly called “the Apostle of the Goths,” has
deserved the grateful remembrance of posterity, but especially of
Christians. About the middle of the fourth century, he invented an
alphabet and translated the scriptures into the Gothic language, with the
exception of the books of Samuel and Kings, lest their warlike contents
should be found too congenial to the ferocity of the barbarians. At first
they appear to have been simple and orthodox in their faith, but
afterwards became deeply tinged with Arianism, especially after the Arian
ministers, who were ejected from their churches by Theodosius, had
labored diligently among them.
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Alaric and his Goths were professed Christians; they directed their wrath
against the heathen temples, but greatly reverenced the churches. This was
the great mercy of God to His people; numbers of whom fled to the
churches, where they found a sanctuary. The earnest faith and the
indefatigable zeal of Ulphilas, together with his blameless life, had gained
the love and confidence of the people. They received in faith the doctrines
of the gospel, which he preached and practiced: so that the first invaders
of the empire had previously learnt in their own land to profess, or at least
to respect, the religion of the vanquished. And herein we see the truth, or
rather the fulfillment of the Apostle’s words in his Epistle to the Romans:
“The gospel of Christ is the power of God unto salvation to every one
that believeth; to the Jew first and also to the Greek;” and again, “I am
debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians; both to the wise and the
unwise.” The learned citizens of the Roman empire, and the rude
inhabitants of Scythia and Germany, were alike brought under the saving
power of the gospel.

THE CONVERSION OF CLOVIS

As the conversion of Clovis is said to have been the most important in the
fifth century, we must give a few particulars of the event — important, we
mean, as to its consequences, both immediate and remote, on the history
of Europe, and so far of the church.
The Franks, a people of Germany, had settled in the north of France, near
Cambray; a most religious part of the country, rendered famous by the
shrine of Saint Martin of Tours, and by the legendary virtues of other
saints. Clovis was a pagan, but Clotilda, his wife, had embraced the
Catholic faith. She had long urged him to become a Christian, but he was
slow to believe. At length, however, when engaged in battle with the
Alemanni, and finding himself in danger, he thought of Clotilda’s God, and
prayed to Him; declaring that his old gods had failed him, and vowing to
become a Christian if he should gain the victory. The tide of battle turned;
his enemies were defeated; and true to his vow, at Christmas, 496, Clovis
was baptised at Rheims by the bishop, Remigius. Three thousand warriors
followed his example, declaring their readiness to be of the same religion as
their king.
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Here we have another Constantine. Clovis found the profession of
Christianity most favorable to his political interests, but it produced no
change for the better in his life. His object was conquest, his ambition was
boundless, his deeds were daring and cruel. From being only a Frankish
chief with a small territory, he became the founder of the great French
monarchy. And from his confession of the Catholic faith, and his alliance
with the Roman Pontiff, he was acknowledged champion of Catholicism,
and declared to be the only orthodox sovereign in the West: all the others
were Arians. Alaric who conquered Rome, Genseric who conquered
Africa, Theodoric the Great who became king of Italy, and many of the
Lombard kings, were Arians. Hence the kings of France derive from Clovis
the title of “eldest Son of the Church.”
To the student of prophecy it is interesting to see, that by this time at
least five or six barbarian kings were in possession of the Roman
provinces, and ruled over what had been the Latin empire. But this had
passed away. It had died as an empire, and must remain in the place of
death until resuscitated, according to the word of the Lord, in the latter
day. (Revelation 13, 17.)
Before concluding the Pergamos period, we find it will be necessary to
notice, however briefly, three things — the internal state of the church, the
Pelagian and Nestorian controversies.

RITES AND CEREMONIES

The more general adoption of Christianity, as will easily be imagined, was
followed by an increase of splendor in all that concerned the worship of
God, so-called. Churches were built and adorned with greater cost; the
officiating clergy were attired in richer dresses; the music became more
elaborate, and many new ceremonies were introduced. And these usages
were then justified on the same ground that we find the high church party
justifying the extraordinary rites and ceremonies of the present day. 11 It
was intended to recommend the gospel to the heathen by ceremonies
which might surpass those of their old religion. Multitudes were drawn
into the church then, as they are now, without any sufficient
understanding of their new position, and with minds still possessed of
heathen notions, and corrupted by heathen morality. Even in the earliest
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days of Christianity we find irregularities in the church at Corinth through
the unforgot-ten practices of the heathen. The burning of candles in
daylight, incense, images, processions, lustrations, and innumerable other
things, were introduced in the fourth and fifth centuries. For, as Mosheim
observes, “While the good-will of the Emperors aimed to advance the
christian religion, the indiscreet piety of the bishops obscured its true
nature and oppressed its energies, by the multiplication of rites and
ceremonies.”12

THE DEGENERATING INFLUENCE OF RITUALISM

The tendency of all ecclesiastical ritualism is to produce a spirit of
superstition to the subversion of faith, of mere formality to the guidance
of the Holy Spirit, and of resting in our own good works to the rejection of
the finished work of Christ. The word of God is thus practically set aside,
the Holy Spirit grieved, and the heart laid open to the inroads of Satan.
When faith is in lively exercise, the word of God strictly followed, and the
promised guidance of the Comforter relied upon, the soul is strong and
vigorous in the divine life, and the suggestions of the enemy unheeded.
Satan is a keen observer of the different states of the believer’s soul, and of
the professing church. He knows when he will be successful in his
attempts against the individual believer or the church; he waits his time —
he watches his opportunity. When he sees the mind taking a wrong
direction, he soothes, flatters, stimulates. Solemn thought for us all!

THE PELAGIAN HERESY

The condition of the church in the beginning of the fifth century gave the
adversary an opportunity to bring in a new heresy, which introduced a
fresh controversy that has continued with more or less violence from that
day even until now. This was Pelagianism. The great heresy, Arianism,
which had hitherto agitated the church, originated in the East and related to
the Godhead of Christ; one was now to arise in the West, which had for its
subject the nature of man after the fall and his relations to God. The last
misrepresented the lost sinner; the first, the divine Savior.
Pelagius is said to have been a monk of the great monastery of Bangor, in
Wales; and probably the first Briton who distinguished himself as a
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theologian. His real name was Morgan. His follower, Celestius, is
supposed to have been a native of Ireland. Augustine speaks of him as
younger than Pelagius — bolder and less crafty. These two companions in
error visited Rome, where they became intimate with many persons of
ascetic and saintly reputation, and disseminated their opinions with
caution and in privacy; but after the siege in the year 410 they passed into
Africa, where they more openly advanced their opinions.
It does not appear that Pelagius was animated by any desire to form a new
doctrinal system, but rather to oppose what he considered moral
indolence, and a worldly spirit among his brethren. Hence he maintained
that man possessed inherent power for doing the will of God, and for
reaching the highest degree of holiness. In this way his theological views
were to a great extent formed and determined. But utterly false as they are,
they were only consistent with his rigid asceticism, and its native fruit. As
scripture undeniably refers all good in man to the grace of God, Pelagius
too, in a sense of his own, acknowledges this; but his ideas of divine grace
were really nothing more than outward means to call forth man’s efforts: a
work of heavenly grace in the heart, and the operations of the Holy Spirit
he did not think were needed. This led him to teach that the sin of our first
parents had injured no one but themselves; that man is now born as
innocent as Adam was when God created him, and possessed of the same
moral power and purity. These doctrines, and such as are connected with
them, especially the idea of man’s free will — “an unbiassed power of
choosing between good and evil,” Pelagius and his colleague, Celestius,
secretly disseminated in Rome, Sicily, Africa, and Palestine; but, excepting
in the East, the novel opinions were generally condemned. There, John,
bishop of Jerusalem, who considered the doctrines of Pelagius as agreeing
with the opinions of Origen, to which John was attached, patronised
Pelagius, allowing him to profess his sentiments freely, and to gather
disciples.13

AUGUSTINE AND DIVINE GRACE

Augustine the famous bishop of Hippo, the great evangelic light of the
West, and the most influential of all the Latin christian writers, began
about this time to assail with his pen the doctrines of Pelagius and
Celestius; and to him chiefly is due, as God’s instrument, the credit of
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checking the growth of this sect at that time. By a remarkable conversion,
and by deep exercise of soul, he had been trained under the Lord’s
discipline for this great work. Thus did the all-wise God secretly raise up a
testimony in opposition to Pelagius, and by means of his heresy, bring out
more scriptural views of the gospel of grace than had been taught since the
days of the apostles; and also fuller views of christian truth, holiness and
humility. The Western churches, led on by Augustine, continued
perseveringly to assail the false doctrines with councils, books, and letters.
The Gauls, the Britons, and even the Palestinians, by their councils, and
the Emperors by their laws and penalties, so far crushed the controversy
in its commencement; but the fundamental principles of Pelagianism in
many forms and degrees remain to the present time. Rather, however, than
pursue the history of this heresy, we will briefly refer to what the
scriptures teach on the two main points of the subject.

REFLECTIONS ON THE CONDITION OF MAN

AND THE GRACE OF GOD
If mere human reason be allowed in this controversy, it must be
interminable; but if the authority of the word of God be owned, it is soon
settled. That there is something good in fallen human nature, and that man,
as such, has power to choose what is good and reject what is evil, lies at
the root of Pelagianism in its numerous forms. The total ruin of man is
denied, and all ideas of divine grace that appear inconsistent with man’s
free will are excluded from their system. But what saith the scripture? A
single line of God’s word satisfies the man of faith. And this ought to be
the only argument of the teacher, the evangelist, and the private Christian.
We must always take the ground of faith against all adversaries.
In Genesis 6 God gives His estimate of fallen human nature. “And God
saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every
imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” God
could find nothing in man but evil, and evil without cessation. Again, in the
same chapter, we read, “And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it
was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.” Not
some flesh, observe, but all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
Here we have God’s judgment of corrupt nature; but at the same time, He
reveals His sovereign grace to meet the condition of man as thus judged.
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God provides an ark of salvation, and then sends forth the free invitation,
— “Come thou and all thy house into the ark.” The cross is the standing
witness, and the grand expression, of the great truths shadowed forth by
the ark. There we have in a way, as nowhere else, God’s judgment of
human nature with all its evil; and at the same time, the revelation of His
love and grace in all their fullness and saving power.14
But all scripture is consistent with Genesis 6 and the cross of Christ.
Take, for example, Romans 5 and Ephesians 2. In the former we are said to
be “without strength,” but in the latter, that we are “dead,” dead in
trespasses and sins. The apostle, in an earlier part of his Epistle to the
Romans, most carefully proves the ruin of man and the righteousness of
God; here we have His love displayed in the great fact of the death of
Christ for us. “For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ
died for the ungodly.” But why say the “due time”? Because man had
been fully proved to be not only “ungodly,” but “without strength” to do
one good thing Godward, or move one step in that direction. Under the
law God showed man the way, appointed means, and gave him a long trial;
but he was powerless to come out of his sad condition as a sinner. How
humbling, but how wholesome, the truth of God! It is good to know our
lost condition. How different from the false theology, and the proud
philosophy of men! But on God’s part, blessed be His name, man’s state
(so demonstrated) was just the opportunity for the manifestation of His
saving grace; and for such Jesus died. “God commendeth His love toward
us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Now man has to
do either with God’s judgment in unbelief, or with His salvation by faith.
There is no middle path. The fullest proof of our lost condition and of
God’s gracious love is,
“that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:6-10.)
In Ephesians 2 it is not merely a question of man’s moral disease, but of
his death. “You hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins.”
In Romans man is viewed as powerless, godless, a sinner, and an enemy;
here, as morally dead: and this is the worst kind of death, for it is the very
spring of the most active wickedness. “Wherein in time past ye walked
according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power
of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience.”
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What a blow to man’s boasted unbiassed power of choosing between good
and evil! Here, on the contrary, he is viewed as under the government of
demons — as the slave of Satan. Man will much more readily admit that
he is godless than that he is powerless. He will boast of having his own
opinion — of being independent and quite able to judge and choose for
himself in spiritual things.
It was one of the favorite dogmas of Pelagius, if not the foundation of his
system, “That as man has ability to sin, so has he also not only ability to
discern what is good, but likewise power to desire it and to perform it.
And this is the freedom of the will, which is so essential to man that he
cannot lose it.” We refer to this false notion, simply because it so cleaves
to the natural mind, and is most difficult to get rid of even after we are
converted, being always a great hindrance to the work of God’s grace in
the soul. Since man is dead in his sins, God and His own work must be
everything. Of course there is great variety amongst men naturally, when
they are “fulfilling the desires of the flesh, and of the mind.” Some are
benevolent and moral, some living in gross and open wickedness, and some
may be gratifying a kind and feeling heart: but from what motive? To do
the will of God? Certainly not! God is not in all their thoughts. They are
energized by the spirit of Satan, and driven by him according to the course
of this world.
“No servant can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one,
and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the
other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” (Luke 16:13.)

HOW IS MAN RESPONSIBLE?

But where, it may be asked, and in what way does man’s responsibility
come in? Surely man is responsible to own that God is true, and to accept
as just, however humiliating, His judgment of his nature and character. “If
we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater.” Take up the
dark picture which God has drawn of man, and say, That is myself, that is
what I have done and what I am. Salvation is by faith; not by willing,
choosing, doing, but by believing.
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have
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everlasting life. For God sent not His Son into the world to
condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be
saved... And this is the condemnation that light is come into the
world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their
deeds were evil.” (John 3:16-19.)
Who can fail to see that a responsibility is created by this display of
divine goodness in Christ, and that of the most abvious, solemn, and
weighty character? So much so indeed, that the evidence is decisive and
final, and the unbeliever judged before God. It is not a question, observe,
of their not finding forgiveness, but of their preferring darkness to light,
that they may continue in sin. This is what God lays to their charge, and
could there be a more just or reasonable ground of condemnation?
Impossible. May it be the happy lot of all who read these pages to bow to
the humiliating sentence of scripture upon our nature, and to take the
ground of lost sinners in the sight of God. So shall an all-merciful and
gracious God meet us in the greatness of His love, and bless us with all
that is due to Christ as the Savior of mankind.

THE NESTORIANS
As the sect, called Nestorians, occupies an important place in church
history, we must briefly notice its formation. They are sometimes called
Syrians, their founder being a Syrian. They are numerous, we believe in
Syria at the present time; but they have not received from the Turkish
government that protection to which they are entitled; and hence they
have been exposed to frequent assaults from the predatory tribes.
Thousands of the Nestorians in the mountains of Kurdistan, including
men, women, and children, were massacred in 1843, and their villages
utterly destroyed, by the Kurdish tribes. Since the year 1834 an
interesting mission has been established among them by the American
Board of Foreign Missions. The character and proceedings of the mission
are highly spoken of. Dr. Grant, one of the missionaries, who resided
among the Nestortans for a considerable time, and had studied their
manners and customs with the greatest minuteness and care, published a
treatise with the view of proving that this interesting class of people are
the descendants of the lost ten tribes of Israel. But his conclusions, like
others on the same subject, may well be doubted.15
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Nestorius, a Syrian monk, became a presbyter of the church at Antioch.
He was esteemed and celebrated on account of the rigid austerity of his
life, and the impressive fervor of his preaching. He attracted large and
attentive audiences, and soon became a great favourite with the people. In
the year 428 he was consecrated patriarch of Constantinople. But the
discipline of the cloister had ill prepared him for so important a position in
public life. No sooner was he promoted to this elevation than he began to
display an intemperate zeal against the various descriptions of heretics,
which partook more of the bigotry of the monk than of the gentle
forbearing spirit of genuine Christianity. In his inaugural discourse,
addressing the Emperor, Theodosius the younger, he gave utterance to
these violent expressions, “Give me a country purged of all heretics, and in
exchange for it I will give you heaven. Help me to subdue the heretics, and
I will help you to subdue the Persians.” But it was not long till Nestorius
himself was also accused of heresy.
The new bishop soon followed up his declaration of war against the
heretics by deeds of violence and persecution. He excited tumults among
the people: the Arians were attacked, their meeting-house burnt down; and
other sects were persecuted. Such proceedings, however, soon raised up
against Nestorius, even amongst the orthodox, a numerous host of
enemies, who sought and soon accomplished his downfall. It happened in
this way.

ANASTASIUS AND MARIOLATRY

Anastasius, a presbyter who had accompanied Nestorius from Antioch,
and was his intimate friend, attacked, in a public discourse, the use of the
expression, Mother of God, as applied to the Virgin Mary. The term thus
violently opposed had on its side the authority of ancient usage, and many
names of great weight with the people. Nestorius approved the discourse,
supported his friend, and in several addresses explained and defended his
attack. Many were pleased with these discourses, and many were stirred
up against Nestorius and his friend: the excitement at Constantinople was
immense; but the cry of heresy, heresy, arose, and the flames of a great and
painful controversy were kindled.
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THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NESTORIUS AND HIS OPPONENTS
Never was there a doctrinal strife in which the contending parties
approximated so closely. Both subscribed, both appealed to, the Nicene
creed: both believed in the absolute Godhead and the perfect manhood of
the Lord Jesus; but it was inferred by the enemies of Nestorius, especially
by Cyril, that he was unsound as to the incarnation from his objecting to
the term, “mother of God.” The meaning or import of the disputed term,
as used by the doctors in the preceding century, was not to imply that the
Virgin communicated the divine nature to the Savior, but to affirm the
union of Godhead and manhood in one Person — that “the child born, the
son given,” was God incarnate. It was attributed to Nestorius, that he
maintained the mere humanity of the Redeemer, and that the Spirit only
dwelt in Him after He became a man, as of old in the prophets. But
Nestorius, as long as he lived, professed himself utterly opposed to such
sentiments. Nor does it appear that such sentiments were ever directly
made by him, but only inferred by his adversaries from his rejection of the
epithet, Mother of God, and from some incautious and ambiguous terms
which he used in his public discourses on the subject.

CYRIL AND ORTHODOXY

Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, in the controversy which had thus arisen,
appears as the great champion of orthodoxy. But all historians agree in
giving him a most unchristianlike, imperious, character. He is accused of
being moved with jealousy because of the increasing power and authority
of the bishop of Constantinople; and of being restless, arrogant, and
unscrupulous in his ways. He was also as violent against the heretics, as
Nestorius. He persecuted the Novatianists, and expelled the Jews from
Alexandria. An honest and pious zeal may have animated these great
prelates, but they utterly failed in uniting with their zeal Christian
prudence and moderation, and too readily allied with it the worst passions
of human nature.
Cyril was first drawn into the controversy by finding that copies of
Nestorius’ sermons had been circulated among his monks in Egypt, and
that they had abandoned the term, Mother of God. He at once blamed
both the monks and Nestorius, and denounced the novelty as heretical. All
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parties were soon excited, and angry words were used by all parties which
need not now be repeated. Suffice it to say, that when Nestorius found
that Cyril had skilfully managed to secure the influence of Celestine,
bishop of Rome, and that he was beset with other difficulties, he appealed
to a general council. As some of his opponents had already petitioned for
such an assembly, it was agreed to, and the Emperor Theodosius issued
orders for the meeting of one at Ephesus in the year 431, which is called
the Third General Council. They met in June. Cyril, in virtue of the
dignity of his see, presided. Matters went against Nestorius. He was
condemned as guilty of blasphemy, deprived of the episcopal dignity, cut
off from all part in the priesthood, and sent into banishment, in which he
closed his days about the year 450.
About two hundred bishops signed the sentence against Nestorius; still it
remains a question with most historians, whether he was really guilty of
holding the errors for which he was condemned. But all are agreed that he
was rash and intemperate in his language, vain of his own eloquence,
disregarded the writings of the earlier Fathers, and was apt to see heresy in
everything that differed from the dogmatic phraseology which he had been
accustomed to in his youth. But it is difficult to determine which was the
principal cause of this great contest, Cyril or Nestorius.16

THE CLOSE OF THE PERGAMOS PERIOD

The council of Ephesus was far from putting an end to these disgraceful
contentions; in place of restoring harmony to the church, it rather
increased her troubles. John, bishop of Antioch, and other Eastern
prelates, judged Cyril and his friends to have acted most unfairly and with
unbecoming haste in the matter of Nestorius: hence arose a new
controversy, and out of this sprang a new heresy-Eutychianism-which
greatly troubled the Eastern churches for about twenty years.
Eutyches, abbot of a convent at Constantinople, in the eagerness of his
opposition to Nestorianism, ran into the opposite extreme. He was
accused of unsoundness on the doctrines of the incarnation, and denounced
as a heretic. This led to another council which was held at Chalcedon in the
year 451, and is called, The Fourth General Council. But the details of
these local contests fall not within the limits of our “Short Papers.” Our
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plan is to give the reader a distinct outline, in the smallest space possible;
and only to present a few details in cases where the name of the person
has become a synonym for the opinions he taught; such as Arius, Pelagius,
etc., or when the events, such as the great persecutions, have a claim on
the sympathy of the church throughout all ages.
In carrying out these purposes, it will now be necessary to turn our
attention more especially to the growing power and the lofty pretensions
of the church of Rome. In Leo the Great we may see the passing away of
the Pergamos period, and the approach of the papal monarchy. But before
venturing on these troubled waters, we shall do well to study our divine
chart — God’s prophetic history of the church during that dark and often
stormy period.
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CHAPTER 13
THE EPISTLE TO THE CHURCH IN THYATIRA

“And unto the angel of the church in Thyatira write: These things
saith the Son of God, who hath His eyes like unto a flame of fire,
and his feet are like fine brass; I know thy works, and charity, and
service, and faith, and thy patience, and thy works; and the last to
be more than the first. Notwithstanding I have a few things against
thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth
herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit
fornication, and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. And I gave her
space to repent of her fornication; and she repented not. Behold, I
will cast her into a bed, and them that commit adultery with her
into great tribulation, except they repent of their deeds. And I will
kill her children with death; and all the churches shall.know that I
am He which searcheLh the reins and hearts: and I will give unto
every one of you according to your works. But unto you I say, and
unto th — rest in Thyatira, as many as have not this doctrine, and
which have not known the depths of Satan, as they speak; I will
put upon you none other burden. But that which ye have already
hold fast till I come. And he that overcometh, and keepeth My
works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations: and
He shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessels of a potter
shall they be broken to shivers: even as I received of my Father.
And I will give him the morning star. He that hath an ear, let him
hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.” (Revelation 2:18-29.)
It requires but little spiritual discernment, we think, and a very moderate
acquaintance with ecclesiastical history, to see the popery of the middle
ages foreshadowed in this epistle. We saw in Ephesus the decline of first
love, in Smyrna persecution from the Roman power, in Pergamos Balaam
seducing the church and uniting her to the world; but things are even worse
in Thyatira. Here we have the sad but natural consequences of this
unhallowed union. How could it be otherwise, when all who merely
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submitted to the outward rite of baptism were regarded as born of God?
The door was thus thrown open for the spoiler and the corrupter to enter
the sacred enclosure of the church of God. All testimony was now gone as
to her heavenly character and her place of separation from the world. She
had falsified the word of the Lord which says of His disciples, “They are
not of the world, even as I am not of the world.” True, in appearance,
Christianity had gained a victory. The cross was now arrayed in gold and
precious stones; but this was the glory of the world, not of a crucified
Christ. It was the world really that gained the victory, and the humiliation
of the church was completed.
The Lord only could estimate the fearful consequences of such a state of
things. His eye saw the corruption, the idolatries, and the persecutions of
the so-called dark ages, of which the church in Thyatira was a remarkable
foreshadow-ing. We will now glance briefly at the contents of the epistle.
1. The titles of the Lord are first to be noticed. They are full of the most
suited instruction for the faithful few, when the general body of Christians
are identified with this world. He introduces Himself as the Son of God,
who has eyes like unto a flame of fire, and His feet like unto fine brass.
When Peter confessed Jesus to be the Christ, the Son of the living God, He
immediately added, “Upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it.” And now, in anticipation of all that was
coming, He recalls the thoughts of His people to that immutable
foundation on which the church is built. He also assumes the attributes of
divine judgment. Fire is the symbol of penetrating judgment; eyes like unto
a flame of fire, of all-searching judgment; and feet like burnished brass, of
impending judgment.
Here then we have, in the character which the blessed Lord takes, the
assurance of the perfect security of the faithful remnant, and the assertion
of the unfailing judgment of the false prophetess, and her numerous brood
of corrupt children — children of her seduction and corruption. Jezebel
was not only a prophetess but a mother: she not only seduced God’s
people by her false doctrines, slaying many of them also; but a large class
of the worst of men derived their existence from her corruption. This is
painfully manifest all through the dark ages — the Jezebel-state of the
church. She established herself within the church as in her own house, and
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published to all the world that she was infallible and to be implicitly
obeyed in all matters of faith. To acquiesce in this blasphemous
assumption was unfaithfulness to Christ; to oppose it was suffering and
death.
2. As the pretensions of Rome waxed louder and louder, and the darkness
grew thicker and thicker, many of the saints of God became more and more
devoted to Christ and His claims. What is due to Christ must ever be the
watchword of the Christian, not what is due to those in high stations.
There seems to have been a spiritual energy displayed at this time which
rises above all that had been seen since the days of the apostles. This is
grace — the marvellous grace of God to His real saints in a most trying
time. It is the silver line of His own love which is so precious in His sight.
We may not always be able to trace it in ecclesiastical history, but there it
is, and there it shines to the eye and the heart of God in the midst of
abounding iniquity. This is to be noted, and always to be remembered, as
most encouraging to the Christian when placed in circumstances of trial.
Hear what the Lord Himself says —
“I know thy works, and charity, and service, and faith, and thy patience,
and thy works; and the last to be more than the first.” Here we have love,
faith, and hope, in lively exercise, the three great foundation principles of
sound practical Christianity; and the last works to be more than the first.
We have not met with such a faithful testimony, or such a measure of
devotedness, since the early days of the church in Thessalonica. It may be,
however, that the surrounding wickedness made their faithfulness all the
more precious to the heart of the Lord, and led Him to praise them more.
But no heart that beats true to Himself in an evil day is unknown,
unnoticed, or unrewarded.
3. But though the Lord loves to praise what He can in His people, and
notice the good things before He speaks of the evil things, He is also
quick-sighted in detecting their failures. They were in danger of tampering
with the false doctrine and with the false religious system of Jezebel; so
He says,
“I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that
woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to
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seduce my servants to commit fornication, and to eat things
sacrificed unto idols.” (Ver. 20.)
Notwithstanding the faithfulness of many earnest souls in Thyatira (or, in
the mediaeval church), there was the public allowance of the spirit of evil:
“Thou sufferest that woman Jezebel.” This was the dark shade on the
silver line: sometimes the latter seems completely obscured. But the Lord
did not fail, as of old, to raise up suited witnesses for Himself. Just as
there were saints in Caesar’s household, an Obadiah in the house of Ahab,
and a faithful remnant in Israel who had not bowed the knee to Baal, so the
Lord was never left without a faithful witness all through the middle ages.
Nevertheless there was an allowance of evil in the general state of things,
which grieved the heart of the Lord and brought down His judgments.
“The woman,” it may be well to observe, is used as a symbol of the
general state; “the man,” it is said, is a symbol of responsible activity.
Balaam and Jezebel are symbolic names — a prophet and prophetess. The
former acted as a seducer among the saints: the latter established herself
within the professing church, and pretended to have absolute authority
there. This was going much farther than even the wickedness of Balaam.
But we all know what Jezebel was when she sat as queen in Israel. Her
name has come down to us as swathed in cruelties and blood. She hated
and persecuted the witnesses of God; she encouraged and patronized the
idolatrous priests and prophets of Baal; she added violence to corruption:
all was ruin and confusion. And this is the name which the Lord has
chosen to symbolise the general state of the professing church during the
middle ages. In Thyatira He, whose eyes were as a flame of fire, could see
the germ of that which was to bear such evil fruit in after days, and so
warns His people to hold fast that which they have already, even Himself.
“I will put upon you none other burden; but that which ye have already,
hold fast till I come.” As the Jezebel-state continues to the end and can
never get right, the Lord now directs the faith of the remnant to His own
return — “Till I come.” The bright hope of His coming is thus presented
as a comfort to the heart in the midst of the general ruin; and His saints are
relieved by the Lord Himself from vain attempts to set either the church or
the world right. Most merciful deliverance! But poor human nature cannot
understand this, and so tries, and tries again, to mend matters both in
church and state.
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4. We have evidently three classes of persons spoken of in this epistle.
(1.) The children of Jezebel — those who owe their christian name and
place to her corrupt system. Unsparing judgment will overtake all
such. Space had been given for repentance, but they repented not;
therefore the full judgment of God falls upon them. “I will kill her
children with death.”
(2.) Those who are not her children, but make no stand against her;
they are easy-going. This alas! is a large class in our own day. It
characterises the public state of Christendom. Without conscience
before God, they are content to float smoothly down the stream, in
fellowship with some religious system, most agreeable to their own
minds. As to whether it is agreeable to God’s mind, they have never
inquired. Still they are His children. The judgment of such is “great
tribulation, except they repent of their deeds.”
(3.) The faithful remnant, the “overcomers.” They are here addressed
as “the rest” or remnant; they will have power over the nations in
association with Christ when He comes to reign.
In the meantime they have this sweet and precious promise: “And I will
give him the morning star.” This is conscious association with Himself
even now. The mediaeval church was especially guilty of two things: she
arrogantly and wickedly sought to possess supreme power over the
nations; and she persecuted the faithful remnant of the saints, such as the
Waldenses and others. But the saints, once so persecuted, shall yet
possess the kingdom, and reign with Christ a thousand years; and the
whole system of Jezebel shall be utterly and for ever rejected: “Strong is
the Lord God who judgeth her.”
5. There is only one other thing to notice in this sketch of the public state
of Christendom since the commencement of the papal system. The
exhortation to “hear” is placed after the special promise. This marks out
the remnant as distinct and separate from the general body. In the first
three churches the warning word — “He that hath an ear, let him hear
what the Spirit saith unto the churches” — comes before the promise; but
in the four concluding churches we have the promise before the call to
hear. The obvious meaning of this change is deeply solemn. In the first
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three the call to hear is addressed to the whole assembly, but in the last
four only to the remnant. It would seem that none are expected to hear but
the overcomers. The general professing body seem both blind and deaf
through the power of Satan and the pollutions of Jezebel; fearful
condition! We must also bear in mind, that the four states as represented
by the last four churches run on to the end or to the coming of the Lord.
May He keep us from all that savours of Jezebel, that we may duly
appreciate our oneness with Himself, and His promised blessings to the
“overcomers.”
Having now briefly examined the divinely drawn picture of the Jezebel-
state of the church during the dark ages, we turn to the ample but dreary
records of its history.

THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE PAPAL PERIOD

It is generally admitted that this period begins with the pontificate of
Gregory the Great, 590, and ends with the Reformation in the early part
of the sixteenth century. But before entering on the general history, we
will endeavor to answer a question which has been asked, and which, we
doubt not, is on the minds of many: When, and by what means, did the
power fall into the hands of the Roman pontiffs, which led to their
supremacy and despotism during the middle ages? The question is an
interesting one, but to answer it fully would lead us beyond our limits. We
can only point out a few facts in the chain of events which laid the
foundation of the great power and sovereignty of the See of Rome.
From the time of the famous edict of Milan in 313 the history of the
church changes in its character. She then passed from a condition of
distress and persecution to the summit of worldly prosperity and honor:
other questions besides those of Christianity were henceforth involved in
her history. Having entered into an alliance with the State, her future path
was necessarily formed by her new relations. She could no longer act
simply in the name of the Lord Jesus, and according to His holy word. But
complete amalgamation there could never be. The one was from heaven,
and the other of this world. They are, in nature, opposed to each other.
Either the church aspired to be the mistress of the State, or the State
encroached on the province of the church and disregarded her inherent
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rights. This was exactly what took place. Soon after the death of
Constantine the struggle between these two great powers, the church and
the State, for the government of the world, commenced; and, in order to
ensure success in this warfare, the Roman pontiffs had recourse to ways
and means which we will not characterise here, as they will come before us
in due course.
Before Constantine transferred the seat of empire to Byzantium and built
Constantinople, Rome was the acknowledged metropolis, and her bishop
the primate. But when Constantinople became the imperial city, her
bishop was raised to the rank of patriarch, and soon began to lay claim to
the dignity of the Roman pontiffs. This was the commencement of the
Greek church as a separate communion, and of the long contest between
the East and the West. There were now four patriarchs, according to the
plan of the Emperor, Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, and Alexandria. The
rank of the bishop was governed by the superiority of the city in which he
presided; and as Constantinople was now the capital of the world, her
bishops would yield to none in honor and magnificence. The others were
jealous, Rome complained, the strife began, the breach widened; but Rome
never rested until she had gained the ascendency over her feeble and less
ambitious rival.

THE ADVANTAGES OF ROME

The court of Constantinople, although it may have encouraged the hopes
and ambition of the bishops, affected to govern the church with despotic
power, and to decide on religious controversies of the gravest kind. But in
the West it was not so. The Roman pontiffs from this period showed the
independent and aggressive spirit of popery which rose to such heights in
after ages. The bishops of the East were thus placed at a disadvantage in
consequence of their dependence on the court and of their quarrels with
the emperors. Besides, the presence and grandeur of the Eastern sovereign
kept the dignity of the bishop in a very secondary place. In Rome there
were none left to dispute the rank or style of the pontiff.
The withdrawal of the emperors from Rome, as the royal residence,. was
thus favorable to the development of the ecclesiastical power there; for,
though deserted by her rulers, she was still venerated as the real capital of
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the world. Hence Rome possessed many advantages as the seat of the
supreme bishop. But that which chiefly pushed on and consolidated the
power of the Roman See was the growing belief, all over Christendom, that
St. Peter was its founder. The Roman bishops denied that their precedence
originated in the imperial greatness of the city, but in their lineal descent
from St. Peter. This dogma was generally received about the
commencement of the fifth century.
By such arguments the church of Rome established her right to govern the
universal church. She maintained that Peter was primate amongst the
apostles, and that his primacy is inherited by the bishops of Rome. But it
may be well to notice here, the twofold aspect of Romanism —
ecclesiastical and political. In both characters she claimed supremacy.
Ecclesiastically she maintained,
1, that the bishop of Rome is the infallible judge in all questions of
doctrine;
2, that he has the inherent right to supreme government in assembling
general councils, and presiding over them:
3, that the right of making ecclesiastical appointments belongs to him;
4, that separation from the communion of the church of Rome involves
the guilt of schism.
Politically she claimed, she aspired to, and gained preeminence and power
over all European society as well as all European governments. We shall
see abundant proof of these particulars in the course of her well-defined
history, which we will now go on with.
It was not till after the first council of Nice that the supremacy of the
Romish bishops was generally allowed. The early bishops of Rome are
scarcely known in ecclesiastical history. The accession of Innocent I., in
the year 402, gave force and definition to this new tenet of the Latin
church. Till this time there had been no legal recognition of the supremacy
of Rome, though she was considered the principal church in the West, and
had been frequently appealed to by the other great bishops for a spiritual
judgment in matters of dispute. When the Greek church fell into Arianism,
the Latin adhered firmly to the nicene creed, which raised her much in the
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opinion of all the West. “Upon the mind of Innocent,” says Milman,
“appears first to have dawned the vast conception of Rome’s universal
ecclesiastical supremacy; dim as yet and shadowy, but full and
comprehensive in its outline.”

LEO THE FIRST, SURNAMED THE GREAT

We may proceed without interruption from the name of Innocent to that
of Leo, who ascended the chair of St. Peter in the year 440, and occupied
it for one-and-twenty years. He was remarkable for his political skill,
theological learning, and great ecclesiastical energy. He maintained with the
haughtiness of the Roman, and with the zeal of the churchman, that all the
pretensions and all the practices of his church were matters of unbroken
apostolical succession. But withal he seems to have been sound in the faith
as to salvation, and zealously opposed to all heretics. The Eastern
churches had lost the respect of Christendom, from their long and
disgraceful controversies. Power, not subtleties, was the ambition of
Rome. Leo condemned the whole race of heretics from Arius to Eutyches;
but more especially the Manichaean heresy.
By his great exertions and extraordinary genius he raised the claims of the
Roman bishop, as the representative of St. Peter, to a height before
unknown. “The apostle,” he says, “was called Petra, the rock, by which
denomination he is constituted the foundation... In his chair dwelleth the
ever living, the superabounding, authority. Let the brethren therefore
acknowledge that he is the primate of all bishops, and that Christ, who
denieth His gifts to none, yet giveth unto none except through him.”1
Making due allowance for the character of the times and for official and
inherited opinions, we believe Leo was sincere in his convictions, and
probably a Christian. At heart he cared for God’s people, and more than
once, by his prayers and political sagacity, saved Rome from the
barbarians. When Attila, the most terrible of the foreign conquerors, with
his countless hosts, was hovering over Italy, ready to fall upon the
defenceless capital, Leo went forth to the “Destroyer” in the name of the
Lord, and as the spiritual head of Rome; and so earnestly did he pray for
his people, that the wild passions of the Hun were soothed, and, to the
astonishment of all, he agreed to terms by which the city was saved from
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havoc and slaughter. But Leo’s main object through life, and that which he
fully accomplished, was to lay the groundwork of the great spiritual
monarchy of Rome. During his pontificate he had the greatest name in the
empire, if not in all Christendom. He died in the year 461.

THE EMPEROR JUSTINIAN

The name of Justinian is so famous in history, and so connected with
legislation both civil and ecclesiastical, that it would be unfair to our
readers to pass it without a notice, though not immediately of the Latin
church. He belonged to the East, and rather hindered the rise of the West.
In the year 527 Justinian ascended the throne of Constantinople, and
occupied it for nearly forty years. The political and military affairs of the
empire he committed to his ministers and generals, and devoted his own
time to those things which he thought more important. He spent much of
his time in theological studies, and in the regulation of the religious affairs
of his subjects, such as prescribing what the priests and the people should
believe and practice. He was fond of mixing in controversy and of acting as
a lawgiver in religious matters. His own faith — or rather, slavish
superstition — was distinguished by the most rigid orthodoxy, and a large
portion of his long reign was spent in the extinction of heresy. But this led
to many instances of persecution, both public and private.
In the mean time Justinian saw a new field opening for his energies in
another direction, and immediately turned his attention to it. After the
death of Theodoric the Great in 526 the affairs of Italy fell into a very
confused condition, and the new conquerors were far from being firmly
seated on their thrones. Rousing the national hostility of the Romans
against the barbarians, the imperial army was united and determined;, and
led by the able generals Belisarius and Narses, the conquests of Italy and
Africa were achieved in a very short space of time. At the sight of the
well-known eagles the soldiers of the barbarians refused to fight, and the
nations threw off the supremacy of the Ostrogoths. The imperial generals
now prosecuted an exterminating war. It is reckoned that during the reign
of Justinian Africa lost five millions of inhabitants. Arianism was
extinguished in that region; and in Italy the numbers who perished by war,
by famine, or in other ways, is supposed to have exceeded the whole of its
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present population. The sufferings of these countries, during the
revolutions of this period, were greater than they had ever endured in
either earlier or later times. So that both the secular events of Justinian’s
reign and his own legislative labors had an important, but most
unfortunate, bearing on the history of Christianity.
After erecting the church of St. Sophia, and twenty-five other churches in
Constantinople, and publishing a new edition of his code, he died A .D .
565.2
We now pass on to the third great founder of the papal edifice.

GREGORY THE FIRST, SURNAMED THE GREAT A.D. 590

We have now come to the close of the sixth century of Christianity. At
this period the early history of the church ends, and the mediaeval begins.
The pontificate of Gregory may be regarded as the line that separates the
two periods. A great change takes place. The Eastern churches decline and
receive but little notice; while the churches of the West, especially that of
Rome, largely engage the attention of the historian. And as Gregory may
be considered the representative man of this transitional period, we will
endeavor to place him fairly before the reader.
Gregory was born at Rome about the year 540, his family being of
senatorial rank, and himself the great-grandson of a pope named Felix; so
that in his descent he blended both civil and ecclesiastical dignity. By the
death of his father he became possessed of great wealth, which he at once
devoted to religious uses. He founded and endowed seven monasteries; six
in Sicily, and the other, which was dedicated to St. Andrew, in his family
mansion at Rome. His costly robes, jewels, and furniture, he reduced to
money, and lavished it on the poor. About the age of thirty-five he gave
up his civil appointments, took up his abode in the Roman monastery, and
entered on a strictly ascetic life. Although it was his own convent, he
began with the lowest monastic duties. His whole time was spent in
prayer, reading, writing, and the most self-denying exercises. The fame of
his abstinence and charity spread far and wide. In course of time he
became abbot of his monastery; and, on the death of the pope Pelagius, he
was chosen by the senate, the clergy, and the people, to fill the vacant
chair. He refused, and endeavored by various means to escape the honors
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and difficulties of the papacy; but he was forcibly ordained, by the love of
the people, as the supreme bishop.
Drawn from the quiet of a cloister and from his peaceful meditations there,
Gregory now saw himself involved in the management of the most various
and perplexing affairs of both Church and State. But he was evidently
fitted for the great and ardous work which lay before him. We will notice
first

THE FERVENT CHARITY OF GREGORY

The character of Gregory was distinguished by the fervor of his
almsgiving. Though raised to the papal throne, he lived in a simple and
monastic style. His palace was surrounded by the suffering poor, as his
monastery had been, and relief was distributed with a liberal hand. Nor
was he content to exercise his almsgiving alone; he powerfully exhorted his
episcopal brethren to abound in the same. “Let not the bishop think,” he
said, “that reading and preaching alone suffice, or studiously to maintain
himself in retirement, while the hand that enriches is closed. But let his
hand be bountiful; let him make advances to those who are in necessity; let
him consider the wants of others as his own; for without these qualities
the name of bishop is a vain and empty title.”
The wealth of the Roman See enabled him to exercise extensive charities.
As administrator of the papal funds, Gregory has the reputation of being
just, humane, and most laborious. But his biographers are so voluminous
in their accounts of his good works that it is bewildering to attempt a brief
sketch. However, as we can esteem him as a believer in Christ,
notwithstanding the false position he was in, and his consequent blindness
as to the true character of the church, we delight to dwell a little on his
memory, and also to trace the silver line of God’s grace in spite of the
unhallowed mixture of secular and sacred things.
On the first Monday of every month he distributed large quantities of
provisions to all classes. The sick and infirm were superintended by
persons appointed to inspect every street. Before sitting down to his own
meal, a portion was separated and sent to the hungry at his door. The
names, ages, and dwellings of those receiving papal relief filled a large
volume. So severe was the charity of Gregory, that one day, on hearing of
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the death of a poor man from starvation, he condemned himself to a hard
penance for the guilt of neglect as steward of the divine bounty. But his
active benevolence was not confined to the city of Rome; it was almost
world-wide. He entered into all questions affecting the welfare of all
classes, and prescribed minute regulations for all, lest the poor should be
exposed to the oppression of the rich, or the weak to the strong. But this
will more fully appear as we notice

THE ECCLESIASTICAL AND TEMPORAL POSITION OF GREGORY

The pastoral care of the church was evidently the main object and delight
of Gregory’s heart. This he believed to be his work, and fain would he
have devoted himself entirely to it; for according to the superstitious
credulity of the times, he had the deepest conviction that the care and
government of the whole church belonged to him as the successor of St.
Peter; and also, that he was bound to uphold the special dignity of the See
of Rome. But he was compelled, from the disturbed state of Italy, and for
the safety of his people — his dear flock — to undertake many
troublesome kinds of business, altogether foreign to his spiritual calling.
The Lombard3 invaders were at that moment the terror of the Italians. The
Goths had been to a great degree civilized and Romanised; but these new
invaders were remorseless and pitiless barbarians; though, strange to say,
they were the avowed champions of Arianism. And the imperial power,
instead of protecting its Italian subjects, acted only as a hindrance to their
exerting themselves for their own defense. War, famine, and pestilence, had
so wasted and depopulated the country, that all hearts failed, and all
turned to the bishop as the only man for the emergency of the times; so
firmly was the opinion of his integrity and ability established among men.
Thus we see that temporal power, in the first instance, was forced upon
the Pope. It does not appear that he sought the position — a position so
eagerly grasped by many of his successors; but rather that he entered with
reluctance upon duties so little in accordance with the great object of his
life. He unwillingly threw off the quiet contemplative life of the monk, and
entered into the affairs of state as a duty to God and to his country. The
direction of the political interests of Rome devolved for the most part
upon Gregory. He was guardian of the city, and the protector of the
population in Italy against the Lombards. All history bears witness to his
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great ability, his incessant activity, and the multiplicity of his occupations
as the virtual sovereign of Rome.
But however unconscious Gregory may have been of what the effects
would be of his great reputation, it nevertheless contributed much to the
ecclesiastical and secular domination of Rome. The pre-eminence in his
case, however sorrowful for a Christian, was disinterested and beneficially
exerted; but not so with his successors. The infallibility of the Pope,
spiritual tyranny, persecution for a difference of opinion, idolatry, the
doctrine of the merit of works, purgatory and masses for the relief of the
dead, which became the discriminating marks of the papacy, had not, as
yet, a settled establishment at Rome; but, we may say, they were all in
sight.
We must not, however, pursue this subject farther at present; we turn to
one more interesting, and more congenial to our minds.

THE MISSIONARY ZEAL OF GREGORY

Notwithstanding the depression of the church, and of all classes of
society, through the inroads of the barbarians, the blessed Lord was
watching over the spread of the gospel in other countries. And surely it
was of His great mercy, that the hosts of invaders which poured down on
the provinces of the empire were soon converted to Christianity. They
may have had very little understanding of their new religion, but it greatly
softened their ferocity, and mitigated the sufferings of the vanquished.
Gregory was most zealous in his endeavors to extend the knowledge of
the gospel, and to bring over the barbarous nations to the Catholic faith.
But his favourite scheme, and that which had been long on his heart, was
the evangelisation of the Anglo-Saxons.
The beautiful story of the incident which first directed Gregory’s mind to
the conversion of Britain, is too pleasing, not to find a place in our “Short
Papers.” In the early days of his monastic life, at least before his elevation
to the papacy, his attention was arrested one day by seeing some beautiful
fairhaired boys exposed for sale in the market-place. The following
conversation is said to have taken place. He inquired from what country
they came. “From the island of Britain,” was the reply. “Are the
inhabitants of that island Christians or Pagans?... They are still Pagans.”
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“Alas!” said he, “that the prince of darkness should possess forms of such
loveliness! That such beauty of countenance should want that better
beauty of the soul.” He then asked by what name they were called.
“Angles,” was the reply. Playing on the words, he said, “Truly they are
Angels! From what province?” “From that of Deira” — Northumberland.
“Surely they must be rescued de ira” — from the wrath of God, and called
to the mercy of Christ. “What is the name of their king?” “Ella,” was the
answer. “Yea,” said Gregory, “Alleluia must be sung in the dominions of
that king.”
“To be the first missionary to this beautiful people,” says Milman, “and
to win the remote and barbarous island, like a christian Caesar, to the realm
of Christ, became the holy ambition of Gregory. He extorted the unwilling
consent of the Pope; he had actually set forth and traveled three days’
journey, when he was overtaken by messengers sent to recall him. All
Rome had risen in pious mutiny and compelled the Pope to revoke his
permission.”4 But although he was thus prevented from executing this
mission in person, he never lost sight of his noble object. From this time
he was not allowed to return to his monastery. He was forced to embark in
public affairs, first as a deacon, then as supreme pontiff. But all this was
compulsory dignity to Gregory. His heart was set on the salvation of the
fair-haired youths of England, and he would a thousand times rather have
undertaken a journey to our island, with all its hardships and unknown
dangers, than be crowned with the honors of the papacy. But such was the
character of his mind, that he pursued with unwearied attention and
devotion any scheme of piety which he had once planned. Hence it was
that, after he was raised to the papal chair, he was enabled to furnish and
send forth a band of forty missionaries to the shores of Britain. But before
speaking of the character and results of this mission, it will be interesting
to glance briefly at the history of the church in the British Isles from the
beginning.

THE FIRST PLANTING OF THE CROSS IN BRITAIN

Far back in the early days of apostolic simplicity, the cross of Christ, we
believe, was planted in our island. There is fair historical evidence for
believing that “Claudia,” mentioned by Paul in his Second Epistle to
Timothy, was the daughter of a British king, who married a distinguished
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Roman, named “Pudens.” This circumstance will not seem unlikely if we
bear in mind that, during the whole period of the Roman dominion in this
country, there must have been many opportunities for the spread of
Christianity; and that these would be readily embraced by those who
loved the Lord Jesus and the souls of men. Besides, it was the custom at
that time for the British kings and nobles to send their sons to Rome for
education; and this practice, it is said, prevailed to such an extent, that a
mansion was established expressly for them, and a tax of one penny was
levied on every house in England for its support.5
Another witness for the early planting of Christianity in this country is
the testimony of the Fathers. Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and Tertullian, who
wrote in the second century, affirm, that in every country known to the
Romans there were professors of Christianity — from those who rode in
chariots, or were houseless, there was no race of men amongst whom there
were not prayers offered in the name of a crucified Jesus. We have also the
testimony of later Fathers. The historic chain seems to be carried down by
the mention of British bishops as having attended several of the general
councils in the fourth century; and their orthodoxy throughout the Arian
controversy has been attested by the weighty evidence of Athanasius and
Hilary. It is also worthy of note that Constantine — who had spent some
time with his father in Britain — when writing to the churches of the
Empire about a dispute concerning Easter, quoted the British church as an
example of orthodoxy. The Pelagian heresy, it is said, was introduced into
Britain by one Agricola in the year 429, and found much acceptance; but in
a conference at St. Albans the heretical teachers were defeated by the
orthodox clergy.6

THE ANCIENT BRITISH CHURCH

Although the British church had acquired such credit for orthodoxy, we
have very little reliable information as to its rise and progress, or as to the
means by which this was effected. There are many traditions, but they are
scarcely worth repeating, and are unsuitable for a brief history. There is
ample evidence, however, that in the early part of the fourth century, and
at least two hundred years before the arrival of the Italian monks, the
British church had a complete organisation, with its bishops and
metropolitans.
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According to the testimony of both ancient and modern historians, the
doctrines and the ritual of the old church were of the simplest character
compared with the Greek or Roman, though a long way from the
simplicity of the New Testament. They taught the oneness of the
Godhead; the Trinity, the divine and human nature of Christ, redemption
through His death; and the eternity of future rewards and punishments.
They regarded the Lord’s supper as a symbol, not a miracle; they took the
bread and wine as our Lord commanded these should be taken — in
remembrance of Him — and they did not refuse the wine to the laity.
Their hierarchy consisted of bishops and priests, with other ministers, and
that a particular service was employed at their ordination. Marriage was
usual among the clergy. There were also monasteries with monks living in
them, sworn to poverty, chastity, and obedience to their abbot. That
churches were built in honor of martyrs; each church had many altars; and
the service, which was performed in the Latin tongue, was chanted by the
priests. Disputes were finally settled by provincial synods, held twice a
year, beyond which, on matters of discipline, there was no appeal. So that
we see the doctrines of the old church were characterized by a true
apostolic simplicity, and as an institution it was free and unfettered.7
It is matter of unfeigned thankfulness that the early church of our own
country has left so fair a name behind her, compared with the
superstitions and corruptions of the East and the West. But, alas! her
existence as a separate establishment was not of long duration. She
scarcely survived the middle of the seventh century. Her calamities were
brought on by three successive steps, and these outside of her own
jurisdiction — the withdrawal of the Roman troops from Britain; the
Saxon Conquest; and the Augustinian Mission. We will now briefly glance
at each step, and its effects.
We have seen something of the decline and approaching fall of the Roman
Empire. In consequence of the heavy calamities which befell the city and
provinces of Rome, the troops were gradually withdrawn from this island
for the protection of the seat of dominion. And the Romans, finding that
they could no longer spare the forces necessary for a military
establishment in Britain, took their final departure from our island towards
the middle of the fifty century, and about four hundred and seventy-five
years after Julius Caesar first landed on its shores. The government then
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fell into the hands of a number of petty princes, who, of course,
quarrelled. Civil wars, national weakness, and demoralization soon
followed, with their usual judgments.
The withdrawal of the Roman troops necessarily exposed the country to
the inroads of invaders, especially the Picts and Scots. The British chiefs,
unable to resist these audacious robbers and spoilers, appealed in their
distress to Rome. “The barbarians,” they said, “break through our walls,
like wolves into a sheep-fold, retire with their booty, and return every
succeeding year.” But however much the Romans might pity their old
friends, they were now unable to help them. Disappointed of aid from
Rome, and despairing of their ability to defend themselves against the
desolating tribes of the North, the Britons turned to the Saxons for help.8

THE ARRIVAL OF THE SAXONS IN ENGLAND

About the middle of the fifth century the Saxon ships reached the British
coast, and under their leaders, Hengist and Horsa, a few hundred fierce and
desperate warriors disembarked. These famous leaders immediately took
the field at the head of their followers, and completely defeated the Picts
and Scots. But the remedy proved worse than the disease. One great evil
was averted, but another and a greater followed. The Saxons, finding the
country they had been hired to defend possessed a more genial climate
than their own, and eager to exchange the bleak shores of the North for the
rich fields of Britain, invited fresh bodies of their countrymen to join them;
and thus, from being the defenders, they became the conquerors and
masters of the ill-fated Britons. The Angles and other tribes poured in on
the country; and although the British did not yield without a severe
struggle, the Saxon power prevailed, and reduced the natives to entire
submission, or drove them to seek shelter in the mountains of Wales,
Cornwall, and Cumberland. Many emigrated, and some settled in
Armorica, now Brittany, in the north-west of France.
But the Saxons and Angles were not only wild warriors, they were savage
merciless pagans. They exterminated Christianity wherever they
conquered. According to the “venerable Bede,” the bishops and their
people were indiscriminately slaughtered with fire and sword, and there
was no one to bury the victims of such cruelty. Public and private
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buildings were alike destroyed, priests were everywhere murdered at the
altar; some who had fled to the mountains were seized, and slain by heaps;
others, worn out with hunger, surrendered themselves, embracing
perpetual slavery for the sake of life; some made for regions beyond the
sea, and some led a life of poverty among mountains, forests, and lofty
rocks.
Britain, after this event, relapsed into a state of obscure barbarism, was
withdrawn from the view of the civilised world, and was sunk down to the
depths of misery and cruelty; and yet these are the very people whom the
Lord had laid on the heart of Gregory to win over to Himself by the gospel
of peace. How could a few poor monks, without fleet or army, we may
well exclaim, venture on such a shore, far less hope to gain the hearts and
subdue the lives of such savages to the faith and practice of the gospel of
peace? It is the Same gospel that triumphed over Judaism, Orientalism,
and Heathenism, and by the same divine power, was soon to triumph over
the fierce barbarism of the Anglo-Saxons. How weak and foolish is the
infidelity that questions its divine origin, power, and destiny! We will now
watch the progress of the mission.

THE MISSION OF AUGUSTINE TO ENGLAND

In the year 596, and about 150 years after the arrival of the Saxons in
Britain, Gregory’s famous mission left Italy for our island. A company of
forty missionary monks, under the direction of Augustine, were sent to
preach the gospel to the benighted Anglo-Saxons. But hearing of the savage
character and habits of the people, and being ignorant of their language,
they became seriously discouraged, and were afraid to proceed. Augustine
was sent back by the others to entreat Gregory to discharge them from the
service. But he was not the man to abandon a mission of that kind. He had
not done it in haste; it was the result of much prayer and deliberation. He
therefore exhorted and encouraged them to go forward, trusting in the
living God, and in the hope of seeing the fruit of their labors in eternity.
He gave them letters of introduction to bishops and princes, and secured
for them all the assistance in his power. Thus animated they pursued their
journey, and, travelling by way of France, they arrived in Britain.
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The forty-one missionaries, having landed on the Isle of Thanet,
announced to Ethelbert, king of Kent, their arrival from Rome, and their
errand with glad tidings of great joy to himself and all his people.
Circumstances greatly favored this remarkable mission. Bertha, the queen
(daughter of Clotaire the First, king of the Franks), was a Christian. Her
father stipulated in her marriage settlement that she was to be allowed the
free profession of Christianity, in which she had been educated. A bishop
attended her court, several of her household were Christians, and divine
service was conducted after the Romish form. The Lord in this instance
made use of a woman, as He often did, for the propagation the gospel
among the heathen. These favourably contrast with the Jezebel class of
women, and preserve the silver line of God’s grace in these dark ages.
Bertha was of the house of Clovis and Clotilda.
Ethelbert, influenced by his queen, received the missionaries kindly.
Augustine and his retinue were allowed to proceed to Canterbury, the
residence of the king. He consented to an interview, but in the open air for
fear of magic. The monks approached the royal party in the most
imposing manner. One of their number, bearing a large silver cross with the
figure of the Savior, led the procession; the others followed, chanting their
Latin hymns. On reaching the oak appointed for the place of conference,
permission was given to preach the gospel to the prince and his
attendants. The king was then informed that they had come with good
tidings, even eternal life to those that received them, and the enjoyment of
the blessedness of heaven for ever. The king was favourably impressed,
and gave them a mansion in the royal city of Canterbury, and liberty to
preach the gospel to his court and his people. They then marched to the
city, singing in concert the litany; “We pray thee, O Lord, in all Thy
mercy, that Thine anger and Thy fury may be removed from this city, and
from Thy holy house, because we have sinned. Alleluia.”
By these preparatory steps the missionaries’ way was now plain and
easy. The approval of the monarch inspired his subjects with confidence,
and opened their hearts to the teachers. Converts, such as they were,
multiplied rapidly. On the Christmas-day of the year 597 no fewer, it is
said, than ten thousand heathen were gathered into the fold of the Catholic
church by baptism. Ethelbert also submitted to baptism, and Christianity,
in the Romish form, became the established religion of his kingdom. This
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was Rome’s first footing in England. She now determined on subduing the
British church to the papacy, and establishing her authority in Great
Britain, as she had done in France. She set to work in this way.

ROMISH HIERARCHY FORMED IN ENGLAND

Gregory, on hearing of the great success of Augustine, sent him more
missionaries, who carried with them a number of books, including the
Gospels, with church plate, vestments, relics, and the pallium which was
to invest Augustine as Archbishop of Canterbury. He also directed him to
consecrate twelve bishops in his province; and, if he should see it
advantageous to the propagation of the faith, to establish another
metropolitan at York, who should then have authority to nominate twelve
other bishops for the northern districts of the island. Such were the
rudiments of the English church, and such the excessive eagerness of
Gregory for ecclesiastical supremacy, that he settled a plan of government
for places before they had been visited by the evangelist.
“In the ecclesiastical view of the case,” says Greenwood, “the
Anglo-Saxon church was the genuine daughter of Rome. But,
beyond the limits of that establishment, no right of parentage can
be assigned to her within the British islands. A numerous christian
population still existed in the northern and western districts,
whose traditions gave no countenance to the Roman claim of
maternity. The ritual and discipline of the British, Welsh and Irish
churches differed in many points from those of Rome and the
Latins generally. They celebrated the Easter festival in conformity
with the practice of the Oriental churches; and in the form of their
tonsure, as well as in that of the baptismal rite, they followed the
same model: differences which of themselves seem sufficient to
preclude all probability of a purely Latin pedigree.”9
Augustine, now at the head of a hierarchy composed of twelve bishops,
immediately made the bold attempt to bring the ancient British church
under the Roman jurisdiction. Through the influence of Ethelbert he
obtained a conference with some of the British bishops at a place which
from that time was called Augustine’s oak, on the Severn. There the
Roman and the British clergy met for the first time; and Augustine’s first
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and imperious demand was, “Acknowledge the authority of the bishop of
Rome.” “We desire to love all men,” they meekly replied, “and whatever
we do for you, we will do for him also whom you call the Pope.”
Surprised and indignant at their refusal, Augustine exhorted them to adopt
the Roman usages as to the celebration of Easter, the tonsure, and the
administration of baptism, that a uniformity of discipline and worship
might be established in the island. This they positively refused to do.
Having received Christianity at first not from Rome but from the East, and
never having acknowledged the Roman church as their mother, they looked
upon themselves as independent of the See of Rome. A second and a third
council were held, but with no better results. Augustine was plainly told
that the British church would acknowledge no man as supreme in the
Lord’s vineyard. The archbishop demanded, argued, censured, wrought
miracles; but all to no purpose — the Britons were firm. At last he was
plainly told that they could not submit either to the haughtiness of the
Romans, or to the tyranny of the Saxons. Aroused to wrathful indignation
at their quiet firmness, the angry priest exclaimed, “If you will not receive
brethren who bring you peace, you shall receive enemies who bring you
war. If you will not unite with us in showing the Saxons the way of life,
you shall receive from them the stroke of death.” The haughty archbishop
withdrew, and is supposed to have died soon after (A .D . 605); but his ill-
omened prophecy was accomplished soon after his decease.
Edelfrid, one of the Anglo-Saxon kings, still a pagan, collected a numerous
army, and advanced towards Bangor, the center of British Christianity.
The monks fled in great alarm. About twelve hundred and fifty of them
met in a retired spot, where they agreed to continue together in prayer and
fasting. Edelfrid drew nearer, and happening to see a number of unarmed
men, inquired who they were. On being told that they were the monks of
Bangor, who had come to pray for the success of their countrymen,
“Then,” he cried, “although they have no weapons, they are fighting
against us;” and he ordered his soldiers to fall upon the praying monks.
About twelve hundred, it is said, were slain, and only fifty escaped by
flight. Thus did the dominion of Rome commence in England, which
continued for nearly a thousand years.
Whether Augustine had really anything to do with the murder of the
monks, it seems hard and is difficult to say. Those who take a strong
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Protestant view of the case plainly affirm that his last days were occupied
in making arrangements for the accomplishment of his own threatening.
Others, who take an opposite view, deny that there is any evidence that
he influenced the pagans to the dreadful tragedy. But, be that as it may, a
dark suspicion must ever rest on the policy of Rome. Augustine’s own
revengeful words, and her whole history, confirm the suspicion. Such was
the nature of the intolerant Jezebel — when argument failed, she appealed
to the sword. Henceforth Romanism was characterized by arrogance and
blood. The ancient church of Britain, which was limited to the
mountainous districts of Wales, gradually diminished and died away.10

REFLECTIONS ON THE MISSION OF AUGUSTINE AND

THE CHARACTER OF GREGORY
Augustine is spoken of by some historians as a devout Christian, and his
missionary enterprise as one of the greatest in the annals of the church.
But, without wishing to detract in the least degree from the greatness of
the man or his mission, we must not forget that scripture is the only true
standard of character and works. There we learn that the fruit of the Spirit
is “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness,
temperance.” And certainly the great churchman did not manifest towards
his brethren, the British Christians, the grace of love, peace, or
conciliation; on the contrary, he was proud, imperious, haughty, and vain-
glorious.
These serious defects in his character were not unknown to Gregory, as he
says, in a letter addressed to himself: “I know that God has performed,
through you, great miracles among that people; but let us remember that
when the disciples said with joy to their divine Master, “Lord, even the
devils are subject to us through Thy name,’ He answered them, ‘Rather
rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.” While God thus
employs your agency without, remember, my dear brother, to judge
yourself secretly within, and to know well what you are. If you have
offended God in word or deed, preserve those offenses in your thoughts to
repress the vainglory of your heart, and consider that the gift of miracles is
not granted to you for yourself, but for those whose salvation you are
laboring to procure.” In another letter he cautioned him against “vanity and
personal pomp;” and reminded him “that the pallium of his dignity was
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only to be worn in the service of the church, and not to be brought into
competition with royal purple on state occasions.”
He was most unsuited for a mission which required patience, and a tender
consideration of others. The British church had existed for centuries, her
bishops had taken part in great ecclesiastical councils and signed their
decrees. The names of London, York, and Lincoln are found in the records
of the Council of Arles (A .D . 314), so that we cannot but respect in the
Britons their desire to adhere to the liturgy transmitted from their
ancestors, and to resist the foreign assumption of the spiritual supremacy
of Rome. Augustine utterly failed to profit by the lessons of humility
which he received from his great master, and has less claim upon our
esteem and admiration.
The great prelate, like his great missionary, did not long survive the
spiritual conquest of England. Worn out at length by his great labors and
infirmities, he died in the year 604, assuring his friends that the
expectation of death was his only consolation, and requesting them to
pray for his deliverance from bodily sufferings.
The conduct of Gregory, during the thirteen years and six months that he
was bishop of Rome, displays a zeal and a sincerity which have scarcely
been equalled in the history of the Roman church. He was laborious and
self-denying in what he believed to be the service of God, and in his duty
to the church and to all mankind. The collection of his letters, nearly eight
hundred and fifty in number, bears ample testimony to his ability and
activity in all the affairs of men, and in every sphere of life. “From treating
with patriarchs, kings, or emperors on the highest concerns of Church and
State, he passes to direct the management of a farm, or the relief of some
distressed petitioner in some distant dependence of his See. He appears as
a pope, as a sovereign, as a bishop, as a landlord. He takes measures for
the defense of his country, the conversion of the heathen, the repression
and reconciliation of schismatics,” etc.11
But notwithstanding the varied excellencies of Gregory, he was deeply
infected with the principles and spirit of the age in which he lived. The
spirit of Jezebel was evidently at work, though yet in its youth. We look
in vain for anything like christian simplicity in the church of God at this
time. The piety of Gregory himself we cannot doubt; but, as an
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ecclesiastic, what was he? Poisoned to the heart’s core by the gross
delusion of the universal claims of the chair of St. Peter, he could brook no
rival, as we see in his determined and bitter opposition to the pretensions
of John, bishop of Constantinople; and, what was darker still, we see the
same spirit in his triumphing over the murder of the Emperor Maurice
and his family by the cruel and treacherous Phocas, merely because he
suspected Maurice of what he called heresy. It appears that Maurice
countenanced what Gregory thought the usurpation of John in assuming
the title of universal bishop. But even to sanction such a claim was no
small crime in the mind of a Roman pontiff. And so it was with Gregory.
When the intelligence of the bloody tragedy reached him, he rejoiced; it
appeared to him in the light of a providential dispensation for the
deliverance of the church from her enemies. The very well-springs of
charity seem to have been dried up in the hearts of all who ever sat on a
papal throne, towards all ecclesiastical rivals. Justice, candor, humanity,
and every right feeling of Christianity, must yield to the dominant claims
of the false church. Even Gregory bowed before, and was fearfully
corrupted by, “that woman Jezebel.”

THE SUPERSTITION AND IDOLATRY OF GREGORY

Ambition, mingled with humility; and superstition, mingled with faith,
characterized the great pontiff. This strange mixture and confusion was no
doubt the result of his false position. It is difficult to understand how a
man of such sound sense could be so debased by superstition as to believe
in the working of miracles by means of relics, and to have recourse to such
things for the confirmation of the truth of scripture. But the sad truth is,
that he was blinded by the one great absorbing object, the interests of the
church of Rome, in place of being devoted to the interests of Christ. Paul
could say, “One thing I do;” another said, “One thing I know.” First, we
must know that we are pardoned and accepted; then, to do the things that
please Christ is the high and heavenly calling of the Christian.
“That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the
fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His
death... But this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are
behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I
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press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in
Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3.)
Such was, and ever ought to have been, the spirit and breathings of
Christianity. But what do we find at the close of the sixth century? What
was the one thing Gregory had in view? Clearly not the claims of a
heavenly Christ, and conformity to Him in His resurrection, sufferings,
and death. We may safely affirm, that the one great object of his public life
was to establish beyond dispute the universal bishopric of Rome. And to
this end, in place of leading souls to delight in the ways of Christ, as well
as in Himself, which Paul ever did, he sought to advance the claims of the
Romish See by idolatry and corruption. Neither was the spirit of
persecution altogether absent.
Monasticism, under the patronage of Gregory, especially according to the
stricter rules of Benedict, was greatly revived and widely extended. The
doctrine of purgatory, respect for relics, the worship of images, the
idolatry of saints and martyrs, the merit of pilgrimages to holy places,
were either taught or sanctioned by Gregory, as connected with his
ecclesiastical system; all which we must own to be the unmistakable
features of the activity of Balaam and the corruption of Jezebel.
But we are now in the seventh century. The dark ages are at hand, and dark
indeed they are. The papacy begins to assume a definite form. And as we
have reached in our history the close of one age of Christianity and the
commencement of another, we may profitably pause for a moment and
take a general survey of the progress of the gospel in different countries.
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CHAPTER 14
THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY OVER EUROPE

The ecclesiastical system which the Italian monks introduced into England
rapidly spread, and ultimately triumphed. In about a hundred years after
the arrival of Augustine, it was professed and believed throughout Anglo-
Saxon Britain. The English church, thus founded on the Roman model,
could not fail to hold a position especially dependent on Rome. This union
at an early period was promoted and strengthened by English monks,
nuns, bishops, nobles, and princes, making frequent pilgrimages to the
grave of St. Peter at Rome. In no country were the Roman missionaries
more successful than among our Anglo-Saxon ancestors, though they were
considered the fiercest of the Teutonic race. The British clergy, though still
adhering to their old ways, and disposed to resist foreign assumption,
were compelled to seclude themselves in the extremities of the land.
Romanism now prevailed all over England.
Scotland and Ireland appear to have been blessed with Christianity
about the same time as Britain. By means of soldiers, sailors, missionaries,
and persecuted Christians from the south, the gospel was preached and
many believed. But, as the early religious history of these countries is so
overlaid with legends, we will only refer to names and events that are well
authenticated.

THE FIRST PREACHERS OF CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND

Patrick, the apostle of Ireland, is supposed to have been born about the
year 372 on the banks of the Clyde. Kilpatrick is said to have taken its
name from him. His parents were earnest Christians; his father was a
deacon, and his grandfather was a presbyter. His mother, who sought to
instil into his heart the doctrines of Christianity, was sister to the
celebrated Martin, archbishop of Tours. But the young Succath — for
such was his original name — was not seriously inclined. Some time after,
his parents left Scotland and settled in Brittany. At the age of sixteen,
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when Succath and his two sisters were playing on the sea-shore, some
Irish pirates, commanded by O’Neal, carried them all three off to their
boats and sold them as captives in Ireland. For six years he was employed
in keeping cattle.
During the period of his slavery he endured many and great hardships. But
his sin had found him out. He became serious and thoughtful. When about
the age of fifteen he had committed some great sin which now pressed
heavily on his conscience both night and day. He prayed often, and wept
much; indeed such was the inward fervor of his soul, that he became
insensible to the cold, the rain, and other inconveniences to which he was
exposed. He now thought of home, of his mother’s tender words and
earnest prayers; and God graciously used the remembrance of the gospel
to the blessing of his soul. He was born again. “I was sixteen years old,” he
says, “and knew not the true God; but in that strange land the Lord
opened my unbelieving eyes, and, although late, I called my sins to mind,
and was converted with my whole heart to the Lord my God, who
regarded my low estate, had pity on my youth and ignorance, and
consoled me as a father consoles his children. The love of God increased
more and more in me, with faith and the fear of His name. The Spirit urged
me to such a degree that I poured forth as many as a hundred prayers in
one day. And during the night, in the forests and on the mountains when I
kept my flock, the rain and snow and frost and sufferings which I endured
excited me to seek after God. At that time I felt not the indifference which
now I feel; the Spirit fermented my heart.”1
If these words can be relied upon as flowing from the lips of Succath, they
present a much purer testimony to the truth of the gospel than we ever
find in the church of Rome. They present an exercised soul in close
quarters with God Himself. The forms and priesthood of Romanism
destroy this beautiful, personal, direct communion with God and with His
Christ through the grace and power of the Holy Ghost. But such, no
doubt, was the Christianity of these British Isles before it was corrupted
by the papal emissaries.
In the course of time Succath gained his liberty, and after travelling much
and preaching he returned to his family. But he soon felt an irresistible
desire to return to Ireland and preach the gospel to the pagans, among
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whom he had found the Savior. In vain did his parents and friends seek to
detain him. He broke through all hindrances, and with a heart full of
christian zeal departed for Ireland. He was now over forty years of age,
and, according to some writers, had been ordained a presbyter, and was
now consecrated bishop of the Irish. After this he is known as Saint
Patrick. He devoted the remainder of his life to the Irish, and labored
among them with great effect, though amidst many difficulties and dangers.
The conversion of Ireland is ascribed to his means. The year of his death is
uncertain.

THE MISSIONARY ZEAL OF IRELAND

The blessed fruits of St. Patrick’s labors were abundantly manifested in
after years. Ireland at this time is described as a kind of elysium of peace
and piety; and its fame for pure scriptural teaching rose so high, that it
received the honorable appellation of “the Isle of Saints.” The labors of
the Irish clergy, however, were not confined to their own country.
Naturally fond of travelling or wandering, and being energized by a love for
souls, numbers left their native country, as missionary bands, under the
leadership of a loved and devoted abbot. The monasteries, it is generally
said, were so filled with pious monks at this time, that there was not
sufficient room in their own country for the employment of their zeal, so
that they felt it was their duty to exercise their activity in other lands.
Thus we see a broad silver line of God’s grace in that rude people, more
distinctly marked than in any other part of Christendom. The Lord’s name
be praised. But let us take an example to see its working.

THE MISSION OF COLUMBA

Columba, a pious man, of royal descent, and full of good works, became
deeply impressed with the importance of carrying the gospel to other
lands. He thought of Scotland, and determined to visit the country of the
famous Succath. Having communicated his intention to some of his fellow-
Christians, who thoroughly entered into his scheme, the mission was
agreed upon. About the year 565 Columba, accompanied by twelve
companions, sailed from the shores of Ireland in an open boat of wicker-
work, covered with skins; and, after experiencing much tossing in their
rude little vessel, the noble missionary band reached the Western Isles — a
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cluster of islands off the west coast of Scotland, called the Hebrides. They
landed near the barren rock of Mull, to the south of the basaltic caverns of
Staffa, and fixed their abode on a small island, afterwards known as Iona,
or Icolmkill. There he founded his monastery, afterwards so famous in the
history of the church. Tradition has preserved a point on the coast at
which they landed by an artificial mound, faintly resembling an inverted
boat, fashioned after the pattern of the currach, in which the pious monks
navigated the sea.2
A goodly number of Christians, it is thought, had already found a refuge
on that barren rock. At that time it must have been almost completely
isolated from the abodes of men. The waters of the Hebrides are so
tempestuous that navigation in open boats must have been extremely
dangerous. The name Iona signifies “the Island of Waves.” Besides its
cross tides, its currents, and its headlands, the heavy swell of the Atlantic
rolls in upon its shores. Of the monks of Iona we shall speak by-and-by;
but we have not yet done with Ireland.
Columbanus, another monk of great sanctity, appears to have left his cell
about sixty years after Columba. He was born in Leinster, and trained in
the great monastery of Bangor on the coast of Ulster. A society of three
thousand monks, under the government of its founder, Comgal, were
fostered in this convent. And the church in Ireland was still free; it had not
yet been enslaved by the church of Rome. They were simple and earnest
in their Christianity, compared with the lifeless forms and the priestly
element of the papacy. Neither did the religious houses of that period
resemble the popish convents of later times. Still they had traveled far
away from the simplicity of apostolic Christianity.
The word of God was not their only guide. Christianity had not existed in
the world six hundred years without contracting many corruptions. It had
passed through many events of very great importance in the history of the
church. Gnosticism, Monasticism, Arianism, and Pelagianism, were giant
evils in those early days; but Monasticism was the popular institution at
the close of the sixth century.
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THE CHARACTERISTICS OF A MONK SUPERIOR
A proficient in the mystic piety of that day was believed to work
miracles, utter prophecies, and enjoy divine visions. He was surrounded
with such a fearful sanctity, that none dared to touch the man of God. He
emerged from his miserable cell as from another world, himself and his
garments covered with dust and ashes; he boldly rebuked the vices of
kings, confronted the most cruel of tyrants, threatened the overthrow of
dynasties, and assumed the lofty tone of superiority over all secular
dignities.
Such was Columbanus. With a colony of monks he sailed from Ireland
about the year 590. He had intended to preach the gospel beyond the
Frankish dominions; but he landed in Gaul. The fame of his piety reached
the ears of Guntram, king of Burgundy, who invited him to settle in that
country. Declining the king’s offer, the abbot requested permission to
retire into some unapproachable wilderness. He established himself in the
Vosges. For a time the missionaries had to endure great hardships. They
had often for days no other food than wild herbs, the bark of trees, and
probably fish from the stream. But by degrees they made a favorable
impression on the people of the neighborhood. All classes looked on them
with reverence. Provisions were sent to them, especially by those who
were desirous of profiting by the prayers of these holy men. The supply
was described as miraculous. The piety and wonder-working powers of
the abbot soon gathered numbers around him. Monasteries arose in
different places, and rotaries flocked in to fill them.
Columbanus presided as abbot over all these institutions. His rule was
probably that of the Irish Bangor. Although his delight was ever to wander
in the wild woods, or to dwell for days in his lonely cave, he still exercised
strict superintendence over all the monasteries which he had formed.
Work, diet, reading, time for prayer, and the adjustment of punishment,
were all ruled by himself. He at length fell into disputes with his neighbors
as to the time of keeping Easter. He wrote on the subject to Pope Gregory
and to Boniface; and placed the church of Jerusalem above that of Rome,
as being the place of the Lord’s resurrection. He labored also in Metz,
Switzerland, and Italy; after founding many monasteries, he died in Rome
A .D . 610.
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The most celebrated follower of the great abbot was his countryman St.
Gall, who had accompanied him in all his fortunes; but being ill when his
master passed through Italy, he could not follow him, and was left in
Helvetia. He afterwards preached to the people in their own language,
founded the famous monastery which bears his name, and is honored as
the apostle of Switzerland. He died about the year 627. From the time of
St. Patrick until the middle of the twelfth century the church in Ireland
continued to assert its independence of Rome, and to maintain its position
as an active living branch of the church, not owning any earthly head.3 We
will now turn to Scotland.

THE FIRST PREACHERS OF CHRISTIANITY IN SCOTLAND

About a hundred and fifty years before the famous Columba landed on the
isle of Iona, St. Ninian, “a most holy man of the British nation,” as Bede
calls him, preached the gospel in the southern districts of Scotland. This
missionary, like almost all the saints of early times, is declared to have
been of royal blood. He received his education at Rome, studied under the
famous Martin of Tours, and, returning to Scotland, fixed his principal
residence in Galloway.
If his biographers can be trusted, we are to believe that he went
everywhere preaching the word, and that the naked savages listened,
wondered, and were converted. “He hastened about the work to which he
had been sent by the Spirit, under the command of Christ; and being
received in his country, there was a great concourse and running together
of the people, much joy in all, wonderful devotion; the praise of Christ
everywhere resounded; some took him for a prophet. Presently the
strenuous husbandman entered the field of his Lord, began to root up
those things which were badly planted, to disperse those badly collected,
and destroy those badly built.” Thousands, it is said, were bap-tised and
joined the army of the faithful.
He began to build a church of stone on the shores of the Solway, but,
before it was finished, he received intelligence of the death of his friend and
patron St. Martin, and piously dedicated the church to his honor. This is
said to have been the first stone building erected in Scotland, and, from
its white and glittering appearance compared with the log and mud cabins
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hitherto used, it attracted great attention. It was called in Saxon, whithern,
or whithorn, from its appearance, and so it is till the present day.4
We know nothing of the immediate successors of St. Ninian: down to the
mission of Columba the history of Christianity in Scotland is little known.
Doubtless the Lord would keep alive the fire which He had kindled, and
preserve and spread the truth of the gospel which had been received by so
many. Among the Picts, south of the Grampians, Ninian appears to
have labored chiefly and successfully; but with the celebrated Columba
begins the most interesting period in the ancient ecclesiastical annals of
Scotland.
We have already seen Columba and his colony of monks settling down in
Iona. There he built his monastery, such as it was. And so famous did the
college of Iona become, that it was considered for many years, nay, for
centuries, the light of the Western world. Men, eminent for learning and
piety, were sent forth to found bishoprics and universities in every quarter
of Europe. For thirty-four years Columba lived and labored on that
solitary rock. Occasionally he visited the mainland, doing the work of an
evangelist among the barbarous Scots and Picts, planting churches, and
exercising an immense influence over all classes; but his great object was
training men for the work of the gospel at home and abroad. A close and
friendly connection would, no doubt, be maintained between the North of
Ireland and the West of Scotland; indeed, at that time they were considered
as identical and were known by the general appellation of Scots.

THE IONA MISSIONARIES

About the close of the sixth, or the beginning of the seventh century,
missionaries began to issue from the cloisters of Iona, carrying the light of
Christianity not merely to the different parts of Scotland, but to England
and the continent. Augustine and his Italian monks landed in Kent a little
before the famous Aidan from Iona and his monks entered
Northumberland. Thus was Saxon England invaded by christian
missionaries at its two extremities.
Oswald, then king of Northumbria, was a Christian. He had been
converted, baptised, and received into the communion of the Scottish
Church when a youth and an exile in that country. On recovering the
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throne of his ancestors he naturally desired that his people should be
brought to the knowledge of the Savior. At his request the elders of Iona
sent him a missionary band, headed by the pious and faithful Aidan. The
king assigned them the island of Lindisfarne for their residence. Here
Aidan established the system of Iona; and the community lived according
to monastic rule. Numbers gathered to the new monastery both from
Scotland and Ireland. The king himself zealously assisted in spreading the
gospel: sometimes in preaching, and sometimes acting as an interpreter,
having learnt Celtic during his exile. Bede, though strongly Roman in his
affections, bears hearty testimony to the virtues of these Northern clergy
— “Their zeal, their gentleness, their humility and simplicity, their earnest
study of scripture, their freedom from all selfishness and avarice, their
honest boldness in dealing with the great, their tenderness and charity
towards the poor, their strict and self-denying life.” 5
The work of conversion appears to have prospered in the hands of both
Augustine and Aidan. The Italian monks extended their teaching and
influence over the south and south-west of the kingdom, while the Scottish
monks spread the truth of a clearer and simpler gospel over the northern,
eastern, and midland provinces. At one time the sees of York, Durham,
Lichfield and London, were filled by Scotchmen. Thus Rome and Iona met
on English ground, a collision was inevitable; who would be master?
Augustine, who had been consecrated primate of England by the pope,
required the Celtic monks to conform to the Roman discipline: this they
stedfastly refused to do, and defended with great firmness their own
discipline and the rules of Iona. Serious disputes now arose. Rome could
submit to no rival; she was determined to hold England in her grasp.
After the death of the pious and generous Oswald, the throne was filled by
his brother Oswy, who also had been converted to Christianity and
baptised in Scotland during his captivity. But his princess adhered to the
customs of Rome, and the family followed the mother. A strong influence
was thus brought to bear against the Scottish monks; and wearied with the
continual taunts and the unscrupulous conduct of the pontiff’s agents,
both sacred and secular, the unyielding presbyters determined to leave
England and return to Iona. By far the largest and most important part of
the country had been converted to Christianity by means of their labors;
but the triumph of Rome at the Whitby conference in 664, through the
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subtlety of the priest Wilfred, so discouraged them that they quietly
withdrew from the field after occupation of about thirty years. “However
holy thy Columba may have been,” said the crafty Wilfred, “wilt thou
prefer him to the prince of the apostles, to whom Christ said, Thou art
Peter, and I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven?” King
Oswy was present, and professed obedience to St. Peter, Lest, he said,
when I appear at the gate of heaven, there should be no one to open it to
me. The people soon followed their prince, and in a short time all England
became subservient to Rome. But neither arguments, intimidation, nor
derision, had any effect on the presbyters of the North. They refused to
acknowledge that they owed any allegiance to the bishop of Rome.
Scotland was still free. How to enslave her was now the great question
with the Romanists. The priests, as usual, set to work with the princes. It
was accomplished in this way: —

THE CLERICAL TONSURE

Amongst the many subjects of dispute between the Celtic and Italian
missionaries, the true day for the celebration of Easter, and the true form
of the clerical tonsure, excited the fiercest controversies, stirred up the
strongest passions, and ultimately led to the fall of the Church in Scotland,
and the triumph of the priests of Rome. But, having already spoken of the
Easter question in connection with the council of Nice, we will only now
notice the dispute about the tonsure.
It must appear strange to our youthful protestant readers, who may never
have seen a catholic priest with his hat off, that the shaving of his crown
was of more weight in his ordination than either his learning or his piety.
And the mere form in which it was shaven was considered of such
importance that it was made a test of orthodoxy. The Scottish monks
followed the churches of the East both in the observance of Easter and in
the form of the tonsure. They shaved the fore part of the head from ear to
ear in the form of a crescent. The Easterns claimed John and Polycarp as
their example and authority. The Italians professed to be greatly shocked
by such barbarity, and called it the tonsure of Simon Magus. The Roman
clergy used the circular form. This was done by making bald a small round
spot on the very crown of the head, and enlarging the spot as the
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ecclesiastic advanced in holy orders. The tonsure was made requisite as a
preparation for orders about the fifth or sixth century.
Augustine and his successors in the see of Canterbury, following the
writings of the most ancient and venerable Fathers, affirmed that the
tonsure was first introduced by the prince of the apostles, in honor of the
crown of thorns which was pressed upon the head of the Redeemer; and
that the instrument devised by the impiety of the Jews for the ignominy
and torture of Christ may be worn by His apostles as their ornament and
glory. For more than a century the controversy raged with great fierceness.
So far did matters proceed, that a man was or was not a heretic according
as he made bare the crown or the fore part of his head. Rome was filled
with anger; human means appeared insufficient to conquer a miserable
band of presbyters in a remote corner of the island. They refused to bend
before her. What was to be done? As always, finding herself unable to
accomplish her object by the priest, she had recourse to court favourites,
nobles, and princes. Naitam, king of the Picts, was made to believe, that
by submitting to the pope he would be equal to Clovis and Clotaire.
Flattered by such greatness of future glory, he recommended all the clergy
of his kingdom to receive the tonsure of St. Peter. Then without delay he
sent agents and letters into every province, and caused all the monasteries
and monks to receive the circular tonsure according to the Roman fashion.
Some refused. The elders of the rock held out for a time; but the orders of
the king, the example of the clergy, and the weakness of some amongst
themselves led the way to the downfall of Iona and all Scotland. About the
beginning of the eighth century the razor was introduced, they received the
Latin tonsure, they became serfs of Rome, and continued so until the
period of the Reformation.6

WHO WERE THE CULDEES?

The Culdees, as their name imports, were a kind of religious recluses,
who lived in retired places. The christian community of Iona was called
Culdees. And this is probably the reason why that isolate’d spot was
fixed upon by Columba as the seat of his monastery. Though utterly free
from the corruptions of the great monasteries on the continent, the life and
institutions of Columba were strictly monastic. And from fragments
gathered up it appears pretty certain, that “they gloried in their miracles,
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paid respect to relics, performed penances, fasted on Wednesdays and
Fridays, had something very like to auricular confession, absolution, and
masses for the dead; but it is certain they never submitted to the decrees of
the papacy in regard to celibacy.” Many of the Culdees were married men.
St. Patrick was the son of a deacon and the grandson of a priest.7
But though these good and holy men were so far infected by the
superstition of the times; the remoteness of their situation, the simplicity
of their manners, and the poverty of their country must have greatly
preserved them from Roman influences, and from the prevalent vices of
more opulent monasteries. We would rather think of it as a seminary, in
which men were trained for the work of the ministry. In after years the
monks were frequently disturbed, and sometimes slaughtered by pirates.
In the twelfth century Iona passed into the possession of Roman monks.
“Its pure and primitive faith,” says Cunningham, “had departed; its
renown for piety and learning was gone; but the memory of these
survived, and it was now regarded with greater superstitious reverence
than ever. Long before this it had been made the burial-place of royalty,
numerous pilgrimages were made to it, and now kings and chiefs began to
enrich it with donations of tithes and lands. The walls which are now
crumbling were then reared; and the voyager beholds these venerable
ecclesiastical remains rising from a bare moor in the midst of a wide ocean,
with feelings akin to those with which he regards the temples of Thebes
standing half buried amid the sands of the desert.”
We will now take our leave for a while of the British Isles. The first
planting of the cross in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and the ultimate
triumph of Rome in these countries are events of the deepest interest in
themselves; but as happening in our own country they are entitled to our
special attention. From this time little outward change takes place in the
history of the church, though there may have been many internal struggles
from the numerous abuses and the audacious demands of Rome.

THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY IN GERMANY AND PARTS ADJACENT

It is more than probable that the cross had been planted, at an early
period, in the heart of the German forests, as well as in those cities and
districts which were in subjection to the Roman Empire. The names of
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several bishops from Germany are found in the lists of the councils of
Rome and Arles held under the authority of Constantine in the years 313,
314. But it was not till the close of the sixth and the beginning of the
seventh century, that it was widely spread and firmly rooted. The Britons,
Scots, and Irish were honored of God as the principal instruments in this
great and blessed work. The ardent Columbanus, whose mission we have
already noticed, was the leader of the earliest band who went to the help
of the heathen on the continent of Europe. He first crossed over into
France, then passed the Rhine, and labored for the conversion of the
Swabians, Bavarians, Franks, and other nations of Germany. St. Kilian, a
Scotchman, and a most devoted evangelist, followed him. He is regarded as
the apostle of Franconia, and honored as a martyr for his christian
faithfulness about the year 692. Willibrord, an English missionary with
eleven of his countrymen, crossed over to Holland to labor among the
Frieslanders; but like other Anglo-Saxons of the period, he was warmly
devoted to the Roman See. He was ordained bishop of Witteburg by the
pope; his associates spread the gospel through Westphalia and the
neighboring countries.
But the man who brought the nations of Germany like a flock of sheep
under the shepherd of Rome, was the famous Winfrid. He was born at
Crediton in Devonshire, of a noble and wealthy family, about the year
680. He enterea a monastery in Exeter at the age of seven, and was
afterwards removed to Nursling in Hampshire. Here he became famous for
his ability as a preacher, and as an expositor of scripture. He felt called of
God in early life to go abroad as a missionary to the heathen. He sailed to
Frisia in the year 716. His labors were long and abundant. Three times he
visited Rome and received great honors from the pope. Under the title of
St. Boniface, and as the apostle of Germany, he died as a martyr at the
age of sixty-five. But though he was a most successful missionary, a man
of great strength of character, of great learning, and of saintly life, he was
the sworn vassal of the pope, and sought rather the advancement of the
church of Rome than the extension of the gospel of Christ.8

THE GREAT PAPAL SCHEME OF AGGRANDISEMENT

The diffusion of Christianity in this century far exceeded its former
bounds both in the Eastern and Western countries. We have seen
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something of its triumphs in the West. In the East the Nestorians are said
to have labored with incredible industry and perseverance to propagate the
truth of the gospel in Persia, Syria, India, and among the barbarous and
savage nations inhabiting the deserts and the remotest shores of Asia. In
particular, the vast empire of China was illumined by their zeal and
industry with the light of Christianity. During several succeeding
centuries, the patriarch of the Nestortans sent out a bishop to preside over
the churches then in China. These interesting people reject image worship,
auricular confession, the doctrine of purgatory, and many other corrupt
doctrines of the Roman and Greek churches.
The Eastern or Greek church appears to have been hindered by internal
dissensions from caring much for the spread of Christianity among the
heathen. In the West all was activity, but alas! not for the spread of the
gospel, or the conversion of souls.9

THE TRANSITIONAL PERIOD OF THE PAPACY

We now return to Rome. Her importance and influence as a center, claim
our closest attention for a little. The spiritual dominions of the pope were
now extended far and wide. From all parts of the empire bishops, princes,
and people looked to Rome as the parent of their faith, and the highest
authority in Christendom. But, though thus exalted to the highest spiritual
sovereignty, the supreme pontiff, in his relation to the eastern empire, was
still a subject. This was unbearable to the pride and ambition of Rome.
The mighty struggle for political life and power now commenced. It lasted
during the whole course of the seventh and eighth centuries. This was the
period of transition from a state of subordination to the civil power to that
of political self-exis-tence. How this could be accomplished was now the
great problem which the Vatican had to solve. But the spiritual dominion
could not be maintained without secular power.
The Lombards — the nearest and most dreaded neighbors of the popes —
and the Greek empire were the two great obstacles in the way of the
pope’s temporal sovereignty. The downfall of the western empire, and the
absence of any truly national government, left the Roman people to look
to the bishop as their natural chief. He was thus invested with a special
political influence, distinct from his ecclesiastical character. The invasions
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of the Lombards, as we have already seen, and the feebleness of the
Greeks, contributed to the increase of political power in the hands of the
pontiffs. But this was only accidental, or the necessity of unforeseen
emergencies. The Roman states were still governed by an officer of the
eastern empire, and the pope himself, if he offended the Emperor, was
liable to be seized and thrown into prison, as was actually the case with
Pope St. Martin in the year 653, who died in exile the following year.

THE ONE GRAND OBJECT OF THE PAPACY

Every day it became more and more manifest, that there could be no solid
peace for Rome, no sure foundation for the spiritual supremacy already
achieved, but in the total overthrow both of the Greek and Lombard
powers in Italy, and the appropriation of their spoils by the holy See.
This was now the one grand object of the successors of St. Peter, and the
battle they had to fight. But like the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite it
must be possessed by fair means or foul. Jezebel plots, and the death of
Naboth is accomplished. The history of the Lombard kings, and of the
great Iconoclastic controversy, during the seventh and eighth centuries,
throws much light on the means used to gain this end; but of these we can
only say a word as we pass along, and must refer our readers to the general
histories.10
“There is abundant historical ground to believe,” says Greenwood,
“that this object had by this time shaped itself very distinctly in
the mind of the papacy: the territory of its religious enemy, the
Emperor, must be definitively annexed to the patrimony of St.
Peter, together with as much more extensive a territorial estate as
opportunity might bring within its grasp. But there remained the
ardous and apparently hopeless task of wresting these prospective
acquisitions from the hands of the Lombard enemy. And, in fact,
the whole course of the papal policy was thenceforward directed
to the accomplishment of this single object.”

PEPIN AND CHARLEMAGNE A.D. 741-814

The eyes of the popes had for some time been turned to France as the
quarter from which deliverance was to come. The Frankish nation had been
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catholic from the beginning of their Christianity; but a closer connection
with Rome had been lately formed by means of St. Boniface, the English
monk. Filled as he was with the reverence of his nation for St. Peter and
his successors, he exerted all his influence among the bishops of France
and Germany, to extend the authority of the Roman See. This prepared
the way for the solution of the great problem now in hand.
Pepin, who was high steward or mayor of the palace to Childeric III, King
of the Franks, had long exercised all the powers of the State together with
all the attributes of sovereignty excepting the title; he thought that the time
was now come to put an end to the pageant royalty of his master, and
assume the kingly name and honors. He possessed in full measure all the
qualities which the nobility and people were accustomed to respect at that
period in princes. He was a gallant warrior and an experienced statesman.
By a brilliant series of successes he had greatly extended the dominion of
the Franks. The poor king being destitute of such abilities sank in popular
favor, and was surnamed the Stupid. Pepin, however, had the wisdom to
proceed cautiously at this stage of his plans. Boniface, who played an
important part in this matter, was secretly dispatched to Rome to prepare
the popefor Pepin’s message, and with instructions how to answer it. In
the meantime he assembled the states of the realm to deliberate on the
subject. The nobles gave it as their opinion, that first of all the pontiff
should be consulted, whether it would be lawful to do what the mayor
desired. Accordingly two confidential ecclesiastics were sent to Rome to
propose the following question to Pope Zachary — “Whether the divine
law did not permit a valiant and warlike people to dethrone an imbecile
and indolent monarch, who was incapable of discharging any of the
functions of royalty, and to substitute in his place one more worthy of rule,
and one who had already rendered most important service to the state?”
The laconic answer of the pope — already in possession of all the secrets
— was prompt and favorable. “He who lawfully possesses the royal power
may also lawfully assume the royal title.”
The pope no doubt replied as his questioners desired. Pepin now felt
secure of his prize. Fortified by the approval of the highest ecclesiastical
authority, and assured of the acquiescence of the people, he boldly
assumed the royal title. He was crowned by Boniface, in the presence of
the assembled nobles and prelates of the realm, at Soissons, A .D . 752. But
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the religious character of the coronation marked the growing power of the
clergy. The Jewish ceremony of anointing was introduced by Boniface to
sanctify the usurper; and the bishops stood around the throne as of equal
rank with the armed nobles. According to the usage of the Franks, Pepin
was elevated on the shield, amid the acclamations of the people, and
proclaimed king of the Franks. Childeric, the last of the Merovingian kings,
was stripped of royalty without opposition, shorn of his long hair,
tonsured, and shut up in a monastery.

ZACHARY’S SANCTION OF PEPIN’S PLOT

The part which Boniface and his patron the pope had in this revolution,
and the morality of the proceedings, have been the subjects of much
controversy. Papal writers have been at some pains to exonerate the
unscrupulous priests, and protestant writers to criminate them. But if we
compare their conduct with the principles of the New Testament, there
can be no controversy. Every right principle and feeling, both human and
divine, was readily sacrificed to secure the alliance of Pepin against the
Greeks and Lombards. The violation of the sacred rights of kings, the great
law of hereditary succession, the rebellious ambition of a servant, the
degradation of a lawful sovereign, absolving subjects from their allegiance,
are here sanctioned by the papacy as right in the sight of God, provided
they are the means of raising the pope to temporal sovereignty. Such was
the daring wickedness and awful blasphemy of the Roman See in the
middle of the eighth century. Let the student of church history note this
occurrence as characteristic of the papacy, and as a precedent for its future
pretensions. It is generally related as the first instance of the pope’s
interference with the rights of princes and the allegiance of subjects. But
the successors of Zachary made ample use of the precedent in after years.
They asserted that the kings of France, from this time, held their crown
only by the authority of the pope, and that the papal sanction was their
only legal title. Little did either Pepin or Zachary foresee the immense
effects of this one negotiation on the history of the church and the world.
It was the first great step towards the future kingdom of the bishop of
Rome — the important link in the chain of events.
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THE TEMPORAL SOVEREIGNTY OF THE PAPACY ESTABLISHED
By a mutual exchange of good offices, in less than three years Pepin
crossed the Alps at the head of a numerous army, overthrew the
Lombards, and recovered the Italian territory which they had wrested from
the Eastern empire. Justice would indeed have demanded that it should be
returned to the Emperor to whom it belonged; or he might have retained it
for himself. But he did neither. Mindful of his obligation to the holy See,
he replied, that he had not gone to battle for the sake of any man, but for
the sake of St. Peter alone, and to obtain the forgiveness of his sins. He
then transferred the sovereignty over the provinces in question to the
bishop of Rome. This was the foundation of the whole temporal dominion
of the popes.
Astolph, king of the Lombards, having sworn to Pepin that he would
restore to St. Peter the towns which he had seized, the French troops were
withdrawn. But the magnificent “donation,” so far as the pope was
concerned, was only on paper. He had not been put into actual possession
of the ceded territories, neither had he the means of putting himself in
possession of the royal gift. No sooner, therefore, had the Frankish king
recrossed the Alps than Astolph refused to fulfill his engagements. He
collected his scattered divisions, and resumed his attacks upon the
scattered territories of the church. He wasted the country up to the very
walls of Rome, and laid siege to the city. The pope, incensed as much at
the evasive conduct of Pepin as at the perfidy of the Lombards, sent
messages to his Frankish protectors in all haste by sea, for every way by
land was closed by the enemy. His first letter reminded King Pepin, that
he hazarded eternal condemnation if he did not complete the donation
which he had vowed to St. Peter. A second letter followed, more pathetic,
more persuasive. Still the Franks were tardy. And finally the pope wrote a
third, as from St. Peter himself. The daring and assumption of this letter is
so awful, that we give it entire as a specimen of the means used by the
pope to terrify the barbarians into the protection of the Holy See and the
advancement of her dominions. He considered all means justifiable for such
high purposes. Thus it reads:
“I, Peter the apostle, protest, admonish, and conjure you, the most
Christian kings, Pepin, Charles and Carloman, with all the
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hierarchy, bishops, abbots, priests and all monks; all judges, dukes,
counts, and the whole people of the Franks. The mother of God
likewise adjures you, and admonishes and commands you, she as
well as the thrones and dominions and all the host of heaven, to
save the beloved city of Rome from the detested Lombards. If ye
hearken, I, Peter the apostle, promise you my protection in this
life and in the next, will prepare for you the most glorious
mansions in heaven, and will bestow on you the everlasting joys of
paradise. Make common cause with my people of Rome, and I will
grant whatever ye may pray for. I conjure you not to yield up this
city to be lacerated and tormented by the Lombards, lest your own
souls be lacerated and tormented in hell with the devil and his
pestilential angels. Of all nations under heaven the Franks are
highest in the esteem of St. Peter; to me you owe all your victories.
Obey, and obey speedily; and, by my suffrage, our Lord Jesus
Christ will give you in this life length of days, security, victory; in
the life to come, will multiply His blessings upon you, among His
saints and angels.”11

THE FORESHADOWING OF THE MAN OF SIN

Nothing could give us a more expressive idea of the fearful apostasy of the
church of Rome than this letter. The one title to eternal life is obedience to
the pope; the highest duty of man is the protection and enlargement of the
holy See. But where is Christ? where are His claims? where is
Christianity? In place of seeking to convert the barbarians and win their
souls for Christ, the Lord’s most holy name, and the name of the apostle
are prostituted to the basest of purposes. The soldier that fights hardest
for the Roman See, though destitute of every moral and religious
qualification, is assured of great temporal advantages in this present life,
and in the life to come the highest seat in heaven. Surely we have here the
mystery of iniquity, and the foreshadowing of that man of sin, the son of
perdition; who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God,
or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God,
showing himself that he is God — even of him, whose coming is after the
working of Satan, with all power and signs and lying wonders. (2
Thessalonians 2:3-12.)
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Pepin soon had his Franks in marching order. The threatenings and
promises of St. Peter’s letter had the desired effect. They again invaded
Italy. Astolph yielded at once to the demands of Pepin. The contested
territory was abandoned. Ambassadors from the East were present at the
conclusion of the treaty, and demanded the restitution of Ravenna and its
territory to their master, the Emperor; but Pepin declared that his sole
object in the war was to show his veneration for St. Peter; and he
bestowed by the right of conquest the whole upon his successors. The
representatives of the pope now passed through the land, receiving the
homage of the authorities and the keys of the cities. But the territory he
accepted from a foreign potentate in the form of a donation belonged to his
acknowledged master, the Eastern Emperor. He had hired for a large sum,
which he took care to make payable in heaven, a powerful stranger to rob
his lawful sovereign for his own advantage, and without shame or
hesitation he accepted the plunder. The French king may be dethroned and
humbled by his servant, and the Greek Emperor may be robbed and defied
by his priest, if the church be thereby aggrandised. Such has ever been the
policy of Rome.
But the munificent donation of Pepin — who died in the year 768 —
awaited the confirmation of his son, Charlemagne. In the year 774, when
the Lombards once more threatened the Roman territories, the aid of
France was implored. Charlemagne proceeded to their help. He arrived in
Rome on Easter-eve. The Romans, we are told, received the king with
unbounded demonstrations of joy. Thirty thousand citizens went forth to
meet him; the whole body of the clergy with crosses and banners; the
children of the schools, who bore branches of palm and olive, and hailed
him with hymns of welcome. He dismounted, and proceeded on foot
towards St. Peter’s church where the pope and all the clergy were in
waiting. The king devoutly kissed each step of the stairs, and, on reaching
the landing kissed the Pope, and entered the building holding his right
hand. He spent the eve of Easter in devout exercises and prayers. But
when the king’s heart was warm and tender, pope Hadrian opened the
subject of a new deed of donation to the holy See. Charlemagne now
greatly enlarged the donation which Pepin had made to the church,
confirmed it by an oath, and solemnly laid the deed of gift on the apostle’s
tomb. After the conclusion of the Easter solemnities, he took his leave of
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the pontiff, and rejoined his army. His arms were victorious everywhere;
nor did he pause till he had entirely and finally subverted the empire of the
Lombards, and proclaimed himself King of Italy.

THE TERRITORIAL DONATION OF CHARLEMAGNE

The actual extent of his donation is very difficult to ascertain. But it seems
to be the general opinion of the historians, that it included not only the
exarchate of Ravenna, but the dukedoms of Spoleto and Benevento,
Venetia, Istria, and other territories in the north of Italy — in short, almost
the whole peninsula with the island of Corsica. Every Naboth was robbed
of his vineyard, and his blood shed, for the gratification of Jezebel’s
ambition, and for the establishment of her throne of iniquity. But mark the
consummation and seal of all wickedness in the way that the pope sought
to reconcile his character, as vicar of Christ, with his new position. As all
men are subject to Christ, he reasoned, so likewise are they subject to His
vicar and representative on earth in all that appertains to His kingdom. But
that kingdom extends over all; therefore nothing belonging to this world or
its affairs can be above or beyond the jurisdiction of St. Peter’s chair. Our
kingdom is not of this world; it is, like that of Christ, in all, above all, over
all. According to this theory, no amount of temporal dominion was to be
regarded as inconsistent with the Savior’s declaration respecting the nature
of His kingdom. On this impious assumption thenceforward, the popes
ever acted. Hence their interference with priest and people, king and
subject, land and sea, all over the world.
Charlemagne visited Rome again in 781, and a third time in 787, and on
each occasion the church was enriched by gifts, bestowed, as he professed
in the language of the age, “for the good of his soul.” Overwhelmed with
gratitude, and fully conscious of his own need of a permanent defender,
the pope crowned Charlemagne on the Christmas-eve of the year 800 with
the crown of the Western empire, and proclaimed him Caesar Augustus. A
Frankish prince, a Teuton, was thus declared the successor of the Caesars,
and wielded all the power of the Emperor of the West. “The empire of
Charlemagne,” says Milman, “was almost commensurate with Latin
Christendom; England was the only large territory which acknowledged
the ecclesiastical supremacy of Rome, not in subjection to the new
 388
Western empire.”12 This event forms the great epoch in the annals of
Roman Christendom.
We must now leave the West for a time, and turn our attention to another
great religious revolution which suddenly and unexpectedly sprang up in
the East — Mahometanism.
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CHAPTER 15
MAHOMET, THE FALSE PROPHET OF ARABIA

It has been with much interest, that we have traced the steady progress
and subduing power of Christianity throughout the whole of Europe,
during the seventh and eighth centuries, though in its Latin or Roman
dress. The name of Jesus was spread abroad, and God could use the sweet
savor of that name for blessing, in spite of the rigid formularies of Rome
which everywhere surrounded it. But all these conquests of the gospel,
through the management of the pope and the influence of his missionaries,
became the conquests of the Roman See. How far her spiritual dominion
might have extended, and how great her power might have become, had she
met with no formidable opposition, it would be impossible to imagine. But
God permitted an enemy to arise, who not only arrested the progress of
Romanism on all sides, but more than once made the pontiff himself
tremble for his safety even in the chair of St. Peter. This was Mahomet,
the impostor of Arabia.
The beginning of the seventh century — the time when this remarkable
man appeared — was peculiarly favorable for the accomplishment of his
great object. Almost the whole world was mad after idols. The prevailing
religion of his own country was grossly idolatrous. There were 360 idols
in the temple of Mecca, which was the precise number of days in the Arab
year. Paganism, with its numberless false gods, still covered a large portion
of the earth; and even Christianity alas! had become extensively idolatrous
both in the Greek and Roman churches. It was at this moment that
Mahomet appeared before the world as a stern and austere monotheist. He
felt himself called to restore the fundamental doctrine of the divine Unity
to its due prominence in the religious belief of mankind. But the very ideas
of incarnation, of redemption, of a Redeemer, of relationship and
communion with God — the pervading influences of a holy love — have
no place in the prophet’s system. The yawning gulf that separates
between God and the sinner is left impassable by the religion of Mahomet.
 390
But, before speaking of his system, we will briefly glance at his family and
youth.

THE FAMILY AND YOUTH OF MAHOMET

According to Arabian tradition, he was of the noble family of the Koreish.
That tribe, the Koreishite, at the time of Mahomet’s birth (which is
generally placed about the year 569) was a kind of hierarchy exercising
religious supremacy, and the acknowledged guardians of the Caaba, the
sacred stone of Mecca, with its temple. His father died soon after his
birth, and his mother when he was very young; so that he was left an
orphan and destitute. Other male members of his family having died, the
governorship of Mecca, and the keys of the Caaba, passed into the hands
of another branch of the family. Little is known of the first twenty-five
years of his life, save that he engaged in mercantile pursuits, and was so
successful and honorable in his dealings that he received the title of the
Amin, or faithful. At the age of twenty-eight he married a widow of his
kindred, possessed of great wealth. Twelve years after his marriage — in
his fortieth year — the prophet began to listen to the intimations of his
future mission. The misfortunes of his family and how to recover its
ancient dignity and power may have been at first in his mind. According to
a custom which was common among his countrymen, he withdrew every
year to a cave in a mountain, and spent some time in religious solitude. It
was in one of these caves, according to his own account, that he received
his first communication from heaven, or rather, as we believe, from the
dark abyss. He was, however, gradually wrought up to a belief that he was
especially called of God to be an instrument for the destruction of idolatry
and for the propagation of the true faith. His oracles, which he professed
to receive direct from heaven by the angel Gabriel, are preserved in the
Koran, and regarded by the faithful as the word of God.

THE RELIGION OF ISLAM

The new religion thus announced was Islam — a word which means
submission or resignation to the will of God. His doctrine was summed up
in his own aphorism, “There is no God but the true God, and Mahomet is
his prophet.” The six main articles in the theoretical faith of Islam were:
 391
1, belief in God;
2, in His angels;
3, in His scriptures;
4, in His prophets;
5, in the resurrection and day of judgment;
6, in predestination.
The practical part of the prophet’s creed was equally unobjectionable,
according to the prevalent thoughts of religious observance at the time. It
embraces four great precepts:
1, prayers and purification;
2, alms;
3, fasting;
4, the pilgrimage to Mecca,
which was held to be so essential that any one who died without
performing it might as well have died a Jew or a Christian.
The only really new and startling article in the religion of Islam was the
divine mission of Mahomet as the apostle and prophet of God. But in
these fair appearances the craft of Satan is most manifest. Such simple and
elementary religious principles would do violence to none, but deceive
many. History clearly proves that his opinions changed with his success,
and that his violence and intolerance increased with his power, until it
became a religion of the sword, of rapine, and of sensuality. “He is a gentle
preacher,” says Milman, “until he has unsheathed his sword.” The sword
once unsheathed is the remorseless argument. At one time we find the
broad principle of Eastern toleration explicitly avowed: diversity of
religion is ascribed to the direct ordinance, and all share in the equal favor,
of God. But the Koran gradually recants all these gentler sentences, and
assumes the language of insulting superiority or undisguised aversion. But,
although the Koran has many points of resemblance both to Judaism and
Christianity, it is thought that Mahomet was not acquainted with either
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the Old or the New Testament — that he rather drew his materials from
Talmudical legends, from spurious Gospels, and other heretical
writings, mixed with the old traditions of Arabia.
The first converts which Mahomet gained over to his new religion were
among his friends and near relations; but the work of conversion proceeded
very slowly. At the end of three years his followers only numbered
fourteen. Not content with his progress, he resolved to make a public
declaration of his religion. He first called upon his own family to recognize
him as a prophet of God; and, having been accepted as the prophet of his
family, he then aspired to be the prophet of his tribe. But his demands
were refused by the Koreishites, his pretensions disbelieved, and himself
and his followers persecuted.

MAHOMET’S TRIUMPHANT ENTRY INTO MEDINA

Hitherto he had endeavored to spread his opinions by persuasion only,
but the people were obstinate and superstitious, and threatened the
prophet with martyrdom. He was obliged to flee from his native city
Mecca, the central spot of the commerce and of the religion of Arabia, and
the hoped-for center of his new spiritual empire. He fled to Medina, where
he was received as a prince. Some of its most distinguished citizens had
embraced his cause; a party had been already formed in his favor. His
flight, A .D . 622, is regarded as the great era in the prophet’s life, and as the
foundation of the Mahometan chronology. Now that he was possessed of
a force, he was charged by a fresh revelation to use it for the propagation
of the faith. The character of his heavenly revelations was now changed;
they became fierce and sanguinary. His mouth was filled, like the prophets
of Ahab, with a lying spirit.
In a few years, after some fighting between the rival cities and the
followers of the rival religions, the strength of the prophet so increased,
that in 630 he gained possession of Mecca. He cleansed the Caaba of its
360 idols, and erected it into the great sanctuary of Islam. From that time
Mecca became the center of his system; the whole population swore
allegiance; all the tribes of Arabia were now under his dominion and in the
profession of his religion.
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MECCA THE CAPITAL OF ISLAM
Mahomet was now lord of Mecca. The unity of God was proclaimed and
his own prophetic mission from the highest pinnacle of the Mosque. The
idols were broken to pieces. The old system of idolatry sank before the
fear of his arms and the outward simplicity of his new creed. The next
important step in the policy of the prophet was to secure the absolute
religious unity of all Arabia. By this means the old hereditary feuds of the
tribes and races disappeared, and all were turned into one united religious
army against the infidels. War was now declared against all forms of
unbelief, which was especially a declaration of war against Christendom,
and an expressed determination to propagate Mahometanism by the
power of his sword.
Mahomet is now an independent sovereign. Arabia, delivered from idols,
embraces the religion of Islam. But, though the prophet is now a temporal
prince and a successful warrior, he neglects not the duties of a priest. He
constantly led the devotions of his followers, offered up the public
prayers, and preached at the weekly festivals on the Fridays. He
blasphemously assumed to be prophet, priest, and king. The mixture, the
delusion, is the inspiration of hell; it is like the masterpiece of Satan,
issuing from the realm of darkness. The fanaticism of his followers was
urged on by the inducements of plunder, and the gratification of every evil
passion. The appropriation of all female captives was recognised as one of
the laws of war, and the reward held out to valor. The maxims inculcated
on all the faithful were such as, “One drop of blood shed in the cause of
God, or one night spent in arms, is of more avail than two months’
employment in fasting and prayer. Whosoever falls in battle, his sins are
forgiven; at the day of judgment his wounds shall be resplendent as
vermilion and odoriferous as musk: and the loss of his limbs shall be
supplied by the wings of angels and cherubim.” The war cry of the
intrepid Khaled was, “Fight on, fight on and fear not! Paradise, paradise, is
under the shadow of your swords! Hell with its fires is behind him who
flies from battle; paradise is open to him who falls in battle.” Thus
animated, the Moslem armies were fired with enthusiasm; and, thirsting
for the spoils of victory here and a sensual paradise hereafter, they rushed
fearlessly into battle.
 394
The foundation of the Arabian empire was now laid. Mahomet summoned,
not only the petty potentates of the neighboring kingdoms, but the two
great powers of the more civilized world, the king of Persia and the
Emperor of the East, to submit to his religious supremacy. Heraclius is
said to have received the communication with respect; but Chosroes, the
Persian, contemptuously tore the letter to pieces: the prophet, on hearing
of the act, exclaimed, “It is thus that God will tear the kingdom, and reject
the supplications of Chosroes.” And so it happened; the kingdom of
Persia was reduced in a short time by the Mahometan arms to a few
scattered communities. But though the circle of Islam was widening, the
center was passing away. Having followed his eldest son to the grave with
tears and sighs, the prophet made his farewell pilgrimage to Mecca, and
died in the year 632, and in the sixty-fourth year of his age. It would
appear that he was untouched by remorse on his death-bed; but the blood
he had shed, and the multitudes he had beguiled, would follow him to the
judgment-seat.
The evil mission of the false prophet was fulfilled. He had organised the
most terrible confederacy the world ever saw. In the short space of ten
years he planted in the East a religion which has taken root so firmly, that
amid all the revolutions and changes of twelve centuries it still exercises a
powerful controlling influence over the minds and consciences of more
than a hundred millions of human beings.

THE SUCCESSORS OF MAHOMET

After the death of the prophet, war was declared against mankind by his
sucessors, the Caliphs. The chief of these were, Abou Beker, the wise;
Omar, the faithful; Ali, the brave; Khaled, the sword of God. These were
the oldest companions and relatives of the prophet. In a few months after
his death these generals were followed by the swarms of the desert, and
overran the plains of Asia. The history of these wars, though deeply
affecting the progress of Christianity, lies not within the sphere of our
“Short Papers.” But as many nations and multitudes of the Lord’s people
were the victims of this fearful scourge, it fairly claims a brief
consideration. Many believe that the Saracen locusts were a partial
fulfillment of Revelation 9:1-12.
 395
The persecuting heathen, such as Chosroes the infidel and defiant king of
Persia, and the merely nominal professors of Christianity, were alike
chastised of God by the successors of Mahomet; but the proud bishops
and priests were the especial objects of their vengeance. “Destroy not
fruit-tree nor fertile field in your path,” said the Caliphs; “be just, and
spare the feelings of the vanquished. Respect all religious persons who live
in hermitages or convents, and spare their edifices. But should you meet
with a class of unbelievers of a different kind, who go about with shaven
crowns and belong to the synagogue of Satan, be sure you cleave their
skulls, unless they embrace the true faith or render tribute.” And so the
mighty horde moved on with an enthusiasm which nothing could check.
“Syria fell; Persia and Egypt fell; and many other countries yielded to their
power.” Many great cities, such as Jerusalem, Bozrah, Antioch,
Damascus, Alexandria, Cyrene, and Carthage, fell into their hands. They
also invaded India, assailed Europe, overran Spain, and advanced even to
the banks of the Loire; but there they were defeated and driven back by
Charles Martel in the year 732. We would only further notice their
treatment of the vanquished in the case of Jerusalem.
In the year 637 Jerusalem fell into the hands of the Caliph Omar, who
built a mosque on the site of the temple. The whole people of that guilty
city were degraded into a marked and abject caste by the haughty
conqueror. Everywhere they were to honor the Mussulmans, and give
place before them. Christianity was subjected to the ignominy of
toleration; the cross was no longer to be exhibited on the outside of the
churches; the bells were to be silent; the Christians were to bewail their
dead in secrecy; the sight of the devout Mussulman was not to be
offended by the symbols of Christianity in any way; and his person was
to be considered sacred, so that it was a crime in a Christian to strike a
Mussulman.
Such was the condition to which the christian inhabitants of Jerusalem fell
at once, and in which they remained undisturbed by any serious aggression
of the Christians till the time of the crusades. Nearly the same terms, we
may believe, were enforced on all the Christians in Syria. Thus did God in
His holy providence deal with many nations both in the East and in the
West that were thickly peopled with Jews and Christians, and doom
 396
millions to a long night of servitude under Mahometanism which continues
to this day.1

REFLECTIONS ON MAHOMETANISM AND ROMANISM

Having brought down our history, both civil and ecclesiastical, to the close
of the eighth century, we may pause for a moment and reflect on what we
have seen, where we are, and what we have to expect. We have watched
the growth of the Roman See in the West, and how she gained the
summit of her ambition. We have also seen the rise of a great antagonistic
power in the East, inferior only in the extent of its religious and social
influence to Christianity itself. The first sprang up gradually in the very
center of enlightened Christendom, the latter arose suddenly in an obscure
district of a savage desert. But what, it may be asked, is the moral lesson
to be drawn from the character and results of these two great powers?
Both have been permitted by God, and, if we rightly judge, have been
permitted by Him as a divine judgment on Christendom for its apostasy,
and on the heathen for their idolatry. On the one hand, the war-cry was
raised against all who refused faith or tribute to the creed and to the armies
of the Caliphs; on the other hand, a more merciless war-cry was raised
against all who refused to believe in the Virgin and the saints, their visions
and miracles, their relics and images, according to the intolerant demands of
idolatrous Rome. The Eastern churches had been weakened and wasted
from the days of Origen by a Platonic philosophy, in the form of a
metaphysical theology, which caused continual dissension. In the West
controversy had been greatly avoided: power was the object there. Rome
had aspired, for centuries, to the dominion of Christendom — of the
world. Both were judicially dealt with by God in the fiery deluge from
Arabia; but Mahometanism remains as the mighty scourge of God in the
East, and Romanism in the West.

MONOTHELITES, ICONOCLASM
While the Arabs under Abou Beker and Omar were over-running the Greek
countries, and wresting province after province from the empire, the
Emperor contented himself by sending out armies to repel them, and
remained in his capital for the discussion of theological questions. From
the conclusion of his successful wars with Persia, religion had become
 397
almost the exclusive object of his solicitude. Two great controversies were
at that moment agitating the whole of the christian world. The first of
these, the so-called Monothelite controversy, may be described generally
as a revival, under a somewhat different form, of the old Monophysite, or
Eutychian, heresy. Under the general name of Monophysites are
comprehended the four main branches of separatists from the Eastern
church, namely, the Syrian Jacobites, the Copts, the Abyssinians, and the
Armenians. The originator of this numerous and powerful christian
community was Eutyches, abbot of a convent of monks at Constantinople
in the fifth century. The Monophysites denied the distinction of the two
natures in Christ; the Monothelites, on the other hand, denied the
distinction of the will, divine and human, in the blessed Lord. A well-
meant but unsuccessful attempt was made by the Emperor Heraclius to
reconcile the Monophysites to the Greek church. But as the sound of
controversy is seldom heard among the Eastern sectaries after this period,
and as a detailed account of their disputes would possess no interest to
our readers, we leave them on the pages of ecclesiastical history.2
Iconoclasm, or the Image-breaking storm, claims a fuller consideration.
It went to the heart of Christendom as no other controversy had ever done
before; and it forms an important epoch in the history of the Roman See.
Jezebel now appears in her true colors, and, from this time onward, her
evil character is indelibly stamped on the papacy. The popes who then
filled the chair of St. Peter openly defended and justified image-worship.
This was surely the beginning of the popedom — the maturity of the
God-dishonoring system. The foundations of popery were laid bare, and it
was thus seen that persecution and idolatry were the two pillars on which
her arrogant dominion rested.

THE FIRST VISIBLE OBJECT OF CHRISTIAN VENERATION

For more than three hundred years after the first publication of the gospel
there is good reason to believe, that neither images nor any other visible
objects of religious reverence were admitted into the public service of the
churches, or adopted into the exercises of private devotion. Probably such
a thing had never been thought of by Christians before the days of
Constantine; and we can only regard it as an early fruit of the union of
Church and State. Up till this period the great protest of Christians was
 398
against the idolatry of the heathen: for this they suffered unto death. And
it is not a little remarkable, that the Empress Helena, Constantine’s
mother, was the first to excite the christian mind to this degrading
superstition. She is said, in her zeal for religious places, to have discovered
and disinterred the wood of the “true cross.” This was enough for the
enemy’s purpose. The predilection of human nature for objects of
veneration was kindled; the flame spread rapidly; and the usual
consequence — idolatry — followed.
Similar memorials of the Savior, the Virgin Mary, the inspired Apostles,
and the Fathers, were found. The most sacred relics that had been
concealed for centuries were now discovered by visions. So great, so
successful, was the delusion of the enemy, that the whole church fell into
the snare. From the age of Constantine till the epoch of the Arab invasion,
a veneration for images, pictures and relics gradually increased. The
reverence for relics was more characteristic of the Western, and that for
images of the Eastern churches; but from the time of Gregory the Great
the feeling of the West became more favorable to images. In consequence
of the almost total decay of literature, both among the clergy and the laity,
the use of images was found to give immense power to the priesthood.
Pictures, statues, and visible representations of sacred objects became the
readiest mode of conveying instruction, encouraging devotion, and
strengthening religious sentiments in the minds of the people. The more
intellectual or enlightened of the clergy might endeavor to maintain the
distinction between respect for images as a means and not as objects of
worship. But the undiscriminating devotion of the vulgar utterly disregards
these subtleties. The apologist may draw fine distinctions between images
as objects of reverence and as objects of adoration; but there can be no
doubt that with ignorant and superstitious minds the use, the reverence,
the worship of images, whether in pictures or statues, invariably
degenerates into idolatry.
Before the close of the sixth century idolatry was firmly established in the
Eastern church, and during the seventh century it made a gradual and very
general progress in the West, where it had previously gained some footing.
It became usual to fall down before images, to pray to them, to kiss them,
to adorn them with gems and precious metals, to lay the hand on them in
swearing, and even to employ them as sponsors at baptism.
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LEO ATTEMPTS THE ABOLITION
OF IMAGE-WORSHIP ABOUT A.D. 726
The Emperor Leo III., surnamed Isauricus, a prince of great abilities, had
the boldness to undertake, in the face o! so many difficulties, to purify the
church of its detestable idols. As the writings of the unsuccessful party
were carefully suppressed or destroyed, history is silent as to the
Emperor’s motives: but we are disposed to believe that the new creed and
the success of Mahomet greatly influenced Leo. Besides, there was a very
general feeling among Christians in the East, that it was the increasing
idolatry of the church that had brought down upon them the chastisement
of God by the Mahometan invasion. The Christians were constantly
hearing from both Jews and Mahometans the odious name of idolaters.
The great controversy evidently arose out of these circumstances.
Leo ascended the throne of the East in the year 717; and, after securing the
empire against foreign enemies, he began to concern himself with the
affairs of religion. He vainly thought that he could change and improve the
religion of his subjects by his own imperial command. About the year 726
he issued an edict against the superstitious use of images — not their
destruction. We cannot suppose that the Isaurian was actuated by the fear
of the true God in this, but rather that his motives were purely selfish.
Being head of the empire and still ostensibly head of the church, he no
doubt thought that by his edicts he could accomplish the total and
simultaneous abolition of idolatry throughout the empire, and establish an
ecclesiastical autocracy. But Leo had greatly overrated his temporal power
in spiritual matters. The time was past for imperial edicts to change the
religion of the empire. He had yet to learn, to his deep mortification, the
disdainful, insolent, haughty pride and power of the pontiffs, and the
religious attachment of the people to their images.
The first edict merely interdicted the worship of images, and commanded
them to be removed to such a height that they could not be touched or
kissed. But the moment that the impious hand of the Emperor touched the
idols, the excitement was immense and universal. The proscription
affected all classes: learned and unlearned, priest and peasant, monk and
soldier, clergyman and layman, men, women, and even children, were
involved in this new agitation. The effect of the edict immediately
 400
occasioned a civil war both in the East and in the West. The monkish
influence was especially strong. They set up a pretender to the throne,
armed the multitude, and appeared in an ill-equipped fleet before
Constantinople. But the Greek fire discomfited the disorderly assailants;
the leaders were taken and put to death. Leo, provoked by the resistance
which his edict had met with, issued a second and more stringent decree.
He now commanded the destruction of all images, and the whitewashing of
walls on which such things had been painted.

THE SECOND EDICT PUBLISHED

Sweeping as the second edict was, the imperial officers, it is said, went
even beyond their orders. The most sacred statues and pictures were
everywhere ruthlessly broken, torn to pieces, or publicly committed to the
flames under the eyes of the enraged worshippers. “Heedless of danger
and death,” says Greenwood, “men, women, and even children, rushed to
the defense of objects as dear to them as life itself. They attacked and slew
the imperial officers engaged in the work of destruction; the latter,
supported by the regular troops, retaliated with equal ferocity; and the
streets of the metropolis exhibited such a scene of outrage and slaughter as
can only proceed from envenomed religious passions. The leaders of the
tumult were for the most part put to death on the spot; the prisons were
filled to repletion; and multitudes, after suffering various corporal
punishments, were transported to places of penal banishment.”3
The populace was now excited to fury; even the presence of the Emperor
did not overawe them. An imperial officer had orders to destroy a statue
of the Savior, which stood over the Brazen Gate of the imperial palace,
and was known by the name of the Surety. This image was renowned for
its miracles, and was held in great veneration by the people. Crowds of
women gathered about the place and eagerly entreated the soldier to spare
their favorite. But he mounted the ladder, and with his axe struck the face
which they had so often gazed upon, and which, they thought, benignly
looked down upon them. Heaven interfered not, as they expected; but the
women seized the ladder, threw down the impious officer, and tore him to
pieces. The Emperor sent an armed guard to suppress the tumult; the mob
joined the women, and a frightful massacre took place. “The Surety” was
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taken down, and its place was filled with an inscription in which the
Emperor gave vent to his enmity against images.4
The execution of the imperial orders was everywhere resisted, both in the
capital and the provinces; the popular enthusiasm was so great that it
could only be quelled by the strongest efforts of the civil and military
power. Passions were kindled on both sides which had their natural issue
in the most daring rebellion and the most violent persecution.

THE POPE REJECTS THE EDICTS OF LEO

The intelligence of the first assault of Leo against the images of
Constantinople filled the Italians with grief and indignation; but when the
orders arrived to put the fatal decrees in force within the Italian
dependencies of the empire, all rose to arms from the greatest to the least.
The pope refused to obey orders and defied the Emperor; and all the
people swore to live and die in the defense of the pope and the holy
images. But the political complication of matters at that moment made it
impossible for the Emperor to enforce his edicts in the papal dominions.
Gregory addressed the Emperor in the most haughty strain; the tone of his
reply to the imperial manifesto breathes a spirit of the most seditious
defiance. The monks, who saw their craft in danger — the superstition to
which they owed their riches and influence, preached against the Emperor
as an abandoned apostate. He was painted by these slaves of idolatry as
one who combined in himself every heresy that had ever polluted the
Christian faith and endangered the souls of men. But as exhibiting the true
spirit of popery, both in the defense of their darling superstition, idolatry,
and in their defiance of temporal power, we will transcribe parts of the
original epistles of the second and third Gregory, leaving the reader to
examine the portrait.
Pope Gregory II. says to the Emperor,
“During ten pure and fortunate years, we have tasted the annual
comforts of your royal letters, subscribed in purple ink with your
own hand, the sacred pledges of your attachment to the orthodox
creed of your fathers. How deplorable is the change! how
tremendous the scandal! You now accuse the catholics of idolatry;
and, by the accusation, you betray your own impiety and
 402
ignorance. To this ignorance we are compelled to adapt the
grossness of our style and arguments: the first elements of holy
letters are sufficient for your confusion; and, were you to enter a
grammar school, and avow yourself the enemy of our worship, the
simple and pious children would cast their tablets at your head.”
After this disloyal and offensive salutation, the pope attempts in the usual
way the defense of image-worship. He endeavors to prove to Leo the vast
difference between christian images and the idols of antiquity. The latter
were the fanciful representation of demons; the former are the genuine
likeness of Christ, His mother, and His saints. He then appeals in
justification of their worship to the decorations of the Jewish temple; the
mercy-seat, the cherubim, and the various ornaments made by Bezaleel to
the glory of God. Only the idols of the Gentiles, he affirms, were
forbidden by the Jewish law. He denies that the catholics worship wood
and stone: these are memorials only, intended to awaken pious feelings.
In speaking of his own edification from beholding the pictures and images
in the churches, we have a passage of great historical interest as showing
the usual subjects of these paintings. “The miraculous portrait of Christ
sent to Abgarus, king of Edessa; the paintings of the Lord’s miracles; the
virgin mother, with the infant Jesus on her breast, surrounded by choirs of
angels; the last supper; the raising of Lazarus; the miracles of giving sight
to the blind; the curing the paralytic and the leper; the feeding of the
multitudes in the desert; the transfiguration; the crucifixion, burial,
resurrection, and ascension of Christ; the gift of the Holy Ghost, and the
sacrifice of Isaac.”5
Gregory enters at length into the common arguments in behalf of images,
and reproaches the Emperor with his breach of the most solemn
engagements, and then breaks out in a contemptuous tone, such as, “You
demand a council: — revoke your edicts, cease to destroy images; a council
will not be needed. You assault us, O tyrant, with a carnal and military
band: unarmed and naked, we can only implore the Christ, the prince of
the heavenly host, that He will send unto you a devil for the destruction of
your body and the salvation of your soul. You declare, with foolish
arrogance, I will dispatch my orders to Rome, I will break in pieces the
image of St. Peter; and Gregory, like his predecessor Martin, shall be
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transported in chains, and in exile, to the foot of the imperial throne.
Would to God that I might be permitted to tread in the footsteps of the
holy Martin; but may the fate of Constans serve as a warning to the
persecutors of the church. But it is our duty to live for the edification and
support of the faithful people; nor are we reduced to risk our safety on the
event of a combat. Incapable as you are of defending your Roman subjects,
the maritime situation of the city may perhaps expose it to your
depredations; but we have only to retire to the first fortress of the
Lombards, and then you may as well pursue the winds. Are you ignorant
that the popes are the bond of union, the mediators of peace between the
East and the West? The eyes of the nations are fixed on our humility; and
they revere, as a God upon earth, the apostle St. Peter, whose image you
threaten to destroy.”
The conclusion of the pope’s letter evidently refers to his new allies
beyond the Alps. The Franks had dutifully listened to the papal
recommendation of Boniface, the apostle of Germany. Secret negotiations
were already begun to secure their assistance. The history and results of
these we have, in a previous paper, examined. Hence the pope assured his
royal correspondent, that “the remote and interior kingdoms of the West
present their homage to Christ and His vicegerent: and we now prepare to
visit one of their most powerful monarchs, who desires to receive from our
hands the sacrament of baptism. The barbarians have submitted to the
yoke of the gospel, while you alone are deaf to the voice of the Shepherd.
These pious barbarians are kindled into rage; they thirst to avenge the
persecutions of the East. Abandon your rash and fatal enterprise; reflect,
tremble, and repent. If you persist, we are innocent of the blood that will
be spilt in the contest; may it fall on your head.”6

A LYING SPIRIT IN THE MOUTH OF POPERY

After carefully reading these ancient epistles, it is impossible to believe
that Gregory could have been so ignorant as to state so many things to Leo
in favor of image-worship that were positively false: we are more inclined
to believe that he knew them to be untrue, but counted on the ignorance of
the Emperor. “You say,” continued Gregory, “that we are forbidden to
venerate things made by men’s hands. But you are an unlettered person,
and ought therefore to have inquired of your learned prelates the true
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meaning of the commandment. If you had not been obstinately and
wilfully ignorant, you would have learned from them that your acts are in
direct contradiction to the unanimous testimony of all the fathers and
doctors of the church, and in particular repugnant to the authority of the
six general councils.” So glaringly false are these statements, that we can
only wonder how any one could have had the effrontery to write them as
true, especially the highest ecclesiastic in Christendom. But it proves that
there has been from the beginning a lying spirit in the mouth of popery, as
there was in the prophets of Baal. (1 Kings 22:23.) Even Greenwood says,
“In none of the general councils does a word about images or
image-worship occur. The statement as to the unanimous
testimony of the fathers is equally at fault. Excepting in the works
of Gregory the Great, I have not met with any mention of the
practice of image-worship in the fathers of the first six centuries of
the christian era.”7
But the lying spirit goes on to say, that the visible appearance of Christ in
the flesh made such an impression on the minds of the disciples, that “no
sooner had they cast their eyes upon Him than they hastened to make
portraits of Him, and carried them about with them, exhibiting them to the
whole world, that at the sight of them men might be converted from the
worship of Satan to the service of Christ, — but so only that they should
worship them, not with an absolute adoration, but only with a relative
veneration.” In like manner the pope assured Leo, that “pictures and
images had been taken of James, the Lord’s brother, of Stephen, and all
other saints of note. And so having done, he dispersed them over every
part of the earth, to the manifest increase of the gospel cause.”
By a strange perversion or confusion of scriptural facts, the pope
compares the Emperor with “the impious Uzziah, who,” he tells him,
“sacrilegiously removed the brazen serpent, which Moses had set up, and
broke it in pieces.” Here we may give the pope the benefit of ignorance.
He was less likely to know his Bible than the six general councils. He
seems to have had some confused recollection of the story of Uzza, whom
the Lord smote, because he put forth his hand to stay the ark when the
oxen stumbled, and of the act of Hezekiah, who broke in pieces the brazen
serpent expressly to prevent the people from paying divine homage to it.
 405
(1 Chronicles 13:9; 2 Kings 18:4.) “Uzziah,” he says, though it was really
Hezekiah — “Uzziah truly was your brother, as self-willed, and, like you,
daring to offer violence to the priests of God.” It might now be asked,
what would the children of our schools say to the pope who mistook the
good king Hezekiah for a wicked king, and his destroying the brazen
serpent for an act of impiety? As well might we expect them to throw
their tablets at Gregory’s, as at Leo’s head. But enough has been said on
this point to show the reader what has been the spirit and character of
popery from its very foundation. It has ever been a barefaced, lying,
idolatrous system, though countless numbers of God’s saints have been in
it during its darkest periods. The saving Name of Jesus has ever been
maintained amidst its grossest absurdities and idolatries, and whosoever
believes in that Name shall surely be saved. The finger of faith that
touches but His garment’s hem, though pressed through a throne of
idolaters, opens the everlasting springs of all healing virtue, and the very
fountain of disease is immediately dried up. And whatever the press or
throne may be, He will look round to see the one that touched Him by
faith, and speak peace to the troubled soul. (Mark 5:25-34.)

CLOSE OF ICONOCLASM
Gregory did not long survive his epistles. In the following year he was
succeeded by a third pope of the same name. Gregory III. was also
zealous in the cause of images, he labored to increase the popular
veneration for them. In Rome he set the example of image-worship on the
most splendid scale. A solemn council was convoked, consisting of all the
bishops of the Lombard and Byzantine territories in Northern Italy to the
number of ninety-three. The assembly was held in the actual presence of
the sacred relics of the apostle Peter, and was attended by the whole body
of the city clergy, the consuls, and a vast concourse of people; and a
decree was framed, unanimously adopted and signed by all present, to the
effect that, “If any person should hereafter, in contempt of the ancient and
faithful customs of all Christians, and of the apostolic church in particular,
stand forth as a destroyer, defamer, or blasphemer of the sacred images of
our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and of His mother, the immaculate ever-
Virgin Mary, of the blessed apostles, and all other saints, he be excluded
 406
from the body and blood of the Lord, and from the communion of the
universal church.”8
Leo, indignant at the pope’s audacity, arrested his messengers, and
resolved to fit out a numerous fleet and army to reduce Italy into better
subjection. But this Greek Armada encountered a terrible storm in the
Adriatic; the fleet was disabled; and Leo was compelled to postpone his
designs for enforcing the execution of his edicts against images in the
Italian dependencies of the empire. He indemnified himself, however, by
confiscating the papal revenues in Sicily, Calabria, and other parts of his
dominions, and transferring Greece and Illyricum from the Roman
patriarchate to that of Constantinople. But here, with both, the scene
closes, but not the contest. Gregory and Leo both died in 741. The
Emperor was succeeded by his son Constantine, whose reign extended to
the unusual length of thirty-four years. Gregory was succeeded by
Zachary, a man of great ability, and deeply imbued with the spirit of
popery. To the end of his reign, Constantine was unrelenting in his enmity
against the worshippers of images. He is blamed for great cruelty towards
the monks, but he was no doubt provoked to the last degree by their
violent and fanatical behavior.
Irene, wife to the son and heir of Constantine, an ambitious, intriguing,
haughty princess, seized the government on the death of her feeble
husband, in the name of her son, who was only ten years old. She
dissembled for a time her designs for the restoration of images. Policy and
idolatry took counsel together in her heart. She was jealous, crafty and
cruel. Her history is the record of inward hatred and treachery with an
outward appearance of courtesy. But we have only to do with the
religious part of her reign.

THE SECOND COUNCIL OF NICAEA

Decrees were issued for a council to be held at Nicaea — a city, hallowed
by the sittings of the first great council of Christendom to decide the
question of image-worship. The number of ecclesiastics present was
about 350. Her chosen men took the lead; everything was, no doubt, pre-
arranged. Among the preliminary acts of the council, it was debated to
what class of heretics the Iconoclasts were to be ascribed. Tarasius,
 407
president of the assembly, asserted that it was worse than the worst
heresy, being an absolute denial of Christ. The whole proceedings of the
council were characterized by the same condemnatory tone towards the
adversaries of image-worship. After assenting to the decrees of the first six
councils, and to the anathemas against the heretics denounced therein, they
passed — acting, as they declared, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit
— the following canon:
“With the venerable and life-giving cross shall be set up the
venerable and holy images, whether in colors, in mosaic work, or
any other material, within the consecrated churches of God, on the
sacred vessels and vestments, on the walls and on tablets, in
houses and in highways. The images, that is to say, of our God and
Savior Jesus Christ; of the immaculate mother of God; of the
honored angels; of all saints and holy men — these images shall be
treated as holy memorials, worshipped, kissed, only without that
peculiar adoration which is reserved for the Invisible,
Incomprehensible, God. All who shall violate this, as is asserted,
immemorial tradition of the church, and endeavor, forcibly or by
craft to remove any image, if ecclesiastics, are to be deposed and
excommunicated; if monks or laymen, to be excommunicated.”
The council was not content with this formal and solemn subscription.
With one voice they broke out into a long acclamation.
“We all believe, we all assert, we all subscribe. This is the faith of
the apostles, this is the faith of the church, this is the faith of the
orthodox, this is the faith of all the world. We who adore the
Trinity worship images. Whoever do not the like, anathema upon
them! Anathema on all who call images idols! Anathema on all who
communicate with those who do not worship images... Everlasting
glow to the orthodox Romans, to John of Damascus! To Gregory
of Rome, everlasting glory! Everlasting glory to all the preachers of
truth!”

HELENA AND IRENE

Thus ended the most critical question that had ever been raised since
Christianity became the religion of the Roman world. By the seventh
 408
general council idolatry was formally and vehemently established as the
worship of the great papal system, and anathemas were denounced
against all who should dare to depart from it. Hence the merciless
persecution of so-called separatists. But it is worthy of note, as according
with our view of Jezebel’s character, that a woman was the first mover in
the worship of images, and a woman was the restorer of images when they
had been cast down. Helena, the mother of Constantine the Great, was a
blameless and devout woman, but she was used of the enemy to introduce
exciting relics and sacred memorials which changed Christianity from a
purely spiritual worship to that paganising form of religion which grew up
with such rapidity in the succeeding centuries. The crafty Irene was again
used of Satan to restore and re-establish the worship of images. From that
day to this both the Greek and Latin churches have adhered to that form of
worship, and maintained the sanctity of their images and pictures.
The political results of the Iconoclastic controversy were equally great and
important. Rome now burst the bonds of her connection with the East,
separating herself for ever from the Byzantine empire; and Greek
Christianity from this time becomes a separate religion, and the empire a
separate state. The West, receiving a great accession of power through this
revolution, ultimately created its own empire, formed alliances with the
Frankish kings, and placed the crown of the Western empire on the head of
Charlemagne, as we have already seen.
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CHAPTER 16
THE SILVER LINE OF SOVEREIGN GRACE

The papal monarchy is now established. The court of France and the
papacy are united. Rome is now dissevered from the East, and become the
center of influence over all the West. But having traced the dark lines of
the apostasy of Latin Christianity from the beginning of the fourth to the
beginning of the ninth century, we will now turn for a little and endeavor
to trace the silver line of God’s sovereign grace in those who separated
from her communion during the same period. If Satan was active in
corrupting the outward church, God was active in gathering out His own
from the corrupt mass, and strengthening them as His own special
witnesses. From the days of Augustine, the noble witness for His grace
against Pelagianism in Western Christendom, down to the Reformation, a
line of faithful witnesses may be traced who testified against the idolatry
and tyranny of Rome, and preached salvation through faith in Christ Jesus
without works of merit.1 Besides multitudes who were nourished in
private, both in convents and families, on the simple truth of the gospel,
we would briefly notice some of the most prominent who form an
important link in the great chain of witnesses, especially as connected with
the history of the church in Europe.

THE NESTORTANS AND THE PAULICIANS

The rise of the Nestorians in the fifth century and their great missionary
zeal have been already mentioned. At their head stood a bishop, known by
the title of Patriarch of Babylon. His residence was originally at Seleucia.
From Persia, it is said, they carried the gospel to the North, the East, and
the South. In the sixth century they preached the gospel with great success
to the Huns, the Indians, the Medes, and the Elamites: on the coast of
Malabar, and the isles of the ocean, great numbers were converted.
Following the course of trade, the missionaries made their way from India
to China, and penetrated across the deserts to its northern frontier. In
1625 a stone was discovered by the Jesuits near Singapore, which bears a
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long inscription, partly Syriac and partly Chinese, recording the names of
missionaries who had labored in China, and the history of Christianity in
that country from the year 636-781. But the propagation of Christianity,
it is thought, awakened the jealousy of the State, and, after witnessing the
success of the gospel, and experiencing persecution, they probably were
exterminated, or fled, about the close of the eighth century. The
Nestortans were patronised by some of the Persian kings, and under the
reign of the caliphs they were protected and prospered greatly. They
assumed the designation of Chaldean Christians, or Assyrians, and still
exist under that name.2
The doctrines, character, and history of the Paulicians have been subjects
of great controversy; but they have not been allowed to speak for
themselves to posterity. Their writings were carefully destroyed by the
catholics, and they are known to us only through the reports of bitter
enemies who brand them as heretics, and as the ancestors of the protestant
reformers. On the other hand, some protestant writers accept the pedigree,
and assert that they were the maintainers of a purely scriptural
Christianity, which may have appeared to the papacy as heretical. This
latter circumstance, from what we have already shown, will be easily
believed. The most grievous corruptions, both in the doctrine and the
worship of the catholic church, had been not only admitted, but enforced,
long before the rise of the Paulicians. Neither the spirit nor the simplicity
of the gospel remained; hence, scriptural Christianity must have appeared
to the image-worshippers as a heresy.
Passing over many individual names from the time of St. Augustine, who
were worthy witnesses of the truth, we will come at once and inquire into

THE ORIGIN OF THE PAULICIANS A.D. 653

The Gnostics, who had been so numerous and powerful during the early
days of Christianity, were now an obscure remnant, chiefly confined to
the villages along the borders of the Euphrates. They had been driven by
the all-powerful catholics from the capitals of the East and the West, and
the remains of their different sects passed under the general and odious
name of the Manicheans.
 411
In this region, at the village of Mananalis, near Samosata, lived about the
year 653 one Constantine, who is described by the Roman writers as
descended from a Manichean family. Soon after the Saracens’ conquest of
Syria, an Armenian deacon, who was returning from captivity among the
Saracens, became the guest of Constantine. In acknowledgement of his
hospitality the deacon made him a present of a manuscript, containing the
four Gospels and the fourteen Epistles of St. Paul. This was indeed a rare
gift, as the scriptures were already concealed from the laity. The study of
these sacred books produced a complete revolution in his religious
principles, and in the whole subsequent course of his life. Some say he had
been trained in Gnosticism, others, that he was a member of the Greek
established church; but, however this may have been, those books now
became his only study and the rule of his faith and practice.
Constantine now thought of forming a new sect, or rather, of restoring
apostolic Christianity. He renounced and cast away his Manichean books,
say his enemies; he abjured Manicheism, and made it a law to his followers
not to read any other books whatsoever, but the Gospels and the epistles
of the New Testament. This may have given their enemies a pretext for
charging them with rejecting the Old Testament and the two Epistles of St.
Peter. But it is more than probable that they did not possess these
portions of the word of God. It is to befeared however, from their peculiar
attachment and devotion to the writings and character of St. Paul, that
other scriptures were neglected.
It is generally agreed that the word Paulician is formed from the name of
the great apostle of the Gentiles. His fellow-laborers, Silvanus, Timothy,
Titus, Tychicus, were represented by Constantine and his disciples; and
their congregations, as they sprang up in different places, were called after
the names of the apostolic churches. It is difficult to see, in this “innocent
allegory,” as it has been termed, how the catholics could have been so
grievously offended with the Paulicians, or could have found a pretext for
hunting them down with fire and sword. Yet so they did, as we shall
presently see. Their unpardonable sin was their separation from the State
church; their testimony against superstition and apostasy; their reviving
the memory of a pure primitive Christianity.
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SILVANUS AT CIBOSSA
Constantine, who styled himself Silvanus, addressed his first appeals to
the inhabitants of a place called Cibossa in Armenia, whom he styled
Macedonians. “I am Silvanus,” he said, “you are Macedonians.” There he
fixed his residence and labored with untiring energy for nearly thirty years;
he made many converts, both from the Catholic Church, and the
Zoroastrian religion. At length, the sect having become sufficiently
considerable to attract attention, the matter was reported to the Emperor,
and an edict was issued A .D . 684 against Constantine and the Paulician
congregations. The execution of the decree was entrusted to an officer of
the imperial court, named Simeon. He had orders to put the teacher to
death, and to distribute his followers among the clergy and in monasteries,
with a view to their being reclaimed. The government, no doubt, ordered as
directed by the church; as in the case of Ahab, “whom Jezebel his wife
stirred up.” (1 Kings 21:25.) But the Lord is above all, and He can make
the wrath of man to praise Him.
Simeon placed Constantine — the chief object of the priests’ revenge —
before a large number of his companions, and commanded them to stone
him. They refused, and, instead of obeying, all dropped the stones with
which they were armed, excepting one young man; and Constantine was
killed by a stone from the hand of that heartless youth — his own adopted
son Justus. This ungrateful apostate has been extolled by the enemies of
the Paulicians, as another David who with a stone slew another Goliath —
the giant of heresy. But from the stoning of Constantine, as from the
stoning of Stephen, a new leader was raised up in the person of his
imperial murderer. Impressions were made on Simeon’s mind by what he
had seen and heard that he could not shake off. He entered into
conversation with some of the sectaries, and the result was that he became
their convert. He returned to the imperial court, but after spending three
years at Constantinople in great uneasiness of mind, he fled, leaving all his
property behind him, and took up his abode at Cibossa, where, under the
name of Titus, he became the successor of Constantine Sylvanus.
About five years after the martyrdom of Constantine the same renegade
Justus betrayed the Paulicians. He knew, like the traitor of old, the habits
and movements of the community, and also where he would be rewarded
 413
for his treachery. He went to the bishop of Colonia, and reported the
revival and spread of the so-called heresy. The bishop communicated his
information to the Emperor Justinian II., and, in consequence, Simeon, and
a large number of his followers were burnt to death in one large funeral
pile. The cruel Justinian vainly thought to extinguish the name and
memory of the Paulicians in a single conflagration, but the blood of the
martyrs seemed only to multiply their numbers and strength. A succession
of teachers and congregations arose from their ashes. The new sect spread
over all the adjacent regions, Asia Minor, Pontus, the borders of Armenia
and to the westward of the Euphrates. They bore, during many successive
reigns, with christian patience, the intolerant wrath of the rulers through
the instigation of the priests. But the prize for cruelty, as one observes,
must doubtless be awarded to the sanguinary devotion of Theodora, who
restored the images to the Oriental church.

ANOTHER JEZEBEL IN POWER A.D. 842

After the death of the Emperor Theophilus, Theodora his widow
governed as regent during the minority of her son. Her concealed
attachment to idolatry was well known to the priesthood, and no sooner
was Theophilus dead than she applied herself to the complete
accomplishment of her great object. When the way was clear, a solemn
festival was appointed for the restoration of images.
“The whole clergy of Constantinople, and all who could flock in
from the neighborhood, met in and before the palace of the
archbishop, and marched in procession with crosses, torches, and
incense, to the church of St. Sophia. There they were met by the
Empress and her infant son Michael. They made the circuit of the
church, with their burning torches, paying homage to every statue
and picture, which had been carefully restored, never again to be
effaced till the days of later, more terrible Iconoclasts, the Ottoman
Turks.” 3
After so triumphant a re-establishment of images, the victorious party no
doubt thought the right time was come to propose and endeavor to secure
another triumph; they now urged the Empress to undertake the entire
suppression of the Paulicians. They had preached against images, relics,
 414
and the rotten wood of the cross. They were not fit to live. The catholics
gained their object! An edict was issued under the regency of Theodora,
which decreed that the Paulicians should be exterminated by fire and
sword, or brought back to the Greek church. But they refused all attempts
which were made to gain them, and the fiery demon of persecution was let
loose among them. Her inquisitors explored the cities and mountains of the
lesser Asia, and executed their commission in the most cruel manner. The
numbers of the sect, and the severity of the persecution, may be judged by
the multitudes who were slain by the sword, beheaded, drowned, or
consumed in the flames. It is affirmed by both civil and ecclesiastical
historians, that, in a short reign, one hundred thousand Paulicians were put
to death. Was there ever a more genuine daughter of Jezebel? She had not
even an Ahab to stir up to do this cruel work, but with her own hand, as it
were — alas! a woman’s hand — by her own decree, she slaughtered one
hundred thousand of God’s saints,* re-established the worship of idols,
and nourished with royal favor the idolatrous priests of Rome.
The history of Iconoclasm has been remarkable for female influence.
Helena was the first to suggest and encourage veneration for relics; Irene
was the restorer of image-worship when threatened with destruction; and
now Theodora not only re-establishes the idolatry which her husband had
endeavored to suppress, but persecutes the true worshippers. Surely that
woman Jezebel — symbol of the dominant church in the dark ages — has
her antitype in these three women, especially the last two. The likeness is
too striking to be questioned. But the whole system of Catholicism
breathes the fearful spirit, and is characterised by the dark features of
Jezebel’s character. The word of the Lord cannot be broken.
“There was none like unto Ahab, which did sell himself to work
wickedness in the sight of the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up.”
This is the type. The antitype is, “I have a few things against thee,
because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a
prophetess, to teach and seduce my servants to commit fornication, and
to eat things sacrificed unto idols. And I gave her space to repent of her
fornication; and she repented not.” (1 Kings 21:25; Revelations 2:20, 21.)
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ROME’S ADMIRATION OF THEODORA’S CONDUCT
Nicolas I., who became pope of Rome in 858, highly commends, by letter,
the conduct of the superstitious and cruel Theodora. He especially admires
and approves her implicit obedience to the Roman see. “She resolved,” he
says, “to bring the Paulicians to the true faith, or cut them all off root and
branch. Persuant to that resolution, she sent noblemen and magistrates into
the different provinces of the empire; and by them some of those unhappy
wretches were crucified, some put to the sword, and some thrown into the
sea and drowned.” Nicolas at the same time observes, that the heretics,
experiencing in her all the resolution and vigor of a man, could scarcely
believe her to be a woman. Indeed the blinding power of an idolatrous
superstition had changed in Theodora (as it did in our queen, “the bloody
Mary”) the tender and compassionate heart of a woman into that of a
merciless and blood-thirsty tyrant. From the pope’s own words, it is
perfectly evident that the Roman See had chiefly to do with the slaughter
of the Paulicians. After telling her that the heretics dreaded, and at the
same time admired, her resolution and steadiness in maintaining the purity
of the catholic faith, he adds, “and why so, but because you followed the
directions of the Apostolic See?”5
It is difficult to believe that the professed vicar of Christ, and the shepherd
of His sheep, could ever have put on record such sayings. But so he was
permitted, and thus they have come down to us as the true witness of the
established anti-christian tyranny of Rome in the ninth century.

THE PAULICIANS REBEL AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT

Like certain of the Albigenses, Hussites of Bohemia, and Calvinists of
France, the Paulicians of Armenia and the adjacent provinces determined
on more decided resistance to their persecutors. This was their sad failure,
and the sad fruit of listening to the suggestions of Satan. For nearly two
hundred years they had suffered as Christians, adorning the gospel by a
life of faith and patience. So far as we have the means of judging, they
seem to have maintained the truth through a long course of suffering, in the
noble though passive spirit of conformity to Christ. But faith and patience
failed at length, and they openly rebelled against the government. It
happened in this way:
 416
Carbeas, an officer of high rank in the imperial service, on hearing that his
father had been impaled by the catholic inquisitors, renounced his
allegiance to the empire, and with five thousand companions, sought a
refuge among the Saracens. The Caliph gladly welcomed the deserters, and
gave them leave to settle within his territory. Carbeas built and fortified
the city of Tephrice, which became the headquarters of the Paulicians.
They naturally flocked to this new home, and sought an asylum from the
imperial laws. They soon became a powerful community. Under the
command of Carbeas, war was waged with the empire, and maintained
with various success for more than thirty years; but as details would be
more depressing than interesting, we forbear.

THE PAULICIANS IN EUROPE

About the middle of the eighth century Constantine, surnamed
Copronymus, either as a favor or as a punishment, transplanted a great
number of Paulicians into Thrace, an outpost of the empire; and there they
acted as a religious mission. By this emigration their doctrines were
introduced and diffused in Europe. They seem to have labored with great
success amongst the Bulgarians. It was in order to guard the infant
church of Bulgaria, that Peter of Sicily, about the year 870, addressed to
the archbishop of the Bulgarians a tract warning him against the infection
of the Paulicians. This document is the chief source of information as to
the sect. In the tenth century the Emperor John Zimisces conducted
another great migration to the valleys of Mount Haemus. Their history
after this period is European. They were favored with a free toleration in
the land of their exile, which greatly softened their condition and
strenghened their community. From these Bulgarian settlements their way
was opened into Western Europe. Many native Bulgarians associated with
them; hence the name of Bulgarians, in a course or corrupted form, is one
of the appellations of hatred, which clung to the Paulicians in all quarters.
As to the subsequent religious history of these interesting people
historians are greatly divided. Nothing is known of them but from the
writings of their enemies; therefore, in common justice, we are bound to
suspend our belief of their statements. One thing however is certain: they
protested against the saint and image-worship of the catholics, and the
legitimacy of the priesthood by which idolatry was upheld. They also
 417
protested against many things in the doctrines, the discipline, and the
assumed authority of the church of Rome. The catholic writers usually
speak of them as Manicheans — the most odious of all heretics. But there
are some protestant writers, who have examined with great care all that can
throw light on their history, and have come to the conclusion, that they
were guiltless of the heresies imputed to them, and maintain that they
were the true and faithful witnesses of Christ and His truth during a very
dark period of the middle ages.6
We now turn to our general history.

THE RELIGIOUS WARS OF CHARLEMAGNE

FROM ABOUT 771-814
Ecclesiastical history, so-called, from the time of Pepin, is so interwoven
with the history of the Frankish kings, and the disgraceful intrigues of the
popes, that we must further, though briefly, trace the course of events
which have an important bearing on the character of popery and the
history of the church.
The rising power of Charlemagne, the younger son of Pepin, was watched
by the occupants of St. Peter’s chair with the greatest possible interest,
and skilfully used by them for the accomplishment of their ambitious
designs. Pope Hadrian I and Leo III, both able men, filled the papal throne
during the long reign of Charles; and succeeded in greatly aggrandising,
through what he called his religious wars, the Roman See.
A quarrel between Desiderius, king of the Lombards, and Pope Hadrian led
to a war with France, which ended in the complete overthrow of the
Lombard kingdom in Italy. This was the result of the grand scheme of the
papacy, and brought about by the unprincipled and treacherous policy of
the pontiff. Charles was son-in-law to Desiderius; but after one year’s
wedlock he divorced Hermingard the Lombard’s daughter, and immediately
married Hildegard, a lady of a noble Swabian house. The insulted father, on
receiving back his repudiated daughter, naturally sought for redress from
the pope, the head of the church, of which Charles was so dutiful a son.
But although the church, when it suited its own purposes, had asserted in
the strongest terms the sanctity of the marriage bond, its open violation in
this instance was passed quietly over; the pope refused to interfere.
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Rome was reckoning on good service from the great Charles, and could not
afford to risk his displeasure. Not a word was said against the conduct of
the dissolute monarch. Desiderius at length resented the bitter insult of
Charles and the wicked connivance of Hadrian; he appeared at the head of
his troops in papal Italy; he besieged, stormed, and spread devastation
everywhere, and threatened the pope in his capital.

HADRIAN SENDS FOR CHARLEMAGNE

The pope now sent messages in the utmost haste to entreat immediate
help from Charles; at the same time diligently superintending in person the
military preparations for the defense of the city and the security of its
treasures. And, according to an old strategy of Rome, Hadrian sent three
bishops to overawe the king and to threaten him with excommunication if
he dared to violate the property of the church. The pope thus gained time;
and Charles, with his usual rapidity, assembled his forces, crossed the
Alps, and laid siege to Pavia. During the siege, which continued several
months, Charles paid a visit to the pope in great state, and was received
with every honor. He was hailed by nobles, senators and citizens, as
patrician of Rome and the dutiful son of the church, who had so speedily
obeyed the summons of his spiritual father, and had come to deliver them
from the hated and dreaded Lombards. When the holy season was over,
Charles and his officers returned to the army.
Pavia at length fell. Desiderius, successor of the great and wise Luitprand,
was dethroned, and took refuge in a monastery — the usual asylum of
dethroned kings; his valiant son, Adelchis, fled to Constantinople; and
thus expired the kingdom of the Lombards, the deadly enemies of the
Italians, and the great hindrance to the papal aggression. The way was now
clear for the conqueror to give the pope a kingdom, not on paper merely,
like his father Pepin, but in cities, provinces, and revenues. And so he did,
and thereby ratified the munificent gift of his father. As lord by conquest,
Charlemagne presented to the successors of St. Peter, by an absolute and
perpetual grant, the kingdom of Lombardy; some say, the whole of Italy.
At the same time Charles claimed the royal title, and exercised a kind of
sovereignty over all Italy and even over Rome itself. But the pope, being
now secure in the possession of the territow, could well afford to allow all
royal honors to his great benefactor.
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THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE ROMAN PONTIFFS A.D. 775
The pope was now a temporal prince. The long looked-for and sighed-for
day was come; the fond dream of centuries was realized. The successors of
St. Peter are proclaimed sovereign pontiffs and the lords of the city and
territories of Rome. The last link of the shadowy vassalage and
subserviency to the Greek empire is broken for ever; and Rome has again
become the acknowledged capital of the West.
The great Pope Hadrian at once assumes the power, privileges, and
language of a temporal sovereign to whom fealty is due. Murmurs from
Ravenna and the East were speedily silenced; and Rome reigned supreme.
The pope’s language even to Charlemagne is that of an equal: “As your
men,” he said, “are not allowed to come to Rome without your permission
and special letter, so my men must not be allowed to appear at the court of
France without the same credentials from me.” He claimed the same
allegiance from the Italians which the subjects of Charlemagne owed to
him. “The administration of justice was in the pope’s name; not only the
ecclesiastical dues, and the rents of estates forming part of the patrimony
of St. Peter, the civil revenue likewise came into his treasury... Hadrian,
with the power, assumed the magnificence of a great potentate... Rome,
with the increase of the papal revenues, began to resume more of her
ancient splendor.”

THE GREAT EPOCH IN THE ANNALS OF POPERY

As the empire of Charlemagne is in a peculiar manner connected with the
history of the church, and forms the great epoch in the annals of the
Roman See, it demands a fuller consideration. Roman catholicism was just
about as much indebted to that great prince, as Mahometanism was to the
great Arab prophet and his successors. “The Saxon wars of Charlemagne,”
says Milman, “which added almost the whole of Germany to his
dominions, were avowedly religious wars. If Boniface was the Christian,
Charlemagne was the Mahometan, apostle of the gospel. The declared
object of his invasions was the extinction of heathenism, subjection to the
christian faith, or extermination. Baptism was the sign of subjugation and
fealty; the Saxons accepted or threw it off according as they were in a state
of submission or revolt. These wars were inevitable; they were but the
 420
continuance of the great strife waged for centuries from the barbarous
North and East against the civilized South and West; only that the Roman
and Christian population, now invigorated by the large infusion of
Teutonic blood, instead of awaiting aggression, had become the aggressor.
The tide of conquest was rolling back; the subjects of the Western
kingdoms, of the Western empire, instead of waiting to see their homes
overrun by hordes of fierce invaders, now boldly marched into the heart of
their enemies’ country, penetrated their forests, crossed their morasses,
and planted their feudal courts of justice, their churches, and their
monasteries, in the most remote and savage regions, up to the Elbe and the
shores of the Baltic.”
The Saxons were divided into three leading tribes, the Ostphalians, the
Westphalians, and the Angarians. Each clan, according to old Teutonic
usage, consisted of nobles, freemen, and slaves; but at times the whole
nation met in a great armed convention. The Saxons scorned and detested
the Romanised Franks, and the Franks held the Saxons to be barbarians
and heathens. For three-and-thirty years the powerful Charles was
engaged in subduing these wild Saxon hordes. “The tract of country
inhabited by these tribes,” says Greenwood, “comprehended the whole of
the modern circle of Westphalia, and the greater portion of that of lower
Saxony, extended from the Lippe to the Weser and the Elbe; bordering to
the horthward upon the kindred Jutes, Angles, and Danes; and to the
eastward of Sclavic origin, who had gradually advanced upon the more
ancient Teutonic races of Eastern Germany.” But we must limit ourselves
chiefly to the religious aspect of these wars; still, it is interesting at this
moment to study these ancient records, as we have just witnessed the
conclusion of the great war of 1870-71 between the descendants of the
Franks and Germans of antiquity.

THE SWORD OF CHARLEMAGNE OR BAPTISM

The professed object of Charlemagne was to establish Christianity in the
remote parts of Germany, but it must ever be regretted that he used such
violent means to accomplish his end. Thousands were forced into the
waters of baptism to escape a cruel death. The sword or baptism were the
conqueror’s terms. A law was enacted which denounced the penalty of
death against the refusal of baptism. He could offer no terms of peace,
 421
enter into no treaty, of which baptism should not be the principal
condition. Conversion or extermination was the watchword of the Franks.
And though the old religion might sit loosely enough on the conscience of
the Saxon, he could see nothing better in the new; for to his mind baptism
was identified with slavery, and Christianity with subjugation to a foreign
yoke. To submit to baptism was to renounce, not only his old religion, but
his personal freedom.
With such anti-Christian, such inhuman, feelings the war was carried on, as
we have said, for thirty-three years. At the head of his superior armies he
oppressed the savage tribes, who were incapable of confederating for their
common safety; nor did he ever, it is said, encounter an equal antagonist in
numbers, in discipline, or in arms. But after a struggle of incalculable
bloodshed, and of almost unexampled obstinacy and duration, the
numbers, the discipline, and the valor of the Franks prevailed at length
over the undisciplined and desultory efforts of the Saxons. “The remnant
of thirty campaigns of undistinguished slaughter,” says Greenwood, “and
wholesale expatriation, accepted baptism, and became permanently
incorporated with the empire of the Franks and Christianity. Abbeys,
monasteries, and religious houses of all descriptions sprang up in every
part of the conquered territory, and the new churches were supplied with
ministers from the school of Boniface — a school which admitted no
distinction between the law of Christ and the law of Rome.”
Baptism was the only security and pledge of peace which the Franks
would accept for the submission of the Saxons. And thus it was — how
sad and humbling to relate! — when the conquest was complete, and the
carnage over, the priests entered the field. Their office was to baptise the
vanquished. Thousands of the barbarians were thus forced, at the point of
the sword, into what the priests called the regenerating waters of
baptism. But to the Saxons their baptism meant neither more nor less than
the renunciation of their religion and their liberty. The consequence was,
that no sooner were the armies of Charles withdrawn, than the
indefatigable Saxons rose again, and burst through the encroaching limits of
the empire, ravaging as they went. In their burning rage and bitter revenge
they hewed down crosses, burnt churches, destroyed monasteries,
slaughtered their inmates, respected neither age nor sex, until the whole
country seemed wrapped in flames and deluged with blood. Such revolts,
 422
it is said, were often provoked by the insolent language, and still more by
the offensive demeanor of the missionary monks, and the servere avarice
with which they exacted their tithes. But such outbursts, on the part of
the Saxons, were followed by a fresh invasion and a merciless slaughter by
the Franks, until tribe after tribe yielded to the conquering arms of
Charlemagne. On one occasion after a severe revolt Charles massacred
4,500 brave warriors in cold blood who had surrendered. This cruel and
cowardly abuse of power leaves a dark, an indelible stain on his history,
which no apology can ever remove. Even the sceptic historian alludes to it
in a most truthful and touching way. “In a day of equal retribution,” he
says, “the sons of his brother Carloman, the Merovingian prince of
Aquitaine, and the four thousand five hundred Saxons who were beheaded
on the same spot, would have something to allege against the justice and
humanity of Charlemagne. His treatment of the vanquished Saxons was an
abuse of the right of conquest.”

THE EVIL INFLUENCE OF THE POPE’S MISSIONARIES

Sad as it is to reflect on the fearful slaughter of the Saxons, and the forced
baptism of the helpless remnant, our sadness is infinitely increased when
we find that the professed messengers of mercy were the great movers in
these long and exterminating wars. In place of being the merciful
missionaries of the gospel of peace, they were in reality the cruel
emissaries of the papacy — of the power of darkness: Charlemagne was,
no doubt, to a great extent deceived and urged on by the priests.
Under the avowed object of cementing the union between Church and
State, for the temporal and spiritual benefit of mankind, and for the
enduring strength of the imperial government, the artful priests saw the
way opening for their own temporal greatness and the more absolute
sovereignty of Rome. And so it happened, as all history affirms. They
very soon gained a position of worldly greatness over the conquered
people and their lands. An entire change takes place just at this time in the
outward condition of the clergy, and indeed in society generally. Ancient
history disappears, we are told, at the death of Pepin, and mediaeval life
begins. A new state of society is inaugurated by his son — the last of
barbaric kings and the first of feudal monarchs. But it is with ecclesiastical
history we have to do, and here, again, we prefer giving a few extracts from
 423
the Dean — so often referred to — who will not be accused of
unnecessary severity, but whose testimony is of the very highest
integrity.
“The subjugation of the land appeared complete before
Charlemagne founded successively his great religious colonies, the
eight bishoprics of Minden, Seligenstadt, Verden, Bremen,
Munster, Hildesheim, Osnaburg, and Paderborn. These, with many
richly endowed monasteries like Hersfuld, became the separate
centers from which Christianity and civilization spread in
expanding circles. But though these were military as well as
religious settlements, the ecclesiastics were the only foreigners.
The more faithful and trustworthy Saxon chieftains, who gave the
security of seemingly sincere conversion to Christianity, were
raised into counts: thus the profession of Christianity was the sole
test of fealty...
“Charlemagne, in christian history, commands a more important
station even than for his subjugation of Germany to the gospel, on
account of his complete organization, if not foundation, of the high
feudal hierarchy in a great part’of Europe. Throughout the Western
empire was, it may be said, constitutionally established this double
aristocracy, ecclesiastical and civil. Everywhere the higher clergy
and the nobles, and so downwards through the different gradations
of society, even of the same rank, and liable to many of the same
duties, of equal, in some cases of co-ordinate, authority. Each
district had its bishop and its count; the dioceses and the counties
were mostly of the same extent...
“Charlemagne himself was no less prodigal than weaker kings of
immunities and grants of property to churches and monasteries.
With his queen Hildegard, he endows the church of St. Martin, in
Tours, with lands in Italy. His grants to St. Denys, to Lorch, to
Fulda, to Prum, more particularly to Hersfuld, and many Italian
abbeys, appear among the acts of his reign.
“Nor were these estates always obtained from the king or the
nobles. The stewards of the poor were sometimes the spoilers of
the poor. Even under Charlemagne there are complaints against the
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usurpation of property by bishops and abbots, as against counts
and laymen. They compelled the poor free man to sell his
property, or forced him to serve in the army, and that on
permanent duty, and so to leave his land either without owner,
with all the chances that he might not return, or to commit it to the
custody of those who remained at home in quiet, and seized every
opportunity of entering into possession. No Naboth’s vineyard
escaped their watchful avarice.
“In their fiefs the bishop or abbot exercised all the rights of a feudal
chieftain... Thus the hierarchy, now a feudal institution, parallel to
and co-ordinate with the temporal feudal aristocracy, aspired to
enjoy, and actually before long did enjoy, the dignity, the wealth,
the power, of suzerain lords. Bishops and abbots had the
independence and privileges of inalienable fiefs; and at the same
time began either sullenly to contest, or haughtily to refuse, those
payments or acknowledgments of vassalage, which sometimes
weighed heavily on other lands. During the reign of Charlemagne
this theory of spiritual immunity slumbered, or rather had not
quickened into life. It was boldly announced — so rapid was its
growth — in the strife with his son, Louis the Pious. It was then
asserted by the hierarchy, that all property given to the church, to
the poor, to the saints, to God Himself — such were the specious
phrases — was given absolutely, irrevocably, with no reserve. The
king might have power over the knights’ fees; over those of the
church he had none whatever. Such claims were impious,
sacrilegious, and implied forfeiture of eternal life. The clergy and
their estates belonged to another realm, to another commonwealth;
they were entirely, absolutely, independent of the civil power.”7

THE FEUDAL HIERARCHICAL SYSTEM

For centuries the papal cry to each succeeding monarch had been, “Give,
give; endow, endow; and the blessed Peter shall surely send you victory
over your enemies, prosperity in this world, and a place near himself in
heaven.” This cry was in a great measure answered about the beginning of
the ninth century. The above extracts will give the reader some idea of the
spoils which came to the clergy from the victories of Charles in Germany.
 425
It was chiefly out of these thirty-three years of internecine war, that the
great feudal hierarchical system arose. Innumerable thousands were slain to
make room for the bishops and abbots — an ecclesiastical aristocracy. Up
rose the princely palaces of these great ecclesiastics all over the conquered
land: but their foundations were laid in cruelty, injustice, and blood.
Though more than a thousand years have passed away since the great
patron of the church died, the palaces still live and are thickly planted all
over Europe. But the heart sickens at the thought of the origin of these
avowed palaces of peace; especially if we bear in mind the true character
of the gospel, and that the ministers of Christ should ever seek to manifest
the spirit of the meek and lowly Jesus. The souls, not the property, of
men should be their object. “We seek not yours, but you” should be their
motto; going forth taking nothing of the Gentiles. But the example of
Christ had been long forgotten. The church sank to the level and spirit of
the world when she was united by Constantine to the State. This was her
great fall, from which her painful inconsistency flows. The love of the
world, of absolute power, of universal dominion, then took possession of
her whole being. Misled by Satan, on whose throne (Revelation 2.) she
sits, the shameless iniquity of her course can only be accounted for on the
ground of his blinding power. All means, in her sight, were justifiable
which had for their object the advancement of the Roman See.

REFLECTIONS ON THE LORD’S CARE FOR HIS OWN

The Lord had, no doubt, His many hidden ones, even in the darkest times,
as in Thyatira: “But unto you I say, and unto the rest in Thyatira, as
many as have not this doctrine, and which have not known the depths of
Satan, as they speak; I will put upon you none other burden. But that
which ye have already hold fast till I come.” One thing, and only one, was
to occupy the faithful after the apostasy had set in — the ascended Savior,
the Man in the glory. And to all such the sweet promise is, “And I will
give him the Morning Star.” But the outward or mere professing church, as
allied to the State, was corrupt to the very core, and sunk, and blinded, and
hardened, in the most unflushing wickedness; for the concentration of
every form of evil was to be found in the chair of St. Peter. Even as to
the religious wars Charlemagne himself stands before as guiltless,
compared with Hadrian.
 426
We must remember that Charles was a barbaric king, though the greatest
perhaps in European history with the exception of Alexander and
Caesar; so that we can understand his object in seeking to unite and
consolidate a great empire; but he was ignorant and superstitious as to
divine things, though the religious element was strong in his mind. On this
the pope acted, and led him to believe that a strong and wealthy church
would make a strong and wealthy State; and that if he would please heaven
and gain eternal life, the harmonious union of Church and State must be the
basis of all his governmental schemes. He personally loved Hadrian,
readily obeyed his call, yielded to his counsels, and wept when he heard of
his death; which took place on the 26th of December in the year 795, after
the unusually long pontificate of twenty-three years and upwards. He
might sometimes see the pope’s real object under the greatest artifice; but,
strong in his own self-reliant power, he could allow such things to pass
without those feelings of distrust and jealousy, which would have been
engendered in a feebler mind. Not given to change, he made a good friend.

THE PAPAL FORGERY

But the kindness of Charlemagne only excited the cupidity and envy of the
rapacious priests. Not content with their estates and tithes, they aspired
to a position far above the lay-lords, and even above the monarch himself.
Stimulated by past success, they now attempted by a daring forgery to
accomplish the object of their secular ambition. A title to almost imperial
power is now for the first time, after the lapse of 450 years, brought to
light. By this original deed of gift it was discovered, that all which Pepin or
Charlemagne had conferred on the church of Rome was only an instalment
of the royal grant to the chair of St. Peter by the “pious emperor
Constantine.”
As our main object throughout this period of the church’s history is to
present the real character of the papal system, the means by which it
reached its wonderful influence and power, and the secularising effects of
the Church and State alliance, we copy the pope’s own letter from
Greenwood. The reader will, no doubt, be surprised to find that any man
with the smallest pretension to respectability — far less the head of the
church — could ever have fabricated such a document, and that merely to
gain more territory and power. But we must remember that Thyatira was
 427
characterized by “the depths of Satan,” and so has the papacy ever since
she drew her first breath, and so must she be until she draws her last.
Revelation 17, 18 describe both her character and her end.
“Considering,” says pope Hadrian, “that in the days of the blessed
pontiff Sylvester, that most pious Emperor did, by his donation,
exalt and enlarge the holy catholic and apostolic church of Rome,
giving unto her supreme power over all the region of the West, so
now we beseech you, that in this our own happy day, the same
holy church may sprout forth and exult, and be ever more and more
lifted up, so that all people who shall hear thereof may exclaim,
‘God save the king, and hear us in the day in which we call upon
thee!’ For behold, in those days arose Constantine, the christian
Emperor, by whom God vouchsafed to give all things to His most
holy church, the church of the blessed Peter, prince of the apostles.
All this, and many territories besides, which divers Emperors,
patricians, and other God-fearing persons, had given to the blessed
Peter and the holy Roman and apostolical church of God, for the
benefit of their souls and the forgiveness of their sins, lying in the
parts of Tuscany, Spoletum, Beneventum, Corsica, Savona —
territories which were taken and kept by the impious nations of
the Lombards, cause all this to be restored to us in these your
days, according to the tenor of your several deeds of gift deposited
in our archives of the Lateran. To that end we have directed our
envoys to exhibit those deeds to you for your satisfaction; and in
virtue of them we now call upon you to command the
undiminished restitution of this patrimony of St. Peter into our
hands; that by your conformity therewith the holy church of God
may be put into full possession and enjoyment of its entire right;
so that the prince of the apostles himself may intercede before the
throne of the Almighty for long life to yourself and prosperity in
all your undertakings.”

THE IGNORANCE AND CREDULITY OF THE TIMES

So deep was the ignorance and credulity of those times, that the most
absurd fables were received with great reverence by all classes. The
cunning priests knew how to clothe their religious frauds with the most
 428
specious piety, and to blind both king and people. According to the legend
Constantine was healed of the leprosy by Pope Sylvester; and so
penetrated with gratitude was the Emperor, that he resigned to the pope
the free and perpetual sovereignty of Rome, Italy, and the provinces of the
West; and resolved on founding a new capital for himself in the East.
The object of Hadrian in forging such a deed, and in writing such a letter,
was no doubt to influence Charlemagne to imitate the alleged liberality of
his great predecessor. If he merely put the popes in possession of the said
donation of Constantine, he was only acting as his executor; if he aspired
to be a spontaneous benefactor of the church, he must exceed the limits of
the original deed of gift. But the depths of this forgery we have not yet
fathomed. It went to prove that the Greek Emperors, all these centuries,
had been guilty of usurpation, and robbing the patrimony of St. Peter; that
the popes were justified in appropriating their territory, and in rebelling
against their authority; that the gifts of Pepin and Charlemagne were
nothing more than the restitution of a small portion of the just and lawful
dominions originally granted to the chair of St. Peter; and that he,
Charlemagne, must consider himself as debtor to God and His church, so
long as a single item of the debt thus entailed upon him remained unpaid.
Such were some of the convenient effects of the document for the
purposes of Hadrian at the time; but though it may have been productive
of great advantages to the papacy both then and afterwards, the forgery
has long since been exposed. With the revival of letters and liberty the
fictitious deed was condemned, together with the False Decretals — the
most audacious and elaborate of all pious frauds. Speaking of the
Decretals, Milman observes, “They are now given up by all; not a voice is
raised in their favor; the utmost that is done, by those who cannot
suppress all regret at their exposure, is to palliate the guilt of the forger, to
call in question or to weaken the influence which they had in their own
day, and throughout the later history of Christianity.”8

THE FOUNDATIONS AND EDIFICE OF POPERY

Such, alas! alas! were the foundations of the great papal edifice. We have
been at some pains to see them laid; we are not mistaken. Were we to
characterize the separate foundation-stones, we might speak of them as
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the most extravagant pretensions, the most insulting arrogance, the most
barefaced forgeries, the most openly avowed and even death-defying love
of idolatries, the most unscrupulous appropriation of stolen territory, the
most unrelenting spirit of persecution, and, what may be said to be the
topmost (as well as the foundation) stone, the most inordinate love of
temporal sovereignty. But if we look inside the house, what do we find
there? It is full of blasphemies, the worst kind of corruptions, and the
concentration of all attractions for the flesh. (Revelations 18:12, 13.) The
very essentials of Christianity were either corrupted or rejected — such as
sacrifice, ministry, and priesthood. The mass was substituted for the
finished work of Christ; the dogmatic teaching of the church for the
ministry of the Spirit of God; and the great ecclesiastical system of
priesthood; or rather, priestcraft — for the common priesthood of all
believers, yea, for that of Christ Himself.
The Lord’s supper had been gradually changed from the simple
remembrance of His love, and showing forth His death, to the idea of a
sacrifice. Many superstitions were practiced with the consecrated bread,
or rather wafers. The sacrifice was supposed to avail for the dead as well
as for the living; hence the practice of giving it to the dead, and burying it
with them. The soul-destroying doctrine of purgatory, which had been
sanctioned by Gregory the Great, was now spreading far and wide. It
appears to have specially taken root in the English church before the ninth
century. But the deception is manifest, for there is no purgatory but the
blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son; as saith the apostle John, “The blood of
Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.” Thank God, there is no
limit to the cleansing power of the blood of Jesus His Son; all who have
faith in that blood are whiter than snow — perfectly fitted for the presence
of God. But the doctrine of purgatory struck at the very root of this
foundation-truth, and became a powerful instrument in the hands of the
priests for extorting money from the dying, and for securing large legacies
to the church; but almost everything was now made subservient to these
base objects. The truth of God, the work of Christ, the character of the
church, the souls and bodies of men, were all readily sacrificed for the
aggrandisement of the See of Rome, and for the aggrandisement of the
clergy in subordination to the papal system.
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The ungodly lives of those entrusted with the government of the church
and the care of souls are also matters of bitter complaint with all honest
historians, both then and now. But here it may be well to introduce one of
good report — Mosheim — as a witness and confirmation of what we
have said as to this period.

MOSHEIM’S SUMMARY
“In the East sinister designs, rancor, contentions, and strife were
everywhere predominant. At Constantinople, or New Rome, those
were elevated to the patriarchal chair who were in favor at court;
and upon losing that favor, a decree of the Emperor hurled them
from their elevated station. In the West the bishops hung around
the courts of princes, and indulged themselves in every species of
voluptuousness: while the inferior clergy and the monks were
sensual, and by the grossest vices corrupted the people whom they
were set to reform. The ignorance of the clergy in many places was
so great, that few of them could read or write. Hence, whenever a
letter was to be penned, or anything or importance was to be
committed to writing, recourse was generally had to some one
individual, whom common fame invested with a certain dexterity in
such matters...
“The bishops and the heads of monasteries held much real estate or
landed property by feudal tenure; wherefore, when a war broke
out, they were summoned personally to the camp, attended by the
number of soldiers which they were bound to furnish to their
sovereign. Kings and princes, moreover, that they might be able to
reward their servants and soldiers for their services, often seized
upon consecrated property, and gave it to their dependants; in
consequence, the priests and monks, before supported by it,
sought relief for their necessities in committing any sort of crimes,
and in contriving impostures.
“Few of those who were raised, about this time, to the highest
stations in the church can be commended for their wisdom,
learning, virtue, and other endowments proper for a bishop. The
greater part of them, by their numerous vices, and all of them, by
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their arrogance and lust of power, entailed disgrace upon their
memories. Between Leo IV., who died A .D . 855, and Benedict III.,
a woman, who concealed her sex, and assumed the name of John, it
is said, opened her way to the pontifical throne by her learning and
genius, and governed the church for a time. She is commonly called
the Papess Joanna. During the five subsequent centuries the
witnesses to this extraordinary event are without number; nor did
any one, prior to the Reformation by Luther, regard the thing as
either incredible, or disgraceful to the church.
“All agree that in those dark days the state of Christianity was
everywhere most deplorable; not only from amazing ignorance, the
parent of superstition and moral debasement, but also from other
causes... The sacred order, both in the East and in the West, were
composed principally of men who were illiterate, stupid, ignorant
of everything pertaining to religion... What the Greek pontiffs
were, the single example of Theophylact shows; who, as credible
historians testify, made traffic of everything sacred, and cared for
nothing but his hounds and his horses. But though the Greek
patriarchs were very unworthy men, yet they possessed more
dignity and virtue than the Roman pontiffs. That the history of the
Roman bishops in this century is a history, not of men, but of
monsters, a history of the most atrocious villantes and crimes, is
acknowledged by all the best writers, those not excepted even who
plead for pontifical authority…
“The essence of religion was thought, both by Greeks and Latins,
to consist in the worship of images, in honoring departed saints, in
searching for and preserving relics, and in enriching priests and
monks. Scarcely an individual ventured to approach God until
interest had been duly sought with images and saints. In getting
relics together, and seeking after them, all the world was busy to
insanity.” 9
Nothing more, we think, need be said at present as to the nature — root
and branch — of the papal system. In the mouth of at least three
competent witnesses, all that we have said of Rome, from the beginning of
the Thyatirian period, has been confirmed. And the half has not been told,
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especially on the subject of immorality. We could not transfer to our pages
the open profligacy of the priests and monks. It is thought by some that
the papacy fell to the deepest point of degradation in the ninth and tenth
centuries. For many years the papal tiara was disposed of by the infamous
Theodora and her two daughters, Marozia and Theodora. Such was their
power and evil influence, by means of their licentious lives, that they
placed in the chair of St. Peter whom they would — men wicked like
themselves. Our pages would be defiled by an account of their open
unblushing iramoralities. Such has been the papal succession. Surely
Jezebel was truly represented by these women, and in the influence they
obtained over the popes and the city of Rome. But, alas! alas! Jezebel,
with all her associations, corruptions, tyrannies, idolatries, and uses of the
civil sword, has been too faithfully represented by popery from its very
foundation.
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CHAPTER 17
THE PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY
NINTH CENTURY

It is truly a great relief to the mind, both of writer and reader, to turn away
from the dark and polluted regions of Rome, and trace for a little the silver
line of God’s saving grace in the spread of the gospel and in the
devotedness of many of His servants. At the same time we must not
expect much of Christ, or of what is called a clear gospel, in the testimony
of the missionaries at this period. The state of Europe generally in the
ninth century, compared with the nineteenth, must be considered, if our
hearts would rise to God in gratitude for that day of small things.
The preference given to human writings above the scriptures was now the
habit, at least wherever the influence of Rome prevailed. The Paulicians,
probably, and others who were standing apart from the communion of
Rome, maintained the authority of the word of God; but the Roman
missionaries were instructed and bound to abide by the decisions of the
fathers. The canons of councils, and the writings of the great doctors, were
constantly appealed to, so that the sacred volume was completely
overlooked. Long before this period the word of God had been treated as
obscure, perplexed, and unfit for general reading. And so it has been
considered by the Catholics from that day until now. Still, God was and is
above all, and overrules all for His own glory, the spread of Christianity,
and the salvation of sinners. “All that the Father giveth me,” says Christ,
“shall come to Me; and him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out:”
on no consideration of country, period, education, or condition, will I cast
out or reject. (John 6:37.)

THE REVIVAL OF EDUCATION

Although the sanguinary ambition and the dissolute life of Charlemagne
forbid our thinking that he was possessed of any true christian principle,
yet it is only fair to acknowledge that he was used of God for the
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advancement of education at home, and for the spread of Christianity
abroad. Schools were erected, universities were founded, learned men were
sought for in Italy, England, and Ireland, with the view of raising his
subjects to a higher level of moral, religious, and intellectual attainments.
Towards the close of his long reign he was surrounded in his royal
residence at Aix-la-Chapelle by literary men from all countries. The
scholars, grammarians, and philosophers of the time were welcomed in the
great Hall of Audience. But chief amongst these was our countryman, the
Anglo-Saxon monk, Aleuin, a native of Northumbria, and tutor to the
imperial family.
Alcuin was the most important, both for his learning and for the extent of
his labors as a teacher among the Franks. But what is of still more
importance, he seems to have had some correct thoughts of Christianity.
He often remonstrated with the Emperor against the enforcement of tithes
from the newly-converted Saxons, and against the compulsory and
indiscriminate administration of baptism. “Instruction,” he said, “should
first be given on the great heads of christian doctrine and practice, and then
the sacrament should follow. Baptism may be forced on men, but faith
cannot. Baptism received without faith or understanding by a person
capable of reason is but an unprofitable washing of the body.”1
How refreshing to the spirit, and how truly thankful we are to find such
plain, honest, dealing with the great Emperor. It shows us that the Lord
had His witnesses at all times and in all places. Let us hope that he may
have been used of the Lord for the spread of the truth and the blessing of
souls in those higher circles.
The end of the great Charles was drawing nigh. Though he had surrounded
himself with literature, music, and everything that could please and gratify
his every taste and passion; and though, it is said, his antechambers were
filled with the fallen monarchs of conquered territories, waiting to
supplicate his favor, or seek restoration to their lawful dominions; he must
yield to the stroke which none can turn aside. He died on the 28th of
January 814, at the advanced age of seventy-two, and after a long reign of
forty-three years. He appointed his son, Louis, as his successor.
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LOUIS THE PIOUS
There can be little doubt that Louis, surnamed the Pious, was a sincere and
humble Christian. But there never was a man in such a false position as the
meek and gentle Louis when the empire fell into his hands. He lived till the
year 840. But his life is one of the most touching, tragical and pitiful, in
the annals of kings. There was something like universal rebellion when the
principles of his government were known. He was too gentle and
scrupulous for his soldiers; much too pious for his clergy. Bishops were
prevented from wearing sword and arms, or glittering spurs on their heels.
The monks and nuns found in him a second St. Benedict. The license of his
father’s court speedily disappeared from the sacred precincts of his
palace; but he was far too easy in the discipline of his sons. Such true
piety, as may easily be imagined, was only turned into ridicule, and could
not long be borne with. He was deserted by his soldiers, whose wealth
arose from plundered enemies; his sons, Pepin, Louis, and Lothaire, were
more than once in arms against him. The clergy, who ought to have
surrounded the fallen monarch with their sympathy in the day of
adversity, only took occasion to show their power by degrading him to the
depths of a cloister; and, to give a fair appearance to their injustice, he was
forced by the priests to confess sins of which he was entirely innocent.
Siding with his rebellious son, Lothaire, a man of cruelty, yet fearing to
sanction his taking the life of his father, they — the son and the priests
together — determined to incapacitate the king by civil and ecclesiastical
degradation for the exercise of his royal authority. He was compelled to do
public penance for alleged crimes; his royal armor and his imperial apparel
he was forced to lay on the altar of St. Sebastian, and to put on a dark
mourning robe.2
But the pride of his nobles was insulted by this display of ecclesiastical
presumption, and the nation wept at the fate of their good and gentle
Emperor. A reaction was inevitable. Indignant at his treatment, the people
demanded his restoration. He was taken from the monastery, re-robed and
restored, but only to experience a deeper humiliation. He was at length
rescued by the hand of divine mercy from the unnatural conduct of his
sons, and from the pitiless persecution of the clergy, who cared only for
the display and the establishment of their own power. With a crucifix
pressed to his bosom, his eyes lifted up to heaven, and breathing
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forgiveness to his son Louis, who was then in arms against him, he
departed this life, to be with Christ, which is far better. (Philippians 1:23.)

THE CONVERSION OF THE NORTHERN NATIONS

The spread of the gospel towards the northern extremities of Europe,
during the ninth and tenth centuries has been so fully detailed in the
general histories, that we shall do little more than name the principal
places, and the chief actors, in connection with the good work. But we
rejoice to trace the footsteps of those self-denying missionaries, in the
very heart of Satan’s kingdom, where for centuries he had reigned
undisturbed. We have already seen that the sword of Charlemagne had
opened the way to the Frieslanders, Saxons, Huns, and other tribes.
In the early part of the reign of his son Louis, the gospel was introduced
among the Danes and Swedes. Disputes, as to the throne of Denmark,
between Harold and Godfrid, led Harold to seek protection from Louis.
The pious Emperor thought this might be a convenient opportunity for
the introduction of Christianity among the Danes. He therefore promised
Harold assistance, on condition that he would embrace Christianity
himself and admit preachers of the gospel into his country. The king
accepted the terms, and was baptized at Mentz, A .D . 826, together with
his queen and a numerous train of attendants. Louis was sponsor for
Harold, the empress for his queen, Lothaire for his son; and sponsors of
suitable rank were found for the members of his train. Thus Christianized,
as was thought in those days, he returned home, taking two teachers of
Christianity with him. And lest Harold might not regain his kingdom,
Louis assigned to him an estate in Friesland.
Ansgarius and Auberg, the two French monks that accompanied them,
labored with great zeal and success; but Aubert, a monk of noble birth,
died in two years, amidst the toils of the missionary.
The indefatigable Ansgarius, on the death of his fellow-laborer, went over
to Sweden. He was equally happy and successful in his work there. In 831
Louis rewarded his great labors by making him archbishop of Hamburg,
and of all the north. He had often great opposition to encounter, but he
usually disarmed his persecutors by the goodness of his intentions and the
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uprightness of his conduct. He lived till the year 865, and labored chiefly
among the Danes, the Cimbrians, and the Swedes.

THE SCLAVONIANS RECEIVE THE GOSPEL

Some efforts were made about this time for the conversion of the
Russians, Hungarians, etc., but the work of the gospel seems to have made
little progress in these quarters until the conquest of Bohemia by Otho, in
the year 950, or rather until the marriage of Vladimir, prince of the
Russians, with Anna, sister of Basil, the Greek Emperor. He embraced the
faith of his queen, lived to an extreme old age, and was followed in his faith
by his subjects. The conversion of the Duke of Poland is also ascribed to
the influence of a Christian queen. In those days the belief of the prince
became the rule of his people, both in faith and practice; and the faith of
the queen, generally speaking, became the rule of the king. Hence the
influence of the wife for good or for evil. This we may have noticed,
especially from the days of Clotilda and Clovis. “There is a strange
uniformity,” says Milman, “in the instruments used in the conversion of
barbarous subjects. A female of rank and influence, a zealous monk, some
fearful national calamity; no sooner do these three agencies coincide, than
the heathen land opens itself to Christianity.”
Bulgaria. The introduction of Christianity among the Bulgarians has been
referred to in our notice of the Paulicians. They were a barbarous and
savage people. Next to the Huns, the Bulgarians were the most hateful and
most terrible to the invaded Europeans. The sister of Bogoris, their king,
having been taken captive by the Greeks in her childhood, had been
educated at Constantinople in the christian faith. After her redemption and
return home, she was greatly affected by the idolatrous habits of her
brother and his people. She seems to have been an earnest Christian; but
all her appeals in favor of Christianity were little heeded, till a famine and
a plague ravaged Bulgaria. The king was at length persuaded to pray to the
God of the Christians. The Lord, in great mercy, stayed the plague.
Bogoris acknowledged the goodness and power of the Christians’ God,
and agreed that missionaries should be allowed to preach the gospel to his
people.
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Methodius and Cyril, two Greek monks, distinguished for their zeal and
learning, instructed the Bulgarians in the truths and blessings of the gospel
of Christ. The king was baptized, and his people gradually followed his
example. One hundred and six questions, it is said, were sent by the king
to the pope, Nicholas I., embracing every point of ecclesiastical discipline,
of ceremonial observance, and of manners. The answers are said to have
been wise and discreet, and fitted to mitigate the ferocity of a savage
nation.
From Bulgaria the zealous missionaries visited many of the Sclavonian
tribes, and penetrated into regions of unmin-gled barbarism. Their dialects
were as yet unwritten. But these devoted men mastered the language of the
country, and preached the gospel to the people in their native tongue. This
was quite a new thing in those days, but heavenly Christianity brings in
her train many precious gifts. The ordinary practice of the time was to
preach and teach in the ecclesiastical languages — Greek and Latin; indeed
complaints were made to the pope of the novelty of worshipping in a
barbarous tongue, but the scruples of the pontiff were overcome with the
reasons assigned by the missionaries; nevertheless the controversy was
renewed in after ages, as some foolishly thought that it was a desecration
of the church services to be celebrated in a barbarous tongue. Cyril is said
to have invented an alphabet, taught the rude people the use of letters,
translated the liturgy and certain books of the Bible into the dialect of the
Moravians. Who can tell what the effect of Cyril’s work may have been
down to the present day? The king of Moravia was baptized, and, as usual
in those times, his subjects followed his example. The province of
Dalmatia, and many others, hitherto in gross darkness, received the gospel
during the ninth and tenth centuries!

THE FLOWING STREAM OF LIFE

How good of the Lord, the great Head of the church, to send forth into
many and distant lands the living waters of the sanctuary, when Rome, the
center of Christendom, was stagnant and corrupt. At that very time,
Baronius, the famous annalist of the Roman church, and whose partiality
to the See of Rome is notorious, cries out, “How deformed, how frightful,
was the face of the church of Rome! The holy See was fallen under the
tyranny of two loose and disorderly women, who placed and displaced
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bishops as their humor led them, and (what I tremble to think and speak
of) they placed their gallants on St. Peter’s chair,” etc. Referring to the
same period, Arnold, bishop of Orleans, exclaims, “O miserable Rome!
thou that didst formerly hold out so many great and glorious luminaries to
our ancestors, into what prodigious darkness art thou now fallen, which
will render thee infamous to all succeeding ages.”3
While such was the state of Rome, the capital of the corruptress, Jezebel,
the vital stream of eternal life from the exalted Savior, was flowing freely
in the extremities of the empire. Many nations and tribes and tongues had
received the gospel with the many blessings it brought to them. Doubtless
it was encumbered with many superstitions; but the word of God so far,
and the name of Jesus, had been introduced among them; and the Spirit of
God can work wonders with that most blessed name, and that most
precious word. The Savior was preached; the love of God and the work of
Christ seem to have been taught with a divine unction which carried
conviction to the rude barbarians. It was God’s own work, and the
accomplishment of His own purposes. In such a case would not Paul have
said, “I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice?” (Philippians 1:18.)

ENGLAND, SCOTLAND, AND IRELAND

Before closing our brief notice of the doings of the Lord at this time, we
will notice a few names which indicate the state of things in our own
country.
Of the glory of Alfred’s reign it is needless to say much. With some
historians he comes up to the conception of a perfect sovereign. At any
rate, we may say, he was a true christian king, and was made a blessing
both to the church and the world. His successful war with the Danes; his
rescuing England from a return to barbarism; his encouragement of learning
and learned men; his own abundant labors; his christian faith and
devotedness, are well known to all who are acquainted with English
history. He succeeded his father in 871 at the age of twenty-two, and
reigned thirty years. Thus the ninth century, which opened with the great
days of Charlemagne, closed with the far more glorious days of Alfred,
probably the most honored name in medieval history.
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Clement, a pious ecclesiastic of the Scotch church, appeared in the center
of Europe about the middle of the eighth century, as a preacher of
evangelical doctrines. History speaks of him as a bold and fearless
defender of the authority of the word of God, in opposition to Boniface,
the champion of tradition and the decisions of councils. It may throw light
on the condition of Christendom, and the history of the church, to view
these two missionaries as the representatives of two systems; namely, the
great human organization of Rome, and the remaining scriptural
Christianity of Scotland.
Alarmed at the boldness of Clement, Boniface, then archbishop of the
German churches, undertook to oppose him. He confronted the Scotchman
with the laws of the Roman church, the decisions of various councils, and
the writings of the most illustrious fathers of the Latin church. Clement
replied that no laws of the church, no decisions of councils, or writings of
the fathers, that were contrary to the Holy Scriptures, had any authority
over Christians. Boniface then appealed to the invincible unity of the
Catholic church with its pope, bishops, priests, etc., but his opponent
maintained that there only, where the Holy Spirit dwells, can be found the
spouse of Jesus Christ.
Boniface was confounded. Fair means had failed; foul must be used.
Clement was condemned as a heretic by a Council met at Soissons in
March, 744. He was afterwards ordered to be sent to Rome under a sure
guard. The further history of Clement is unknown, but it is easy to
conjecture what must have been his fate.
It is said by some that Clement held strange notions as to our Lord’s
descent into hades, on the subject of marriage, and predestination; but little
reliance is to be placed on the statements of his enemies. Boniface
appeared in court as his adversary, accuser, and judge. Rather let us hope
that he was a true representative of the ancient faith of his country. But
we must not suppose that Clement was the only one who appears in
contest with the Roman missionaries at this period of our history. From
time to time we find such witnesses for the truth openly testifying against
the pretensions of Rome. Certain Scotchmen, who called themselves
bishops, were condemned in a council at Chalons, in the year 813. But
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clerical forms having taken the place of the word of God, enlightened and
faithful men were condemned as heretics.
John Scot Erigena, a native of Ireland, who resided chiefly in France, and
at the court of Charles the Bald, is said by Hallam to have been, in a
literary and philosophical sense, the most remarkable man in the dark ages.
But he was more of a philosopher than a theologian, though he wrote
largely on religious subjects, and appears to have belonged to some order
of the clergy. He had studied the early fathers and the Platonic
philosophy, and was too much inclined to favor human reason, even in the
reception of divine truth. But, according to D’Aubigne, there appears to
have been real piety in his heart. “O Lord Jesus,” he exclaimed, “I ask no
other happiness of Thee, but to understand, unmixed with deceitful
theories, the word that Thou hast inspired by Thy Holy Spirit! Show
Thyself to those who seek for Thee alone.” He is supposed to have died
about the year 852.
The Irish divines in the eighth century held so high a character for learning,
that the literary men invited by Charlemagne to his court were chiefly
from Ireland. Until the time of Henry II., king of England, the church of
Ireland continued to assert its independence of Rome, and to maintain its
position as an active, living, branch of the church of Christ, and owning no
earthly head. But from this period the original Irish church, with its high
reputation, completely disappears.

THE NORTHMEN
Were it not that we believe these powerful enemies of Christianity — the
Northmen, or pirates from the regions of the North — were instruments in
God’s hands for the punishment of the apostate church of Rome, it would
not be in our way to have introduced them. But as they appear to be
nothing short of the judgment of God against the overgrown worldliness of
every order of the Catholic priesthood, we may give them a brief notice.
Originally they came from the shores of the Baltic, in Denmark, Norway,
and Sweden. Probably they were a mixture of Goths, Danes, Norwegians,
Swedes, and Frisians. But, though composed of so many different tribes,
they were all agreed as to their main object — plunder and slaughter. Their
petty kings and chieftains were practiced pirates, and the most daring that
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ever infested the seas or the shores of Western Christendom. They pushed
their light boats up the rivers as far as they could go, burning, slaying, and
plundering wherever they went.
“From the shores of the Baltic,” says Milman, “from the Scandinavian
islands, from the gulfs and lakes, their fleets sailed on, wherever the tide or
the tempest might drive them. They seemed to defy, in their ill-formed
barks, the wildest weather; to be able to land on the most inaccessible
shores, to find their way up the narrowest creeks and shallowest rivers;
nothing was secure, not even in the heart of the country, from the sudden
appearance of these relentless savages.” They have been called “the Arabs
of the sea,” but, unlike the Mahometans, they did not wage a religious war.
They were ferocious heathens, and their gods, like themselves, were
warriors and pirates. Plunder, not the propagation of a faith, was their
object. The castle or the monastery, the noble lord, the bishop, or the
monk, were alike in their eyes, provided a rich booty could be obtained.
The religious estates, especially in France, suffered the most. The wealth,
and the defenceless position of the monasteries, pointed these out as the
chief objects of their attack.
A day of retribution had come. God’s hand was sore upon those who
called themselves His people. His wrath seemed to burn. The church had
now to pay dearly for her worldly greatness and glory. It had been her
ambition for centuries; and Charlemagne had raised the clergy to great
wealth and worldly honor. But, scarcely had they been seated in their
palaces, when the tide of barbaric invasion began to desolate the empire,
and lay waste the religious edifices. The richer the abbey, the more
tempting the prey, and the more remorseless the sword of the barbarian.
Ignorant of the different orders of clergy, they massacred indiscriminately.
Fire and sword were their weapons throughout their whole career. “France
was covered with bishops and monks, flying from their ruined cloisters,
their burning monasteries, their desolate churches, bearing with them the
precious relics of their saints, and so deepening the universal panic, and
preaching despair wherever they went.”
To purchase repose from the warlike Normans, who forced their way up
the Seine, and for two years besieged the city of Paris, Charles the Simple,
of France, ceded the duchy of Normandy to their leader Rollo in 905. Thus
 443
the pirate of the Baltic assumed the Christian religion, became first Duke
of Normandy, and one of the twelve peers of France. William, conqueror
of England in 1066, was the seventh Duke of Normandy.
England, like France, was greatly harassed and desolated by the
Northmen. The first descent, which was severely felt, was about the year
830. From that time these invasions were incessant. And here, as in
France, they found the richest booty in the defenceless monastew. The
sanctuaries were wasted with fire and sword. At length, after the victory
gained by Alfred over Guthrum in 878, a large territory was ceded to the
Danes in the East of England, on condition of their embracing Christianity,
and living under equal laws with the native inhabitants. But the peace thus
obtained was only for a time.4

THE SUPPOSED END OF THE WORLD

No period in church history, or perhaps in any history, or in any country,
presents a darker picture than christian Europe at the close of the tenth
century. The degradation of the papacy, the corrupt state of the church
within, and the number and power of her enemies without, threatened her
complete overthrow. Besides the unbelieving Mahometans in the East, and
the pagan Northmen in the West, a new enemy — the Hungarians —
burst unexpectedly upon Christendom. In the strong language of history,
they seemed as hordes of savages, or wild beasts, let loose upon mankind.
Their source was unknown, but their numbers appeared inexhaustible.
Indiscriminate massacre seemed their only war law: civilization and
Christianity withered before their desolating march, and all mankind were
panic-stricken.
In addition to these appalling calamities, famines prevailed and brought
plague and pestilence in their train. The most alarming signs were
supposed to be seen in the sun and the moon. The prediction of our Lord
seemed to be accomplished: “And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the
moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with
perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them for
fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for
the powers of heaven shall be shaken.” But, though these words fitly
 444
describe the state of things then, the prophecy was far from being fulfilled;
as our Lord immediately adds,
“And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with
power and great glory.” (Luke 21:25-27.)
But if ever man might be forgiven the dream of believing that the end of the
world was come, it was then. The clergy preached it, and people believed
it, and it rapidly spread over all Europe. It was boldly promulgated that
the world would come to an end when a thousand years from the Savior’s
birth were expired. From about the year 960 the panic increased, but the
year 999 was looked upon as the last which any one would ever see. This
general delusion, through the power of Satan, was founded on a total
misunderstanding and false interpretation of the prophecy concerning the
millennial reign of the saints with Christ for a thousand years.
“Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such
the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of
Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.” (Revelation 20:1-7.)

THE YEAR OF TERROR

The ordinary cares and employments of this life were given up. The land
was left untilled; for why plough, why sow, when no one would be left to
reap? Houses were allowed to fall into decay; for why build, why repair,
why trouble about property, when a few months will put an end to all
terrestrial things? History was neglected; for why chronicle events, when
no posterity was expected to read the records? The rich, the noble, the
princes, and bishops, abandoned their friends and families, and hastened to
the shores of Palestine, in the persuasion that Mount Zion would be the
throne of Christ when He descended to judge the world. Large sums of
money were given to churches and monasteries, as if to secure a more
favorable sentence from the supreme Judge. Kings and emperors begged at
monastery doors, to be admitted as brethren of the holy order; crowds of
the common people slept in the porches of the holy buildings, or at least
under their shadow.
But in the meantime the multitudes must be fed. The last day of the
thousand years had not yet arrived. But food there was none; corn and
 445
cattle were exhausted, and no provision had been made for the future. The
most frightful extremities were endured, far too revolting to be repeated
here. But the day of doom drew nearer and nearer. The last evening of the
thousand years arrived: a sleepless night for all Europe! Imagination must
fill up the doleful picture. But in place of some extraordinary convulsion,
which all were tremblingly waiting for, the night passed away as other
nights had done, and in the morning the sun shed forth his beams as
peacefully as ever. The amazed but now relieved multitudes began to
return to their homes, repair their buildings, plough, sow, and resume their
former occupations.
Thus closed the first thousand years of the church’s history; the darkest
day in the reign of Jezebel, and in the annals of Christendom.
 446

CHAPTER 18
THE CHURCH-BUILDING SPIRIT REVIVED

The beginning of the eleventh century was marked by great activity in

repairing and building churches; and, but for the many uses to which these
sacred edifices were applied by the poor people, they might not be
worthy of our notice. We may reasonably suppose that during the past
thirty or forty years there had been little disposition to engage in such
works. But when the awful night was past, and when the first day of the
year 1001 shone upon the world, the hopes of all nations revived. Men’s
minds had reached, with the close of the tenth century, the lowest point,
but from that date a manifest rise was apparent: and their first attention
was given to the holy buildings, by whose virtues, as they believed,
judgment had been turned away, and the favor of heaven restored.
This superstitious feeling was no doubt what led to those great
architectural efforts and results which characterize this period. Many of
them are now standing, to attest the greatness of the plan and the solidity
of the work. “The foundations were broad and deep, the walls of immense
thickness, roofs steep and high, to keep off the rain and snow... Tall pillars
supported the elevated vault, instead of the flat roof of former days... The
great square tower, which typified resistance to worldly aggression, was
exchanged for the tall and graceful spire, which pointed encouragingly to
heaven.”1
But we must not suppose that the uses and purposes of those enormous
buildings were merely as places of public worship. The village church in
medieval times was equal to a number of separate buildings in our own
day. It was large enough to enable the greater part of the population to
wander in its aisles. The cottages of the poor were then miserable hovels,
without windows, into which they retired to sleep. But the vast, beautiful
building consecrated by religion was the poor man’s mansion, where he
spent his leisure time, and where he felt as if it all belonged to himself. It
was like the town-hall, the market-place, the news-room, the school-room,
 447
and the meeting-place of friends, all in one. We, who live in the
comfortable houses of the nineteenth century, can have no just idea of the
uses and convenience of such buildings. But all tended, like everything else
in those times, to increase the power of the clergy, and the servility of the
people. Not only was the sanctuary hallowed, but the priests became
glorified, in the eyes of the people, and far outshone even the dignity of
kings.

THE REVIVAL OF LITERATURE

The beginning of the eleventh century was not only famous for the putting
forth of great architectural skill, but also for the renewed energies of the
human mind in the various departments of learning. The long, dull,
unquestioning belief of ages was now to be disturbed by a free and
wholesome inquiry.
The intellectual energy of Europe, it is said, was in a condition of gradual
decay from the fifth to the middle of the eighth century; and though the
condition of the British isles, and the labors of the venerable Bede, may
seem to furnish some exception to the general rule, it was then that
ignorance reached its widest and darkest boundaries. Bede, we may
observe in passing, is spoken of as the man who most eminently deserves
to be called England’s teacher. He was born in the year 673, in the village
of Jarrow in Northumberland; he was a monk and a priest, but a most
devout, laborious, and godly man: the instruction of youth had been one of
the great objects of his life, which he continued till his latest hours: he died
in the midst of his beloved scholars, May 26th, 735.2

THE REVIVAL OF LETTERS BY THE ARABS

We now meet with a somewhat curious and unexpected phenomenon in
the history of literature during these dark ages; and though it may not
properly fall within the line of our church history, it is too interesting and
important to overlook. The professed teachers of Christendom were at
this time, as is well known, sunk in the very depths of ignorance; but we
find the Saracens had risen to be the students and the teachers of the
national literature of Greece. This was the remarkable state of things at the
beginning of the eleventh century.
 448
We have already seen that in the seventh century the companions and
successors of Mahomet desolated the face of the earth with their arms, and
darkened it by their ignorance, and the acts of barbarism ascribed to them
— such as the burning of the Alexandrian library, attest their contempt for
learning, and their aversion for the monuments which they destroyed. In
the eighth century they seem to have settled down in the countries which
they subdued, and, with the advantages of a finer climate and a richer soil,
they began to study the sciences and useful knowledge. “In the ninth
[century],” says Dean Waddington, “under the auspices of a wise and
munificent Caliph, they applied the same ardor to the pursuit of literature
which had heretofore been confined to the exercise of arms. Ample schools
were founded in the principal cities of Asia, Bagdad, and Cufa, and
Bassora; numerous libraries were formed with care and diligence, and men
of learning and science were solicitously invited to the splendid court of
Almataunts. Greece, which had civilized the Roman republic, and was
destined, in a much later age, to enlighten the extremities of the West, was
now called upon to turn the stream of her lore into the barren bosom of
Asia; for Greece was still the only land possessing an original literature.
Her noblest productions were now translated into the ruling language of
the East, and the Arabians took pleasure in pursuing the speculations, or
submitting to the rules, of her philosophy.
“The impulse thus given to the genius and industry of Asia was
communicated with inconceivable rapidity along the shores of
Egypt and Africa to the schools of Seville and Cordova; and the
shock was not felt least sensibly by those who last received it.
Henceforward the genius of learning accompanied even the arms of
the Saracens. They conquered Sicily; from Sicily they invaded the
southern provinces of Italy; and, as if to complete the eccentric
revolution of Grecian literature, the wisdom of Pythagoras was
restored to the land of its origin by the descendants of an Arabian
warrior.”3

THE LEARNING OF THE ARABS IMPORTED INTO CHRISTENDOM

Pope Sylvester II., who filled the chair of St. Peter when the first morning
of the eleventh century dawned upon Europe, formed the link between the
wisdom and learning of the Arabians, and the ignorance and credulity of
 449
the Romans. He had studied at the Mahometan schools in the royal city of
Cordova, where he had acquired much useful knowledge as to this life,
which he began to teach and practice in Rome. But such was the dark
superstition of the people generally, that they attributed his great
acquirements to the arts of magic, and maintained that such powers could
only be possessed through a compact with the evil one. For ages after
Pope Sylvester was remembered with horror, lest the throne of St. Peter
should have been filled by a necromancer. But as time passed on, and the
darkness of the tenth century was more and more left behind, there arose a
race of men who were distinguished, not merely for great philosophic
attainments, but for the study of the holy scriptures, and for their
devotedness to the progress of Christianity. To have learned to read, and
to have attended to the meaning of words, at such a time, especially in
connection with the sacred writings, were blessings to mankind. The
superiority of the eleventh over the tenth century must be chiefly ascribed
to the improvements and advancement in learning, as a means in the Lord’s
hands.
But we must say another word about Sylvester. It would be unfair to leave
so great and so good a man under the dark shade of the people’s
prejudices. He is spoken of by enlightened and impartial history as the
most eminent prelate of his age. His own name was Gerbert. “In learning
peerless, in piety unimpeachable, was Gerbert of Ravenna,” says Milman.
He was the tutor, guide, and friend of Robert, the son and successor of
Hugh Capet, who, by a great but silent revolution, was raised to the throne
of the imbecile race of Charlemagne, in the year 987. The royal pupil
seems to have profired by the instructions of Gerbert. He came to the
throne of France about the year 996, and reigned till the year 1031. He was
a great friend to learning, died lamented, and was surnamed the Sage. In
998 Gerbert was appointed pope by Otho III., Emperor of Germany,
when he took the name of Sylvester II. He died May 12th, 1003.

TRACES OF THE SILVER LINE OF GOD’S GRACE

Stephen, a most pious prince of Hungary, was baptized by Adelbert,
bishop of Prague, and began to reign in the year 997. He was a most
zealous supporter of the gospel, schools, and missionary work. He often
accompanied the preachers, and sometimes preached himself. His pious
 450
queen, Gisla, daughter of Henry III., greatly assisted him. He also
introduced many social reforms, was kind to the poor, and endeavored to
suppress all impiety throughout his dominions. He lived to see, under the
blessing of God, all Hungary become externally christian. He died in the
year 1038. A change of government brought about persecution, and the
pious laborers were interrupted in their good work.
Othingar, a bishop of Denmark, and Unwan, bishop of Hamburg, were
earnest, devoted, servants of Christ, and used by Him for the spread of the
truth. John, a Scotchman, the bishop of Mecklenburg, baptized great
numbers of the Sclavonians; but the Prussians resisted all attempts to
introduce the gospel among them. Boleslaus, king of Poland, endeavored
by force to evangelize them, but in vain. Then eighteen missionaries, under
one Boniface, went to labor among the Prussians, by means of the peaceful
gospel, but they were all massacred by that barbarous people. They seem
to have been the last of the European nations who submitted to the yoke
of Christ. Christianity had no footing in Prussia till the thirteenth century.
The reign of Olave, who became king of Sweden towards the end of the
tenth century, and died about 1024, was famous for the propagation of the
gospel in that country. The zeal of the English clergy embraced the
opportunity, and many of them went over to preach the gospel in
Sweden; among them was Sigfred, archdeacon of York, who labored many
years among the Swedes. But the zeal of Olave led him to use violent
measures in the spread of Christianity, and excited a general hatred against
him among the adherents of the old religion. After many struggles, and
much bloodshed, the christian religion was firmly established about the
end of the eleventh century. The number of churches in Sweden was
increased to about eleven hundred.
The progress of the gospel in Norway had been slow from the time of
Ausgar’s mission; but when Olave, son of Harold, became king in 1015,
he determined to carry on the good work with great zeal. Many
missionaries were invited from England; at their head was a bishop named
Grimkil, who drew up a code of ecclesiastical laws for Norway. But the
king pursued the system — too common in those days, but always the
Roman system — of enforcing Christianity by such means as confiscation
and severe bodily punishments, even unto death. He often had to
 451
encounter armed resistance. At length a conference was agreed upon. The
king and his missionary, Grimkil, met the heathen priest at Dalen, in 1025.
Olave, it is said, spent a great part of the night in prayer. The god Thor,
who was represented as superior to the Christians’ God, because he could
be seen, was brought into the place of conference. When they met in the
morning, the king pointed to the rising sun as a visible witness to his God
who created it; and while the heathen were gazing on its brightness, a
gigantic soldier raised his club, and broke the idol to pieces. A swarm of
loathsome creatures, thus rudely disturbed, rushed forth, and, running in
all directions, the men of Dalen were convinced of the vanity of the old
superstition, and consented to be baptized. Olave was afterwards slain in a
civil war, but it was rumored that his blood had healed a wound in the
hand of the warrior who killed him; and many other miracles were said to
have been wrought by him. He was canonized, and St. Olave was chosen
as the patron of Norway.
The triumphs of the gospel were especially conspicuous in Denmark
towards the end of this century. “Look,” says Adam of Bremen, who
wrote in the year 1080; “Look at that very ferocious nation of the
Danes; for a long time they have been accustomed to celebrate the praises
of God. Look at that piratical people; they are now content with the fruits
of their own country. Look at that horrid region, formerly altogether
inaccessible on account of idolatry; they now eagerly admit the preachers
of the word.” History represents the Danes and the English as enjoying a
kind of millennial scene at this time, through the effects of missionary
labors. In mutual confidence and charity they were enjoying together the
blessings of Christianity. This must have been indeed wonderful and
surprising to those who had known with what savage barbarity the Danes
had formerly desolated the dwellings of the English. These were the
peaceful triumphs of the gospel of Christ. The preaching of the cross,
attended with the energy of the Holy Spirit, is sure to effect such blessed
and salutary changes in the rudest people. The gospel not only
emancipates the immortal soul from the slavery and doom of sin, but it
greatly ameliorates the condition of man in this life, and diffuses through
the world the precepts of peace, order, and good government. These are
the native effects of the gospel, but they are often marred and hindered by
 452
the natural enmity of the heart, especially by those who have the sword
on their side.
Laneranc and Anselm are names famous in church history at this time,
though not so much for grace as for learning and controversy: both were
archbishops of Canterbury. They had both been monks, and celebrated
teachers in that humble rank. Upwards of four thousand scholars attended
the pre-lections of Lanfranc when a monk at Caen. Anselm was of equal
reputation in Normandy. Lanfranc, however, has the unenviable reputation
of confirming, by his great influence and learning, the dogma of
transubstantiation. In the darkness of the tenth century it had made its
first authoritative appearance in the church. It was attacked by Berengar,
of Tours, who used all the powers of his mind, and all the resources within
his reach, to demonstrate its unsoundness. But Lanfranc defended it, and
having the majority of the clergy on his side, Berengar was confuted,
stripped of all his preferments, and condemned to a rigorous seclusion for
the remainder of his life. Berengarism became a term of reproach, and was
considered a heresy. Thus the mysterious dogma of the Real Presence
was established about the middle of the eleventh century. Lanfranc died in
1089. William Rufus appointed Anselm to be his successor. He has the
reputation of being a great divine, a sincere Christian, and most blameless
in his life. He died in 1109, being the sixteenth year of his archbishopric,
and the seventy-sixth of his age. Both Lanfranc and Anselm, we need
scarcely say, were zealous supporters of the power of Rome.
Margaret, Queen of Scotland, was evidently a divine channel of God’s
grace in those days, notwithstanding the legality of Popery. She was the
daughter of Ethelred, and sister to Edgar Atheling, the last of the Saxon line
of princes. The rapacity and profaneness of the Norman princes,
especially of William Rufus, led Edgar and Margaret to seek a safe retreat
in Scotland. King Malcolm Canmore married the English princess. The
most wonderful things are related of her piety, liberality, and humility.
Her character was fitted to throw a luster over a purer age. She had by
Malcolm six sons and two daughters. Three of her sons reigned
successively, and her daughter, Matilda, was wife to Henry I. of England,
and was considered a pious Christian.
 453
As the life and character of Margaret will give a better view or embodiment
of Romish Christianity in one of its brightest examples, than we could
describe, we will quote a few passages from real life. “The royal lady, who
has been honored with canonization, though very superstitious, and
somewhat ostentatious in her acts of beneficence, nevertheless possessed
many eminent virtues, and must be ranked among the best of our queens.
She exercised unbounded influence over her brave but illiterate husband,
who, though unable to read her books of devotion, was accustomed
fervently to kiss them. Every morning she prepared food for nine orphans,
and on her bended knees she fed them. With her own hands she ministered
at table to crowds of indigent persons, who assembled to share her
bounty; and nightly, before retiring to rest, she gave a still more striking
proof of her humility by washing the feet of six of them. She was
frequently in church, prostrate before the altar, and there, with sighs and
tears and protracted prayers, she offered herself a sacrifice to the Lord.
When the season of Lent came round, besides reciting particular offices,
she went over the whole Psalter twice or thrice within twenty-four hours.
Before repairing to public Mass, she prepared herself for the solemnity by
hearing five or six private masses; and when the whole service was over,
she fed twenty-four on-hangers, and thus illustrated her faith by her
works. It was not till these were satisfied that she retired to her own
scanty meal. But with all this parade of humility, there was an equal
display of pride. Her dress was gorgeous, her retinue large, and her coarse
fare must needs be served on dishes of gold and silver, a thing unheard of
in Scotland till her time.
“Fortunate in having obtained a good education, St. Margaret was
particularly fond of showing her learning and knowledge of the
scriptures. She often discoursed with the clergy of Scotland on
questions of theology, and through her influence Lent was
henceforward observed according to the Catholic institution. She
did good service to religion and virtue in many ways; but the life of
this good queen was shortened by the severity of her fasts. They
gradually undermined her constitution... She was lying, wasted and
dying, with the crucifix before her, when her son, Edgar, arrived
from the battle of Alnwick. ‘How fares it with the King and my
Edward?’ said the dying mother. The young man stood silent. ‘I
 454
know it all,’ she cried; ‘I know it all. By this holy cross, by your
filial affection, I adjure you, tell me the truth.’ ‘Your husband and
your son are both slain,’ said the youth. Lifting her hands and her
eyes to heaven, she devoutly said, ‘Praise and blessing be to thee,
Almighty God, that thou hast been pleased to make me endure so
bitter anguish in the hour of my departure, thereby, as I trust, to
purify me in some measure from the corruptions of my sins; and
Thou, Lord Jesus Christ, who, through the will of the Father, has
enlivened the world by Thy death, oh, deliver me!’ While the
words were yet upon her lips she softly expired.”4

REFLECTIONS ON THE MISSIONARY SPIRIT OF ROME

We have seen, in tracing the good work of the gospel in different countries,
the activity, energy, and aggressive character of the church of Rome. And
although there was a fearful amount of human tradition, and many foolish
absurdities, mixed up with “the gospel of God,” still the name of Jesus
Christ was proclaimed, and salvation through Him, though not alas
through Him alone. Nevertheless God in grace could use that blessed name,
and give the eye of faith to see its preciousness, amongst the rubbish of
Roman superstition. The full, clear, gospel of Christ was completely lost.
It was no longer Christ only, but Christ and a thousand other things. They
were eloquent in preaching good works, but, at the same time, they
obscured the faith from which all good works should spring.
“Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world;...
Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God,
and there is none else;... Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest;... Him that cometh to Me I will in no
wise cast out.” (John 1:29; Isaiah 45:22; Matthew 11:28; John 6:37.)
These, and such like texts, give the idea of a gospel that brings souls to
Christ Himself, by faith alone; not to Christ, and rites and ceremonies
innumerable, before the soul can be saved. To be converted to Christ
Himself is the best of all conversions. To rest on the unfailing efficacy of
the blood of Christ is sure salvation to the soul, and perfect peace with
God.
 455
There were, no doubt, many good and earnest men in the missionary field,
whose spiritual state may have been much better than their ecclesiastical
one, and whom God may have used to gather precious souls to Himself.
But there can be no doubt that the spirit of Rome’s missionaries was more
of proselytizing to the church of Rome than to the faith and obedience of
Christ. Baptism, and implicit, unquestioning, subjection to the authority
of the pope, was the demand made on all converts, ruler or subject. Faith
in Christ was not looked for. The ambition of the Roman See was to
embrace the whole world; and, as far as Europe was concerned, all public
profession of Christianity which professed independence of the Roman
domination was to be immediately suppressed, and utterly destroyed.
Just about this time, a monk of humble origin, but of the most
extraordinary character, appeared on the scene. In him were accomplished
all the fond dreams of dominion over the human mind. Till now the
mission of the Papacy had never been fulfilled. But as there never had been
such a Pope before, and never has been such a Pope since, we must briefly
sketch his unparalleled career.
 456

CHAPTER 19
THE PONTIFICATE OF GREGORY VII

Hildebrand, a native of Tuscany, born in the early part of the eleventh

century, had embraced from his boyhood the most rigid ideas of
monasticism. Dissatisfied with the laxity of the Italian monks, he crossed
the Alps, and entered the austere convent of Cluny, in Burgundy, then the
foremost in numbers, wealth, and piety.
In the year 1049, Bruno, bishop of Toul, arrayed in all the splendor, and
attended by the retinue, of a Pontiff elect, arrived at Cluny, and demanded
the hospitality and the homage of the monks. Bruno was cousin to Henry
III., Emperor of Germany, and had been nominated by him to fill the
vacant See of Rome. Hildebrand, the Prior of Cluny, soon acquired great
influence over the mind of Bruno. He convinced him that he had made a
false step in having accepted the appointment from the hands of a layman,
and recommended him to lay aside the pontifical vestments which he had
prematurely assumed, travel to Rome as a pilgrim, and there receive from
the clergy and people that apostolical office which no layman had a right
to bestow. Bruno consented. Hildebrand’s lofty views of ecclesiastical
dignity prevailed over the more genial mind of his new friend. He followed
the advice; threw aside his robes, and taking the monk as his companion,
he pursued his journey to Rome in the simple garb of a pilgrim.
The impression produced was great, and all in favor of Bruno. No
sacerdotal or imperial display could have had the same power over the
people. Miracles are said to have marked his way, and by his prayers
swollen rivers sank within their natural bounds. He was hailed with
universal acclamations as Pope Leo the Ninth. Hildebrand was
immediately rewarded for his services. He was raised to the rank of a
cardinal, and received the offices of sub-deacon of Rome with other
munificent preferments. From this time he was practically pope — the
real director of the Papacy.
 457
EXTREMES OF CHARACTER
Just at this point of our history we meet, through the subtlety of Satan,
the most extreme and opposite of characters, Hildebrand’s one object was
to subdue the outer world; the self-inflicted cruelties of others were to
subdue the world within themselves.
Peter Damiano, bishop of Ostia, was severely ascetic. He wore sackcloth
secretly, he fasted, he watched, he prayed, and, in order to tame his
passions, he could rise in the night, stand for hours in a stream, until his
limbs were stiff with cold, and spend the remainder of the night in visiting
churches, and reciting the Psalter. The avowed object for which he so
labored was the restoration of the dignity of the priesthood, and a stricter
church discipline. Such is the delusive power of the enemy within the
church of Rome. But a monk, named —
Dominic, was considered the great hero of this warfare against the poor
unoffending body. Satan concealed from his dupe the difference between
the body and the deeds of the body. Dominic wore next to his skin a tight
iron cuirass, which he never put off, except to chastise himself. His body
and his arms were confined by iron rings, his neck was loaded with heavy
chains, his scanty clothes were worn to rags, his food consisted of the
coarsest fare, his skin was as black as a negro’s, from the effects of his
discipline. His usual exercise was to recite the Psalter twice a day, while he
flogged himself with both hands, at the rate of a thousand lashes to ten
psalters. It was reckoned that three thousand lashes were equal to a year’s
penance; the whole Psalter, therefore, with this accompaniment, was
equivalent to five years. In Lent, or on occasions of special penitence, the
daily average rose to three psalters; he “easily”(?) got through twenty —
equal to a hundred years of penance — in six days. Once, at the beginning
of Lent, he begged that a penance of a thousand years might be imposed on
him, and he cleared off the whole before Easter.
These flagellations were supposed to have the effect of a satisfaction for
other men’s sins — works of supererogation, which formed the capital for
the sale of indulgences, which we shall hear of by-and-by. Death
mercifully put an end to his pitiable delusions in the year 1062.
 458
Take another example of ecclesiastical life, for Satan found something to
suit every taste.
The worldly prelates were in the habit of riding forth attended with troops
of soldiers, with swords and lances. They were surrounded with armed
men like a heathen general. Every day royal banquets, every day parades;
the table loaded with delicacies; the guests, their voluptuous favorites.
Crime and licentiousness held revel in the palaces of the prelates. So great
was the wickedness of Rome in the tenth century, that historians in
general consent to draw a veil over it for the sake of our common
humanity. Can our deluded countrymen who are hastening over to Rome,
know, that within a period of a century and a half, about this time, so
dreadful were the scenes of the Vatican, that “two popes were murdered,
five were driven into exile, four were deposed, and three resigned their
hazardous dignity. Some were raised to the pontifical chair by arms, some
by money, and some received the tiara from the hands of princely
courtesans... It would be heretical to say that the gates of hell had
prevailed against the seat and center of Catholicism; but Baronius himself
might be cited to prove that they had rolled back on their infernal hinges to
send forth malignant spirits, commissioned to empty on her devoted head
the vials of bitterness and wrath.” 1
We now turn to the immediate object of our history — the career of
Hildebrand, as Gregory the Seventh, from whose lips we shall hear an
account of the infallible popes very different from the above.

GREGORY AND CLERICAL INDEPENDENCE

The day is yet future when man, the Antichrist of 2 Thessalonians 2
energized and led on by Satan, will “exalt himself above all that is called
God, or that is worshipped;” but surely in the life and character of
Gregory, we have a dark foreshadowing of that masterpiece of the enemy.
Were it not for the proof and illustration of scripture which Hildebrand’s
designs afford, we would willingly pass over his history. No silver line of
grace, no love, human or divine, can be traced in a single act of his public
administration; but with great swelling words of the most daring
blasphemy he speaks of himself as the successor of St. Peter, the follower
of Jesus, and the utterance of the mouth of God. At the same time it is
 459
evident to all that he was the very incarnation of antichristian pride,
arrogance, and intolerance. His language sometimes borders on the
assumption of divinity, and nearly approaches the blasphemy of the man
of sin.
From the time he entered Rome as the companion of Bruno till his
advancement to the pontifical chair — a period of twenty-four years — he
was the ruling spirit in the Vatican; but he was in no haste for preferment.
With more than human sagacity he was studying the condition and
relations of Church and State; he was acquiring a knowledge of man and of
the affairs of all Europe; he was maturing a lofty but daring scheme of a
vast spiritual autocracy in the person of the Pope. All this appeared when
he ascended the throne, and assumed in his own person the responsibility
of the power which he had so long directed, though in an inferior station.
His avowed object from the first was the absolute freedom and
independence of the clergy from imperial and all lay interference of every
description, whether to nominate or to consecrate an ecclesiastic; and, on
the basis of this liberty, he boldly asserted that spiritual authority was
higher and more legitimate than temporal. These proud pretensions led the
church of Rome, in the person of her pontiff, to usurp dominion over the
western empire, and over all the kingdoms of Europe, or rather of the
whole world. Nothing more is wanted to confirm these assertions than the
following Dictates.

THE “DICTATES OF GREGORY”

The following are said to be some of Gregory’s maxims; they will give the
reader an idea of the man, and of the spirit of popery. “It is laid down that
the Roman pontiff is universal bishop, that his name is the only one of the
kind in the world. To him alone it belongs to depose or to reconcile
bishops; and he may depose them in their absence, and without the
concurrence of a Synod. He alone is entitled to frame new laws for the
church — to divide, unite, or translate bishoprics. He alone may use the
ensigns of empire; all princes are bound to kiss his feet; he has the right to
depose emperors, and to absolve subjects from their allegiance. He holds in
his hands the supreme mediation in questions of war and peace, and he
only may adjudge contested successions to kingdoms — that all kingdoms
were held as fiefs under St. Peter. With his leave inferiors may accuse their
 460
superiors. No council may be styled general without his command. The
Roman church has never erred, and, as scripture testifies, never will err.
The pope is above all judgment, and by the merits of St. Peter is
undoubtedly rendered holy. The church was not to be the handmaid of
princes but their mistress; if she had received from God power to bind and
to loose in heaven, much more must she have a like power over earthly
things.”2
But while the sovereign domination of the church had long been the fond
dream of Hildebrand, he saw that certain reforms were necessary to the
accomplishment of his object; and to these he now addressed himself in all
the energy and intrepid firmness of his character.

GREGORY AND REFORM

About the close of Gregory’s first official year (March, 1074), he
assembled a numerous council at Rome, for the purpose of declaring war
against the two great vices of the European clergy, and the two great
hindrances to his theocratic scheme, namely, concubinage and simony, or
the marriage of the priests and the sale of benefices. Many who were
favorable to reform thought the edict as to celibacy not only severe but
unjust, because it applied equally to the most honorable marriages and the
basest profligacy. It was resolved in council, without opposition: first,
that priests should not marry; secondly, that those who were married
should put away their wives, or renounce the priesthood; thirdly, that for
the future no one should be admitted to holy orders who should not
profess inviolable continence.
Many of the early fathers had endeavored to establish the connection
between celibacy and sanctity, and to persuade men that those Who were
wedded to the church should avoid the contamination of an earthly union.
Several of the popes had also advocated celibacy; but, unless under the
severest personal discipline or in the strictest monastic communities, it
was little observed and probably never enforced beyond the bounds of
Italy. But Gregory made his voice to be heard and feared on this subject
from the Vatican to the utmost limits of Latin Christendom. He wrote
letters to all archbishops and bishops, princes, potentates, and lay officers
of every degree, on pain of incurring severe punishment or eternal
 461
perdition, to cast out and depose, without mercy, all married priests and
deacons, and to refuse their contaminating ministrations. These despatches
were full of anathemas against all who resisted his decrees; and, assuming
the place of God, he says, “How shall they obtain pardon for their sins
who despise him who openeth and closeth the gates of heaven to whom he
pleaseth? Let all such beware how they call down the divine wrath upon
their own heads;... how they incur the apostolic malediction, instead of
earning that grace and blessing so abundantly poured out upon them by
the blessed Peter! Let them be assured that neither prince nor prelate shall
escape the doom of the sinner who shall omit to drive out and expel, with
inexorable rigor, all simoniacal and married priests; and all who shall listen
to the call of carnal sympathy or affection, or shall from any worldly
motive withhold the sword from the shedding of blood in the holy cause of
God and His church, or shall stand aloof while these damning heresies are
gnawing at the vitals of religion... shall be regarded indiscriminately as
accomplices of the heretics, as counterfeits and cheats.”3

CELIBACY AND SIMONY

The promulgation of this edict produced, as may well be conceived, the
greatest possible agitation and distress throughout the whole of
Christendom. Up to this time, right or wrong, marriage had been the rule,
celibacy the exception. And the injustice of the edict made it more
intolerable, for it fell as severely on the most virtuous as on the most
vicious, and stigmatized them all alike as guilty of concubinage. We must
leave the reader to imagine the effect of such a decree on thousands and
tens of thousands of happy families; details would fill a volume. It
dissolved the most honorable marriages, rent asunder what God had joined
together, scattered husbands, wives, and children, and gave rise to the most
lamentable contentions, and spread everywhere the direst calamities;
wives, especially, were driven to despair, and exposed to the bitterest grief
and shame. But the more vehement the opposition, the more loud the
anathemas against any delay in the plenary execution of the pontiff’s
commands. The disobedient were delivered over to the civil magistrates, to
be persecuted, deprived of their properties, and subjected to indignities
and sufferings of various kinds. Part of one of his letters said on this point,
“He whom flesh and blood moveth to doubt or delay is carnal; he is
 462
condemned already; he hath no share in the work of the Lord; he is a rotten
branch, a dumb dog, a cankered limb, a faithless servant, a time-server, and
a hypocrite.”
But as none of the sovereigns of Europe were disposed to fight for the
wives of the clergy, the pope soon had the matter all his own way, and
many of the lewd priests were not sorry to be delivered from the
obligations of their evil ways.
Simony. The conflict arising from the twin law for the suppression of
simony was more difficult to deal with; and, being protracted through
many years, it involved both the church and state in many and great
calamities.

THE SIMONIACAL HERESY

In the eleventh century the feudal system is said to have arrived at
maturity, and the sin of simony — or the sale of ecclesiastical benefices —
to have reached its evil height. At this period history informs us that, from
the Papacy down to the lowest parochial cure, every spiritual dignity had
its money-price and became an object of barter or sale. Even the bishopric
of Rome had been so notoriously bought and sold about this very time,
that there were three contemporary popes: Benedict IX. held the Lateran;
Sylvester III., the Vatican; and Gregory VI., Santa Maria. But so
disgraceful were the contentions, and so fierce the actual warfare between
the popes and their friends, that the Emperor Henry III. was implored by
the Italians to come to Rome and examine the conflicting claims of the
three pontiffs. A council was held at Sutri, about the year 1044, when the
most unheard of immoralities, and the most flagrant simony, were proved
against the popes before Henry. Which of the three the high church now
claims as the legitimate successor of St. Peter, we know not; but there can
be no doubt that they were all the lineal descendants of Simon Magus,
who thought that the gift of God might be purchased with money. Few,
very few, were the true descendants of Simon Peter, who left all and
followed Jesus.
The evil worked downwards, and every order of the clergy was affected, if
not corrupted, by this prevailing sin. When the bishop found he had paid
too much for his See, he naturally raised the price of the inferior stations in
 463
order to indemnify himself. Thus the great prelates of the church were
engaged in the most degrading traffic and secularizing speculations.
Nothing could be lower, and it opened the door of the church to the worst
of men. Laymen, without education or religion; barbarians, without
civilization, purchased holy orders, and forced themselves into the sacred
ranks of the priesthood, and of course brought with them the worst
wickedness of the world, and the greatest enormities of the heathen.
Simony thus became the all-comprehending sin of that period, and every
vice naturally sprang from it. But we will endeavor to ascertain its origin.

THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF SIMONY

So long as the church was poor, persecuted, and despised by the world,
there were no purchasers for benefices. When a man lost his worldly
status by becoming a Christian, and exposed himself to imprisonment and
death, all trafficking in ecclesiastical preferments was unknown. But after
the union of Church and State, and when the wealth of the world began to
flow into the coffers of the church, there was a great temptation to enter
the sacred order for the privileges and immunities which it secured.
Simony thus became the inevitable consequence of the rich endowment of
the greater Sees.
In the early days of episcopacy the bishop was elected by the clergy and
the people of his diocese, but in process of time episcopal elections
became so important; that the lay-lords, and even the sovereigns, were
tempted to interfere, and ultimately to establish and claim the privilege of
positive appointment. Charlemagne himself set the example of advancing
his natural sons to high ecclesiastical dignities. The privilege thus usurped
was soon abused. The most important charges and offices were either
bestowed on favorites, or publicly sold to the highest bidder, without
regard for the interests of religion, sanctity of character, or even literary
qualifications.
The universal feudal practice of making presents to the sovereign, or to the
liege lord, at every act of promotion, was followed by the ecclesiastics.
When a bishop or abbot died, it was usual, in the first place, to report the
vacancy to the court, then the ring and the crosier of the deceased prelate
or abbot were placed in the hands of the temporal superior. The bishop or
 464
abbot next appointed was bound by the general custom to present a gift or
acknowledgment; this necessarily led to a transaction which assumed the
character of a bargain and sale. The gift or offering, which at first was
accepted as honorary and voluntary, was at length exacted as a price with
unscrupulous rapacity. With this was connected the famous question of
investiture. The ring, the symbol of his mystic marriage with his diocese;
the staff, the scepter of his spiritual sway. This investiture conveyed the
right to the temporal possessions or endowments of the benefice. It
presumed not to consecrate, but permitted the consecrated person to
execute his office in a certain defined sphere, and under the protection and
guarantee of the civil power.
Many of the Sees were endowed with sovereign rights and royalties within
their respective provinces. Bishops and abbeys had grown into
principalities and governments, and to these ecclesiastical princes the
largest share in the offices and councils of state had been entrusted. In the
feudal system, bishops had become in every respect the equals of the
secular nobles. “In every city,” says Milman, “the bishop, if not the very
first of men, was on a level with the first; without the city he was lord of
the amplest domains. Archbishops almost equalled kings; for who would
not have coveted the station and authority of a Hincmar, Archbishop of
Rheims, rather than that of the feeble Carlovingian monarch?”4
But the superior clergy were in no respect behind the laity in the corrupt
practice of selling the spiritual offices within their patronage. Bishops and
abbots sold their churches, without shame or remorse, that they might
repay themselves for their outlay. That which had been obtained by
unworthy means was employed for unworthy ends. Such was the fearful
state of things both in Church and State, and such the unhallowed motives
of men for taking holy orders, when Hildebrand sent forth his famous
decree against all simoniacal practices, and against the whole right of
investiture by the temporal sovereign, prince, noble, or any layman.

GREGORY AND INVESTITURES A.D. 1075

The formal inauguration of a bishop or abbot by the delivery of a ring and
a staff had been customary with the emperors, kings, and princes of
Europe, long before the establishment of the feudal system by
 465
Charlemagne, probably from the time of Clovis. And so far, if we bear in
mind the relation of the Church to the State, and the original source of the
privilege, it appears fair and right, though to a spiritual mind a most
incongruous combination of temporal and spiritual powers, and ruinous to
both. “When the early conquerors of the West,” says Dean Waddington,
“conferred territorial grants upon the church, the individuals who came to
the enjoyment of them were obliged to present themselves at court, to
swear allegiance to the king, and to receive from his hands some symbol, in
proof that the temporalities were placed in their possession. The same
ceremony, in fact, was imposed on the ecclesiastical as on the lay
proprietor of royal fiefs, and it was called investiture. Afterwards, when
the princes had usurped the presentation to all valuable benefices, even to
those which had not been derived from royal bounty, they introduced no
distinction, founded on the different sources of the revenue, but continued
to subject those whom they nominated to the same rank of allegiance, and
the same ceremony of investiture, with the laity.”5
In the first fervor of conversion, the conquerors, from Constantine
downwards, had been in the habit of bestowing a share of their newly-
acquired property upon monasteries and churches; but the gifts of the
successive dynasties were moderate, compared with the imperial house of
Saxony. Under the German emperors church property accumulated
rapidly, and to an enormous extent. “In the eleventh and twelfth
centuries,” says Greenwood, “freeholds in perpetuity were possessed by
the churches to a very great extent. The bishops and abbots were enriched,
not, as heretofore, by gifts of single plots of ground, or farms, but by
grants of whole cities and towns, by cantons and counties. Thus Otho I.
gave to the monastery of Magdeburg several boroughs, with their purlieus
and the rural districts appertaining thereto. Otho II. granted three boroughs
out of the imperial domain to the church of Aschaffenburg, with all the
lands appurtenant. The terms of the conveyance do not appear to have
differed at all from those used in secular grants of the like nature. And in
practice, notwithstanding the different character and calling of the grantees,
the same ideas of the nature and requirements of the grant appear to have
been entertained by the spiritual as by the lay vassal. Thus bishops and
abbots buckled on armor, mounted their chargers, and marched to the field,
at the head of their sub-vassals and tenants, in discharge of the feudal
 466
duties incurnbent upon their lands, nor could the latter be easily moved at
all till led into action by their lawful chiefs.
“The great ecclesiastics, so far from objecting to these
unprofessional demands, entered heartily into the sport of war, and
bore themselves in the field with a degree of martial prowess which
might become the bravest of the lay chivalry.”6
Such was the state of what may be called the christian constituency when
Hildebrand issued his memorable edict against lay investitures; and such
was the right or usage on the part of the crown of nominating and
appointing to the greater ecclesiastical dignities and benefices.
Hildebrand’s scheme was to abolish entirely even the remotest claim of
any interference, either for or against, on the part of the laity, in spiritual
appointments, and to deprive the sovereign of the right of investiture, with
which the law and custom of centuries had armed him, and which he
regarded as the most precious prerogative of his crown. This was the
question raised, the prize at issue, and the great battle to be fought,
between the potentates of Europe and the meagre monk in the Vatican.
Gregory now addressed himself to the contest, the greatest by far ever
undertaken single-handed in any age.

GREGORY AND HENRY IV

The discerning eye of the vigilant pontiff had long watched the spirit and
movements of all Christendom. He was well acquainted with the moral and
political life, the strength and weakness, of all nations. He may be seen in
the spiritual warfare temporizing with the strong, and bending all his
strength against the weak. He speaks contemptuously of the feeble king of
France, and claims tribute as an ancient right. Charlemagne, he says, was
the pope’s collector, and bestowed Saxony on the apostle. But to the
dreaded William of England and Normandy his language is courteous. The
haughty Norman maintained his Teutonic independence; created bishops
and abbots at his will; was absolute lord over his ecclesiastical as over his
feudal liegemen.7
In Spain and the northern nations Gregory was more assumptuous and
successful, but it was against the empire that he concentrated all his forces,
and resolved to measure the strength of the Papacy with the whole power
 467
of Henry. If he could humble the highest and proudest of monarchs — the
successor of the Caesars — the victory would tell on all other sovereigns.
The youth and inexperience of Henry, the demoralizing tendencies of his
education, the revolt of the German princes, and the troubles that too
often afflict a country during a minority, encouraged the daring priest in
his bold designs. The decisions of the council, held in 1074, against the
universal sin of simony, and the marriage of the clergy, were duly
communicated to the Emperor. The crafty pope embraced the opportunity
of assuming the greatest friendship for Henry. He admonished him as a
father to return to the bosom of his mother, the holy Roman church, to
rule the empire in a more worthy manner, to abstain from simoniacal
presentations to benefices, and to render due allegiance to his spiritual
superior.
The Emperor received the pope’s legate courteously, commended his zeal
for the reform of the church, and was altogether most submissive in his
tone. But Gregory was not to be satisfied with unmeaning praise and
apparent repentance. He now desired permission, as supreme arbiter of
the affairs of Germany, to summon councils there, by which those accused
of simony might be convicted and deposed. But neither Henry nor the
bishops would grant leave to the pope’s legates to assemble a council in
Germany for such a purpose. The clergy dreaded his severe inquisition
into their titles, and the Emperor dreaded having his own patronage
curtailed. But the impatient zeal of the ambitious priest would brook no
delay and submit to no opposition.
In the following year (1075) he convoked a second council at Rome, and
proceeded to those measures which he had intended to accomplish by
synods in Germany. At the head of his Roman clergy, men vowed to his
cause by interest and pride, he determined at all hazards to strike at the
root of all abuses comprehended under the odious name of simony. On
this occasion he excommunicated some of the favorites of Henry; he
deposed the Archbishop of Bremen, and the bishops of Strasburg, Spires,
and Bamberg, besides some Lombard bishops, and five of the imperial
court, whose assistance the Emperor had used in the sale of benefices. He
also decreed that “whoever should confer a bishopric or an abbacy, or
should receive an investiture from the hands of any layman, should be
 468
excommunicated.” Henry again professed a measure of penitence,
acknowledged the existence of simony, and his intentions in future to
discourage it, but that he could by no means be induced to give up the
power of appointing bishops and abbots, and the investiture so closely
connected with that power. Gregory, on the other hand, exasperated by
the king’s disobedience, and by his appointing to the See of Milan and
other bishoprics, without awaiting the decision of the apostolic See, sent
him the most peremptory summons to appear in Rome, to answer for all
his offenses before the tribunal of the pope, and before a synod of
ecclesiastics; if he should refuse or delay, he was at once to suffer the
sentence of excommunication. The 22nd of February was the day
appointed for his appearance.
“Thus the king,” says Milman, “the victorious king of the
Germans, was solemnly cited as a criminal, to answer undefined
charges, to be amenable to laws which the judge had assumed the
right of enacting, interpreting, and enforcing by the last penalties.
The whole affairs of the empire were to be suspended while the
king stood before the bar of his imperious arbiter; no delay was
allowed; the stern and immutable alternative was humble and
instant obedience, or that sentence which involved deposition from
the empire, and eternal perdition.”
The Emperor, who was a high-minded prince and of an ardent
temperament, being extremely indignant at this mandate, treated it as a
wanton insult, and immediately called a convention of German bishops at
Worms. His object was to depose the pope who had thus declared war,
even to the death, against himself. These prelates, after passing many
censures on the conduct of Hildebrand, pronounced him unworthy of his
dignity, deposed him, and appointed a meeting for the election of a new
pontiff. Gregory, on receiving the sentence by the king’s messengers and
letters, was not the least disturbed by such empty denunciations. In a full
assembly of one hundred and ten bishops, he suspended the ecclesiastics
who had voted and spoken against him. He then pronounced the
excommunication of the Emperor, declaring “that he had forfeited the
kingdoms of Germany and Italy, and that his subjects were absolved from
their oath of fealty.”
 469
THE EMPEROR DEPOSED BY THE POPE
In the assembly Gregory thus spoke:
“Now, therefore, brethren, it behoves us to draw the sword of
vengeance; now must we smite the foe of God and of His church;
now shall his bruised head, which lifts itself, in its haughtiness,
against the foundations of the faith, and of all the churches, fall to
the earth, there, according to the sentence pronounced against his
pride, to go upon his belly, and eat the dust. Fear not, little flock,
saith the Lord, for it is the will of your Father to grant you the
kingdom. Long enough have ye borne with him; often enough have
ye admonished him: let his seared conscience be made to feel!” The
whole synod replied with one voice, “Let thy wisdom, most holy
father, whom the divine mercy has raised up to rule the world in
our days, utter such a sentence against this blasphemer, this
usurper, this tyrant, this apostate, as may crush him to the earth,
and make him a warning to future ages... Draw the sword, pass the
judgment, that the righteous may rejoice when he seeth the
vengeance, and wash his hands in the blood of the ungodly.”
The formal sentence followed: the audacious priest, in the most
blasphemous manner, identifies himself with the divine majesty, and utters
the most solemn language in the foulest hypocrisy. After affirming, with a
lying tongue, that he had been reluctantly compelled to ascend the
pontifical throne, he said,
“In full confidence in the authority over all christian people granted
by God to the delegate of St. Peter, for the honor and defense of
the church, in the name of the Almighty God, the Father, the Son,
and the Holy Ghost, and by the power and authority of St. Peter, I
interdict King Henry, son of Henry the Emperor, who, in his
unexampled pride, has risen against the church, from the
government of the whole realm of Germany and Italy. I absolve all
Christians from the oaths which they have sworn, or may swear,
to him, and forbid all obedience to him as king... Because he has
held communion with the excommunicated, and despised the
admonitions which, as thou knowest, I have given him for his
salvation... I bind him, therefore, in thy name, in the bonds of thy
 470
anathema, that all the nations may know, and may acknowledge,
that thou art Peter, and that upon thee, as upon a rock, the Son of
God hath built His church, and that the gates of hell shall not
prevail against her.”
Before the synod was prorogued, Gregory addressed letters to “all
Christians,” enclosing copies of the acts of the council, and commanding all
men, as they desired to be numbered among the flock of the blessed Peter,
to accept and obey the orders therein contained; more especially those
which related to the deposition and anathema against the king, his “false
bishops, and reprobate ministers.” And, after exhorting the people to
resist Henry, even unto blood, the lying priest dared to utter, “God is
herein our witness that we are not moved by any desire of temporal
advantage, or by carnal respects of any kind, in reproving wicked princes
or impious priests; but that all we do is done from pure regard for our high
office, and for the honor and prerogative of the apostolic See,” etc.

A GREAT CIVIL WAR

War was now openly proclaimed; the effect of these letters, thrown
broadcast into a kingdom already divided and among a people already
discontented and accustomed to rebellion, was immense. Both Church and
State were rent in pieces, some taking part with the king, others with the
pontiff. A civil war broke out, which raged for seventeen years,
throughout the Roman empire; bishop against bishop, the people against
the people; “while,” says one, “the earth drank up the blood that was
shed, and the grave closed alike over those who suffered and those who
inflicted the misery.” All Germany was in a state of distraction, dissension,
and all but prostration.
The dukes of Swabia, taking advantage of the general feeling against Henry,
and encouraged by the pope’s legates, rose in arms against the sovereign to
whom they had sworn fealty, and elected Adolphus as king. In the
meantime, Hildebrand himself neglected none of his own means of warfare,
a warfare in which he was deeply skilled. Great swelling words of most
awful import were his weapons. The “name of God; the peace of God; the
commands of God; the salvation of God; the keys of the blessed Peter;
closing the gates of heaven; opening the gates of hell; eternal perdition,”
 471
etc., were words which struck terror into every human mind, and the
manacles with which he bound his slaves.
As this great struggle went on, the pope was gathering strength, Henry
was losing it and felt it ebbing fast. His heart sank within him: everything
seemed blasted by the curse of St. Peter; the princes revolted; the prelates
and the people renouncing their allegiance, and conspiracies arose on every
side. Such was the evil influence of the pope, who now stepped forth in
the full panoply of ecclesiastical, or rather of diabolical, power, to trample
in the dust his own liege lord. Under all these depressing and crushing
circumstances Henry came to an arrangement with the rebellious princes
— that the claims and wrongs of both parties should be submitted to the
pope, who was invited to preside at a council to be held at Augsburg for
that purpose.

HENRY SETS OUT FOR ITALY

The fallen Emperor was now caught in the toils of the enemy. The policy
of Gregory had been successful. Having created a revolution, and caused
much bloodshed between the princes of the realm and Henry, which he
artfully shifted from the ground of individual or political grievance to that
of religion, he now pretended to be a peacemaker. Hence such words of
base hypocrisy as, “Deal gently with Henry, and extend to him that
charity which covereth a multitude of sins.” We shall soon see the quality
of Gregory’s gentleness and charity towards Henry.
The king’s cause was now desperate. Stripped of all power, even of the
sign of royalty, and feeling that he had nothing to hope for from an
assembly of his rebellious subjects and his avowed enemy, he resolved, as
a last chance, to try and gain a personal interview with the pope, and
throw himself as a penitent at his feet. With difficulty he collected from
his few remaining friends sufficient money to defray his expenses to Italy.
He left Spires in the depth of winter, with his wife and infant son, and one
faithful attendant. But the Alps were still between them and Italy. And
even nature now seemed to conspire with the pope against the fallen king.
The weather was unusually severe. The Rhine and the Po were thickly
frozen over, and the snow which covered the Alps was as hard and as
slippery as ice. Besides, the passes were jealously watched by the Dukes
 472
of Bavaria and Carinthia, the enemies of Henry. Altogether a passage
seemed impossible. But the effort must be made, however perilous.
According to the agreement between Henry and the rival princes, or the
states general, he must obtain absolution within a year and a day of the
date of the papal anathema, or forfeit his crown and kingdom for ever; but
if he could obtain absolution within that time, they would return to his
standard and their allegiance.
The Alps must be crossed. The fatal day — the 23rd of February — was
hastening on. Guides, well acquainted with the paths, were hired,
something like a road was cut through the snow for the royal party. With
great difficulty they reached the summit of the pass; but the descent was
yet more hazardous. It looked like a vast precipice of smooth ice. But the
difficulty must be overcome. The men crept down on their hands and
knees, often slipping and rolling down the glassy declivities. The queen,
her infant son, and female attendant, were drawn down by the guides in
the skins of oxen, as in sledges. The horses were lowered by various
contrivances; some, with their feet tied, were allowed to roll down; but
some were killed, and few of them reached the reached the bottom in a
serviceable state.

HENRY AT CANOSA
The unexpected arrival of Henry in Italy produced a great senation.
Princes and bishops assembled in great numbers, and received him with the
highest honors. The Italians looked to him for a redress of their grievances.
Those who had been excommunicated by Hildebrand looked eagerly for
vengeance; and the Lombard nobility and the prelates hoped that he was
come to depose the dreaded and detested Gregory. As he moved onwards
the number of his followers gradually increased; but Henry could not
pause to plunge himself into any new scheme; he could not imperil the
throne of Germany; he must obtain absolution before the fatal 23rd of
February.
In the meantime Gregory had set out for Germany, but the news of
Henry’s descent into Italy arrested his march. He was uncertain whether
he had come as a humble suppliant, or at the head of a great army, and
hastened to place his person in safety at Canosa, a strong castle in the
 473
Apennine mountains, belonging to his faithful friend and ally, the “great
countess” Matilda.
Bishops and abbots who had fallen under the papal ban followed the
king’s example, and hastened to Canosa. With naked feet, and clothed in
sackcloth, they presented themselves before the pontiff, humbly imploring
pardon and absolution from the dire anathema. After a few days’ penance
in solitary confinement, and with scanty fare, he absolved them, on
condition that, until the king should be reconciled, they were to have no
intercourse with him. For Henry himself more humiliating terms were
reserved.
On arriving at Canosa, the king obtained an interview with Matilda, the
Marchioness Adelaide (his mother-in-law), and Hugh, abbot of Cluny, and
engaged their intercession with the pope for a merciful consideration of his
case. After many objections raised by the implacable pope, and pleas
urged by Henry’s friends, Gregory at length proposed, “that if he be truly
penitent, let him place his crown, and all the ensigns of royalty, in my
hands, and openly confess himself unworthy of the royal name and
dignity.” This demand seemed too hard, even to the ardent admirers of the
pope, who entreated him “not to break the bruised reed;” and in
condescension to their importunities, he promised to give the king an
interview.

THE PENANCE OF THE KING

It was now towards the end of January; the year of grace was nearly
expired; and Henry resolved to accept the pope’s conditions. He was
determined to do and to bear all, so that he might but disappoint the
plottings of his rebellious subjects, and retain the empire.
“On a dreary winter morning,” says Milman, “with the ground
deep in snow, the king, the heir of a long line of emperors, was
permitted to enter within the two outer of the three walls which
girded the castle of Canosa. He had laid aside every mark of
royalty, or of distinguished station; he was clad only in the thin
white linen dress of the penitent, and there, fasting, he awaited in
humble patience the pleasure of the pope. But the gates did not
unclose. A second day he stood, cold, hungry, and mocked by vain
 474
hope. And yet a third day dragged on, from morning to evening,
over the unsheltered head of the discrowned king. Every heart was
moved, except that of the representative of Jesus Christ. Even in
the presence of Gregory there were low, deep, murmurs against his
unapostolic pride and inhumanity. The patience of Henry could
endure no more. He took refuge in an adjacent chapel of St.
Nicolas, to implore, and with tears, once again the intercession of
the aged abbot of Cluny. Matilda was present; her womanly heart
was melted; she joined with Henry in his supplications to the
abbot. “Thou alone canst accomplish this,” said the abbot to the
countess. Henry fell on his knees, and, in a passion of grief,
entreated her merciful interference. To female entrearies Gregory at
length yielded an ungracious permission for the king to approach
his presence. With bare feet, still in the garb of penitence, stood the
king, a man of singularly tall and noble person, with a countenance
accustomed to flash command and terror upon his adversaries,
before the pope, a greyhaired man, of small unimposing stature,
bowed with years.”8
The terms imposed on Henry were characteristic of the unfeeling,
inexorable, tyrant; he acted in this matter more like a fiend incarnate than a
human being. Finding that the royal penitent was brought so low, that any
terms would be accepted, he forced him to drink the bitterest dregs of
humiliation. We need not trouble the reader with his lengthy stipulations.
Such demands had never been made or heard of before in the annals of
mankind. But his one grand object was the consolidation of his own
elaborated scheme of papal authority. Having placed his foot on the neck
of the greatest monarch in the world, he attempted the establishment of
the pontiff’s right, in the face of Europe, to judge kings, dispose of
kingdoms, and absolve subjects from their oath of allegiance to
excommunicated kings. This gave the pope enormous power over the
whole outer world. It constituted rebellion against a lawful sovereign a
sacred duty to the church and to God.

THE EFFECTS OF THE PAPAL POLICY

Gregory soon found that he had gone too far — that the humiliation at
Canosa could never be forgotten and could never even sleep until it was
 475
revenged. Compassion as well as interest moved many princes and
prelates to gather round the fallen king, now that he was released from the
ban of excommunication. Hildebrand was generally hated because of his
political tyranny, and dreaded because of his ecclesiastical censures. The
revolted princes of Germany were secretly encouraged by the pope to
dispute the possession of the throne with Henry, which increased his
perplexity, and prevented him from turning his arms against Rome. He
prayed that Henry might never prosper in war, and, in the name and with
the blessing of the apostles, he bestowed the kingdom of Germany on the
rebel, Rudolph, duke of Swabia. The pope even ventured to prophesy that
within a year Henry would either be dead or deposed; and, as if he knew
the end from the beginning, he sent a crown to the future king, with an
inscription, signifying that it was the gift of Christ to St. Peter, and of St.
Peter to Rudolph. But he was soon proved to be a lying prophet as well as
a lying priest, and the remorseless foreenter of civil war.9
The king’s strength gradually increased in spite of all the wicked and cruel
plottings of Gregory. After years of the most terrible civil war and fearful
bloodshed, the armies of Henry and of his rival, Rudolph, met once more
on the bank of the Ulster, in October 1080. The engagement was long and
obstinate, but the fall of Rudolph gave Henry the victory. He received his
death-wound, it is said, from the lance of Godfrey, afterwards the first
king of Jerusalem; a sabre-wound from another cut off his right hand. It is
reported that the dying prince, looking on his dissevered hand, sorrowfully
acknowledged, “With this hand I ratified my oath of fealty to my
sovereign, Henry: the punishment is just; I have now lost life and
kingdom.” The king’s adversaries being now discouraged and paralysed, he
determined on turning his forces against his most formidable and
irreconcilable enemy. He crossed the Alps, entered Italy, and encamped
under the walls of Rome.
The city having been well provisioned, the walls strengthened, and the
loyalty of the Romans secured by the wealth of Matilda, Henry was more
or less engaged for three years in blockading and besieging Rome; but in the
summer of 1083 he gained possession of the guilty city. Gregory took
refuge in the strong castle of St. Angelo, and a few of his partisans in their
fortified houses. Henry was willing to come to terms with Hildebrand, and
to accept the imperial crown from his hands. But the pope would hear of
 476
nothing but unconditional submission. “Let the king resign his dignity, and
submit to penance,” were the only terms of Gregory. The clergy —
bishops, abbots, and monks, and the laity, entreated him to have mercy on
the afflicted city, and come to terms with the king.
But all attempts at negotiation were fruitless; the inflexible pope despised
alike supplications and threatenings. The absolute submission of Henry,
and satisfaction to the church, were the lofty demands of the imprisoned
pope. But Henry was no longer the deserted, the broken-spirited,
suppliant at his feet, as at Canosa.

HENRY AND BERTHA CROWNED A.D. 1084

The Romans at length, weary of enduring the miseries of a siege, and no
hope of relief from the Italian Normans, declared in favor of Henry. He
was master of the greater part of the city. His first step was to place
Guibert the Archbishop of Ravenna in the papal chair, as Clement the
Third. He had been named by a synod of bishops as the future pope.
Henry now received the imperial crown from Clement, with his Queen
Bertha, and was saluted as Emperor by the Roman people.
The position of Gregory now seemed desperate. He was a prisoner, and
might soon be given up to the vengeance of Henry. He could expect no aid
from Philip of France. William of England was not disposed to embroil
himself in the pope’s quarrels. Matilda, Countess of Tuscany, alone could
be relied on. She was the most powerful, wealthy, and zealous supporter
of the interests of the church in that country. On the death of her mother
and of her husband, while still young and beautiful, the crafty pope
persuaded her to settle all her possessions on the church of Rome; which
were afterwards entitled the States of the Church. But Matilda’s men and
money were not sufficient for the pope’s present necessity. In his great
distress he entreated the help of Robert Gutscard, a great Norman warrior.
He had been suspected as an accomplice of Cencius in his conspiracy
against Gregory, and had been under the censure of the church for several
years. But the pope was ready to release him from the ban of
excommunication, and even to hold out the hope of the imperial crown if
he would at once come to his aid. The great Norman accepted the pope’s
terms, and placed his ruthless sword at Gregory’s service.
 477
ROBERT GUISCARD ENTERS HOME A.D. 1084
In order therefore to meet the pope’s wishes, receive his blessing, and
overthrow his enemies, Robert collected an army of 30,000 irregular
infantry, and 6000 Norman cavalry, and put them in march for Rome. It
was a wild and motley host, in which were mingled adventurers of many
nations: some had joined his banner to rescue the pope, and others from
love of war; even the unbelieving Saracens had enlisted in great numbers.
Tidings soon reached Rome that an overwhelming force was advancing to
the relief of the beleaguered forts.
Henry, apprehending no danger, had sent away a great part of his troops;
and as the remainder were unequal to encounter this formidable host, he
prudently withdrew his forces, assuring his Roman friends that he would
soon return. He retired to Civita Casteliana, where he could watch the
movements of all parties.
Three days after Henry had left the city, the Norman army appeared
under the walls. Alas, alas, for the inhabitants of that guilty city! A darker
and heavier day than she had ever passed through was at hand; and all her
calamities were traceable to the revengeful, implacable spirit of her high
priest. But rather than yield to the temporal power, even the blood of
Rome — his own city and capital — must flow. The dominion of the
papacy over the kingdoms of this world was his one grand idea; and no
adversity could induce him to yield one point of his lofty pretensions. He
was as inflexible in a prison as in a palace. “Let the king lay down his
crown and give satisfaction to the church” were the proud and disdainful
words of Hildebrand, though a prisoner, and though both the clergy and
the laity were beseeching him to come to terms with Henry. But he
despised alike the murmurs, the menaces, and the supplications of all. He
must have known the character of those murderous hordes that were at his
gates, and what the consequences would be the moment they entered. But
his mind was made up, and at any cost of human bloodshed and misery he
inexorably pursued his imperious designs.
The Romans were unprepared for their defense, and scarcely made a show
of resistance. The gate of St. Laurence was speedily forced, and the city
was at once in their power. The first act of Robert, that dutiful son of the
church, was to release the pope from his long imprisonment in the Castle
 478
of St. Angelo. The Norman formally received the pontifical blessing.
Rising from the pope’s feet, thus blessed and edified — awful mockery
and blasphemy! Robert let loose his ruffian bands on the unprotected
flock of the so-called chief shepherd. For three days Rome was subjected
to the horrors of a sack. The Normans and the infidel Saracens spread
themselves over every quarter of the city. Slaughter, plunder, lust, and
violence, were uncontrolled. On the third day, when the Normans were
feasting and revelling in careless security, the inhabitants, driven to
despair, broke out in general insurrection, rushed armed into the streets,
and began a terrible carnage of their conquerors. Thus surprised, the
Normans flew to arms, and immediately the whole city was one scene of
wild and desperate conflict.

THE BURNING OF ANCIENT ROME

“The Norman horse,” says Milman, “poured into the streets, but
the Romans fought at advantage, from their possession of the
houses and their knowledge of the ground. They were gaining the
superiority: the Normans saw their peril. The remorseless
Gutscard gave the word to fire the houses. From every quarter the
flames burst forth furiously: houses, palaces, convents, churches,
as the night darkened, were seen in awful conflagration. The
distracted inhabitants dashed wildly into the streets, no longer
endeavoring to defend themselves, but to save their families. They
were hewn down by hundreds. The Saracen allies of the pope, who
had been the foremost in the pillage, were now the foremost in the
conflagration and the massacre.”10
Gregory, it is said, exerted himself at this terrible moment, yet not, alas! to
save his so-called flock from the cruelty of the Normans, but to save some
of the principal churches from the general conflagration. Gutscard was at
length master of the city, or rather of the ruins of Ancient Rome, but his
vengeance was not yet appeased. Thousands of Romans were publicly
sold as slaves, and thousands carried off as prisoners. It is supposed that
neither Goth nor Vandal, neither Greek nor German, ever brought such
desolation on the city as this capture by the Normans. And be it carefully
noted by the reader, as showing the real spirit of popery, that the
ferocious Gutscard was bribed by Gregory to become his ally, his
 479
deliverer, his protector, and his avenger. The miseries, massacres, and ruin
of Rome were justly attributed to the obstinacy of the pope at that time,
and have been ever since by all impartial writers. And no one was ever
more fully persuaded of this fact than Gregory himself. He never trusted
either his person or his fortunes even within the ramparts of St. Angelo
after the departure of his Norman allies.

THE DEATH OF GREGORY A.D. 1085

Covered with everlasting shame, branded with eternal infamy, and dreading
to hear the reproaches which must have been cast upon him as the author
of the late calamities, he retired from the city of St. Peter, in company
with his allies, while its ruins were still smoking, its streets lying desolate,
and its once numerous inhabitants slaughtered, burned, or carried into
captivity. Faint and broken-hearted, we doubt not — from pride awfully
mortified — he first rested at the monastery of Monte Casino, then
proceeded to the Normans’ strong castle of Salerno. He never saw Rome
again.
A numerous body of ecclesiastics, devoted to the promotion of the lofty
pretensions of the degraded pope, followed him to Salerno. There he held a
synod, and as if unmoved and unshaken by the horrors he had caused and
witnessed, he thundered out again anathemas and excommunications
against Henry, the anti-pope Clement, and all their adherents. But these
were his last thunderpeals. Death was approaching rapidly. The great, the
inflexible, asserter of the supremacy of the sacerdotal order must die like
other men. He called before him his fellow-exiles, made a confession of his
faith — especially as to the eucharist, having been suspected of
sympathising with Berengar’s views — forgave and absolved all whom he
had anathematised, with the exception of the Emperor and the anti-pope.
With these he charged his followers to make no peace unless on their entire
submission to the church.
A fearful tempest raged, it is said, as his friends hung over the dying pope.
His last memorable words were, “I have loved righteousness, and hated
iniquity; therefore I die in exile.” “In exile, my lord,” said a bishop of
congenial feelings, whose priestly pride was not rebuked by that spectacle
of mortality, “thou canst not die in exile! Vicar of Christ and His apostles,
 480
thou hast received from God the heathen for thine inheritance, and the
uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession!” The daring breath of
blasphemy thus closed, as it had surrounded, the life of the great
churchman. But his departed spirit was far away from the flattery of his
friends to be manifested before another tribunal. There all would be judged,
not according to the principles of popery, but according to the eternal
truth of God as it has been revealed unto us in the Person and work of the
Lord Jesus Christ.
“Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him” is a word of sweetest
assurance to the heart; for what must that word “blessed” mean, when
used by God Himself! But oh! what of those who live and die without
Christ! who will at last have to say, “The harvest is past, the summer is
ended, and we are not saved.” Oh! who can fathom the depths of misery
— the eternity of woe, in these two words, “not saved!” “not saved!”
What a text for a preacher! what a warning word for a sinner! May my
reader lay it to heart, before laying down this volume; and may he
carefully contrast the death of the great churchman with the death of the
great apostle.
“I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept
the faith: Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of
righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at
that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His
appearing.” (2 Timothy 4:7, 8.)
Even a false prophet was compelled to say, “Let me die the death of the
righteous, and let my last end be like his.”

THE REMAINING YEARS AND DEATH OF HENRY

Having seen so much of the king in connection with the pope, we will
briefly notice his end before commencing a fresh chapter.
He survived his great antagonist twenty-one years. On the 7th of August,
1106, Henry closed his long and agitated life, his eventful reign of fifty
years. History is full of every incident of that great monarch’s life from his
early boyhood till his death, but even an outline of his political life falls
not within our plan. The contrast between the affections of his people and
 481
the enmity of the church is remarkable, and tells its own tale. Branded
though he had been by the pope with the mark of the beast, he was greatly
loved by the people. He had many faults very common to kings, but he
had a large place in the hearts of his people. “At the news of his death,”
says Greenwood, “their love overflowed in deep and bitter lamentations.
A general cry was heard in the streets of the city of Liege; the court and
the people, the widows and the orphans, the multitude of the poor and
indigent of the city and country flocked to the obsequies of their
sovereign, their friend, their benefactor. With uplifted voices they bewailed
the loss of their father; dissolved in tears they kissed his cold hands, they
embraced the inanimate limbs, and could with difficulty be persuaded to
give place to the attendants in waiting to prepare the body for burial. Nor
could they be persuaded to quit the tomb; but for many days relieved each
other day and night to watch and pray beside the place where they had
laid him.”11
Nothing could be more beautiful or touching than the testimony of these
true mourners to the benevolence of the Emperor. But oh, how different,
how sad, how sorrowful, when we turn to the so-called church, the so-
called representatives of the meek and lowly Jesus! The wrath of his papal
adversaries seems to have been heated sevenfold when they heard of such
honors being paid to the body of the excommunicated Henry. The young
king, his son, Henry V., was threatened with the anathemas of heaven
unless he caused the accursed remains of his father to be exhumed and
deposited in some unconsecrated spot; or-inconceivable assumption and
wickedness!-let the pope be applied to for a post mortera absolution. His
faithful bishop Albert, who had given his sovereign decent burial in the
church of St. Lambert, was compelled, as a penance for this act of
gratitude and love, to disinter the body with his own hands, and have it
conveyed to an unconsecrated building in an island on the Moselle. But
these indignities thus heaped on the lifeless body of the late emperor
produced a reaction. The young king, though he had been trained by Pope
Pasehal II. to deceive his father and openly to rebel against him, became
alarmed at this spiritual terrorism, gave orders for the body to be removed
to Spires, and solemnly deposited in the tomb of his ancestors. The
procession was followed by nearly the whole population. The service for
 482
the dead was performed with every ceremony and honor usual on such
occasions.
Bishop Gibbard, one of the fiercest of the late Emperor’s persecutors,
happened to be from home at this moment, but the news of what had
taken place brought him back in all haste. Boiling over with indignation, he
caused the body to be once more exhumed, placed in unconsecrated
ground, and imposed a penance on all who had attended the procession.
But the voice of affection could not be silenced by the relentlessness of the
bishop. The citizens in a body attended the corpse to its new resting-place
with loud lamentations. “They reminded the bishop,” says Milman, “how
the munificent Emperor had enriched the church of Spires; they recounted
the ornaments of gold and silver and precious stones, the silken vestments,
the works of art, the golden altar-table, richly wrought, a present of the
eastern Emperor Alexius, which had made their cathedral the most
gorgeous and famous in Germany. They loudly expressed their grief and
dissatisfaction, and were hardly restrained from tumult. But they prevailed
not. Yet the bier of Henry was still visited by unbought and unfeigned
witnesses to his boundless charities. At length, after five years of
obstinate contention, Henry, was permitted to repose in the consecrated
vault with his imperial ancestors.”12

REFLECTIONS ON THE STRUGGLE

BETWEEN HENRY AND GREGORY
We have thus given a more detailed account than usual of the struggle
between Gregory and Henry, in order that the reader may have before him
a fair specimen of the spirit and doings of popery in the middle ages. And
be it known, its spirit never changes: its doings may, according to the
power and opportunities of the reigning pope. As it was, so it is, and
evermore will be the same. No language can exaggerate the blasphemy,
cruelty, and tyranny of the papacy; and the same spirit pervades, more or
less, every member of her community. For what, it may be asked, in plain
terms, was the crime of Henry which brought upon him such unrelenting
persecution during his life and after his death? The reader will remember
that the dispute arose about investitures.
 483
The traditional right of monarchs to have a voice in the appointment of the
bishops and church dignitaries in their states had been recognized for
centuries. They not unfrequently nominated to the See of Rome, as to the
other bishoprics in their dominions. Even Hildebrand himself waited
patiently till his own election received the legal ratification of the Emperor.
But scarcely had he been raised to the pontifical chair, when he wrote an
insulting letter to the Emperor, commanding him to abstain from simony,
and to renounce the right of investiture by the ring and staff. Henry, in
self-defense, asserted the prerogatives which his predecessors had
exercised without question, especially since the days of Charlemagne.
Gregory then thundered a sentence of excommunication against him,
released his subjects from their oath of fealty, and pronounced him
deposed for disobedience. Popery now threw off its mask, and the world
was no longer in doubt of the aims and objects of the spiritual power. But
so great was the ignorance of the period that the wildest pretensions found
many supporters, and so superstitious were the people, that they were
made to believe that all who took up arms against the excommunicated
king, were to be regarded as the champions of the faith.
This was the head and front of Henry’s offense against the papacy. This
was the cause of so much human bloodshed and suffering: the inexorable
priest would not yield a point, the Emperor fought for his traditional
rights, and thus the great struggle continued until death closed the scene.
 484

CHAPTER 20
THE CRUSADES

The enemy now changes his tactics. The pope had gained little or nothing
by his long wars with the empire, and the common sense of mankind had
been insulted by his unexampled insolence. Means more plausible, more
deceiving, more pious, must be devised. How can the spiritual power gain
complete ascendancy over the temporal? was still the one question to be
solved.
The evil genius of Rome presiding in her councils suggests a holy war for
the purpose of rescuing the sepulcher of Christ from the hands of the
unbelieving Turks. Pope Urban immediately embraced the suggestion, and
became its champion. The whole Vatican agreed. It was perfectly evident
that by these long expeditions to Palestine, the blood of Europe must be
drained, its strength exhausted, and its treasure wasted. There was no
thought of seeking to convert the unbelieving to the faith of Christ — the
true mission of Christianity — but of weakening the power of the
temporal monarchs, that the pontiffs might reign over them. The papacy is
essentially infidel. “Marriage is honorable in all” — in all, says the word
of God. No, said Gregory, it is concubinage in the priesthood — a soul-
damning sin. But the word of God stands unchanged and unchangeable.
Marriage is honorable in all — not in some only, but in all; and mark,
honorable, in all. It was instituted by God Himself who “brought the
woman to the man,” sanctioned by Christ, and proclaimed “honorable in
all,” by the Holy Spirit. “Preach the gospel to every creature” is the
Savior’s commission to all who own Him as Savior and Lord. No, says
Urban, slaughter the unbelievers without mercy. This is the work which
God requires at your hand. Let the tares be torn up by the roots, and cast
into the fire that they may be burned up. But this was not all. The power
of the nations must be reduced that the pontiff may triumph over them.
Results will soon show that such were the counsels of the evil genius of
popery.
 485
THE SACRED PLACES
From an early period pilgrimages to the Holy Land became a ruling
passion with the more devout and superstitious. Jerome speaks of the
crowds which from all quarters thronged the sacred places. But the
supposed discovery of the real sepulcher, the disinterment of the true
cross, the magnificent church built over the sepulcher by the devout
Helena and her son Constantine, awakened in all classes a wild enthusiasm
to visit the Holy Land. From this time (A .D . 326), the stream of pilgrimage
continued to flow, and with increasing fullness, down to the period when
Jerusalem was captured by the Mahometans, under the Caliph Omar, in
637. The pilgrims had been protected and cared for by the way; they had
only to encounter the privations and perils of a long journey. But under
the Mahometan government they were prevented from entering the holy
city, unless they purchased the privilege by paying tribute to the Caliphs.
This being agreed to, the pious soon began to flock in undiminished
numbers to perform their devotions at the holy sepulcher.
About the year 1067, a new race of conquerors gained possession of
Palestine, who proved to be harder masters than the Saracens. These were
the Seljukians, a tribe of Tartars, now familiarly known as the Turks.
They came originally from Tartary. They had embraced the Mahometan
religion, and were more fanatic Islamires than the Arabian followers of the
‘prophet.’ But with the intolerant zeal of recent converts to Islam they
combined the tyranny and inhumanity of barbarians. Under these new
lords of Palestine, the condition of the christian inhabitants and the
pilgrims was greatly altered for the worse. In place of being treated as
merely tributary subjects, they were despised as slaves, and the pilgrims
exposed to severe persecutions.

PETER THE HERMIT

The feelings of European Christians were naturally excited by the reports
of the cruelties and outrages to which their brethren in the East were
subjected by the infidel possessors of the Holy Land; and this gave an
appearance of justice to the idea of a religious war.
In the year 1093, Peter, a native of Amiens, as a pilgrim monk, visited
Jerusalem. His spirit was greatly stirred by the sight of the indignities
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which the Christians had to endure. The blood of the martial Frank became
as fire when he saw the sufferings and degradations of his brethren. He
spoke to Simeon, the patriarch of Jerusalem, on the subject of their
deliverance; but the desponding Simeon deplored the hopelessness of their
condition, as the Greeks, the natural protectors of Christians in Syria,
were too weak to render them any assistance. Peter then promised him the
help of the Latins. “I will raise the martial nations of Europe in your
cause,” he exclaimed, and he believed his vow was ratified in heaven. When
prostrate in the temple, he heard the voice of the Lord Jesus, saying to
him, “Rise, Peter, go forth to make known the tribulations of my people;
the hour is come for the delivering of my servants, for the recovery of the
holy places.” It was a convenient habit in those days, for monks in austere
solitude with an excited imagination, to believe whatever they wished, and
then to have confirmed by dreams and revelations whatever they believed.
Peter now believed in his own mission, and this was a great means of
others believing it. He hastened to Rome. The pope, Urban II., was
infected by his fervor, and gave full sanction to his preaching the
immediate deliverance of Jerusalem. The hermit having now the sanction of
both heaven and the pope, he set forth on his mission. After traversing
Italy, he crossed the Alps and entered France. He is described as short of
stature, lean, dark complexion, but with an eye of fire. He rode on a mule
with a crucifix in his hand, his head was bare, and his feet naked; his dress
was a long robe girt with a rope, and a hermit’s cloak of the coarsest
material. He preached to high and low; in churches, and on highways, and
in the market places. His rude glowing eloquence was that which stirs the
heart of the people, for it came from his own. He appealed to every
passion; to indignation and pity, the pride of the warrior, the compassion
of the Christian, the love of the brethren, the hatred of the infidel; to the
foul desecration of the land which had been hallowed by the Redeemer’s
birth and life. “Why,” he vehemently exclaimed, “should the unbelievers
be allowed any longer to retain the custody of such christian territories as
the Mount of Olives and the Garden of Gethsemane? Why should the
unbaptized followers of Mahomet, those children of perdition, pollute
with hostile feet the sacred ground which had been the witness of so many
miracles, and still furnished so many relics which manifested superhuman
power? Bones of martyrs, garments of saints, nails of the cross, thorns of
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the crown, were all lying ready to be gathered up by the faithful
priesthood who would lead the expedition. Let the floors of Zion be
purified with the blood of slaughtered infidels.”1
When words and breath failed him, he wept, he groaned, he beat his breast,
and held up a crucifix, as if Christ Himself were imploring them to join the
army of God. The ravings of his frenzy had a prodigious effect on all
classes and in all lands. Men, women, children, crowded to touch his
garments; even the hairs which dropped from his mule were gathered up
and treasured as relics. In a short time he returned to the pope, assuring
him that everywhere his appeals had been received with enthusiasm, so
that he had with difficulty restrained his hearers from at once taking arms
and following him to the Holy Land. Nothing was now wanted but a plan,
leaders, organization; and the pope boldly resolved to undertake this great
work.

POPE URBAN AND THE CRUSADES

In March 1095, a council was summoned to meet Urban at Placentia, to
consult about the holy war and other important matters. Two hundred
bishops, four thousand clergy, and thirty thousand laity appeared; and, as
no building was large enough to contain the vast multitude, the greater
sessions were held in a plain near the city. Besides the project of the holy
war, the pope embraced the favorable opportunity to confirm the laws and
assert the principles of Gregory. And while at Placentia the final sanction
was given to the two strongest characteristics in the doctrines and in the
discipline of the Roman church — namely, transubstantiation and the
celibacy of the clergy.2
In November of the same year, another council was summoned to meet the
pope at Clermont in Auvergne. The citations to this council were urgent,
and the clergy were charged to stir up the laity in the cause of the crusade.
A vast assemblage of archbishops, bishops, abbots, etc., were drawn
together; the towns and neighboring villages were filled with strangers,
while numbers were obliged to lodge in tents. The session lasted ten days;
the usual canons being passed in condemnation of simony, etc., Urban
ventured to advance a step beyond Gregory, by forbidding not only the
practice of lay investiture, but that any ecclesiastic should swear fealty to
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a temporal lord — a prohibition which was intended entirely to do away
with all dependence of the church on the secular power. Thus we see the
crafty pope taking every advantage of his extreme popularity, and when
the minds of all were engrossed with the greater subject of the holy
crusade. No moment could be more favorable for the advancement of the
great papal object of ambition, the acknowledged supremacy over Latin
Christendom; or for the elevation of Urban himself over the rival Pope
Clement, and the temporal sovereigns who supported him.
At the sixth session the crusade was proposed. Urban ascended a high
pulpit in the market-place, and addressed the assembled multitudes. His
speech was long and exciting. He dwelt on the ancient glories of Palestine,
where every foot of ground had been hallowed by the presence of the
Savior, of His Virgin Mother, and other saints. He enlarged on the present
condition of the sacred territory — possessed as it was by a godless
people, the children of the Egyptian handmaid; on the indignities, the
outrages, the tyranny, which they inflicted on Christians redeemed by
Christ’s blood. Nor did he forget to speak of the progressive
encroachments of the Turks on Christendom. “Cast out the bondwoman
and her son,” he cried. “Let all the faithful arm. Go forth, and God shall be
with you. Redeem your sins — your rapine, your burnings, your
bloodshed — by obedience. Let the famous nation of the Franks display
their valor in a cause where death is the assurance of blessedness. Count it
joy to die for Christ where Christ died for you. Think not of kindred or
home; you owe to God a higher love; for a Christian every place is exile,
every place is home and country.” There was no passion which the self-
seeking pope left unstirred. But his real design and one grand object was to
dispose of unruly barons and obstinate monarchs by engaging them in a
distant and ruinous expedition; and, in their absence, gather up into his
own hand all the threads of this great movement and consolidate the lofty
schemes of his predecessor and teacher, Hildebrand.
In conclusion, the blasphemous pope offered absolution for all sins — the
sins of murder, adultery, robbery, arson — and that without penance to all
who would take up arms in this sacred cause. He promised eternal life to
all who should suffer the glorious calamity of death in the Holy Land, or
even on the way to it. The Crusader passed at once into paradise. The
great battle of the Cross and the Crescent was to be decided for ever on the
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soil of the Holy Land. For himself, he said, he must remain at home: the
care of the church detained him. Should circumstances permit, he would
follow; but, like Moses, while they were slaughtering the Amalekites, he
would be perpetually engaged in fervent and prevailing prayer for their
success.3
The pope’s speech was here interrupted by an enthusiastic exclamation
from the whole assemblage, “God wills it — God wills it!” words which
afterwards became the war cry of the Crusaders; and the whole assembly
declared itself the army of God. The contagious frenzy spread with a
rapidity inconceivable. “Never, perhaps,” says one, “did a single speech of
man ever work such extraordinary and lasting results as that of Urban II. at
the Council of Clermont.” “It was the first blast of fanaticism,” says
another, “which shook the whole fabric of society from the extremities of
the West even to the heart of Asia, for above two centuries.”
Having now stated as clearly and as concisely as possible the ostensible
causes of the Crusades, or rather the motives of the papacy, we need do
little more than give the dates and a few particulars of each expedition.

THE FIRST CRUSADE A.D. 1096

1. The festival of the Assumption, August 15th 1096, was fixed as the
day on which the Crusaders should commence their march. Women urged
their husbands, their brothers, and their sons to take the cross; and those
who refused became marks for general contempt. Property of all kinds was
sold to raise money; but as all wanted to sell and none to buy, it naturally
fell to an exceedingly low price, and was bought up chiefly by the clergy;
so that nearly the whole property of the country passed into their hands.
Godfrey pledged his castle of Bouillon, in the Ardennes, to the bishop of
Liege. The artisan sold his tools, the husbandman his implements, to raise
the means of equipment. The fabulous splendor and wealth of the East
were set before the imagination, already stimulated by the romantic
legends of Charlemagne and his peers. Besides the religious enthusiasm
which now animated all ranks, a variety of other motives was at work. For
the peasant there was now opportunity to quit his depressed life, to bear
arms, and forsake the service of his feudal lord. For the robber, the pirate,
the outlaw, there was pardon and restoration to society; for the debtor
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there was escape from his obligations; and for all who took up the cross
there was the assurance that death in the holy war would make them
partakers in the glory and bliss of the martyrs. And so great was the
excitement produced by this papal epidemic, that long before the time
appointed for the commencement of the expedition, the impatience of the
multitude was unable to restrain itself.
Early in the spring of 1096, Peter, the first missionary of the crusade, set
out on his march for the East at the head of a wild and motley host. About
sixty thousand of the populace from the confines of France and Lorraine
flocked around the hermit, and pressed him to lead them to the holy
sepulcher. He now assumed the character, without the abilities, of a
general, and marched along the Rhine and Danube. Walter the Penniless,
a poor but valiant soldier, followed with about fifteen thousand. A monk
named Gottschalk pursued closely after Peter and Walter with about
twenty thousand from the villages of Germany. A fourth swarm of about
two hundred thousand of the refuse of the people, conducted by a Count
Eraecho, pressed upon their rear. These successive crowds now numbered
fully three hundred thousand warriors of the cross, so-called. But it was
soon manifest that another spirit animated them. Not one of them knew
the cross, save as an outward idolatrous emblem. Old and infirm, women
and children, and the lowest dregs of the idle populace, followed the camp
of the Crusaders!
Nothing could be more melancholy and disastrous than the conduct and
fate of these deluded swarms. Their wants and numbers soon compelled
them to separate. They were without order or discipline, and most of them
unprovided with either armor or money. They had no idea of the distance
of Jerusalem, or of the difficulties to be encountered by the way. So
ignorant were they, that, at the sight of the first city beyond the limits of
their knowledge, they were ready to inquire if this was Jerusalem. In place
of sobriety and order in their march, it was marked by murder, plunder,
dissoluteness, and infamous habits of every kind. The unoffending Jewish
inhabitants of the towns on the Moselle, the Rhine, the Maine, and the
Danube, through which they marched, were plundered and slaughtered as
the murderers of Christ and the enemies of the cross. The population of
Hungary and Bulgaria rose up against them because of their disorderly and
plundering habits, and immense numbers of them were slain.
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After repeated disasters and foolish adventures they reached
Constantinople; but Alexius, the Greek Emperor, more alarmed than
gratified with his allies, had them speedily, if not treacherously, conveyed
across the Bosphorus. A great battle was fought soon after, under the
walls of Nicaea — the Turkish capital. The army of the Hermit was cut to
pieces by Solyman, the Turkish Sultan of Iconturn. Walter the Penniless
was slain, with most of his followers; their bones were gathered into a vast
heap to warn their companions of the hopelessness of their enterprise. It
is reckoned that in these ill-conducted expeditions three hundred thousand
had already perished; some extend the number to half a million. Of those
who had started under the guidance of Peter and his lieutenants, not more
than 20,000 survived; and these endeavored to find their way back to their
home, but only to tell the sad fate of their companions who had died by
the arrows of the Turks and Hungarians, or by want and fatigue. Hardly
one of Peter’s army ever reached the borders of the Holy Land. Pope
Urban lived to hear of the distresses and miseries of his own evil work, but
died before the capture of Jerusalem.

THE SECOND DIVISION OF THE FIRST CRUSADE

In the meantime, while the poor, naked, deluded, plebeian multitude had
been cut down, the aristocracy of the West had assumed the cross,
encouraged each other, and were preparing to depart on the same holy
mission. Of the chiefs it will be necessary to say a little, that we may have
some idea how thoroughly the epidemic had affected all classes.
The most eminent was Godfrey of Bouillon, a descendant of Charles the
Great. The first rank is assigned to him both in war and in counsel. He had
accompanied William of Normandy, in his invasion of England; again, in
the service of Henry the Fourth, he has the reputation of giving Rudolph
his death-wound, which ended the civil war; and he was the first of
Henry’s army to mount the walls of Rome. He is represented by the
chroniclers as remarkable for the depth of his piety and the mildness of his
character in ordinary life; but wise in counsel, and bold as a lion in the
battlefield. He was accompanied by his two brothers, Eustace and
Baldwin; Hugh, brother of the King of France; the Counts Raymond of
Toulouse, Robert of Flanders, and Stephen of Blots; and Robert Duke of
Normandy, son of William the Conqueror. But so great and so general was
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the excitement, that nearly all the gallant chiefs of Europe were inspired
with knightly courage and national rivalries, to distinguish themselves in
this holy war.
Six hundred thousand men are supposed to have left their homes at this
time, with innumerable attendants, women and servants, and workmen of
all kinds. The difficulty of procuring subsistence for so many, led them to
separate their forces and proceed to Constantinople by different routes. It
was agreed that they should all meet there, and from thence begin their
operations against the Turks. After a long and painful march, in which
thousands perished, the survivors reached the Eastern capital. Alexius,
though he would have been thankful for a moderate force from the West,
to assist him against the Turks, who were dangerously near him, was
astonished and alarmed at the approach of so many powerful chiefs and
large armies. The peace of his borders had been disturbed by the thefts and
unruliness of the promiscuous multitudes under Peter the Hermit; but he
dreaded more serious consequences from the arrival of such formidable
troops under Godfrey. Learning from one company that another would
soon follow, he had them artfully decoyed across the Bosphorus, so that
they might not be united in the neighborhood of his capital. By this means,
though not without threatened hostilities, the Crusaders had all passed
into Asia before the feast of Pentecost.

THE SIEGE OF NICAEA

The zeal and the indignation of the pilgrims were greatly excited when
they saw the pyramid of bones which marked the place where Walter and
his companions had fallen. Nicaea was besieged, and yielded in about five
weeks; but they were greatly disappointed of their expected plunder.
When the Turks found that their position was no longer tenable, they
secretly agreed to surrender the city to Alexius. The imperial banner was
planted on the citadel, and the important conquest was guarded with
jealous vigilance by the perfidious Greeks. The murmurs of the chiefs were
unavailing, and after a few days’ rest, they directed their march towards
Phrygia.
The great battle of Dorylium was fought about a fortnight after the siege
of Nice. Solyman rallied his Turkish hordes and pursued after what he
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called the western barbarians. He surprised and attacked them before they
reached Dorylium. His cavalry is stated by the Christians to have
numbered three hundred thousand. So fearful was the onset and so thick
the poisoned arrows, that the Crusaders were overwhelmed. They were
thrown into such confusion, that but for the personal valor and military
conduct of Bohemond, Tancred, Robert of Normandy, and the timely help
of Godfrey and Raymond, the whole army might have perished. At length
the long contest was decided in favor of the Crusaders, and the camp of
Solyman fell into their hands. Superstition affirmed that the victory was
gained by heavenly champions, who descended to aid the Christians.
In a march of five hundred miles through Asia Minor, the army suffered
severely. Hunger, thirst, the extremity of heat, the scarcity of food, the
difficulty of the march, greatly thinned their ranks. Thirst was fatal to
hundreds in a single day. Nearly all the horses died. And, to add to their
confusion and dismay, disunion appeared among the leaders, even to open
feud. But in spite of every difficulty, the great mass of the Crusaders, who
survived these calamities, held on their way to Jerusalem. Baldwin, the
brother of Godfrey, succeeded in getting possession of the town of
Edessa, and founded the first principality of the Latins beyond the
Euphrates.

THE SIEGE OF ANTIOCH

On the 18th of October, 1097, the “warriors of the cross” laid siege to
Antioch, where the disciples were first called Christians, and which soon
afterwards became the center of the great apostle’s missionary labors. But
how changed the spirit, object, and ways, of his so-called successor — of
him who assumed the blasphemous title of the vicar of Christ; but at
whose door the guilt and bloodshed of this, the greatest of all popular
delusions, for ever rests. Jezebel may still reign both in Church and State,
and friends as well as foes must be sacrificed to gain her ends and gratify
her ambition. But the day is fast hastening on when requisition shall be
made for blood, and judgment adjusted according to the motives as well as
the actions in guilt. The testimony, thanks be to God, that went out from
Antioch in the first century, is as plain and true now as it was then, and of
equal authority over the heart and conscience, notwithstanding the ten
thousand corrupt streams which professedly flow from thesame fountain.
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It is with the apostles’ doctrine, not the tradition of the Fathers that we
have to do. In all ages the Christian’s creed should be, the person of Christ
for the heart, the work of Christ for the conscience, and the word of God
for the path.
The siege of Antioch lasted eight months. The miseries endured during
that period were frightful. For a time the luxuries of the soil and climate
were enjoyed, even to excess, but the winter set in and their enjoyment
was at an end. The heavy rains flooded their camp, and the winds
demolished their tents. Famine and pestilence with their many
consequences prevailed. The flesh of horses, dogs, and even of their
slaughtered enemies was greedily devoured. At the beginning of the siege,
their horses numbered seventy thousand, at the end they only numbered
two thousand, and scarcely two hundred fit for service. At length
however, help came, or they must have perished to the last man. Through
the treachery of a Syrian officer in the city, who had the favor of the emir,
and who commanded three towers, a gate was opened. The army rushed
into the devoted city, shouting the Crusaders’ war-cry, “God wills it!” and
Antioch was once more in the hands of the Christians. But the victory was
not complete. The citadel refused to surrender, and soon after this
apparent victory, an overwhelming force of Turks appeared, under
Kerboga, Prince of Mosul. For five-and-twenty days the Crusaders were
again on the verge of complete destruction between Kerboga and the
garrison of the fortress.
When the hearts of all began to sink, and a general indifference to life
prevailed, a cunning monk of the name of Bartholomew, presented
himself at the door of the council chamber, and declared it had been
revealed to him from heaven in a dream, that under the great altar of the
church of St. Peter would be found the spear which pierced the Savior on
the cross. The ground was opened, but after digging to the depth of twelve
feet, they had not found the object of their search. In the evening, bare-
footed and in the penitent’s dress, Bartholomew himself descended into
the pit; he soon came upon the head of a lance. The ring of steel was heard,
it was the sacred weapon. At the first gleam of the holy spear the
desponding Crusaders passed from despair to enthusiasm. A martial psalm
was chanted by the priests and monks, “Let God arise, and let his enemies
be scattered.” The gates of Antioch were thrown open, and the now
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fanatical warriors rushed forth, the holy spear being carried by the legate’s
chaplain. The charge was irresistible; the Saracens fled before the
unexpected attack, leaving behind them an immense mass of spoil.
Bohemond was proclaimed Prince of Antioch, under conditions that he
would accompany them to Jerusalem.

THE SIEGE OF JERUSALEM A.D. 1099

In place of marching at once to Jerusalem, when so cheered and
strengthened by victory, and their enemies over-awed, they idly spent
their time, enjoying the luxuries of Syria, for nearly ten months, and, when
marching orders were given the following May, only a very small part of
the once mighty host remained. Three hundred thousand, it is supposed,
reached Antioch; but famine, disease, and the sword, had reduced their
force to little more than forty thousand. The relics of the army moved off
in the month of May. As they drew nearer the object of their long and
perilous journey, and recognized the sacred places, such as Tyre, Sidon,
Caesarea, Lydda, Emmaus, and Bethlehem, their enthusiasm knew no
bounds. But when an elevation was reached which gave them a full view of
the holy city, a cry of, “Jerusalem! Jerusalem! God wills it! God wills it!”
burst forth. All threw themselves on their knees, and kissed the sacred
ground. The scenes of gospel history filled their minds with enraptured
delight. But Jerusalem was yet in the hands of the infidels, and they were
unprovided with the necessary engines of assault.
The siege lasted forty days, but they were forty days of great suffering to
the besiegers; especially from the fierce thirst produced by the midsummer
sun of that parched country. The brook Kedron was dried up; the cisterns
had been destroyed or poisoned; their provisions were exhausted; indeed,
so great was their distress, they were on the point of yielding to despair.
But, as on former occasions, relief was at hand. Superstition came to the
rescue. Godfrey saw on the Mount of Olives a heavenly warrior waving
his bright shield as a signal for another assault. With renewed military
ardor they attacked the unbelievers, and, after a fierce struggle, they
became masters of the holy city. Historians agree in saying, that on the
15th of July, A .D . 1099, being a Friday, at three o’clock in the afternoon,
the day and hour of the Savior’s passion, Godfrey of Bouillon stood
victorious on the walls of Jerusalem. He leaped into the devoted city,
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accompanied by Tancred, and followed by the soldiers, who filled every
street with slaughter.
“The crusaders,” says Robertson, “inflamed to madness by the
thought of the wrongs inflicted on their brethren and by the
obstinate resistance of the besieged, spared neither old man,
woman, or child. Seventy thousand Mahometans were massacred;
many who had received a promise of life from the leaders were
slaughtered by the soldiery. The temple and Solomon’s porch were
filled with blood to the height of a horse’s knee; and, in the general
rage against the enemies of Christ, the Jews were burnt in their
synagogue. Godfrey took no part in these atrocities, but
immediately after the victory repaired, in the dress of a pilgrim, to
the church of the holy sepulcher, to pour out his thanks for having
been permitted to reach the holy city. Many followed his example,
relinquishing their savage work for tears of penitence and joy, and
offering at the altar the spoil which they had seized; but, by a
revulsion of feelings natural to a state of high excitement, they soon
returned to their savage work, and for three days Jerusalem ran
with blood.”4

JERUSALEM IN THE HANDS OF THE CHRISTIANS

Jerusalem, which had been under the Mahometan yoke since the
conquest of Omar in 637, was again in the hands of the Christians; and
eight days after this memorable event the victorious chiefs proceeded to
the election of a king. By the free and unanimous voice of the army,
Godfrey of Bouillon was proclaimed the most worthy champion of
Christendom and king of Jerusalem. But the humble and pious pilgrim,
while he accepted the place of responsibility, refused the name and ensigns
of royalty. How could he be called king and wear a crown of gold, when
the King of kings, his Savior and Lord, had worn a crown of thorns? He
contented himself with the humbler title of Defender and Baron of the
Holy Sepulcher.
Scarcely had Godfrey been seated on his throne, when he was again
summoned to the field. A large force of Saracens from Egypt were
hastening to avenge the loss of Jerusalem. But again the Crusaders were
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victorious in what is called the Battle of Askelon. Their position in the
Holy Land being now considered secure, most of the army prepared to
return to Europe. After ascending the hill of Calvary, amidst the loud
anthems of the clergy, bedewing with their tears the holy ground, bathing
in the Jordan, carrying with them palm-branches from Jericho, and relics
innumerable, they bent their way homewards. Among those who returned
was Peter the Hermit, who spent the remainder of his days in a monastery
of his own founding, at Huy, near Liege, until his death in 1115.
Three hundred knights and two thousand foot-soldiers were all that
Godfrey retained for the defense of Palestine. But the infant kingdom was
soon to be assailed by a new enemy, and one with whom we are too well
acquainted — a voracious priest of Rome. In the name of the pope, he was
installed Patriarch of Jerusalem, and claimed such revenues and property
for the Church that the State was left poor indeed. The pious Godfrey
submitted; both he and Bohemond received investiture from the priest, and
thus the scepter of Jerusalem fell into his hands, or rather was seized by
the ambitious pope. Wearied with all his labors, and feeling that his great
work was now done, Godfrey was little disposed to fight against the
priest, and so allowed him to usurp and place of jurisdiction, both in
spiritual and temporal matters. The Greek Christians were persecuted by
the Latins as schismatics; and, of course, the breach was widened between
the East and the West.
After establishing the French language, and laying the foundation of a code
of laws, afterwards famous under the name of the “Assizes of Jerusalem,”
and holding his dignity for little more than a year, the brave and victorious
Godfrey — the true hero of the crusade — died August 17th, A .D . 1100.

THE SECOND CRUSADE A.D. 1147

Having thus given a somewhat minute and detailed account of the first
crusade, we need do little more than give the dates, with a few particulars,
of the following seven. The same unreasonable, and unscriptural, but
exciting causes, and the same disastrous results, are apparent in each of the
expeditions. They have been styled as so many faint and unsuccessful
copies of the original.
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The immediate descendants of the first Crusaders are described as giving
way to a life of Syrian ease and luxury, and so becoming utterly depraved
and effeminate. But, on the other hand, the Mahometans, having recovered
from their sudden terror and consternation, collected large forces, and
harassed the Christians with perpetual wars. In 1144 Zenghis, prince of
Mosul, made himself master of Edessa. The inhabitants were slaughtered,
the city plundered, and utterly destroyed. The exultation of the
Mahometans was boundless; they threatened Antioch, and the courage of
the Christians began to sink. With tears they now implored the help of the
christian kings and the armies of Europe. The enemies of the cross are
advancing, they cried; thousands of Christians have been massacred, and
not one will be left alive in the Holy Land unless help come speedily.
The Roman Pontiff, Eugene III., favored these petitions, and resolved to
stir up a new crusade. The kings, princes, and people of Europe were
summoned by the pope’s letters to the holy war; but the preaching of the
crusade over these countries he wisely delegated to the celebrated St.
Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux. He was a man of immense influence, of
saintly character, and of great reputation for working miracles. In the most
glowing eloquence he pictured the sufferings of the Eastern Christians, the
profanation of the holy places by the infidels, and the certain success of
the armies of the Lord. Louis VII. of France, his queen, and a vast number
of his nobles, took the vow, and devoted themselves to the holy war.
Conrad III., Emperor of Germany, after resisting for a time the appeals of
St. Bernard, at length declared himself ready to obey the call to God’s
service. Many of the chiefs of Germany followed the Emperor’s example
in taking up the cross — as the phrase then was — but it was a cross
without either truth or grace, the fearful delusion of Satan, and the wicked
prostitution of that sacred symbol to the blinding and ruin of millions.
No sooner had these monarchs taken the vow than preparations for the
expedition were urged on. Troops and supplies of every kind were
collected; and in 1147 their mighty armies, composed chiefly of French,
Germans, and Italians, and numbering over nine hundred thousand, moved
forward in two columns towards Palestine. Proceeding, as they thought,
and as Bernard had assured them, under the sanction of heaven, they
expected the final blow would now be given to the power of the
Mahometans, that the kingdom of Jerusalem would be firmly established,
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and that peace would be secured to the Latin Christians. In some respects
the second crusade differed from the first. That was the result of popular
enthusiasm; this was a great European movement, headed by two
sovereigns, followed by their nobles, and supported by the wealth and
influence of nations; but they were equally unsuccessful with the army of
Peter the Hermit. They were cruelly betrayed by the treacherous Greeks,
who were more afraid of the Crusaders than they were of the
Mahometans. The approach of a hundred and forty thousand heavy-armed
knights, with their immediate attendants, in the field, besides the light-
armed troops, infantry, priests and monks, women and children — in all
numbering nearly a million — so alarmed the effeminate Greeks, that the
Emperor sent envoys, requiring them to swear that they had no design
against the empire. But their terror took the form of hostility, and, as the
Crusaders entered the imperial territow, difficulties thickened on every
side.
The history of the second crusade in the Holy Land is more pitiful,
shameful, and disastrous than the first. In 1149 Conrad and Louis led back
to Europe the few soldiers that survived. What had become of all the rest?
Their bones were whitening all the roads and deserts over which they had
passed. A million had perished in less than two years. Loud murmurs were
heard against Bernard, as the priest by whose preaching, prophecies, and
miracles, it had been chiefly promoted. But the crafty abbot convinced the
people that he had been quite right in all he said, and that the failure of the
expedition was a fit chastisement for the sins of the Crusaders. Thus we
see that the only effect of the second crusade was to drain Europe of a
great portion of its wealth, and of the flower of its armies, without
bettering the condition of Christians in the East.

THE THIRD CRUSADE A.D. 1189

In the year 1187 the far-famed Saladin, Sultan of Egypt, invaded the
Holy Land at the head of a large army. His avowed object was to retake
Jerusalem from the Christians. Having gained a great victory at Tiberias, he
pushed forward his army to the walls of the Holy City, besieged it, and
took its monarch prisoner. It was surrendered to Saladin on the 3rd of
October. The cross was thrown down, relics were dispersed, the sacred
places profaned, and the Mahometan worship restored. Yet the conduct of
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Saladin, though a conqueror and a Mahometan, was wholly free from that
revengeful spirit which stained the character of the Franks under Godfrey.
He spared the holy sepulcher, and allowed Christians to visit it for a
certain payment. His generosity to the captives is celebrated by all
writers. Thousands were set free without a ransom, and numbers received
a passage to Europe at his own expense. Christians were allowed to remain
in their homes on condition of paying tribute.
The news of these fresh calamities, and especially of the conquest of
Jerusalem, excited the greatest indignation and alarm throughout all
Christendom. Again the cry for help was heard from the Christians in the
East to their brethren in the West. But at first they were dull of hearing.
Only forty years had elapsed since the last expedition, and Europe had
scarcely forgotten her misfortunes, or recovered from her exhaustion. But
the cause was vigorously taken up by the pope, Clement III. The cardinals
bound themselves never to mount on horseback “so long as the land
whereon the foot of the Lord had stood should be under the feet of the
enemy,” and to preach the crusade as mendicants. The interest increased,
though men at first hesitated to commit themselves to the enterprise. But
the priest persevered, and the three greatest princes in Europe were
influenced to receive the cross from the hands of the bishop; their subjects
were taxed, under the name of “Saladin’s Tithe,” to defray the expenses of
the war.
In the spring of 1189 the third crusade was commenced by Frederick I. of
Germany, surnamed Barbarossa; Philip Augustus of France; and Richard
I. of England, surnamed Coeur de Lion, or the lion-hearted prince.
Barbarossa, now sixty-seven years of age, with his large army, traversed
the provinces of Hungary, Bulgaria, and Greece, as the former pilgrims had
done, and were again molested by the first two, and betrayed by the last.
Eighty-three thousand Germans crossed the Hellespont, and for a few
days their march through Asia Minor was prosperous; but the guides and
interpreters who were furnished by the Greeks had been bribed to deceive
them, and after luring them into the desert, they disappeared. No markets
could be found, horses died for want of food, and their flesh was greedily
devoured by the soldiers. Still he was able to maintain discipline; and,
though with greatly reduced numbers, he boldly attacked and defeated the
Turks with great slaughter, while his son assaulted the city of Iconturn and
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compelled the Sultan to surrender it. The army, refreshed with the
provisions of Iconturn, pressed onwards in the hope of speedily reaching
the object of their expedition; but their great leader died the following year
near Tarsus, and, Frederick the younger dying soon after, many of the
survivors abandoned the crusade and returned to Europe. Sixty-eight
thousand of the German army had perished in less than two years.
The English and the French armies reached Palestine by sea in the year
1190, and fought under the same banner. But after the reduction of Acre,
Philip returned to Europe, leaving Richard to carry on the war. The valor
of the “lion-hearted” king has been so fully celebrated, both in English and
Mahometan history, that, we need only add, he defeated Saladin at
Askelon and, having concluded a peace securing certain privileges to the
pilgrims in Jerusalem and along the sea-coast, he returned to England in
1194, though not without great difficulty and expense. Saladin died in
1195, while Richard was on his way home. It is reckoned that, in the
expedition thus ended, more than half a million of professedly christian
warriors perished. In the siege of Acre alone, one hundred and twenty
thousand Christians, and one hundred and eighty thousand Mahometans,
perished. Such were the alleged holy wars of the hell-inspired councils of
Rome.

THE REMAINDER OF THE CRUSADES A.D. 1195-1270

The fourth crusade, which was commenced in 1195 by the Emperor
Henry VI., was more political than religious. It had in view, not so much
the deliverance of the Holy Land, as the destruction of the Greek empire.
But after some successful engagements Henry died, and the Germans
resolved to return home. Pope Celestine III., who had urged on the
expedition, survived the Emperor only a few months. He died A .D . 1198.
To describe the Fifth and Sixth Crusades would involve much
repetition, but the seventh and eighth deserve a few words.
Louis XI., king of France, who is commonly known by the name of St.
Louis, believed that he was raised up from a serious illness by heaven to
undertake the recovery of the Holy Land. Nothing could dissuade him
from performing his vow. After four years’ preparation he sailed to
Cyprus in 1249, accompanied by his Queen, his three brothers, and all the
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knights of France. After a few trifling successes and the taking of
Damietta, he was defeated and taken prisoner along with two of his
brothers. The Earl of Salisbury, who had accompanied him, with almost all
his English followers, perished. Pestilence and famine began to do their
dreadful work among the Franks; the distress increased; the fleet was
destroyed; and the Saracens, in vast numbers, were hovering around them.
The liberty of the king was at length purchased by a large ransom, and a
truce was concluded for ten years. After quietly visiting some of the
sacred places, he returned to France. But amidst all the labors of
government at home the pious Louis never forgot his crusading vow. He
was haunted with the idea that he had been entrusted by heaven with this
great mission.
At length, on the 14th of March A .D . 1270, he entered upon his second
and the Eighth Crusade. He was so weak that he could neither bear his
armor nor remain long on horseback. But scarcely had he landed his army
on the shores of Africa, than all his sanguine visions perished. The
Sultan’s troops, the climate, the want of water and of food, began to
produce their sad effects. His army was almost wholly destroyed, and
Louis himself, with his son, John Tristan, sank and died in the month of
August. The survivors returned to Europe; and thus terminated these holy
wars, leaving the avowed object of the crusades as far distant as before the
days of Peter the Hermit.

THE CHILDREN’S CRUSADE A.D. 1213

Between the fifth and sixth crusades, about the year 1213, the excitement
and madness of the time produced one of mere children. A shepherd boy
named Stephen, near Vendome, in France, professed to have been charged
by the Savior in a vision to preach the cross. He soon gathered other
children around him by his wondrous revelations, and they commenced
their journey, expecting to conquer the infidels by singing hymns and
saying prayers. They passed through towns and villages, displaying
banners and crosses, and chanting, “O Lord, help us to recover Thy true
and holy cross.” A similar movement originated in Germany about the
same time. We are told that the numbers swelled as they went along, until
about ninety thousand boys, about ten or twelve years of age, were ready
to march to the Holy Land. But the whole band in a short time melted
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away. Many of the unfortunate children died through hunger and fatigue;
others were betrayed by ship-masters, who promised to convey them to
the shores of Palestine, but who are supposed to have sold them into
slavery. Such was the insanity of those times, that, in place of preventing
such a movement, the pope declared that the zeal manifested by the
children put to shame the listlessness of their elders. 5

REFLECTIONS ON THE CRUSADES

Many and varied are the opinions of historians as to the origin, character,
and effects of the crusades. That they had an immense influence on the
course of human affairs, especially in Europe and Asia, all are agreed.
They were the means, under the overruling providence of God, of changing
the whole structure of society in this and other countries. From the serf to
the sovereign all experienced a great change. The social condition of the
serf and the vassal was raised, the number and power of the feudal lords
were diminished, and the strength of the sovereign increased. By the same
means commerce was greatly improved, and the barons not a little
impoverished. Many of them mortgaged their estates to wealthy citizens,
which in course of time led to the establishment of the third estate in the
realm — the Commons. The liberties of Europe, both civil and religious,
had their rise in this class.
But the Papacy was the chief gainer by the Crusades. A vast accession of
power, influence, and wealth, to the pope, the clergy, and the monastic
institutions was the immediate result. And this was the one grand object of
the papal policy. What Hildebrand fought for and saw in the distance,
Urban seized and used with great craft and power. And this supremacy he
obtained by means apparently good and holy, but really most subtle and
Satanic. The theory was this: — “the Crusader was the soldier of the
church, and this was his first allegiance, which released him from all other.”
Never was there a more sweeping, levelling, unrighteous theory proposed
to mankind. But in its apparent piety lay its deep subtlety.
When Urban placed himself at the head of the armies of the faith in 1095,
he assumed to be the director of their movements, the dispenser of their
blessings, their infallible counsellor and lawgiver. He preached that it was
not a national war of Italy, France, or Germany, against the empire of
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Egypt, but a holy war of Christians against the Mahometans. No Christian
was to go to war with another Christian, but all were to unite in a holy
alliance against the common foe — the infidels. The privileges promised to
all the soldiers of Christ were great and many, as may be seen by Urban’s
oration. They were assured of the immediate remission of all their sins, of
the paradise of God, if they fell in battle, or if they died on their way to
the Holy Land; and further, as to this life, the pope declared all temporal,
civil, and social obligations dissolved, by taking the cross. Thus every tie
was broken that binds society together, a new principle of obedience was
substituted, and the pope became the liege lord of mankind.6

THE KNIGHTS TEMPLARS AND HOSPITALLERS

We may just notice, before leaving the subject, that during these wars of
the Christians with the Mahometans, three celebrated military-religious
orders were founded — Knights of the Temple of Jerusalem, Knights of
the Hospital, and Teutonic Knights. The principal duties of these knights,
according to their founders, were to afford protection and assistance to the
poor, the sick, and the wounded among the pilgrims, and to provide in
every way for the defense of Jerusalem and the Holy Land. They soon
became extremely popular. Many of the nobility of Europe accepted the
cross and professed the vow of the knights of Palestine. Superstition
enriched them, and, we need scarcely add, it also corrupted them; and their
wealth excited the cupidity of others. After the Christians lost possession
of the Holy Land, these knights were dispersed throughout several
countries. The order of the Templars was dissolved by the Council of
Vienne in the fourteenth century, and that of the Teutons in the
seventeenth, by the German authorities. The Hospitallers obtained from
Charles V. the possession of the island of Malta, and are now known as
the Knights of Malta.7
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CHAPTER 21
HENRY V. AND GREGORY’S SUCCESSORS
A.D. 1106-1122

Having thus given a consecutive history of the Crusades, which has led us
on to the end of the thirteenth century, we must now return for a little to
the point where we left off, and gather up the threads of our general
history.
The long and wasting wars occasioned by the dispute between Gregory
and Henry as to the right of investiture, utterly failed to bring that
question to anything like a settlement. The successors of Gregory, deeply
imbued with his spirit, endeavored by every means to carry out his
scheme. On the other hand, the new king Henry V. was equally determined
to oppose the papal demands, and also to recover all that his crown had
lost by the spiritual tyranny of the popes. He invested bishops with the
ring and crosier as his ancestors had done, and compelled the prelates of
Germany to consecrate them. Anathemas and excommunications without
number from popes and councils were fulminated against the rebellious
Emperor, but he allowed them to roll peacefully over him. Thus the
contest was continued, though with less bloodshed than in Gregory’s time.

THE DONATION OF MATILDA

In the year 1115 “the Great Countess” Matilda of Tuscany died. Before
her death, she had made over to the Roman See her vast possessions. The
deed which she executed was entirely contrary to feudal law, but in full
accordance with pontifical law. Thus a fresh subject of strife between the
popes and the emperors sprang from this donation. Had the pope been
allowed to take peaceable possession of her estates, he would have been
like a king in Italy. But, however devoted the great woman was to the
church of Rome and sincere in her gift, the deed was contrary to law and
never fully took effect, although it ultimately contributed much to the
temporal power of the popes. But details need not be given. The world
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was growing weary of the history of popes and antipopes, with factions,
perjuries, and hypocrisies; of the monotony of bloodshed and devastation,
which had lasted over half a century. All hearts yearned after peace, says
one, and the love of battle had become extinct on both sides; the flame of
civil and religious discord, which was kindled by Gregory and fanned by
his successors, had been quenched in the floods of calamity. After many
efforts peace was ratified between the pope’s legates and the Emperor, in
the year 1122, on the following conditions.

THE CONCORDAT OF WORMS

The pope Calixtus, though an inflexible asserter of the papal claims,
seeing the general eagerness for peace, gave instructions to his legates to
convoke a general council of all the bishops and clergy of France and
Germany at Mentz, for the purpose of taking into consideration the re-
establishment of concord between the Holy See and the Empire. When this
celebrated treary was reduced into form and had received the golden seal of
the empire, the assembly adjourned from Mentz to a spacious meadow
near the city of Worms. Here unnumbered multitudes assembled to
witness the exchange of the ratified copies of the treaty which was to bring
back civil and religious peace to all Europe. The ceremony concluded,
according to the custom of the times, with a solemn mass and Te Deum by
the Cardinal-bishop of Ostia, during which the legate communicated with
the Emperor, and in the name of the Pope imparted the kiss of peace.
This treaty has been received from that day until now as the fundamental
assertion of the papal and imperial rights. Its stipulations were these:—
“The Emperor gives up to God, to St. Peter, and to the catholic
church, the right of investiture by Ring and Crosier; he grants to
the clergy throughout the empire the right of free election; he
restores to the church of Rome, to all other churches and nobles,
the possessions and feudal sovereignties which have been seized
during the wars in his father’s time and his own, those in his
possession immediately, and he promises his influence to obtain
restitution of those not in his possession. He grants peace to the
pope and to all his partisans, and pledges himself to protect,
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whenever he shall be thereto summoned, the church of Rome in all
things.”
The pope granted on his part, that all elections of bishops and abbots
should take place in the presence of the Emperor or his commissioners,
only without bribery and violence, with an appeal in cases of contested
elections to the metropolitan and provincial bishops. The bishop elect in
Germany was to receive, by the touch of the scepter, all the temporal
rights, principalities, and possessions of the See, excepting those which
were held immediately of the See of Rome; and faithfully discharge to the
Emperor all duties incident to those principalities. In all other parts of the
empire the royalties were to be granted to the bishop consecrated within
six months. The pope grants peace to the Emperor and his adherents, and
promises aid and assistance on all lawful occasions.”1
So ended the contest which had wasted Germany by a civil war for fifty
years, and Italy by the most disastrous invasions. And a moment’s
reflection, on the adjustment of the quarrel and the slight concessions on
either side, will show the awful iniquity of those who prolonged the
struggle. But neither Calixtus nor Henry long survived the Concordat of
Worms. The pope died in 1124, and the Emperor in 1125.
It will not be necessary to say much more on the events of this century.
The great features by which it is marked are the crusades and their results,
which we have already examined. But it may be well to notice briefly two
or three remarkable men that appeared at this time, whose names are
familiar amongst us to this day, and whose histories conduct us to the
secrets and depths of the cloister. Besides, we learn more of the general
state of religion, literature, and manners, from such individual histories
than from mere abstract statements.

ST. BERNARD, ABBOT OF CLAIRVAUX

The most celebrated of these men is the famous St. Bernard. He is
considered the brightest representative of the Roman Catholic religion
which the church had seen since the days of Jerome, Ambrose, Augustine,
and Gregory. For half a century he appears before us the leading and
governing head of Christendom — the oracle of all Europe. The popes are
lost sight of in the brighter light of the abbot. “He is the center,” says one
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of his biographers, “around whom gather the great events of christian
history, from whose mind flow forth the impulses which animate and
guide Latin Christendom, towards whom converge the religious thoughts
of men. He rules alike the monastic world, the councils of temporal
sovereigns, and the intellectual developments of the age. He is believed by
an admiring age to have confuted Abelard himself, and to have repressed
the more dangerous doctrines of Arnold of Brescia.” To those who have
read his life this picture will not appear overdrawn. But as throwing light
on those times we would first notice his training.
Bernard was born of noble parentage in Burgundy. His father, Tesselin,
was a knight of great bravery and piety, according to the ideas of religion
prevalent at that time. His mother, Alith, was likewise of high birth, and a
model of devotion and charity. Bernard, their third son, was born at
Fontaines, near Dijon, in 1091. From his infancy he was thoughtful and
devoted to religion and study. His pious mother died while he was yet a
youth, leaving six sons and one daughter. He was then left free to choose
his occupation for life. What shall it be? He had no great choice; it must
either be a fighting knight or a fasting and praying monk. He resolved at
length to retire from the world and devote himself to the monastic state.
At the age of twenty-three he entered the monastery of Citeaux.
When his family first heard of his resolution, they were much opposed.
His father, Tesselin, and his two brothers, Guido and Gerard, were
following the great Duke of Burgundy to his wars, as military noblemen.
But such was the force of Bernard’s character that he influenced his
brothers one after the other, and his sister also, to take the vow; and the
whole family in a short time disappeared within the walls of the convent.

ST. BERNARD AND MONASTICISM

As monastic Christianity or enthusiasm, in the theory of the Roman
church, was at this time the only real christian perfection, we will present
the reader of the nineteenth century with a few particulars of the system,
that he may be able to judge for himself of the extreme blindness of even
true believers such as Bernard, and of the awful perversion of the sacred
name of Christianity. Were the proofs not unquestionable, the facts could
not now be believed. The renunciation of the world, solitude, asceticism,
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stern mortification, was preached as almost the only safe path to heaven.
The supposed merits of monkew, not the finished work of Christ, was the
ground of admittance by St. Peter into the realms of glow. Hence it was
that, the more sincere the monk, the more he inflicted on himself every
kind of torture and misery. This was the deception: “The more remote
from man, the nearer to God; holiness was measured by suffering; all
human sympathies, all social feelings, all ties of kindred, all affections,
were to be torn up by the roots from the groaning spirit; pain and prayer,
prayer and pain, were to be the sole, stirring, unwearying occupations of a
saintly life.”
Surely this is the masterpiece of Satan, the deepest delusion of the
counsels of hell. Let thy holy Bible be thy guide, dear reader; and rest
assured that all who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ are, not only wil! be,
but are saved, and that all who truly believe will be careful to maintain
good works, in virtue of the divine nature and the power of the Holy
Spirit.

THE CISTERCIAN MONASTERIES

Stephen Harding, an Englishman, originally from Sherborne in
Dorsetshire, was the abbot of the Cistercian monastery at Citeaux. He
followed St. Benedict’s rule, with additional severities. They had but one
common meal a day, and had been twelve hours at work before they
received it. They never tasted meat, fish, or eggs, and milk only rarely.
It was usual when anyone wished to become a monk at Citeaux, says
Bernard’s biographer, to make him wait for four days before he was taken
to the chapter in presence of the assembled convent. After this he
prostrated himself before the lectern, and was asked by the abbot what he
wanted. He replied, “God’s mercy and yours.” The abbot bade him rise,
and expounded to him the severity of the rule, and inquired of his
intentions again; and, if he answered he wished to keep it all, the abbot
said, “May God who hath begun a good work in thee Himself accomplish
it.” This ceremony was repeated three days, and after the third he passed
from the guesthouse to the cells of the novices, and then at once began the
year of probation.
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The following was the ordinary routine in the monastery during Bernard’s
year. At two in the morning the great bell was rung, and the monks
immediately arose from their hard couches, and hastened along the dark
cloisters in solemn silence to the church. A single small lamp, suspended
from the roof, gave a glimmering light, just sufficient to show them their
way through the building. After prayer, or divine service, they retired, and
after a brief repose rose again for matins, which took them about two
hours; then other services, partly regulated by the season of the year —
summer or winter; but they were employed in various religious exercises
till nine, when they went forth to work in the fields. At two they dined; at
night-fall they assembled to vespers; at six or eight, according to the
season, they finished the day with compline, and passed at once to the
dormitory.
But however severe we may think these practices and austerities to have
been, they were far from satisfying the zeal and spirit of self-mortification
of Bernard. He spent his time in solitude and study. Time given to sleep
he regarded as lost, and was wont to compare sleep and death, holding that
sleepers may be regarded as dead among men, even as the dead are asleep
before God. He diligently read the scriptures; he strove to work out his
own conception of perfect and angelic religion. He had so absolutely
withdrawn his senses from communion with the outer world that they
seemed dead to all outward impressions: his eyes could not tell him
whether his chamber was ceiled or not, whether it had one window or
three. Of the scanty food which he took, his unconscious taste had lost all
perception whether it was nauseous or wholesome. He drank oil but could
not tell it from water. And yet this deluded man, though we doubt not he
was already saved through grace, was doing all this for salvation; and still,
as a matter of course, he was not satisfied. He spoke of himself as but in
his noviciate; others might have attained, he had but begun his
sanctification.

BERNARD’S PROFESSION
A year has elapsed since Bernard entered Citeaux. His probation is ended;
he now makes his profession. This ceremony was performed with great
solemnity, and surrounded with all that could impart to it awe and
majesty. The novice was called into the chapter, and, before all, made
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disposal of any worldly goods he might possess. His head was shorn, and
his hair burnt by the sacristan in a piscina used for this purpose. Going to
the steps of the presbytery, he then read the form of profession, made
over at the sign of the cross, and, inclining his body, approached the altar.
He placed the profession on the right-hand side of it, which he kissed,
again bent his body, and retired to the steps. The abbot, standing on the
other side of the altar, removed from it the parchment, while the novice on
his hands and knees implored pardon, repeating three times the words,
“Receive me, O Lord.” The whole convent answered with “Gloria Patri,”
and the cantor began the Psalm, “Have mercy on me, O God,” which was
sung through by the two choirs alternately. The novice then humbled
himself at the abbot’s feet, and afterwards did the same before the prior,
and successively before all the brotherhood — even before the sick if there
were any. Towards the end of the Psalm, the abbot, bearing his crosier,
approached the novice and made him rise. A cowl was blessed and
sprinkled with holy water, and the abbot, removing from the novice his
secular garments, replaced them with the monastic dress. The “Credo” was
said, the novice had become a monk, and took his place in the choir.2

BERNARD LEAVES CITEAUX

The arrival of Bernard, of his kindred, and his followers, at Citeaux,
proved a turning-point in its history. The popularity of the small
monastery was raised, and its dormitories were crowded. It soon became
necessary to look out for the means of founding another. Bernard was
selected by Stephen, the general of the Cistercian communities of France,
as the head of the community. Twelve monks and their young abbot —
representing the Lord and His apostles — were assembled in the church.
Stephen placed a cross in Bernard’s hands, who solemnly at the head of
his small band, walked forth from Citeaux. After travelling northward for
nearly ninety miles, they came to a valley in Champagne, called the Valley
of Wormwood, but which now exchanged its name for that of Clairvaux —
the Bright Valley. It was a barren solitude; for a time the hardships which
the little community had to bear were excessive. A rude fabric to shelter
them from wind, rain, heat, and cold, was raised with their own hands: —
they were obliged to live on beech-leaves, nuts, roots, intermixed with
coarse grain, until the Lord in mercy supplied their need from the
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compassion of the neigh-bouring peasants. Of course the supplies of
money and corn were attributed to the miraculous intervention of St.
Bernard, his piety, his prayers, and his prophetic visions. But the good
Lord had pity and saved these poor deluded men from actual death by
starvation.
William of Champeaux, bishop of Chalons, hearing that the life of
Bernard was in danger from the extreme rigor of his mortifications,
succeeded in getting him away from Clairvaux for twelve months; and,
compelling him to take proper food and rest, he saved him from a slow but
certain suicide. In later years Bernard expressed disapprobation of such
excess in mortification as that by which he had weakened his own body
and impaired his own strength.

THE POWER OF BERNARD’S PREACHING

After this period, according to his biographers, the fame and influence of
Bernard spread rapidly and widely. His health had suffered so much from
ascetic practices that he could no longer labor in the field with his brethren
for their daily subsistence; but he labored with his pen, and his preaching
retained all its impressive solemnity and persuasive eloquence. His pale
face, macerated form, and bodily weakness, contrasted strangely with his
powerful voice, his gushing flow of language, and the burning fervor of his
pathetic appeals. When it was known that he was to preach in any given
place, wives hurried away their husbands, mothers withdrew their sons,
friends their friends, from the resistless power of the saintly abbot, lest
they should renounce the world for the cloister. His reputation as a
preacher and a writer soon spread over the whole of Christendom, and all
the world began to ascribe the impression he produced to a divine power,
and to endow him with the gift of working miracles.
The “Bright Valley” was soon beset by candidates for admission; the
number of its inmates rapidly rose to seven hundred; and the number of
monasteries founded by Bernard himself amounted to one hundred and
sixty. These were scattered over France, Italy, Germany, England, Spain;
indeed over every country in the West. And, as might be expected, all
looked back with superstitious reverence and affection to their founder.
Clairvaux thus became a free and open court to which all might appeal
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without cost; and from which, it is said, all retired without dissatisfaction,
whether justified or condemned. He knew how to address himself to
persons of every class in a style most suited to their understanding, and
thus exercised an immense influence over all kinds of men. His wondering
disciples vied with each other in publishing abroad the wonders wrought
by his hand or his prayers, until his every act became a miracle and his
every word a prophecy. The Gospels contain not such countless miracles
as the life of Bernard. He healed diseases by his touch, the bread which he
blessed produced supernatural effects, and a blind man received his sight
by standing on the same spot where the holy man had stood!

THE AGE OF MIRACLES AND VISIONS

To those who are at all acquainted with the spirit and temper of the
medieval age, these groundless beliefs will excite no surprise; but to those
who are only familiar with our own time it must appear strange that any
one was found weak enough to believe them. And were it not for their
historical value we should not think them worth transcribing. But they
show, as nothing else can, the modes of thought and the measure of man’s
mental development at the time; and on this ground we can understand and
explain why such foolish tales and absurd fictions were received as the
present revelation of God. The result was, as Satan designed, even in the
case of true Christians, that the word of God, which is the only standard
of faith and practice, was completely set aside and the deceivers’ lies
believed. Good man and talented as Bernard must have been, he was
deeply imbued with the superstitious credulity of his age. He believed
with others that God had performed miracles by him. But all men in the
twelfth century, and for several ages, both before and after, believed in
miracles, visions, revelations, and the interference of both good and evil
angels with sublunary things.
The effect of the monastic system on the people generally in the dark ages
must account for their readiness to believe anything a monk said,
especially about good or evil, heaven or hell. The silvery peals of the
convent bells were constantly reminding the warlike lord and his vassals,
of the heavenly occupation of the monks; which, to their superstitious
minds, must have had a great effect. And we cannot wonder. There in the
lonely valley, the solitudes of nature, stood the holy monastery. The
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prince, the peasant, and the pauper, may knock at its gates and find a
shelter within its hallowed walls. Peace is promised in this life to all who
enter, and heaven hereafter. The chorus-song of vigils and matins during
the night must have appealed to the religious feelings of all around, and
filled them with most holy awe and reverence for the unearthly people.
Hence the monastew was looked upon as the gate of heaven, and all its
inmates as the servants of the Most High. It was no doubt a great mercy at
that time to the poor, and to the people generally, especially during the
reign of feudalism.

THE DEGENERACY OF THE MONASTIC RULE

But before leaving the subject of the monasteries, having looked at them
under the generalship of Bernard, it may be well to notice what they had
become before his day, and what they were afterwards. Most of the old
monasteries had become wealthy and suffered from the natural
consequences. Some had altogether relaxed their discipline, had long
renounced poverty, and disregarded their vow of obedience to the abbot or
prior. They had fertilized their immediate territory; and, as though they
had now but to enjoy the fruits of their toil, they sank to indolent repose,
and idleness brought its ten thousand other sins. Milman speaks of
monasticism as tracing the same cycle in all ages. This is so truly and so
graphically described that we quote the passage entire. But we must add
that he leaves out in this paragraph the fearful immoralities, dissensions,
and insubordination, which were always the consequences of wealth.
“Now the wilderness, the utter solitude, the utmost poverty, the
contest with the stubborn forest and unwholesome morass, the
most exalted piety, the devotion which had not hours enough
during the day and night for its exercise, the rule which could not
be enforced too strictly, the strongly competing asceticism, the
inventive self-discipline, the inexhaustible emulous ingenuity of
self-torture, the boastful servility of obedience: then the fame for
piety, the lavish offerings of the faithful, the grants of the
repentant lord, the endowments of the remorseful king — the
opulence, the power, the magnificence. The wattled hut, the rock-
hewn hermitage, is now the stately cloister; the lowly church of
wood, the lofty and gorgeous abbey; the wild forest of heath, the
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pleasant and umbrageous grove; the marsh, a domain of
intermingling meadows and corn-fields; the brawling stream or
mountain torrent, a succession of quiet tanks or pools, fattening
innumerable fish. The superior, once a man bowed to the earth
with humility, care-worn, pale, emaciated, with a coarse habit
bound with a cord, with naked feet, is become an abbot on his
curvetting palfrey, in rich attire, with his silver cross borne before
him, travelling to take his place amid the lordliest of the realm.”3
A new order, a new institution, grew up under the hand of Bernard.
Clairvaux was the commencement of a new era in the history of
monasticism. Men of all ranks were attracted to the Cistercian order,
notwithstanding the noted strictness of its discipline; and numbers of
monasteries sprang up in the deserts after the pattern of Clairvaux. But all
the power of Bernard could not prevent the most bitter jealousies and
unseemly dissensions arising between the monks of the new and of the old
orders, especially with the once celebrated monastery of Cluny, which had
trained Hildebrand for the papal throne.

BERNARD LEAVES CLAIRVAUX A.D. 1130

A great schism in the church, caused by two unprincipled popes, was the
occasion of St. Bernard being drawn reluctantly from his peaceful
seclusion, and plunged at once into the affairs of the world. But, as an
example of what was a common occurrence in connection with papal
elections, we will give a few particulars. The reader will see and judge for
himself of papal infallibility. Alas! few of the popes were outwardly
decent.
When Pope Honorius II. was dying, but before he had breathed his last,
Cardinal Peter Leonis, a grandson of a Jewish usurer, made a bold effort
to mount the chair of St. Peter. But the dying pontiff being brought to the
window and shown to the people as still alive, Peter and his friends retired
for the moment. Another party, determined to exclude Peter, and watching
till the poor pope did die, at once proclaimed Cardinal Gregory supreme
pontiff of the christian world under the name of Innocent II. The party of
Peter all the same time went through the form of election with their pope,
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dressed him in the proper pontificals, and declared that he, under the title
of Anacletus II., was the authentic vicar of Christ.
Rome, the scene of endless strife and warfare, was now filled with two
armies of ferocious partisans. Devastation and bloodshed followed rapidly
on their spiritual threats and curses. Anacletus, it is said, at the head of a
mercenary band, began the attack by laying siege to the church of St. Peter.
He forced his way into the sanctuary, carried off the gold crucifix, and all
the treasure in gold and silver and precious stones. These riches led
numbers to side with him. Besides the was rich and could afford to pay for
followers. He assailed and despoiled the churches of the capital one after
another. Innocent was soon convinced that Rome, in the present state of
public feeling, could be no safe place for him. He determined to fly. His
person was in danger. It was with great difficulty that he and his friends
escaped in two galleys, and safely reached the port of Pisa. From thence
they repaired to France, and were received with open arms by the
communities of Cluny and Clairvaux.
Bernard zealously espoused the cause of Innocent. His zeal drew him from
his den. He traveled from sovereign to sovereign, from count to count,
from monastery to monastery, until he could boast that Innocent was
acknowledged by the Kings of France, England, Spain, the Amperor
Lothaire, the more powerful clergy, and the religious communities
throughout these countries. The powerful Duke Roger of Sicily alone
adhered to Anacletus, which prevented Innocent returning to Rome. But
death came to tlhe relief of all parties. Anacletus died in his impregnable
fortress of St. Angelo, in January 1138, having defied all his enemies for
eight years. Innocent returned to Rome in May with Bernard by his side,
and was duly acknowledged as supreme pontiff.

THE GREAT COUNCIL OF THE LATERAN A.D. 1139

Innocent, now undisputed master of Rome, assembled at the Lateran a
general council. Never had Rome or any other city of Christendom beheld
one so numerously attended. A thousand bishops and countless
ecclesiastical dignitaries were present. The speeches and the decrees image
forth the Christianity of the times. The feudal authority of the pope was
the great subject. He declared that, “Inasmuch as Rome is the metropolis
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of the world, from which all earthly power flows, so likewise the
pontifical throne is the source of all ecclesiastical authority and dignity;
and that every such office or dignity is to be received at the hands of the
Roman pontiff as a fief of the Roman See, and held of him as the great
spiritual liege lord.”
As usual on such occasions, Innocent annulled all the decrees of his
adversary Anacletus. He was consigned to the realms of Satan, and the
prelates who had received schismatic consecration were degraded. They
were summoned to appear before the revengeful pope. He assailed them
with indignant reproaches, wrenched their crosiers out of their hands,
stripped the pails from their shoulders, and took from them their
episcopal rings. After this, as if to consummate the vilest hypocrisy, the
“Truce of God” — a cessation of private feuds and conflicts — in its
fullest extent was re-enacted. But the canon which most interests us in
that celebrated council was directed against a class of men, who before long
will force themselves on our notice. “We expel from the church as heretics
those who, under the semblance of religion, condemn the sacrament of the
body and blood of Christ, the baptism of infants, the priesthood,” etc.
This anathema, and those against whom it was hurled, are like the faint
streaks of the dawn of the great struggle for religious liberty which resulted
in the glorious Reformation.
The remainder of this wretched man’s life was almost entirely spent in
war, notwithstanding his re-enacting the “Truce of God.” He actually
headed, and led on an armed force against Roger of Sicily, the friend of
Anacletus; but he fell as a prisoner of war into the hands of the Normans.
Awestruck with their holy captive, they bowed before him, obtained his
blessing, and sent him home. Such was the superstition of the king, such
the awful iniquity of the pope. But his life was ebbing fast, and soon he
must stand before the tribunal of the Judge of all the earth.
“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that
every one may receive the things done in his body, according to
that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” (2 Corinthians 5:10.)
On the 24th of September, 1143, the pontiff breathed his last, amid the
turmoil of popular revolution and strife; and Celestine II. reigned in his
stead.
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BERNARD AND ABELARD
Before the death of Innocent, Bernard was called away from his peaceful
retirement at Clairvaux, to make war against a new enemy of the church in
the person of Peter Abelard. This new conflict arose out of the
intellectual movements of the age, and marks a distinct epoch in the
history of the church, of literature, of spiritual and of civil freedom. We
will briefly notice what led to it.
Most of our readers are aware that the learning which had been
accumulated in the Latin and Greek languages was almost entirely
destroyed by the barbarians in the fifth century. What is called the
literature of the ancients was almost wholly lost when the barbarous
nations were established on the ruins of the Roman empire. For fully five
hundred years gross ignorance prevailed. Any knowledge that remained
was confined to the ecclesiastics; and they, during that period, were
forbidden to study or copy secular learning. Nevertheless some of the
monks, especially of the Benedictine order, collected and copied ancient
manuscripts; and, says Hallam, “It is never to be forgotten that but for
them the records of that very literature would have perished. If they had
been less tenacious of their Latin liturgy, of the vulgate translation of
scripture, and of the authority of the Fathers, it is very doubtful whether
less superstition would have grown up; but we cannot hesitate to
pronounce that all grammatical learning would have been laid aside. But
among them, though instances of gross ignorance were exceedingly
frequent, the necessity of preserving the Latin language, in which the
scriptures, the canons, and other authorities of the church, and the regular
liturgies were written, and in which alone the correspondence of their
hierarchy could be conducted, kept flowing, in the worst seasons, a slender
but living stream.”4
Among these monks there must have been every variety of mind: some, no
doubt, coarse, sluggish and mechanical; others, refined, active, inquiring,
which could not be confined within the barriers of the established catholic
doctrine, or submit to the power of the sacerdotal order. So it was; so it
proved to be. The Reformer, the Protestant, sprang from the monastic
order. There were many premature Luthers. In every insurrection, it has
been said, whether religious or more philosophical, against the dominant
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dogmatic system, a monk was the leader, and there had been three or four
of these insurrections before the time of Abelard. Gotschalk in the ninth
century was scourged and imprisoned for his stubborn confidence in what
was called predestinarianism. John Scot Erigena, a most learned monk
from Ireland or the Scottish islands, was invited by Hincmar, Archbishop
of Rheims, to oppose Gotschalk; but he alarmed the church no less than
his antagonist, by appealing to a new power above catholic authority,
human reason. He was a strong rationalist, but speculated largely in
scholastic theology. Under the censure of the church he fled to England,
and found a refuge, it is said, in Alfred’s new university of Oxford.

THE DAWN OF LIGHT IN THE DARK AGES

During the latter part of eleventh century we meet with the famous names
of Lanfranc, Anselm, and Berengar. A fresh impulse was given to
intellectual activity by the labors of these and other eminent teachers. It
was about this time that the old cathedral schools developed into
seminaries of general learning, and these became the parents of our modern
universities. This intellectual activity, following a long apathy, became so
extremely attractive that thousands crowded to the lectures, and, like men
long debarred from the tree of knowledge, too eagerly embraced what they
heard. But it was a reaction against the dogmatic authority of the church,
which taught men that it was henceforth possible to reason and inquire.
Peter Abelard was the most audacious, and by far the most popular, of
all the lecturers on dialectics — professedly the science or art of
discriminating truth from error by human reason. This remarkable man was
born in 1079, near Nantes, in Brittany. His father, Berengar, was lord of
the castle of Le Pallet, and although Peter was his eldest son, he early
preferred “the conflicts of disputation to the trophies of arms,” and,
resigning the family inheritance of his brothers, betook himself to the life
of a scholar. He was first a pupil of Rosellin, then of William archdeacon
of Paris, and also of Ariselm, theological lecturer of Laon. But the long and
extraordinary history of this man we need not follow. It is a history of
victories, crimes, and misfortunes. He was at once the representative and
the victim of that scholastic theology which endangered the power and the
constitution of the Roman church. He was the first instance of a man
professing the science of theology without being a priest. Wherever he
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went, thousands of enthusiastic scholars surrounded his chair. “Crowds,”
says Bernard’s biographer, “amounting to thousands, crossed high
mountains and broad seas, and endured every inconvenience of life, to
enjoy the privilege of hearing Abelard lecture.” “His eloquence,” says
another, “was so fascinating, that the listener found himself irresistibly
carried away by the stream; and if an opponent was hardy enough to stand
up against him, the acuteness of his logic was as infallible as the torrent of
his oratory had been, and in every combat he carried away the prize.”5
Abelard wrote, as well as lectured, on many important subjects; but he
was most unsound on the fundamental doctrines of Christianity. And yet
in all Europe no champion of truth and orthodoxy could be found to meet
in single combat this giant of heresy. Bernard of Clairvaux was at length
appealed to. A letter from William, Abbot of St. Thierry, drew him from
his cloister. The saint and the logician met at Sens in 1140. The King of
France was present, with a great number of bishops and ecclesiastics.
Abelard was surrounded with his disciples; Bernard with two or three
monks. The one addressed the reason of the few; the other inflamed the
hearts and passions of all classes. The one was supported by admirers; the
ether by worshippers. The one had been denounced as a heretic; the other
had the reputation of being the most holy man of his age, above kings,
prelates, and even the pope. Under such circumstances Abelard had no
chance. He soon felt the power that was against him; and, before the
incriminated passages were all read, he rose up and said, to the
astonishment of all present, “I refuse to hear more, or answer any
questions; I appeal to Rome;” and left the assembly.
It is said by some, in explanation of this unexpected conduct, that the
ranks of hostile faces which he saw before him, not only quenched his
enthusiasm but made him feel that his life was in danger. Hearing that a
report of the council had reached Rome, and that he was condemned by
the pope, he applied in his distress to the “venerable” Peter of Cluny,
who, from pity for his misfortunes, gave him an asylum in his monastery,
though he was opposed to his doctrines.
We may just notice in passing, that the well-known story of the sufferings
of his beautiful Eloisa gave birth to a new idea of woman’s place in
society, without which no true civilization could have taken place. Up to
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this period the church had avowedly looked with disdain on woman,
because she had been first in the transgression. But the touching story of
the misfortunes of Eloisa led to the elevation of woman to her proper
place in the social circle.
The fallen and broken-hearted Abelard, after spending about two years in
the solitudes of Cluny, reeeiving many kindnesses from its charitable
abbot, and satisfying his ecclesiastical judges with the humility of his
repentance, ended his agitated life in the year 1142. His principles lived in
many of his disciples; one deserves a special notice.

ARNOLD OF BRESCIA
Although Arnold passed as a disciple and a faithful follower of Abelard, it
is evident from all we can gather that he was a man of another order. There
is reason to believe that he was a sincere Christian, and possessed many of
the elements of a reformer, though in an age unripe for reformation.
Besides he was too political — too great an admirer of the old Roman
Republic — to be used of God in laying a solid foundation for the
reformation of His church. He was honored with martyrdom, but it was
more for his advocacy of civil liberty than for his preaching subjection to
Christ and the word of God. Nevertheless he commands our respect and
gratitude, as an early sower of the seeds of the great Reformation.
Arnold was born at Brescia in Lombardy — probably about the year
1105. At an early period in his history he separated himself from the
secular clergy, embraced the monastic life, and began to preach unsparingly
against the corruptions of both the clergy and the monks. He seems to
have been possessed of an inward conviction that he had a divine
commission to preach against the pride, luxury, and immorality of the
priesthood, from the pope himself down to the lowest rank in the church;
and to this mission he boldly and fearlessly devoted all his strength.
Possessed, according to all accounts, of the most vigorous and awakening
style of address, combined with an eloquence which was singularly
copious and flowing, he mightily moved the masses wherever he preached.
“His words,” says Bernard, “are smoother than oil and sharper than
swords.” His great idea was, the complete separation of Church and State.
The old papal edifice — the hierarchy, which had been rising into such
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vast proportions ever since the days of Constantine, and which, under
Gregory VII., aspired to govern the whole world, and to bind all the
nations of the earth as so many fiefs of St. Peter — he boldly maintained
should be utterly demolished and swept from the face of the earth. He
used as his text, what many have done since, though not knowing its
spiritual import, “My kingdom is not of this world.” Ministers of the
gospel, he argued, should have no power but for the spiritual government
of the flock of Christ, and no riches but the tithes and the free-will
offerings of the faithful. The immense evils and discords that arose in the
church, he affirmed, were mainly owing to the vast riches of the pontiffs,
bishops, and priests.
While there was a great deal of truth in much that he said, he blended, in
the most painful way, his love of old Roman liberty and the lowly religion
of Jesus — the rigid monk and the fierce Republican. “If poverty was of
Christ,” he would exclaim, “if poverty was of His apostles, if the only real
living likenesses of the apostles and of Christ were the fasting, toiling,
barely-clad monks, with their cheeks sunk with the famine, their eyes on
the ground, how far from the apostles, how far from Christ, were those
princely bishops, those lordly abbots, with their furred mantles of scarlet
and purple, who ride forth on their curvetting palfreys, with their golden
bits, their silver spurs, and holding their courts like kings?’ Consistently
with this, he also taught the people “that the temporal sovereign is the
proper fountain of honor, of wealth, of power, and to that fountain should
revert all the possessions of the church, the estates of the monasteries, the
royalties of the popes and the bishops.”6

ARNOLD’S PREACHING
To these new and dangerous doctrines the people of Brescia listened with
the greatest ardor. He unfolded to them the dark pages of ecclesiastical
history, over which we have just been travelling. The whole city was in a
state of the greatest excitement. Nor can we wonder at the enthusiasm of
the populace, when they heard that the riches of the clergy should return
to the laity, and that, in future, their pastors were to be supported by the
voluntary contributions of their flocks. He would be a bold preacher who
dared to arouse the people to fanaticism with such appeals and proposals
in the nineteenth century: what must he have been in the twelfth, in the
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midst of darkness, ignorance and superstition? Such a man was the
premature reformer of Brescia; and, being a stern monk of blameless life,
unquestioned as to his orthodoxy, and having full sympathy with popular
religion, his power was resistless. The great object of his efforts was the
complete overthrow of sacerdotal power — the temporal supremacy of
the pope. He thus dared to lay his hand on the great papal scheme of
universal dominion, and for a moment it tottered to its base. The pope was
driven from his throne, the Republic proclaimed, the standard of liberty
raised, the separation of the spiritual and temporal powers published, and
the government of priests abolished. But the enthusiasm of the citizens
was evanescent, without unity, and of short duration. The soil was not yet
prepared for the growth of liberty. The iniquity of the anti-christian
system was not yet full. Jezebel’s thirst was not yet quenched with the
blood of the saints of God. Millions more must perish before she receives
her deadly wound. This we shall soon see.
Arnold was no longer safe in Italy. The resentment of the clergy he found
to be stronger and deeper far than the favor of the populace. He escaped
beyond the Alps, and ultimately found a safe and hospitable shelter in
Zurich. There the forerunner of the famous Zwingle was allowed for a time
to lecture, and the simple people long retained the spirit of his doctrines.
But such a man must not be allowed to live anywhere. Bernard was
watching his every movement. He urged the pope to extreme measures; he
wrote angrily to those who gave him a shelter, warning them to beware of
the fatal infection of heresy. He sharply rebuked the diocesan bishop of
Zurich for protecting him. “Why,” he says, “have you not long since
driven Arnold away? He who consorts with the suspected becomes liable
to suspicion; he who favors one under the papal excommunication
contravenes the pope and even the Lord God Himself. Now therefore that
you know your man, drive him from among you; or, better still, chain him
down, that he may do no more mischief.”
After various fortunes, such as are common to that class of men, and such
as we need not here trace, Arnold returned to Rome. Here he was allowed
to remain for some time because of the feebleness of the pontiff and the
troubled state of the city; but when Pope Adrian ascended the throne of
St. Peter, the days of Arnold were numbered.
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THE MARTYRDOM OF ARNOLD A.D. 1155
The new pope was an Englishman of great ability; and the only one, it is
said, that ever sat on the papal throne. He was originally a monk of St.
Albans, but obliged to leave his home because of the severity of his father.
After travelling for some time on the continent, and studying divinity and
canon law with great ardor and success, and rising from rank to rank in
ecclesiastical orders, he was at length raised to the highest order of
ecclesiastical greatness by the name of Adrian IV. His English name was
Nicolas Breakspeare.
An opportunity now presented itself to get rid of the bold reformer. The
Emperor Barbarossa was on his way to receive from the hands of Adrian
the imperial crown. He sent forward an embassy of three cardinals to meet
the Emperor, and to request as the price of his coronation the surrender of
Arnold of Brescia into his hands. To a man who thought so little of human
life as Frederick, it seemed but a light thing indeed, and he compelled the
friends of Arnold to deliver him up into the hands of the papal emissaries.
No time was now to be lost, lest his friends should hear of it and attempt
to rescue him. The church took upon itself the summary condemnation
and execution of the rebel, without employing, as usual, the temporal
sword. Before break of day the officer of the pope had imbrued his hands
in the blood of his victim; his dead body was burned to ashes, and the
remains cast into the Tiber, lest the people should collect and worship the
relics of their martyred friend. The clergy triumphed in his death, but his
memory lived in the minds of the Romans. “And in the ashes of Arnold’s
funeral pile,” says Milman, “smouldered for centuries the fire, which was
at length to blaze out in irresistible violence.”
Bernard, the great antagonist of Abelard and of Arnold, had passed
peacefully away at Clairvaux in the year 1153. The saint, the philosopher,
and the reformer, are gone — gone to another world; gone to be judged, not
by papal decrees, but by the throne of eternal righteousness and
immaculate holiness. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and in the work which
He finished for lost and guilty sinners, is the alone ground of pardon and
acceptance in God’s sight. There is no purgatory but the precious blood of
His cross. But, what a mercy, that blood can make the vilest clean! “Purge
me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than
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snow.” Nothing short of the blood of Jesus can make a soul whiter than
snow and fit for heaven. All other means are but a mockery, a delusion of
Satan, which only deepens and perpetuates the guilt of the soul. “The
blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, cleanseth us from all sin.” Salvation is
by faith alone without works of law. We must be grafted into the true vine
before we can bear fruit to God. Christ is the only fruit-bearer; believers
are branches. “He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to
walk, even as he walked.” Apart from a true and living faith in Christ,
there is no pardon, no salvation, no happiness, and no heaven; “but
blessed are all they that put their trust in Him.” (Psalms 51:7, 12; 1 John
1:7; 2:6.)
We now return to our history, and first we would notice —

THE MEETING BETWEEN ADRIAN AND FREDERICK

Were it not for a circumstance which we consider purely childish, the
meeting between Adrian and Frederick might have been passed without a
notice, so little does it concern the history of the church. But it concerns
the history of the papacy, and we think it right to note everything which
manifests its true spirit while in the Thyatiran period. Besides, the most
trifling incident sometimes reveals the most deeply seated purpose, and
betrays the most unyielding determination.
The ready grant of Arnold’s blood had not removed from the dark mind of
Adrian all suspicion as to Frederick’s intentions. The negotiations,
however, were at length satisfactory, and Adrian rode to the camp of
Frederick. He was courteously received by some of the German nobles and
conducted to the royal tent. The pope remained in his saddle, expecting
the Emperor to come and hold his stirrup while he dismounted. But he
waited in vain; Frederick made no advance, and the pope alighted without
his assistance. This neglect of homage to the supreme pontiff was
considered a great insult and indicative of hostilities. Most of the cardinals
fled in alarm, but the intrepid Nicolas Breakspeare remained. Frederick
pleaded ignorance of the custom; but the pope refused to be reconciled or
give him the kiss of peace until he had humbled himself and gone through
the ceremony. The haughty German said he must consult his nobles. A
long discussion ensued. Adrian maintained that it had been the custom
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since the days of Constantine the Great, who held the stirrup for Pope
Sylvester. This assertion was utterly false; as the first act of such homage
had occurred about fifty years before by Conrad, the worthless and
rebellious son of Henry IV. But that was a small matter to the papal
party, if an emperor was to be humbled and the pope exalted. Alleged
precedents were produced in order to prove that the practice had existed
for eight hundred years; and consequently, “as the Emperor had declined
the honors due to the apostles Peter and Paul, there could be no peace
between the church and the empire till he had discharged that duty to the
letter.” Such was the blasphemous assumption of these wicked men. They
urged their pretensions to the homage of mankind by representing
themselves as in the place of the apostles — of Christ — of God Himself.
As the evidence appeared in the pope’s favor and Frederick did not mind
much how it went, he allowed himself to be persuaded that the precedents
were true, and that he ought to do homage to the pope. Accordingly on the
following day, like a dutiful son of the church, the Emperor dismounted as
Adrian approached, took his bridle in hand, and held his stirrup when he
alighted. Outward amity was now restored, and the spiritual father and the
obsequious son advanced towards the holy city and proceeded with the
coronation.
After a reign of about four years, and, we may add, of ceaseless strife and
bloodshed, Adrian died in 1159. He was preparing for the open declaration
of war, and the excommunication of the Emperor, when death put an end
to the conflict. So most of these men lived and so they died, at open war
with the temporal power. Frederick Barbarossa is spoken of as the
mightiest sovereign who had reigned in Europe since Charlemagne. He
entered on the third Crusade, as we have seen, in 1189, and died, or was
drowned, in the stream Saleph near Tarsus, in 1190.
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CHAPTER 22
THE ENCROACHMENTS OF ROME
IN ENGLAND A.D. 1162

We now approach a period in our history which must awaken a peculiar

interest in the mind of the English reader. The Anglo-Saxon was giving
place to the Anglo-Norman rule both in Church and State. The whole
condition of the country was either changed or changing. But the Italian
priest was far from being satisfied with the footing which he had under the
reign of the Normans. The blooming vineyard of Naboth was coveted, and
must be possessed by fair means or foul. England, with all its pride and
wealth and power, must be reduced to a state of subserviency to the
Roman See. This was her settled purpose, and necessary to the carrying
out of her scheme. We will first notice the position of the antagonists, and
then the nature and end of the fierce struggle.
During the reign of Alexander III., an able, subtle, and vigilant pontiff, a
great contest arose in England between Henry II. and Thomas a Becket,
Archbishop of Canterbury, which drew away and absorbed the whole
mind of Europe for many years. It resembled in its main features the long
war between Henry IV. and Gregory VII., only, if possible, pursued with
greater bitterness and obstinacy, and ending more tragically. A more
violent collision between the spiritual and the temporal powers had not
occurred since the days of Constantine. The personal character and the
position of the leaders, no doubt, gave a world-wide interest to the
conflict. But it was much more than personal: the whole question of the
power of Rome in England, the prerogative of the Sovereign, and the
responsibility of the subject, was involved in this new war. Henry, of true
Norman blood, was determined to be the king, and to govern his subjects
according to the laws and customs of the realm; Becket, a violent
churchman, was equally determined to maintain, according to the infallible
decrees of Rome, that the hierarchy is a separate and privileged caste in the
community, entitled to exemption from trial by civil process, and subject
only to its own jurisdiction.
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The English reader of the nineteenth century may well be surprised to hear
that a decree from the Vatican, sent by the pope’s legate, for the purpose
of changing the laws and customs of England, should be for a moment
listened to, far less yielded to. But this was the way then; and the
mightiest monarchs in Europe were made to bow in ignominious
submission at the feet of the pontiff. But why this dreadful slavish fear of
Rome? Because of the ignorance and superstition of the people generally.
“The Romish system, with all its insolent pretensions, was still shrouded
in a blood-red halo of superstitious reverence, which scared away thought,
or quenched it in the fear of death temporal and eternal.” The cunning
priest could pretend to shake the keys of St. Peter in the face of his
opponent, and threaten to lock him out of heaven and to lock him up in
hell, if he did not obey the church. It was their avowed sanctity and their
wicked perversion of scripture that gave them such power over the
ignorant and superstitious.

THE ENGLISH LAW AND CUSTOM

From the earliest period, the kings of England were acknowledged both by
clergy and laity to have the fullest power in matters pertaining to the
external government of the church. Whether touching the property and the
endowments of the churches, or the persons of the clergy, the authority of
the crown was, by law and custom of the realm, supreme. Edward, the
Anglo-Saxon king, told the clergy that “they wielded the sword of St.
Peter, he the sword of Constantine.” And of William the Conqueror, his
biographer says, “All affairs, ecclesiastical as well as secular, were made
dependent on his pleasure.” But during the twelfth century the country
was gradually sinking into a state of deplorable subjection to the Roman
See.
At the same time, we must not forget that, although the progress of the
church was towards Rome, God in His infinite mercy over-ruled the
temporal power of the clergy and the great ecclesiastical establishments of
the monks for the protection and blessing of the poor in the land. He ever
thinks, blessed be His name, of “the poor of the flock.” By the Norman
conquest of England, a foreign hierarchy as well as a foreign nobility had
been introduced; but the lower offices generally were filled with Saxons,
whose language and feelings were in sympathy with the native population.
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This gave them an immense power over the popular mind. They were
looked upon as the tnle shepherds of their flocks, and the guides and
comforters of the distressed. The Normans, whose language and feelings
were still foreign, were hated as their oppressors and spoilers. The English
had been sacrificed by William to supply the liberal grants of lands and
places of honor, which he bestowed upon his followers; and thus the
Saxons, in their turn, were compelled to become the servants or
dependents of their conquerors. Whatsoever a man sows that shall he also
reap. His sin is sure to find him out. But the feeling of personal wrong was
another thing, and sure to mingle in every fresh conflict between the races.
This is manifest in the great struggle between the Norman king and the
English primate, and may assist us in our judgment of its important
results. But we must first notice that which immediately led to the
dispute.

THE INTRODUCTION OF CANON LAW INTO ENGLAND

After repeated attempts and repeated failures, on the part of the pope, to
introduce a legatine power into England, it was so far accomplished during
the troubled reign of Stephen, A .D . 1135. This was an entirely new thing
in this country, and a most daring thing on the part of Rome. But as it
forms a distinct and important epoch in the history of the English church,
we must carefully mark the change. And here, to ensure accuracy, we will
quote a few passages from our legal historian, Thomas Greenwood,
barrister-at-law, book 12, vol. 5.
“The publication and adoption of the Isidorian Decretals changed
the order and distribution of the ecclesiastical powers. Every
function of church management became vested in the clergy, or,
which was the same thing, in the Pope of Rome as their supreme
head. The authority of the state in all matters even remotely
connected with the life and conversation, temporal or spiritual, of
churchmen, was vehemently denounced and repelled: their
possessions were pronounced sacred and inalienable; their duties
subject to no censorship but that of their official superiors; their
persons exempt from secular jurisdiction or punishment; all
interference on the part of prince or secular person in the
appointment of bishops, priests, or spiritual incumbents was
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declared to be of the nature of simony. Although these principles
of church legislation had been in few instances fully developed in
practice, they had been received without contradiction, and
partially adopted by the clergy of France, Italy, and Germany. In
Normandy a complete separation of the secular and ecclesiastical
jurisdiction had already taken place. In England, however, as yet
the only canons known to clergy or laity were those enacted by the
national church herself, with the assent and concurrence of the
sovereign...The exertions of the Romanizing bishops of England,
subsequent to the conquest, were steadily directed to the
introduction of the more important articles of the Isidorian code;
more especially to the; emancipation of church property and
endowments from its dependence upon crown or secular ordinance,
and of the persons and causes of clerks from the interference of the
king’s judges...”
“The earlier ordinances of William the Conqueror for the
separation of the ecclesiastical from the lay tribunals were never
carried out to the extent of exempting churchmen from
responsibility to the law. But it is also true, that both the
Conqueror and his successors, down to John, endeavored to steer a
middle course between canonism and prerogative. In their
solicitude to stand well with the court of Rome, they often took
steps which endangered the safety, but certainly never shifted the
ancient basis, of the law of the land, or the rights of the crown. In
the bitter quarrel between Archbishop Anselm of Canterbury and
Henry I., the latter stoutly maintained his right to determine which
of the two rival pretenders to the papacy the clergy of his
dominions should recognize. And when Anselm, without the king’s
consent, insisted upon transferring his spiritual allegiance to Urban
II. in preference to his rival Clement III., Henry bluntly informed
him that ‘he knew of no law or custom which entitled a subject,
without the king’s license, to set up a pope of his own over the
kingdom of England; and that any man who should presume to take
out of his hands the decision of that question would have as good a
right to take the crown from his head!’...”
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“The struggle between Henry and Anselm was long and obstinate.
The bishop fled to Rome; the king seized the temporalities of his
See. While the contest was still undecided, a papal officer appeared
on the coast announcing himself as legate of the court of Rome,
entrusted with a legatine power over all England from the pope.
But the king held it to be a special prerogative of his crown to
accept or reject at pleasure such interferences with the ordinary
course of ecclesiastical government by a foreign prince; and the
legate was sent away without having been admitted to the presence
of the king. About fifteen years afterwards, the same pope made a
second attempt to introduce a legate-extraordinary into the
kingdom, but with no better success... A third attempt of the same
pontiff was equally unsuccessful. It was indeed, by this time,
pretty well understood that the law and custom of England
repudiated the legative commission, as an illegal interference with
the ordinary course of church government, which the common law
had placed under the superintendence of the sovereign.”
But after the death of the wise and able Henry I., which took place in
1135, the crafty and persevering pope — Alexander III. — was more
successful. In the reign of Stephen, a feeble monarch, a legate from Rome
made his way into our island. The Anglican prelates fully understood the
drift of the movement; and a synod held in London protested, in the face
of the legate, against the presumption of a foreign priest in taking the
presidential chair above archbishops, bishops, abbots, and the assembled
nobility of the whole realm of England. The protest, however, remained
without effect. A timid and time-serving spirit was creeping into the heart
of the Anglican church. The prevailing ignorance of the mass of the people,
the secular character of the clergy, the miserable state of the whole
country, during the reign of Stephen, afforded a favorable opportunity for
the systematic encroachments of the Romanizing party upon the
prerogative of the crown and the liberties of the national church. The
Anglo-Norman bishops at the time were barons rather than prelates, their
palaces were castles, their retainers vassals in arms: almost all were
wearing arms, mingling in war, and indulging in all the cruelties and
exactions of war. Such were the prelates of England when Henry II.
ascended the throne in 1154. The opposition of Becket to this rich and
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powerful king, throws a clearer light on the secular ambition of Rome than
any of the conflicts we have yet recorded.

THOMAS A. BECKET AND HENRY II

The birth and parentage of Becket are unknown. The obscurity of his
origin was probably concealed by his biographers. But some Jay that he
was born about the year 1119. According to Du Pin he commenced his
studies in London and finished them in Paris, the best school for Norman
French.
Soon after his return to England, he was strongly recommended to
Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, who employed him in the
management of his affairs. Becket was now on the high road to preferment.
Theobald, who suspected that the young king Henry was tainted with his
father’s opposition to the pretensions of Rome, was anxious to place near
his person one who might counteract this perversity. The sagacious
primate had discerned in his archdeacon, not only great abilities for
business, but the elements of a lofty, a determined, and devoted
churchman. Through his recommendation Becket was raised to the dignity
of chancellor. “He was now the second civil power in the realm, inasmuch
as his seal was necessary to countersign all royal mandates. Nor was ii
without great ecclesiastical influence, as in the chancellor was the
appointment of all the royal chaplains, and the custody of vacant
bishoprics, abbacies, and benefices.” But as Thomas a Becket has come
down to us in school and storybooks of English history, as a saint and a
martyr, let us briefly glance at him, in the first place, as a man of the
world.

THOMAS A BECKET AS CHANCELLOR A.D. 1158

By the affability of his manners, the apparent pliancy of his disposition,
the acuteness of his senses, and the attractions of his person, he soon
gained the confidence and affections of the king. He made him his constant
companion in all his amusements and pleasures; but it was in the graver
affairs of government that Henry derived great advantage from the wisdom
and prudence of his chancellor. His abilities, it is said, as an accomplished
courtier, as a superior military leader, and as a practiced statesman, were
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unrivalled. To the reader of the present day, an ecclesiastic, who held a
number of clerical benefices, being a brave military general, sounds
unaccountably strange. But such was the far-famed saint. One of his
biographers remarks, “In the expedition made by King Henry to assert his
right to the dominions of the Counts of Toulouse, Becket appeared at the
head of seven hundred knights who did him service, and foremost in every
adventurous exploit was the valiant chancellor. At a period somewhat
later, he was left to reduce certain castles which held out against his
master, and often distinguished himself for valor and personal prowess: he
returned to Henry in Normandy at the head of twelve hundred knights and
four thousand horsemen, raised and maintained at his own charge.”
Another observes, “Who can recount the carnage, the desolation, which he
made at the head of a strong body of soldiers? He attacked castles, razed
towns and cities to the ground, burned down houses and farms without a
touch of pity, and never showed the slightest mercy to any one who rose
in insurrection against his master’s authority.”1
Grave and serious churchmen, even in those days, would no doubt mourn
over such things in the Archdeacon of Canterbury; but the practice was
too common to excite much surprise. Secular dignity, alas! had become the
grand object of ambition with nearly all the clergy, so that many more
would be found to admire the course of Becket, than to grieve over it. His
wealth, magnificence, and power, exceeded all precedent. He was king in all
but name. The world, it was said, had never seen two friends so entirely
one. But like the friendship of the world, or of two selfish, ambitious,
unscrupulous men, it lasted just as long as it served their interests. This
we shall now see and in a way which has been seldom witnessed.

THOMAS A BECKET ARCHBISHOP

OF CANTERBURY A.D. 1162
About a year after the death of Theobald, Becket was by the King named,
Archbishop of Canterbury and primate of all England. Before his elevation
to the throne, he had feigned to be wholly devoted to the interests of his
royal master; but from the moment that his election had been made known
to Alexander III., and especially after their meeting at the Council of
Tours, his whole heart and soul became completely changed towards his
sovereign. He returned from Tours to Canterbury, the professed, the
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inflexible, vassal of Rome, an enemy to his king and the laws of his
country. Such was, and is, and ever must be, the spirit of popery. The
intentions of the King to limit the growing power of the church were well
known to Becket, who had presided in his privy council. But these
intentions must be opposed at all costs; and thus the battle began.
The pretensions of the sacerdotal order as a separate caste of mankind,
from the highest to the lowest, had become extremely perplexing to the
civil government, and a great obstruction to its administration. The church
demanded complete exemption from the control of secular law. It was
boldly maintained, that the persons and property of the clergy should be
placed beyond the reach of the ordinary tribunals, responsible only to
their own superiors, and directly subject in life and property to the
decrees of Rome. But lawlessness leads to violence; and the result of this
papal aggression in England was a fearful increase of crime, to the
immenent peril of the life and property of the subject. “For example,”
says our barrister, “it was proved that, since the commencement of the
reign of Henry II., no fewer than a hundred murders had been committed
by clerks in orders with almost absolute impunity. Rape, arson, robbery,
theft, were excused or sheltered under the frock of the priest or the cowl of
the monk; no penalties known to the Canon law existed adequate to the
repression and punishment of crimes of so deep a dye; and King Henry
was at length driven to put the significant question, ‘Whether the ancient
laws and customs of the realm were to be observed or not.’”
The King, determined to bring these great questions to an issue, summoned
a parliament at Westminster, and demanded a plain answer to his question.
The answer given by the clergy to the King’s question was that the ancient
laws and customs of the realm ought to be observed and kept, “saying
always the privileges of their order.” This reply, although it had the
appearance of an evasion, was really a refusal. The King, in a state of great
consternation, broke up the assembly, left London, and began to deprive
Becket of his power, and of the privilege and honor of educating his son.
The bishops taking alarm, knowing the pride and power of Henry,
entreated their primate either to withdraw or change the offensive answer.
But he at first declared that if an angel from heaven should counsel such
weakness, he would hold him accursed. He at length, however, yielded:
some say through the influence of Pope Alexander, as Henry had
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threatened not to pay Peter’s pence. And thus, all through the long
quarrel, the pope sided with the king when he needed money, and with
Becket when he could do without it.

THE CONSTITUTIONS OF CLARENDON

But, having received an answer in the affirmative from the hierarchy, the
king summoned a great council of the realm to Clarendon, a royal palace
near Salisbury, to ratify the concession. The King’s object was peace. The
law of the land was everywhere set at defiance by the church, the exercise
of justice interrupted, and the country threatened with an internecine war.
The King had the laws and customs drawn up in due legal form to be
signed by the lay barons and bishops, in the hope of settling the contest
between the crown and the church. Whether from fear of the King’s rage,
or from policy, or treachery, it is difficult to say; but the archbishop took
the oath and signed the celebrated “Constitutions of Clarendon.” He
was followed by the rest of the bishops. They thus escaped out of the
hands of the King and the barons. But it is perfectly plain that Becket
never for a moment intended to obey the laws which he had so solemnly
sealed and sworn to keep to the King’s honor. He knew his remedy for the
basest perjury. Not a moment was to be host; he made known to the:
pope what he had reluctantly done; and within a month he received a
formal condemnation of the “Constitutions,” with letters “absolving him
from all engagements contrary to the canons, and a mandate to all the
bishops and prelates of the kingdom without scruple to break through any
promises of the like nature they might have contracted.”
Could perjury be more deliberate, or dissimulation more coolly
perpetrated? And that by one who stood highest in the church and nearest
to the person of his royal master? The heart sickens as the pen transcribes
such daring unblushing wickedness. Surely there is no iniquity so great as
that which cloaked itself under the name of Jesus, and of Christianity.
Such revelations give us the most distressing ideas of the evil spirit of
popery. The worst of crimes towards both God and man are justifiable if
they further the worldly power and greatness of the church. When, and in
what circumstances, we may ask, with such double dealing before us, is
the real papist to be trusted? Thankful we are that we are not his judge,
but God will judge mankind.
 536
“Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the
world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained;
whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath
raised Him from the dead.” (Acts 17:31.)
The archbishop, who had won the confidence, and made himself familiar
with every feeling of the King’s heart, kept the pope fully informed of all
that passed between them; so that he well knew when to humor the King
and when his zealous minister. But surely this is the basest of all treachery
on the part of a servant, and the most unrighteous conduct on the part of
his spiritual guide. But no man can serve two masters. He must be traitor
to one; and so it was in the case before us; and one of the darkest
complexion on record. No sooner had the primate appended his seal to the
“Constitutions of Clarendon,” than Alexander had notice both of his
repentance and his renunciation. “The poison was no sooner swallowed
than the antidote was at his lips.”2

THOMAS A BECKET OPPOSES THE KING

War was now publicly declared between the prerogative of the crown and
the pretensions of the church. The same battle, which was fought between
Henry IV. of Germany and Gregory VII., was to be fought over again on
English ground by the King and the archbishop. Becket resigned the
chancellorship and returned the seals of his office. He withdrew from the
pleasures of the court, the chase, the banquet, the tournament, the war,
and the board of council; and became all at once an austere and mortified
monk. He wore a monk’s frock, a haircloth shirt, and flogged himself with
an iron scourge. All his fine establishments were broken up; he fasted on
bread and water, lay on the hard floor, and every night with his own hands
he washed the feet of thirteen beggars. This assumed unapproachable
sanctity was his strength for battle. Secular hands may not touch the holy
man of God — the Lord’s anointed high priest. Becket knew his man; he
had studied every fold of his character.
Henry was astonished, uneasy, disappointed. He had raised his favorite
minister to the still higher position of Archbishop of Canterbury, that his
services might be more effectual against the Romanizing party in England.
It was no question, be it observed, as to the proper legal privileges of the
 537
church of England; Henry had shown no disposition to encroach upon
them. But the church had shown, through the instructions of the pope, the
most resolute purpose to encroach on the liberties of the crown and the
whole people of England. And the King knew no man in all his dominions
so able to contend in talent and acuteness with the emissaries of Rome as
his gay chancellor and boon-companion.
Now, he thought, we have one at the head of the Church, as well as the
State, who will do good battle for the liberties of the crown and the people
of his native land. But it was not for these worthy objects that Becket had
accepted the ring and crosier. From the moment that he touched his
episcopal crucifix, he was the sworn vassal to death of the Roman See, and
the avowed enemy of every man and principle that opposed the interests
of the chair of St. Peter. And Henry soon found that his able and pliant
chancellor, “from whom he had expected support and victory, had turned
against him with the most ruthless animosity, and pushed the pretensions
of Rome to a pitch they had never reached before.”3

THE PERPLEXITY OF THE KING

It is not difficult to suppose with what feelings the proud and injured
Plantagenet received the news of his primate’s behavior. Besides
possessing wealthand power above any monarch of his time, he was a man
of great ability, decision, and activity. After various but fruitless attempts
to bring the refractory priest to repentance, orders were given that he
should be tried as a traitor. Becket, knowing the temper and power of
Henry, reasonably concluded that his best chance of personal safety lay in
immediate flight. He was received by the King of France, not as a fugitive,
but as a distinguished guest worthy of all honor. The archbishop was now
proclaimed a traitor; his personal friends and relations and friends were
banished; and severe measures were adopted to prevent communications
with his partisans in England. Becket, in retaliation, excommunicated all
his opponents. And thus the storm and strife raged for seven long years;
during which time, many sovereigns, popes and anti-popes, prelates and
dignitaries of every kind, were mixed up with it. But into that maze of
falsehood, treachery, and unrighteousness, we must not follow.
 538
Having examined with some care the great questions of Church and State
— and not without a measure of national interest — which led to this
unseemly contest, we feel that our work is done. The details of these
seven years would be tedious and unprofitable to read, and most painful to
write. The worst passions of our fallen human nature were abundantly
displayed. Besides, such disputes can have no termination unless it be in
the death of the priest or the submission of the King. According to papal
principles the priest can never be wrong and can never yield.
This was Becket’s ground, and he inflexibly maintained it. But at last,
through the intercession of the French king and the pope, he was allowed
to return from his exile. The sincerity of Henry he much doubted, but his
return he considered a glorious triumph over the King. He was as haughty
and unyielding as ever. He demanded the immediate restitution of the
estates of his See, and peremptorily refused to absolve the bishops and
others whom he had excommunicated.
As from the beginning of the strife, his bearing was insulting and defiant.
The conduct of Becket since his return was detailed to Henry by the
bishops who implored his protection for themselves and the clergy of the
realm. One of them incautiously said, “So long as Thomas lives, you will
never be at: peace.” The King’s mind was greatly troubled and sought
relief. Chafed to madness by the unconquerable firmness and arrogance of
Becket, the secret wish of his heart burst from his lips — “I am an
unhappy prince: will none revenge me on a single insolent priest, who
gives me so much trouble, and endeavors by every means to make void my
royal authority?”

THOMAS A BECKET ASSASSINATED A.D. 1171

It is by no means certain that there was any deadly purpose in the mind of
the King when he uttered these hasty words, but those around him put
their own interpretation upon them. Four knights, chamberlains of the
King, fierce and warlike men, resolved on the desperate service. Reginald
Fitz-Urse, William de Tracy, Hugh de Morville, and Reginald Brito,
disappeared from the court, then at Bayeux. Fearing the intention of the
absent knights, the King despatched with all speed the Earl of Mandeville
with orders to arrest the primate, and to recall the four knights. But the
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murderers hurried across the channel, and before the King’s messengers
could overtake them, the archbishop was assassinated.
The particulars of this dark deed of blood are well-known to most of our
readers, and need not be dwelt upon here. But we may add, as well-
authenticated history, that it does not appear that the four knights had
deliberately determined on the murder of the primate without first
endeavoring to obtain a promise of obedience to the King, and to absolve
the bishops. Hence they entered his chamber unarmed. But their imperious
demands, and his haughty defiant answers, roused the worst passions of
those feudal lords, who had a strong sense of the subject’s allegiance to the
sovereign. They became furious, rushed out and called for their arms. The
gates were closed behind them. It was some time before they could break
in. Every one knew what must follow. The archbishop might have escaped
but he would not; the victory was already his, it would be greater if he
were martyred. The bell was toiling for vespers. He walked into the church
in solemn state with his crosier carried before him. The noise of armed men
was heard in the cloister; the affrighted monks fled. “Where is the traitor?”
shouted one; no answer. “Where is the archbishop?... Here I am,” he
answered. Again the knights demanded the absolution of the bishops, and
an oath of allegiance to the King. He refused. A fierce altercation followed,
which ended in blows, and the archbishop was slain at the altar. The
murderers fled, first to Rome to do penance, then to Jerusalem, where,
according to the pope’s orders, they spent the remainder of their days in
penitential austerities.

THE HUMILIATION OF HENRY II

The King was greatly troubled on hearing the appalling news of the
sacrilegious murder. A feeling of horror ran through Christendom, and the
King was branded as an irreligious tyrant, and Becket was worshipped as a
martyred saint. His death was attributed to the King’s direct orders. For
three days and nights the unhappy monarch shut himself up in solitude,
and refused all food and comfort, till his attendants began to fear for his
life. At the close of his penance he sent envoys to the pope to clear
himself of all participation in the crime. Alexander was so indignant at
first, that he would listen to nothing, or even permit the execrated name of
the King of England to be uttered in his presence. He threatened to
 540
excommunicate the King by name, and to pronounce with the utmost
solemnity an interdict on all his dominions. “Mediators, however, were
always to be found,” says Greenwood, “for a proper consideration at the
papal court. Certain cardinals were cautiously sounded, and found not
inaccessible to the arguments with which the envoys were, as usual,
abundantly supplied. Thus introduced, the pope permitted himself to be
propitiated.” Terms of reconciliation were talked of; but the pope had now
his foot on the King’s neck and he was determined to have papal terms
before he relieved him. His personal triumph over the headstrong King was
as complete as could be desired.
Two cardinals were despatched by Alexander with legatine power to meet
Henry in Normandy, inquire more fully into the whole case, and
substantiate the King’s penance. Henry swore on the Gospels that he
had neither commanded nor desired the death of Becket; that he had not
grieved so deeply over the death of his father or his mother; yet he
confessed that words uttered in his anger against that holy man might
possibly have led to his death; for which cause he was prepared to do
penance as the pontiff might see fit to exact. The Holy See then demanded
and Henry stipulated:
“1. To maintain two hundred knights at his own cost in the Holy
Land.
2. That within three years he would take the cross in person, unless
released by the Holy See.
3. To abrogate the Constitutions of Clarendon, and all bad customs
introduced during his reign.
4. That he would reinvest the church of Canterbury in all its rights and
possessions, and pardon and restore to their estates all who had
incurred his wrath in the cause of the primate.
5. That he, and his son Henry the younger, would hold, preserve, and
keep the crown of England faithful to Pope Alexander and his
successors, and that they and their successors would not regard
themselves as true kings until they — the pope and his successors —
should have acknowledged them as such.”
 541
Having duly sealed and attested the formal deed, the King was reconciled
to the pope in the porch of the church, on May 22, 1172; but he was not
yet out of the hands of the inexorable priests; his degradation was not yet
complete.
The clergy preached from their pulpits, and the people were ready enough
to believe, that certain family trials which befel the King about this time
were the judgments of God for the persecution of His saint. The people
were also led to believe that the saint had been fighting the battles of the
poor against the rich — especially of the poor and oppressed Saxons
against the cruel and avaricious Normans. Depressed by misfortunes,
accused of complicity with the murderers, and haunted by superstitious
fears, the unhappy prince was prepared to make a full atonement for his
sins. Nothing short of a public humiliation, he was assured, could appease
offended heaven and the martyred saint. The scenes of Canosa must be
enacted over again. Such is the true spirit of the relentless priesthood of
Rome. If they cannot shed the blood of their victims, they will force him
to drink the bitterest dregs of humiliation.

THE PENANCE OF HENRY AT THE TOMB

OF BECKET A.D. 1174
About three years after the death of Becket, the King visited his tomb at
Canterbury. When he came within sight of the church where the
archbishop lay buried, he alighted from his horse, and for three miles
walked in the habit of a pilgrim with bare and bleeding feet along the rough
road. He threw himself prostrate before the tomb of the now canonized
saint. After lying in that position for a considerable time he prayed to be
scourged by the monks; an operation which they were not unwilling to
perform. So, from one end of the church to the other, the pride of the
monks was gratified, by each one inflicting a few stripes on the back of the
haughty Norman. He then passed all that day and night without any
refreshment, kneeling upon the bare stones.
The triumph of the spiritual over the temporal power, in the person of the
King, and well nigh over the law of the land, was complete. And thus the
ambitious purposes of the papacy were better served by the death of their
champion than they could have been by a prolongation of his life.
 542
REFLECTIONS ON THE CLOSE OF THE GREAT STRUGGLE
By way of helping the reader to form a fair judgment on this long and
bitter contest, we offer a few reflections. Nothing, we believe, can give the
protestant reader so just an estimate of the real spirit of popery as a
history of its ambitious designs, and its unscrupulous means of attaining
them.
If we inquire, What was the real object of the great and tragic struggle,
what answer can be given? Was it for the spiritual liberties of the church of
God, that she might be privileged to worship and serve Him according to
the teaching of His holy word? Had the primate or the pope in view, the
civil and religious liberties of individual Christians, or the welfare of
mankind at large? Or did they even raise the voice of remonstrance against
the King or his court for their open and flagrant violation of the laws of
God, and warn them of judgment to come? All who have taken pains to
examine the details of the controversy must admit, however sorrowfully,
that none of these worthy objects had any place in their thoughts. Their
object was one, and only one — priestly power! Every thing — truth,
Christianity, the peace of the church, the peace of the nation, to say
nothing of the glory of Christ, or the realities of eternity — all were
sacrificed on the altar of the deified claims of the clergy. Becket was the
representative of these claims. He demanded for the persons and property
of the clergy an absolute inviolable sanctity. “From beginning to end,”
says Milman, “it was a strife for the authority, the immunities, the
possessions of the clergy. The liberty of the church was the exemption of
the clergy from law; the vindication of their separate, exclusive, distinctive
existence from the rest of mankind. It must be acknowledged by all, that if
the King would have consented to allow the churchmen to despise all law
— if he had not insisted on hanging priests guilty of homicide as freely as
laymen — he might have gone on unreproved in his career of ambition; he
might unrebuked have lived in direct violation of every christian precept of
justice, humanity, conjugal fidelity; extorted without remonstrance of the
clergy any revenue from his subjects, if he had kept his hands from the
treasures of the church.”
Such is the solemn and weighty judgment of a church dignitary, who will
not be accused of prejudice against his own class, but whose criticisms are
 543
considered most valuable and just, as his history is in other respects most
reliable.
We not only agree with all the Dean says, but would add, that no language,
however weighty and solemn, could adequately express the depths of evil
which were sheltered and propagated by the papal system. We speak not
thus, be it observed, of the Catholic church, or rather of the church
eeclesiastically considered as distinct from the papacy; but of the secular
ambition and unscrupulous policy of the popes, especially from the time
of Hildebrand. But there have been, notwithstanding, during the darkest
period of her history, many dear saints of God in her communion, who
knew nothing of the evil ways of the bishop of Rome and his council. This
the Lord Himself intimates, in His address to Thyatira. “But unto you I
say, and unto the rest in Thyatira, as many as have not this doctrine, and
which have not known the depths of Satan.” Here we find a believing
remnant connected with a system which is characterized by “the depths of
Satan.” (Revelation 2:24.)
Before taking our leave of this already long story, we would further add,
that the tragical death of Becket was immediately and diligently improved
by the disciples of his school. Biographies and memoirs of the martyr, we
are informed, were multiplied and scattered abroad with surprising
industry. The strong element of idolatry, which has ever been in the
church of Rome, now became manifest in England. Pilgrimages to the tomb
of the martyr for the remission of sins became fashionable; and the saint
himself became an object of popular devotion. Pilgrims from all parts
flocked to his shrine, and enriched it with the most costly gifts and
offerings. A large trade was done in articles said to have been in contact
with his person, and were now invested with miraculous virtue. As many
as one hundred thousand pilgrims were. registered on one occasion in
Canterbury. Even Louis VII. of France made a pilgrimage to the wonder-
working tomb, and bestowed on the shrine a jewel which was esteemed the
richest in Christendom. But Henry VIII. dared to pillage the rich shrine,
ordered the saint to be raised, his bones to be burnt, and his ashes to be
thrown to the winds.
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CHAPTER 23
THE THEOLOGY OF THE CHURCH OF ROME

We are now crossing the threshold of the thirteenth century. The great
actors and the stirring times of the twelfth have passed away. The
reflection is a solemn one. Beyond the line that separates the two states of
being, it is well that we cannot pass. And were it not that the agitation of
the twelfth century is really though remotely connected with the great
Reformation of the sixteenth, it would possess but little interest to us in
the nineteenth. But in these men and their times, we see the great currents
of human thought and feeling which had their rise in the monastery, and
their results in the civil and religious liberty which we now enjoy under the
good providence of God.
A new generation, another class of men, now occupy the ground. The
popes, the primates, the emperors, the monks, the philosophers, the
demagogues, with whom we had become familiar, have made room for
others. But whither are they gone? Where are they now? We only ask the
question that we may be led to improve our own day and our own
precious opportunities — that we may not have to lament with the
prophet of old,
“The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.”
(Jeremiah 8:20.)
The right time: has come, we believe, when the witnesses for God and His
truth should have a special place in our history. They come prominently
before us from the dose of the twelfth century. But first of all it may be
well to place before our readers certain theological definitions and usages
of the Roman church at this time, for we shall find that by these the
witnesses were judged, and the papacy gained its power over the lives and
liberties of the saints of God.
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THE SEVEN SACRAMENTS
In the New Testament, where all is plain and simple, we only read of two
sacraments, or divine institutions, as connected with a saved people —
baptism and the Lord’s supper. But in both the Greek and Latin churches
the number had been greatly increased and variously stated by different
theologians. It was no longer a question of divine revelation, but of the
human imagination. Some speak of as many as twelve sacraments; but in
the Western church the mystical number of seven was ultimately
established, as corresponding with the idea of the sevenfold gifts of the
Holy Ghost. And these were — baptism, confirmation, the eucharist,
penance, extreme unction, ordination, and matrimony.1
Thus was the snare laid for the feet of the true followers of Christ. It
mattered not how sincerely a man believed and obeyed the word of God, if
he disregarded the sacraments of the church and her numerous ceremonies,
he exposed himself to the charge and the consequences of heresy. On the
other hand, it: mattered nothing though the word of God was utterly
despised, if obedience to the church was professed. But for all who
followed the Lord according to His word escape was impossible. The net
was widely spread.

TRANSUBSTANTIATION
To attempt an enumeration of all the additions made to the outward
observances of religion would be hopeless. Many new rites, ceremonies,
usages, holidays, and festivals were added from time to time, both by the
pontiffs publicly and by the priests privately. But no priestly invention
ever made such way, or produced such an impression on the popular
mind, as transubstantiation. The dogma nowhere occurs in the writings of
either the Greek or Latin Fathers. The first trace of it is to be found in the
eighth century. In the ninth, a period of great darkness, the monk
Pascasius seems to have given form and definiteness to the monster
superstition. In the eleventh, it was strongly opposed by Berengar of
Tours, and ably defended by Anselm of Canterbury. It continued to be a
subject of contention among the doctors till the fourth Lateran council,
which was held in the year 1215. It was then placed among the settled
doctrines of the church of Rome. By a canon of that council it was
 546
affirmed, that when the officiating priest utters the words of consecration,
the sacramental elements of bread and wine are converted into the
substance of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. “The body and
blood of Christ,” they say, “are contained really in the sacrament of the
altar under the species of bread and wine; the bread being transubstantiated
into the body of Jesus Christ, and the wine into His blood, by the power
of God, through the officiating priest. The change thus effected is declared
to be so perfect and complete, that the elements contain Christ whole and
entire — divinity, humanity, soul, body, and blood, with all their
component parts.”2
From that period, the consecrated bread of the Eucharist received divine
honors. Important changes also were introduced about the same time in the
manner of administering the sacrament. The consecrated wine, it was said,
was in danger of being profaned by the beard dipping into the chalice, from
the sick not being able to swallow it, and from children being likely to spill
it. So the cup was withheld from the laity and the sick; and infant
communion discontinued altogether, at least by the Latins: the Greeks
retained it and still practice it.
The most dreadful superstitions naturally followed the establishment of
the doctrine of transubstantiation. At a certain part of the mass service the
priest elevates the host — the consecrated sacramental wafer — and at the
same instant the people fall prostrate before it in worship. On some
occasions, the wafer is placed in a beautiful casket, and carried in solemn
procession through the streets, every individual, as it passes him, bowing
the knee in token of adoration. In Spain, when a priest carries the
consecrated wafer to a person who is supposed to be dying, he is
accompanied by a man ringing a small bell; and at the sound of the bell all
who hear it are obliged to fall on their knees and remain in that posture as
long as they hear its sound. The priests make the people believe that the
living God, in the form of bread, resides in that casket, and may be carried
from place to place. Surely this is the consummation of all iniquity,
idolatry, and blasphemy; and the exposing of everything sacred to the
ridicule of the profane. It was conceived and cradled in a time of great
ignorance, depravity, and superstition.
 547
Such was and is the daring wickedness of the Popish priesthood; such the
pitiful but guilty blindness of the Romish church! Yet God has suffered it
a thousand years; but a day of reckoning will come when He will judge the
secrets of men’s hearts, not by the standard of a Roman ritual, but by the
gospel of Jesus Christ our Lord.
“For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to
Me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of
us shall give account of himself to God.” (Romans 14:11, 12.)

MARY-WORSHIP
The worship of the Virgin Mary originally sprang from the ascetic spirit
which became so prevalent in the fourth century. Before this period, there
is no trace of the worship of Mary. About the same time — the close of
the fourth century — it was discovered and circulated that there were in
the temple at Jerusalem virgins consecrated to God, among whom Mary
grew up in vows of perpetual virginity. This new doctrine led to the
veneration of Mary as the very ideal of the celibate state, and sanctioned
the profession of religious chastity. Soon after this it became customary to
apply to the virgin the appellation, “Mother of God;” which gave rise to
the Nestorian controversy. But, in spite of all opposition, Mary-worship
prevailed; and, in the fifth century, images and beautiful paintings of the
virgin, holding the infant Jesus in her arms, were placed in all the churches.
Thus introduced, she rapidly rose into an object of direct worship; and
Mariolatry became the ruling passion of the Romish church. The daily
office for Mary, and the days and festivals which had been dedicated to
her honor, were confirmed by Urban II. in the Council of Clermont, A .D .
1095.
Reverence for the blessed virgin was now an established doctrine and
practice in the church of Rome, and has so continued down to the present
day. Romanists may affect to deny that they honor Mary with the
worship due to God only, but in their books of devotion prayers to the
virgin occupy a prominent place. No prayer, we believe, is in more
constant use than the “Ave Maria,” or “Hail Mary,” which, after quoting
a passage from the salutation of the angel Gabriel to the virgin, adds these
words, “Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now, and in the
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hour of death, Amen.” Again, in another prayer, the virgin is thus
addressed, “We fly to thy patronage, O holy Mother of God, despise not
our petitions in our necessities, but deliver us from all dangers, O ever
glorious and blessed Virgin.” Another runs thus, “Hail, holy Queen,
Mother of mercy, our life, our sweetness, and our hope! to thee we cry,
poor banished sons of Eve, to thee we send up our sighs, mourning, and
weeping in this valley of tears; turn, then, most gracious advocate, thine
eyes of mercy towards us,” etc. She is also called, “Ark of the Covenant,”
“Gate of heaven,” “Morning Star,” “Refuge of sinners,” and many other
such terms, which plainly show the idolatrous place which Mary occupies
in the devotions of the Romish church.3
The Rosary, that is, a series of prayers, and a string of beads by which
they are counted — consists of fifteen decades. Each decade contains ten
Ave Marias, marked by small beads, preceded by a Pater Noster, marked
by a larger bead, and concluded by a Gloria Patri. The Romish Breviary
also, the great universal book of devotion, of which every priest must read
a portion each day in private under pain of mortal sin, uses the following
strong language as to the virgin: “If the winds of temptation arise, if thou
run upon the rocks of tribulation, look to the star, call upon Mary. If thou
art tossed on the waves of pride, of ambition, of distraction, of envy, look
to the star, call upon Mary. If anger or avarice, or the temptation of the
flesh toss the bark of thy mind, look to Mary. If disturbed with the
greatness of thy sins, troubled at the defilement of thy conscience,
affrighted at the horrors of the judgment, thou beginnest to be swallowed
up in the gulf of sadness, the abyss of despair, think upon Mary — in
dangers, in difficulties, in doubts, think upon Mary, invoke Mary.” So
completely did the worship of Mary become the worship of Christendom,
that every cathedral, almost every spacious church, had its “Chapel of our
Lady.”
It is surely more than evident from these quotations, that Mary is
addressed as not only an entercessor with her Son, but the first and highest
object of worship. And these are calm and sober specimens compared with
the wild language of a chivalrous adoration, which is to be found in hymns,
psalters, and breviaries. The attributes of Godhead are assigned to her, and
she is represented as the Queen of Heaven, and sitting between cherubim
and seraphim. The dogma of the Immaculate Conception was the natural
 549
result of this growing adoration of Mary. It has been re-asserted as an
article of faith in the Romish church by the present pope, and generally
accepted.

SAINT-WORSHIP
The origin of saint-worship may be considered as coeval with that of
Mary-worship, and the fruit of the same soil. Indeed it is the same thing;
only Mary is raised high above all the host of saints and martyrs because
of her peculiar sanctity and her great influence in heaven.
The veneration that was paid in the early ages of Christianity to those
who had faithfully witnessed and suffered for Christ, no doubt led to the
practice of invoking the saints, and imploring the benefit of their
intercession. A pardonable affection became a superstitious veneration,
and ended in a positive adoration. The step between veneration and
adoration is easy and natural, though not always observable. Hence the
importance of the apostle’s warning, “Little children, keep yourselves
from idols.” According to this word it would appear, that all who have not
the Person of Christ before them, as the one all-governing object of the
heart, have an idol. The apostle has just been speaking of our wondrous
place and blessing in Him; as he says, “We are in Him that is true, even in
His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life.” Having eternal
life in Him, and being identified with Him as to our position before God,
surely He ought to be our one object. Any other is an idol. And the best of
Christians are in danger of paying too much homage to some favorite
teacher or leader. How will all this compare with John’s epistle in the last
great day? The Lord keep us from undue veneration for the creature,
whether living or dead!
A great and influential system arose out of these small beginnings, through
the subtlety of the priesthood, which ultimately brought enormous wealth
to the church. Pilgrimages with their atonement money and free-will
offerings are parts of the system. At an early period it was customary to
perform religious services with peculiar sanctity at the graves of the saints
and martyrs. But as the darkness thickened and the spirit of superstition
increased, this was not enough. In the fourth century splendid churches
were built over their once humble burial-places; and even some supposed
 550
relic of the saint was enshrined in the building erected to his honor. It was
usually affirmed that the body of the miracle-working saint was buried
under the high altar; and that there was a special efficacy in the
intercession of such saints. This drew myriads to their shrines; some to
see wonders done, others to have miracles wrought in their favor, or
receive good to their souls. Pilgrimages soon became the most popular kind
of worship, and as the worshippers were lavish with their oblations —
their hearts being warm and tender — it was greatly encouraged by a
sordid priesthood. During the sixth century an incredible number of
temples arose in honor of the saints, and numerous festivals were
instituted to keep up the remembrance of these holy men.
According to Milman and others, so popular did saint-worship become,
that they were in danger of being overlooked because of their multiplicity,
or rather, infinity. “The crowded calendar knew not what day it could
assign to the new saint without clashing with, or dispossessing, an old one.
The East and the West vied with eacn other in their fertility. But of the
countless saints of the East, few comparatively were received in the West;
and the East as disdainfully rejected many of the most famous, whom the
West worshipped with the most earnest devotion. Still the multiplicity of
the saints bears witness to the universality of the idolatry.” Rivalry of
church with church, of town with town, of kingdom with kingdom, of
order with order, kept up a state of excitement for centuries, in order to
attract the concourse of worshippers to the shrine of their patron saint.
The: fame of some new celebrated saint, such as St. Thomas of
Canterbury, drew away, for a time, the traffic and profit from other
places. Hence the necessity of creating some fresh excitement by fresh
discoveries of that which would turn the tide in favor of the new shrine.
Even while we write — September, 1873, most sorrowful to say, nearly a
thousand pilgrims from England are on their way, not with naked feet as of
old, to Paray-le-monial, in France; there to bow down before the shrine of
the “Sacred Heart,” in honor of the blessed Mother, Margaret Mary
Alacoque. This is a surprise to all, and awakens deep thoughts in many
minds as to its real object in the mind of the papacy. Professedly of course
it is for the good of the pilgrims’ souls, the honor of the saint, and the
triumph of the church. If we go as far back as the days of Origen, who was
the first to inculcate saint-worship; or to the shrine of Martin of Tours,
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which was the most popular in the fourth and fifth centuries; and come
down to the present day, we have about fourteen hundred years of saint-
worship and pilgrimages both in the Greek and Latin churches. No wonder
that the Mahometans concluded that all Christians were idolaters.
Most of us have been familiar with the names of what may be called
universal saints, such as the early fathers and the patron saints of
kingdoms; but to discover on a closer search the extent of this idolatry is
truly appalling. Throughout the extent of Roman Christendom there is to
every country, community, and individual, an intercessor with Christ, who
is the One Great Intercessor between God and man. Many Catholics chose
their patron saint from their birthday — the saint’s day on which they
were born. The saint is regarded as the peculiar protector of the individual,
community, or country; so that scarcely less than divine power and divine
will are assigned to the patron saints. The argument is that, having been
human, and still possessed of human sympathies, they are less awful,
more accessible, than Christ, and may exercise their influence with Him for
the benefit of the places and companions of their earthly sojourn. They are
represented however as being changeable, and easily offended. Fruitful
harvests, victory in war, deliverance in affliction, safety in travelling, and
the like mercies, are attributed to their prayers; but, if there should be
calamities, the saint is supposed to be offended, and must be appeased.
More honor must be paid to his shrine, and more costly offerings must be
laid upon his altar.

RELIC-WORSHIP
The history of relic-worship being similar in its character to that of saint-
worship, a brief notice will be sufficient. Its origin is the same. The
passion, the weakness, it may be, of our nature, for cherishing memorials
of beloved ones, was used by the enemy to betray Christians into the
most degrading kind of worship. If it was argued, our fondness for the
memorials of human affection be so excusable, and so amiable, “how much
more so of objects of holy love, the saints, the blessed Virgin, the Savior
Himself!” But, however specious such reasoning may be, it is neither fair
nor true. The deep delusion, the Satanic power, and the terrible
wickedness of relic-worship, lies mainly in the fact, that the church of
Rome maintains that there is an inherent indefeasible power in relics to
 552
work miracles; and as such they are used and devoutly worshipped, from
the pope down to the lowest in her communion.
As early as the days of Constantine, reverence for the relics of saints and
martyrs had assumed the more definite form of positive adoration. The
Empress Helena, mother of Constantine, in her superstitious zeal to do
honor to the places in Palestine which had been hallowed by the life and
death of the Savior, erected splendid churches over the supposed places of
His birth, His death, and ascension. During the necessary excavations the
Holy Sepulchre, it was affirmed, came to light; and in the sepulcher were
found the three crosses and the tablet, with the inscription originally
written by Pilate in three languages. The news of this wonderful discovery
rapidly spread all over Christendom, and created great excitement. As it
was doubtful to which of the crosses the tablet belonged, a miracle decided
the claims of the true cross. Singularly enough, the nails of the Savior’s
passion were also found in the holy sepulcher. These precious treasures,
we need scarcely say, proved inexhaustible capital for the traffic in relics.
Parts of the true cross were made into crucifixes for the rich, and parts
were enshrined in the principal churches both in the East and the West. So
rapidly did the wood of the cross vegetate, said the wits, that it soon grew
into a forest.
The passion for relics, which had been increasing every century, was
greatly nourished by the crusades. Many saints before unknown, and
relics innumerable, were then introduced to the Christians of the West.
Passing over the vast quantity of old bones of reputed saints and other
smaller relics, which were brought from the East, and became an important
branch of traffic, we notice two or three of the most famous. And chief
amongst these was the “holy vessel” — a green glass cup, said to be an
emerald — brought from Caesarea, and venerated as having been used at
the last supper. Another relic of great fame was the seamless coat of our
Lord said to be found at Argentcull in 1156; and also the holy coat, said to
have been presented by the Empress Helena to the Archbishop of Treves.
We need only further add as a practical illustration of relic-worship, that in
holy week every year the pope and cardinals go in procession to St.
Peter’s at Rome, for the purpose of adoring the three great relics. When
performing the ceremony they kneel in the nave of the church, and the
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relics, which are exhibited from the balcony above the statue of St.
Veronica, consist of a part of the wood of the true cross, one half of the
spear that pierced the Savior’s side, and the holy countenance. This latter
relic is a piece of cloth on which our Lord is said to have miraculously
impressed His countenance, and which ‘was brought to Italy for the cure
of the Emperor Tiberias when afflicted with leprosy. The ceremony takes
place in solemn silence. Outwardly no act of worship is more profound in
the Roman Catholic church. Could folly, we may ask, or absurdity, or
human weakness, or Satanic power, be carried to a greater height? For men
of education, and, in many cases, men of cultivation and piety, to bow
down in profoundest adoration before a piece of rotten wood, a broken
spear, and a painted rag, can only be accounted for on the principle of the
most solemn judicial blindness. Gross darkness has long settled down on
both priest and people through their deliberate concealment of the word of
God and quenching the light of the Holy Spirit. And this must always be
the case, more or less, whether for Catholic or for Protestant, when God
and His word are disregarded, as saith the prophet,
“Give glory to the Lord your God, before he cause darkness, and
before your feet stumble on the dark mountains, and while ye look
for light, he turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross
darkness.” (Jeremiah 13:16.)

PURGATORY
Augustine, bishop of Hippo, is said to be the first who suggested the
doctrine of a middle state, but his opinions are vague and uncertain. It was
not formally received as a dogma of the church of Rome until the time of
Gregory the Great, A .D . 600. He has the reputation of being the discoverer
of the fires of purgatory. In discussing the question of the state of the soul
after death, he distinctly says, “We must believe that for some slight
transgressions there is a purgatorial fire before the day of judgment.” But
as the growth of this doctrine for hundreds of years is extremely difficult
to trace, we will refer at once to the decrees of the Council of Trent, the
great and undisputed authority on the subject.
“There is a purgatory,” says the Council, “and the souls detained
there are assisted by the suffrages of the faithful, but especially by
 554
the acceptable sacrifice of the Mass. This holy council commands
all bishops diligently to endeavor that the wholesome doctrine
concerning purgatory, delivered unto us by venerable fathers and
sacred councils, be believed, held, taught, and everywhere preached
by Christ’s faithful... In the fire of purgatory the souls of just men
are cleansed by a temporary ]punishment, in order to be admitted
into their eternal country, into which nothing that defileth
entereth... The sacrifice of the Mass is offered for those that are
deceased in Christ, not entirely purged.”4
Roman Catholic writers attempt to support this dreadful dogma from
various passages of scripture, but chiefly from the Apocrypha and
tradition. With the two latter we have nothing to do. Anything; men please
may be proved from such uncertain sources; but nothing can be more
daring, and at the same time more futile, than their misapplication of
scripture on this subject. Take two texts as an example:
1. “Thou shalt by no means come out thence till thou hast paid the
uttermost farthing.” (Mattthew 5:26.) Here the Catholics are inconsistent
with themselves; for if venal sins are forgiven in purgatory, the passage
speaks of the uttermost farthing being paid. Surely we cannot speak of a
debt being forgiven, and at the same time paid to the last farthing.
2. “Quickened by the Spirit, by which [clearly, ‘by which Spirit’] also he
went and preached unto the spirits in prison.” (1 Peter 3:18, 19.) This
passage can have no reference to the supposed prison of purgatory, for
those who are guilty of mortal sin do not go there. And, strangely
inconsistent, according to the Douay version of the passage, the
antediluvians were “incredulous,” unbelievers, guilty of mortal sin. And, as
we have seen in our extracts, purgatory is only for “those that are
deceased in Christ, not entirely purged.” The passage also teaches that
Christ did not preach in person. He preached by the Spirit in Noah to the
antediluvians who are now in prison. So little to the point are the texts
alleged in favor of purgatory, that thoughtful Roman Catholics endeavor to
support the dogma by the authority of the church alone.
There is much vagueness with Romish writers, and even with the Council
of Trent, as to where purgatory is, and what it actually is. The general
opinion seems to be, that it is under the earth, and adjoining to hell — that
 555
it is a middle place between heaven and hell, in which the soul passes
through the fire of purification before it enters heaven.
But how material fire can purify a spirit, Catholic writers have been
careful enough not to define. Those in the middle state, says the Council of
Florence, A .D . 1439, are in a place of torment, “but whether it be fire, or
storm, or anything else, we do not dispute.” Still the general voice seems
to be that it is a prison, in which the soul is detained, and tortured as well
as cleansed; and that, not by mental anguish or remorse, but by a real fire,
or what fire produces. And yet so varied are the opinions of their best
theologians, that some have represented the torments as a sudden
transition from extreme heat to extreme cold. But the vague speculations of
Augustine, and the adventurous dogmas of Gregory, were soon
authenticated by dreams and visions. In the dark ages there were many
travelers to those subterranean regions, who inspected and reported the
secrets of purgatory. Take one report as an example, and that the mildest
and the least offensive we can choose.

THE REGION OF PURGATORY

“Drithelm, whose story is related by authorities no less than Bede and
Bellarmine, was led on his journey by an angel in shining raiment, and
proceeded in the company of his guide towards the rising sun. The
travelers arrived at length in a valley of vast dimensions. This region, to
the left, was covered with roasting furnaces, and, to the right, with icy
cold, hail, and snow. The whole valley was filled with human souls, which
a tempest seemed to toss in all directions. The unhappy spirits, unable in
the one part to bear the violent heat, leaped into the shivering cold, which
again drove them into the scorching flames which cannot be quenched. A
numberless multitude of deformed souls were in this manner whirled about
and tormented, without intermission, in the extremes of alternate heat and
cold. This, according to the angelic conductor who piloted Drithelm, is the
place of chastisement for such as defer confession and amendment till the
hour of death. All these, however, will at the last day be admitted to
heaven; while many, through alms, vigils, prayers, and especially the
Mass, will be liberated even before the general judgment.”5 Any one may
see at a glance the intention of this vision. It is skilfully drawn up, so as to
 556
act powerfully on the fears of the serious, to increase the power of the
priesthood, and to secure large legacies for the church.
And is this the place, we may ask, to which holy mother church sends her
pious and penitent children? Yes; and it is only the justified that go there.
Those who die under the guilt of mortal sins go straight to hell, over the
gloomy gates of which is written, “There is no hope.” How dreadful the
thought of purgatory must always be to every devout mind! As an
illustration of this, we may mention that we happen to know at this
moment a young lady who has lately embraced the Catholic religion, or, as
the term is, “gone over to Rome.” She is rigidly devoted to the church,
fresh in her first love, but evidently winces at the thought of purgatory. “I
believe I shall go there,” she will say; “I hope to go; for as I cannot pretend
to be good enough to go straight to heaven when I die, I must pass through
purgatory; but I may not be more than five hundred years there.” There is
no doubt of her being a true Christian, and justified from all things; but
such is the blinding power of Satan through the papal system. We can
only rejoice that ere long they will be happily undeceived, according to
many portions of the word of God; such as —
“Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be
partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.”... “Absent from the
body, present with the Lord.”... ”Today shalt thou be with Me in
paradise.”... “Having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which
is far better.”... “The beggar died, and was carried by the angels into
Abraham’s bosom.”... “Thy sins, which were many, are forgiven.”
(Colossians 1:2; 2 Corinthians 5; Luke 23; Philippians 1; Luke 16:22)
It is perfectly plain from these passages, and many others that might be
quoted, that the same moment the soul of the believer leaves the body it is
present with the Lord in the paradise of God — surely the happiest place
in all heaven. What then can be the object of the Romish church so to
pervert scripture — so to deny the efficacy of the blood of Christ, which
is said to cleanse the believer from all sin? To answer this question, the
mind must comprehend and grapple with the very depths of Satan.
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THE USES MADE OF PURGATORY
Historically, the use which has been made of this Satanic superstition by
the Romish priesthood has been to act upon the fears and affections of
mankind. What would the young lady referred to above, or her fond
parents, not give to save her five hundred years’ torment in that dreadful
abode? Praying souls out of purgatory, by Masses said on their behalf,
became a source of untold treasure to the church. With a rich man dying,
who could not take his wealth with him and who dreaded the torments of
purgatory, the priest could make his own terms. Besides, out of this
superstition arose the scandalous traffic in papal indulgences to mitigate
the pains of the middle passage.
But there is yet another point of wickedness connected with this dogma,
which we wonder the heart of man or of Satall could ever have conceived,
and that is the priest’s authority over his victim after he is dead and
buried. He makes the departing soul believe that it will still be dependent
on his influence, his intervention; that he has the key of purgatory, and
that his doom hangs upon the word from the priest’s lips. Surely these are
the depths of Satan — we tremble as we seek to penetrate them. But lies
they all are; and the most fearful blasphemy for any man to say that the
keys of heaven, hell, and purgatory have been entrusted to him.
“Fear not,” said the blessed Lord to John; “I have the keys of hell [hades]
and of death.” He only has power and authority over the unseen world,
but scripture makes all plain to faith; that God “hath delivered us from the
power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear
Son.” Here it is plainly taught that the believer is not only pardoned and
saved, but that he is now delivered from the whole realm of darkness, and
now translated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son. The language need not
be mistaken; “Who hath” — not who will, or who can — but “Who hath:”
it is true now, and the truth is to be enjoyed now. There is no power but
in the hands of the risen Lord, and no purgatory but His precious blood,
unless it be the washing of water by the word also. “Purge me with
hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.”
(Revelation 1:17, 18; Colossians 1:13; Psalms 51:7; John 13; 15; 1 John 5.)
 558
The Greek Abyssinian, and Armenian churches reject the doctrine of
purgatory in name, but hold it substantially. Prayers and masses are said
for the dead, and incense burned over the graves of the deceased.6

EXTREME UNCTION
Like every false system, popery is glaringly inconsistent with itself.
Falsehood, the mother of lies, is written upon her forehead, though there
may be many honest and godly hearts in her communion. How unlike the
perfect unity of divine truth! Though written by so many different
persons, on so many different subjects, under so many different
circumstances, and in so many different places and ages of the world, yet
we have a perfect whole. Who can fail to see the glories of the cross, the
riches of divine grace, the lost condition of the sinner, and his full
salvation, all through scripture; for example, in Abel’s lamb, Noah’s ark,
and in the cleansing of the leper? But in passing from one sacrament to
another of the Romish system we find the flattest contradictions. ‘Thus it
is with purgatory and extreme unction. If there be any truth in extreme
unction, purgatory is a mere delusion. There can be no such place, and no
need for such a place. The declared object, and the effect of the sacred oil,
according to the Council of Trent, is to wipe away the remains of sins.
The heretic who despises it must go straight to the depths of hell. Thus it
is administered.
“The priest, having entered the house, shall put over his surplice a
violet-covered stole, and present the cross to the sick person, to be
devoutly kissed. Prayers having been recited, and holy water
sprinkled, the priest dips his thumb in the holy oil, and anoints the
sick, in the form of the cross. Beginning with the sense of sight, he
anoints each eye, saying, ‘The Lord, through His holy unction, and
His most gracious compassion, forgive thee whatever sins thou
hast committed by seeing.’ After this manner there are seven
anointtrigs, one for each of the five senses — eyes, ears, nose,
mouth, hands, and the other two are the breast and feet.” After
many prayers and crossings, and the ceremony of burning the cloth
which wiped the oil off the different parts of the anointed body
and the priest’s thumb, the dying man or woman is pronounced in
a fit state to pass with safety to the port of eternal happiness.
 559
This sacrament is never administered while there is any expectation of
recovery to health. It is called extreme because it is the last to be
administered. By means of this so-called infallible sacrament for the dying,
one would naturally expect that purgatory would receive very few
subjects from the church of Rome, so that it must be peopled by
Protestants who despise the priestly ointment, or by those in the Romish
communion who were disqualified to receive the sacrament. But there is
great variety of opinion amongst Romanists on this subject. Some think
that every soul, without exception, from the pope downwards, however
saintly the life may have been, or however properly the last sacrament
may have been administered, must pass through purgatory — that no soul
can pass direct from earth to heaven. They argue that, as no man has
complete control over his thoughts, foolish and even sinful thoughts may
pass through his mind during the administration of extreme unction, or
immediately after it; therefore the soul must pass through the realm of
purgatory on its way to heaven. Of course the sin may be so small that the
detention may be very short. But even a Gregory or a Bernard must be
purified by the fires of purgatory. Alas for the children of Rome! we
would exclaim; they must all be the slaves of the prince of purgatory
before they can taste the liberty and happiness of heaven. How dreadful,
how gloomy, the thoughts of death must ever be! How different from the
thoughts and feelings of the great apostle, when he said, “For to me to live
is Christ, and to die is gain.” If he lived, he lived Christ; he enjoyed the
fullest and sweetest fellowship with Him: if he died, he made a gain upon
that... “Having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ, which is far
better.” Besides, the word of God is positive as to all believers in Christ
Jesus — “Absent from the body, present with the Lord.” (Philippians
1:21-23; 2 Corinthians 5:8.)
The allusion in the New Testament to the ancient practice of anointing
has given the Catholic writers great boldness in pressing the necessity of
this sacrament. But they carefully overlook or conceal the fact, that
scriptural anointing was for the miraculous healing of the body, and the
lengthening of the days of the living. Romish unction is for the soul — a
permanent sacrament for the conveyance of grace, the pardon of sin, the
attainment of salvation, in the hour of death. Apostolic unction was for
the recovery of health; extreme unction is the last preparation for death.
 560
“And they cast out many devils, and anointed with oil many that were
sick, and healed them.”
“Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church;
and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of
the Lord: And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord
shall raise him up.” (Mark 6:13; James 5:14, 15.)
It is not difficult to see how superstition would use such passages for the
accomplishment of its own ends; but it is perfectly plain that the original
anointing was used for the recovery of health in particular persons, and
continued while the gift of healing and the power of working miracles
remained, which probably scarce survived the apostolic age. And extreme
unction, in its present form, was unknown in the church during the first
eleven centuries of her history. It was established during the reign of
ignorance and priestcraft in the twelfth century, and ultimately received
the stamp of the great seal of the Council of Trent.

AURICULAR CONFESSION
The sacraments of the church of Rome being considered necessary to
spiritual life, and at the disposal of the priesthood, necessarily gave them
enormous power. But none of its many sacraments tended to increase the
influence of the priests, or to enslave and lower the morality of the people,
more than auricular confession. From the Emperor to the peasant the
whole heart of every man and woman belonging to the church of Rome
was laid open to the priest. No act, scarcely a thought, at least in the dark
ages, was kept a secret from the father confessor. To conceal or disguise
the truth was a sin to be punished with the most humiliating penance, or,
it might be, with the pains of hell for ever. Before a power so arbitrary, so
irresponsible, so dreaded, who did not tremble? The priests thus became a
kind of spiritual police, to whom every man was bound to inform against
himself. They knew the secrets of all persons, of all families, of all
governments, of all societies, and, of course, how to rule and lay their
plans so as to accomplish whatever they pleased. The conscience, the
moral as well as the religious or spiritual being of man, were in their
power. It was like the seal and consummation of all wickedness and
 561
blasphemy. Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, masters and
servants, were all under their secret, but real, supervision and control.
The power thus gained in the confessional was exercised for the alleged
good of the church — sometimes on granting, delaying, or refusing
absolution, as the case might be. All depended on the ends to be gained by
the church: the most selfish, cruel, and unprincipled use has often been
made of information thus religiously given. We refer especially to the long
protracted cases of dispute and discipline, which never could be settled
until the church had gained the day. Excommunication was a real thing in
those days, and the pope a real antagonist. When Hildebrand thundered a
sentence of excommunication against Henry, released his subjects from
their oath of fealty, and pronounced him deprived of his throne, he found
it a vain thing to fight against the pope, though he was at that time the
greatest sovereign in Europe. He was forced to yield; and in the most
degraded condition, barefoot, and shivering with cold, he humbly
supplicated the inexorable monk to remove the censure of the church, and
reinstate him on his throne. The awful sentence of excommunication cut
the offender off, whatever his rank or station, and as salvation was
considered an utter impossibility beyond the pale of the Romish church,
there was no hope for any one dying under this sentence. Even the body
might be denied a resting-place in consecrated ground, but the soul would
be the prey of demons for ever.

THE ORIGIN OF THE CONFESSIONAL

The history of this innovation is not easily traced, neither is it necessary
for our purpose. The question of private confession, and of priestly
absolution, had often been discussed by the theologians, but no definite
law on the subject was laid down by the church till the beginning of the
thirteenth century. In the year 1215, under the pontificate of Innocent III.,
the practice of auricular confession was authoritatively enjoined by the
fourth Council of Lateran upon the faithful of both sexes at least once a
year. From that time, down to the present day, it has been considered a
positive divine ordinance in the church of Rome. It is also practiced in the
Greek and Coptic churches.
 562
The principal passages of scripture adduced by Romanists on this subject,
are —
“Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another,
that ye may be healed.” (James 5:16)
“Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and
whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.” (John 20:23.)
The first of these passages evidently refers to the mutual confession of
faults on the part of Christians; and the second to church discipline; but
neither certainly to the secret confession of sins into the ear of a priest,
with the view of receiving absolution. The duty, or privilege, of confession
must be admitted by all, Protestants as well as Catholics; but the question
is, to whom ought we to confess? To a priest, or to God? Numerous
passages might be quoted, from both the Old and New Testaments, to
prove that confession of sin is to be made to God. Take one from each.
“And Joshua said unto Achan, My son, give, I pray thee, glory to
the Lord God of Israel, and make confession unto him; and tell me
now what thou hast done; hide it not from me.” (Joshua 7:19)
“I f we sa y t hat we hav e no si n, we d ece ive our sel ves , an d t he
tr uth is not in us. If we con fes s ou r s ins , He is fa ithf ul and jus t
to for giv e u s ou r s ins , an d t o c lean se us from al l
un righ teo usn ess. ”; (1 John 1: 8, 9.)
But the form of confession prescribed by the Romish church to be used
by every penitent at the confessional will best show us its real character.
He must kneel down at the side of his confessor, and make the sign of the
cross, saying, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy
Ghost, “I confess to Almighty God, to the blessed Mary, ever virgin, to
blessed Michael the archangel, to blessed John Baptist, to the holy
apostles Peter, and Paul, to all the saints, and to you, my ghostly father,
that I have sinned exceedingly, in thought, word, mad deed, through my
fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault.” At this point of
the ceremony the penitent specifies his several sins in their details,
without evasion or equivocation; the most indelicate or the most diabolical
are poured into the ear of the priest, whatever he may be. We know what
many of them have been. When the priest has satisfied himself with
 563
details, the penitent goes on — “Therefore I beseech the blessed Mary,
ever virgin, the blessed Michael the archangel, blessed John Baptist, the
holy apostles Peter and Paul, and all the saints, and you, my ghostly
father, to pray to our Lord God for me. I am heartily sorry, purpose
amendment for the future, and most humbly ask pardon of God, and
penance and absolution of you, my ghostly father.”7
The penitent is now in the hands, and entirely at the mercy of the priest.
He may prescribe the most unreasonable penance, or delay his absolution
until his own evil ends are gained. But there we must leave them, and
briefly notice, under the head of Roman Theology, the kindred dogma of

INDULGENCES
The system of papal indulgences, which gradually rose to such heights and
ultimately produced such effects, demands a careful though brief notice. It
has ever been the practice of the evil genius of Rome to introduce by small
beginnings the greatest evils that characterize her history. Imperceptibly,
the thin end of the wedge is introduced by the presiding spirit of her
policy, but when fairly introduced, the whole machinery of Rome is
employed to drive it home. By an apparent respect for the memory of the
dead, and a proper regard for the tokens of their affection, the sin of saint
and relic worship was introduced, which resulted in the most positive and
confirmed idolatry. And so with the whole system of indulgences. The
ecclesiastical corruption, once admitted, remained, increased, and spread
from age to age, until all Christendom was overrun with its wickedness,
and the moral and religious sense of mankind so insulted by the infamous
traffic in indulgences, that a protest was raised and the Reformation
followed.
The chief feature in the new doctrine of indulgences was the discovery of a
resource or treasury in the church, by the application of which sins were
remitted, without the painful or humiliating process of penance, and
without the observance of the sacraments. It was alleged by the deep
contriver of this sweeping dogma, that there was an infinite treasure of
merit in Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the other saints, which was more
than sufficient for themselves. Although the Savior Himself was said to be
the source of all merit, the merits of the saints were also much spoken of,
 564
and this gave rise to the new idea of works of supererogation. By their
works of penance, and by their undeserved sufferings in this world, they
had done more than was necessary for their own salvation; and by these
works of supererogation, with the superabundant merits of Christ, a
treasury was formed, of which the pope possessed the keys, and which he
could apply for the relief of offenders, both in this life and in purgatory.
The power of the keys was thus substituted for the efficacy of the
sacrament.
This is the popish theory of indulgences, but its antiscriptural character
betrays its author. It is glaringly antiscriptural, as it promises remission of
sins without repentance; and, even on Catholic ground, its wickedness is
manifest. It supersedes the penitential exercise of the individual; it
dissolves the whole discipline of the church; it offers for a sum of money
the pardon of all sins committed, a license for sins to be committed; it
gives a written guarantee of deliverance from the pains of purgatory, and
from hell itself. It encourages the most flagrant iniquity with the
profession of Christianity; indeed by this dogma morality was severed
from religion. Could even papal depravity go farther? Men emboldened to
let loose the reins of vice, to follow at large their own evil ways, and then
purchase eternal forgiveness, without any conditions of repentance, for a
piece of money! What a day of reckoning awaits the Jezebel of Rome, and
all the children of her seduction! The Lord preserve His people from her
seductions now!
History places the first formal indulgence issued by the church of Rome in
the early part of the eleventh century, but the system was brought into its
fullest operation by the crusades. Pope Urban II., at Clermont, in the year
1095, proclaimed a plenary indulgence and remission of sins for all who
should share in the holy war. It became customary after this period to
grant indulgences of lesser degrees. Absolution from a hundred years or
more of purgatorial pain might be purchased from a bishop, by repairing or
enlarging a church, by building a bridge, or enclosing his forest; and also for
extra religious duties, such as reciting a certain number of prayers before a
certain altar, pilgrimages to relics, and the like. The pope, according to the
theory of the vatican, is the sovereign dispenser of the church’s treasury,
and this power he dispenses to bishops in their respective dioceses. The
 565
pope may grant indulgences to all Christians; the bishop’s power is
limited to his own diocese.

HISTORY OF INDULGENCES
Thus the system of indulgences prevailed more and more extensively as
time advanced; and although, in consequence of its glaring abuses, some of
the ablest of the schoolmen did not hesitate to express their objections to
the trade that was carried on in the sale of indulgences, others wrote in
favor, and men generally were unwilling to suffer a long course of severe
penance, of unpleasant austerities, when they could obtain immediate
absolution by pecuniary payments, or so much almsgiving to churches or
churchmen. From the earliest period it was the practice of the church of
Rome to impose painful works or sufferings on offenders; when these
were discharged or undergone with humility, they were called
satisfactions; but when the penance was shortened or entirely remitted
because of some consideration in money or good works, this was called an
indulgence. The price was regulated according to the nature of the crime
and the circumstance of the purchaser.
The following curious event, as quoted by Milner from Burnet, will give
the reader a better idea of the extent of this remarkable trade than anything
we could say on the subject, and this happened at a time when, owing to
the Reformation, the sale to a great extent, had decreased. “Burner informs
us, that the scandalous sale of pardons and indulgences had by no means
so completely ceased in popish countries as is commonly taken for
granted. He says, that in Spain and Portugal there is everywhere a
commissary, who manages the sale with the most infamous circumstances
imaginable. In Spain the King, by an agreement with the pope, has the
profits. In Portugal the King and the pope go shares.
“In the year 1709 the privateers of Bristol took a gallion, in which
they found five hundred bales of bulls — or printed pardons in the
name of the pope — for indulgences... and sixteen reams were in a
bale; so that they reckon the whole came to three millions eight
hundred and forty thousand. These bulls are imposed on the
people and sold, the lowest at three ryals, a little more than twenty
pence, but some were as high as about eleven pounds of our
 566
money. All are obliged to buy them against Lent. Besides the
account given of this in the cruising voyage, I have a particular
attestation of it by Captain Dampier.”8
But the reader will be better prepared for this almost incredible statement
if we are spared to continue our history to the period of its occurrence. In
the meantime enough has been said to give him a correct idea of the
foundation, character and effects oil the traffic. The sacrament of
matrimony will come so fully before us in its workings, that we need not
now give it a separate paper. So we shall leave for the present the
painfully interesting subject of Roman theology, or alas! alas! papal
Christianity, and return to our general history.9
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CHAPTER 24
INNOCENT III. AND HIS TIMES A.D. 1198-1216

During the reign of this great pope the Roman See rose to its utmost
height. The thirteenth century is commonly distinguished as the noon-day
of pontifical glory. We have seen the dawn of papal assumption, or
rather the first streaks of dawn, in the bold conceptions of Innocent I. and
Leo the Great in the fifth century. Gregory the Great in the seventh, and
Nicholas and John in the ninth centuries, did much towards laying the
foundations of the great papal scheme; but it was Gregory VII. that raised
the superstructure. The one grand object of this bold, ambitious,
unscrupulous priest, was to restore to papal Rome all that imperial Rome
had lost; and thus to set the chair of St. Peter above all other thrones. But
the daring pope perished in the desperate struggle. Rome was taken, as we
have seen; Hildebrand was compelled to flee, and died in exile at Salerno.
For more than a hundred years after his death, no pope filled the chair who
could complete the work which he had begun. But in the beginning of the
thirteenth century the superior genius of Gregory was surpassed by
Innocent. The bold schemes which the former had planned were fully
executed by the latter. No doubt the conjunction of many circumstances
was favorable, and the powers of his: mind were adapted to the
accomplishment of his grand object; so that he fully obtained what had
haunted the imagination of popes for ages — “sacerdotal supremacy’,
regal monarchy, and dominion over the kings of the earth.” The crowned
priest of Rome now moved with a masterly hand, and with unwearied
application, the whole machinery of popery, that he might maintain and
consolidate the absolute sovereignty of the Roman See. But here, on this
summit, we must pause a little for reflection. Let us endeavor to ascertain
the mind of God on this great religious system, not merely the testimony
of history.
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THE BABYLON OF REVELATION 17
It has been our desire from the commencement of this work, to study
history from a scriptural point of view; but more especially in the light of
the epistles to the seven Apocalyptic churches. The evils which were only
budding then are now full-blown. In Pergamos, we have Balaam teaching
“to commit fornication;” and in Thyatira, we have Jezebel introduced, who
imposed idolatry by force. But these and many other evils we shall now
find concentrated in the cup of the false woman of Revelation 17.
There can be no question, we think, as to what is meant by the symbol
here used. Not only a woman, but a licentious woman, and enthroned
amidst the corruptions of the seven-hilled city.
“And here is the mind that hath wisdom. The seven heads are
seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth.”
Here we have a material point — that which has always characterized
Rome, both in prose and poetry; as one has said, speaking of Arnold of
Brescia, “In the service of freedom, his eloquence thundered over the seven
hills.” Every reader knows what city the historian means by this
description. But the word of God is perfectly plain to “the mind that hath
wisdom.” Rome is clearly indicated, and her religious corruptions are
symbolized by “the mother of harlots.” But why, it may be asked, is she
called Babylon? The term is applied figuratively, we believe, just as Sodom
and Egypt are applied to Jerusalem.
“And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city,
which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord
was crucified.” (Revelation 11:8.)
Besides, the literal Babylon, the Chaldean capital, was built upon a plain
— the plain of Shinar.
These points being fairly disposed of, and Rome fully identified, we
accept Revelation 17, 18 as descriptive of the papacy. The character,
conduct, relationships, and final judgment of this spiritual Babylon, are
here set before us, not by the partial or imperfect pen of history, but by
the Spirit of Truth who sees the end from the beginning. The papal system
as a whole is looked at morally from God’s point of view. This is an
 569
immense point gained to the man of faith. We will now briefly examine
some of its more prominent features.
1. She is seen in vision as “seated upon many waters.” This is
explained by the angel in verse 15 to mean, “Peoples, and multitudes, and
nations, and tongues.” The figure implies that this false woman, or the
corrupt religious system of Rome, exercises a soul-ruining influence over
all these multitudes, nations, and tongues. But God sees it all — marks it
all: her evil history is written in heaven.
2. She is represented as having intercourse of the most seductive,
licentious character with all classes. “With whom the kings of the earth
have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been
made drunk with the wine of her fornication.” What a state of things for
that which professedly bears the fair name of Christ! The term
“fornication,” as here used, means, we have no doubt, the seducing power
of the Romish system in drawing away the affections from Christ, who is
the only true object of faith for the heart. The priest comes in between the
heart and the blessed Lord; the Bible is concealed; the mind of God is
unknown; the people are intoxicated with her exciting falsehoods; and
worship they know not what. The whole earth is corrupted with the wine
of her fornication. But her end, her fearful end, speedily draws near, “For
her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her
iniquities. Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her
double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her
double.”
3. She is next seen as ruling and directing the civil power. “And I
saw a woman sit upon a scarlet-colored beast, full of names of blasphemy,
having seven heads, and ten horns.” Whether it be the resuscitated Roman
empire (Revelation 13), or the different kingdoms which arose from the
ruins of its imperial unity, or all governments and principalities of the
earth, the woman swayed her scepter, or rather her blood-stained sword,
over them all as her divinely given domain. The purple of the Caesars was
claimed by the popes, the imperial eagles were exchanged for the cross-
keys, and his Holiness proclaimed a universal monarch. And this new
mistress of the world was not so in name only. She clothed with new
power her ancient name. Rome imperial never inspired such terrors by its
 570
arms, as Rome papal by her anathemas. “Christendom,” as one has said,
“through all its extended realms of mental and moral darkness, trembled
while the pontiff fulminated excommunications. Monarchs quaked on their
thrones at the terror of papal despotism, and crouched before his spiritual
power like the meanest slave. The clergy considered the pope as the
fountain of their subordinate authority, and the way to future promotion.
The people, immersed in gross ignorance and superstition, viewed his
supremacy as a terrestrial deity, who wielded the temporal and eternal
destinies of man. The wealth of nations flowed into the sacred treasury,
and enabled the successor of the Galilean fisherman and head of the
christian commonwealth, to rival the splendor of Eastern pomp and
grandeur.”1 The extent of her dominions too far exceeded the widest
conquests of the empire. Many nations that had escaped the iron grasp of
Rome imperial were held beneath the yoke of Rome papal. This we have
seen in our history of the religious wars of Charlemagne. Some have
reckoned them as Ireland, the north of Scotland, Sweden, Denmark,
Norway, Prussia, Poland, Bohemia, Moravia, Austria, Hungary, with a
considerable part of Germany. These, we are told, were gathered as sheep
into the fold of the shepherd of Rome by such missionaries as Boniface;
but in God’s account they were ellslaved by the tyranny and usurpation
of the great corruptress.
4. But there is more than her sitting by the many waters and sitting
on the beast. She is full of idolatries and the uncleanness of her
fornication. “And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and
decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in
her hand full of the abominations and filthiness of her fornication.” In spite
of all her outward glory — that which the world counts precious and
beautiful, she is in God’s sight as a licentious woman with a gorgeous cup
full of all abominations. We have already seen her tenacious love of images,
which is here referred to by the term “abominations.”
5. Her great, flaunting, and exclusive pretensions to the truth of
God. “And upon her forehead was a name written, Mystery, Babylon the
Great, the Mother of harlots and Abominations of the Earth.” This is the
gravest and weightiest of Rome’s sins; the awful counterfeit of Satan, and
the basest of all her hypocrises. Of the true, the heavenly mystery we
thus read,
 571
“This is a great mystery,” says Paul, “but I speak concerning
Christ and the church.” (Ephesians 5:32.)
But in place of subjection to Christ and faithfulness to Him, she — like an
abandoned shameless woman — corrupts by her foul embrace the great
ones of the earth. Nor is this all. She is a mother — the mother of harlots;
she has many daughters. Every religious system in Christendom, that
tends in any measure to lead souls away from Christ, to engage their
affections with objects that come between the heart and the Man in the
glow, is related to this great parent of spiritual iniquity.
6. Her insatiable thirst for the blood of God’s saints. “And I saw the
woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the
martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.”
This strange sight — a woman — a religious community, professing to be
the true spouse of Christ, drunken with the blood of the martyrs, the
saints of God, fills the mind of the apostle with great amazement. Nor
need we wonder. But we shall soon have to see this strange sight, not in
vision only but in unprecedented reality. Innocent III. was the man who
declared war on the peasants of the south of France, and turned the sword
of the notorious Simon de Montfort against the well-known Albigenses
and Waldenses, and that under the pretense of doing the will of Christ,
and acting by His authority.
From verse 7, we have the explanation which the angel gives of the vision,
and the awful doom of Babylon from the hand of both man and God,
down to the close of chapter 18. But as we are not interpreting, we need
not pursue the solemn theme of these chapters any farther. We can now
tread ill the dark blood-stained footsteps of the historian in the light of
holy scripture.2

INNOCENT AND THE KINGS OF THE EARTH

The different features or characteristics of Babylon which the Spirit of
God has distinctly shown us in these chapters, and which are most hateful
to Him, we shall find most fully displayed in the history of this pontiff.
But both reader and writer have to watch against the spirit of Babylon
creeping into our own hearts. We are not to suppose that it is confined to
popery, though there it is publicly enthroned and will be publicly dealt
 572
with in judgment. Unless we are gathered around the rejected Jesus, and
walking with Him in the fellowship of His sufferings and in the hope of
His glories, we are in danger of being caught in the snare. Men, christian
men, too often connect the present enjoyment of prosperity and pleasure
in the world with the name and sanction of Christ. This is the very essence
of Babylon — the unhallowed mixture of Christ and the world, of heaven
and earth. He who professes faith in a rejected Christ, and yet has his
heart in the world that rejected Him, is deeply imbued with the spirit of
Babylon. It is like one truly espoused to the Prince of heaven, and yet
listerling to the flatteries and accepting the favors of the prince of this
world. And do we not see, alas! everywhere, the indulgence of worldly
desires with the profession of the name of the Lord? This is the
inconsistency, the confusion, which is so offensive to God, and which He
will judge in so awful a manner. May the Lord keep us from ever seeking
to mingle the cross and the heavenly glory of Christ with this present evil
world.
The spirit of popery is all for this world with the highest pretensions of
being all for Christ. “I sit a queen,” she says, “and am no widow, and shall
see no sorrow.” Dominion has ever been her one desire — . dominion over
Church and State, over sea and land, over the souls and bodies of men,
with power to open and shut the gates of heaven and hell as she pleased.
So thought Innocent, and so he acted as we shall now see.
Lothario de’Conti was the original name of Innocent. He was of the
house of the Counts of Segni, one of the great Roman families. Under the
tuition of his two uncles, the Cardinals of St. Sergius and St. Paul, the great
natural abilities of Lothario gave promise of that kind of distinction which
his friends and relatives most desired. He afterwards acquired great fame
for learning in the schools of Rome, Bologna, and Paris; but canon law was
his favorite study. At the death of Celestine III. he was duly elected to the
vacant chair, and consecrated February 22nd, 1198, at the early age of
thirty-seven. The cardinals saluted him by the name of Innocent in
testimony of his blameless life.
 573
INNOCENT’S VIEWS OF THE POPEDOM
A few extracts from the inauguration sermon, and other writings of
Innocent, will give the reader the best idea of popish, or Babylonish
pretensions. The unmeasured assertion of his dignity, with the loudest
protestations of humility, betrays the real spirit of the pope. Thus he
spoke out: “Ye see what manner of servant that is whom the Lord hath set
over His people; no other than the vice-gerent of Christ, the successor of
St. Peter. He is the Lord’s anointed; he stands in the midst between God
and man; below God, above man; less than God, more than man. He judges
all, he is judged by none, for it is written, ‘I will judge.’ But he whom the
preeminence of dignity exalts, is lowered by his office of a servant that so
humility may be exalted, and pride abased; for God is against the high-
minded; and to the lowly he showeth mercy: and he who exalteth himself
shall be abased.” He also discovers the popedom in the Book of Genesis.
“The firmament,” he says, “signifies the church. As the Creator of all
things hath set in the heavens two great lights, the greater to rule the day,
the lesser to rule the night, so also hath He set up in the firmament of His
church, two great powers: the greater to rule the souls, the lesser to rule
the bodies of men. These powers are the pontifical and the royal: but the
moon, as being the lesser body, borroweth all her light from the sun; she is
inferior to the sun both in the quantity and quality of the light she sends
forth, as also in her position and functions in the heavens. In like manner
the royal power borrows all its dignity and splendor from the pontifical, so
that the nearer it approaches the greater light, the more are its rays
absorbed, and its borrowed glories eclipsed. It was moreover ordained that
both these glories should have their fixed and final abode in this our land of
Italy, inasmuch as in this land dwelleth, by and through the combined
primacy of the empire and the priesthood, the entire foundation and
structure of the christian faith, and with it a predominant principality over
both!”3
The reader will have no difficulty in gathering from these statements,
though clothed in metaphor, the high pretensions of the papal scheme, as
matured in the mind of this celebrated pontiff. He unmistakably affirms,
that all earthly dominion is simply derived from the pope; that all kings
and princes of this world are his subjects and servants; and that universal
dominion is his.
 574
INNOCENT AND THE CITY OF ROME
Like a wise man, he commenced his great life-work by reforming his own
household. Rigid simplicity was established in the place of courtly luxury.
The multitude of nobles and high-born pages who lately thronged the
palace were dismissed, but with handsome presents which retained them
as friends, and secured their services on occasions of high ceremony. The
citizens, who were clamorous for the donative with which they had been
usually gratified at the commencement of every new reign, he did not
forget, and thus secured the favor of the multitude. He combined with the
boldness of Gregory VII. the politic caution and patience of Alexander III.
He knew the Romans and how to manage them. They have the worst
character of any people in history. Hear the evidence of St. Bernard in
writing to the pope, “Why should I mention the people? The people is
Roman. I have no shorter nor have I any clearer term to express my
opinion of your parishioners. For what is so notorious to all men and ages
as the wantonness and haughtiness of the Romans? A race unaccustomed
to peace, habituated to tumult a race merciless and untractable, and to this
instant scorning all subjection, when it has any means of existence...
Whom will you find even in the vast extent of your city who would have
you for pope, unless for profit or the hope of profit? the promise of
fidelity, to have the better means of injuring those who trust them? They
are men too proud to obey, too ignorant to rule, faithless to superiors,
insupportable to inferiors; shameless in asking, insolent in refusing;
importunate to obtain favors, restless while obtaining them, ungrateful
when they have obtained; grand, eloquent, and inefficient; most profuse in
promise, most niggardly in performance; the smoothest flatterers, the most
venomous detractors. Among such as these you are proceeding as their
pastor, covered with gold and every variety of splendor. What are your
sheep looking for? If I dared to use the expression, I should say that it is a
pasture of demons rather than ‘sheep.’”4
Such, as witnessed by the highest authority, was the character of the
people whom the new shepherd of Rome had around his person, and
whom he had to watch over. But his mind was not to be dismayed, even
by the exhaustive style of St. Bernard; with great energy, prudence, and
skill, he began his successful reign.
 575
Next to the affairs of his own household, those of the city had his
immediate attention. His first object was to abolish the last vestige of
imperial sovereignty in Rome. This was a hold step, but he had
smoothed his way by silently and skillfully distributing money throughout
the thirteen quarters of the city. Hitherto the prefect of Rome had held his
office under the Emperor, he was the representative of the imperial
authority. But Innocent influenced him to reject the imperial and submit
entirely to the papal power. He took from his hand the secular sword, the
ancient emblem of his power, and substituted a silver cup in its place, as
the symbol of peace and friendship. He absolved him from his oath of
allegiance to the German emperors, compelled him to take a strong oath of
fidelity to himself, and to receive investiture from his hands. Thus was the
last link broken of the imperial power in Rome.
In like manner the new pope persuaded the senator, or representative of
the legislature, to resign, in order that he might substitute another in his
place, whom he bound by an oath to himself as sovereign. The judges,
officers, and all the citizens were required to swear obedience to his
spiritual majesty, and acknowledge the exclusive sovereignty of the Holy
See.

INNOCENT AND THE KINGDOM OF SICILY

But the imperial city, at this moment, was surrounded by many dangerous
neighbors. How to rid himself of these was now the first and important
question with Innocent. The fairest provinces of central and southern
Italy, even up to the gates of Rome, and the kingdom of Sicily, were under
the gillling yoke of fierce German adventurers. It happened in this way.
Henry VI. Emperor of Germany, surnamed the Severe, in the year 1186
married Constantia, legitimate heir to the crown of Sicily, with the
lordship of all the Norman provinces in southern Italy.
The evident advantage of this union to the Emperor, and the equally
evident danger to the papacy, alarmed the reigning pontiff, Lucius III.; and
led him to take steps to prevent the marriage, but dying suddenly, nothing
was accomplished. His successor, Urban III., also failed to break the
engagement and the marriage was celebrated on the 27th of January, 1186.
But as usual, a pretender to the crown of Sicily was found and supported
 576
by the papacy, which led to a cruel and desolating war of several years’
duration. Henry invaded the Italian territories for the avowed purpose of
putting himself in possession of his wife’s inheritance. The expedition was
completely successful. Province after province fell into his hands, and in a
short time the whole of southern Italy and the kingdom of Sicily submitted
to the merciless tyrant, the treacherous husband of Constantia. Before
leaving the conquered territories, says Greenwood, “All the great military
commands were bestowed on the most distinguished officers of his army.
Castles, lands, revenues, powers of the largest and most indefinite kind,
were showered upon the mob of adventurers and mercenaries, whose only
object was plunder, and whose rapacity was unchecked by the remotest
regard for the rights or the welfare of those whom they were appointed to
govern.”
Philip, Henry’s brother, duke of Swabia, was intrusted with the
government of central Italy, including the estates of the Countess Matilda,
and the duchy of Tuscany. Markwald, a knight of Alsace, the Emperor’s
favourite, was made duke of Ravenna and Romagna. Conrad of
Lutzenburg, a Swabtan knight, as duke of Spoleto, possessed that city and
its domain. Thus were the pontifical states enclosed by a hostile chain of
fortresses on all sides. Communication with the outer world was well nigh
cut off. But the master-hand that was required to direct and control the
different garrisons was suddenly withdrawn.
Henry died at Messina on the 28th of September, 1197, rather more than
three months before the accession of Innocent.5
We have thus rapidly referred to the military occupation of the country
when Innocent took into his hands the reins of government. For fuller
details the general histories may be consulted. But as our object in this
chapter is to show how completely the ecclesiastical power triumphed
over the civil, we have felt it necessary to show the strong position of the
latter. And now the problem is to be solved. How can a single man, by a
single word, overthrow the physical force of the empire, and compel both
prince and people to submit to a spiritual despotism? The unseen power,
we doubt not, is from beneath. The blending of the lamb and the dragon,
or the man of sin, in one power, or system, proves its origin. (Revelation
13:11-18.)
 577
INNOCENT AND THE STATES OF THE CHURCH
The death of Henry, the jealousies and rivalries of the German chiefs, the
exasperated state of the Italians, prepared the way for the full exercise of
Innocent’s great powers of administration. The cruelties of the Emperor
Henry to his Italian subjects had ripened the whole country for revolt.
They only awaited a deliverer from the German yoke. That deliverer was
Innocent. He summoned Markwald, the most formidable of imperial
lieutenants in command, to surrender to St. Peter all the estates of the
church. Markwald paused: though he was a bold and ambitious man, and
possessed of great wealth and power, he wished to avoid an open contest
with the pope. He was conscious of his danger from the people’s hatred of
the foreign yoke; and endeavored to draw him into an alliance with many
fair promises of great service to the church. But the pope was firm and
withstood all his offers whether of money or of service. He demanded the
immediate unconditional surrender of all the territories of the church.
Markwald refused. The people rose to assert the papal claims. The war
began. The German banners were torn down; city after city rose in
rebellion, and cast to the ground everything German. Markwald, insulted
and burning with rage, “revenged himself by sallying forth from the gates
of Ravenna, ravaging the whole region, burning, plundering, destroying
homesteads and harvests, castles and churches. Innocent opened the papal
treasures, borrowed large sums of money, raised an army; hurled an
excommunication against the: rebellious vassal of the church, in which he
absolved from their oaths all who had sworn allegiance to Markwald.”6
The fall of Markwald filled the others with consternation. They proposed
terms of peace and offered to pay tribute, but Innocent would agree to no
compromise. He claimed possession of the patrimonial domains without
reserve, declared himself heir to the Countess Matilda’s donation, and
sovereign of the duchy of Tuscany. But no event, consequent on the
decease of the Emperor was more important to the papacy than the
faithless conduct of the Empress Constantia. Immediately after the death
of her husband, though left the natural guardian of the realm, she separated
herself from the German cause, and returned to Sicily with her infant son
Frederick. She espoused the interest of her native land, threw herself and
her son into the arms of the Holy See, caused him to be crowned in
Palermo, and requested the pontifical investiture of the kingdom for her
 578
son as a fief of the papal See. Innocent saw his own strength, her
weakness, and made his own terms. The Empress and her son were
required to acknowledge the absolute feudal superiority of the pope over
the whole kingdom of Naples and Sicily, and pay a large annual tribute.
The German warriors were compelled to retire to the castles on the
mainland; but only to brood over their present defeat and their future
revenge.
The conquests of Innocent had been rapid and were apparently
complete. In less than one year after his accession to the papal throne, he
was virtually king of Sicily, and master of his own large territories. By
means of his legates, he made his presence to be felt, and enforced
obedience, throughout his newly acquired dominions. But, as ever, the
beast on which the woman rode became most refractory. The territories,
forts, citadels, and revenues, that had been recovered from the Germans,
were claimed by the Papal See as her possessions. But as these demands
were both unjust and illegal, resistance on the part of the citizens and the
imperial governors was the natural consequence, and for years Sicily and
her provinces was a scene of anarchy, videnee, bloodshed, and ceaseless
intrigues. And yet, at this very moment, Innocent reminded those cities
which objected to surrender to him the full benefit of their hard-won
deliverance, of the awful nature of the power they dared to oppose. Their
lack of confidence in him was a crime against the Lord Jesus Himself
whose successor he was, “one in whom there was no sin at all, neither was
any deceit found in his mouth.” Could blasphemy be more daring, more
barefaced? Could there be a more wicked attempt to unite the dragon and
the lamb?

INNOCENT AND THE EMPIRE

Before the close of the eventful year over which we have been travelling,
Constantia, the Sicilian princess and the German Empress, died. On the
27th of November, 1198, she breathed her last. Her death, it is supposed,
was hastened by her maternal solicitude for her infant son, Frederick. He
was then about four years old, had been crowned king of Sicily, and was
heir of the empire. In her last will she bequeathed him to the guardianship
of the pope as his liege lord, and provided that thirty thousand pieces of
gold should be paid yearly to the pope for his pious protection of her son,
 579
and that all his other’ expenses were to be charged on the revenue of the
country.
But the tranquillity of Rome was not secured by its great successes. The
civil war, with all its horrors, was renewed. The pontiff lost no time in
making known, in loftiest phrase, to the nobles of Sicily his accession to
the government as regent, and commissioned his legate to administer the
oath of allegiance. Markwald, in the meantime, hearing of the death of the
Empress, resumed the title of Seneschal of the Empire, and, by a document
which professed to be a will of the late Emperor, laid claim to the regency
of Sicily during the minority of tlhe young king. In support of these claims
he had assembled a large force of adventurers, besieged and obtained
possession of the papal city, Germano, and had almost become master of
the great monastery of Monte Casino, which was defended for eight days
by a garrison of the pope; but a fresh supply of troops and provisions
from Rome strengthened the position of the warrior monks, and compelled
the great duke to raise the siege. According to the best authorities,
Innocent now assumed the most warlike attitude. He issued a
proclamation, summoning the whole realm of Naples and Sicily to arms.
He assembled troops from Lombardy, Tuscany, Romagna, and Campania,
paying them from the patpal treasury. Markwald and all his accomplices
were excommunicated in the most solemn manner every Sunday, with
quenched candles and tolling bells — bell, book, and candle. The whole
kingdom was ravaged, laid waste, and distracted by the armies of the pope
and the soldiers of the empire. But the death of the rebel chief, Markwald,
in the year 1202, relieved the pope of his most powerful and most
successful antagonist.
We now turn for a little to observe the working of that same powerful
mind in the complicated affairs of the empire.
An infant Emperor, now an orphan; a vacant throne, fiercely contested by
rival princes; opened up a still wider field for papal ambition.
The immediate object of Innocent’s policy was to separate the kingdom of
Sicily from the empire. While both remained in the same hands, a sovereign
more powerful than himself might be placed on the Sicilian throne. The
possibility of a neighbor so dangerous must be removed. The contest then
raging for the possession of the crown gave him the desired opportunity.
 580
The troops, being required at home, were withdrawn from Sicily, Apulia,
and Capua. The garrisons being thus reduced, the German dominion was
overthrown, the countries separated from the empire, and the papal
authority established by force.
Immediately after the death of Henry, his brother, Philip, duke of Swabia,
took possession of the imperial treasures, declared himself regent of the
realm, and protector of the interests of his young nephew. And so far he
seems to have acted from a right motive. But an infant Emperor was
contrary to German usage, and unsuited to those troublous times. An
adverse party speedily arose, and strongly opposed the election of the
child as king. The adherents of the house of Hohenstaufen entreated
Philip to become the representative of his family, in opposition to the
other candidates for the crown. He consented, and was chosen defender of
the kingdom by a large body of princes and prelates assembled at
Mulhausen.
The party opposed to the Swabian family was headed by Adolphus, of
Altena, archbishop of Cologne. This faction was chiefly composed of the
great prelates of the Rhine. Such was the principal occupation of prelates
and clergy in those days. They were determined to raise up an antagonist
to the house of Hohenstaufen. After several princes had refused to become
candidates for the imperial dignity, the churchmen turned their thoughts to
the house of Saxony, the irreconcilable adversary of the house of Swabia.
Their choice fell on Otho, the second son of Henry the lion, duke of
Saxony.
In consequence of his father’s family having fallen under the ban of the
empire, and being banished from Germany, he was brought up at the court
of England. His mother, Matilda, was sister to King Richard Coeur de
Lion. The young knight had shown signs of valor such as Richard admired,
and he created Otho first Count of York and Poitou. Well furnished with
English gold, and a few followers, he set forth, reached Cologne, where he
was proclaimed Emperor, and champion of the church.

PHILIP AND OTHO

Philip was twenty-two years of age, Otho twenty-three. “In personal
character,” say the chroniclers, “in wealth, and in the number ofhis
 581
adherents, Philip had the advantage. He was praised for his moderation
and his love of justice. His mind had been cultivated by literature to a
degree then very unusual among princes, and his popular manners
contrasted favorably with the pride and roughness of Otho. But Otho was
the favorite with the great body of the clergy, to whom Philip was
obnoxious, as the representative of a family which was regarded as
opposed to the interests of the hierarchy.”7
But what, the reader may be supposed to inquire — what of the young
Frederick who had been crowned and anointed, and to whom both princes
and prelates had sworn allegiance. and over whose rights the pope was
handsomely paid to keep watch and ward? The only answer to this
inquiry is to be found in the secret but perfidious policy of Innocent. His
one grand object in allowing, if not in creating, this great national quarrel
for the imperial crown, was the humbling of the haughty house of Swabia,
and every subordinate consideration must be sacrificed to the limitation of
that power. But the elastic conscience of the papacy never was at a loss
for an apparently pious reason for the perpetration of the greatest
wickedness, or the most faithless and treacherous conduct. Innocent could
not deny, and therefore makes a show of lofty equity in admitting, the
claims of Frederick. This was the dragon’s voice. He admits the lawfulness
of his election, and the oath of allegiance taken by the nobles of the
empire. But, on the other hand, he discovers that the oath was exacted by
the father before the child was a Christian by baptism. He decreed that a
child of two years old, unbaptized, was a nullity: therefore their oaths
were null and void, and all obligation to the young heir was entirely set
aside.
What a character, we may exclaim, for posterity to contemplate! He who
assumed to be “the representative of God’s eternal and immutable justice
upon earth, absolutely above all passion or interest,” now absolves the
whole constituency of Germany from the most solemn oath of fealty to
the legitimate heir of the kingdom. In place of maintaining the rights of his
ward — to whom he wrote when he accepted the charge, “that though
God had visited him by the death of his father and mother, he had
provided him with a more worthy father — His own vicar on earth; and a
better mother — the church” — rebuking the rival parties, and persuading
them to peace; we see him fomenting the animosities of both, we see
 582
justice, truth, righteousness, peace, and every claim of humanity, all
wantonly sacrificed, in the hope of increasing and consolidating the papal
power. The crafty pope kept behind the scene, but stirred up and fed the
flame of contention, knowing that both parties would be compelled, from
the loss of blood and treasure, to lay their cause at his feet, and then he
could come forward as the sovereign director of kings, and dictate his own
terms. These convictions are fully borne out by the following judgment of
Dean Milman: “Ten years of strife and civil war in Germany are to be
traced, if not to the direct instigation, to the inflexible obstinacy of Pope
Innocent III.”8

THE CIVIL WAR IN GERMANY

Richard, king of England, and Philip Augustus, king of France — who
warmly espoused the cause of Philip — spared no amount of flatteries and
professions to win over the pope to the party of their respective
candidates. But he delayed, having too many objects in view to be
straightforward. In the meantime war broke out along the Rhine. Philip, at
the first, gained great advantages; he advanced almost to the gates of
Cologne; but a powerful army of Rhenish prelates and Flemish nobles
caused him to retreat. The largest and most powerful part of the empire
acknowledged and supported the cause of Philip; the clergy and the Count
of Flanders stood almost alone on the side of Otho.
It was a civil war of the most ferocious and barbarous lawlessness. At the
end of the first year, fortune favored the cause of Philip. The death of
Richard, in 1199, had deprived Otho of his most powerful ally. John, who
succeeded him, was not disposed to part with his money for such a distant
and uncertain game. The war might now have terminated with a fair show
of honor, even to Otho; but papal vengeance against the hated house of
Hohenstaufen was not yet full. The pope openly avowed the cause of the
usurper, Otho; and for nine long dreary years, with but short intervals of
truce, Germany was abandoned by the tender shepherd of the Tiber to, all
the horrors of a civil war. But the deceitful underhand policy of Innocent
became apparent to all. His suffering flock accused and reproached him as
the guilty cause of all their misery, as having provoked, inflamed, and kept
up the disastrous strife, for the gratification of his own malicious purpose
 583
of ruining the royal house of Henry the Severe. It required all his wits,
with the help of Satan, to acquit himself of the charge.
But the war had done its work — its dragon work. “It was a war, not of
decisive battles, but of marauding, desolation, havoc, plunder, wasting of
harvests, ravaging open and defenceless countries — war, waged by
prelate against prelate, by prince against prince; wild Bohemians, and
bandit soldiers of every race, were roving through every province.
Throughout the land there was no law; the roads were impassable on
account of robbers; nothing was spared, nothing sacred, church or
cloister.” Such, and worse, was the civil war in Germany. Yet the
unrelenting mind of the wretched man continued to thunder his anathemas
against Philip; declared all oaths which had been taken to him null and
void, and showered privileges and immunities of all sorts on the bishops
and the monastic societies who espoused the party of Otho. But the
thunders of the Vatican became unavailing, and the strength of Philip
increased year by year. 9
The course of events could not fail to tell even on the inflexible mind of
Innocent. He was threatened with the humiliation of a total defeat. At the
close of ten years the cause of Otho was hopeless. But how can the pope
forget his vows of implacable enmity against the house of Swabia, or
struggle out of his vows of perpetual alliance with the house of Saxony?
He must find some holy and pious reasons for abandoning the cause of
Otho, and espousing the cause of Philip. He found great difficulty in
covering the shame of this debasing position. But Philip made such ample
professions and promises to the pope by his ambassadors, that he saw it
to be his duty to receive back his penitent son, and absolve him from the
censures of the church. The papal legate proceeded to Metz, and there
proclaimed him the victorious Emperor.

THE DEATH OF PHILIP

Peace now seemed to be secured on all sides. Philip had obtained the
highest object of his wishes. A proposal of marriage between Otho and
Beatrice, the daughter of Philip, had been sanctioned by the pope, under
the pretense of healing the long-standing feud between the houses of
Swabia and Saxony. But uncertain is the tenure of all human greatness and
 584
human glow. On the 21st of June, 1208, the Emperor Philip, one of the
ablest and mildest of his race, was basely assassinated by the Count
Palatine of Bavaria for some private offense. The country was paralyzed
by the news of this terrible crime. The execration of mankind pursued the
murderer; his castle was levelled with the ground, and the assassin put to
death with many wounds.
Innocent now retraced his steps. The crime of the Bavarian relieved him
from the humiliation of his apostasy. He hastened to write to the German
princes, charging them to acquiesce in the manifest declaration of divine
providence in favor of Otho. He used every means in his power to prevent
a fresh election, and to unite all parties in his support; and he warmly
exhorted Otho to moderation and conciliation. On both sides there was an
ardent desire for peace, and Otho was now undisputed Enqperor.
The: following year, 1209, he proceeded to Italy, to receive the imperial
crown. He was attended by the princes, prelates, and nobles of the empire,
with a numerous army of military dependents. Their march was a
succession of festive receptions. The cities opened their gates to welcome
the champion of the church, and the Emperor chosen by the pope.
Innocent and Otho met at Viterbo. “They embraced, they wept tears of
joy, in remembrance of their common trials, in transport at their common
triumph.” But the pope did not forget the prerogative of his pontifical
throne. He demanded security that Otho would surrender, immediately
after his coronation, the lands of the church, and yield every pretension to
the long-disputed inheritance of the Countess Matilda. But so good, so
humble, so submissive was Otho, as he was kneeling for the diadem, that
his heart was grieved at the apparent suspicion of his loyalty by his holy
father. “All that I have been,” he exclaimed, “all I am, all I ever shall be,
after God, I owe to you and the church.”

THE APOSTASY OF OTHO

The imperial crown was now on the head of Otho. Not only was he
crowned by the hands of Innocent in St. Peter’s, at Rome, but he was
raised to that dignity by the artful and cruel policy of the apostolic See.
But the deceiver was deceived; the traitor was betrayed. Scarcely was the
ceremony of the coronation completed, when the mask of obedience under
 585
which Otho had veiled his real intentions was thrown off. The effect of the
iron crown was irresistible. He felt himself a new man, in a new position,
and bound to maintain the prerogatives of his crown against the
encroachments of the spiritual power. From that hour the Emperor and the
pope were implacable enemies. Such was the disappointment, as overruled
by the righteous government of God, of the unscrupulous pontiff. Satan
may rule, but an all-wise God overrules.
“Be not deceived,” says the apostle; “God is not mocked: for
whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” (Galatians 6:7.)
Innocent had taught his nominee to deceive, and now he must eat the bitter
fruit of his own teaching.
The unusual strength and numbers of Otho’s army which accompanied
him, and now lay encamped under the walls Of Rome, were regarded with
great jealousy by the inhabitants. The quarrels, which had become
customary on such occasions, were renewed with great fierceness. Many
of the Germans were slain, and a number of their horses were killed — so
they said, at least. But it was enough. Otho’s smothered ambition was
now kindled into a flame of indignation. He withdrew in wrath from the
city. He demanded compensation. Innocent refused. The troops were
distributed over the patrimony of St. Peter to the great damage of the
people and the increasing alarm of the pope. The Emperor was requested
to withdraw his soldiers from the neighborhood of Rome, but he declared
they would remain until the provisions of the country were exhausted. He
enriched himself by the plunder of pilgrims whom his soldiery intercepted
on their way to Rome. He marched into Tuscany, took possession of the
cities on the frontier of the territory of the Countess Matilda, seized
towns and fortresses which the pope had lately occupied; estates and
dignities within the pontifical claims he bestowed upon his favorites, and
the most formidable of the pope’s adversaries, Count Diephold, he
invested with the duchy of Spoleto. Success inflamed his ambition; he
contemplated the invasion of Sicily, and seizing the young Frederick, the
last of the house of Hohenstaufen.
He who had proclaimed himself infallible was in despair. After all his
labors, all his sacrifices, all his treacheries, he had raised up to himself a
more formidable antagonist, a more bitter foe, than any of the Swabtan
 586
family had ever been. The most earnest appeals to his gratitude, the most
solemn admonitions, and the loudest thunders of excommunication, were
alike disregarded by the headstrong pupil of Richard Coeur de Lion.

THE FALL OF OTHO

Otho had now been three years absent from Germany — three years of
unwonted peace in that country — their hands had become strong. The
kindred of the young Frederick became anxious for his safety. He was now
about eighteen years of age. The pope was quietly consulted. He turned
round, saw good reason to take active measures against Otho, and to
assume the most friendly disposition towards Frederick. There were many
difficulties in the way, because of the occupation of Otho; but two brave
and loyal Swabian knights accomplished the dangerous expedition, and
Frederick was safely conducted from his sunny Palermo to the colder
regions of Germany, where he was welcomed with open arms to resume
his ancestral throne. But the cause of Frederick against Otho was really
won by Philip Augustus of France.
Between the two rivals for the empire there was no great battle. France
had all along been the steady friend of the Swabians, as England had been
of the Saxons. Philip entered into a close alliance with Frederick. The
Count of Flanders, the princes of the lower Rhine, and the king of England,
entered into league with Otho. At the head of a large army he advanced,
under the impulse of vindictive passion, towards the frontiers of France.
He regarded Philip as the real author of all his misfortunes. But his vigilant
adversary was ready to receive him. On the 27th of July, 1214, a great
battle was fought at the village of Vouvines, not far from Lille. Philip
Augustus was victorious over the last of the Othos and his allies. He
survived his fall about five years, which he was allowed to spend in
monastic penance without being formally deposed.
The following year Frederick II. was crowned at Aix-la-Chappele, and in
the enthusiasm of the moment, he, with many others, made a vow to go in
person on a crusade to the Holy Land. This rash promise was the occasion
of troubles which he little expected, extending over his long reign of thirty-
five years.
 587
INNOCENT AND PHILIP AUGUSTUS
We have seen the interference of Innocent in the elevation of three
emperors to the throne of Germany, and the policy he pursued in order to
obtain more temporal power for the Roman See, and a more extensive
dominion over the minds and ways of all mankind. We now follow him to
the kingdom of France, there to witness an expression of the same
pontifical power, but on other grounds, and for other objects. He now
comes before us as the protector of innocence against wrong, the preacher
of christian morals, and the maintainer of the sanctity of the marriage
bond. We are willing to allow that in his contest with Philip he may have
been actuated by a right motive; but his outward conduct is marked by the
same dictatorial spirit that has hitherto characterized his reign. He assumes
to himself the high function of the supreme direction of all human affairs;
as arbiter in the last resort, whether it be a contested throne, or the holy
sacrament of marriage. But our main object, under this heading, is to give
the reader an example of a whole kingdom being laid under the papal ban.
It is difficult in our own days to believe the awful consequences of such a
thing.
A remarkable circumstance in connection with the second marriage of
Philip furnished Innocent with the desired opportunity to chastise and
humble the ally and supporter of the house of Swabia. On his return from
the crusade in 1193, he was attracted by the fame of the beauty and
virtues of Ingeburga, or Isamburga, sister of the king of Denmark. The
hand of the king of France was readily accepted, the dowry fixed. She
arrived in France under an escort of Danish nobles, and the king hastened
to meet her at Amiens. The day after their marriage the royal pair were
crowned; but during the ceremony of the coronation Philip was observed
to shudder and turn pale. It was soon found that he had conceived an
unconquerable aversion for his new queen. As no real cause could be found
for such a change in the king, it was popularly ascribed to witchcraft, or
diabolic influence. She is described as of gentle manners, very beautiful,
and sincere as a Christian. Philip proposed to send her back at once to
Denmark; her attendants refused the disgraceful office; and she herself was
determined to remain in France.
 588
The king was now in a great difficulty. He applied for a divorce, but knew
that, unless a dissolution of the marriage could be obtained in due form, he
would have no peace. The genealogies of the royal houses were traced,
and, as it was found by the bishops devoted to the king that the royal pair
were within the forbidden degrees, therefore the clergy of France, with the
Archbishop of Rheims at their head, pronounced the marriage null and
void. When the sentence was explained to Ingeburga, who could scarcely
speak a word of French, her feelings of indignation were expressed by
exclaiming, “Wicked France! Rome! Rome!” Her brother took up her
cause, and appealed to the aged pope, Celestine; but he was unequal to
contend with the powerful king of France, and no decided step was taken
during the remainder of his pontificate. In the meantime Ingeburga was
shut up in a convent, and Philip married Agnes, the beautiful daughter of
the duke of Meran. His affection for Agnes was as intense as his hatred of
Ingeburga. The former was introduced on all occasions to grace the royal
circle; the latter was dragged from convent to convent, or rather from
prison to prison.
Such was the state of things in France when Innocent espoused the cause
of the repudiated princess of Denmark. He first wrote to the bishop of
Paris, then to the king himself. After enlarging on the sanctity of marriage,
he admonished the king to put away Agnes and to restore Ingeburga. The
king haughtily declared that the affair of his marriage was no business of
the pope’s. But Philip had soon to feel the power and the terror of the
papal thunders, and as they had never before been felt in France.

THE POPE’S LEGATE IN FRANCE

Peter, Cardinal of St. Mary in the Via Lata, was sent as legate into France,
with authority, in case of the king’s obstinacy, to lay his dominions under
the papal ban. But the command to put away his beloved Agnes, and to
receive again the hated Ingeburga, the king treated with contempt and
defiance. The pope was inflexible. “If, within one month,” he wrote to the
legate, “after your communication, the king of France does not receive his
queen with conjugal affection, you shall subject his whole realm to
interdict — an interdict with all its awful consequences.” A council was
held at Dijon, messengers appeared from the king, protesting in his name
against all further proceedings, and appealing to Rome. But the orders to
 589
the legate were peremptory. The interdict was proclaimed with all its
appalling circumstances. It is thus described: — “At midnight, each priest
holding a torch, were chanted the psalm for the miserable, and the prayers
for the dead, the last prayers which were to be uttered by the clergy of
France during the interdict. The cross on which the Savior hung was veiled
with black crape; the relics replaced within the tombs; the host was
consumed. The cardinal, in his mourning stole of violet, pronounced the
territories of the king of France under the ban. All religious services from
that time ceased; there was no access to heaven by prayer or offering. The
sobs of the aged, of the women and children, alone broke the silence. The
interdict was pronounced at Dijon. Only the baptism of infants, and
extreme unction to the dying, were allowed by the church, while the realm
lay under the curse of the papal ban.”
For the guilt of the sovereign the whole nation must suffer, reasoned the
pope, in order that his heart might be softened, either by pity for the
misery of his people or by fear of their discontent; and in those days of
superstition the misery was extreme; for death at such a time would be
thought eternal perdition. “O how terrible,” exclaimed an eye-witness,
“how pitiable a spectacle it was in all our cities! To see the doors of the
church watched, and Christians driven away from them like dogs; all divine
offices ceased; the sacrament of the body and blood of the soul was not
offered; no gathering together of the people, as wont at the festivals of the
saints; the bodies of the dead not admitted to christian burial, but their
stench infected the air, the, loathsome sight of them appalled the living:
only extreme unction and baptism were allowed. There was a deep silence
over the whole realm, while the organs and the voices of those who
chanted God’s praises were everywhere mute.” 10

THE RAGE OF THE KING

Philip Augustus was a proud, haughty, arbitrary prince, not accustomed
to brook encroachment quietly. He broke out into paroxysms of fury; he
swore by the sword of Charlemagne that he would rather lose half his
dominions than part from Agnes of Meran. He threatened the clergy with
the last extremities if they dared to obey the pope. Ingeburga was seized,
dragged from her cloister, and imprisoned in the strong castle of Etampes.
But the wrath of the king would not prevail over the stern decree of the
 590
pope. The barons, whose power he had reduced, cared not to rally round
him; the people were in a state of pious insurrection. They had assembled
round the churches, forced the doors; they were determined not to be
deprived of their religious services. The king became alarmed at the
mutinies among the people, and promised to obey the pope.
A deputation was sent to Rome. The king complained of the harsh
proceedings of the legate, but declared himself ready to abide by the
sentence of the pope. “What sentence?” sternly exclaimed his holiness;
“he knows our decree; let him put away his concubine, receive his lawful
wife, reinstate the bishops whom he has expelled, and give them
satisfaction for their losses. Then will we raise the interdict, receive his
sureties, examine into the alleged relationship, and pronounce our decree.”
The answer went to the heart of Agnes, and drove the king to madness. “I
will turn Mahometan,” he exclaimed. “Happy Saladin, he has no pope
above him.” But the haughty Philip must bow. The affections and religious
feelings of all classes were with the clergy. He summoned a parliament at
Paris; it was attended by all the great vassals of the crown. “What is to be
done?” demanded the king, with his beautiful Agnes by his side. “Obey
the pope, dismiss Agnes, receive back Ingeburga;” was the crushing reply.
Thus he who had doubled France in extent by the sharpness of his sword,
and the prudence of his policy; he who had raised the crown to something
like independence above the great feudal lords; must now drink the dregs
of humiliation in the presence of the nobles of France at the bidding of
the pope.
The scene was overwhelming. Agnes had declared that she cared nothing
for the crown; that it was her husband she loved; a stranger, the daughter
of a christian prince, young and ignorant of the world, she married the
king; and had borne him two children. Sever me not from my husband, was
her touching appeal. But the inexorable decree had gone forth; “Obey the
pope, dismiss Agnes, receive back Ingeburga.” The king at last agreed to a
reconciliation with Ingeburga. She was brought in; but the sight of her so
aroused the king’s aversion that negotiations were almost broken off. At
last he mastered himself for the moment and bowed to the papal sentence.
He swore to receive and honor her as queen of France. At that instant the
ringing of bells proclaimed that the interdict which had weighed so heavily
on the people for upwards of seven months was taken off. “The curtains
 591
were withdrawn from the images, from the crucifixes, the doors of the
churches flew open, the multitudes streamed in to satiate their pious
desires, which had been suppressed during the period of the interdict.”
Rome has accomplished her object; she has triumphed over the greatest
king in Christendom; the word of God is fulfilled; “The woman which
thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.”
Universal dominion over the bodies and souls and affairs of men was her
unquenchable desire, her unceasing aim. And beyond this display of power
we cannot suppose that Rome had any higher object in view, as she had
sanctioned in Philip’s great predecessor more outrageous conduct.
The distressed king now separated himself from his broken-hearted Agnes.
She soon after died of grief, having given birth to a son, to whom she gave
the significant name of Tristan — the son of my sorrow. Ingeburga was
received with outward honor, but was in reality a state prisoner; nothing
could ever induce Philip to live with her as his wife, though he consented
to her living in the palace. Fresh quarrels between France and England
diverted the mind of Innocent from the neglected queen, and opened up a
more inviting field for his active and ambitious mind. We will now turn to
home scenes for a little.

INNOCENT AND ENGLAND

Richard the Lion-hearted, it will be remembered, was the great
supporter of Otho, the papal claimant of the empire. England at that time
was in close alliance with the See of Rome. After the death of Richard his
brother John, the youngest son of Henry II., was raised to the vacant
throne. According to our present laws of succession his nephew, Arthur,
duke of Brittany, the only son and heir of his elder brother, Geoffrey
Plantagenet, would have been king. But crowns at this time were as much
elective as hereditary.
The whole reign of John — 1199-1216 — is a history of weakness and
violence, of wickedness and degradation, of the most cruel, sensual, and
faithless of monarchs. But the hand of the Lord is most manifest in the
affairs of England at this time. Never had a viler prince worn a crown; yet
God in His mercy, and in His care for England, overruled his many faults
for the benefit of the church and the people of England. We speak of
 592
course in general terms. But from this reign may be dated England’s
wholesome dread of popery, and her enthusiasm for civil and religious
liberty. Disastrous to the last degree as was the reign of John; humiliating
to the king and to the nation; yet the united voice of history affirms that it
was then that the foundations were laid of “the English character, the
English liberties, and the English greatness; and to this reign, from the
attempt to degrade the kingdom to a fief of the Roman See, may be traced
the first signs of that independence, that jealousy of the papal
usurpations, which led eventually to the Reformation.” The overruling
hand of God, in His special care of England, has been manifest in all her
revolutions ever since. Scarcely any benefit resulted to either Church or
State in France from the pope’s interference with Philip, excepting that
they were made to feel the awfulness of the papal power. But no Magna
Charta was signed, no House of Commons arose.
One of John’s first and great scandals, reveals in the clearest light the
unprincipled character of Innocent’s policy. John had been married twelve
years to a daughter of the Earl of Gloucester before he came to the throne.
After that, aspiring to a royal connection, he sought a dissolution, and the
obsequious Archbishop of Bordeaux dissolved the marriage bond. He
suddenly became enamored with a lady who was the betrothed bride of the
Count de la Mark, carried her off, and was married to her, while his own
wife was living. But what will the pope now say about the holy sacrament
of matrimony — he whose horror of such connections has been so
inexorably displayed in the case of Philip and Agnes? Fast and thick we
may expect his thunderbolts to fly at the adulterous king; but no! no
censure is uttered from Rome against either the king or the archbishop. He
confirms the dissolution of the marriage in the face of God, the church, and
the world. Such was the glaring wickedness of “his holiness, his
infallibility.” But why show such partiality to John? He was the
supporter of Otho, and the enemy of the house of Swabia.
But if the pope was quiescent, the world was scandalized. Such an outrage
on a great vassal was a violation of the first law of feudalism. The barons
of Anjou, Touraine, Poitou, Maine, were eager to avenge the indignity
offered to Hugh de la Mark, and from that day they held themselves
absolved from their fealty to John. They appealed to Philip, king of
France, for redress. Philip Augustus felt his strength, and summoned the
 593
English king to answer in his courts of Paris for the wrongs done to the
Count de la Mark. John appeared not; this led to a ruinous war, and to the
loss of immense territories in France to England. In a few months Philip
wrested from John the great inheritance of Rollo — the great Anglo-
Norman dukedom, which in the days of his father Henry II. was equal in
the extent of its territories, its revenues, its forces, its wealth, to the whole
of that over which the French monarch swayed his scepter.11

JOHN AND THE PAPACY

We now leave the civil, and turn more directly to the ecclesiastical
history of affairs in England at this interesting moment.
We have seen the pope overlooking the gravest immoralities in John, on
account, as we suppose, of his being the partisan of Otho, and the ally of
the Holy See; but John was now guilty of crimes which his Holiness could
not overlook. His matrimonial irregularities, however criminal, might be
allowed to pass without censure; but his disposal of sees, his taxation of
monasteries, his interference in the appointment of a primate, brought him
into direct collision with the papacy, and involved him in a fierce
contention with his ally, Pope Innocent.
Immediately after the death of Hubert, archbishop of Canterbury, the
younger monks hastily elected their sub-prior, Reginald, to the vacant See.
But, soon finding that they had acted imprudently, they applied to the
king for leave to proceed in a fresh election. The choice of a bishop was
really in the hands of the sovereign, though nominally it might be in the
hands of the clergy. Such was the Anglo-Norman system. The king
recommended one of his chief councillors, John de Grey, bishop of
Norwich, who was accordingly chosen, invested with the temporalities of
the See, and sent to Rome for confirmation. The pope now saw his
opportunity, and eager to extend his power in England, disallowed both
elections, Reginald and John de Grey, and commanded the election of
Stephen Langton, an Englishman by birth, a learned prudent man, and of
excellent character. A more fit person, as it happened, could not have been
named by the pope; but his action was in defiance of the privilege claimed
by the monks, the suffragan bishops, and the king himself. In vain did the
representatives of Canterbury and the king’s commissioners urge the
 594
necessity of the royal assent. Innocent ruled otherwise. He constituted
them a chapter by “the authority of God and the Apostolic See.” The
monks were now between two tyrants — the spiritual and the temporal.
Twelve were under oath to the king not to elect any one but the bishop of
Norwich; the pope commanded them to elect Langton, on pain of
excommunication and anathema. Overcome by this awful menace, the
chapter yielded to the spiritual tyrant, proceeded to elect Stephen, and on
the 17th of June, 1207, the pope consecrated him Archbishop of
Canterbury.
Such an interference with the rights of the established church and the
prerogative of the crown was wholly new in England. Had John been a
popular prince and surrounded by the strength and sympathies of his
insulted people, he might have laughed to scorn the daring presumption
and menaces of a foreign priest; but the folly and unpopularity of the king
gave the pope the opportunity he desired. The monks of Canterbury, on
their return from Rome, were impeached of high treason; and were in
consequence expelled from their residences, and their property
confiscated. But the king’s fury knew no bounds; he dispatched a troop of
horse to drive the monks out of the country, and, in case of resistance, to
put them to death. The orders were executed in the temper they were
given. The soldiers broke into the monastery with drawn swords; the prior
and monks were ordered to leave the kingdom, and threatened, if they
resisted or delayed, to see their monastery set on fire, and themselves
thrust back into the flames. Many of them fled and found an asylum in
Flanders. The king also indulged in the most insulting and stinging language
to the proud and passionate pontiff; protesting that he would never accept
Stephen Langton as primate, that he would maintain the right of the
bishop of Norwich, and, in case of the pope’s refusal, he would cut off all
communication between his dominions and Rome. But the pope proceeded
with no less energy than John, only with a calmer dignity.
In the course of some further exchange of letters the pope enlarges on the
learning and piety of Langton, and exhorts the king to abstain from taking
up arms against God and His church; but, as John made no concession,
Innocent commanded the bishops of London, Worcester, and Ely, to lay
the whole kingdom under an interdict. When the bishops delivered their
message, the king’s anger broke out in wild oaths and blasphemies. He
 595
swore that if either pope or prelate should lay the kingdom under an
interdict, he would drive the bishops and clergy out of the kingdom
“without eyes, ears, or noses, to be the scarecrows of all nations.” The
prelates withdrew, and, when at a convenient distance from John,
published the interdict.

ENGLAND UNDER THE BAN

In a moment all divine offices throughout the kingdom ceased, except the
rite of baptism and extreme unction. “From Berwick to the British
Channel,” says one account of this fearful malediction, “from the Land’s
End to Dover, the churches were closed, the bells were silent; the only
clergy who were seen stealing silently about were those who were to
baptize new-born infants, or hear the confession of the dying. The dead
were cast out of the towns, buried like dogs in some unconsecrated place,
without prayer, without the tolling bell, without funeral rite. Those only
can judge the effect of a papal interdict who consider how completely the
whole life of all orders was affected by the ritual and daily ordinances of
the church. Every important act was done under the counsel of the priest
or the monk. The festivals of the church were the only holidays, the
processions of the church the only spectacles, the ceremonies of the
church the only amusements. To hear no prayer nor chant, to suppose
that the world was surrendered to the unrestrained power of the devil and
his evil spirits, with no saint to intercede, no sacrifice to avert the wrath of
God; when no single image was exposed to view, not a cross unveiled: the
intercourse between man and God utterly broken off; souls left to perish,
or but reluctantly permitted absolution in the instant of death.” And from
other quarters we learn that, in order to inspire a deeper gloom and
fanaticism, the hair was to be left uncut and the beard unshaven; the use of
meat was forbidden; and even the ordinary salutation was prohibited.
Such was the state of our own country, England, for at least four years.
The public misery was great and universal; but neither the misery of the
subject, nor the religious privations of the Christian, moved the obdurate
heart of the king or the pontiff. The triumph of the shepherd of Rome over
a great kingdom was far more to be desired than the welfare of the flock.
The prelates who published the edict with other rich bishops fled the
kingdom; “there they lived,” says the historian, “in abundance and luxury,
 596
instead of standing up as a defense for the Lord’s house, abandoning their
flocks to the ravening wolf.” The vindictive tyrant John seemed to defy
and treat with insolent disdain the awful effects of the edict on his
suffering subjects. He revelled in his vengeance against the bishops and
priests who obeyed the pope. He confiscated the property of the superior
clergy and monasteries throughout England; and compelled the Jews to
yield up their wealth by imprisonment and torture. This state of things
had lasted nearly two years when another bull was issued.
The crafty pope had narrowly watched the effect of the first; and seeing
that John was losing his friends and becoming more unpopular, he
published the sentence of excommunication against the name and person of
the sovereign. Still the profligate habits of John were such that, while he
defied the pope and the hierarchy, he at the same time alienated the
affections of all orders in the country. Again the pope saw his
opportunity, and issued another bull yet more appalling. The subjects of
John were absolved from their allegiance and commanded to avoid his
presence. But with that stoical indifference to human suffering which he
uniformly manifested, he determined that both himself and the nation
should brave the full vengeance of Rome. The papal thunders seemed
wasted on the unfeeling and irreligious king; and had he managed his nobles
and people wisely, the greatest of the popes and the heaviest of his bolts,
must have been ineffectual on the people of England. But the rapacity,
barbarities, and outrageous conduct of the king, estranged all classes.
Disaffection grew into murmurs, almost into revolt. Innocent, observing
this leaven of disaffection working so effectually in England, prepared to
launch his last and most dangerous thunderbolt against the contumacious
sovereign. “The interdict had smitten the land; the excommunication had
desecrated the person of the king; there: remained the act of deposition
from the throne of his fathers, which was now pronounced. That John,
king of England, be deposed from the royal crown and dignity; that his
subjects be dissolved from their oath of allegiance, and be at liberty to
transfer them to a person worthier to fill the vacant throne.”12
The throne of England was now publicly and solemnly declared vacant,
by the decree of the pope, and the king’s dominions the lawful spoil of
whoever could wrest them from his unhallowed hands. Such was the
power of the popes in those days, and such the terror of his thunders. He
 597
struck great nations with his anathemas, and they fell before him as if
withered and blasted; he hurled great kings from their thrones, and
compelled them to bend before the tempest of his wrath, and humbly obey
the mandate of his will. All, without exception, in Church and State, must
accept his own terms of reconciliation, or die without salvation and be
tormented in the flames of hell for ever. The haughty and able Philip
Augustus of France was tamed into submission in a few months; while the
weak and contemptible John disregarded his fulminations for years, but it
was only to receive a heavier blow at last, and submit to a deeper
humiliation. We shall now see how this was accomplished; and, in the
plot, the reader will also notice the deep cunning and deceitfulness of the
pope. We have no difficulty, throughout this affair, in seeing the depths of
Satan.

THE CROWN OF ENGLAND OFFERED TO FRANCE

The papal sentence of deposition against the king of England having been
publicly and solemnly promulgated, Philip of France was delegated to
execute the decree. The legates placed in his hands a formal commission,
directing him by apostolic authority to invade England, depose the king,
and take his crown; and it is observed by the historian, that the legates and
prelates feigned the most wondrous zeal and earnestness in the whole
affair; while it was altogether the merest artifice. Nothing was farther from
Innocent’s mind than to unite the two crowns on one head. This would
have strengthened France, not the Roman See. Philip had not forgotten the
insolence of the pope in interdicting his kingdom, and excommunicating
himself; but his hatred of John, his love of enterprise, and the pope’s
treachery, completely blinded him. He counted on the truthfulness of the
pope, but he made a ruinous mistake. Not a moment, however, was lost
by Philip in collecting a numerous fleet and army for the invasion of
England.
The pope at the same time published a crusade all over Christendom
against the impious king John, promising to all who should take part in
this holy war the remission of sins and the privileges of crusaders. But the
fallen king was not wanting either in vigor of subtlety. He assembled a
large fleet at Portsmouth, and an army on Barham Downs, near
Canterbury. He assumed the aggressive: but he soon discovered that in his
 598
large army there were not many to be relied upon. Maddened with
passion, he threatened to become a Mahometan and seek an alliance with
the Caliph; but at this moment the spirit of the impatient king underwent a
sudden revolution. From the height of defiant rage he fell to the lowest
depths of prostration and fear.

ENGLAND SURRENDERED TO ROME

As it was not the interest or the intention of his Holiness to allow matters
to be carried to extremities, the vigilant pope saw his time was come to
interfere. Two legates, Pandulph and Durand, were sent over with the final
demands of Innocent to John. They assured him that the King of France
was ready to invade England with a great host and a powerful fleet, and
that he would be accompanied with the archbishops, bishops, and clergy,
whom John had banished; that they would transfer their allegiance to his
rival Philip, and place the crown upon his head. With many such-like
statements, they terrified the king, who lost all self-possession, and threw
himself and his kingdom into the hands of the legates without reserve.
With a meanness of spirit almost exceeding belief, and an abject
submission which knew no bounds, he laid his crown at the feet of the
haughty legate, resigned England and Ireland into the hands of the pope,
swore homage to him as his liege lord, and took an oath of fealty to his
successors. The terms of this remarkable oath are rather long and wordy,
but the following is the substance of it, as given in the Encyclopedia
Britannica.
“I John, by the grace of God King of England and Lord of Ireland, in order
to expiate my sins, from my own free will and the advice of my barons,
give to the Church of Rome, to Pope Innocent and his successors, the
kingdom of England and all other prerogatives of my crown. I will
hereafter hold them as the pope’s wtssal. I will be faithful to God, to the
Church of Rome, to the pope my master, and to his successors
legitimately elected. I promise to pay him a tribute of 1000 merks;13 to
wit, 700 for the kingdom of England, and 300 for the kingdom of Ireland.”
This memorable submission took place on the 15th of May, 1213, in the
fourteenth year of his reign, at the house of the Templars, not far from
Dover.
 599
This oath was taken by the King kneeling before all the people, and with
his hands held up between those of the legate. The attesting witnesses
were, one archbishop, one bishop, nine earls, four barons. Having then
agreed to install Langton in the primacy, he received the crown which he
had been supposed to have forfeited. The wary and politic Pandulph,
having received the fealty of the King of England, and eighty thousand
sterling as compensation for the exiled bishops, hastily gathered up his
charter and his money-bags, and hurried to rejoin the banished prelates in
Normandy and divide the money. He next hastened to the camp of King
Philip Augustus, and finding the army on the point of embarkation for
England, he coolly informed the King, “that there was now no further need
for his services; and that in fact any attempt to invade the kingdom, or to
annoy the King of England, must; be highly offensive to the holy See,
inasmuch as that kingdom was now part and parcel of the patrimony of
the church: it was therefore his duty to dismiss his army, and himself to
return home in peace.” When Philip discovered that he had been so
thoroughly duped, he broke out in a storm of indignant invectives against
the pope. “He had been drawn into enormous expense; he had called forth
the whole strength of his dominions, under the delusive promise of a
kingdom and the remission of his sins; all this he had done at the earnest
entreaty of the pope. And was all the chivalry of France, in arms around
their sove, reign, to be dismissed like hired menials when there was no
more use for their services?” But the King’s fury was met by a cool
repetition of the order, “Desist from hostilities against the vassal of the
Holy See.”14
Philip’s disappointment and mortification were great; but not daring to
offend the pope and unwilling to disband his army without attempting
some enterprise, he made a descent on Flanders. Ferrand, the earl, though a
peer of France, having entered into a secret league with John, gave Philip a
fair pretext for turning his arms against his revolted vassal. But the fleets
of England joined the Flemings, and the attempted conquest of Flanders
ended in disgraceful defeat. The English captured three hundred vessels,
and destroyed about a hundred more: whilst Philip, finding it impossible
to prevent the rest from falling into the hands of the enemy, set fire to
them himself, and thus abandoned the enterprise. Such was the heavy loss
and discomfiture of Philip through the deep laid plot of Innocent.
 600
MAGNA CHARTA
John having thus triumphed over his bitter enemy, and secured the alliance
of the Holy See, continued the same cruel and tyrannical measures which
had hitherto rendered him odious to his subjects. His long misgovernment,
and his reckless indulgence in excesses of every vicious habit, had
exhausted the patience of all classes both in Church and State. A general
desire was expressed for the privileges and the control of settled law.
The story of Magna Charta is so truly English, so well known, and so
intimately connected with church, as well as civil history, that we must
give it a brief notice in our “Short Papers.” Besides, it is said by historians,
that no event of equal importance occurred in any other country of Europe
during the thirteenth century; and that the results of no single incident
have ever been so enduring or so widely spread as those of the meeting of
the barons at Runnymede and the summoning of the burgesses to
Parliament. While monarchy was making such rapid strides in France, a
counter-balancing power was formed in England by the combination of the
nobility and the rise of the House of Commons.
Archbishop Langton, whom Innocent had raised to the primacy, in order
by his means to maintain all the exorbitant pretensions of Rome over
England, was himself an Englishman, and on all occasions showed a sincere
regard for the interests of the kingdom to the utter disappointment of the
pope. Having found amidst the rubbish of an obscure monastery a copy of
the charter of Henry I., he conferred privately with the barons, and
exhorted them to have it renewed. Those of the barons who had felt
deeply the degradation which John had inflicted on the whole kingdom by
his abject submission to the pope, received the document with loud
acclamations, and took a solemn oath to conquer or to die in the defense of
their liberties. After several conferences and delays forty-five barons,
armed in mail, well mounted on their war-steeds, and surrounded with
their knights, servants, and soldiers, presented a petition to the King,
praying him to renew and ratify the charter. John at first resented their
presumption in a furious passion, and swore “that he would newer grant
them liberties which would make himself a slave.” But the barons were
firm and united, and the court of John rapidly diminished. He eventually
submitted and agreed to a friendly conference. The barons named
 601
Runnymede as a proper place for meeting. It was a meadow situated
between Staines and Windsor; the ground is still held in veneration as the
spot where the standard of English freedom was first unfurled. On the
15th day of June, 1215, both parties met there; the King signed the charter
— the great charter of the liberties of England.

THE RAGE OF INNOCENT

Among the witnesses to that signature was Pandulph, the haughty legate.
He saw it was a deadly blow to the papal power in England. Innocent was
soon in possession of the startling news. His infallibility shuddered with
alarm; he raged, he swore, as his manner was; he knit his brow, as the
historian says, and broke out into the language of astonishment. “What!
have the barons of England presumed to dethrone a king who has taken the
cross, and placed himself under the protection of the apostolic See? Do
they transfer to others the patrimony of the Church of Rome? By St.
Peter we cannot leave such a crime unpunished.” The great charter was
declared null and void, the King forbidden under pain of excommunication
to respect the oath which he had taken or the liberties he had confirmed.
But the spiritual censures, the annulling edicts, were now received by the
barons with utter disregard.
War broke out; and to the still deeper disgrace of John, who had no army
of his own, he brought over from the continent bailds of adventurers and
freebooters promising them the estates of the English barons as rewards of
valor. At the head of these mercenary troops, with the aid of two warlike
bishops, Worcester and Norwich, he traversed the whole country from
the channel to the Forth. He let loose his ferocious hordes like wild beasts
upon his unhappy realm. The barons had made no preparations for war,
not suspecting the introduction of a foreign army. Here again we see the
depths of Satan; he is ever ready to give to another what power he has
over the nations, provided he to whom he gives it subjects himself entirely
to his will. “All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and
worship me.” (Matthew 4:8, 9.) It was much the same to John whether he
became a vassal of the pope, Mahomet, or Satan. For a short time he was
undisputed master of the field. The whole land was wasted with fire and
sword. Plunder, murder, torture, raged without control. Nothing was
sacred, nothing was safe. Nobles and peasants fled with their wives and
 602
families when it was possible. The blood-stained assassins of the King and
the pope passed through the country with the sword in one hand and the
torch in the other; when a cry rose to heaven, “Oh, unhappy England! Oh,
unhappy country! May God have mercy on us, and may His judgments
fall on the King and the pope.”
The judgment was not long delayed. Neither heaven nor earth could
tolerate their cruelties and tyrannies any longer. The pope died on July
16th, 1216, at the age of fifty-five; just a year, a month, and a day, after
the signing of Magna Charta. John survived him only a few months. He
died on the 12th of October, 1216, in the forty-ninth year of his age, and
the seventeenth of his reign. It is supposed that he died from fright
accompanied by drunkenness. As he was returning from one of his scenes
of slaughter, the royal wagons were crossing the sands of the Wash, from
Norfolk into Lincolnshire, when the tide rose suddenly and all sank in the
abyss. The accident filled the King with terror; he felt as if the earth was
about to open and swallow him alive. He drank copiously of cider, which,
with fear and remorse, closed the days of the meanest and most despicable
tyrant that has ever sat on the throne of England. The names of other
kings, whose vices are black enough to call forth the execrations of
posterity, are often surrounded with such a halo of talent, either in the
senate or the field, as to mitigate the severity of the sentence. But King
John dies: his character stands before us unredeemed by one solitary
virtue.15
 603

CHAPTER 25
INNOCENT AND THE SOUTH OF FRANCE

A new field of blood, and an entirely new character of warfare, were now
brought before the mind of the voracious priest of Rome. It was a war not
against the enemies of the faith abroad, or against the refractory kings at
home, but the army of the church warring against the confessed followers
of the Lord Jesus Christ. This was a new thing in the annals of
Christendom.
By the favor of the princes and by the indifference of the clergy the
Albigenses had been allowed for centuries to preach the gospel and to
spread the truth unmolested. Roman Catholicism had nearly perished from
the provinces of Count Raymond. The people generally were well inclined
to break off their connection with the church of Rome altogether. When
this state of things came to the ears of Innocent, he called for a crusade
against the heretics of Languedoc, and rested not until he had swept the
whole population from the soil of France.
But we must first of all go back a few steps in order to connect the line of
witnesses for Christ and His gospel.

THE CHAIN OF WITNESSES

When we parted with the Paulicians1 — the Eastern witnesses for God
and His truth — we promised to meet with them again in the regions of
the West. It is asserted that in their missionary zeal they spread
themselves over Europe; but whether they remained a distinct and
characteristic sect, or mingled with the sectaries of the West, has been a
question with historians. Among the various forms of heresy which were
denounced by the dominant church, scarcely one of them escaped the
charge of Manicheism — the brand affixed to the emigrants from the East.
But it would be unreasonable to contend from this general charge that the
Western sects were the fruit of their mission, though branded with the
same name. It is more than likely, however, that they found many
 604
separatists in spirit, though not openly so, and in such cases may have
become their teachers, and in this way perpetuated their principles.
The Western witnesses we have no doubt were the result of the same
spirit of grace and truth, through the faithfulness of God, who never left
Himself without a witness, but we see no ground to speak of them as the
descendants of the misrepresented Paulicians. More likely there was an
intermingling of these seceders from the established church.
We shall now endeavor to trace the silver line of God’s grace, which was
actively at work, though under different forms and names, during the
darkest period of the papal oppression. There is no difficulty in
identifying God’s witnesses from the earliest period down to the
Reformation, or in tracing the unbroken chain of testimony against the
wickedness of Rome, and for the true gospel of the grace of God. We
brought the line of witnesses in the history of the Paulicians down to the
tenth century; we shall now notice the more prominent sects which arose
in the West before and since that period.
1. Claudius, a Spaniard by birth, was famous as a commentator on the
scriptures in the court of Louis in Aquitaine. His patron, the Emperor,
promoted him to the bishopric of Turin in the year 814. He is spoken of in
history as the Wyckliffe of the ninth century, and the strenuous advocate
of primitive Christianity. On reaching his diocese he found the churches
filled with images and embellished with flowers and garlands. He at once,
and in the most unceremonious manner, ordered all such ornaments to be
removed. No distinction was to be made in favor of any picture, relic, or
cross; all were to be swept away as with the besom of destruction. He
denounced the worship of such things as the renewal of the worship of
demons under other names, in place of preaching the glorious resurrection
of the Lord Jesus. He declared that the apostolic office of St. Peter ceased
with the life of the apostle. He therefore made light of papal censures and
the alleged power of the keys. It has been said that he went the length of
separating his church from the Romish communion.
But, like many other reformers, Claudius was rough and intemperate in his
zeal. The fearful corruptions of the clergy and the idolatries of the people
led him to speak and write in strong and passionate terms. Nor need we
wonder. But the Lord watched over him in the most marvellous way.
 605
Though he was a bold reformer and a fearless iconoclast in an Italian city,
he was permitted by the unseen hand of Providence to finish his labors in
the full privileges of a bishop, though not unopposed.
As a link in the chain of witnesses, Claudius has a very distinct place. His
influence was great and widely spread. Theodemir, abbot of a monastery
near Nismes, ingenuously confesses, says Milman, that most of the great
transalpine prelates thought with Claudius. And the hostility to the
Romish church and her many sacraments, which afterwards prevailed in
the Alpine valleys, has been generally traced to the reformer, Claudius. He
died in the year 839.

PETROBRUSSIANS
2. About the year 1110, a preacher, named Peter de Brueys, began to
declaim against the corruptions of the dominant church and the vices of the
clergy. As a missionary, he labored chiefly in the south of France,
Provence, and Languedoc. And, what may seem strange to us, he was
allowed to disseminate his new doctrines with impunity for about twenty
years. The enemy could neither silence nor kill the witness until his
testimony was finished. But as nearly all we know of such men comes to
us through the writings of their adversaries, we only hear of what were
called their heresics. The venerable abbot of Cluny wrote a treatise against
Peter’s followers — thence called Petrobrussians: they are charged with
many offenses, but which may be reduced to the following — opposition
to infant baptism, to the mass, celibacy, crucifixes, transubstantiation, and
the efficacy of prayers for the salvation of the dead. But nothing which the
founder of this sect did or said seemed to rouse the public feeling against
him until he burned a number of crosses bearing the image of Christ. The
priests then succeeded, a popular tumult was raised, and he was burned
alive at St. Gilles in Languedoc. But his protest was not so easily
consumed. Divine light may be overshadowed for a time, but it can never
be extinguished.

HENRICIANS
3. The fire which burned Peter de Brueys neither discouraged nor silenced
his followers. One of these, named Henry, a monk of Cluny, and a
 606
deacon, became a more daring and a more powerful preacher than Peter. In
the retirement of his monastery he had devoted himself to the study of the
New Testament; and having gained a knowledge of Christianity from the
pure word of God, he longed to go forth into the world to proclaim the
truth to his fellow-men. His personal appearance, and his private
education, combined to make his preaching most powerful and awakening.
The rapid change in his countenance is likened to a stormy sea; his stature
was lofty, his eyes were rolling and restless; his powerful voice, his naked
feet and neglected apparel, attracted an attention, which was fixed by the
fame of his learning and his sanctity. In years he was but a youth, yet his
deep tones, his wonderful eloquence, with his remarkable appearance,
appalled the clergy and delighted the people. In the spirit of a John the
Baptist he called upon the people to repent, and turn to the Lord, and not
unfrequently assailed the unpopular vices of the clergy.
But the opposition which Henry encountered from the clergy only
attracted the people the more towards him. Multitudes, both of the poorer
and the wealthier classes, received him as their spiritual guide in all things.
He is first heard of historically at Lausanne, but he traversed the south of
France from Lausanne to Bordeaux; and, as Neander observes, “he chained
the people to himself, and filled them with contempt and hatred towards
the higher clergy — they would have nothing to do with them. The divine
service celebrated by them was no longer attended. They found themselves
exposed to the insults and gibes of the populace, and had to apply for
protection to the civil arm.” The prudent bishop of Le Mans, seeing the
influence he had gained over the people, contented himself with simply
directing Henry to another field of labor. The zealous monk quietly
withdrew, and made his appearance in Provence, where Peter de Brueys
had labored before him. Here he developed still more clearly his
opposition to the errors of the church of Rome, and drew down upon
himself the bitter hostility of the hierarchy.
Henry was apprehended by the archbishop of Arles; he was condemned as
a heretic by the Council of Pisa, which was held in 1134, and sentenced to
confinement in a cell. In a short time he escaped, and returned to
Languedoc. Desertion of churches, it is said, total contempt of the clergy,
followed the eloquent herestarch wherever he went. A legate, named
Alberic, was sent by Eugenius III. to subdue the revolt; but his mission
 607
would have been fruitless, had he not prevailed on St. Bernard to share
with him the labor and the glory of the enterprise. “Henry is an
antagonist,” he said, “who can only be put down by the conqueror of
Abelard and of Arnold of Brescia.”
The powerful abbot of Clairvaux wrote to the prince of the Provence to
prepare for his arrival, and signifying the object of his coming. “The
churches,” he wrote, “are without people; the people without priests; the
priests without honor; and Christians without Christ. The churches are no
longer conceived holy, nor the sacraments sacred, nor are the festivals any
more celebrated. Men die in their sins — souls are hurried away to the
terrible tribunal — without penitence or communion; baptism is refused to
infants, who are thus precluded from salvation.” The abbot wrought
miracles, as was believed; the people wondered and admired; Henry fled;
Bernard pursued, purifying the places infected by the pestilence of heresy.
At length the heretic was seized; he was handed over in chains to the
bishop of Toulouse, who consigned him to prison, where he soon
afterwards died suddenly. He was thus delivered from all his persecutors
in the year 1148, and entered into his rest.

VAUDOIS, ALBIGENSES, WALDENSES

4. The origin of the Western sectaries, so-called, under the common name
of Waldenses, has been the subject of much controversy. One class of
writers, favorable to Romanism, with the view of involving them in the
common charge of Manicheism, have endeavored to prove that their
opinions were of Eastern, or Paulician origin; while the opposite party
affirm that they were free from the Manicheart error, and that they have
been the inheritors and maintainers, from father to son, of a pure and
scriptural Christianity, from the time of Constantine, if not from the days
of the apostles.2
But as it is not so much our object at present to trace the history of these
ancient, simple, and devoted christian people, as to bring out another
feature of the papacy under Innocent, in its most fully expressed
blasphemy and cruelty; we will merely satisfy the reader as to who these
people were, and as to the scene of their slaughter. “The terms,” says Dr.
Gilly, “Vaudois in French, Vallenses in Latin, Valdisi in Italian, and
 608
Waldenses in English ecclesiastical history, signifying nothing more or less
than ‘men of the valleys;’ and as the valleys of Piedmont have had the
honor of producing a race of people who have remained true to the faith
introduced by the first missionaries who preached Christianity in those
regions, the synonyms have been adopted as the distinguishing names of a
religious community, faithful to the primitive creed, and free from the
corruptions of the church of Rome.”
The Albigenses, though essentially one with the Waldenses in matters of
faith, were so called because the greater part of Narbonnese-Gaul which
they inhabited was called Albigesium, or from Albi, a town in Languedoc.
The Alps separated the two communities. God found an asylum for the
Waldenses in the valleys on the eastern side, and for the Albigenses in the
valleys on the western side, of that great mountain range, where they were
preserved and fortified for many centuries.

PETER WALDO
From a similarity of names, Peter Valdo, or Waldo, the reformer of Lyons,
has frequently been spoken of as the first founder of the Waldensian sect.
This we think a mistake, but one easily made, and one which the
Romanists eagerly improved as an argument against their antiquity, and
one which has been adopted by most of the general histories. But Mr.
Elliot, in his “Horae Apocalypticae,” and those mentioned in the note
above, have examined the question with great patience and research, and,
we believe, clearly established the conclusion of the orthodoxy and the
antiquity of the “men of the valleys.”3
At the same time Peter Waldo is worthy of all praise for his self-denying
services in the cause of truth, and against error. His piety, zeal, and
courage were most conspicuous at a period when the papal hierarchy
began to persecute all who questioned its authority and infallibility. He
was no doubt raised up of God just at that time to give greater distinctness
to the testimony of the Alpine peasants. The simplicity of their worship,
and the scene of their tranquillity, appear not to have excited the jealousy
of their neighbors or the suspicion of the universal church till about this
time. It happened, under the hand of God, in this way.
 609
About the year 1160 the practices of idolatry which accompanied the
doctrine of transubstantiation deeply impressed Peter with an alarming
sense of the wickedness of the times, and the dangerous corruptions of the
papacy. This led to the true conversion of his soul to God. From that
moment he was devoted to His service and His glory. He abandoned his
mercantile occupations, and distributed his wealth to the poor, in imitation
of the early disciples. Numbers gathered around him; he felt the need of
instruction in the things of God; where was it to be found? He became
deeply desirous to understand the Gospels which he had been accustomed
to hear in church. He employed two ecclesiastics to translate them into the
native tongue, with some other books of scripture, and some passages of
the Fathers. This was Waldo’s greatest work, for which he deserves the
best thanks of posterity. The scriptures at that time were in a great
measure a sealed book in Christendom, being only in the Latin tongue. The
followers of Waldo, being thus provided with copies of the scriptures in
their own tongue, they were able to explain to the people that they were
not advancing doctrines of their own, but a pure faith as it really existed in
the Bible. After the manner of the seventy, he sent out his disciples, two
by two, into the neighboring villages to preach the gospel.
This awoke the thunders of the Vatican. As long as Waldo and his friends
confined themselves to their own protest against the innovations, the
hierarchy did not seriously molest them; but as soon as they employed
that dreaded engine, the scriptures in the vulgar tongue, they were
immediately anathematized and excommunicated. As yet they
contemplated no secession from the church, but only its reformation.
They persisted in preaching the glorious gospel of the grace of God to lost
sinners: an interdict was issued against them by the Archbishop of Lyons.
Waldo resolutely replied, “We must obey God rather than man.” From
that time “the poor men of Lyons,” as they were called, were branded by
the Clergy with obloquy and contempt as heretics. For three years after
his first condemnation, which took place in 1172, Waldo contrived to
remain concealed in the city of Lyons or its neighborhood, but Pope
Alexander the Third fulminated his threats and terrors so effectually, not
only against Waldo, but against all who should dare to hold the slightest
communication with the reformer, that, for his friends’ sake, he fled from
Lyons, and became a wanderer for the rest of his life. After seeking a
 610
shelter in several places, but finding a resting-place in none, he passed
from among the Bohemian mountaineers, the ancestors of Huss and
Jerome, into his eternal rest about the year 1179.

THE DISPERSION OF WALDO’S FOLLOWERS

When Waldo fled, his disciples followed him. The dispersion took place
similarly to that which arose on the occasion of Stephen’s persecution.
The effects were also similar; the blessed gospel was more widely
disseminated throughout Europe. Their great strength was their possession
of the sacred scriptures in their own language. They read the Gospels;
they preached and they prayed in the vulgar tongue. Many of them, no
doubt, found their way to the valleys of Piedmont and the cities of
Languedoc. A new translation of the Bible was doubtless a rich accession
to the spiritual treasures of that interesting people.
The scene was now ready for Pope Innocent: the papal threatenings
having been transmitted to his vigorous hand, were executed with a willing
and unrelenting mind. He who had humbled the great kings of Germany,
France, and England, and had received implicit submission from almost
every part of Christendom, was still disowned as supreme head of the
church by the Waldenses wherever they were found. It was not likely that
such a spirit as Innocent’s would continue to endure with calmness this
resistance to his boasted universal supremacy. But what was their crime?
where were they to be found? and how were they to be dealt with?
1. They had the highest reputation everywhere, even from their worst
enemies, for modesty, frugality, honest industry, chastity, and
temperance. “In no instance,” says a high authority, but not very favorable
to what he calls the anti-sacerdotalists, “are the morals of Peter Waldo and
the Alpine Bible-Christians arraigned by their bitterest foes.” Their mortal
sin was found in their appeal to the scriptures, and to the scriptures alone,
in all matters of faith and worship. They rejected the ‘vast system of
tradition-religion, as maintained by the church of Rome. Both in life and in
doctrine they were noble witnesses for Christ and the simplicity of the
gospel; but they formed a powerful protest against the wealth, the power,
and the superstitions of the dominant religion. They rejected the almost
innumerable sacraments of Rome, and maintained that there were only two
 611
in the New Testament — baptism and the Lord’s supper. In general we
may say that they anticipated and held the same doctrines which, after the
lapse of three centuries, were to be promulgated by the Reformers of
Germany and England, and which form the creed of Protestants at the
present time.
2. The progress of “the poor men of Lyons,” after their persecutions,
appears to have been rapid, and widely extended. They spread abroad, we
are told, into the south of France, into Lombardy, and into Arragon. “In
Lombardy and Provence,” says Robertson, “the Waldenses had more
schools than the Catholics; their preachers disputed and taught publicly,
while the number and importance of the patrons whom they had gained,
rendered it dangerous to interfere with them. In Germany they had forty-
one schools in the diocese of Passau, and they were numerous in the
dioceses of Metz and Toul. From England to the south of Italy, from the
Hellespont to the Ebro, their opinions were widely spread.”4
3. Such was the state of things on the accession of Pope Innocent III. With
anxious forebodings, and a far-seeing eye, he watched this spirit of
religious independence, but how to crush it effectually was the question.
Besides, at that time, as the reader will remember, his hands were full. He
was seeking to destroy the balance of power in Germany and Italy, he was
contending with the kings of France and England by turns, he was directing
the march of the Crusaders, and overturning by their means the Greek
empire at Constantinople; yet was he watching, and determined to punish
every dissent from the tenets of the church of Rome, and every exercise of
the thinking faculty on religious subjects. It was loudly rumored about this
time that the two principal seats of this disaffection towards Rome were
the valleys of Piedmont and the south of France. The Piedmontese
Christians flourished in comparative obscurity, while the Albigenses were
rendered more notorious, as well as more dangerous, by the protection
afforded them in the wealthy cities of Languedoc. Raymond VI., Count of
Toulouse, not only favored those of the Waldensian creed as the best of
his subjects, but employed them in his family, though avowedly himself a
Roman Catholic. The Count of Foix was married to a Waldensian; of his
two sisters, one was said to be a Waldensian, and the other a catharist, or
puritan.
 612
THE REGION OF ALBI
The name of Languedoc was given to these remote provinces of the
kingdom, because of the rich, melodious, and flexible language which was
then vernacular there. In refinement, wealth, and liberty, both political and
religious, they surpassed all the rest of France. The old Roman civilization
still lingered in the valleys of Languedoc and Provence. The feudal
chieftains, especially the counts of Toulouse and Foix, though owning the
king as lord paramount, possessed and exercised sovereign authority in
their own domains. By the favor of Raymond, and the indifference of the
other chiefs, this beautiful region had advanced far more rapidly towards
civilization than any other part of Europe; but this civilization, observes
Milman, was entirely independent of, or rather hostile to, ecclesiastical
influence. The curse of popery, as we have often seen, is not only ruinous
to the souls of men, but destructive of all progress in the arts of life and in
general civilization. Even the face of a Catholic country seems blasted by
its withering influence. The mind must be kept ignorant, superstitious, and
enslaved, if popery is to flourish. But for a long time the inhabitants of
Languedoc had been left unmolested by the hierarchy of Rome, and, as a
natural consequence, their cities were filled with a peaceful, industrious,
and wealthy community.
But, on the other hand, as was most natural, in proportion as the word of
God and liberal opinions prevailed, the church of Rome and the clergy
sank into the greatest comtempt. Nobles and knights no longer allowed
their younger sons to be trained for the church, but put sons of their serfs
into benefices, and appropriated the tithes. Equally hated by the nobility
and the common people for their grasping and unprincipled conduct, the
priests could offer no resistance to the progress of the new opinions. They
were no longer feared for their spiritual power, and they were despised for
their sensuality. They became the song and the jest of the Troubadours;
their spoiling of orphans, their swindling of widows, their dishonesty,
gluttony, and drunkenness, were proverbial, and undeniable. “So sensible,”
says Robertson, “were they themselves of their ignominy, that they were
fain to hide their tonsure by drawing the hair from the back of the head
over it.” The simplest peasant, on hearing of a scandalous action, was in
the habit of saying, “I would rather be a priest than be guilty of such a
deed.” So numerous were the, seceders from Rome become, that they
 613
constituted the mass of the population. The Jews were also numerous and
wealthy; and, of course, a number of individuals properly of no sect,
peopled the flourishing cities of Languedoc; but we must now speak of
them all under the common name of Albigenses.

INNOCENT AND THE ALBIGENSIAN PERSECUTION

Such was the state of things in that sunny, peaceful, prosperous region,
when a dark thunder-cloud gathered in the horizon. Innocent heard with
dismay the progress of the new opinions, and resolved to crush them.
With this object in view, he first of all addressed a letter to the prelates
and princes of southern France, exhorting them to take vigorous measures
for the suppression of heresy; all heretics were to be anathematized and
banished. But to Raymond and others such a merciless requisition
appeared so arbitrary, that it met with little attention. “We have been
brought up with these people,” replied Raymond; “we have relations
among them, we know that their life is honest; how can we persecute
those whom we respect as the most peaceable and loyal of our people?” It
was obvious that in such a sacrifice of the population the interests and the
revenues of the princes were involved, and that it would amount to a
process of extermination; but to this fearful process the supreme shepherd
of Christ’s flock did not hesitate to resort, however much the temporal
sovereign might. The Albigenses were excommunicated, and placed under
an anathema, which extended to every one who might lodge or shelter
them, deal with them in trade, or join with them in social intercourse. But
the disobedient Raymond still showed favor to his heretical subjects, and
the enraged pope, in consequence, next sent two legates — Reinerius and
Guido — to inquire into the causes of the failure, and armed with full
authority to extirpate the heretics. Many of these unoffending people
were arrested, condemned, and committed to the flames; still Raymond
was inactive, and the heresy grew and gathered strength.
What was to be done? New powers were demanded; sterner and more
active agents were required. Raymond, an independent sovereign, and
knowing the blameless character of his subjects, refused to execute the
demands of Rome. St. Bernard, long the champion of the papacy, was
dead, but the pope turned to his spiritual descendants. Peter of
Castelnau, a Cistercian monk, was sent to Raymond as apostolic legate,
 614
in the year 1207, to demand that he should exterminate his heretical
subjects with fire and sword. But the tolerant prince, who seems to have
been a gay, pleasure-loving man, without strength of character to be either
a heretic or a bigot, could not be aroused to obey the papal mandate.
Twice he refused, and twice he was excommunicated, and his dominions
laid under a solemn interdict. Innocent sanctioned what his legate had
done, and wrote a letter to Raymond, unexampled in the arrogance and
insolence of its language. “Pestilent man! imperious, cruel, and direful
tyrant; what pride has seized your heart, and what is your folly, to refuse
peace with your neighbors, and to brave the divine laws, by protecting the
enemies of the faith? If you do not fear eternal flames, ought you not to
dread the temporal chastisements which you have merited by so many
crimes? For verily the church can have no peace with the captain of
freebooters and robbers — the patron of heretics — the contemner of the
holy seasons — the friend of Jews and usurers — the enemy of the
prelates, and a persecutor of Jesus Christ and His church. The arm of the
Lord shall still be stretched out against thee, until thou art crushed to dust
and atoms. Verily, He shall make thee feel how difficult it is to withdraw
thyself from the wrath thou hast called down upon thine own head.”
Such is a specimen of the vehemence of papal invective in mediaeval times.
And for what? the reader may inquire. Not for immorality, however bad he
may have been; but because he refused to be the pope’s executioner, and
shed the blood of his own peaceful, industrious, faithful subjects. But such
was the power of these incarnate fiends, that Raymond was frightened
into submission. He signed a treaty, most reluctantly, for the
extermination of all heretics from his dominions. He was slow, however, in
proceeding with the work of persecution. The legate perceiving this, could
not conceal his rage, but broke out in the most reproachful language against
the prince — called him a coward, accused him of perjury, and renewed
the excommunication in all its plenitude. Need we wonder that a feudal
prince was irritated to wrathful indignation by the daring impudence of the
monk? He is reported to have exclaimed, in an unhappy moment, that he
would make Castelnau answer for his insolence with his life. It is
supposed that the menace was heard by one of his: attendants, who, the
following day, after an angry debate, drew his poignard, struck the legate
in the side, and killed him. The quarrel, as has been observed, assumed an
 615
aspect similar to that which raged a short time before this between Henry
II. of England and Thomas Becket.

RAYMOND A SPIRITUAL OUTLAW

Innocent had now obtained what he wished — a decent pretext for the full
outpouring of the vials of his wrath. The honors of martyrdom were
decreed to the victim; Raymond was denounced as tlhe author of the
crime, and proclaimed a spiritual outlaw; and the faithful were called upon
to assist in his destruction. “Up, soldiers of Christ,” he writes to Philip
Augustus of France, “up most christian King! hear the cry of blood; aid us
in wreaking vengeance on these malefactors. Up ye nobles, knights of
France, the rich and sunny lands of the south will be the reward of your
valor.” The preaching of the crusade was entrusted to the Cistercian order,
under their fanatical abbot, Arnold; “a man,” says Milman, “whose heart
was sheathed with the triple iron of pride, cruelty, bigotry.” Just at this
moment, the missionaries fell in with the notable Spaniard, Dominic, ever
since famous as the founder of the Inquisition and the Dominican friars.
His heart was in no wise softer than Arnold’s, and he was more successful
as a preacher. Not a moment was lost in denouncing the crime and its
perpetrators. Every heart and hand was engaged to take vengeance for the
insult upon God in the person of His servant. The same indulgences which
had ever been granted to the champions of the holy sepulcher were assured
to those who should enter upon the new crusade against Raymond and the
Albigenses. The clergy everywhere preached with indefatigable zeal this
new way of obtaining the forgiveness of sins and everlasting life.
“To that ignorant and superstitious generation,” says Sir James Stephens,
“no summons could have been more welcome. Danger, privations, and
fatigue, in their direst forms, had beset the rugged paths by which the
crusaders to the East had fought their way to the promised paradise. But
in the war against the Albigenses the same inestimable recompense was to
be won, not by self-denial, but by self-indulgence. Every debt owing to
man was to be cancelled, every offense already committed against the law
of God was to be pardoned, and an eternity of blessedness was to be won,
not by a life of future sanctity, but by a life of future crime; not by the
restraint, but by the gratification, of their foulest passions; by satiating
their cruelty, their avarice, and their lust, at the expense of a people whose
 616
wealth excited their covetousness, and whose superiority provoked their
resentment.” Forward to this mingled harvest of blood and plunder, of
priestly absolution and military fame, rushed all the wild spirits of the age.
The whole of Europe resounded with preparations for the holy war.

THE HOME CRUSADE

In the year 1209, in answer to the call of one man, and he professedly the
chief pastor of the church of Christ, three hundred thousand soldiers
gathered around the infected provinces. Some of the writers of that age
raise the number to half a million, and all wearing in solemn mockery the
symbol of the cross. They formed three great armies, over each of which
presided an archbishop, a bishop, and mitred abbot. But eminent above all
the leaders of this sacred war was the notorious Simon de Montfort, lord
of a fief near Paris, and Earl of Leicester, in right of his mother, an English
lady. Satan had skilfully selected his instruments — Innocent, Arnold,
Dominic, and de Montfort are names of awful memory in history. It
would be difficult to say which of the four hearts was most thoroughly
sheathed in the triple iron.
Raymond, being wholly unprepared to meet such a host, took refuge in
submission. The pope promised absolution on certain conditions. But
these were hard and cruel in the extreme.
1. He must clear himself of the murder of Castelnau;
2. as a proof of his sincerity he must surrender seven of his best
castles;
3. that he should do public penance for his past offenses;
4. that he should in his own person become a crusader against his own
subjects.
The poor count complained of the terms imposed on him; but such were
the tellder mercies of the pope, and they must be rigorously fulfilled to the
letter. He submitted and received absolution in St. Gilles in the presence of
three archbishops and nineteen bishops. He next appeared in the cathedral
where Castelnau was buried, with naked shoulders, and a rope round his
neck, either end of which was carried by a bishop; the scourge was then
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applied, not as a mere ceremony, but with hearty goodwill, till, covered
with blood, the unhappy count was permitted to escape from his
tormentors and from the vast crowd which had gathered to witness this
almost incredible degradation of their suzerain lord. But this was not the
worst penalty; he was obliged to accompany the crusaders against his own
loyal subjects, and against his nephew, Raymond-Roger, the Viscount of
Beziers, whose territories were said to be full of the odious Albigenses.
The vindictive soul of the pope being so far propitiated with having
abased and duped his enemy, the mighty armament moved on. Three
hundred thousand infuriated warriors poured into his beautiful states.
“Forward,” was the cry of the holy abbot, “you shall ravage every field;
you shall slay every human being; strike and spare not. The measure of
their iniquity is full, and the blessing of the church is on your head.” Thus
instructed by the priest, De Montfort was prepared to act. The vast army
marched through the land of vineyards, and of oliveyards, burning, slaying,
ravaging, as they went. The peasantry were ridden down and slaughtered
in cold blood.

THE SLAUGHTER AND BURNING OF BEZIERS

Raymond-Roger, a gallant young man of twenty-four, displayed a braver
spirit than his uncle, and resolved to defend his people against the
crusaders. His two great cities, Beziers and Careassonne, were his chief
strength. He threw himself into the latter, the stronger place. “The soldiers
of the cross — the priests of the Lord,” as they called themselves,
appeared before Beziers; which had been well provided and garrisoned by
the viscount. The bishop of the place was in the army: he was allowed by
Arnold to offer his advice to the people and recommend a surrender.
“Renounce your opinions and save your lives,” was the bishop’s advice;
but the Albigenses firmly replied that they would not renounce a faith
which gave them the kingdom of God and His righteousness. The
Catholics joined with the heretics in declaring that, rather than surrender,
they would suffer death in its worst form. “Then,” said Arnold, “there
shall not be left one stone upon another; fire and sword shall devour men,
women, and children.” The town fell into the hands of the besiegers, and
fearfully was the injunction obeyed. The knights, pausing at the gates,
asked the abbot how the soldiers were to distinguish catholics from
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heretics; “Slay them all,” he replied, “the Lord knoweth them that are
His.” The slaughter began: men, women, children, clergy, were massacred
indiscriminately, while the bells of the cathedral were rung till the slaughter
was complete. Trembling multitudes fled to the churches, in hope of
finding a sanctuary within the hallowed walls; but not one human being
was left alive. The vast population of Beziers, who so lately had thronged
the streets and marts, now lay in slaughtered heaps. The numbers thus
slain are estimated variously from twenty to one hundred thousand. So
many from the open country flee for refuge to the cities at such times, that
numbers cannot be correctly estimated. The city was given up to plunder,
and then set on fire.
Never did the dragon-abbot say a truer word than that “the Lord knoweth
them that are His,” though he said it in awful derision, and was himself an
utter stranger to the remaining part of the verse,
“And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ
depart from iniquity.” (2 Timothy 2:19.)
The Lord surely knows all who believe in Him, and infinitely precious to
Him is the feeblest of His saints. And Arnold will one day see, in the same
glory with their Lord, those whom he denounced as heretics and slew with
the sword. What a day that will be when the persecutor and the
persecuted, the accuser and the accused, shall stand face to face in the
presence of Him who judges righteously! Till then, may we walk by faith,
seeking only to please the Lord.

THE SIEGE OF CARCASSONNE

From Beziers, of which nothing now remained but a burning pile, the
crusaders moved on in the direction of Carcassonne. As they advanced,
they found the country desolate. The terrible example of Beziers struck
terror into all hearts. The inhabitants of the defenceless villages fled as
they saw the smoking ruins of the strong city. Woes innumerable tracked
the polluted steps of these dragon hosts. They stood before the walls of
Carcassonne: Roger commanded in person, and sustained a long siege with
great valor. Simon de Montfort was foremost in the assault. On the other
side, Roger was seen exposing himself everywhere at the head of the
defenders, and animating their courage by words and example;. During
 619
forty days the siege was continued, and the besiegers were repulsed with
great loss. But for the treachery of the abbot, Raymond-Roger would have
triumphed. Thus matters stood.
The soldiers of the cross were only required to serve forty days, both by
feudal law and in order to gain all the privileges of crusaders. At the end of
this period many of the leaders and the great mass of the troops returned
home disappointed and dissatisfied. The excessive heat, the scantiness of
water, the infected atmosphere from the unburied dead, the rapacity,
cruelty, and perfidy of the priests, led many to welcome the close of their
feudal term. In these extremities and surrounded with disorderly troops
the abbot had recourse to craft — the wiles of Satan. The noble and brave
viscount was decoyed into a conference. On the oath of the legate and the
barons of the army that good faith would be maintained, Roger came out
with three hundred of his followers. But with so formidable a heretic faith
was not to be kept. And just as he was beginning to propose terms, the
legate exclaimed that no faith was to be kept with one who had been so
faithless to his God; and ordered the viscount to be put in chains and cast
into prison with his followers. But he was soon relieved from his
humiliation and suffering by death, which was popularly attributed to the
hand of Simon. The people, dismayed by the loss of their chief, abandoned
the city and escaped by means of a subterranean passage, but the priests
consoled themselves by seizing about four hundred of the citizens, whom
they hanged and burned for the common offense of heresy.
The city of Carcassonne and the princely heritage of Raymond-Roger were
now in the hands of the papal party, and according to the law of conquest
entirely at their disposal. The legate and his clergy presented these rich
lands to Simon de Montfort as the firstfruits of a glorious victory over the
heretics; and he was hailed as Viscount of Beziers and Carcassonne,
promising to hold his dignities and territories on condition of a yearly
tribute to the pope as liege lord of the conquered territories.
The election of Simon was confirmed by the pope, though the great
principles of justice and the faith of treaties were so glaringly and
shamelessly violated; but the King of Arragon, as suzerain, refused to
invest Simon in his new possessions. The conquest appeared to be
complete, but it was not really so. The Duke of Burgundy, the Count of
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Nevers, and other French noblemen, withdrew from the crusade, being
greatly offended with the arrogance of the pope’s mercenaries. De
Montfort, being thus left with a comparatively small force, was unable to
maintain his position. Many cities and castles that had been taken by the
papal party were again lost, and an incessant war was carried on; now
marked by the fierce exasperation of the people, and the most relentless
cruelties on both sides. De Montfort wrote in despair to the prelates of
Christendom for a fresh army.
The trumpet of Rome was again sounded: a fresh crusade was preached.
“Swarms of monks,” says Greenwood, “issued from the numberless cells
and monasteries of the Cistercian order, preaching perdition to heretics,
and boundless pardons to all who should shed the blood — were it only of
one — of the accursed brood. There was no crime so black, no vice so
rooted in the heart, but that a forty-days’ campaign against these outcasts
would wipe it away, even to the last trace of guilt, nor leave the faintest
sense of remorse behind.” Attracted by the promise of great earthly spoils
in the sunny south, and of eternal felicity in heaven, unnumbered troops of
fanatics flocked to the standard of De Montfort. In the spring of 1210 he
received a large reinforcement under the command of his wife, and the war
recommenced with fresh fury.

THE RUIN OF RAYMOND DETERMINED

The submission of Count Raymond to the papal terms of reconciliation
appears to have been complete. He had surrendered his castles, had
undergone the basest personal humiliation, and had accompanied the
crusades, notwithstanding his bleeding shoulders, against his own kinsman
Roger. Surely the church will be satisfied, express her approbation, and
receive him back into her bosom. But, alas, it was just the opposite. True,
the pope in the most treacherous manner professed to embrace him as his
obedient son, absolved him from his alleged guilt as to the murder of
Castelnau, and gave him a cloak and a ring. With these valuable presents
the count returned to his own country, in the hope that the pope’s
concessions would be confirmed by his legates. But here, history has lifted
the veil, and revealed the most deliberate and avowed treachery that ever
blackened the policy of any ruler. In a letter written by this pontiff to his
legates in Toulouse, he refers to the words of the apostle in justification of
 621
his deceitful conduct, “Nevertheless, being crafty, I caught you with
guile.” (2 Corinthians 12:16.) Thus he writes, “We counsel you with the
apostle Paul to employ guile with regard to this count; for in this case it
ought to be called prudence. We must attack separately those who are
separated from unity. Leave for a time this count of Toulouse, employing
towards him a course of dissimulation, that the other heretics may be the
more easily defeated, and that afterwards we may crush him when he shall
be left alone.” The confiding but doomed count, as a matter of course,
urged the fulfillment of the pope’s decree. But the crafty legates,
Theodosius and Arnold, who were in their master’s secret, had other
intentions. They contrived delays, made demands, until the count found
his cast was hopeless in their hands. On being told that he had not cleared
himself of the crimes of heresy and murder, and that they could not
absolve him, he burst into tears; when the iron-hearted churchmen mocked
his disappointment, quoting the text; “Surely in the floods of great waters
they shall not come nigh unto him” (Psalms 32:6); and pronounced his
excommunication afresh.

THE REAL OBJECT OF THE CATHOLICS

The reader has now before him the real, though then concealed, object of
these Satan-inspired men. It is the old, the cruel story of Naboth and his
vineyard: Jezebel must have the charming regions of the south as her own
vineyard; the blood of Naboth the Jezreelite must be shed. It will be seen
from the pope’s secret injunctions to his legates, that the ruin, not only of
Raymond, but of all the princes in Languedoc, was determined; and that he
had deceived Count Raymond by a reigned reconciliation, so as to separate
him from the rest of the Languedocian nobles, that they might be
destroyed one by one with greater ease. This was the policy of Innocent
as written by his own hand and still extant, and his legates were apt:
disciples of their master. But the spoils of the Count of Toulouse and all
his partisans were a matter of necessity to Simon and his allies the legates;
nothing less than the whole south could satisfy the cupidity of De
Montfort and the fanaticism of the rapacious priests. It was therefore
determined to involve the Counts of Foix, Comminges, and Bearn, with all
their territorial dependencies.
 622
The Count of Toulouse was suzerain of five great subordinate fiefs. The
courts of these petty sovereigns vied with each other in splendor and
gallantry. Life, we are told, was a perpetual feast or tournament. Some of
them had been amongst the most distinguished of the crusaders in the East,
and had brought home many usages of oriental luxury. It was no question
with such of either heretic, Waldensian or Albigensian. They were good
catholics outwardly; but their religion really was chivalry, and the music of
the troubador. Still there were some honorable exceptions; we can trace the
silver line of God’s rich sovereign grace in the courts of these gay princes.
We read of Almeric, lord of Montreuil, and his sister, the Lady Geralda of
Vetville, who were Albigenses, and who defended their own cities against
the catholics, but were overpowered; and these lords and ladies with many
others were instantly destroyed. Aimeric, with eighty nobles, was brought
before De Montfort. He ordered them all to be hanged; the overloaded
gibbets broke down; they were hewn to pieces; the Lady Geralda was
thrown into a well and huge stones rolled down upon her. Only a few
escaped the general massacre of Vetville to tell the tale. But the whole
country shared a similar fate. The true Christian, the gay courtier, the
gallant knight, the pleasure-loving multitude who were too enervated
through the influence of the luxurious habits of the country to be either
heretic or bigot — must either submit to the pope’s terms, or to the halter,
the stake, or the faggot.
Every department of the south was now charged with the guilt of
sheltering heretics; and Raymond as suzerain lord was summoned to
appear before the council at Aries. All concealment of their savage iniquity
was now thrown off. The count was accompanied by his friend Pedro,
king of Arragon, a good and devoted catholic, who pleaded his cause and
offered to become security for his fidelity. Their terms of reconciliation
were these: let the reader note them carefully as a sample of popish
arrogance and audacity in those days — “That Count Raymond should
disband his army; that he should raze all his castles, recall all the
commandants of his walled towns and strong places; that he should
renounce all the tolls and dues from which the principal part of his revenue
was derived; that he should compel all gentry and commonalty of his
domains to wear a penitential garb; that he should deliver up all his
subjects suspected of heresy to be converted or burned, as the case might
 623
be; that he should hold himself personally in readiness to pass over to
Palestine to serve under the brotherhood of St. John of Jerusalem till
recalled by the pope; that every head of a family should pay yearly
fourpence to the legate; that he should be obedient to the church, pay all
the expenses which they charge on him, and during his whole life submit
himself without contradiction. All these terms duly fulfilled, his lands
would be restored to him by the legate and the Count de Montfort.”5
The intent of this fresh outrage was not to be mistaken; the unhappy
count, in defiance of the council’s order, rode away, in company with his
intercessor, the king of Arragon. Judgment was then given. “The Count of
Toulouse was condemned as a declared heretic — an enemy of the church,
and an apostate from the faith; and his domains and property, public or
personal, were adjudged to the first occupants who should seize and
appropriate them.” These terms and decrees will give the reader some faint
idea of how the church, under the most sanctified language and
pretensions, accomplished the ruin of a nobleman in those days, in order
to obtain possession of his lands and his wealth. It was everywhere so.
The prince and his people must be drowned in blood or consumed in fire,
if his possessions cannot be obtained by milder means. Every Naboth
must deliver up his field to Jezebel if she covets it. And before leaving this
point, let the reader bear in mind, that, just at this moment, when the pope
and his legates were working the ruin of the count and his vassal chiefs, the
inquisitors Dominic and Reinerius were busily engaged in a “religious
reconnaissance of the whole area of heresy,” having full authority from the
pope himself to inflict capital punishment upon heretics. That dreadful
tribunal, which then obtained, and yet retains, the name of the
Inquisition, was first opened this year — a year of awful memory, A .D .
1210, in a castle near Narbonne.

THE WAR CHANGES ITS CHARACTER

Count Raymond hastened to Toulouse; he caused the ban of
excommunication, with the hard terms of his absolution, to be publicly
read aloud; the citizens were indignant, and declared that they would rather
submit to the greatest extremities than accept such shameful conditions.
As the news spread from town to town, the same enthusiasm prevailed
throughout his dominions. The character of the war was now completely
 624
changed. It was evident to all, that the crusaders were determined to
conquer the provinces for the purpose of converting them into
dependencies of the See of Rome; and the provinces were equally
determined to resist the crusaders as base hypocrites, and to cast off the
cruel and usurping tyranny of Rome. The professedly religious purposes
of the crusade had degenerated into a war of universal carnage and plunder.
The whole nation was thus in a state of general insurrection against the
dominant church as against a foreign invader.
War was now proclaimed; but the combatants were unequal. Raymond
seems to have been a gentle, kindly, indolent monarch; much loved by his
people; and unambitious, save for the pleasures and gratifications of this
life. There is no evidence that he was the least inclined to the Albigensian
religion, but professedly a true Roman Catholic. On the other hand, Simon
de Montfort, the great general of Rome, was considered the most daring
and skillful military leader of his day, and the sworn champion of the
papacy. He was regular in the exercises of his religion, and heard mass
daily. “But,” observes one, “even with Simon’s better qualities were
combined some of the vices which not uncommonly seek their
sanctification from high religious profession — a vast ambition, a daring
unscrupulousness as to the means of pursuing his objects, a ruthless
indifference to human suffering, and an excessive and undisguised
rapacity.”6 At the head of a new host of crusaders, to execute the sentence
of the church, and to win the noble prize of Raymond’s dominions, he
marched through the devoted land. Slaughter, rapine, and the most savage
barbarities, such as may not be described, tracked his every step. Heretics,
or those suspected of heresy, wherever they were found, were compelled
by the legate Arnold and De Montfort to ascend vast piles of burning
faggots, while the monks revelled in their sufferings and mocked the
shrieks of burning women.
The whole country, as the papal army advanced, became the scene of the
most wanton cruelties: they destroyed vineyards and growing crops, burnt
villages and farmhouses, slaughtered unarmed peasants, women, and
children; they spread desolation over the whole land, and then spoke of
their sanctified zeal for religion. The exasperated people retaliated — nor
need we wonder — and a savage war was waged on both sides. But details
must be left to the civil historian. Having placed the real motives and
 625
objects of the pope in this unparalleled outrage on humanity and religion,
in as clear a light as brevity would allow, we will now only note a few of
the principal engagements in this great struggle, which brought it to a close,
and which manifest yet more fully the character of Simon and the monks
of Citeaux, under the direction and sanction of the pontiff.

THE BARBARITIES OF SIMON AND ARNOLD

Simon de Montfort, as feudal lord of the Viscounty of Beziers and
Carcassonne, was bound by his ecclesiastical tenure to extirpate the
heretics. He therefore continued his campaign; many towns and castles fell
into his hands, some by force, some by panic. In the diocese of Albi, the
chief seat of the obnoxious doctrines, the war was conducted with the
most savage cruelty. When La Minerye, near Narbonne, after an obstinate
defense, surrendered, one in whose heart a spark of humanity yet
remained, proposed that the vanquished should be allowed to retire, if
they would recant their heresy; but such mild terms were objected to by
the merciless monks. “The terms are too easy,” they exclaimed, “we come
to extirpate heretics, not to show them favor!” “Be not afraid,” replied the
abbot in cruel mockery, “there will not be many converts.” And he was
right, but not in the sense in which he spoke. His intention was to kill
every one of them; but their intention, or rather, firm purpose was, to
accept of death rather than the papal terms. The Albigenses in the
meantime were assembled for prayer. The abbot of Vaux-Cernay found a
number of christian women in a house quietly engaged in prayer and
waiting for the worst that could befall them. They expected no mercy from
these holy fathers, and were prepared to die. He also found a number of
men on their knees in another house peacefully awaiting their end. The
abbot began to preach to them the doctrines of popery; but with one voice
they interrupted him; and all exclaimed, “We will have none of your faith;
we have renounced the church of Rome; your labor is in vain, for neither
death nor life shall make us renounce the truth we hold.” De Montfort was
asked to speak to them. He visited both the men and the women, in all
about one hundred and forty. “Be converted to the catholic faith,” he said,
“or mount this pile.” He had previously caused an enormous pile of dry
wood to be raised. Not one of the Albigenses wavered for a moment. They
denied the supremacy of the pope and the authority of the priesthood;
 626
they owned no head but Christ, and no authority but His holy word.
Irritated to rage at their constancy and calm firmness, he ordered the fire to
be lighted; the pile was soon one mass of flames. The undaunted
confessors of the name of Jesus, committing their souls into His hands,
rushed voluntarily into the flames, as if ascending to heaven in a chariot of
fire.
When the castle called Brau capitulated, De Montfort plucked out the
eyes of more than a hundred of the defenders, and otherwise shamefully
mutilated them, leaving one of them one eye that he might lead away the
rest. Not, says the abbot of Vaux-Cernay, that the count took pleasure in
such things, “for of all men he was the mildest,” but because he wished to
retaliate on the enemy. Such was the judgment of the monkish historian.
At Lavaur, the city of the good Roger Bernard, Count of Foix, the
barbarities surpassed all precedent even in this fearful war. The count is
claimed by the Waldenses as one of themselves. “Of all the provincial
princes,” says Milman, “the Count of Foix was the most powerful, and
the most detested by the church as a favourer of heretics. In this case the
charge was an honor rather than a calumny. He was a man of profound
religion; the first to raise the native standard against De Montfort, he was
a knight of valor as of christian faith.” At length the city fell into the hands
of the besiegers; a general massacre was permitted; men, women, and
children were cut to pieces; till there remained nothing to kill except some
of the garrison and others reserved for a more cruel fate. Four hundred
were burned in one great pile, which caused universal rejoicing in the camp.
And amid all this rioting in fiendish cruelty, the bishops and legates stood
chanting, “Come, Holy Ghost.” It was here that lord Almeric with eighty
nobles was brought before De Montfort, who ordered them to be hanged,
as we have already seen. The pious Lady Geralda also suffered here; of
whom it is said, “No poor man ever left her door without being fed.”7

THE SIEGE OF TOULOUSE

From the blazing pile of four hundred human beings and gibbets
overloaded with noble lords, the champion of the church advanced to the
siege of Toulouse. His numerous conquests had rather inflamed than
satisfied his “undisguised rapacity.” He hoped to add to his possessions
the lordship of Toulouse, and thus to raise himself to a level with
 627
sovereign princes. The bishop Fouquet was in his camp. This new bishop
of Toulouse, placed there to suit the pope’s purpose, is spoken of by
historians, as one of the most treacherous, cruel, sanguinary and
unscrupulous men that ever breathed. Rabenstein was deposed to make
room for him that he might work within the gates the ruin of the count,
while the inquisitors and crusaders were doing it outside. But in spite of all
the pope’s treachery and Simon’s bravery the tide of fortune was on the
turn. The Count of Toulouse, under the stern discipline of prolonged
calamity showed that he was really gifted with courage and force of
character. He had gathered around him his allies with their followers, who
defended the city, and also made such bold sallies from the garrison that
Simon was compelled to break up the siege. He revenged himself by
wasting the gardens, vineyards, and fields. The state of matters was now
completely changed. Raymond, instead of acting on the defensive, became
the active and energetic assailant; and before a few months had elapsed, he
recovered most of the places which had been seized by the crusaders. The
forty-days’ feudal principle caused continued fluctuation in Simon’s army,
and no doubt prevented him from improving his advantages to the full, so
that his successes were checkered by occasional reverses. The triumph of
Raymond, however, was but a temporary respite, and the prelude to a
terrible defeat.
A fresh crusade was preached in Germany and northern France; many
adventurers, trained in the wars of Germany and of the East, now joined
the new army. All temporal blessing in a beautiful country, with heaven at
last, induced numbers to assume the cross. The archbishops of Rheims and
Rouen, the bishops of Paris, Laon, Toul, were with them; and William,
archdeacon of Paris, was the chief engineer of the army. The poor
discouraged Albigenses, at the approach of such a myriad host, fled from
the open country, and sought a refuge either among the woods and
mountains, or in the large cities. Raymond, feeling his own weakness,
sought the alliance of his kinsman, Don Pedro, king of Arragon; the gallant
Spaniard promised him his support, but before engaging in the war he
made an appeal to the pope in favor of Raymond.
Moved by the king’s appeal, and becoming jealous of the growing power
of De Montfort, his holiness, for a moment, seemed disposed to alter his
line of policy. He intimated his displeasure to the legates: they had, he
 628
said, laid hands on territories that had never been polluted with heresy; he
commanded the restitution of the lands of the Counts of Foix and
Comminges, and of Gaston de Beam. He also suspended his indulgences to
the crusaders. But all this appearance of justice or pity was mere
sentiment in the mind of the pope. He very soon revoked all his own
concessions. The letters of his legates and inquisitors were absolutely
furious — “Arm yourself, my lord pope, with the zeal of Phineas;
annihilate Toulouse, that Sodom, that Gomorrah, with all the wretches it
contains; let not the tyrant, the heretic, Raymond, nor even his young son,
lift up his head; already more than half-crushed, crush them to the very
utmost. The purification of Languedoc must not be thought of until the
city of Toulouse be razed to the ground, and the citizens put to the sword.
If the Raymonds be allowed to lift up their heads, they will take unto
themselves seven other devils worse than the first. Let your apostolic
wisdom provide against this evil; let not your hand be withheld from this
holy and pious work until the serpent of our Moses shall have swallowed
up the serpents of this Pharaoh; until the Jebusite with all the
uncircumcised and impure be dispersed, and your people rejoice in the
quiet possession of the land of promise.”

THE POPE TEMPORIZES — THE BATTLE OF MURET

The pope was in a difficulty; he yielded to a necessity. He alone had called
forth the movement; but the power to control it had slipt from his hold;
his agents were only carrying out his instructions; he had no right to
complain. Making a virtue of necessity, he sharply rebuked the king of
Arragon — the chief support of the Catholic cause in Spain — charged
him with misrepresentation, threatened him with a crusade, and confirmed
his sentence of excommunication against Raymond and his allies. De
Montfort was proclaimed the active servant of Jesus Christ, and the
invincible champion of the Catholic faith; he was also authorized to retain
his conquests. The patience of the long-suffering king of Arragon was now
exhausted, and, provoked by the insolence of the clergy, he flew to arms.
At the head of a thousand knights and a large army, he crossed the
Pyrenees, and encountered the crusaders at the little town of Muret, about
nine miles from Toulouse. At the head of the warriors of the cross,
attended by seven bishops, appeared Simon de Montfort in full military
 629
array. “His army,” says Greenwood, “though fewer in numbers, consisted
of the heavy-armed chivalry of France, eager, by victory over the heretical
host, to earn immortal honor, or by martyrdom to be wafted into the
presence of the saints in paradise.” The battle which followed was fierce,
short, and decisive. Don Pedro with many of his nobles was numbered
with the slain. The remnant of his army, deprived of his command, broke
and dispersed; and the whole of the raw and ill-armed militia of Raymond
and his allies were either put to the sword, or drowned in the Garonne to
the last man.
The cause of the Albigenses in consequence of the great victory of Muret
had now become desperate, and the fate of the devoted land appeared to
be decided for ever. Raymond was stripped of his territories; De Montfort
was acknowledged as prince of the fief and city of Toulouse, and of the
other counties conquered by the crusaders under his command.
Overwhelmed by his misfortunes, and by the censures of the church,
Raymond offered no opposition. Fouquet, the pope’s bishop, took
possession of the palace of his ancestors, and, with a cruel impudence
which no language can describe, ordered the noble count and his family to
retire into obscurity. Such were and are the tender mercies of the Romish
priesthood, even to their own flock if reckoned disobedient; for Raymond
never was accused of heresy, only of sheltering heretics in his dominions
— or, in other words, of refusing to massacre in cold blood his most
dutiful and loyal subjects: this was his whole crime in the sight of Rome,
as heaven will surely judge.

THE CONQUERORS QUARREL AMONG THEMSELVES

The conquest appeared to be complete, and the conquerors began to divide
the spoil; but Arnold and De Montfort quarrelled about the ducal crown
of Narbonne. Each claimed the dukedom. The legate had assumed the
archbishopric of Narbonne, to which he affirmed the rights of temporal
sovereignty were attached; but De Montfort, who took to himself the title
of Duke of Narbonne, felt indignant that a priest should lay claim to that
temporal authority which he asserted was all his own as prince and
sovereign of the whole land. The quarrel became serious. Simon, branding
Arnold and all his adherents as heretics, invaded the prelate and took
possession of the city by force of arms; the legate, exercising his spiritual
 630
authority, excommunicated the great crusader, and laid all the churches of
the city under an interdict. The pope, regarding with jealousy the
formidable power of these great rivals, and not feeling equal to interfere in
this strife, convened — A .D . 1215 — the fourth Lateran Council, in
order to bring to an end the crusade against the Albigenses, and finally to
dispose of the conquered territories.
This was the most numerous council ever held in Christendom. But we
must not venture even on the faintest description of its proceedings. We
would only notice what immediately affects our present subject.
“Raymond and his son, accompanied by the Counts of Foix and
Comminges, and many other nobles of Languedoc were admitted to the
presence of the pope, seated in full consistory among his cardinals and
other prelates. They knelt before him: the young Raymond presented
letters from his uncle the king of England. The English monarch expressed
his indignation at the usurpation of the inheritance of Raymond by Simon
de Montfort. The pope was moved by the beauty and graceful bearing of
the young prince, thought of his wrongs, and was observed to shed tears.”
This noble youth of the old ancestral house of Toulouse, and connected by
blood or marriage with all the sovereigns of Europe, and who had never
been accused of the taint of heresy in any way, had been robbed and
spoiled by the pope’s agents, and driven into exile. The son was followed
by the father, and the other counts, who complained of the injustice of the
legate and of De Montfort; of the pillage of their lands and the lawless
massacre of their subjects. The enormous cruelties of Fouquet were dwelt
upon by all the witnesses, whom they denounced as the destroyer of more
than ten thousand of the flock intrusted to his pastoral care.
Something like pity seemed for a moment to touch the heart of Innocent
on hearing the depositions of so many noble witnesses, and all professedly
Catholics. Many members of the Council were also touched with remorse,
and spoke in favor of the dispossessed princes. But this tendency to
something like justice on the part of the Council raised the indignation of
Simon’s partisans to the most vehement height. They assured his holiness
that, if the legate and De Montfort were compelled to surrender the
territories and lordships which they had, no one henceforth would ever
embark in the cause of the church; no one would ever be found to run any
hazard in her defense. Still the pope seemed disposed to listen to the
 631
complaints of the princes; and raising his voice said, “I give leave to
Raymond of Toulouse and his heirs to recover their lands and their
lordships from all who hold them unjustly.” The prelates were furious.
The pope stood dismayed before the power he had created, and by which
he was now compelled into injustice. De Montfort was confirmed in all his
conquests, with the exception of the territory of the Venaisin, which was
reserved for the younger Raymond, if his conduct should satisfy the
legate. Philip Augustus, acquiescing in this sentence, granted to Simon de
Montfort the investiture of the Countships of Toulouse, of Beziers, and
of Carcassonne, and of the dukedom of Narbonne. Simon was now on the
throne which he had reached through oppression, tyranny, and blood; he
was proclaimed sovereign of Toulouse, and general of the armies of God,
the son and darling of the church. The clergy and people came out to meet
him with the blasphemous salutation, “Blessed is he that cometh in the
name of the Lord.” But the triumphing of the wicked is short; his end and
his eternal award were near at hand.

THE LIES OF FOUQUET

The decree of the Lateran Council, which prohibited the further preaching
of the crusades, deprived De Montfort of fresh supplies. This changed
state of affairs revived the spirit of the younger Raymond, who resolved
to raise an army and make an heroic effort to regain the conquered
dominions of his father. He was soon at the head of a large force; the hope
of deliverance from the cruelties of Simon, and attachment to their
hereditary sovereigns, animated the whole population of Languedoc. De
Montfort now treated Toulouse as a conquered city, exacting enormous
sums, and endeavoring to secure them by the sternest measures. A general
rising of the oppressed citizens was evident; but they unwisely accepted
the treacherous mediation of their bishop, the perfidious Fouquet. He
assured them that not a hair of their heads would be touched if they agreed
to the terms of De Montfort. The citizens agreed, and thus he swore to
them: “I swear by God, and the holy Virgin, and the body of the
Redeemer, by my whole order, the abbot and other dignitaries, that I give
you good counsel, better have I never given; if Count de Montfort inflict
on you the least wrong, bring your complaints before me, and God and I
will see you righted.” How cruel! This is popery. These were the sheep of
 632
his own pasture. We are not now speaking of the rights or the wrongs of
the war, but of the perfidious falsehoods of the avowed shepherd of the
sheep.
The people were now in the snare of Satan. They were treated as subjects
detected in revolt, and punished by the bishop himself with all his
relentless cruelty. The first act of De Montfort was “the demand of thirty
thousand marks of silver, the demolition of the walls, and every stronghold
in the city, and the plunder of the inhabitants to the very last piece of
cloth, or measure of meal.” Thus they had to spend the winter, but the
ensuing spring brought relief.

THE DEATH OF DE MONTFORT

On the appearance of the old Count and his son beneath the broken-down
walls of Toulouse with a large army, fear gave way to the enthusiastic joy
with which the people welcomed back the Raymonds to the palace and the
dominions of their ancestors. Many of the nobles of Languedoc raised
troops and threw themselves into the city. Simon and his son, Guy,
hurried to the spot, but were ignominiously repulsed. The bishop of
Toulouse and the wife of Simon sought help in France. A new crusade was
preached, but De Montfort could not keep an army more than forty days;
numbers flocked to the Raymonds. The siege lasted nine months; it was
the scene of many a fierce encounter. In the spring of 1218, De Montfort
came against Toulouse with a fresh company of one hundred thousand
crusaders. “You are about to conquer the city,” said the lying spirit, “to
break into the houses, out of which no single soul, neither man nor woman,
shall escape alive; not one shall be spared in church, in sanctuary, in
hospital!”
Such were the counsels of Rome, but God had decreed otherwise. When
kneeling at high mass, a shout announced that the besieged had made a
sally; instantly springing to his feet, Simon placed himself at the head of
his veterans and hastened to the place of attack. But little did he think it
was for the last time; at that moment he was wounded by an arrow from
the city walls; this evidently troubled him in spirit; he retired a few paces,
when a fragment of a rock, thrown from a machine struck him on the head
and severed it from his body. As the lifeless trunk lay on the ground, his
 633
admirers dared to reproach God with his death, and to arraign the divine
justice. But there we must leave them: Simon is before God, and has learnt
his eternal doom.
The siege was raised, the besieging army was entirely defeated. The bell
was tolled to call the citizens to offer thanksgivings in tumults of
exultation. Raymond was hailed as their lawful and now undisputed
sovereign; and again the standard of the house of St. Gilles waved above
the palace and the ramparts of Toulouse.

THE KINGS OF FRANCE AND THE ALHIGENSES

Innocent III. was now dead, and the papal throne was occupied by the
third Honorius, who entered with great ardor into the cause of De
Montfort, and was warmly supported by the kings of France. The
prospect of peace to the poor Albigenses under the mild government of
Raymond was intolerable to the new shepherd of Rome. To gratify the
infuriated pope, and under the pretense of fulfilling his vow and ensuring
his eternal welfare, Louis, son of Philip Augustus, conducted a crusade as
early as the year 1219. All the atrocities of the former time were renewed
and surpassed, if possible, under the direction of the clergy. But we spare
the reader the description of the satanic mixture of deceit, hypocrisy,
perfidy, baseness, and savage cruelty, displayed by the clergy under the
sanction of the sovereign.
The elder Raymond died, leaving the defense of his states to his son, then
in the vigor of his age and hopes. It is said by Milner, “that he died of
sickness, in a state of peace and prosperity, after his victory over Simon
— that no man was ever treated with more injustice by the popedom.”
Philip Augustus also died, leaving his crown to Louis. The younger De
Montfort, in the year 1224, despairing of success, finally abandoned
Languedoc, and Raymond VII. sat on the throne of his ancestors, with no
enemy to dread, excepting the pope and his sovereign — his pastor and his
liege lord. But Raymond had a beautiful portion in France, and Louis was
impatient to unite it to his crown.
Jezebel again plots; she convenes a council at Bourges, in the year 1225,
at which Louis is enjoined to purge the land of heretics, and raises money
for that purpose. Louis accordingly takes the cross, and attended by his
 634
barons and their followers, to the number of two hundred thousand men,
advances once again to devastate the budding fields of Languedoc, and to
exterminate all heretics according to the decrees of Rome. Poor unhappy
Languedoc! When will Rome, the dragon, the devourer of God’s saints, be
satiated with blood? — with the blood of infants, of little children, of
mothers and maidens, of unarmed, unoffending young men and fathers! A
name could be given to the beast that symbolizes the Chaldean, Persian,
and Grecian empires, but the fourth beast which symbolizes the Roman,
whether pagan or papal, must be left unnamed.
“After this I saw in the night visions,” says Daniel, “and, behold, a
fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it
had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped
the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts
that were before it, and it had ten horns.” (Daniel 7:7.)
As a matter of interpretation, Daniel’s vision refers more directly to the
civil power; but the ecclesiastical aspect of the beast as in Revelation is
more blood-thirsty than the civil ever was.
This unnamed monster we have now before us in the king of France urged
to extremities by the pope. At the approach of the two hundred thousand
crusaders under the banner of their own sovereign, the hearts of the people
sank within them. Town after town yielded, for all the defenders had died.
“They had so repeatedly endured all the horrors of war in all their most
frightful forms, that the barons, knights, and communes of Languedoc,
with one accord, hastened to avert, by timely concessions, the continuance
of these intolerable calamities.” But just at this moment when all seemed
lost, the hand of the Lord interposed. A pestilence broke out in the
invading camp. Louis himself was carried off, and thirty thousand of his
soldiers were swept away by the contagion. The impending ruin of the
inhabitants, and of the house of Raymond, was postponed for a little.
At the death of Louis VIII. his son, who was but a child, succeeded to the
throne of France, and the reins of government meanwhile fell into the
hands of his mother, Blanche of Castile. By her orders the siege of
Toulouse was renewed. The advantages of the war were all in favor of
Raymond; but the glory of his victories, according to one chronicler, were
sullied by the cruelty with which he treated the vanquished who fell into
 635
his hands. The siege of Toulouse was protracted and difficult; the
crusaders were losing hope; in their perplexity, Fouquet, the evil genius
and the lying spirit of Toulouse, suggested the only means of a successful
attack. By his advice all the vines, the corn, and the fruit trees were
destroyed; all the houses burned for miles round the city, till the country
was converted into a desolate wilderness; and the city of Toulouse stood
in the center of a desert. Of course no supplies of any kind could be
procured. This was the work of the bishop of the place, this was his
diocese, these were the people over whom he had been appointed as
overseer! The reader must judge whether he partakes more of the spirit of
Daniel’s fourth beast, or of Him who says to every shepherd, “Feed my
sheep... Feed My lambs.” (John 21.)
When this new vial of papal wrath was poured out on their devoted land,
and every green thing withered up, the inhabitants of the city were so
discouraged, and the spirit of Raymond their leader so completely broken,
that at the end of three months peace was obtained on the most
humiliating terms. The treaty of Paris, which terminated the war for a
time, was signed in the month of April, 1229. The terms were dictated by
the papal legate, and approved by the king of France. Raymond VII.
whose comely form and graceful manners, together with the sense of his
wrongs, drew tears from Innocent in the great Lateran Council, now bows
his neck to a foreign yoke, and bares his shoulders to a spiritual
despotism. He was led by the legate to the church in Paris; and, like his
father in St. Gilles, with naked shoulders and bare feet, he underwent the
same public and ignominious flogging by priestly hands. On his knees, in
the church of Notre Dame, he solemnly abdicated all his feudal sovereignty
to the king of France, and submitted to the penance of the church. The
reader may remember that the father in his penance renounced seven
castles, now the son renounces seven provinces. Thus it was ordered by
Him who rules over all, and ordered for the future humbling of Rome, that
the peace of Languedoc turned out so much to the advantage of Rome, as
of the rapidly increasing monarchy of France. Philip Augustus had
wrested from the feeble hands of John the continental possessions of the
English crown, and now the dominions of the Count of Toulouse, and of
the king of Arragon, north of the Pyrenees, were added to the French
crown. “The possession of Normandy,” says James White, “had already
 636
made France a maritime power; and now, by the acquisition of the
Narbonnais and Maguelonne from Raymond VII., she not only extended
her limits to the Mediterranean; but, by the extinction of two such vassals
as the Count of Toulouse and the Duke of Normandy, incalculably
strengthened the royal crown.”8

REFLECTIONS ON THE CALAMITIES OF LANGUEDOC

To every thoughtful mind, to every man of faith, especially to those who
study history from a scriptural point of view, the wars in Languedoc are
most suggestive. They are the first of the kind on record. It was reserved
for Innocent III. to inaugurate this new character of warfare. There had
been many instances of individuals being sacrificed to the prejudice of the
priesthood, such as Arnold of Brescia: but this was the first experiment on
a great scale, which the church made to retain her supremacy by force of
arms. It was not, observe, the army of the church going forth in holy zeal
against the pagan, the Mahometan, the denier of Christ, but the church
itself in arms against the true followers of Christ — against those who
acknowledged His deity, and the authority of the word of God.
We might fill pages with quotations from their worst enemies as to the
soundness of their faith, the purity of their morals, and the simplicity of
their manners. We will only give two or three from the highest authorities
in the church of Rome. “They denied,” says Baronius, “the utility of
infant baptism; that the bread and wine became the body and blood of the
Lord by the consecration of a priest; that unfaithful ministers had any
right to the exercise of ecclesiastical power, or to tithes or firstfruits; that
auricular confession was necessary. All these things the wretched men
asserted that they learned from the Gospels and Epistles, and that they
would receive nothing, except what they found expressly contained
therein; thus rejecting the interpretation of the doctors, though they
themselves were perfectly illiterate.” Reinerius, the inquisitor, and
persecutor of the Albigenses, says, “they were the most formidable
enemies of the church of Rome, because they have a great appearance of
godliness; because they live righteously before men, believe rightly of God
in all things, and hold all the articles of the creed; yet they hate and revile
the church of Rome and the clergy; and in their accusations they are easily
believed by the people.” St. Bernard, who knew them intimately, lived
 637
amongst them, yet deemed it his duty to oppose them as being enemies to
the pope, candidly admits, “If you ask them of their faith, nothing can be
more christianlike; if you observe their conversation, nothing can be more
blameless, and what they speak they make good by their actions. You may
see a man, for the testimony of his faith, frequent the church, honor the
elders, offer his gifts, make his confession, receive the sacrament. What
more like a Christian? As to life and manners, he circumvents no man,
overreaches no man, does violence to no man. He fasts much and eats not
the bread of idleness; but works with his hands for his support.”9
Such then, was the spiritual, moral, and social character of the Albigenses,
as evidenced by their enemies. They were true witnesses for Christ,
evidently formed by the grace of God to show forth His praise in the
world. And had we as many of their writings as we have of the Reformers
of the sixteenth century, we might find thai they were more simple on
certain points of doctrine than these were. But according to the mind of
the Lord, other three hundred years were necessary to ripen Europe for
the Reformation; and in the meantime the arts of printing and paper-
making were discovered.
What then, it may be asked, was the crime of the Albigenses? The head
and front of their offense was simply this — they denied the supremacy
of the pope, the authority of the priesthood, and the seven sacraments as
taught by the church of Rome; and, in her eyes, greater criminals there
could not be on the face of the whole earth: therefore utter extermination
was the one unchangeable decree. Those who escaped the sword of the
crusader must be caught in the toils of the inquisitor.
“In hundreds of villages,” says the historian, “every inhabitant had been
massacred. Since the sack of Rome by the Vandals, the European world
had never mourned over a national disaster so wide in its extent, or so
fearful in its character.” What a record! what a witness! and if such be the
records of earth, what must they be in heaven! Oh, Rome! Rome! drunken
with the blood of God’s saints, and covered with the execrations of
millions, what must thy future be? How wilt thou bear the reproaches of
those whom thou hast deceived with thy lies and caused to perish with
thy sword? Do any think that we speak too strongly? let them listen to
the address of one of the bishops to the crusaders before the battle of
 638
Muret: “Whosoever has confessed his sins to a priest, or has the intention
of doing so after the battle, will in dying, obtain eternal life, and escape the
passage through purgatory. I will be your surety in the day of judgment.
Depart in the name of Christ.” Was not this a soul-deceiving lie? But
Jezebel will hear of it again.
“For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered
her iniquities. Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double
unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath
filled, fill to her double... Therefore shall her plagues come in one
day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly
burned with fire; for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her... And
in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all
that were slain upon the earth.” (Revelation 18:5-24.)
But Rome overreached herself. Though Languedoc was desolate, the
Albigenses who escaped the sword, fled into other countries. By the grace
and the good providence of God, they preached the gospel in almost every
part of Christendom, and testified against the cruelties, the superstitions,
and the falsehoods of the church of Rome. From this time it begins to lose
its hold on the confidence and reverence of mankind. Thus the Lord
prepared the way for Wycliffe and Huss, Melancthon and Luther.
 639

CHAPTER 26
THE INQUISITION ESTABLISHED IN LANGUEDOC

By the treaty of Paris, A .D . 1229, the open war against the Languedocians
was at all end, but the Inquisition continued its secret, and hardly less
destructive crusade. It was not enough that the treachery of Arnold and
the sword of Montfort had exterminated these heretics; steps must be
taken to prevent their reappearance in all time coming. Dominic and his
associates, although we have not seen them in the siege or in the battle,
have been doing their dreadful work in secret. But now the Inquisition is to
be canonized. At a Council held in Toulouse in November, 1229, it was
ordered that a permanent Inquisition should be established against the
heretics. One of the canons indirectly reveals the root of Satan’s rage, and
reflects great honor on the name of the Albigenses, but throws a deep
shade of guilt on the name of their persecutors. It was discovered by the
inquisitorial missionaries, that the Bible was the principal source of their
opinions; therefore, to prevent its perusal by the people, the Council
passed the following decree — “We prohibit the books of the Old and
New Testament to the laity; unless, perhaps, they may desire to have the
Psalter, or Breviary, or the Hours of the blessed Virgin Mary; but we
expressly forbid their having the other parts of the Bible translated into
the vulgar tongue.” The scriptures had long been withheld from the laity,
but this is the first direct prohibition that we meet with.
The papal interpretation of this canon, or justification of its severity, will
give the reader a fair specimen of how the clergy quoted and applied
scripture in those days. “If so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall
be stoned or thrust through with a dart.” The people were as beasts
because of their ignorance; the word of God was as a mountain, and, if
they dared to touch it, they were to be instantly killed. Innocent had a
general acquaintance with scripture and used it largely in his letters and
edicts, after this style; but the divine words, though misapplied, had an
immense power over the ignorant mind. One grand object of the
Inquisition was to keep the people in utter darkness as to the divine mind
 640
on spiritual subjects, so that the power of the clergy might be
unquestioned and absolute; or, rather, the power of Satan, the prince of
darkness. Not only was all public teaching suppressed by the Council of
Toulouse, but freedom of thought in secret was condemned under the
severest penalties. It would be difficult to conceive of wickedness more
daring: to withhold the word of life, to suffer the people to perish, and to
make the possession of it a capital crime, is surely the height of diabolical
enmity to Christ and precious souls. And these were the professed
shepherds of the sheep, who swore they would lead them by the green
pastures and the still waters. But we must not stay to moralize, although
it is difficult to pass on without expressing the indignation which rises in
the heart against such spiritual iniquity. But knowing their just sentence is
with the living God, we may withhold ours.

THE STATUTES OF THE COUNCIL OF TOULOUSE

The following brief notice of the statues against heresy, will give the reader
some idea of the unrelenting cruelties of the Catholics, and the oppressed
state of the feeble remnant in Languedoc. “The archbishops, bishops,
and abbots, were to appoint in every parish one priest, and three or four
lay inquisitors, to search all houses and buildings, in order to detect
heretics, and to denounce them to the archbishop or bishop, the lord of his
bailiff, so as to ensure their apprehension. The lords were to make the
same inquisition in every part of their states. Whoever was convicted of
harbouring a heretic forfeited the land to his lord, and was reduced to
personal slavery. Every house in which a heretic was found was to be
razed to the ground, the farm confiscated, the bailiff who should not be
active in detecting heretics was to lose his office, and be incapacitated from
holding it in future. Heretics who recanted were to be removed from their
homes, and settled in Catholic cities, to wear two crosses of a different
color from their dress, one on the right side, one on the left. Those who
recanted from fear of death were to be imprisoned for life. All persons,
males of the age of fourteen, females of twelve, were to take an oath of
abjuration of heresy, and of their catholic faith; if absent, and not
appearing within fifteen days, they were held suspected of heresy.”
The above extracts from a Catholic code of persecution are sufficient to
show the reader what the spirit of popery was in those days, and what it
 641
would be today if it had the same power. And these laws were considered
by the legate not strict enough; and so he summoned a Council at Melun,
where new statutes were enacted more rigorous and efficient. But as the
heretics could only be judged by a bishop or an ecclesiastic, and the work
becoming so laborious from the number of apprehensions, Pope Gregory
IX. in the year 1233, committed this formidable jurisdiction into the hands
of the Dominicans, and the Inquisition was then erected into a distinct
institution. Having said so much about the Inquisition as to its origin, it
may be interesting to glance for a moment at the gradual expansion of the
inquisitorial idea in the church from its commencement.

THE HISTORY OF THE INQUISITION

Previous to the reign of Constantine, or to the union of Church and State,
heresy and spiritual offenses were punished by excommunications only;
but shortly after his death capital punishments were added. Theodosius is
generally allowed to have been the first of the Roman Emperors who
pronounced heresy to be a capital crime. But the inquisitors at that time
did not belong to the clerical order, they were laymen appointed by
Roman prefects. Priscillian, the Spanish heretic, was put to death about
385. Justinian in 529 enacted penal laws against heretics, and as centuries
rolled onward, the proceedings against them were marked by increasing
severity. It was not, however, as we have just seen, until the thirteenth
century that the court of Inquisition was established by canon-law. Then
it became a criminal tribunal, charged with the detection, prosecution, and
punishment of heresy, apostasy, and other crimes against the established
faith. Whether Dominic or Innocent is to have the credit of the invention,
it evidently had its origin in the Albigensian war. The papal legate
discovered that the open slaughter of heretics would never accomplish
their utter extermination. This difficulty led to the creation of a new
fraternity, called the order of the Holy Faith; the members of which were
bound by solemn oaths to employ their utmost powers for the repression
of free inquiry in matters of religion and for maintaining the unity of the
faith, for the destruction of all heretics and for the rooting out of all heresy
from the homes, the hearts, and the souls of men. But it was reserved for
Gregory IX., in the Council of Toulouse, to fix the establishment of the
 642
Inquisition in the form of a tribunal, and at the same time to give it
positive laws.
This terrible tribunal was gradually introduced into the Italian states, into
France, Spain, and other countries; but into the British islands it never was
allowed to force its way. In France and Italy it required strenuous and
persevering efforts to organize and establish it; Germany successfully
resisted a permanent Inquisition; in Spain, however, though it met with
some opposition at first, it speedily gained a footing, and in time attained a
magnitude which, from a variety of causes, it never reached in any other
country. Gradually the authority of the inquisitors was extended, and they
were called upon to pronounce judgment, not only upon the words and
actions, but even upon the thoughts and intentions of the accused. During
the fourteenth century, its progress was steady, whilst its rigor and energy
were continually on the increase. But it was not till the close of the
fifteenth century; when Isabella, wife of Ferdinand of Arragon, had
ascended the throne of Castile, and when the different kingdoms of Spain
— Castile, Navarre, Arragon, and Portugal — were united under these
sovereigns, that the Inquisition became general in the country, and
assumed that form which it retained until the period of its dissolution in
1808.1

THE INTERNAL PROCEEDINGS OF THE INQUISITION

Under this head, as all know now, the darkest deeds, the most
irresponsible tyranny and inhuman cruelties that ever blackened the annals
of mankind, might be written; but lengthy details, however painfully
interesting, would be out of place in our “Short Papers;” so we will
content ourselves with a few brief statements and extracts. No tribunal, we
may safely affirm, so regardless of justice, humanity, and every sacred
relationship in life, ever existed in the dominions of heathenism or
Mahometanism.
When a man was slightly suspected of heresy, spies, called the Familiars
of the Inquisition, were employed narrowly to watch him, with the view
of discovering the least possible excuse for handing him over to the
tribunal of the Holy Office. The man may have been a good Catholic, for
Llorente assures us that nine-tenths of the prisoners were true to the
 643
Catholic faith; but, perhaps, he was suspected of holding liberal opinions,
or he may have shown in conversation that he knew more of theology than
the illiterate monks, or differed with them on some point of doctrine. Any
of these things would be enough to create suspicion; for nothing was more
to be dreaded than new light or truth; he was now marked and denounced
by the familiars.
At midnight a knock is heard, the suspected man is ordered to accompany
the messengers of the Holy Office. His wife and family know what that
means; their distress is great; they must now take a last farewell of the
beloved husband and the beloved father. Not a word of entreaty or of
remonstrance dare be breathed. Thus suddenly and unexpectedly this
frightful institution pounced upon its victims. Wives gave up their
husbands, husbands their wives, parents their children, and masters their
servants, without a question or a murmur. Terror constituted the great
element of its power. No man, from the monarch to the slave, knew when
the knock might come to his door. An impenetrable secrecy characterized
all the proceedings of this institution. This feeling of insecurity and the
workings of the imagination lent their aid to exaggerate the fearful reality.
Neither rank, nor age, nor sex, afforded any defense against its watchful
vigilance and its pitiless severity.
The prisoner, the helpless victim, is now within the gates of the
Inquisition; and few who ever entered there left it absolved and acquitted;
not more, it is said, than one in a thousand. Certain forms were gone
through as to the question of the alleged guilt of the accused, but all were a
gross mockery of justice. “The court sat in profound secrecy; no advocate
might appear before the tribunal; no witness was confronted with the
accused; who were the informers, what the charges, except the vague
charge of heresy, no one knew. The suspected heretic was first summoned
to declare on oath that he would speak the truth, the whole truth, of all
persons living or dead, with himself, or like himself, on suspicion of
heresy, or Waldensianism. If he refused, he was cast into a dungeon, the
most dismal, the most foul, the most noisome, in those dreary ages. No
falsehood was too false, no craft too crafty, no trick too base, for this
deliberate, systematic, moral torture which was to wring further
confession against himself, denunciation against others. It was the
deliberate object to break the spirit; the prisoner’s food was to be slowly,
 644
gradually, diminished till body and soul were prostrate. He was then to be
left in darkness, solitude, and silence.” The next part of the procedure of
the Holy Office in these secret prisons was the application of bodily
torture. The helpless victim was charged with the culpable concealment
and denial of the truth. In vain did he affirm that he had answered every
question fully and honestly to the Utmost extent of his knowledge; he was
urged to confess if ever he had entertained an evil thought in his heart
against the church, or the Holy Office, or anything else they chose to
name. No matter what answer he gave, he was denounced as an obstinate
heretic. After some hypocritical expressions as to their love for his soul,
and their sincere desire to deliver him from error, that he might obtain
salvation, a vast apparatus of torturing instruments were shown to him;
the rack must now be applied to make him confess his sin.

THE APPLICATION OF TORTURE

Were it not that truth and impartial history demand that the real nature of
the papacy should be told, we would much rather not describe, even in the
briefest way, those scenes of torture; but few of our young readers in
these peaceful times have any idea of the cruel character of popery, and of
its thirst for the blood of God’s saints. And that nature, let it be
remembered, is unchanged. As late as 1820, which may be said to be our
own day, when the Inquisition was thrown open in Madrid by the orders
of the Cortes, twenty-one prisoners were found in it: not one of them
knew the name of the city in which he was; some had been confined for
three years, some a longer period, and not one knew perfectly the nature
of the crime of which he was accused. One of these persons was to have
suffered death the following day by the Pendulum. This method of torture
is thus described. The condemned is fastened in a groove, upon a table, on
his back, suspended above him is a pendulum, the edge of which is sharp,
and it is so constructed as to become longer with every movement. The
victim sees this implement of destruction swinging to and fro above him,
and every moment the keen edge approaches nearer and nearer; at length it
cuts the skin of his face, and gradually cuts through his head, until life is
extinct.” This was a punishment of the Secret Tribunal in 1820, and may
be so today in some places in Spain and Italy!
 645
The penances and punishments to which the accused were subjected, in
order to obtain such a confession as the inquisitors desired, were many and
various; the rack was usually the first. The naked arms, to which a small
hard cord was fastened, were turned behind the back, heavy weights were
tied to the feet; and then the sufferer was drawn up by the action of a
pulley to the height of the place he was in. Having been kept suspended
for some time, he was suddenly let down with a jerk to within a little
distance of the floor; this done several times, the joints of the arms were
dislocated, whilst the cord, by which he was suspended, cut through the
skin and flesh, and penetrated to the bone; and by means of the weights
appended to the feet, the whole frame was violently strained. This species
of torture was continued for an hour and sometimes longer, according to
the pleasure of the inquisitors present, and to what the strength of the
sufferer seemed capable of enduring. The torture by fire was equally
painful. The prisoner being extended on the floor, the soles of his feet were
rubbed with lard, and placed near the fire, until, writhing in agony, he was
ready to confess what his tormentors required. A second time the judges
doomed their victims to the same torture, to make them own the motives
and intentions of their hearts for their confessed conduct or sayings; and a
third time, that they might reveal their accomplices or abettors.
When cruelties failed to wring a confession, artifices and snares were
resorted to. Persons were sent into the dungeons, pretending to be
prisoners like themselves, who ventured to speak against the Inquisition,
but only with the view of ensnaring others that they might witness against
them. When the accused was held to be convicted, either by witnesses or
by his own forced confession, he was sentenced according to the
heinousness of his offense. It might be to death, to perpetual
imprisonment, to the galleys, or to flogging. Those sentenced to death by
fire were allowed to accumulate, that the sacrifice of a great number at once
might produce a more striking and terrible effect.

THE AUTO DE FE
The cruel death by which the Inquisition closed the career of its victims
was styled in Spain and Portugal as AUTO DE FE , or “Act of Faith,” being
regarded as a religious ceremony of peculiar solemnity; and to invest the
act with greater sanctity, the cruel deed was always done on the Lord’s
 646
day. The innocent victims of this papal barbarity were led forth in
procession to the place of execution. They were dressed in the most
fantastic manner. On the caps and tunics of some were painted the flames
of hell, and dragons and demons fanning them to keep them brisk for the
heretics; and the Jesuits thundering in their ears that the fires before them
were nothing to the fires of hell which they would have to endure for ever.
If any brave heart attempted to say a word for the Lord, or in defense of
the truth for which he was about to suffer, his mouth was instantly
gagged. The condemned were then chained to stakes. Any of the persons
confessing that he was a true Catholic and wished to die in the Catholic
faith, had the privilege of being strangled before he was burned; but those
who refused to claim the privilege, were burnt alive, and reduced to ashes.
A quantity of furze, sometimes green, and pieces of wood were laid
around the bottom of the stakes and set on fire. Their sufferings were
indescribable. The lowest extremities of the body were sometimes actually
roasted before the flames reached the vital parts. And this appalling
spectacle was beheld by crowds of people of both sexes, and of all ages,
with transports of joy; so demoralized were the people by Romanism. For
upwards of four centuries the Auto de Fe was a national holiday in Spain,
which its kings and queens, princes and princesses, witnessed in the pomp
of royalty.
According to the calculations of Llorente, compiled from the records of the
Inquisition, it appears that from the year 1481 to 1808 this tribunal
condemned, in Spain alone, upwards of three hundred and forty one
thousand persons. And if to this number be added all who suffered in
other countries, then under the dominion of Spain, what would the total
number be? Torquemada, on being made Inquisitor-general of Arragon in
1483, burned alive, to signalize his promotion to the Holy Office, no less
than two thousand of the prisoners of the Inquisition. Sovereigns, princes,
royal ladies, learned men magistrates, prelates, ministers of state, were
boldly and fearlessly accused and tried by the Holy Office. But the Lord
knows them all — He knows the sufferers, He knows the persecutors, He
knows how to reward the one and how to judge the other. The dark deeds
of those secret dungeons, the pitiful wail of the helpless sufferers, the
cruel mockings of the unaccountable Dominicans, must all be revealed
before that throne of inflexible justice, of overwhelming purity. The pope
 647
and his college of cardinals, the abbot and his fraternity of monks, the
inquisitor-general and his gaolers, tormentors, and executioners, must all
appear before “the great; white throne” — the judgment-seat of Christ.
There we leave these wicked men, thankful that we have not to judge
them, and perfectly content with the Lord’s decisions. Shall not the Judge
of all the earth do right?
He who rebuked His disciples for entertaining the thought of calling down
fire on the Samaritans will judge them by His own standard. He then
placed on record what should have been a guide to His people in all ages.
He rebuked the disciples, and said,
“Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of. For the Son of man is
not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.” (Luke 9:55, 56.)
It may be necessary just to state here, that we do not consider all who
suffered by the Inquisition to be martyrs, or even Christians. The crimes
of which the inquisitors took cognisance were heresy in all its different
forms; such as Judaism, Mahometanism, sorcery, polygamy, apostasy;
besides, we have not the privilege of knowing the final testimony of the
sufferers. It was quite different with the martyrs under the heathen
emperors. At the same time, it is impossible not to be strongly moved
with horror as well as compassion, in reading the histories of that dark and
diabolical period.
The reader has now before him the commencement and the general
character of the Inquisition; individual cases of its cruelty will come before
us in the progress of our history. Next in order to be noticed, however
briefly, are the new orders of monks which sprang out of the same
memorable Albigensian war.

ANCIENT AND MODERN MONKS

The origin and early history of monachism are carefully traced in the first
volume of our “Short Papers;”2 but, as it completely changes its character
in the thirteenth century, it may be well rapidly to sketch its progress
from these early times, and thus more clearly see the contrast. This plan
will also give us an opportunity of glancing at the internal condition of the
 648
church of Rome before the light of the Reformation penetrated and
revealed its fearful darkness.
Towards the end of the third century, but especially during the fourth, the
deserts of Syria and Egypt had been the abode of monks and hermits. The
most private and unfrequented places in the wide wilderness were selected
by the original recluses. The accounts of their sanctity, miracles, and
devotion, became the literature of the church. The infection spread. Men
who were anxious to excel in holiness, or to obtain the reputation of a
peculiar piety, embraced the monastic order. The practice prevailed so
rapidly, that before the.’ beginning of the sixth century it was almost
coextensive with Christendom. There were three classes of those ancient
monks.
1. Solitaires — those who lived alone in places remote from all towns
and habitations of men — hermits.
2. Coenobites — those who lived in common with others in the same
house: for religious purposes, and under the same superiors.
3. Sarabaites — They are described as strolling, irregular monks, who
had no fixed rule or residence.
They may be considered as seceders from the Coenobites, who lived
within their own gates. The wall which confined them, in some instances,
enclosed also their wells and gardens, and all that was necessary for their
sustenance, so as to leave no pretext even for occasional intercourse with a
world which they had deserted for ever.
Those whom we call monks now-a-days are Coenobites, who live together
in a convent or monastery, make vows of living according to a certain rule
established by the founder, and wear a habit which distinguishes their
order.
The revolutions of the West, in the fifth century, proved favorable to
monasticism. The barbarians were awed by the numbers, peculiarities, and
professed sanctity of the monks. Their abodes, therefore, were
undisturbed, and became a quiet retreat from the troubles of the time.
Superstition honored them; wealth began to flow in, but with it degeneracy
 649
and corruption. Already there was room for a reformer, and the person
who was to appear in that character was the famous St. Benedict.

ST. BENEDICT
As nearly all the monastic institutions throughout Europe, for more than
six hundred years, were regulated by the Rule of St. Benedict, we need
only to give some account of this celebrated order to know the
constitution and character of them all. And, as their name is legion, we will
thus save a great deal of repetition.
This remarkable man was the son of a Roman senator, born at Nurcia, in
Italy, A .D . 480. At the age of twelve he was sent to study at Rome. He had
probably heard and read about the lives of the holy anchorites and hermits
of the East. With these examples before his mind, and the irregularities of
his fellow-students around him, he longed for solitude. When about fifteen,
unable to endure any longer the corrupt state of Roman society, he
separated himself even from his faithful nurse, Cyrilla, who had been sent
with him to Rome by his parents, and left her to lament over his mental
derangement. The ferocious Huns and Vandals had made even the heart of
Italy a wilderness, so that the youthful hermit found a secluded spot not
far from Rome. For years he lived in a lonely cave; the only person
acquainted with the secret of his retreat was a monk, named Romanus,
who supplied him with bread, by saving a portion of his own daily
allowance. But as a steep rock lay between the cloister of Romanus and
the grotto of Benedict, the bread was let down by a string to the mouth of
the cave. At length he was discovered by some shepherds, who were
delighted to hear his instructions and witness his miracles. As the fame of
his piety increased, he was persuaded to become abbot of a monastery in
the neighborhood; but the strictness of his discipline displeased its
inmates, and they agreed to rid themselves of the severe recluse by mixing
poison in his wine. But on his making the sign of the cross, which he
usually did over his meat and his drink, the cup flew into pieces;
whereupon he mildly rebuked the monks, and returned to his mountain
cave.
Benedict now became an object of greater interest than ever. His fame
spread; great multitudes flocked to him; men of wealth and influence joined
 650
him, and large sums of money were placed at his disposal. He was now in
a position to build twelve monasteries, each of them consisting of twelve
monks, under a superior. Having succeeded in so far accomplishing the
object of his residence in the district, and being disquieted by the jealous
interference of Florentius, a neighboring priest, he quitted Subiaco with a
few followers in the year 528. After some wanderings, he arrived at Monte
Cassino, where Apollo was still worshipped by the rustics. With great
skill and energy he uprooted the remains of heathen idolatry among the
peasants. He cut down the grove, destroyed the idol of Apollo, and on the
site of the altar an oratory was erected, which he dedicated to St. John the
Evangelist and St. Martin. This was the germ of the great and renowned
monastery which became the parent root of the innumerable branches
which in a short time covered the face of Europe. Here Benedict drew up
his famous Rule, about the year 529. It consists of seventy-three chapters,
we are told, which contain a code of laws regulating the duties of monks to
each other, and between the abbot and his monks. He provides for the
administration of an institution, composed of every variety of character,
engaged in every variety of occupation, but all to be perfectly subject to
one absolute ruler. The comprehensiveness of his system is astonishing, as
being the result of one mind, and without example or precedent. It is
regarded by the learned as the most celebrated monument of ecclesiastical
antiquity, and was in its operations the very strength and watchword of
the satellites of Rome.

THE RULE OF ST. BENEDICT

The wisdom of this great monk as a legislator, and the superiority of his
discipline to all that had previously existed, are mainly found in the place
which he gives to manual labor. This was the distinctive feature of the
new order — hard, healthy, bodily labor. Monasticism had been hitherto
almost entirely a life of mere seclusion and contemplation, supported by
the charity of the public, or the overawed peasantry in the neighborhood
of the monastery. Benedict had seen the evil effects of this idle, dreamy,
state of existence, and made ample provision for the occupation of the
monks. Idleness he branded as the enemy of both soul and body. They
were not only to labor in the way of prayer, worship, reading, and the
education of youth; but they were to labor with their hands, as with the
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axe in the forest, the spade in the fields, and the trowel on the walls. The
advantages of this new system were great. The Benedictine abbeys became
industrious agricultural settlements. Husbandry, and the arts of civilized
life, were introduced into the most barbarous regions, and the wilderness,
under the hands of the monks, blossomed with fertility.
Although the order of St. Benedict was in every way contrary both to the
letter and spirit of the word of God, it had more of reason and common
sense than the idle and languishing systems of the East. “He was one of
those who held,” say’s Travers Hill, “that to live in this world a man must
do something — that life which consumes, but produces not, is a morbid
life, in fact an impossible life — a life that must decay — arid therefore,
imbued with the importance of this fact, he made labor, continuous and
daily labor, the great foundation of his rule.” His penetration is also seen in
his consideration for the unfriendly climate of the West, and for European
constitutions. His laws were milder and more practicable than had been
attempted in Eastern countries; the diet rather more generous; and he did
not propose any extreme mortification, but permitted his followers to live
according to the common habits of their respective countries. In these wise
and reasonable considerations lay the whole secret of the wondrous
success of the Benedictine order.
But with our modern notions of good living, and of comparatively few
religious services in the course of a week, the reader may be disposed to
question what we have said of the mildness of the monastic rules, and of
the generous nature of the diet. We have spoken of these as compared with
the East, where monasticism originated.
At two o’clock in the morning the monks were aroused for vigils, on which
occasion twelve psalms were chanted, and certain lessons from the
scriptures read or recited. They assembled again at day-break for matins;
this service was almost the same as the first, so that in their vigils and
matins twenty-four psalms were to be chanted each day, that the psalter
might be completed each week. The time for their in-door devotions and
their out-door labors was arranged, in summer and winter, as the superior
saw fit. But they were obliged to attend at least seven distinct religious
services every twenty-four hours, besides seven hours each day for labor.
They breakfasted about noon, and dined in the evening. Their usual food
 652
consisted of vegetables, grain, and fruit; one pound of bread per day for
each monk, and a small quantity of wine. On the public table no meat was
allowed; only to the sick was animal food given. Sometimes they had eggs
or fish with an evening meal. But every day in Lent they fasted till six in
the evening, and were allowed less time for sleep.
The dress of the monks was to be coarse and plain, but variable, according
to circumstances. They were allowed the luxury of boots. Their outer
garment was to be a loose black gown, with large wide sleeves, and a cowl
on their heads, ending in a point behind. Every monk had two coats, two
cowls, a table-book, a knife, a needle, and a handkerchief. The furniture of
their cells was a mat, a blanket, a rug, and a pillow. Each had a separate
bed, and they slept with their clothes on. A dean was to preside over each
dormitory, and a light was to be kept burning in each. No talking was
allowed after they retired. For small faults they were shut out from the
meals of the brotherhood, for greater they were excluded from the chapel;
incorrigible Offenders were excluded from the monastery.
Thus the long and tedious day of the self-doomed monk was spent; from
his midnight vigils till his evening vespers, all his observances were merely
mechanical. On entering the monastery, he renounced wholly every
species of personal liberty. His vow of implicit obedience to his superiors
in everything was irrevocable. No one could receive a present of any kind,
not even from a parent, nor have any correspondence with persons outside
the monastery, except by its passing under the inspection of the abbot. A
porter always sat at the gate, which was kept locked day and night, and no
stranger was admitted without leave from the abbot, and no monk could go
out unless he had permission from his superior.
The garden, the mill, the well, the bakehouse, were all within the walls, so
that there might be no necessity for leaving the monastery. The trade or
the occupation of every monk was to be determined by the abbot. A monk
who once was rich and of high birth was now penniless, and might be
appointed cook or waiter, tailor, carpenter, or ditcher, according to the
pleasure of the absolute superior; the quality and quantity of his food
were prescribed and limited as if he had been the merest child. He was not
allowed to speak but at certain times. All conversation was strictly
prohibited during meals; some one read aloud the whole time.
 653
Thus was the man — the social man — isolated from society. Woman,
whom God gave to man, was to be considered, not only a stranger to his
thoughts, but the natural enemy of his lonely perfection. By the subtlety
of Satan, self was the supreme object of all monks — of every system of
monkery. How forcibly the words of the apostle come into the mind when
musing on the liberty of Christ and the slavery of Satan: “But what things
were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.” Mark these truly
christian words, “what things were gain to me — gain to me!” If only gain
to me, what is the good of them? I want Christ. I have seen Christ in the
glory. I want to be like Him. Everything that religious flesh could boast of,
which was gain to him, he flung behind his back as the merest dross. “Yea,
doubtless,” he says, “and I count all things but loss for the excellency of
the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord.” What blindness, what
perversity, for any one to prefer the order of St. Benedict to Philippians 3
— to the love and liberty of Christ! But such was the deceiving power of
Satan, that man thought the sure, if not the only, way to heaven was to
become a monk.

THE BENEDICTINES
Before the death of Benedict, which took place in 543, his order had been
established in France, Spain, and Sicily. It spread rapidly far and wide.
Wherever the monks traveled, they converted the wilderness into a
cultivated country; they cleared forests, drained morasses, reared stately
abbeys with their own hands, civilized rude populations, pursued the
breeding of cattle and the labors of agriculture in every way. They also
cultivated learning, and had schools for the young. But though the
Benedictines soon became a great community, and spread through various
countries, they were all subject to one rule. The time when this order came
into England is well known. St. Augustine and his monks were
Benedictines, and so was Gregory who sent them. But although they have
the credit of reducing wastes into fertility by tillage, they have also the
credit of choosing, when they had the opportunity, the fairest spots in the
land for their settlements. “In every rich valley,” says Milman, speaking
of England, “by the side of every clear and deep stream, arose a
Benedictine abbey. The labors of the monks in planting, in cultivation, in
laying out the sunny garden, or hanging the hills with trees, may have
 654
added much to the picturesque grace of these scenes; but in general, if a
district in England be surveyed, the most convenient, most fertile, most
peaceful, spot will be found to have been the site of a Benedictine abbey.”3
The first intention of St. Benedict was not to found a monastic order, but
simply to prescribe rules for the Italian monks, in accordance with the
practice of the anchorites and recluses of the early church. But the monks
of Monte Cassino soon became famous for their superior intelligence,
peaceful lives, correct habits, and earnest zeal. In a country and at a time
when strife, rapine, ignorance, and dissolute manners were universal, the
calm and holy monastery presented an inviting haven of shelter, where,
during life’s brief period, man might attend to his religious duties, and end
his days in peace with heaven and with mankind. The young ardent spirit
entering the world had little choice of life; practically it was between a life
of war, violence, and wickedness — a life of ferocious joys and sorrows,
or of seclusion, humility, obedience, and self-denying labor. The more
thoughtful and timid natures welcomed the new haven of rest. Men of all
ranks left their luxury or their poverty, and joined the new community;
and thus it went on increasing, till its wealth and power were incredible.
The following statistics will give the reader a better idea of the opulence of
these ancient Benedictine abbeys than mere descriptions.
“The property belonging to the parent monastery of Monte
Cassino at length included four bishoprics, two dukedoms, thirty-
six cities, two hundred castles, three hundred territories, thirty-
three islands, and one thousand six hundred and sixty-two
churches. The abbot assumed the following titles: — Patriarch of
the Holy Faith; Abbot of the Holy Monastery of Cassino; Head
and Prince of all Abbots and Religious Houses; Vice-chancellor of
both the Sicilies, of Jerusalem, and Hungary; Count and Governor
of Campania and Terra di Savono, and of the Maritime Provinces;
Vice-Emperor; and Prince of Peace.”4

THE MISSIONARY ZEAL OF BENEDICTINES

The Benedictines, in course of time, as their numbers increased, sent out
missionaries to preach the gospel amongst the nations then plunged in the
depths of Paganism. It has been estimated that they were the means of
 655
converting upwards of thirty countries and provinces to the Christian
faith, or, as we would say, to the church of Rome. Still, the Lord in His
mercy could, and no doubt did, use the cross of Christ as then preached
for salvation. A very little bit of truth about the cross or the blood of
Christ will convert the soul when the Lord uses it. A most remarkable
change took place in the history of the church, or of Christianity, through
the preaching of the Benedictines, and of St. Benedict’s order, which
we will merely name, and leave for the reflection of the thoughtful.
During the first three centuries of the Christian era, the emperors, and all
earth’s great ones, persecuted the faithful followers of Christ; but during
the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth centuries many emperors and kings
resigned their crowns, and became monks of the Benedictine order; and
also empresses and queens became nuns of the same order.5
From the seclusion of the Benedictine cells forty-eight popes were raised
to fill the chair of St. Peter; two hundred cardinals, seven thousand
archbishops, fifteen thousand bishops, fifteen thousand abbots, four
thousand saints, and upwards of thirty-seven thousand religious
establishments, including monasteries, nunneries, priories, hospitals, etc.
The order has also produced a vast number of eminent writers, and other
learned men. Rabanus established the first school in Germany, Alcuin
founded the University of Paris, Guido invented the scale of music,
Sylvester the organ, and Dionysius Exiguus perfected the ecclesiastical
computation.
“The abbots were often little inferior to sovereign princes: their splendor
was greatest in Germany, where the abbot of Angia, surnamed the Rich,
had a yearly revenue of sixty thousand golden crowns, and into his
monastery none were received but the sons of princes, earls, and barons.
The abbots of Weissemburg, of Fulda, and St. Gall, were princes of the
empire. The abbot of St. Gall once entered Strasburg with a retinue of a
thousand horse.”6 For six hundred years all rules and societies gave way
before the universal prevalence of the Benedictine order. Many other sects
arose during that period, and, though differing from each other in some
points of discipline or dress, all acknowledged the Rule of Benedict. The
Carthusians, Cistercians, and others innumerable, were only branches
growing out of the original stock.
 656
These boasted results of the rule of the solitary hermit of Monte Cassino
extend over a period of at least seven hundred years, during which time the
Benedictines, like all other human institutions, experienced many reverses
and many revivals, which we need not attempt to trace. We would only
further say under this head, that, in accordance with the often-told story,
no sooner did the monks of St. Benedict become rich and luxurious, than
they began to depart from the principles of their founder, and gave
themselves up to indolence and every vice. They became involved in civil
affairs and the intrigues, of courts, seeking only to advance the authority
and power of the Roman pontiffs.

THE NEW ORDERS — ST. DOMINIC AND ST. FRANCIS

It has often been remarked that, where the Spirit of God is working by
means of the gospel, and where there are manifest results, in the
conversion of souls to Christ, there also the enemy is sure to be active. He
will not quietly suffer his kingdom to be invaded. It may be in hindering
the work by persecution, or in corrupting it by seducing to self-indulgence,
or by imitating it in an evil and wicked way. We have many sad instances
of such things in the history of both Israel and the church — instances too
numerous to be referred to here; but we shall now see, at this period of our
history of the monastic institutions, what will explain our meaning.
The special object of the new orders which sprang up in the beginning of
the thirteenth century, was to counterwork the influence which the
Albigensian preachers acquired over the poorer classes of the people by
familiarly mixing with them, and constantly preaching the gospel to them.
Preaching the gospel of Christ suitably for the humbler classes had been
completely neglected for centuries by the clergy of the Romish church.
Sometimes an earnest preacher was raised up, such as Claudius, of Turin;
Arnold, of Brescia; Fulk, of Neuilly; Henry, the deacon; or Peter Waldo,
who devoted himself to the work of the gospel and the salvation of souls;
but these instances were few and far between. More commonly it was for
some purely popish object, such as the Crusades, when the clergy
attempted to rouse the people by their eloquence.
“In theory,” says the ecclesiastical historian, “it was the special
privilege of the bishops to preach, but there were few amongst
 657
them who had either the gift, the inclination, the leisure from their
secular, judicial, or warlike occupations, to preach even in their
cathedral cities; in the rest of their dioceses their presence was but
occasional, a progress, or visitation of pomp and form, rather than
of popular instruction. Almost the only means of religious
instruction was the Ritual, which, in so far as language was
concerned, had long ceased to be intelligible; and the priests were
almost as ignorant as the people; they had just learned to go
through the stated observances in the most mechanical way. The
married, or secular clergy, as they were called, though by far the
most moral and respectable, were acting in opposition to the laws
of the church, and even subject to the accusation of living in
concubinage; their ministrations had very little weight with the
people. The unmarried, or regular clergy obeyed the outward rule,
but by every account they so flagrantly violated the severer
principles of the church, that their teaching, if they attempted
actual teaching, must have fallen powerless on the minds of the
people.” 7
Such a state of things in the Established Church left the way open for
the heretics, so-called. They embraced the opportunity, stepped in, and
labored diligently to spread their doctrines among the people. Preaching in
public and in private was the secret, under God, of the great success of the
Waldensos and Albigenses. This was from the earliest times, and still is,
the divine way of spreading the truth, and gathering souls to Jesus. The
more public the preaching, the better. In all ages it has pleased God, by
what the world calls “the foolishness of preaching, to save them that
believe.” Open-air preaching, visiting and teaching from house to house,
public testimony within-doors and out-of-doors, are ways and means
which God will always bless. And such means seem to have been
diligently used by those accused of heresy in Languedoc.
The watchful enemy, observing the effect of this mode of action, changes
his tactics. In place of shutting up all the sincere and earnest and pious
members of the church of Rome in monasteries, to think only about
themselves, instruct themselves, pray and preach only to themselves, he
now sends them out as open-air preachers, and to overrun the very fields
which had been occupied for centuries by the true followers of Christ. His
 658
emissaries had strict orders, not only to imitate the heretics, but to surpass
them, in plainness of dress, humility, poverty, and familiarity with the
people. A complete change now takes place in the history of the monastic
orders; in place of cloistered monks, secluded from the eye of the world,
saying their prayers, working in the fields, or gathering the fruit of their
gardens, we have preaching friars at the corner of every street, and in every
town throughout Europe, yea, begging from door to door. But this was not
all; being favorites of the pontiffs, they had the direction of nearly
everything in Church and State for three centuries. “They held the highest
offices, both civil and ecclesiastical,” says Mosheim, “taught with almost
absolute authority in all the schools and churches, and defended the
majesty of the Roman pontiffs against kings, bishops, and heretics, with
amazing zeal and success. What the Jesuits were after the Reformation, the
same were the Dominicans and Franciscans from the thirteenth century
to the times of Luther. They were the soul of the whole Church and State,
and the projectors and executors of all the enterprises of any moment.”

THE ORIGIN AND CHARACTER OF THE DOMINICANS

As we think it more satisfactory to know the beginning of things, we will
now briefly describe the origin and character of these two great pillars of
the proud temple of Rome. Up to this time — the beginning of the
thirteenth century — the exertions of the popes have been almost entirely
confined to the building of this temple — the establishment of their own
supremacy in the church, and of their temporal authority over the State.
But the increasing light of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and the
increasing depravity of the church, brought into the field of testimony
many noble witnesses for Christ and for His gospel. The temple began to
shake. The clergy had alienated the hearts of the common people by their
grasping and oppressive power; and their indolence, indulgence, and
immoralities, unfavorably contrasted with the industry, humility, self-
denial, and consistency of those accused of heresy. The whole fabric was
in danger, for these heresiarchs were scattered throughout all provinces,
and among all ranks and classes of society, even in Rome itself. The
enemy, perceiving the necessities of the moment, hastened to the rescue ef
the threatened hierarchy. The two men adapted to meet the exigencies of
the time were Dominic and Francis.
 659
Dominic was born in 1170, in the village of Calaroga in Old Castile. His
parents were of noble name, that of Guzman, if not of noble race.
According to some writers, the effect of his burning eloquence as a
preacher was foreshown by his mother dreaming that she gave birth to a
whelp carrying a fire-brand in his mouth, with which he set the world on
fire. But whether it was his mother or his monk historian that had the
vision, he faithfully answered to the similitude. “Beware of dogs” never
had a truer application than to Dominic; and literal fire, not merely the fire
of his eloquence, was his chosen and favorite agent of destruction from the
commencement of his career. The flames of hell, Dominic and his followers
alleged, were reserved for all heretics, and they deemed it a good work to
begin the eternal burnings in time. From infancy his life was rigidly ascetic.
His nature, at an early period, showed signs of tenderness and
compassion, but his religious zeal, in process of time, steeled him against
every kindly impulse of nature. His nights were, for the most part, spent
in severe penitential exercises; he flogged himself nightly with an iron
chain, once for his own sins, once for the sinners in this world, and once
for those in purgatory.
Dominic became a canon in the rigorous house of Osma, and soon excelled
the others in austerities. In consequence of his reputation, the Spanish
bishop of Osma — a prelate of great ability and of strong religious
enthusiasm — invited Dominic to accompany him on a mission to
Denmark. He had then reached his thirtieth year, and, though he was
considered mild towards Jews and infidels, he was burning with
unrelenting hatred towards the heretics. Having crossed the Pyrenees, the
zealous bishop and his congenial companion found themselves in the midst
of the Albigensian heresy; they could not close their eyes to the
disgraceful state of the Romish clergy, to the contempt into which they
had fallen, and to the prosperity of the sectaries. The Mass had not been
said in some places for thirty years. The papal commission too, which had
been appointed by Innocent III., about the year 1200, they found in a
most dejected state. This mission, it will be remembered, consisted of such
men as Reinerius, Guy, Castelnau, and the infamous Arnold, all monks of
Citeaux, the spiritual offspring of St. Bernard. They bitterly lamented their
want of success: heresy was deaf to their warnings and threatentrigs; it
owned not the authority of the pope.
 660
The papal legates, according to the good old style, had been marching
through the land, from city to city, in the most hierarchical pomp, in rich
attire, with their retinue, and a vast cavalcade of homes. “How expect
success with this secular pomp?” replied the severer Spaniards. “Sow the
good seed as the heretics sow the bad. Cast off those sumptuous robes,
renounce those richly-caparisoned palfreys, go barefoot, without purse
and scrip, like the apostles; out-labor, out-fast, out-discipline these false
teachers.” The bishop of Osma and his faithful Dominie sent back their
own horses, stripped themselves to the rudest monkish dress, and thus led
on the spiritual army.
This was the deep subtlety of Satan. The power of the Holy Spirit had
been manifested by the men of the valleys, and by the Poor Men of
Lyons, who had spread themselves over the provinces; and now comes a
great display of mock humility and false zeal, a base imitation of the gifts
and graces of the Holy Spirit. It was only by such lies and hypocrisy that
the authority of Rome could be maintained, or that the enemy could hope
to retain the nations of Europe in Captivity.
We have already spoken of Dominic’s labors in the Albigensian territory.
There he spent ten years in endeavoring to root out heresy. A small
fraternity was then formed, who went out two and two, in imitation of the
Lord’s appointment of the seventy. (Luke 10; Matthew 10.) The burnings
in Languedoc then commenced. Like dogs of a keen scent, the Dominicans
went from house to house, searching for prey to feed the sword of de
Montfort, and the fires which they had kindled. Dominic’s great
achievements secured for him the favor of the pontiffs, Innocent III. and
Honorius III., who established him in the privileges of a “Founder.” He
died in 1221; but before he quitted the scene of his cruelties, no fewer than
sixty monasteries of his order had sprung up in various regions of
Christendom. He was canonized by Gregory IX. in 1233. The fearful
tribunal of the Inquisition, directly or indirectly, we doubt not, owed its
origin to Dominic, and the most numerous and merciless of its officials
belonged to his brotherhood. A few more details may be given when
speaking about the Franciscans, as they may be described together.
 661
THE ORIGIN AND CHARACTER OF THE FRANCISCANS
Contemporary with St. Dominic was his great compeer in ecclesiastical
fame, St. Francis, who was to rival, and even exceed, the Spanish monk in
celebrity. He was a native of Assist, a town of Central Italy. The many
absurd legends which crowd the pages of his Franciscan biographers need
not be referred to; they are really blasphemous. Such was their
enthusiastic frenzy, that they impiously maintained that St. Francis was a
second christ; that the stigmata, or wounds of the Savior, were
miraculously impressed upon his body, in imitation of the crucified body
of Jesus; and this imposture they dared to found on the text,
“From henceforth let no man trouble me: for I bear in my body the
marks of the Lord Jesus.” (Galations 6:17.)
During a year’s captivity in Perugia, and other bodily afflictions, he
became the subject of the most extraordinary visions and raptures, by
which he was encouraged to go forth into the world as a servant of God,
and as a savior of mankind. The feverish dreams of his weak mind were
divine revelations to the Catholics.
Francis now began to talk mysteriously about his future bride — that
bride was poverty. He exchanged his dress for rags. He was raised up, he
said, “to oppose truth to error, poverty to the desire of wealth, and
humility to ambition.” He begged at the gates of monasteries; he discharged
the most menial offices; he devoted himself to the care of lepers; he
washed their feet and dressed their wounds. “His mother,” we read, “heard
and beheld all his strange acts with a tender and prophetic admiration: but
his father was ashamed of him, and treated him as a madman.” But though
at first he was mocked and pelted in the streets of Assist, he was believed
in by the church, sheltered by the bishop, and soon followed by a crowd
of imitators.
Francis was now openly wedded to poverty by an oath never to be
broken; and it was to be poverty in its lowest form — beggary. He
accepted from an old friend “a herinit’s attire, a short tunic, a leathern
girdle, a staff, and slippers;” but this was too much fine and comfortable
for the ideas of the young fanatic. Making the worst use of the Savior’s
instructions to His disciples in Matthew 10 and Luke 10, he threw away
 662
all he had, excepting a coarse dark grey tunic, which he tied round him with
a rope, and set out through the city, calling all to repentance.
Such strange but: fervent piety or fanaticism, at that period of dark
superstition and ignorance, could not fail to kindle the zeal of others. The
essence of the gospel as taught by Jesus Christ, he affirmed, consisted in
the most absolute poverty of all things — that there was no safe path to
heaven unless by the destitution of all earthly possessions. “Wonder grew
into admiration, admiration into emulation, emulation into a blind
following of his footsteps. Disciples, one by one, began to gather round
him. He retired with them to a lonely spot in the bend of the river, called
Rivo Torto. A rule was wanting for the young brotherhood. The Gospels
were opened. Francis read three texts.
1. ‘If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the
poor.’
2. ‘Take nothing for your journey.’
3. ‘If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up
his cross, and follow Me.’ (Matthew 19:21; Mark 6:8; Matthew
16:24.)
Francis made the sign of the cross, and sent forth his followers into the
neighboring cities, to the east and west, the north and south.”
Such was the origin, and such the character, of the new orders. Though
somewhat different in their first constitution, they were very nearly
assimilated in character, and even in profession, and entered upon the same
career with almost the same objects in view and the same principles of
action. Itinerant preachers under the vow of poverty characterized both. In
their identification with the lowest of mankind they were entirely agreed.
The enemy saw what the Poor Men of Lyons, or the Waldenses, were
doing; and these were to be the poor men of the papacy, who were to meet
the heretics on their own ground, and outdo them in poverty, humility,
labor, and suffering. Having received the formal sanction and protection of
the pope, Francis sent forth his followers, vowed to the service of God, to
the extirpation of heretics, to chastity, poverty, and obedience.
 663
The new orders included nuns, or a sisterhood, founded in connection with
each of the brotherhoods. There was also a grade connected with the
mendicant friars, called Tertiaries, who continued to be engaged in the
common occupations of the world, and added greatly to the popularity
and influence of the friars. It was an avowed link between the world and
the church. A few words as to the habits of the preaching friars, in
contrast with the earlier monastic orders, will be the simplest way of
giving the reader a clear view of both. And, as we have no doubt, the new
orders were permitted of God to uphold the tottering fabric of the Romish
church, and to hinder the accomplishment of the Reformation for three
hundred years, great interest is connected with their history. But the saints
of God had a long education to pass through, and the true church of Christ
to be enriched with a noble army of martyrs, before that glorious end was
gained.

THE EARLIER AND LATER MONASTIC ORDERS

We are fully aware that all human systems must be examined by the word
of God, if we would rightly understand their real character. It is not by
contrasting the later with the earlier that we can find out how far they may
have wandered from the mind of the Lord. The word of the living God, by
which all shall at last be judged, must be our only standard now. It matters
very little what improvement may he found in one system compared with
another, if both are the result of human inwmtion. This is true as to all
persons as well as all systems. The word of God must be the Christian’s
only rule, and Christ Himself the only head and center, power and
authority, in the system which He owns — the church, the assembly of
God. But, as we have on different occasions looked into scripture on these
points, we will now, in a few words, state the difference between the
earlier and later monastic systems.8
The chief, if not the exclusive, object of the early hermits, anchorites,
and ascetics; of every name, was their own religious perfection. The
instruction or salvation of others formed no part of their creed. Isolation
from the dangerous world, and seclusion in some lonely cell, with all its
privations, were deemed necessary to this end. As the halo of their
sanctity attracted and allured others, houses were built, and large tracts of
land were cultivated, for the necessities of this life. These small beginnings
 664
sometimes grew up to be the most stately settlements in the country. And
during the long dark night of the middle ages, with its barbarism and
feudalism, the monasteries often proved a great mercy to the sick, the
poor, and the traveler. All must thankfully acknowledge this fact. During
the five or six centuries which followed the subversion of the western
empire, the monastic system became a powerful instrument in correcting
the vices of society, and in protecting the lower classes from the lawless
oppression of the feudal lord. Hospitality, or the entertainment of
strangers and pilgrims, was one of the important uses of the monasteries at
that time. Inns for the reception of travelers appear not to have existed
earlier than the eleventh century. Almost the only two stately buildings
which met the traveller’s eye in those days, were the castle of the
powerful baron and the abbey of the praying monks. The one was war,
and the other peace. Religion, learning, and science found a refuge behind
the monastery walls, and true piety could peacefully labor there, in
writing, transcribing, and otherwise collecting and preserving useful
information.
“The Benedictines,” says Travers Hill, “were the depositaries of
learning and the arts; they gathered books together, and reproduced
them in the silence of their cells, and they preserved in this way
not only the volumes of sacred writ, but many of the works of
classic lore. They started the gothic architecture; they alone had the
secrets of chemistry and medical science; they invented many
colors; they were the first architects, artists, glass-stainers, carvers,
and mosaic workers in mediaeval times. It was a mighty system,
and did good work in the world, but it went the way of all human
things and human institutions; it became intoxicated with its
power, blinded with its own splendor, and corrupted by its own
wealth; its abbots grew avaricious, its monks voluptuous; they lost
their original simplicity; the rule of their founder existed no longer
in the activity of their husbandmen, their scholars, and their artists,
but was only to be found in the words mechanically read in the
chapter house — monasticism engendered its own corruption, and
out of that corruption carne death.”
The magnificent abbey of Glastonbury once covered sixty acres. Before
the fall of the monasteries in England, the royal commissioners report
 665
concerning it; that they had never seen a house so great, good, and
princely, with four parks adjoining, a great fishery five miles in compass,
well replenished with pike, perch, bream, and roach; four manor houses,
besides the chapel, hospital, tribunal, schools, and the great gate-house.
Many of the houses of Glastonbury have been built out of the materials of
this once superb abbey.9
The habits of the modern monks were a perfect contrast to the earlier. In
place of dwelling within the walls of a superb abbey, the whole of
Christendom in a short time was overspread with hosts of Dominicans and
Franciscans. They were gathered from every country, and spoke,
therefore, every language and dialect. They preached the old faith in its
fullest mediaeval inflexible rigor, in almost every town and hamlet.
Unswerving loyalty to the pope and the extirpation of heresy were their
grand themes. And the pontiffs in return protected them, and conferred
upon them the highest privileges and advantages. Before the century
closed, the monasteries and nunneries of the Minoritc order had reached
the surprising number of eight thousand, and were inhabited by at least
two hundred thousand inmates.

THE APOSTASY OF THE MENDICANTS

The two rival orders, the Dominicans and Franciscans, not contented with
embroiling all Europe in discord, and angry strife, began soon after the
decease of their respective founders, to contend with each other for
precedence. And although the pontiffs of this and the following centuries
used various means to compose and terminate these unseemly disputes,
their attempts were fruitless; for these two great orders continued for
many a long year to cherish this keen rivalry, and to hurl at each other the
most bitter recriminations. They fought hard for the mastery in all the
seats of learning in Christendom, but the most noted contest was that of
the Dominicans with the university of Paris. Another prominent point of
great controversy which long raged, was the doctrine of the immaculate
conception of the Virgin Mary. It was the favorite doctrine of the
Franciscans, and was always violently assailed by the Dominicans. The
famous Thomas Aquinas argued in favor of the Dominican view of the
question, and Duns Scotus, the Dialectictan, taking up the Franciscan view
of the doctrine, entered the arena of debate, which has continued to this
 666
day; for although the present pope Plus IX. has pronounced the dogma of
the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary, the Dominican fraternity
are unwilling to admit it. However it has now become an article of faith in
the Romish church.
As early as 1256, when Bonaventura became the general of the
Franciscans, he found they had begun to be faithless to their ungenial
bride, poverty, and were struggling for a divorce. The affections of Francis
had not survived in his followers. But under the prudent management of
their new general, comparative tranquillity was maintained during his life;
but after his death, which took place in 1274, dissensions broke out with
as great violence as ever. Indeed these mendicant, or rather satanic, orders
caused the most violent contentions in almost every country of Europe
down to the period of the Reformation. But all classes, both in Church and
State, had to bear with their pride and arrogance, as they were the most
faithful servants and satellites of the Roman See.
The following brief sketch from the pen of Matthew Paris, a Benedictine
of St. Alban’s, who wrote about 1249, will place before the reader the real
character and ways of these dreadful pests of society. The picture is by no
means overdrawn, though Matthew belonged to the old aristocratic order
and might despise his new democratic brothers. Solitude, seclusion, the
lonely cell, the private chapel, communication with the outer world sternly
cut off, was the old order; the following is a sample of the new, and of
what prevailed in England in the thirteenth century.
“It is terrible — it is an awful — presage, that in three hundred
years, in four hundred years, even in more, the old monastic orders
have not so entirely degenerated as these fraternities. The friars,
who have been founded hardly forty years, have built even in the
present day in England, residences as lofty as the palaces of our
kings. These are they, who, enlarging day by day their sumptuous
edifices, encircling them with lofty walls, lay up within them
incalculable treasures, imprudently transgressing the bounds of
poverty, and violating, according to the prophecy of the German
Hildegard, the very fundamental rules of their profession. These
are they, who, impelled by the love of gain, force themselves upon
the last hours of the lords, and of the rich whom they know to be
 667
overflowing with wealth; and these, despising all rights,
supplanting the ordinary pastors, extort confessions and secret
testaments, boasting of themselves, and of their order, and
asserting their vast superiority over all others. So that no one of
the faithful now believes that he can be saved, unless guided and
directed by the preachers or friars minor. Eager to obtain privileges,
they serve in the courts of kings and nobles, as counsellors,
chamberlains, treasurers, bridesmen, or notaries of marriages; they
are the executioners of the papal extortions. In their preaching they
sometimes take the tone of flattery, sometimes of biting censure;
they scruple not to reveal confession, or to bring forward the most
rash accusations. They despise the legitimate orders, those founded
by holy fathers, by St. Benedict or St. Augustine, with all other
professors. They place their own order high above all; they look on
the Cistercians as rude and simple, half laic or rather peasants; they
treat the black friars as haughty epicureans.”10
 668

CHAPTER 27
THE APPROACHING DAWN OF THE REFORMATION

Centuries before Luther nailed his theses to the church door in

Wittemburg, the Lord was preparing both nations and individuals for the
accomplishment of this great work. The weakening of the papal power and
the increasing boldness of the witnesses, foretold what was approaching.
In our contemplations of Rome, we must always distinguish between the
catholic church and popery, or the ecclesiastical and the temporal power.
The church, though fallen and enslaved, was still the church; protestant in
heart and faithful in measure to Christ; but to venture in her pious services
beyond the defined limits of Roman orthodoxy subjected her to its severe
discipline. The papacy vowed destruction on all trespassers. Immorality,
irreligion, might be passed over, at least with a slight censure; but heresy
or schism — in other words, any form of dissent from the Roman church,
must be rooted out by fire and sword, and all heretics consigned by
pontifical sentence to eternal death.
During the long reign of papal terror, the true saints of God witnessed and
prophesied in sackcloth. But the silver line of sovereign grace was
preserved unbroken from the days of the apostles, under the sheltering
wing of the living God. He preserved His witnesses from the devouring
dragon in the secret places of the earth; in mountains, valleys, and caverns;
and in many quiet convents in the remote regions of Christendom.
But it may be interesting, first of all, to renew our acquaintance with the
state of Christianity in some of the countries which we have already
noticed. In this way we shall naturally fall in with our long line of
witnesses, which go down to the days of Luther. And, first in order, we
will notice the state of
 669
CHRISTIANITY IN IRELAND
Centuries have rolled on since we last looked at the state of things in the
sister island. St. Patrick left behind him at his death in 492, a band of
well-educated, devoted men, who greatly venerated their master and
sought to follow in his footsteps. The fame of Ireland for its monasteries,
missionary schools, and as the seat of pure scriptural teaching, rose so
high, that it received the honorable appellation of “The isle of saints.” On
the testimony of Bede we learn that, about the middle of the seventh
century, many of the Anglo-Saxon nobles and clergy repaired to Ireland,
either for instruction, or for an opportunity of living in monasteries of a
stricter discipline.
We have already noticed the labors of the Irish clergy as missionaries.1 The
Culdees of Iona owed their origin as a christian community to the
preaching of the Irish apostle Columba. Britain, France, Germany, the low
countries, and different parts of the continent of Europe, were mainly
indebted to Irish missionaries for their first acquaintance with divine truth.
Charlemagne, himself a man of letters, invited to his court various eminent
scholars from different countries, but especially from Ireland. For many
ages she maintained her independence of Rome, rejected all foreign control,
and acknowledged Christ only as Head of the church. But the invasion of
the Danes about the beginning of the ninth century, and their occupation
of the country, quenched the light, and changed the character of “the isle of
saints.” These piratical and predatory hordes wasted her fields, slew her
sons, or dispossessed them of their inheritance, demolished her colleges,
and maintained themselves in the country with the cruelty and arrogance
of usurpers. Moral, spiritual, and literary darkness followed, and prepared
the way for Romanism. Up till this time religious institutions, and the
labors of the ecclesiastics, form the chief subjects of her history; but since
then, intestine wars, turbulence, crime, and desolation.
Various attempts had been made by Roman pontiffs to subject the Irish
church to the See of Rome, but without success until the reign of Pope
Adrian IV. He was an Englishman, known by the name of Nicolas
Breakspear; born in poverty and obscurity, he became a monk of St.
Alban’s, and was afterwards elevated in the revolution of human affairs, to
the pontifical dignity. Though suddenly raised from indigence to opulence,
 670
his pride and arrogance were extreme. He took great offense at the
Emperor Frederic Barbarossa for omitting to hold his stirrup, and refused
to give him the kiss of peace. Frederic declared that the omission was the
result of ignorance, and, submitting to the service as equerry to his
Holiness, was forgiven, and received the kiss.
Amongst the earliest acts of this modest pontiff, was the assumption of
authority over Ireland, and making a grant of it to Henry II., king of
England. The ground on which the pope rested his right to make this grant
was thus expressed: “For it is undeniable, and your majesty acknowledges
it, that all islands on which Christ the sun of righteousness hath shined,
and which have received the Christian faith, belong of right to St. Peter and
the most holy Roman church.” In virtue of this right, he authorizes Henry
to invade Ireland with a view to the extension of the church, the increase of
religion and virtue, and eradicating the tares of vice from the garden of the
Lord; on condition that a penny shall be yearly paid from each house to
the See of Rome.
From this period, 1155, the Irish church came to be essentially Romish in
its doctrines, constitution, and discipline. Long before the Reformation,
“Nearly six hundred monastic establishments, belonging to eighteen
different orders, were scattered over the entire face of the country.
Ghostly friars, black, white and grey, swarmed in countless multitudes,
practicing upon an ignorant and deluded people.” In 1172, Henry
completed his conquest of the country; an assembly of the Irish clergy
convened at Waterford, submitted to the papal dictation, proclaimed
Henry’s title to the sovereign dominion of Ireland, and took the oath of
fidelity to himself and his successors. Rapid declension now marked the
church in Ireland. Her far-famed spirituality and intelligence were gone. At
one time she had about three hundred bishops; at the dawn of the
Reformation, we believe the number was under thirty. Jealousies,
contentions, and rebellions, have blotted almost every page of her history,
both civil and eccqesiastical, from the ninth to the present century. 2

CHRISTIANITY IN SCOTLAND
We have already seen, that the Roman clergy experienced great difficulty
in obtaining a permanent footing in Scotland.3 The Culdees — whom we
 671
are disposed to honor for their works’ sake — continued for centuries to
resist the encroachments of popery and to maintain their ground,
notwithstanding all the efforts put forth by the church of Rome to crush
and exterminate them. For they held fast by the word of God, like the
reformers of a later day, as the only infallible guide and authority in all
matters of faith and practice. Even Bede, the monk historian, in candor
admits that “Columba and his disciples would receive those things only
which are contained in the writings of the prophets, evangelists, and
apostles; diligently observing the works of piety and virtue.” But Rome at
length triumphed: the faithful Culdees, long oppressed, diminished in
numbers, weakened in energy, through the soreeries of Jezebel, disappear
from the page of history, and Scotland is again enshrouded in darkness and
superstition. Monasteries rose rapidly, and soon overshadowed all the
land; and as they reached a height of wealth and power, unsurpassed in
any other portion of Europe, we must give them a brief examination.
The great mania for enriching churches began with Charlemagne: Alfred the
Great imitated his example, and soon all Christendom was infected by this
superstition. In the person of Margaret, the Saxon princess, it traveled
northward. The invasion and conquest of England by the Normans, and
the establishment of a new dynasty in that country, produced the most
important effects on the history of the church in Scotland. Many of the
Saxons fled into Scotland to escape from their new masters; and among
others Margaret, who became the wife of the Scottish king, Malcolm III,
and the mother of Alexander I, a powerful and vigorous prince, and of
David I, who was a bigoted supporter of Romanism. Margaret’s piety,
charity, and ascetic life are celebrated with enthusiasm by her confessor
and biographer, Turgot, a monk of Durham, and bishop of St. Andrew’s.
Malcolm, animated by the devout spirit of his beloved wife, made some
donations to the church; but the royal munificence of his son David in the
endowment of bishoprics and abbeys has been rewarded by the praise of
all monastic writers, although James I. speaks of him as “a sore saint to
the crown.” Yet his extravagant superstition tended not only to
impoverish the crown, but to the oppressive taxation of the people. “He
founded the bishoprics of Glasgow, Brechin, Dunkeld, Dumblane, Ross,
and Caithness... The same pious liberality called into existence a multitude
 672
of abbacies, priories, and nunneries; and monks of every order and in every
garb swarmed in the land.”4
The superior civilization of the Anglo-Saxon refugees, and their attachment
to the English hierarchy, tended greatly to its establishment in Scotland.
The Celtic element was depressed, while the Court took an English tone
and character. From this period, we are informed, a stream of Saxon and
Norman settlers poured into Scotland. They soon acquired the most fertile
districts from the Tweed to the Pentland Firth; and almost every noble
family in Scotland now traces from them its descent. These new
proprietors, following the example of the monarch, lavished their riches on
the church. The passion to found and endow monasteries became so great,
that long before the Reformation, there were upwards of a hundred
monasteries spread over the country, and more than twenty convents for
the reception of nuns.
A brief sketch of two or three of these religious houses may not be
uninteresting to the reader; which will also show the state of things
introduced by the Romish hierarchy into that once simple and primitive
country. The statistics are taken from Mr. Cunningham’s history.

THE WEALTH OF THE ABBEYS IN SCOTLAND

Jedburgh, one of the noblest abbeys in Scotland, was held by the red
friars. Among the donations made to it by a succession of pious
benefactors, we find — the tithe of the king’s hunting in Teviotdale, a
house in Roxburgh, a house in Berwick, pasture for the monks’ cattle along
with those of the king, timber from the royal forests according to their
wants, the multure of the mill — a measure of corn — from all the men of
Jedburgh, a saltpan near Stirling, exemption from any exaction on their
tuns of wine, a fishing in the Tweed, acres, ploughgates and exgangs of
land, with a villein to till, and several parish churches, with their tithes and
other revenues. They followed the rule of St. Augustine, which bound
them to devote the first part of the day to labor, and the remainder to
reading and devotion.
Paisley — The Abbey of Paisley was anciently one of the richest religious
houses in Scotland. It was founded by Walter Fitz-Allan, the high steward,
about the year 1160, for Cluniac monks, who followed the order of St.
 673
Benedict. They were first located at Renfrew, but afterwards removed to
Paisley, and were soon richly endowed by the pious liberality of
successive high stewards, and by some of the great lords of Lennox and the
Isles. In the thirteenth century, they were in possession of thirty parish
churches, with all their revenues; and about two-thirds of the whole soil of
the extensive parish of Paisley had passed into their hands, with acres and
ploughgates in almost every district in the west of Scotland. The stewards
had moreover given them the tithe of their hunting, and the skins of all the
deer taken in the adjoining forests, pasture for their cattle, a mill at Paisley,
a salmon-net in the Clyde at Renfrew, a fishing at Lochwinnoch, the
liberty of quarrying both building stones and lime stones for burning at
Blackhall and elsewhere, of digging coal for the use of their monasteries, its
granges, smithies, and brew-houses, of making charcoal of dead wood, and
of cutting turf for covering in the charcoal, of green wood for their
monasteries and grange buildings, and for all operations of agriculture and
fishing.
Such were the monks, and such their revenues in those days. They might
well rejoice in the abundance of all the good things of this life; but the
parish priest, strange to say, was left in a state of poverty and
dependence. The revenues of the parish were appropriated by the bishops
and religious houses, so that a very scanty income was reserved for the
parochial clergy. All went to fatten the idle friars; who, whatever their
primitive virtues may have been, were now the scandal of the church. At
the time of the Reformation, of the thousand parishes in Scotland, about
seven hundred had been appropriated to bishops and religious houses. The
more thorough and regular division of the country into parishes and
dioceses took place about the beginning of the twelfth century.
Some of our youthful readers may be disposed to inquire, why it was that
in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries more especially, the kings and
nobles of the earth strove with each other to enrich the church. Many
causes combined to produce this state of things. The feudal charters in
those days were signed with the king’s +, as he could not write his own
name; and all his subjects were rude, ignorant, and superstitious. The
monks and friars had a high reputation, as we have frequently noticed in
our history, for superior holiness, for the fervor of their devotions, and the
austerity of their lives. These things attracted the attention and won the
 674
veneration of a credulous and superstitious age. Besides, the donor was
assured that his donations would secure the repose of his soul after death,
which then meant eternal life. It was by means of this great religious
imposture that the clergy attained to such a degree of opulence and power;
that the rich became their worshippers, and built them those beautiful
houses, the very ruins of which still attract the traveler, and excite his
admiration.”5

THE EFFECTS OF WEALTH ON THE CLERGY

Before the Reformation, according to the most trustworthy accounts, more
than the half of the wealth of Scotland belonged to the clergy, and the
greater part of this was in the hands of a few individuals. The effect of
such a state of things, as it has always been in every age and country, was
the corruption of the whole order of the clergy, and of the whole system
of religion. “Avarice, ambition, and the love of secular pomp, reigned
among the superior orders. Bishops and abbots rivalled the first nobility in
magnificence, and preceded them in honors; they were privy councillors,
and lords of session as well as of parliament, and had long engrossed the
principal offices of state. A vacant bishopric or abbacy called forth
powerful competitors, who contended for it as for a principality or petty
kingdom. Inferior benefices were openly put to sale, or bestowed on the
illiterate and unworthy minions of courtiers; on dice-players, strolling
bards, and the natural sons of bishops. The bishops never, on any
occasion, condescended to preach; from the erection of the regular Scottish
Episcopacy down to the era of the Reformation, history mentions only
one instance of a bishop preaching, and that was Dunbar, Archbishop of
Glasgow, for the purpose of excluding the Reformer, George Wishart.”
The lives of the clergy, corrupted by wealth and ignorance, became such a
scandal to religion, and such an outrage on decency, that we canner transfer
the description of the most conscientious historian to our pages. But all
historians are agreed, both Catholic and Protestant, that monasteries and
all religious houses became the nurseries of superstition and idleness, and
ultimately the haunts of lewdness and wickedness. Yet it was deemed
impious and sacrilegious to speak of reducing their numbers or alienating
their funds. “The kingdom swarmed with ignorant, idle, luxurious monks,
who, like locusts, devoured the fruits of the earth, and filled the air with
 675
pestilential infection; with friars, white, black, and grey; canons regular,
Carmelites, Carthusians, Cordeliers, Dominicans, Franciscan conventuals,
and observantines, Jacobins, Premonstratensians, monks of Tyrone, and of
Vailis Caulium, and Hospitallers, or Holy Knights of St. John of
Jerusalem; nuns of St. Austin, St. Clair, St. Scholastica, and St. Catherine
of Sienna, with canonesses of various clans.”6
Without an adequate knowledge of the state of Christendom before the
Reformation, it would be impossible to form a just estimate of the
necessity and importance of that most merciful revolution. At this
distance of time and with such a changed state of society before us, it is
difficult to believe that such enormous abuses then prevailed in the church.
Of the doctrines of Christianity almost nothing remained but the name. At
the same time we as firmly believe, that the Lord had His hidden ones —
His true witnesses, who mourned over the evil ways and intolerance of the
high and dominant party. The Lord Himself in His address to Thyatira,
speaks of a remnant then in separation from the corruptions of Jezebel,
and that their good works increased as the darkness thickened. “I know
thy works, and charity, and service, and faith, and thy patience, and thy
works; and the last to be more than the first.” The lives, faith, and works
of this remnant were no doubt regulated by the word of God; but this very
circumstance ensured their obscurity, and their absence from the page of
history. The silver line of God’s sovereign grace could never be
interrupted, and tens of thousands from the darkest ages shall reflect the
glow of that grace for ever. In quietness they fulfilled their peaceful
mission, and as peacefully passed off the scene, but left no record of their
labors of love on the pages of the annalist. Not so with the proud, the
ambitious, the fanatic, the hypocrite: all such stand prominent on the
pages of ecclesiastical history. But there is another tribunal besides that of
posterity before which both must stand, and be measured by God’s own
standard.
But we return to our theme — the state of religion in Scotland before the
Reformation.
 676
POPERY AS A SYSTEM
The word of God, which is able to make men wise unto salvation, was
locked up from the people. Even the bishops were not ashamed to confess
that they had never read any part of sacred scripture, except what they
had met with in their missals. The religious service was mumbled over in a
dead language, which many of the priests did not understand, and some of
them could scarcely read; and the greatest care was taken to prevent even
catechisms, composed and approved by the clergy, from coming into the
hands of the laity. The sacrifice of the mass was represented as procuring
forgiveness of sins to the living and the dead; and the consciences of men
were withdrawn from the precious sacrifice — the finished work — of the
Lord Jesus Christ, to a delusive reliance upon priestly absolutions, papal
pardons, and voluntary penances.
“They were taught,” says the eminent historian of John Knox, “that if
they regularly said their aves and credos, confessed themselves to a priest,
punctually paid their tithes and church-offerings, purchased a mass, went
on a pilgrimage to the shrine of some celebrated saint, refrained from flesh
on Fridays, or performed some other prescribed act of bodily
mortification, their salvation was infallibly secured in due time; while
those who were so rich and so pious as to build a chapel or an altar, and to
endow it for the support of a priest, to perform masses, obits, and dirges,
procured a relaxation of the pains of purgatory for themselves or their
relatives, in proportion to the extent of their liberality. It is difficult for us
to conceive how empty, ridiculous, and wretched those harangues were
which the monks delivered as sermons. Legendary tales concerning the
founder of some religious order, his wonderful sanctity, the miracles which
he performed, his combats with the devil, his watchings, fastings,
flagellations; the virtues of holy water, chrisre, crossing, and exorcism; the
horrors of purgatory, and the numbers released from it by the intercession
of some powerful saint; these, with low jests, table-talk, and fireside
scandal, formed the favorite topics of the preachers, and were served up to
the people instead of the pure, salutary, and sublime doctrines of the
Bible.
“The beds of the dying were besieged, and their last moments
disturbed, by avaricious priests, who labored to extort bequests to
 677
themselves or to the church. Not satisfied with exacting tithes from
the living, a demand was made upon the dead: no sooner had the
poor husbandman breathed his last, than the rapacious vicar came
and carried off his corpse-present — or a present from the corpse
to the vicar — which he did as often as death visited the family.7
Ecclesiastical censures were fulminated against those who were
reluctant in making these payments, or who showed themselves
disobedient to the clergy. Divine service was neglected; and, except
on festival days, the churches, in many parts of the country, were
no longer employed for sacred purposes, but served as sanctuaries
for malefactors, places of traffic, or resorts for pastime.
“Persecution, and the suppression of free inquiry, were the only
weapons by which its interested supporters were able to defend
this system of corruption and imposture. Every avenue by which
truth might enter was carefully guarded. Learning was branded as
the parent of heresy. If any person, who had attained a degree of
illumination amidst the general darkness, began to hint
dissatisfaction with the conduct of churchmen, and to propose the
corrections of abuses, he was immediately stigmatised as a heretic,
and, if he did not secure his safety by flight, was immured in a
dungeon, or committed to the flames. And when at last, in spite of
all their precautions, the light which was shining around did break
in and spread through the nation, the clergy prepared to adopt the
most desperate and bloody measures for its extinction.”
It will now be unnecessary to trace the origin and progress of popery in
other lands. The above sketch of the condition of things in Scotland, from
the thirteenth till the sixteenth century, may be sufficient to illustrate the
state of all Europe, and for the purpose of history. As a system it is the
same in all ages and in all countries. Its grand dogma has ever been — the
Unity of the Roman Catholic Church. Whether it be in the immediate
vicinity of Rome or in the far distant regions of the north, its spirit is the
same, and must be so, until it comes to its end by the direct judgment of
the Lord Himself from heaven
“How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so
much torment and sorrow give her; for she saith in her heart, I sit a
 678
queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. Therefore shall
her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and
she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God
who judgeth her.” (Revelation 18:7, 8.)

THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY

From the time of Innocent III. Roman Catholic writers boast of the
missionary zeal of the mendicant orders. They are spoken of as most
assiduous in visiting prisons, hospitals, and places of imminent peril, in
caring for the spiritual wants of the poor; and that they were also the most
active servants of the church in the propagation of Christianity among
remote and savage nations. So far this appears to have been the case in the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; but as all history goes to prove, that
these mendicants were the most zealous agents of the Holy See in all its
ambitious schemes and worst practices throughout Christendom, it is
difficult to give them credit for pure christian zeal. From the methods they
pursued and the results of their missions, it is more than obvious that they
had chiefly in view their own advancement or the extension of the papal
sovereignty. Still, there may have been pious men amongst them, who
were animated by higher motives, and labored with disinterested devotion;
and as the vices of the mendicants in general are notorious, we should be
glad to record all the good of them we can.
From the time of the religious wars of Charlemagne to the exterminating
wars in Languedoc, the Roman missionaries usually preached the gospel
of peace at the head of an army headed by bishops, and laid the pathway
for its reception open by the sword; but in the thirteenth century, pious
missionary bands of Dominicans and Franciscans were sent by the Roman
pontiffs to the Chinese, the Tartars, and the adjacent countries. Large
numbers among these nations professed the christian faith. John of Monte
Corvino, a Franciscan, was distinguished by the success of his labors; and
in 1307 Clement V. erected an archiepiscopal see at Cambalu, that is,
Pekin, the modem capital of China. The same pontiff sent seven other
bishops, also Franciscans, into those regions; and this distant branch of the
hierarchy was carefully nourished by succeeding pontiffs. “So long as the
Tartar empire in China continued, not only the Latins, but the Nestorians
also had liberty to profess their religion freely all over northern Asia, and
 679
to propagate it far and wide. But that most potent emperor of the
Tartars, Timur-Bec, having embraced Mahometanism, persecuted with
violence and the sword all who adhered to the Christian religion. The
nation of the Tartars, in which such numbers once professed Christianity,
universally submitted to the Koran. Thus the christian religion was
overthrown in those parts of Asia inhabited by the Chinese, the Tartars,
the Moguls, and other nations, whose history is yet imperfectly known.
At least no mention has been found of any Latin Christians resident in
those countries, subsequent to the year 1370. But of the Nestortans living
in China, some traces can be found, though not very clear, as late as the
sixteenth century.”
Among the European princes, Jagello, duke of Lithuania, Poland, was
nearly the only one that still adhered to the idolatry of his ancestors. And
he, in the year 1386, embraced the christian rites, was baptized, and
persuaded his subjects to do the same thing. What remains there were of
the old religions in Prussia and Livonia, were extirpated by the Teutonic
knights and crusaders with war and massacres. In Spain the Saracens still
held the sovereignty of Granada, Andalucia, and Murcia; and against them
the christian kings of Castile, Arragon, and Navarre, waged perpetual war;
and, though with difficulty, triumphed, and became sole masters of Spain
in the fifteenth century under the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella.8

REFLECTIONS ON THE HISTORY OF POPERY

We have traced, however briefly, the origin, progress, and loftiest height of
the papal system. This was reached by the great abilities of Innocent III.
But how varied and full of all contrarieties and contradictions is that
marvellous and mysterious history! We pause for a moment to reflect on
the hypocrisies and tyrannies, the assumed piety and positive cruelty, of
that woman Jezebel. It was she who sent the choicest of her children in
early times to dwell in the lonely mountain cave or the secret cloister,
under the pretense of there peacefully contemplating the glory of God and
being transformned to His image. But again we hear her with altered voice
rallying the myriad hosts of Europe to go forth and rescue the Holy Land
from the foul grasp of the uncircumcised Philistines, and defend the banner
of the cross on the holy se!oulchre. Now she becomes callous to the
common feelings; of nature, insensible to the miseries of mankind, and
 680
stained with the blood of millions. For two hundred years she employed
all her power in promoting the destruction of human life by the ruinous
expeditions to the Holy Land. And as each successive Crusade proved
more hopeless and disastrous than the former, she redoubled her exertions
to renew and peiloetuate those scenes of unequalled folly, suffering, and
bloodshed.
But turn again and behold the double aspect of her character at the same
moment. When the Crusaders came in sight of Jerusalem they alighted
from their horses, and uncovered their feet, that they might approach the
sacred walls as true pilgrims. Loud shouts were raised, O Jerusalem!
Jerusalem! as if holy fear were moving their hearts. But when the governor
offered to admit them as peaceful pilgrims, they refused. No, they were
determined to open their way with their swords, and to wrest by military
ardor the holy city from the hands of the unbelievers. Hardly had they
scaled the wails when they rushed forth to the indiscriminate massacre of
Mahometans and Jews, and filled the holy places with blood. And then,
for a little while, the work of carnage and plunder was suspended, that the
pious pilgrims might perform their devotions; but the places on which
they came to kneel in adoration were covered with slaughtered heaps. This
is a true picture of the spirit and character of Jezebel as manifested in all
ages and countries. When Dominic himself grew ashamed of the
bloodstained missionaries of Innocent in Languedoc, having seen
thousands of the peaceful peasantry murdered in cold blood, he retired to a
church and prayed for the success of the good cause; and the victories of
Montfort and his ruffians were attributed to the prayers of the saintly-
minded Spaniard. This was a crusade, not against Turks and Infidels, but
against the saints of the Lord, because they dared to speak of certain
abuses in holy mother church. And, the more effectually to chastise her
children, she invented the Inquisition, that engine of domestic persecution,
torture, and death.
And, strange as it may seem now-a-days, and cruel beyond all compare,
wholesale destruction of human life and property was the very life-blood
of popery. She grew rich by appropriating the contributions that were
raised for the purposes of the Crusades; and she grew strong through
weakening the monarchs of Europe by exhausting their treasures and
depopulating their countries. Thus was the papal zeal inflamed to a
 681
burning passion for the Crusaders; and thus it passed from Urban II. and
the Council of Clermont down to his successors. Every thought of the
papal mind, every feeling of the papal heart, every mandate that issued
from the Vatican, had but one object in view — the enriching and
strengthening of the Roman See. No matter how subversive of all peace,
how baneful to all society, she pursued her own interests with a callous
uncompromising obduracy. Excommunications were used for the same
purposes of papal aggrandisement. “The heretic forfeited not only all
dignities, rights, privileges, immunities, even all property, all protection of
law; he was to be pursued, taken, despoiled, put to death, either by the
ordinary course of justice — the temporal authority was bound to execute,
even to blood, the sentence of the ecclesiastical court — or if he dared to
resist by any means whatever, however peaceful, he was an insurgent,
against whom the whole of Christendom might, or rather was bound, at the
summons of the spiritual power, to declare war; his estates, even his
dominions if a sovereign, were not merely liable to forfeiture, but the
church assumed the power of awarding the forfeiture, as it might seem best
to her wisdom.
“The army which should execute the mandate of the pope was the
army of the church, and the banner of that army was the cross of
Christ. So began crusades, not on the contested borders of
Christendom, not in Mahometan or heathen lands, in Palestine, on
the shores of the Nile, among the Livonian forests or the sands of
the Baltic, but in the very bosom of Christendom; not among the
implacable partisans of an antagonistic creed, but on the soil of
catholic France, among those who still called themselves by the
name of Christian.”9
Such was, and is, and ever must be, the spirit and character of the church
of Rome. How dark the picture! How sad the reflection, that she who calls
herself the true church of God, the holy mother of His children, and the
representative of Christ on earth, should have been transformed, by
Satanic agencies, into a monster of the most sickening hypocrisies, and
“abominable idolatries!” She became the foster-mother of the most open,
unbounded, saint, relic, picture, and image worship — of the theory of
transubstantiation, and the practice of the confessional. Outwardly her
unscrupulous ambition for secular glow, her intolerance in persecuting to
 682
extermination all who ventured to dispute her authority, her insatiable
thirst for human blood, have no parallel in the most barbarous ages of
heathenism.
And is this the church, thou mayest well exclaim in thy reflections — is
this the church that so many are joining in the present day? Yes, alas, alas;
and so many of the upper and intelligent classes! Such conversions, surely,
can only be the fruit of the blinding power of Satan, the god of this world.
(2 Corinthians 4:3, 4.) Many young ladies from the best families in
England have submitted, in blind devotion, to be shorn of their natural
covering, and imprisoned in a nunnery for life; and many of the
aristocracy, both lay and clerical, have joined the communion of the
Romish church. But she is not changed: the change is with those whose
light has become darkness, according to the word of the prophet:
“Give glory to the Lord your God, before He cause darkness, and
before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye
look for light, He turn it into the shadow of death, and make it
gross darkness.” (Jeremiah 13:16.)
As she was in the days of Gregory VII., Innocent III., Cardinal Pole, and
bloody Mary, so is she today as to her spirit, had she only the power.
But what must be the guilt of the English converts, with the New
Testament before them and seeing the contrast between the blessed Lord
and His apostles, and the pope and his clergy; between the grace and
mercy of the gospel, and the intolerance and cruelty of popery! Rather let
my reader remember the exhortation,
“Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins,
and that ye receive not of her plagues... for by her sorceries were all
nations deceived; And in her was found the blood of prophets, and
of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.” (Revelation 18.)
 683

CHAPTER 28
THE DECLINE OF PAPAL POWER

From the time of Innocent III. down to the age of the Reformation, the
Lord was preparing the way for that great event, by weakening the power
of the popes over human governments, and over the minds of men
generally. The decline was slow, at least for about a hundred years, for the
whole power of Satan was put forth to support the “mystery of iniquity;”
but it pleased God to weaken her power by raising up men of ability and
integrity to expose her many evils. These witnesses we propose to
examine in our next chapter. In the meantime we may add that the whole
mind of Europe had become so familiarised with the assertion of the papal
claims, that they were accepted as an essential part of Christianity. The
ruling idea of this great theocratic scheme was the absolute supremacy of
the spiritual over the temporal power, “as of the soul over the body, as of
eternity over time, as of Christ over Caesar, as of God over man — that all
earthly power is subordinate to the spiritual power in every respect, either
mediately or immediately touching on or affecting religion or its chief.”
This principle, first asserted in all its fullness by Hildebrand, acquired its
“firmest establishment and greatest expansion” in the able hands of
Innocent. He stood on the summit of pontifical power and glory. What
had been the day-dream of many of his predecessors was fully realized
during his pontificate; but from this pinnacle the crowned priest begins to
descend.
Details of the long and ruinous wars between the papacy and the empire
which immediately followed, especially between Gregory IX., Innocent
IV., and Frederick II., would be unsuited to our pages and unnecessary for
the purpose of our history. We will therefore content ourselves with a
rapid sketch of the leading pontiffs during this period of papal decline.
In the year 1216, Honorius III succeeded Innocent. The whole attention
of the new pontiff was devoted to the promotion of the holy war. The
Crusades had become so established an article in the papal creed, and so
 684
necessary to the maintenance of the papal power, that no cardinal who
was not in heart and soul a Crusader would have been raised to the chair of
St. Peter. This was the highest qualification of the chief priest of the
christian religion. Hence the first act of Honorius after his installation was
to send a circular letter to all Christendom, urging Christians in the most
exciting terms to contribute either in money or in person to the new
campaign. Frederick II., the Emperor-elect, in his youthful ardor had made
a solemn vow to Innocent to engage without loss of time in a new crusade;
not against the now crushed Albigenses, whose ashes were still
smouldering, but for the destruction of the Mahometans, and the liberation
of the holy sepulcher from infidel desecration. And no one in those times
who had taken the vow was allowed to excuse himself. If unable to
undertake the expedition in person, he must find substitutes or money.
Letters were instantly dispatched to Frederick, reminding him of his late
crusading vow, and pressing his immediate departure for the Holy Land.
But Frederick was yet a youth, his rival Otho was still alive, his realm in
the most unsettled state, so that he could not possibly leave for some
time. Neither menace nor persuasion could move Frederick, though in him
the papal hopes were chiefly centered.

THE CONQUEST AND LOSS OF DAMIETTA

The call was now fiercely sounded and the hymn of battle sung by the
emissaries of the pope throughout France, Germany, Italy, Spain,
Hungary, and the whole of the West: the kings, princes, and nobles, were
besieged and harassed to collect without delay, ships, men, money, arms,
and all needed supplies. But the pope found to his mortification that the
enthusiasm of former ages had passed away — that Honorius had no
longer the magic power of Urban. Neither papal legates nor preaching
friars could kindle in the hearts of the people a zeal for the holy war. Only
one king obeyed the summons, Andrew of Hungary. Princes and prelates,
dukes, archbishops and bishops, joined the Hungarian king. A large force
was collected. The first object of attack was Damietta, which, after a
siege of sixteen months, fell into the hands of the crusaders. But the
destruction of human life for this papal folly was fearful. “The inhabitants
had been so much reduced by famine, pestilence, and the sword, that out
of eighty thousand only three thousand are said to have remained alive; the
 685
air was tainted by the smell of corpses; yet even in the midst of these
horrors the captors could not restrain their cruelty and rapacity.”1
The report of this splendid victory was received by the pope with
exultation. His hopes of ultimate success were stimulated to the highest
pitch. But these hopes were soon to be disappointed. It was besieged the
following year by an overwhelming force of infidels under the active and
able leadership of Malek al Kamul, Sultan of Egypt and Syria. Damietta
was surrendered.
The deep mortification of the pope vented itself on the Emperor. The
failure of the expedition, the calamities of the Christians, were ascribed to
his wilful procrastination. It is supposed that thirty-five thousand
Christians, and about seventy thousand Mussulmans, had perished at
Damietta. But defeat and disaster only stimulated the zeal of the pontiff
for fresh crusades. During a reign of eleven years, Honorius had been
chiefly engaged in promoting crusades against the Albigenses in the south
of France and against the Saracens in Palestine. In 1227 he died, still
pressing the departure of Frederick, and, we are not sorry to add, still
pressing it in vain.

GREGORY IX. AND FREDERICK II.

Gregory IX., a near relation of Innocent III., and a staunch disciple of his
school, was immediately raised to the pontifical throne with loud and
unanimous acclamations. His coronation was of the most gorgeous
character. “He returned from St. Peter’s, wearing two crowns, mounted on
a horse richly caparisoned, and surrounded by cardinals, clothed in purple,
and a numerous clergy. The streets were spread with tapestry, inlaid with
gold and silver, the noblest productions of Egypt, and the most brilliant
colors of India, and perfumed with various aromatic odors.”2 He had
reached his eighty-first year when he ascended the throne of St. Peter. But
at that extreme age his mental faculties were unimpaired. He is spoken of
as having the ambition, the vigor, almost the activity, of youth; in purpose
and action, inflexible; in temper, warm and vehement.
Frederick, it will be remembered, was a ward of Innocent III. The
adventures, perils, and successes of the youthful king, as he struggled
upward to his hereditary throne in Sicily, and to the imperial crown of
 686
Germany, are almost unparalleled in history. During the pontificate of
Honorius his character was expanding into the prime of manhood; he was
thirty-three when that pontiff died. At this time he was in undisputed
possession of the empire, with all its rights in northern Italy, king of
Apulia, Sicily, and Jerusalem. Historians vie with each other in their
descriptions of his character, and the enumeration of his virtues and vices.
Milman, in his usual poetical style, describes him as at once the
magnificent sovereign, the gallant knight, the poet, the lawgiver, the patron
of arts, letters, and science, whose farseeing wisdom seemed to anticipate
some of those views of equal justice, of the advantages of commerce, of
the cultivation of the arts of peace, and the toleration of adverse religions,
which even in a more dutiful son of the church would doubtless have
seemed godless indifference. Others describe him as at once selfish and
generous, placable and cruel, courageous and faithless; and not forbidding
himself the most licentious indulgences. His personal accomplishments
were remarkable; he could speak fluently the languages of all the: nations
which were reckoned among his subjects Greek, Latin, Italian, German,
French, and Arabic.
Both the papacy and the empire were now represented by able and
resolute champions of their respective claims. Frederick would bear no
superior, Gregory no equal. The Emperor was determined to maintain his
monarchical rights; the pope was equally determined to maintain the papal
dignity as above the imperial. The mortal strife began; it was the last
contest between the empire and the papacy; but the Crusaders were
indispensable to papal victory.
The aged canonist addressed himself to his work. His first and immediate
act after his coronation was to urge the renewal of the Crusades at the
various courts of Europe. But his appeals were addressed to deaf ears.
Lombardy, France, England, and Germany, persisted in their hostility to
the Crusades and to their promoters. The fall of Damietta was fresh in
their minds. Nothing, therefore, remained to the obdurate old man but to
push on Frederick. Although, for political reasons, he was unwilling to
leave his dominions, yet, to please the pope, he collected a considerable
armament of men and ships, and embarked from Brindisi. But a pestilence
broke out, which carried off many of his soldiers; and among them the
Landgrave of Thuringia and two bishops. The Emperor himself, after being
 687
three days at sea, was over-taken by the malady, and returned to land for
the benefit of the baths. This caused the dispersion of the army, and the
temporary abandonment of the expedition.

FREDERICK DISREGARDS THE PAPAL EXCOMMUNICATION

The pope was infuriated; he treated the story of his illness as an empty
pretense, and, without waiting or asking for explanation, he launched the
sentence of excommunication against the perjured outcast, Frederick of
Swabia. This took place within six months from his elevation to the See,
and from that day Frederick found but little rest in this world, till he found
it in his grave. In vain did he send bishops to plead his cause, and
witnesses to the reality of his sickness: the pope’s only answer was, “You
fraudulently pretended sickness, and returned to your palaces to enjoy the
delights of leisure and luxury;” and he renewed the excommunication again
and again, requiring all bishops to publish it.
But in place of Frederick being humbled, and brought before Gregory IX.,
as Henry IV. was brought before Gregory VII. at Canosa, he boldly
denounces the whole system of popery. “Your predecessors,” he wrote to
Gregory, “have never ceased to encroach upon the rights of kings and
princes; they have disposed of their lands and territories, and distributed
them among the minions and favorites of their court; they have dared to
absolve subjects from their oaths of allegiance; they have even introduced
confusion into the administration of justice, by binding and loosing, and
persisting, without regard to the laws of the land. Religion was the pretext
for all those trespasses upon the civil government; but the real motive was
a desire to subjugate governors and subjects alike to an intolerable tyranny
— to extort money, and so long as that was to be got, to care little if the
whole structure of society were shaken to its foundations.” And many
other things of a like nature did Frederick dare to say, which shows the
weakened state of the papal power. At the same time he was a good
Catholic king in many respects, enacting severe laws against the heretics;
but he wanted the pope to keep his own place and rule the church, and
leave him to rule the empire. He was willing that the pope should be the
clerical, but he must be the lay, chief.3
 688
Frederick’s great crime, in the mind of the fanatical pontiff, was his
reluctance to go to the Holy Land. He had preferred the interests of his
empire to the orders of the Holy See. This prudential calculation was his
unpardonable sin. He did not see the sense of sacrificing men, money, and
ships, without a reasonable prospect of success. He was resolved,
however, to fulfill his vow and prove his sincerity as a soldier of the cross.
In the end of June, 1228, he again sailed from Brindisi. Much of the deadly
animosity against the Mahometans which had animated the older
Crusaders had passed away. Frederick was on friendly terms with the
sultan; so that, instead of seeking by fire and sword the extermination of
the followers of Mahomet, the Emperor proposed a peaceful treaty. This
was agreed to by the generous Kamul, and a treaty was concluded on the
18th of February, 1229, by which Jerusalem was to be made over to
the Christians, with the exception of the temple, which, although open
to them, was to remain under the care of the Moslem. Nazareth,
Bethlehem, Sidon, and other places, were to be given up. By this treaty
the Crusaders had gained more than they had for many years ventured to
expect as possible.4
But this bloodless victory, gained by an excommunicated monarch,
exasperated the hoary pontiff to frenzy. He denounced, in terms of furious
resentment, the unheard-of presumption of one under the ban of the
church daring to set his unhallowed foot on the sacred soil of the Savior’s
passion and resurrection; and bewailed the pollution which the city and
the holy places had contracted from the Emperor’s presence. But God
overruled this remarkable event, ill His providence, to lay bare to all
mankind the hollowness of Gregory’s professed enthusiasm for the
liberation of the Holy Land. His own papal and personal dignity were a
thousand times dearer to him than the birth-place of Christ. He resorted to
every device which his own inventive malice, and that of his advisers,
could suggest to accomplish the failure of the expedition and the ruin of
Frederick. His minorite friars were dispatched to the patriarch and the
military orders of Jerusalem, to throw every impediment in the way, with
the expressed intent that Frederick might find either a grave or a dungeon
in Palestine. A plot was laid by some Templars for surprising Frederick on
an expedition to bathe in the Jordan; but, the plot being discovered, the
Templars were disappointed. The revengeful old man, however, had not
 689
yet done plotting. He collected a considerable force, and, headed by John
of Brienne, invaded the Apulian dominions of the Emperor. Tidings of
these movements brought Frederick with all speed from the East. The
papal armies fled at his approach, and the whole country was rapidly
recovered by the influence of his presence.
But the papal sword was now drawn — the sword of implacable strife and
discord. During the course of a long reign, Frederick, the greatest of the
Swabtan house, “was excommunicated for not taking the cross,
excommunicated for not setting out to the Holy Land, excommunicated for
setting out, excommunicated in the Holy Land, excommunicated for
returning, after having made an advantageous peace with the
Mahometans,” was deposed from his throne, and his subjects absolved
from their oath of allegiance. But without attempting further to describe
the military advantures of the empire, or to trace the faithless politics of
the papacy, we will only add, that the wretched old pontiff died in his
ninety-ninth year, in the midst of hostilities, and from a fit of wrathful
agitation. He was succeeded by Innocent IV., who followed in the
footsteps of Innocent III. and Gregory IX. The cause of Frederick gained
nothing by the change of pontiffs. He lived till the year 1250, when, in the
fifty-sixth year of his age and the twenty-seventh of his reign, he died in
the arms of his son, Manfred, having confessed, and received absolution
from the faithful archbishop of Palermo.
With the death of Frederick we might suppose that papal hostilities would
have at least paused for a little; but it was far otherwise. The hatred that
followed him to his grave, and far beyond it, pursued his sons, until it was
extinguished in the blood of the last scion of his house, on the scaffold, at
Naples. The war was carried on between what was called the Guelphic and
the Ghibelline armies, or the papal and the imperial factions. Pope
Clement IV. invited the cruel Count Charles of Anjou, the brother of Louis
IX., to hasten to the help of the Guelphic army, with the promise of the
crown of Sicily. “He accepted,” says Greenwood, “the papal commission
with the eagerness of an adventurer, and in the reckless spirit of a crusader.
He was one of the most accomplished of the tyrants that figure in the
world’s history: cruelty, rapacity, lust, and corruption, wrought their
perfect work under his command.” With a large army, which had been
raised for the rescue of the Holy Land, he entered Italy. Some of the
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bravest of the chivalry and gentry of France were in this “army of the
cross.” But in place of going to assist their brethren in Palestine against the
Mahometans, the pope absolved them from their vow, promised them the
forgiveness of sins and eternal blessedness, to turn their arms against their
brethren of the house and followers of the late Emperor. This was papal
zeal and honesty for the deliverance of the holy sepulcher.
Charles of Anjou being crowned king of Sicily, the pilgrims received a
license to slay and plunder in the quarters pointed out by the pope; and
under his direction they invaded the fairest portions of the Emperor’s
dominions. But he was in his grave, and the magic of his name was gone.
His sons hastened to collect such adventurers as their finances enabled
them to assemble; the contest for a time was doubtful, but the well-
disciplined chivalry of France at length overcame the ill-trained bands of
the young princes. Manfred fell in battle, Conrad was cut off suddenly by
death, and the younger Conradin, with his youthful cousin, prince
Frederick of Bavaria, were taken prisoners, and beheaded by Charles in the
public square at Naples.
Christendom heard with a shudder the news of this unparalleled atrocity.
For no other crime than fighting for his hereditary throne against the
pope’s pretender, Conradin, the last heir of the Swabtan house, was
executed as a felon and a rebel on a public scaffold. The pope was charged
with participation in the murder of a son and heir of kings; he had put the
sword into the tyrant’s hands, and must stand before the tribunal of divine
and human judgment, as stained with the blood of Conradin. In the end of
the following month the detested pope followed his victim to the grave,
beyond which it is not our province to go; but sure we are that the Judge
of all the earth will do right, and that from the throne of divine
righteousness he will hear the sentence of eternal justice, which admits of
no succeeding change for ever. The fire is everlasting, the worm never dies,
the chain can never be broken, the walls can never be scaled, the gates can
never be opened, the past can never be forgotten, the upbraidings of
conscience can never be silenced — everything combines to fill the soul
with the agonies of despair, and that for ever and ever. Who would not
desire, above all things, to be pardoned and saved through faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ, who died to save the chief of sinners? (Mark 9:44-50.)
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THE OVERRULING HAND OF GOD
In the providence of God this odious crime, which could never be
forgotten by the monarchs and people of Europe, must have tended
greatly to discredit and weaken the papal power, and to strengthen the
hands of the civil ruler against the usurpations and encroachments of the
church of Rome. The change becomes more apparent from this date. The
tragical death of Conradin of Hohenstaufen, and of Frederick of Bavaria,
took place in 1268, and the famous “Pragmatic Sanction” became the
“Magna Charta” of the Gallican church in 1269. This document was issued
by the most pious king, Louis IX. of France, who is commonly called St.
Louis. The whole tone of this edict is antipapal. It limits the interference
of the court of Rome in the elections of the clergy, and directly denies its
right of ecclesiastical taxation, except with the sanction of the king and the
church of France. Nothing could be more just and liberal, but nothing could
more directly oppose the pretensions of the See of Rome. Under the
fostering care of the civil lawyers, who were now establishing in the minds
of men a rival authority to that of the hierarchy and canon law, the
Pragmatic Sanction became a great charter of independence to the Gallican
church.
This anti-papal edict, coming from the most religious of kings — a
canonized saint — awoke no opposition on the part of the Roman See.
Had such a law been promulgated by Frederick II., or any of his race, the
effect would have been very different. But it is more than probable that
neither Louis nor the pope foresaw what would be made of this pious
decree — originally intended for the benefit and reformation of the clergy.
But in the hands of Parliaments, lawyers, and ambitious monarchs, it
became the barrier against which the encroachments and lofty pretensions
of Rome were destined to be broken to pieces.
Before concluding our already rather long chapter, we must briefly glance
at the pontificate of Boniface VIII., as it is the crowning evidence of the
papal decline, and the hinge on which its future history turns.

BONIFACE VIII. AND PHILIP THE FAIR A.D. 1295 TO 1303

In less than forty years from the promulgation of this famous edict, since
known in history as the “Pragmatic Sanction,” the proud and imperious
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pontiff, Boniface VIII., was openly defied by the king of France. He was
the first to teach the nations of Europe that the Roman bishops could be
vanquished, and be trampled under the feet of the sovereign, as they had
trampled for ages the sovereigns of Europe under their feet. Philip the Fair
— so called from his personal appearance, certainly not from his actions
— was as high-minded, as strong-handed, as arrogant, as jealous, as
violent, as unrelenting as Boniface, and even surpassed him in craft and
subtlety. The pride of Boniface was his ruin; it acknowledged no limits,
and disdained to bend to circumstances, and no considerations of religion,
policy, or humanity could repress his violence and cruelty. But the high
looks and the haughty pride of the prelate were soon to be brought low.
He was deeply involved in many quarrels with many nations, sovereigns,
and noble families; but the crafty and powerful king of France proved
more than his match. When Boniface sent an extravagant demand to Philip,
he sent back a contemptuous reply. And when bull after bull, in burning
wrath, issued from the Vatican against the king, he caused them to be
publicly burned at Paris, and sent back a message to his holiness that it
was the office of a pope to exhort, not to command, and that he would
suffer no dictator in his affairs.
But matters could not stop here; Philip determined on humbling his
adversary. In strengthening his position against the proceedings of Rome,
he had recourse to the most constitutional means. While Boniface was
offending the population of France by his intemperate attacks on the king,
the politic king was attracting the admiration of his people by standing up
for the dignity of his crown and the welfare of the nation against the
encroachments of the pope. He assembled the nobles and prelates of
France, and with them summoned the representatives of the third estate,
the burgesses of France — said to be the first convocation of the States
General. This plan was soon followed by other kings, which deeply
affected the future history of the papacy. The king had the satisfaction of
obtaining a strong protest against the papal demands, and the assertion of
the independence of the crown.
Boniface, not perceiving this crisis in his own history and in that of the
papacy, blindly pursued with an ill-timed arrogance his former course.
Addressing Philip in a letter he says, “God has set me over the nations and
the kingdoms, to root out and to pull down, to destroy, to build, to plant
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in His name and by His doctrine. Let no one persuade you, my son, that
you have no superior, or that you are not subject to the chief of the
ecclesiastical hierarchy. He who holds that opinion is senseless, and he
who obstinately maintains it is an infidel, separate from the flock of the
good shepherd. Wherefore we declare, define, and pronounce, that it is
absolutely essential to the salvation of every human being, that he be
subject to the Roman pontiff.” The king’s answer was moderate, but firm
and defiant. Perplexities increased. Not content with these assertions, the
pope laid an interdict upon France, excommunicated the king, and offered
his crown to another. But Philip, in no wise troubled with these censures,
which were now powerless, published an ordinance which prohibited the
exportation of all gold, silver, jewels, arms, horses, or other munitions of
war from the realm. By this ordinance the pope himself was deprived of
his revenues from France.

THE HUMILIATION OF THE PONTIFF

Burning with rage, Boniface repeated and redoubled his menaces. But
Philip now determined on a shorter path to settle the contest. He
dispatched a trustworthy officer, Nogaret, with Sciarra Colonna, a
member of a noble Italian house which Boniface had ruined and desolated;
and who was, of course, the sworn enemy of the pope. These, with other
adventurers, and three hundred armed horsemen, had strict orders to arrest
the pope wherever he might be found, and bring him a prisoner to Paris.
The perplexed old man — now in his eighty-sixth year — had retired to
his palace at Anagni, his native place, to compose another bull, in which he
maintained, “that as vicar of Christ, he had the power to govern kings with
a rod of iron, and to dash them to pieces like a potter’s vessel.” But his
blasphemous assumption of omnipotence was soon turned into a spectacle
of human weakness and death.
A shout was heard; the pope, and the cardinals, who were all assembled
around him, were startled with the trampling of armed horse, and the
terrible cry, “Death to pope Boniface! Long live the, king of France!” The
soldiers were immediately masters of the pontifical palace. Nearly all the
cardinals, and even the personal attendants of the pope fled. He was left
alone, but he lost not his self-command. Like the English Thomas a
Becket, he awaited the final blow with courage and resolution. He
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hurriedly threw the mantle of St. Peter over his shoulders, placed the
crown of Constantine on his head, grasped the keys in one hand and the
cross in the other, and seated himself on the papal throne. His age,
intrepidity, and religious majesty, struck the conspirators with awe. When
Nogaret and Colonna saw the venerable form and dignified composure of
their enemy, they refrained from their sanguinary purpose, and satisfied
themselves with heaping vulgar abuse on the wretched old pontiff. The
wrongs inflicted on the families and friends of these officers by the cruel
pope had extinguished every feeling towards him but revenge. But in the
providence of God they were restrained from shedding the blood of a
helpless old man in his eighty-sixth year.
While the leaders were thus employed, the body of the conspirators had
dispersed themselves throughout the splendid apartments in eager pursuit
of plunder. “The palaces of the pope,” says Milman, “and of his nephew
were plundered; so vast was the wealth, that the annual revenues of all the
kings in the world would not have been equal to the treasures found and
carried off by Sciarra’s freebooting soldiers. His very private chamber was
ransacked; nothing was left but bare walls.”
At length the people of Anagni were aroused to insurrection. They
assaulted the soldiers by whom they had been overawed. But as they were
now in possession of the plunder, and the pope imprisoned, they were not
unwilling to withdraw. The pope was restored to his freedom; infuriated
by the disgrace of his captivity, he hurried to Rome burning with revenge.
But the violence of his passion overpowered his reason; he refused
nourishment; he cried for revenge; but he was now impotent as other men.
He removed all his attendants, shut himself up in a room lest any one
might see him die — but he died; and he died alone; and will stand before
the judgment-seat of God alone; and have to answer alone for the deeds
done in the body, and under a responsibility entirely his own. We cross
not the line; but what, oh what! must the eternal portion be of one, of
whom impartial history says, “of all the Roman pontiffs, Boniface has left
the darkest name for craft, arrogance, ambition, even for avarice and
cruelty.”5
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REFLECTIONS ON THE DEATH OF BONIFACE
Five hundred and seventy-two years have rolled heavily and drearily over
the dark regions of hell since Boniface died by his own suicidal course.
What time for reflection, reproach, remorse, despair! Why, oh why, will
men, intelligent men, risk an eternity of misery for a few short years of
earthly glory, or sensual gratification, or the love of self in any way? But
alas, the most solemn warnings are disregarded; the most gracious
invitations of mercy are rejected, in the eager chase after their own selfish
object. And when they have reached it, what is it? How much do they
enjoy it? How long do they possess it? Only nine years did Boniface reign
as supreme pontiff; and in order to secure that shadowy gleam of glory, he
accomplished privately the murder of his predecessor Celestine, whom he
had supplanted. But as a man sows, so must he also reap. Celestine has
the compassions and sympathies of posterity; but over the tomb of
Boniface all posterity has written, “He mounted the chair like a fox, he
reigned like a lion, he died like a dog.” And so it was, without the
consolations of the mercy of God and without the tender ministries of
man, he died. When his bedroom door was burst open, he was found cold
and stiff. His white locks were stained with blood, the top of his staff bore
the marks of his teeth, and was covered with foam.
How happy they, we are ready to exclaim, who have an inheritance
incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for
all whose faith and hope are firmly fixed on Christ alone. They are the
children of God by faith in Christ Jesus; they belong to the royal family of
heaven; they need not seek after earthly glory; they are heirs of God and
joint-heirs with Christ. They have a throne that can never be shaken, a
crown that can never be cast to the ground, a scepter that can never be
plucked from their hands, an inheritance that can never be alienated. Still
they can afford to linger over the melancholy end of a fellow-sinner with
profound pity, and seek to turn that scene of darkest and deepest sorrow
into an occasion of spiritual profit for others. One look of faith to the
Savior would have been life to his soul, chief of sinners though he was, and
the first look of faith is eternal life to the chief of sinners today.
“Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am
God, and there is none else.” (Isaiah 45:22.)
 696
But we must now return to our history.

THE POPES OF AVIGNON

We have been at some pains to present to our readers, as fully as our
space would admit, the quarrel between Boniface and Philip, as it is one of
the great epochs in the papal history. From this moment it sank rapidly
and never rose again to the same commanding height. But the degradation
of the papal chair was not yet complete according to the hard and
unrelenting spirit of Philip. His next object was to have the pope under his
own eye, and as his abject slave. This he accomplished in Clement V., who
was raised to the chair in the year 1305. His election led to the most
debasing period in the histow of the Romish church. Clement, who was a
native of France, and the king’s obedient servant, immediately transferred
the papal residence from Rome to Avignon. The pope was now a French
prelate, Rome was no longer the metropolis of Christendom. This period
of banishment lasted about seventy years, and is spoken of in history as
the Babylonian captivity of the popes in Avignon. The great line of
mediaeval pontiffs, the Gregorys, the Alexanders, and the Innocents,
expired with Boniface VIII. After seventy years of exile they emerged
from their state of slavery to the kings of France, but only to resume a
modified supremacy.
Philip survived his adversary eleven years; he died A .D . 1314. History
speaks of him as one of the most unprincipled, evil-hearted kings that ever
reigned. But nothing so blackens his memory as his cruel assault on the
order of the Templars. His avarice was excited by their wealth, and he
rusolved on the dissolution of the order, the destruction of the leaders, and
the appropriation of their wealth. He knew that thousands of the best
manors in France belonged to the institution, and that the spoils of such a
company would make him the richest king in Christendom. In order to lay
his hand on such treasures, he first sought to discredit the knights because
of their defeat at Courtrat — the battle of the Spurs; then he exacted the
consent of his creature, Pope Clement V., and summoned a council of the
realm to sanction the suppression of the order. Having now these
authorities to support him — the sacred and the civil — his covetous and
cruel ends were gained. Numbers of these gallant Christian knights — for
such they were, though they had greatly degenerated from their original
 697
vows — were seized and thrown into prison, on a charge of having
dishonored the cross, and trampled on the sign of salvation. The severest
tortures were applied to crush out confessions of guilt, numbers were
condemned and burned alive, sixty-eight were burned alive at Paris in
1310. The grand master, James de Molay, was also burned at Paris in
1314. Letters were sent to all other kings and princes, under the sanction
of the pope and Philip, to pursue the same course; but the European
sovereigns in general were satisfied with the spoils, and adopted gentler
methods in dissolving the order.
The reader may here note for further examination what we may call a new
division in the history of Europe. The papacy, feudalism, and knighthood,
which had risen and flourished together since about the time of
Charlemagne, fell together during the reign of Philip the Fair.
But a heavy cloud was gathering over the house of the cruellest and worst
of kings. The darkest shades of immorality covered with shame and
disgrace his whole family. The deep dishonor of the royal house of
France through the infidelity of his queen and his three daughters-in-law
sank into his heart, and hastened his end. The people now said, it is the
vengeance of heaven for the outrage on Boniface; others said, it is for the
iniquitous persecution and extinction of the Templars. But he was now
before a tribunal without the shelter of a pope, or the sanction of a
national assembly, and must answer to God for every deed done in the
body, and for every word uttered by his lips; for even the thoughts and
counsels of the heart must be brought into judgment. And neither the
people nor the ermine can shelter a sinner there; nothing but the blood of
Christ, sprinkled as it were on the door-posts of the heart before we leave
this world, can be of any avail in the waters of death. Those who neglect
to apply the blood of Christ by faith now, must be engulfed for ever in the
cold, deep, dark waters of eternal judgment. But the blood of Jesus Christ,
God’s Son, cleanses us who believe from all sin.
We now leave this fresh division of our history, and take up the line of
witnesses, and the forerunners of the Reformation.
 698

CHAPTER 29
THE FORERUNNERS OF THE REFORMATION

In a former chapter we brought down the line of witnesses for the truth of
God and the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ to the great Albigensian war,
during which so many of them were slain. We have also brought down the
history of the papacy to its humiliation and fall in Boniface VIII. and to its
banishment from the throne of St. Peter with all its traditionary majesty
and glory in Clement V. We will now return to the chain of witnesses
which we believe has been maintained unbroken since the earliest times;
though the silver line of God’s grace has often been so overlaid and
obscured that it became difficult to trace its path. Still, it was ever bright
to the eye of God, and the mirror on which His own grace and glory were
reflected.

THE FIRST GREAT SCHOOLS OF LEARNING

The rise of public schools or academies in the twelfth century, and the
increase of intellectual activity, no doubt contributed greatly to the
weakening of the papacy and the feudal aristocracy. This led the way to
the rise and the establishment of the third estate in the realm — the middle
classes — and to commercial enterprise. The enlightenment and the
liberties of Europe from this period steadily advanced. Schools were
erected almost everywhere; the thirst for knowledge increased. “The kings
and princes of Europe seeing what advantages a nation may derive from
the cultivation of literature and the useful arts, invited learned men to their
territories, encouraged a taste for information, and rewarded them with
honors and emoluments.” But with such an increase of mental activity,
many wild and dangerous doctrines and opinions were taught. Scholastic
theology, Aristotelian philosophy, sacred and civil law, had their place and
reputation by turns. It was about this time — the middle of the twelfth
century — that the great universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and Paris
were founded; with many others on the continent. Greek and Hebrew were
studied, and lectures given in the way of expositions and commentaries on
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the holy scriptures, which the Lord could use in blessing to the students,
and through them to others.
“To impose some restraint,” says Dean Waddington, “on this great
intellectual licentiousness — to revive some respect for ancient authorities
— to erect some barrier, or at least some landmark, for the guidance of his
contemporaries, Peter the Lombard published his celebrated “Book of
the Sentences.” Having studied for some time in the famous school at
Bologna, he proceeded to Paris for the purpose of prosecuting his studies
in divinity. The Book of the Sentences is a collection of passages from the
Fathers, especially from St. Hilary, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, and St.
Augustine — a sad mixture, no doubt, of truth and error; but the Lord is
above all and could use His own word, though intermixed with fashionable
subtleties, for the conversion and blessing of souls. It long retained an
undisputed supremacy in the theological schools, and its author was raised
to great honors.

THE REAL WORTHIES OF ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY

The true pioneers of the Reformation, and the real worthies of
ecclesiastical history, are difficult to discover. In humility of mind, and not
seeking the praise of men, they walked before the Lord, quietly doing His
will. Their ministrations of sympathy, their deeds of charity, their desire
to lead souls to the Savior, their endeavors to spread the knowledge of His
word, are features of character but little observed by the eye of the
historian. And the deeper their piety, the greater their obscurity. But they
have their reward; their record is on high. Multitudes of God’s saints
during the long dark night of the middle ages thus fulfilled their mission,
and passed off the scene without leaving a trace of their usefulness in the
annals of time. Not so the pompous prelate, the wonder-working saint, the
intriguing rapacious cardinal, the noisy polemics, and the whole host of
proud ambitious enthusiasts; the pages of the annalist are principally
consecrated to such.1
After a careful examination of the prominent characters which appear on
the page of history from the twelfth century to the Reformation, they
seem to fall into three distinct classes:
1, Literary men;
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2, Theologians;
3, Reformers, or protestants.
By noticing these in order we shall have the forerunners of the
Reformation fairly before us.

LITERARY MEN
The chief of this class were such men as Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, and
our English Chaucer. Soon after the founding of colleges, and the great
uprising of the human mind, these four “stars of literature” arose almost
simultaneously. It pleased God, in His infinite wisdom, to use the writings
of these men, and many others, for the exposure of the evils of the Romish
system, and for the weakening of its power. And while many of lesser
note, and for smaller crimes, suffered bonds, imprisonment, and death,
these writers were allowed, not only to escape the vengeance of the
church, but to pursue their own course. Their attractive literary
productions gave them such favor generally, that the priests were afraid to
molest them. Thus, in the providence of God, the hitherto half-concealed
corruption of morals which prevailed among the clergy, monks, and every
order of the system, was brought out into broad daylight; under the veil of
popular poems, pleasant tales, and satires, the corrupt state of the whole
ecclesiastical system was exposed. The unbridled passions and the
unblushing immoraltries of the court of Avignon, and the vices of the
clergy generally, became the chief subject of song and jest in almost every
country in Europe. But neither the poetry nor the prose of such writers is
fit to be repeated in the pages of our “Short Papers.”
Dante, who is considered the father of Italian poetry, and celebrated
chiefly for his imaginative description of purgatory, hell, and heaven, died
A .D . 1321. Petrarch, who was some years younger, had even a greater
reputation for prose; less is said of Boccaccio, his writings being of a
grosser character. Chaucer is well known in this country as the author of
“Canterbury Tales.” He was born in 1328, and died in 1400. But enough
of this class, we now turn to—
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THE THEOLOGIANS
Robert Grostete, or Greathead, an English prelate of the twelfth century,
will illustrate what we mean by a theologian, and protester, though not,
strictly speaking, a reformer. Like many others in all ages, his views of
reformation extended only to the discipline and administration of the
church, not to the uprooting and the pulling down of the incurably false
thing els in the sixteenth century. He strongly held a high view of the
papacy, though he might speak of individual popes as antichrist, because
of their immorality or rebellion against Christ. But the anti-christian
character of the papacy was not yet known, and the grand fundamental
truths of Christianity but indistinctly apprehended. Grostete was born at
Stradbroke, in Suffolk, about the year 1175. After having studied at
Oxford, he went to Paris, which was then the fashion, as the Paris
University was the most renowned in Europe. There he studied both
Greek and Hebrew, and completely mastered the French language.
According to the ideas of the age, he was considered a consummate
theologian and philosopher.
In the year 1235, when he was sixty years of age, he became bishop of
Lincoln, and labored with an almost intolerant zeal and earnestness for the
reformation of his diocese, which was one of the largest in England. He is
said to have been much occupied in the study of the holy scriptures in
their original languages, and owned their sovereign authority. This was a
great advance on the past, and in the right direction; still, there were glaring
inconsistencies as we now contemplate them. He was at first greatly
captivated with the new orders — the Dominicans and Franciscans —
because of their apparent sanctity; but he lived to discover their
hypocrisy, and to denounce them as the deceivers of mankind. True
reform denounced the existence, not merely the abuses, of the orders to be
entirely opposed to the word of God. At the same time he was a bold,
pious, and energetic man. He lifted up his voice against the blasphemous
assumption of Innocent III., when he proclaimed himself to be the vicar,
not merely of St. Peter, but of God. “To follow a pope,” he said, “who
rebels against the will of Christ, is to separate from Christ and His body;
and if ever the time should come when all men follow an erring pontiff,
then will be the great apostasy.” The rapacity of the Roman court, the
abuse of indulgences, the bestowal of patronage on unfit and undeserving
 702
persons, were amongst the evils against which he contended. A bishop so
active, so zealous, and so fearless, was sure to create many enemies. He
was accused of magic by his contemporaries, and of daring presumption
by the pope. He barely escaped martyrdom. Through the Lord’s tender
mercy and care of His servant, he died in peace, in the year 1253.2
Roger Bacon, a man of superior genius and penetration, who had a clear
perception of the state of things, both in the schools and in the church,
deserves a brief notice, though there is not much evidence of his genuine
piety and love of evangelical truth. He is said to have been the greatest of
English philosophers before the time of his celebrated namesake. About
the year 1214, he was born near Ilchester, in Somersetshire.
After studying at Oxford and Paris, he became a Franciscan friar at the age
of thirty-four. His knowledge of physical science — astronomy, optics,
mechanics, chemistry — as well as of Greek and oriental learning, exposed
him to the popular but dangerous reputation of a magician. His researches
placed him immensely in advance of his monastic superiors, who found a
convenient refuge for their ignorance in charging the friar with dealings in
magic. He was greatly persecuted, and was many years confined in a
loathsome dungeon.
Though he speaks with great respect of the holy scriptures, he strangely
contends for an alliance between philosophy and Christianity, reason and
faith. He denounces the sophistry of the fashionable learning of his time,
and complains that the original languages of the Old and New Testament
were neglected; that children got the knowledge of scripture, not from the
Bible itself, but from versified abridgements; that lectures on the
“Sentences” were preferred to lectures on scripture. In this way he
exposed the ignorance, the superstition, and the idleness of the religious
orders, and so brought down upon himself the charge of heresy and the
censures of the church, though he lived and died a strict Roman Catholic,
probably about the year 1292. His last work was a compendium of
theology.
Thomas Aquinas, the “angelic doctor,” was the most renowned of the
schoolmen in the thirteenth century, and the truest type of a theologian.
He was descended from an illustrious family, and born in the neighborhood
of Naples about the year 1225. He entered very young into the Dominican
 703
order, greatly against the will of his nearest relations, and studied at
Cologne and Paris. In 1257 he was professor of theology in Paris; but died
at the early age of fifty, and was canonized by the pope. When his
collected writings were published at Rome, in the year 1570, they
extended to seventeen folio volumes.
The ecclesiastical doctors of our own day tell us — for we are wholly
unacquainted with the writings of such authors — that among the best
known of his works are, the “Sum of Theology,” a commentary on the
four Gospels, and on other books of the Old and New Testament; an
elaborate commentary on the “Sentences” of Peter Lombard, the great
textbook of the schools; his expositions of Aristotle; and a treatise ill favor
of the Catholic faith, and against the Greek church. But notwithstanding
the greatness of his learning and the number of his books, it is to be feared
that he was a stranger to the saving doctrine of justification by faith alone,
without the deeds of the law; though, when on his death-bed, he showed
great signs of piety, similar to that of Augustine. So that we may hope he
belonged to the saved remnant of the schoolmen in those days. We rejoice
in the conviction that there will be a saved remnant in heaven from all
classes — emperors, kings, popes, and philosophers, which will manifest
the sovereignty and the power of the grace of God in all ages, and to all
classes of men. The riches and the glory of the grace will be to His praise
for ever.
Bonaventura, a native of Tuscany, entered into the order of the
Franciscans in the year 1243 at the age of twenty-one. He completed his
studies at Paris, and with such success, as to acquire the title of the
“seraphic doctor.” He died in 1274, as cardinal-bishop of Albano. His
works were less voluminous than his contemporary, Thomas Aquinas, and
less intellectual, but more devotional. “His works,” it is said, “surpass in
usefulness all those of his age, in regard to the spirit of the love of God and
christian devotion which speaks in him; that he is profound without being
prolix, subtle without being curious, eloquent without vanity, ardent
without inflation; his devotion is instructive, and his doctrine inspires
devotion.” On being asked, when dying, from what books he had derived
his learning, he answered by pointing to the crucifix, and he was in the
habit of referring to the scriptures rather than to St. Francis, the founder of
his order. But we must wait a little longer before we find the all-important
 704
doctrine of justification through simple faith in the Lord Jesus Christ
taught by the learned. Bonaventura as a theologian represents the mystics.
He might have been the author of the “Imitation of Christ,” said to be
written about this time by Thomas a Kempis. But never was book so
misnamed. It begins with self, and ends with self. The internal emotions of
the soul absorb the mystic. It is monastic Christianity. The love of Christ
is purely unselfish: He laid down His life to save His enemies. “While we
were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” And faith can say, “He loved me,
and gave Himself for me.” (Romans 5; Galatians 2.)
Duns Scotus was a doctor of great celebrity; but his birthplace and early
life are enveloped in obscurity. Dean Waddington says, without question,
“This doctor died in the year 1308. He was a native of Dunse, in Scotland,
and a Franciscan.” He was a dialectictan and styled the “subtle doctor.” He
boldly ventured to impugn some of the positions of the great St. Thomas,
which gave rise to a controversy between the Dominicans and the
Franciscans that lasted hundreds of years, engaged the attention of popes
and councils, as it even still divides the schools of the Latins. The
principal points of theological difference between these great doctors were,
“the nature of divine co-operation, and the measure of divine grace
necessary to a man’s salvation,” with what is called the immaculate
conception of the Virgin Mary. The Dominicans maintained that the holy
virgin was not exempt from the taint of original sin; the Franciscans
supported the immaculate conception.3
William of Ockham, so called from his native place in the county of
Surrey, had studied at Paris, under Duns Scotus, and became a famous
doctor of the Franciscans. According to the custom of the schools, he was
distinguished by high sounding titles, such as the “singular and invincible
doctor.” But he was more of a metaphysician than a theologian. He boldly
attacked the papal pretensions on many points, but especially as to
temporal dominion and “the plenitude of power.” He denied the
infallibility of the pope and the general councils; and maintained that the
Emperor was not dependent on the pope, but that the Emperor has the
right of choosing him. These anti-papal opinions soon spread in all
directions, and made their way to all classes through the agency of the
mendicant friars. When threatened with the highest censures of the church,
he found a shelter at the court of St. Louis, who greatly favored the
 705
Franciscans. “Defend me with your sword,” said William to the king, “and
I will defend you with the word of God.” He died under the sentence of
excommunication at Munich, in 1347.4

REFLECTIONS ON THE SCHOOLMEN

Enough — yes, we say enough — of the scholastic doctors and the
philosophical divines for our present purpose. To wade through a number,
and select a few as genuine specimens, is dry and wearisome work. But
they form a certain link in the chain of events between the twelfth and
sixteenth centuries which has its importance; and the reader will see what
is meant by the general term of “the schoolmen” at that period of our
history. One salutary lesson we may at least learn from the examples
before us, and that is, the utter darkness and perplexity of the mind,
however great the learning and study, when the word of God, in its divine
simplicity, is not known and believed. One single text, “The just shall live
by faith,” when used of God in the hands of Luther, was sufficient to clear
away the darkness of the middle ages, while the seventeen volumes folio of
Thomas Aquinas, and all the other folios of all the great schoolmen, only
deepened the gloom of ignorance and perplexity as to the knowledge of
God and the way of salvation. The greatest development of the natural
powers of the human mind leads no guilty sinner to the cross of Christ —
to the precious blood which alone cleanseth from all sin. The enemy of
souls, taking advantage of the growing celebrity of the Aristotelian
philosophy, seduced the best of the doctors to believe that the most
important work they could be engaged in, was the reconciling of the
teaching of Christ with the decrees of the Greek philosopher, lest the
scholars should think more highly of the latter than the former. Such was
the miserable work of the best of the schoolmen at that time; but no doubt
many of simpler minds, who were not blinded by the subtleties of logic,
found the way of truth and salvation amidst the darkness, though much
perplexed and bewildered.
The church of Christ was scarcely visible in Europe about this time, with
the exception of the churches of the valleys; there the true light continued
to burn, and thousands found “the more excellent way,” notwithstanding
the union of the powers of earth, both secular and ecclesiastical, to
extinguish it. But there was the true building of God, and the gates of hell
 706
could never prevail against the works of His hands. We now turn to renew
our acquaintance with the Waldenses and other Protestants of that time.

THE WALDENSES
Our history naturally reverts to the fatal crusade against the Albigenses in
the thirteenth century. That once beautiful region, in some respects the
richest and most civilized province in the spiritual empire of St. Peter, we
have seen depopulated and desolated. The peaceful inhabitants had
presumed to question the dogmas of the Vatican and the authority of the
priesthood, which was sin unpardonable against the majesty of Rome. The
edicts of Innocent, the sword of De Montfort, the fires of Arnold, the
treachery of Fouquet, and the Inquisition of Dominic, did their terrible
work. But the combined powers of Europe, with fire and sword and
suffocating dungeons, failed to touch the root of that which Innocent called
heresy. The divine, vital principle of Christianity was far, far beyond his
reach. The sword may hew down the branches, and the fire may consume
them; but the living root is in the truth and grace of God, which can never
fail. The spirit of Christianity is stronger than the sword of the persecutor,
and the arm on which faith leans is more powerful than the combined
forces of earth and hell. The weakness of the papacy was manifested in its
apparent triumphs in Languedoc. The heretics, as Jezebel thought, had
been drowned in blood; but a bleeding remnant was spared, in the good
providence of our God, to bear testimony in every part of Europe to the
injustice, the cruelties, and the spiritual despotism of papal Rome.
The exiles from the south of France who had escaped the sword went
forth to the utmost limits of Christendom preaching the doctrines of the
cross, and testifying with holy indignation against the falsehoods and
corruptions of the dominant church. In different parts of France, in
Germany, Hungary, and the neighboring regions, the sectaries appeared in
great numbers. And the popes found many of the kings little inclined to
exert themselves for the suppression of the Cathari, as they were called,
or the various religious sects. It is also more than probable that many of
the persecuted about this time sought a place of rest in the quiet valleys of
Piedmont. The more secluded of these regions appear to have been a
secure asylum for the witnesses of God until the fourteenth century.
Though known to Claudius, bishop of Turin, in the ninth century, they
 707
seem to have escaped notoriety and conflict till about the thirteenth, if not
later. But as the darkness of popery thickened around them, the brightness
of their example became more seen and felt. Calumnies were invented, and
the godly Waldenses were singled out as reprobate schismatics. They were
spread over the valleys on both sides of the Cottian Alps — Dauphiny on
the French side, and Piedmont on the Italian side, of the mountains.
From time immemorial these Alpine regions had been inhabited by a race
of Christians who continued the same from age to age; who never
acknowledged the jurisdiction of the Roman pontiff, and who had been
through all periods of ecclesiastical history, a pure branch of the apostolic
church. But their peaceful retreats, their happy homes, their simple
worship, and their industrial habits, were soon to be invaded and desolated
by the Roman inquisitors. The tragedy begins. From the fifteenth to the
present century, their history is a narrative of sanguinary struggles for
existence, with few intervals of repose. They were often driven to
desperation, yet the church of the valleys lived through it all. Like the
flaming bush, it has burned but has not been consumed. Its stronghold was
not merely the Alpine mountains, but the truth of the living God.

WALDENSIAN PERSECUTIONS
In the year 1380, a monk inquisitor, named Francis Borelli, was appointed
by Clement VII. to search out the heretics in the valleys of Piedmont.
Armed with this papal bull, the communes of Fraissiniere and Argentiere
were ransacked for heretics. In the space of thirteen years, one hundred
and fifty Waldenses were burned at Grenoble, and eighty around
Fraissiniere. There was now a double motive for persecution; a law was
made that half the goods of the condemned should go to the inquisitors’
court, and the other half to their temporal lords. Thus avarice, malice, and
superstition were united against the unoffending peasants. But these
burnings were too few and too far between to satisfy Rome’s thirst for the
blood of God’s saints.
In the winter of 1400, the massacre extended from Dauphiny to the Italian
valley of Pragela. The poor people, seeing their mountain caves
possessed by their enemies, fled over the Alps. But the severity of the
season and the coldness of the heights proved fatal to nearly all who had
 708
escaped from the hand of slaughter. Many of the mothers were carrying
their infants and leading by the hand the little children who were able to
walk. But cold and hunger speedily brought relief. One hundred and eighty
babes are said to have died in the arms of their mothers, and were soon
followed, with other children, by their broken-hearted mothers. No
estimate can be formed of the numbers that perished by the tyrannies and
cruelties of Rome. But heaven guesses not at their number, or even at their
names. The martyred parents and the children have their record and reward
eternal in the heavens; while their persecutors have had time to gauge their
guilt and feel their punishment these four hundred years in the place of
hopeless woe. In allusion to such scenes, the noblest of our poets
composed the following sonnet: —
“Avenge, O Lord, thy slaughtered saints, whose bones
Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold;
Even them who kept Thy truth so pure of old,
When all our fathers worshipped stocks and stones,
Forget not; in Thy book record their groans,
Who were Thy sheep, and in their ancient fold,
Slain by the bloody Piedmontese, that rolled
Mother with infant down the rocks. Their moans
The vales redoubled to the hills, and they
To heaven. Their martyred blood and ashes sow
O’er all the Italian fields, where still doth sway
The triple tyrant; that from these may grow
A hundredfold, who, having learned Thy way,
Early may flee the Babylonish woe.” — MILTON.

The fires of persecution were again kindled in the valley of Fraissiniere, in

the year 1460, by a monk of the order of Friars Minor, armed with the
authority of the Archbishop of Embrun. Debarred from social intercourse,
driven from their places of worship, beset with enemies, they had no
resource, no refuge, but in a good conscience and the living God. The
inquisitors did their cruel work.
In Piedmont, the Archbishop of Turin labored much to promote the
persecutions of the Waldenses. Their charge against them was that they
made no offerings for the dead, valued not masses and absolutions, and
took no care to redeem their relations from the pains of purgatory. But the
princes of Piedmont, who were the dukes of Savoy, were unwilling to
disturb their subjects, of whose loyalty, peaceablehess, and industry, they
 709
had received such good accounts. Yet every method which fraud and
calumny could invent was practiced against them. The priests at length
prevailed, and the civil power permitted the dragon host to indulge its
thirst for blood.
About the year 1486 the memorable Bull of Innocent VIII. gave unlimited
powers to Albert de Capitanets, archdeacon of Cremona, to carry
confiscation and death into the infected valleys. An army of eighteen
thousand was raised, and precipitated into the mountain retreats of the
Waldenses. Driven to despair, and availing themselves of the natural
advantages of their situation, they defended themselves with wooden clubs
and crossbows — the women and children praying — and turned into
confusion this great military force.
The house of Savoy — which was established in supreme authority in
Piedmont about the middle of the thirteenth century — had acted in a mild
and tolerant way towards the proscribed people; but, sad to say, the
regent-mother, like Theodora and Irene, during the minority of her son, is
the first to sign a state-paper for their persecution. She called upon the
authorities of Pignerol to assist the inquisitors to compel the heretics to
return to the bosom of the church — a worthy daughter of her mother
Jezebel! But not a single one of the inhabitants could be forced to return to
the arms of Rome. The sword was now let loose upon them; and soon
were the streams of the valleys tinged with the blood of the saints.
Subsequent edicts of the sons were more tolerant. They began to speak of
their Waldensian subjects, not under the obnoxious appellation of heretics,
but as religionists, men of the valleys, and faithful vassals; whom they
recognized as privileged subjects because of ancient stipulations.
So far Rome had utterly failed to accomplish her cruel and fiend-like
object. She had determined to exterminate these obstinate opponents of
popery, but faithful witnesses of the truth; and to eradicate their very
name from the valleys. But, wonderful to say, neither the individual
executions nor the indiscriminate slaughters, the secret treachery nor the
open violence, could prevail for their extinction. But Jezebel still plots;
and the tiara and the mitre generally proved too strong for the crown.
 710
WALDENSIAN MISSIONARIES
With the twofold object of spreading the pure truth of the gospel, and of
finding new and more peaceful settlements, many of them about the close
of the fourteenth century left their native valleys and settled in
Switzerland, Moravia, Bohemia, various parts of Germany, and probably
in England. But the most extensive of these colonies was formed in
Calabria in the year 1370. Being peaceable in their manners, industrious
in their habits, and strictly moral in all their ways, they soon gained the
confidence of their landlords, and the affections of their neighbors. The
lords of the country saw their lands enriched and fertilized by the superior
husbandry of the new colonists, and granted them many privileges.
They were allowed to invite pastors from the parent church in the Alps,
and to introduce schoolmasters for their children. But such temporal and
spiritual prosperity, with so much social comfort, was an intolerable
grievance to the evil eye of popery. The priests growled and murmured
exceedingly. They complained to the landlords that the strangers did not
conform to the rites of the Romish church; that they had no masses said
for the repose of their dead; that they were heretics. The lords, however,
were not disposed to listen to the priests. “They are a very just and
honest people,” said they, “all know them to be temperate, industrious,
and in their words peculiarly decent. Who has ever heard them utter a
blasphemous expression? And as they enrich our lands and pay their rents
punctually, we see no reason to condemn them.”
In every country and in every age the priests of Rome have been the
greatest enemies to the pure, simple, religion of the Bible; to education,
toleration, light, liberty, and every social improvement. Their power, their
interests, their sensuality, and every evil passion, are necessarily exposed
and undermined by the introduction of light or the toleration of liberty.
But the temporal interests of the lords led them to protect their tenants,
and maintain them in their privileges. We have here one of the mysterious
passages in divine providence, over which the mind loves to dwell a little.
For nearly two hundred years these Nonconformists were allowed to
remain and multiply in the districts of Calabria, in the very neighborhood
of Rome itself. But at length the pope listened to the complaints of the
 711
priests, and the dark cloud, which had long been gathering over the
peaceful plains of Calabria and Apulia, burst upon them with all its fury.

THE DARK YEAR OF 1560

About the year 1560, Pope Plus IV. was seized with a fit of great zeal
against the spread of heresy. It was reported to have taken deep root in
several parts of Italy, besides the valleys of Piedmont. The subalpine
communities and all infected districts were placed under papal interdicts.
Another crusade was preached, and great preparations made for the
complete extermination of the heretics. The Spanish Viceroy of
Naples, commanding the troops in person, and assisted by an inquisitor
and a number of monks, entered the Waldensian settlements in Calabria.
Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, marched with an armed force on
Piedmont; and the French King on Dauphiny. “The poor men of the
valleys,” with their wives and children, now saw themselves exposed to
the hostile power of the French King on the one side of the Alps, and to
that of the Duke of Savoy on the other. The industrious tillers of the
ground in Calabria, with their ministers, schoolmasters, and families, were
surrounded by the troops of the Spanish Viceroy.
Thus prepared for the slaughter of the saints, the Waldenses were
commanded to banish their ministers and schoolmasters, to abstain from
the exercise of their own forms of worship, and to attend the services of
the Romish church. They nobly refused. Orders were now given for
confiscation, imprisonment, and death. The merciless sword of
persecution was openly unsheathed and did not return to its scabbard for
more than a hundred years. The awful work of blood and carnage began.
Two companies of soldiers, headed by the pope’s agents, went on slaying,
burning, ravaging the defenceless peasantry in Calabria, until the work of
extermination was nearly completed. A remnant cried for mercy, for their
wives and children, promising to leave the country and never to return; but
the inquisitors and monks knew not how to show mercy. The most
barbarous cruelties were inflicted on many, the whole apparatus of pagan
persecutions was revived, until the Protestants were exterminated in the
south of Italy. One of their chief ministers, Lewis Paschal, who affirmed
that the pope was antichrist, was conveyed to Rome, where he was
burned alive, in the presence of Pius IV., that he might feast his eyes with
 712
the sight of a heretic in the flames. But the piety and the sufferings of
Paschal excited the pity and the admiration of the spectators.
Hundreds of Waldenses in the valleys perished on the scaffold, or at the
stake; the villages swarmed with ruffians, who, in the name of officers of
justice, plundered the helpless inhabitants, and haled them to prison, until
the dungeons were choked with victims. The plains were deserted; the
women, children, feeble, and aged, were sent for refuge to the heights of
the mountains, to the rocks and the forests. The men, taking advantage of
the nature of the country, determined on resistance. Every man and boy
that could handle a weapon were formed into small brigades, and so
planted as to defend themselves against the troops. The duke was not
much inclined to carry on such a guerilla warfare, and shortly withdrew his
soldiers; but only for a little while. According to ancient treaties, the men
of the valleys had certain rights and privileges, which their sovereigns were
reluctant to violate, but too often yielded to the importunity and the
misrepresentations of the Romish hierarchy. From the following dates the
reader will see how brief were their periods of rest: — “The years 1565,
1573, 1581, 1583, and the period between 1591 and 1594, are memorable
as dates of religious and civil conflict. But never did the majesty of truth
and innocence stand out more brightly to view than during the tempests of
persecution which raged at intervals for the next hundred years and
more.”5
The testimony of Dr. Beattie, who visited the Protestant valleys of
Piedmont, Dauphiny, and the Ban de la Roche, about forty years ago, is to
the same effect. “But the fierceness of the persecution seemed only to
increase the measure of their fortitude... Although marked as the victims of
indiscriminate massacre, of lawless plunder, of torture, extortion, and
famine; their resolution to persevere in the truth remained unshaken. Every
punishment that cruelty could invent, or the sword inflict, had expended
its fury in vain; nothing could subvert their faith or subdue their courage.
In defense of their natural rights as men — in support of their insulted
creed as members of the primitive church — in resistance of those
exterminating edicts which made their homes desolate, and deluged their
altars with blood — the Waldenses exhibited a spectacle of fortitude and
endurance that has no parallel in history.”6
 713
Having brought down the history of the witnesses to the sixteenth
century, we will now leave them, in the hope of meeting them again, when
we reach that period in our general history.
 714

CHAPTER 30
JOHN WYCLIFFE

Every attentive reader of history must be frequently reminded of that

weighty word of warning, given by the apostle: “Be not deceived; God is
not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” The
most solemn and practical illustrations of this divine law in the affairs of
men may be seen on every page of history. He who sows tares in spring
cannot expect to reap wheat in autumn; and he who sows wheat in spring
shall not be required to reap tares in autumn. We may see the truth of this
principle of the divine government around us daily. How often the habits
of youth determine the condition of old age! Even the riches of divine grace
arrests not the course of this law. The King of Israel had to hear from the
mouth of the prophet the solemn sentence,
“The sword shall never depart from thine house;”
but this did not hinder the flow of God’s tender mercy to the royal
penitent:
“And Nathan said unto David, The Lord also hath put away thy
sin; thou shalt not die.” (2 Samuel 12.)
Such is the boundless, measureless grace of God to the truly penitent; but
such too the immutable law of His government.
Although we cannot speak with the same confidence as to the general
system of human society, yet we may reverently trace the hand of the
Lord in the wisdom of His ways and in the accomplishment of His
purposes. For example —
The sanguinary triumphs of the papacy in Languedoc proved to be the
means of its rapid decline and fall. In crushing the Count of Toulouse and
the other great feudatory lords in the south of France, the dominions of the
French Crown were greatly enlarged, and the kings of France from that
moment became the irresistible adversaries of the pope. Louis IX.
 715
immediately published the Pragmatic Sanction, which established the
liberties of the Gallican Church; and Philip the Fair compelled the haughty
Boniface to drink the cup of humiliation which the popes had often mixed
for the secular powers of Europe. From 1305 to 1377, the popes at
Avignon were little better than the vassals of Philip and his successors.
And from 1377 to 1417, the papacy itself was rent asunder by the great
schism. Thus, by an equitable retribution in the providence of God, they
who sought the destruction of others were their own destroyers.1 We see
the same thing in England.

ENGLAND AND THE PAPACY

The submission of John to Innocent III. was the turning-point in the
history of the papacy in this country. In the humiliation of the sovereign
the whole nation felt itself to be degraded. Innocent went too far; it was an
abuse of assumed power; but it recoiled upon himself in due time. England
never could forget such abject prostration on the part of its king at the feet
of a foreign priest. From that hour a spirit of disaffection towards Rome
grew up in the minds of the English people. The usurpations, the
exorbitant claims, of the papacy, their interference with the disposal of
English bishoprics, frequently brought the government and the church into
collision and widened the breach. But just when men’s patience was
almost exhausted by the many practical grievances of popery, it pleased
God to raise up a powerful adversary to the whole hierarchical system —
the first man who shook the papal dominion in England to its foundation,
and withal a man who sincerely loved the truth, and preached it both to
the learned and to the lower classes. This man was John Wycliffe, justly
styled the harbinger, or Morning Star of the Reformation.
The early part of Wycliffe’s life is involved in much obscurity; but the
general opinion is, that he was born of humble parentage in the
neighborhood of Richmond in Yorkshire, about the year 1324. His
destination was that of a scholar, to which, we are informed, the humblest
in those days could aspire. England was almost a land of schools, every
cathedral, almost every monastery, having its own; but youths of more
ambition, self-confidence, supposed capacity, and of better opportunities,
thronged to Oxford and Cambridge. In England, as throughout
Christendom, that wonderful rush of a vast part of the population towards
 716
knowledge, thronged the universities with thousands of students, instead
of the few hundreds who have now the privilege of entering those seats of
learning.2
John Wycliffe found his way to Oxford. He was admitted a student of
Queen’s College, but soon removed to Merton College, the oldest, the
wealthiest, and most famous of the Oxford foundations. It is supposed
that he was privileged to attend the lectures of the very pious and
profound Thomas Bradwardine, and that from his works he derived his
first views of the freeness of grace, and the utter worthlessness of all
human merit, in the matter of salvation. From Grostete’s writings he first
caught the idea of the pope being antichrist.
Wycliffe, according to his biographers, soon became master of the civil, the
canon, and the municipal law; but his greatest efforts were diverted to the
study of theology, not merely that barren art which was taught in the
schools, but that divine science which is derived from the spirit as well as
from the letter of scripture. In the prosecution of such inquiries, he had
numerous and formidable difficulties to contend against. It was a study
which the church had not sanctioned, and had not provided for. The sacred
text was neglected, scholastic divinity had taken the place of the authority
of scripture; the original language of the New, as well as of the Old
Testament, was almost unknown in the kingdom. But, in spite of all these
disadvantages and discouragements, Wycliffe pursued his way with great
perseverance. “His logic,” says one, “his scholastic subtlety, his rhetorical
art, his power of reading the Latin scriptures, his varied erudition, may be
due to Oxford; but the vigor and energy of his genius, the force of his
language, his mastery over the vernacular English, the high supremacy
which he vindicated for the scriptures, which by immense toil he
promulgated in the vulgar tongue — these were his own, — to be learned in
no school, to be attained by none of the ordinary courses of study.”3

WYCLIFFE AND THE FRIARS

About the year 1349, when Wycliffe had reached his twenty-fourth year,
and was rising to some renown in the college, this country was visited by a
terrible pestilence, called the “black plague.” It is supposed to have made
its appearance first in Tartary, and after ravaging various countries in Asia,
 717
proceeded by the shores of the Nile to the islands of Greece, carrying
devastation to almost every nation of Europe. So prodigious was the
waste of human life that some say a fourth part of the inhabitants were cut
off; others, that the half of the human race, besides cattle, were carried off
in certain parts. This alarming visitation filled the pious mind of Wycliffe
with the most gloomy apprehensions, and fearful forebodings as to the
future. It was like the sound of the last trumpet in his heart. He concluded
that the day of judgment was at hand. Solemnized with the thoughts of
eternity, he spent days and nights in his cell, and no doubt in earnest
prayer for divine guidance. He came forth a champion for the truth; he
found his armor in the word of God.
By his zeal and faithfulness in preaching the gospel, especially to the
common people on Sundays, he acquired and deserved the title of the
“evangelic doctor.” But that which brought him such fame and
popularity at Oxford, was his defense of the university against the
encroachments of the mendicant friars. He fearlessly and unsparingly
attacked these orders, which he declared to be the great evil of
Christendom. They were now four in number — Dominicans, Minorites
or Franciscans, Augustinians, Carmelites — and swarmed in all the best
parts of Europe. They strove hard in Oxford, as heretofore in Paris, to
obtain the ascendancy. They took every opportunity of enticing the
students into their convents, who, without the consent of their parents,
were enlisted into the mendicant orders. To such an extent was this
system of trepanning carried on, that parents ceased to send their children
to the universities. Thirty thousand youths had at one time studied at
Oxford, but from this cause the number was reduced to six thousand.
Bishops, priests, and theologians, in almost every country and university
in Europe were contending against those arch-deceivers, but it was all to
little effect, for the pontiffs vigorously defended them as their best friends,
and conferred on them great privileges.
Wycliffe struck boldly, and we believe fatally, at the root of this great and
universal evil. Next to the decline of the papal power, which we have
already noticed, we may begin to mark that of the mendicant orders. He
published some spiritual papers entitled, “Against able Beggary,”
“Against idle Beggary,” and on “The poverty of Christ.” “He denounced
mendicancy in itself, and all the others as able-bodied beggars, who ought
 718
not to be permitted to infest the land. He charged them with fifty errors of
doctrine and practice. He denounced them for intercepting the alms which
ought to belong to the poor; for their unscrupulous system of
proselytizing; for their invasion of parochial rights; their habit of deluding
the common people by fables and legends; their hypocritical pretensions
to sanctity; their flattery of the great and wealthy, whom it would rather
have been their duty to reprove for their sins; their grasping at money by
all sorts of means; the needless splendor of their buildings, whereas parish
churches were left to decay.”4
Wycliffe was now the acknowledged champion of a great party in the
university and in the church; and dignities and honors were conferred upon
him. But if he had gained many friends, he had many enemies whose wrath
it was dangerous to provoke. His troubles and changes now began. The
friars supplied the pope with information as to all that was going on. In
1361 he was advanced to the mastership of Balliol college and rectory of
Fillingham. Four years after he was chosen warder of Canterbury hall. His
knowledge of scripture, the purity of his life, his unbending courage, his
eloquence as a preacher, his mastery of the language of the common
people, rendered him the object of general admiration. He maintained that
salvation was by faith, through grace, without human merit in any way.
This was striking, not at the outward evils merely, but at the very
foundations of the whole system of popery. Led by divine wisdom, he
commenced his great work at the right place and in the right way. He
preached the gospel and explained the word of God to the people in
vernacular English. In this way, he planted deep in the popular mind those
great truths and principles which eventually led to the emancipation of
England from the yoke and tyranny of Rome.

WYCLIFFE AND THE GOVERNMENT

The fame of Wycliffe, as a defender of truth and liberty, was no longer
confined to the university of Oxford. The pope and the cardinals feared
him, and minutely watched his proceedings. But on the other hand, the
king and the parliament entertained so high an opinion of his integrity and
judgment as to consult him on a matter of grave importance to both church
and state.
 719
About the year 1366 a controversy had arisen between Urban V. and
Edward III. in consequence of the renewed demand of an annual tribute of
one thousand marks, which King John had bound himself to pay to the
Roman See, as an acknowledgment of the feudal superiority of the Roman
pontiff over the kingdoms of England and Ireland. The payment of this
ignominious tribute had never been regular, but it had been entirely
discontinued for thirty-three years. Urban demanded payment in full of
the arrears. Edward refused, declaring himself resolved to hold his kingdom
in freedom and independence. The parliament and the people sympathized
with the king. The arrogance of the pope had created great excitement in
England; both houses of parliament were consulted; the settlement of the
question interested all classes, even all Christendom. Wycliffe, who was
already one of the king’s chaplains, was appointed to answer the papal
arguments; and so effectually did he prove that canon, or papal law, has no
force when it is opposed to the word of God, that the papacy from that
day to this ceased to lay claim to the sovereignty of England. The
arguments of Wycliffe were used by the lords in parliament, who
unanimously resolved to maintain the independence of the crown against
the pretensions of Rome. The short, pithy, plain speeches of the barons
on this occasion are curious and characteristic of the times.
In the year 1372 Wycliffe was raised to the theological chair. This was an
important step in the cause of truth, and used by the Lord. Being a Doctor
of Divinity, he had the right of delivering lectures on theology. He spoke
as a master to the young theologians at Oxford; and having such authority
in the schools, whatever he said was received as an oracle. It would be
impossible to estimate the wholesome influence which he exercised over
the minds of the students, who attended in great numbers at that time. The
invention of printing had not yet supplied the student with books, so that
the voice, the living energy, of the public teacher, was nearly all he had to
depend upon. Hundreds who listened to him were in their turn to go forth
as public teachers bearing the same precious seed.

WYCLIFFE AT AVIGNON
Although it was now well known that Wycliffe held many and-papal
opinions, he was not yet committed to direct opposition to Rome. But in
the year 1374 he was employed in an embassy to the pope, Gregory XI.,
 720
whose residence was at Avignon. The object of this mission was to
represent and have removed the flagrant abuses of the papal reservation of
benefices in the English church. But we doubt not the Lord allowed this,
that Wycliffe might see, what strangers were slow to believe, namely, that
the papal court was the fountainhead of all iniquity. On his return from
that mission he became the open, direct, and dreaded antagonist of Rome.
The experience of Avignon and Bruges added to the results of his previous
thought and inquiry, and satisfied his mind that the pretensions of the
papacy were without foundation in truth. He published indefatigably the
deep convictions of his soul, in learned lectures and disputations at
Oxford, in pastoral addresses in his parish, and in spirited tracts written in
clear English prose, which reached the humbler and less educated classes.
He denounced with a burning and long-treasured indignation the whole
papal system. “The gospel of Jesus Christ,” he said, “is the only source of
true religion. The pope is Antichrist, the proud worldly priest of Rome,
and the most cursed of clippers and purse-carvers.” The pride, the pomp,
the luxury, the loose morals of the prelates, fell under his withering rebuke.
And being a man of unimpeachable morals himself, of profound devotion,
undoubted sincerity, and original eloquence, numbers gathered around the
dauntless professor.5

WYCLIFFE A HERESIARCH
Wycliffe had now risen to high distinction, and had received many marks
of the royal favor. In the end of the year 1375, he was presented by the
crown to the rectory of Lutterworth in Leicestershire, which was his
home throughout the remainder of his life, although he frequently visited
Oxford. But dangers were gathering around him from other quarters: he had
incurred the displeasure of the pope, and the prelates. At Lutterworth and
in the villages around, he was the plain, bold, vernacular preacher; at
Oxford, he was the great master. But whether in town or country, he
raised his voice against the discipline of the church, the scandalous lives of
churchmen, their ignorance, their neglect of preaching and the abuse of
their privileges as ecclesiastics to shelter notorious criminals. It was only
natural that such plain speaking should give offense. The professor was
accused of heresy, and summoned to appear before the convocation which
commenced its sittings in February, 1377.
 721
Wycliffe answered to the citation and proceeded to St. Paul’s Cathedral,
but not alone. He was accompanied by John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster,
and Lord Percy, marshal of England. The motives of these great
personages were no doubt political, and added no real honor to the name or
to the cause of Wycliffe. But we find a strange collision and confusion of
religion and politics in the history of all the reformers. William Courtenay,
son of the Earl of Devon, was then bishop of London, and appointed
president of the assembly by Archbishop Sudbury. The proud and
haughty bishop was moved to great displeasure when he beheld the heretic
supported by the two most powerful nobles in England. So great was the
concourse of people to witness this exciting trial, that the Earl-marshal
assumed the authority of his office to make a way to the presence of the
judges. The indignant bishop resented this exercise of the marshal’s power
inside the cathedral.
“If I had known, my lord,” said Courtenay to Percy, sharply, “that you
claimed to be master in this church, I would have taken measures to
prevent your entrance.” Lancaster, who at that time administered the
kingdom, coldly replied, “that the marshal would use the authority
necessary to maintain order in spite of the bishops.” When they reached
the court in the Lady Chapel, Percy demanded a seat for Wycliffe.
Courtenay now gave way to his anger, and exclaimed in a loud voice, “He
must not sit down, criminals stand before their judges.” Fierce words
followed on both sides. The duke threatened to humble the pride, not only
of Courtenay, but of all the prelacy of England. The bishop replied with a
provoking, specious humility, that his trust was in God alone. A scene of
great violence followed; and, instead of the proposed inquiry, the
assembly broke up in confusion. The partisans of the bishop would have
fallen upon the duke and the marshal; but they had force enough for their
protection. Wycliffe, who had remained silent, escaped under their shelter.
Although the people were then all Roman Catholics, there were many who
favored reform; these were called Wycliffites, and they prudently
remained in their own houses during this excitement. The clerical party
that had thronged St. Paul’s filled the streets with their clamor. The
populace arose — a wild tumult began. The rioters first attacked the house
of Percy; but after bursting open every door, and searching every chamber,
without finding him, they imagined that he must be concealed in
 722
Lancaster’s palace. They rushed to the Savoy, at that time the most
magnificent building in the kingdom. A clergyman who had the misfortune
of being taken for Lord Percy was put to death. The ducal arms were
reversed like those of a traitor; the palace was plundered, and further
outrages might have been committed but for the interposition of the
bishop, who had cause to fear the consequences of such lawless
proceedings.

WYCLIFFE AND THE PAPAL BULLS

Wycliffe was again at liberty. The severities which his persecutors had
intended for him were not inflicted, and he continued to preach and
instruct the people with unabated zeal and courage. Just about this time
there were two popes, or anti-popes; one in Rome, and one in Avignon.
This fact is spoken of in history as “The schism,” and caricatured by
some writers as the cloven, or two-headed Antichrist. Through which head
apostolic succession flows, the reader must judge for himself. Wycliffe
denounced both popes alike as antichrist, and found strong sympathy in
the hearts and minds of the people. The most disgraceful scenes followed.
The pontiff of Rome proclaims war against the pontiff of Avignon. A
crusade is preached in favor of the former. The same indulgences are
granted as to the crusaders of old who went to the Holy Land. Public
prayers are offered up, by order of the primate, in every church of the
realm, for the success of the pontiff of Rome against the pontiff of
Avignon. The bishops and clergy are called on to enforce upon their flocks
the duty of contributing to this sacred purpose. Under the mitred captain,
Spencer, the young and martial bishop of Norwich, the crusaders moved
forward. They took Gravelines and Dunkirk, in France; but alas! this army
of the pope, headed by an English bishop, surpassed the ordinary
inhumanity of the times. Men, women, and children, were hewn to pieces
in one vast massacre. The bishop carried a huge two-handed sword, with
which he seems to have hewn down with hearty goodwill the unoffending
flock of the rival pope at Avignon.
Such an expedition could only end in shame and disaster. It shook the
papacy to its foundation, and greatly strengthened the cause of the
reformer. From 1305 to 1377, the popes were little more than the vassals
of the French monarchs at Avignon; and from that till 1417, the papacy
 723
itself was rent asunder by the great schism. But the myrmidons of the
pope continued eager and constant in their pursuit after the herestarch.
Nineteen articles of accusation against him were submitted to Gregory XI.
In answer to these accusations, five bulls were despatched to England,
three to the archbishop, one to the king, and one to Oxford; commanding
inquiry into the erroneous doctrines of Wycliffe. The opinions charged
against him, were not against the creed of the church, but against the
power of the clergy. He was charged with reviving the errors of Marselius
of Padua, and John Gaudun, the defenders of the temporal monarch against
the pope.
Wycliffe was cited a second time to appear before the same papal
delegates, but on this occasion it was not at St. Paul’s but at Lambeth. He
had no longer the duke of Lancaster and the Earl-marshal at his side. He
trusted in the living God. “The people thought he would be devoured,
being brought into the lion’s den;” and many of the citizens of London
forced themselves into the chapel. The prelates seeing their menacing looks
and gestures became alarmed. But scarcely had the proceedings been
opened, when a message was received from the young king’s mother —
the widow of the Black Prince — prohibiting them from proceeding to any
definite sentence respecting the doctrine or conduct of Wycliffe. “The
bishops,” says Walsingham the papal advocate, “who had professed
themselves determined to do their duty in spite of threats or promises, and
even at the hazard of their lives, were as reeds shaken by the wind, and
became so intimidated during the examination of the apostate, that their
speeches were as soft as oil, to the public loss of their dignity, and the
damage of the whole church. And when Clifford pompously delivered his
message, they were so overcome with fear, that you would have thought
them to be as a man that heareth not, and in whose mouth are no reproofs.
Thus this false teacher, this complete hypocrite, evaded the hand of
justice; and could no more be called before the same prelates, because their
commission expired by the death of the pope Gregory XI.”6
The death of Gregory and the great schism in the papacy combined, in
the good providence of God, to deliver Wycliffe from the cruel hand of
persecution, which no doubt had marked him as its victim. He therefore
returned to his former occupations, and by his pulpit discourses, his
academical lectures, and his various writings, labored to promote the cause
 724
of truth and liberty. He also organized about this time an itinerant band of
preachers, who were to travel through the land, preaching the gospel of
Jesus Christ, accepting hospitality by the way, and trusting in the Lord to
meet all their need. They were called “poor priests,” and not unfrequently
met with persecution from the clergy; but the simplicity and earnestness
of these missionaries drew crowds of the common people around them.

WYCLIFFE AND THE BIBLE

Without following more minutely the general labors of Wycliffe, or the
plottings of his enemies to interrupt him, we will now notice that which
was the great work of his useful life — the complete English Version of
the Holy Scriptures. We have seen him boldly and fearlessly assailing and
exposing the countless abuses of popery, unfolding the truth to the
students, and zealously preaching the gospel to the poor; but he is now
engaged in a work which will a thousand times more enrich his own soul.
He is yet more exclusively engaged with the Sacred Writings. It was not
until he became more fully acquainted with the Bible, that he rejected the
false doctrines of the church of Rome. It is one thing to see the outward
abuses of the hierarchy, it is quite another to see the mind of God in the
doctrines of His word.
As soon as the translation of a portion was finished, the labor of the
copyists began, and the Bible was ere long widely circulated either wholly
or in parts. The effect of thus bringing home the word of God to the
unlearned — to citizens, soldiers, and the lower classes — is beyond
human power to estimate. Minds were enlightened, souls were saved, and
God was glorified. “Wycliffe,” said one of his adversaries, “has made the
gospel common, and more open to laymen and to women who can read
than it is wont to be to clerks well learned and of good understanding; so
that the pearl of the gospel is scattered and is trodden under foot of
swine.” In the year 1380 the English Bible was complete. In 1390 the
bishops attempted to get the version condemned by Parliament, lest it
should become an occasion of herestes; but John of Gaunt declared that
the English would not submit to the degradation of being denied a
vernacular Bible. “The word of God is the faith of His people,” it was
said, “and though the pope and all his clerks should disappear from the
face of the earth, our faith would not fail, for it is founded on Jesus alone,
 725
our Master and Our God.” The attempt at prohibition having failed, the
English Bible spread far and wide, being diffused chiefly through the
exertions of the “poor priests,” like “the poor men of Lyons” at an earlier
period.
The christian reader will not fail to trace the hand of the Lord in this great
work. The grand, the divine, instrument was now ready and in the hands
of the people, by means of which the Reformation in the sixteenth century
was to be accomplished. The word of God which liveth and abideth for
ever is rescued from the dark mysteries of scholasticism, from the dust-
covered shelves of the cloister, from the obscurity of ages, and given to the
English people in their own mother-tongue. Who can estimate the
blessing? Let the ten thousand times ten thousand tongues which shall
praise the Lord for ever, give the answer. But oh! the wickedness — the
soul-murdering wickedness — of the Romish priesthood in keeping the
word of life from the laity! Is the glorious truth of God’s love to the world
in the gift of His Son — of the efficacy of the blood of Christ to cleanse
from all sin — to be concealed from the perishing multitude, and seen only
by a privileged few? There is no refinement in cruelty on the face of the
whole earth to compare with this. It is the ruin of both soul and body in
hell for ever.

PARTIAL TRANSLATIONS
The first attempt at anything like a vernacular translation of a portion of
the holy scriptures appears to have been in the seventh century. Down to
this period they were only in the Latin tongue in this country, and being
chiefly in the hands of the clergy, the people in general received what they
knew of the revelation of God from their instructions. But, as most of the
priests knew nothing more than what they were obliged to repeat in the
church service, the people were left in gross darkness.
The Venerable Bede mentions a poem in the Anglo-Saxon tongue, bearing
the name of Caedmon, which gives with tolerable fidelity some of the
historical parts of the Bible, but owing to its epic character, it has not been
ranked with the versions of the sacred writings. Still it was a
commencement in this blessed work, for which we can be truly thankful. It
 726
may have given the idea to others more competent, and been the precursor
of real translations.
In the eighth century, Bede translated the apostles’ creed and the Lord’s
prayer into Anglo-Saxon, which he frequently presented to illiterate
priests: and one of his last efforts was a translation of the Gospel of St.
John; which is supposed to be the first portion of the New Testament
which was translated into the vernacular language of the country. He died
in 735.
King Alfred, in his zeal for the improvement of his realm, did not
overlook the importance of vernacular scripture. With the assistance of the
learned men in his court he had the four Gospels translated. And Elfric,
towards the close of the tenth century, had translated some books of the
Old Testament. About the beginning of the reign of Edward III. William of
Shoreham rendered the Psalter into Anglo-Norman; and he was soon after
followed by Richard Rolle, chantry priest at Hampole. He not only
translated the text of the Psalms, but added an English commentary. He
died in 1347. The Psalter appears to be the only book of scripture which
had been entirely rendered into our language before the time of Wycliffe.
But the moment was come in the providence of God for the publication of
the whole Bible, and for its circulation among the people. Every
circumstance, in spite of the enemy, was overruled of God to favor the
noble design of His servant.
Having received many warnings, many threatenings, and experienced some
narrow escapes from the loathsome dungeon and the burning pile, Wycliffe
was allowed to close his days in peace, in the midst of his flock and his
pastoral labors at Lutterworth. After a forty-eight hours’ illness from a
stroke of paralysis, he died on the last day of the year 1384.7

REFLECTIONS ON THE LIFE OF WYCLIFFE

The humble Christian, the bold witness, the faithful preacher, the able
professor, and the great reformer, has passed off the scene. He has gone to
his rest and his reward is on high. But the doctrines which he propagated
with so much zeal can never die. His name in his followers continued
formidable to the false priests of Rome. “Every second man you meet in
the way,” said a bitter adversary, “is a Wycliffite.” He was used of God to
 727
give an impulse to christian inquiry which was felt in the most distant
corners of Europe, and which rolled on through future ages. No person has
expressed a juster sense of the influence of Wycliffe’s Biblical labors than
Dr. Lingard, the Roman Catholic historian. Thus he writes, “He made a
new translation, multiplied copies with the aid of transcribers, and by his
poor priests recommended it to the perusal of his hearers. In their hands it
became an engine of wonderful power. Men were flattered with the appeal
to their private judgment; the new doctrines insensibly acquired partizans
and protectors in the higher classes, who alone were acquainted with the
use of letters; a spirit of inquiry was generated; and the seeds were sown
of that religious revolution, which, in little more than a century, astonished
and convulsed the nations of Europe.” Many of Wycliffe’s doctrines were
far in advance of the age in which he lived. He anticipated the principles of
a more enlightened generation. “The scripture alone is truth,” he said; and
his doctrine was formed on that foundation alone. But it was the
translation and circulation of the Bible that gave lasting efficacy to the
holy truths which he taught, and was the imperishable crown of all his
other labors — the treasure which he bequeathed to future and to better
ages.8
So long as Wycliffe confined his vehement denunciations to the and-
christian spirit of the court of Rome, the wealth of the clergy, and the
peculiar tenets of the papacy, so long he could count on many powerful
protectors. He might sweep away one by one the many abuses of the
system; but no sooner did he rise into the higher region of the positive
truth and free grace of God, than the number and enthusiasm of his
followers rapidly declined. His doctrinal controversy secured his
banishment from Oxford about two years before his death. But this, in the
providence of God, was overruled to give him a period of repose at the end
of a laborious and stormy life. For many years he had preached the most
distinguishing doctrines of the reformers of the sixteenth century,
especially those held by Calvin. But his opposition to the Romish
doctrine of salvation by works would naturally lead him to speak strongly.
“To believe in the power of man in the work of regeneration,” he would
say, “is the great heresy of Rome, and from that error has come the ruin of
the church. Conversion proceeds from the grace of God alone, and the
system which ascribes it partly to man and partly to God is worse than
 728
Pelagianism. Christ is everything in Christianity; whosoever abandons that
fountain which is ever ready to impart life, and turns to muddy and
stagnant waters, is a madman. Faith is a gift of God; it puts aside all
human merit, and should banish all fear from the mind. Let Christians
submit not to the word of a priest, but to the word of God. In the
primitive church there were but two orders, bishops and deacons: the
presbyter and the bishop, or overseer, were one. The sublimest calling
which man can attain on the earth is that of preaching the word of God.
The true church is the assembly of the righteous for whom Christ shed His
blood.”
Such were the essential points of Wycliffe’s preaching and pamphlets for
nearly forty years, proclaimed with great fer-your and ability in the midst
of papal darkness, superstition, and the worst forms of worldliness. To
write the words which hand down to posterity so great, so glorious, a
work of God’s Spirit in our land, causes the heart to expand and arise to
the throne of grace in praise and thanksgiving unfeigned, unmingled,
unending. The popes, cardinals, archbishops, bishops, abbots, and
doctors, who thirsted for his blood, have either perished from the page of
history, or they are associated in our minds with the demon of
persecution, while the name and the memory of John Wycliffe continue to
be held with unimpaired and increasing veneration.9

THE LOLLARDS
Wycliffe had organized no sect during his life, but the power of his
teaching was manifested in lhe number and zeal of his disciples after his
death. From the hut of the peasant to the palace of royalty, they were to
be found everywhere under the vague name of “Lollards.” Crowds
gathered round their preachers. They denied the authority of Rome and
maintained the absolute supremacy of the word of God alone. They
maintained that the ministers of Christ should be poor, simple, and lead a
spiritual life; and they publicly preached against the vices of the clergy.
For a time they met with so much sympathy and success, that they no
doubt thought the Reformation was about to triumph in England.
In the year 1395 the followers of Wycliffe boldly petitioned Parliament to
“abolish celibacy, transubstantiation, prayers for the dead, offerings to
 729
images, auricular confession,” and many other popish abuses, and then
nailed their petition to the gates of St. Paul’s and Westminster Abbey. But
these murmurs of a burdened and oppressed people were lost sight of for
the moment in the dethronement and death of King Richard II., son of the
favourite Black Prince, and the accession of Henry IV., the first of the
Lancastrian dynasty.
When Henry, son of the famous Duke of Lancaster, the friend and patron
of Wycliffe, ascended the throne, the Lollards naturally expected a warm
supporter of their principles in the new king. But in this they were
bitterly disappointed. Archbishop Arundel, the implacable enemy of the
Lollards, had great influence with Henry. He had contributed more than all
other adherents to the overthrow of Richard and to the usurpation of
Henry. Arundel had great influence, was high-born, haughty, unscrupulous
as a partisan, skillful as a politician, and withal, practiced in the cunning
and cruelty peculiar to the priesthood. He had made up his mind, through
the influence of the king, to sacrifice the Lollards. Almost the first act of
Henry IV. was to declare himself the champion of the clergy, the monks,
and the friars, against their dangerous enemies.

THE STATUTE FOR THE BURNING OF HERETICS

Down to the beginning of the fifteenth century there had been no statute
law in England for the burning of heretics. In all other parts of
Christendom the magistrate, as under the old Roman imperial law, had
obeyed the mandate of the bishops. England stood alone: without a legal
warrant no officer would have executed the ecclesiastical criminal. “In all
other countries,” says Milman, “the secular arm received the delinquent
against the law of the church. The judgment was passed in the
ecclesiastical court or that of the Inquisition; but the church, with a kind of
evasion which it is difficult to clear from hypocrisy, would not be stained
with blood. The clergy commanded, and that under the most awful threats,
the fire to be lighted and the victim tied to the stake by others, and
acquitted themselves of the cruelty of burning their fellow-creatures.” But
the end of this honorable distinction for England was come. The
obsequious Henry, to gratify the archbishop, issued a royal edict, ordering
every incorrigible heretic to be burnt alive. The lying tongues of the priests
and friars had so industriously circulated reports of the wild and
 730
revolutionary purposes of the Lollards, that Parliament became alarmed
and sanctioned the King’s decree.
In the year 1400 “the burning of heretics” became a statute law in England.
“On a high place in public, before the face of the people, the incorrigible
heretic is to be burnt alive.” The primate and the bishops hastened to their
work.
William Sautree is the first victim under this terrible edict. He is the
proto-martyr of Wycliffism. He was a preacher at St. Osyth’s in London.
Through natural fear of suffering he had recanted and again relapsed at
Norwich; but afterwards, coming to London, and gaining more strength of
mind through faith, he openly preached the gospel, and testified against
transubstantiation. He was now doomed to the flames as a relapsed
heretic. “The ceremony of his degradation,” says the historian, “took place
at St. Paul’s, with all its minute, harassing, impressive formalities. He was
then delivered over to the secular arm, and for the first time the air of
London was darkened by the smoke of this kind of human sacrifice.”
The second victim of this sanguinary edict was a plain working man. His
crime was a common one among the Lollards — the denial of
transubstantiation. This poor man, John Badby, was brought from
Worcester to London to stand his trial. But what must the plain country-
man have thought, when he found himself before the dignified tribunal of
the archbishops of Canterbury and York, the bishops of London,
Winchester, Oxford, Norwich, Salisbury, Bath, Bangor, St. David’s,
Edmund Duke of York, the Chancellor, and the Master of the Rolls?
Arundel took great pains to persuade him that the consecrated bread was
really and properly the body of Christ. Badby’s answers were given with
courage and firmness, and in words of simplicity and plain sense. He said
that he would believe “the omnipotent God in Trinity,” and said,
moreover, “if every host being consecrated at the altar were the Lord’s
body, that then there be twenty thousand gods in England. But he believed
in one God omnipotent.” This incorrigible heretic was condemned to be
burnt alive by these wolves, or rather fiends, in sheep’s clothing. The
Prince of Wales chanced to be passing through Smithfield just as the fire
was kindling, or he came on purpose to witness the auto da fe. He looked
on the calm inflexible martyr; but on the first sensation of the fire, he heard
 731
the word, “Mercy” fall from his lips. The prince, supposing that he was
entreating the mercy of his judges, ordered him to be pulled out of the fire.
“Will you forsake heresy?” said young Henry; “will you conform to the
faith of holy mother church? If you will, you shall have a yearly
maintenance out of the King’s treasury.” The martyr was unmoved. It was
to the mercy of God, not of man, that he was appealing. Henry, in a rage,
ordered him to be thrust back into the blazing faggots, and he gloriously
finished his course in the flames.

THE CONSTITUTIONS OF ARUNDEL

Encouraged by the royal countenance, the clergy drew up the well-known
Constitutions of Arundel, which forbade the reading of the Bible and the
books of Wycliffe, asserting the pope to be “not of pure man, but of true
God, here on the earth.” Persecution now raged in England; a prison in the
archiepiscopal palace at Lambeth, which received the name of the Lollards’
tower, was crowded with the followers of Wycliffe. But there was a
prisoner in the royal chamber as well as in the Lollards’ tower. Death, the
messenger of divine judgment to the unpardoned, had come. In the year
1413 Henry IV. died. “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this
the judgment.” These two dark and heavy clouds — death and judgment
— were now ready to burst in all their fury on the unsheltered soul of the
persecuting monarch. His last years were darkened by a loathsome disease
— eruptions in his face. But oh! what must his future be! Darkened not
merely by a temporal disease, which divine mercy restrains within certain
limits, but with the full vengeance of eternal woe; and darkened and
deepened still more by the fearful shadows of the burning piles in
Smithfield. Oh death, oh judgment, oh eternity, great, terrible and certain!
How is it, why is it, that man, in whose very nature this solemn truth is
deeply planted, should be so forgetful and so regardless?
One thing is certain with regard to future judgment and retribution, that
even where such doctrines are not expressly denied, they are not made to
occupy in the pulpit and in the press, the place which they hold in the
New Testament. There is a very general disinclination to press, in the
plain way of scripture, these most awful subjects. Yet it cannot be denied
that the discourses of our blessed Lord — whose mission was love, the
tenderest compassion, the richest grace — abound with the most solemn
 732
statements of future judgment. Some may say, that the fear of punishment
is a comparatively low motive: be it so, but how many there are who have
immortal souls, whose intelligence is such that they are not raised above
such motives! God is wiser than man; and we so find with the fullest
revelations of divine love, and the freest proclamations of salvation, the
most solemn warnings are given. Listen to one:
“Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way,
when His wrath is kindled but a little. (Psalm 2)
Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him.” (Matthew 11:20-30.)
We now return to our history.
The witness of the execution of John Badby is now on the throne under
the title of Henry V. But it is to be feared that the triumphs of divine
grace in that simple artisan made no salutary impression on his mind. Few
princes have had a worse character before they reached the throne and it
was hoped that, having no religion, he would not be the slave of the
hierarchy. But in this the Lollards were again bitterly disappointed. When
he became king, he became religious according to the ideas of the time; and
that was, to signalise his orthodoxy by suppressing heresy. Thomas
Netter, a Carmelite, one of the bitterest opponents of Wycliffism, was his
confessor. Under his influence the laws against heretics were now
rigorously executed.

THE TRIAL OF LORD COBHAM

The victims, under this fresh outbreak of persecution, were of all classes;
but the most distinguished for character and for rank was Sir John
Oldcastle, who, in right of his wife, sat in parliament as Lord Cobham. He
is spoken of as a knight of the highest military reputation, and who had
served with great distinction in the French wars. The whole ardor of his
soul was now thrown into his religion. He was a Wycliffite — a believer in
the word of God, a reader of Wycliffe’s books, and a violent opposer of
popery. He had caused numerous copies of the reformer’s writings to be
made, and encouraged the poor priests to circulate them, and to preach the
gospel throughout the country. And so long as Henry IV. lived he was
unmolested; the King would not permit the clergy to lay hands on his old
 733
favourite. But the young King had not the same appreciation of Sir John,
though he knew something of his value as a brave soldier and a skillful
general, and wished to save him.
The primate Arundel had been watching narrowly the movements of his
antagonist, and resolved to crush him. He was accused of holding many
heretical opinions, and on the ground of these crimes he was denounced to
the King. He was summoned to appear and answer before Henry. Cobham
protested the most submissive loyalty. “You I am most prompt and
willing to obey: you are a christian king, the minister of God, that bears
not the sword in vain, for the punishment of wicked doers, and the reward
of the righteous. To you, under God, I owe my whole obedience.
Whatsoever you command me in the name of the Lord that I am ready to
fulfill. To the pope I owe neither suit nor service; he is the great antichrist,
the son of perdition, the abomination of desolation in the holy place.”
Henry thrust aside Cobham’s hand as he presented his confession of faith:
“I will not receive this paper: lay it before your judges.” Lord Cobham
retired to his strong castle of Cowling, near Rochester. The summonses
and the excommunications of the archbishop he treated with utter
contempt. The King was influenced to send one of his officers to
apprehend him. The loyalty of the old baron bowed to the royal officer.
Had it been any of the pope’s agents, he would have settled the question
with his sword according to the military spirit of the age, rather than have
obeyed. He was led to the Tower. Ill-omened journey for nearly all who
ever went that way!
The ecclesiastical tribunal, such as John Badby stood before, was sitting at
St. Paul’s. The prisoner appeared. “We must believe,” said Arundel,
“what the holy church of Rome teaches, without demanding Christ’s
authority.” He was called upon to confess his errors. “Believe!” shouted
the priests, “believe!... I am willing to believe all that God desires,” said Sir
John; “but that the pope should have authority to teach what is contrary
to scripture, I never will believe.” He was led back to the Tower. Two
days after he was tried again in the Dominican convent. A crowd of
priests, canons, friars, clerks, and indulgence-sellers, thronged the large hall
of the convent, and attacked the prisoner with abusive language. The
suppressed indignation of the old veteran at length burst out into a wild
prophetic denunciation of the pope and the prelates. “Your wealth is the
 734
venom of the church,” he cried with a loud voice. “What meanest thou,”
said Arundel, “by venom?... Your possessions and your lordships...
Consider ye this, all men. Christ was meek and merciful; the pope haughty
and a tyrant. Rome is the nest of anti-christ; out of that nest come his
disciples.” He was now adjudged a heretic and condemned.
Resuming his calm courage, he fell on his knees, and lifting up his hands
unto heaven, exclaimed: “I confess to thee, O God! and acknowledge that
in my frail youth I seriously offended Thee by my pride, anger,
intemperance, and impurity: for these offenses I implore Thy mercy!”
With mild language, but with a stern and inflexible purpose, the wily priest
endeavored to reduce the high spirit of the baron, but in vain. “I will none
otherwise believe than what I have told you. Do with me what you will.
For breaking God’s commandments man has never cursed me, but for
breaking your traditions I and others are thus cruelly entreated.” He was
reminded that the day was passing, that he must either submit to the
church or the law must take its course. “I ask not your absolution: it is
God’s only that I need.” said the honest knight, his face still wet with
tears. The sentence of death was then read by Arundel with a clear and
loud voice, all the priests and people standing with their heads uncovered.
“It is well,” replied the intrepid Cobham, “though you condemn my body,
you have no power over my soul.” He again knelt down and prayed for his
enemies. He was led back to the Tower; but before the day appointed for
his execution he made his escape.
Rumors of conspiracies, of a general rising of the Lollards, were now
circulated by the priests and friars. The King became alarmed; about forty
persons were instantly put on trial and executed; a new and violent statute
was passed for the suppression of the Lollards; the government was afraid
of such a man as Cobham heading the insurrection; a thousand marks was
offered for his arrest. It does not appear that there was any ground for
these alarms, except in the lies of the priests — their false rumors. For
about three years Lord Cobham was concealed in Wales. He was retaken in
December 1417, and suffered without delay.
 735
THE MARTYRDOM OF LORD COBHAM
The once valiant knight, the man whom the King honored, was now
ignominiously dragged on a hurdle to St. Gile’s-in-the-Fields, and there
suffered a double execution. He was suspended on a gallows over a slow
fire, and then burned to death. Many persons of rank and distinction were
present. Before his execution he fell on his knees and implored forgiveness for his
enemies. He then addressed the multitude, exhorting them to follow the
instructions which God had given them in His holy word; and to disclaim those
false teachers, whose lives and conversation were so contrary to Christ and His
example. He refused the services of a priest: “To God only, now as ever present,
I confess and entreat His pardon,” was his ready answer. The people wept and
prayed with him and for him. In vain did the priests affirm that he was suffering
as a heretic, and as an enemy to God. The people believed in him. His last words,
drowned by the crackling of flames, were “Praise God;” and, in his chariot of fire,
surrounded by the angels of God, he joined on high the noble army of martyrs.
How sweet the song of victory
That ends the battle’s roar;
And sweet the weary warrior’s rest
When all his toils are o’er.

The London prisons at this time were filled with Wycliffites, awaiting the
vengeance of the persecuting clergy. “They should be hanged on the
King’s account, and burned on God’s account,” was the cry of the false
priests of Rome. From this time until the Reformation their sufferings
were severe. Those who escaped prison and death, were compelled to hold
their religious meetings in secret. But the papal influence gradually
decreased and prepared the way for the Reformation in the next century.
Henry Chicheley, who succeeded Arundel as Archbishop of Canterbury,
not only followed in his footsteps, but exceeded him in his exterminating
wars against the Lollards. He is called by Milner “the firebrand of his age.”
He urged on Henry in his contest with France, which caused an enormous
loss of human life and the most dreadful miseries to both kingdoms.
Arundel seems to have died by the hand of the Lord. Soon after he read the
sentence of death on Lord Cobham, he was seized with a malady in the
throat, of which he died. But here we leave them, and follow the Spirit of
God who is working in other lands and preparing the way for a glorious
Reformation in Europe.10
 736

CHAPTER 31
THE REFORMATION MOVEMENT IN BOHEMIA

It is truly satisfactory to know, that the blessed soul-saving truths of the

gospel, which had been taught by Wycliffe and his followers, were already
producing results of a wide and lasting importance: that in spite of all the
burnings and slayings of Rome, they were sinking deep into the hearts of
thousands and hundreds of thousands, and spreading in nearly all parts of
Europe. The Bishop of Lodi in the council of Constance, A .D . 1416 — a
year before the martyrdom of Cobham, and thirty-six years after the
translation of the Bible — declared that the heresies of Wycliffe and Huss
were spread over England, France, Italy, Hungary, Russia, Lithuania,
Poland, Germany, and through all Bohemia. Thus a bitter enemy is
unconsciously, or unintentionally, the witness of the influence and the
unextinguishable vitality of the good seed of the word of God.
But here it will be necessary to clear our way by saying a few words on
the great papal schism, before tracing the broad silver line of God’s grace
in the testimony and martyrdom of Huss and Jerome.

THE COUNCIL OF PISA

At the commencement of the fifteenth century, the Roman Catholic church
had two heads — two rival popes, Benedict XIII. at Avignon, and
Gregory XII. at Rome. Each claimed to be the representative of Christ on
earth, and each accused the other before the world of falsehood, perjury,
and the most nefarious secret designs. So scandalous was the conduct of
these two old gray-headed prelates each above seventy years of age, that
all Europe beheld with shame and indignation the obstinacy and
wickedness of the contending pontiffs. What was to be done, that the
wounds of the divided church might be healed? Kings and cardinals began
to use both force and entreaty to induce both popes to resign their claims
that one might be unanimously chosen in their stead. They promised,
under oath, that they would voluntarily resign if the interests of the church
 737
should require it; but they had no sooner promised than they dissembled,
deceived their cardinals, and violated their pledges. Finding that no
dependence could be placed on their word, that they were men without
truth, honor, or religion, the cardinals of Benedict revolted and joined the
cardinals of Gregory, and the two colleges assembled at Leghorn to
consider what could be done to put an end to this long and disgraceful
schism. They came to the conclusion that, under the circumstances, they
had an undoubted right to convoke a council which might judge between
the two competitors for the popedom, and restore the church to its unity.
Pisa, a walled city in central Italy, was selected as the most suitable place
for the proposed council. This was an entirely new thing in Christendom.
About a dozen cardinals, without the sanction of pope or emperor, called
together the famous Council of Pisa. His infallibility was now made
amenable to a new tribunal, and the highest prerogative of his throne
usurped; but he had so lost the respect of mankind that the whole church
justified the cardinals in assuming power over him.
The council was opened on the 25th of March, 1409. The assembly was
one of the most august and numerous ever seen in the history of
Christendom. We will give a few details to show the youthful reader what
an Ecumenical Council was in those days when Roman Catholicism was
the religion of Europe. There were present twenty-two cardinals; the Latin
patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Grade; twelve
archbishops were present in person, and fourteen by their proctors; eighty
bishops, and the proctors of one hundred and two; eighty-seven abbots,
and the proctors of two hundred others; besides priors; generals of orders;
the grand master of Rhodes, with sixteen commanders; the prior-general of
the knights of the holy sepulcher; the deputy of the grand master and
knight of the Teutonic Order; the deputies to the Universities of Oxford,
Cambridge, Paris, Florence, Cracow, Vienna, Prague, and many others;
more than three hundred doctors of theology; and ambassadors from the
Kings of England, France, Portugal, Bohemia, Sicily, Poland, and Cyprus;
from the Dukes of Burgundy, Brabant, etc. Roads and rivers in all
directions were covered for weeks with the pomp and splendor of these
dignitaries. Some of them entered Pisa with two hundred horses in their
train.1
 738
The assembly continued its sittings from March till August. After much
deliberation in due form, the contesting popes were unanimously
condemned. On the 5th of June sentence was passed. Both were declared
to be heretical, perjured, contumacious, prohibited from assuming any
longer the sovereign pontificate, and unworthy of any honor: the papacy
was declared vacant. The next step was to elect a new pope. This was a
more difficult matter. Where is the man, possessing such qualities, as will
win back the reverence of mankind for the supreme pontiff? was now the
grave question. Twenty-four cardinals, after being shut up for ten days,
decided upon Peter of Candia, Cardinal of Milan, seventy years of age,
who took the name of Alexander V. But the two old pontiffs despised the
decrees of the council, and continued to perform their functions as
legitimate popes. Benedict fulminated his anathemas against the council
and against his rivals; Gregory did the same, having entered into an alliance
with the ambitious Ladislaus, King of Naples; Alexander, who was still
without the chair and the patrimony of St. Peter, issued his anathemas and
excommunications against Benedict, Gregory, and Ladislaus, who had
taken possession of the dominions of the Roman See.
Murmurs were now heard in all quarters that the council, instead of
extinguishing the schism, had but added a third pope. Where is now the
boasted unity of the Roman Catholic church? we may inquire; and through
which pope does apostolic succession flow? The three popes, of whom
Christendom was ashamed and weary, fiercely assailed each other with
reciprocal excommunications, reproaches, and anathemas. Alexander V.
lived only about a year, and his place was filled by John XXIII., a man,
says Mosheim, destitute of principle and piety. The difficulties were
greater than ever; the papal kingdom thus divided against itself could not
stand; it was on the eve of total ruin. Some advised that the European
powers should unite and sweep away the name and power of the pontiff,
or at least limit his autocracy. It was now manifest that the popes
themselves would make no personal sacrifice for the peace of the church;
so what next could be done to arrest the disgraceful war of the pontiffs and
heal the wounds of the divided church, was now the perplexing question.
Had the church been left it itself, Ladislaus might then have taken
complete possession of Rome and all the papal provinces, and left the
chair of St. Peter a throne in name only. But the princes of the earth were
 739
not yet prepared for such a sacrilegious overthrow. It awaited the days of
Victor Emmanuel.
Sigismund, Emperor of Germany, the King of France, and other kings
and princes of Europe, who showed more concern for the credit and
welfare of the church than the selfish popes, prevailed on John XXIII. to
assemble a general council of the whole church, for the purpose of bringing
to a close this great controversy.

THE COUNCIL OF CONSTANCE

Constance, an imperial city on the German side of the Alps, was agreed
upon as a suitable place for the gathering of such an assembly. It was
accessible from all parts of the world, and provisions could be more easily
obtained by means of its spacious lake. So great was the influx of persons,
that it was reckoned that not less than thirty thousand horses were
brought to Constance, which may give us some idea of the enormous
concourse of people; and the ship-loads of provisions that would be
required. Besides ecclesiastical dignitaries of every name innumerable,
there were more than a hundred princes; one hundred and eight counts;
two hundred barons; and twenty-seven knights. Tournaments, feasts, and
various amusements were arranged by way of relief from their spiritual
occupations; five hundred minstrels were in attendance to beguile the
vacant hours of these holy priests and noblemen, and to soothe their
anxious minds; they had come together for the avowed purpose of healing
the almost deadly wound of antichrist; but what are the facts of history?
For the space of three years and a half — commencing November 5th,
1414 — these dissolute men filled the quiet ancient city of Constance with
their unblushing wickedness. To write that which was then open as day
would defile the pages of our history. The heart shudders as we think of
the pollution, the daring impiety and hypocrisy, of these so-called holy
fathers, to say nothing of their remorseless cruelty in the burning of Huss
and Jerome.
The object of this great council was twofold.
1, To put an end to the schism which had afflicted the church for so
many years.
 740
2, For the suppression of the herestes of Wycliffe and Huss.
The first of these objects was so far satisfactorily accomplished. Having
established that a pontiff is subject to a council of the whole church, John
XXIII. was deposed on account of the irregularities of his life, and the
violation of his oath to the Emperor. Gregory and Benedict were again
deposed; and Otho de Colonna was elected pontiff, and assumed the name
of Martin V.
The doctrines of Wycliffe, which John Huss and his followers were
accused of propagating in the cities and villages of Bohemia, even in the
University of Prague, were most offensive to the members of the council,
and now engaged their attention.

THE SPREAD OF THE TRUTH

The marriage of Anne of Bohemia to Richard II. of England had brought
the two countries into close connection, just at the moment when the
doctrines of Wycliffe were making their most rapid progress. “Bohemian
scholars,” says Milman, “sat at the feet of the bold professor of theology
at Oxford; English students were found at Prague. The writings of
Wycliffe were thus brought into Germany in great numbers, some in Latin,
some translated into Bohemian, and disseminated by admiring partizans.”
The princess, whose pious exercises and study of the scriptures have been
commemorated by preachers and historians, had been first affected by the
reforming movement in her own land. She brought with her to England
versions of the Gospels in the German and Bohemian tongues as well as in
Latin. These were then precious treasures to one of her piety and love for
the pure word of God; but they also show us, though indirectly, the
progress which the new doctrines were making in Germany at that early
period.
One of her first acts in this country shows the power of the grace of
Christ in her heart, and presents a striking contrast to the persecuting
spirit of Jezebel. “Some days after the marriage of the royal pair,” says
Miss Strickland, “they returned to London, and the coronation of the
Queen was performed most magnificently. At the young Queen’s earnest
request a general pardon was granted by the King at her consecration. The
afflicted people stood in need of this respite, as the executions, since Wat
 741
Tyler’s insurrection, had been bloody and barbarous beyond all precedent.
The land was reeking with the blood of the unhappy peasantry, when the
humane intercession of the gentle Anne of Bohemia put a stop to the
executions. This mediation obtained for Richard’s bride the title of ‘The
good Queen Anne;’ and years, instead of impairing the popularity,
usually so evanescent in England, only increased the esteem felt by her
subjects for this beneficent princess.”
How truly refreshing to meet with such an instance of consistent piety at
such a period, and in such a station of life! But there were many such at
that time in Bohemia and other lands. After the death of Anne, her
Bohemian attendants returned to their own country, and carried with them
the valuable writings of John Wycliffe. These had been studied by many
foreigners at Oxford, and they were now diligently read by the members of
the university of Prague.
The most famous of these doctors was John Huss, or John of Hassinetz,
a village near the Bavarian frontier. He was born about the year 1369, so
that he must have been about fifteen years of age when his admired and
acknowledged teacher, the venerable Wycliffe, died. It is interesting to look
back and contemplate the ways of our God in His care for the maintenance
and spread of the truth. Who then could have thought, that in an obscure
village in Bohemia, He was raising up and qualifying a noble witness, who
was to bear, in his turn, “the torch of truth, and to transmit it with a
martyr’s hand to a long succession of witnesses — and he was worthy of
the heavenly office?”2 He was early distinguished, we are informed, by the
force and acuteness of his understanding, the modesty and gravity of his
demeanor, and the irreproachable austerity of his life. He was tall, slender,
with a thoughtful countenance; gentle, friendly, and accessible to all. His
talents being of a high order, he was sent to the university of Prague, with
the view of studying for the church. Here he distinguished himself by his
extensive attainments as a scholar. He advanced rapidly in church and
university preferments, and was made confessor to the Queen Sophia. He
was also appointed preacher in the university chapel, called Bethlehem —
the house of bread — on account of the spiritual food which was there to
be distributed in the vernacular tongue.
 742
This gave the bold and eloquent preacher an excellent opportunity for
unfolding the word of God to the people in their mother-tongue; and we
doubt not that he did so, for he was a sincere Christian and a true witness
for Christ. But like most, if not all reformers, he may have been more
anxious at first to preach against prevailing abuses than to instruct the
people in the pure truth of God. We are convinced that this has generally
been the case, and in all kinds of reform, and must account for many
scenes of violence in the best of causes. If the people were led, first of all,
through the blessing of God, to receive the truth, especially the truth as it
is in Jesus, the end would be gained without the mind being inflamed by
hearing denounced in strong language the vices of their priestly
oppressors. The pride, luxury, and licentiousness of the whole clerical
system had become intolerable to mankind; so that to condemn the abuses
without touching the doctrines of the church was the high road to
popularity.
God is wiser than men; and if we are guided by His word, we shall seek to
lead the ignorant to love the truth and follow it; rather than create in their
minds a hatred for error, which, without the knowledge of Christ, is sure
to end in revolutionary excitement and disaster. This divine principle is
applicable to the smallest disputes as well as the greatest among men. It is
always better to enlighten than to agitate.
“The servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all
men, apt to teach, patient. In meekness instructing those that
oppose themselves; if God peradventure will give them repentance
to the acknowledging of the truth; and that they may recover
themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by
him at his will.” (2 Timothy 2:24-26.)

CIVIL COMMOTIONS
Good man as John Huss was, he had overlooked the wholesome advice of
the apostle. He first became involved in a university quarrel as to the
privileges of the students; and again his opposition to Gregory XII. gave
great offense to the archbishop of Bohemia, who sided with the anti-pope.
Prohibitory decrees were issued against Huss, but, being a great favorite at
court and with the people, nothing was done. He was allowed to continue
 743
his preaching in the vernacular language. But in a few short months
circumstances arose which kindled anew the flames of religious contention
in Bohemia.
Among the first acts of John XXIII. was to send forth his emissaries to
preach a crusade against Ladislaus, King of Naples, and to offer the usual
indulgences. The vendors of these indulgences, while haranguing the
people about the value of their wares, were interrupted and exposed to
insult and outrage. The magistrates interfered; some of the rioters were
seized and privately executed; but the blood which flowed from the prison
into the street betrayed the fate of the prisoners. Women dipped their
handkerchiefs in the blood to treasure it as a precious relic; the passions of
the multitude were stirred to the uttermost; the town-house was stormed;
the headless bodies of these young men were carried off by the people,
and borne in solemn procession to the various churches, chanting holy
anthems. They were at length buried in the chapel of Bethlehem, with the
aromatic offerings usually deposited on the tombs of martyrs. The three
young men were now spoken of in sermons and writings as saints and
martyrs, and the fermentation increased.
John Huss, knowing that he was suspected and accused of being the prime
mover in the whole affair, wisely withdrew for a time from the city. He
was summoned, but without effect, to appear before the tribunal of the
Vatican. Huss was now declared to be under the ban of excommunication,
and the place of his residence to be under the papal interdict. Regardless of
these church censures, he continued preaching all over the country. The
minds of the people being already greatly excited were easily aroused to
the greatest indignation against the clergy. Nearly the whole of the
kingdom was on his side, at least as against the abuses of the hierarchy.

THE IMPRISONMENT OF JOHN HUSS

The agitation which these events had produced was not allayed when the
Council of Constance assembled. The emperor Sigismund, who had
convened the council, requested his brother the king, Wenceslaus, to send
Huss to Constance, and promised him a safe-conduct. The terms of this
passport were very explicit; it required all the emperor’s subjects to allow
the doctor to pass and repass in full security. Huss readily obeyed the
 744
emperor’s summons, as he had always desired the opportunity of
appealing to a general council. He arrived in Constance earlier than the
emperor, and was immediately brought before the pope, John XXIII., for
examination. His doctrines were well known; a long list of charges was
brought against him; and as he refused to retract them, he was thrown into
prison on a charge of heresy, notwithstanding the safe-conduct of the
emperor. And in order to justify their flagrant breach of honor and pacify
Sigismund, they passed a decree that no faith ought to be kept with a
heretic.
Loud complaints were sent to the emperor from Bohemia. He received the
first intimation of the imprisonment of Huss with indignation, and
threatened to break open the prison. But on reaching Constance he was
plied with arguments from the canon law, urging that the civil power did
not extend to the protection of a heretic; and the treacherous priests
absolved him from all responsibility. He now allowed the enemies of Huss
to take their course. In the gloom of a loathsome dungeon, without a breath
of fresh air, and harassed by priests and monks, the reformer became very
ill. But the deluded emperor cared for none of these things. Historians,
however, have not been wanting who utterly condemn the faithless
conduct of the emperor, and charge him with having violated truth, honor,
and humanity, in surrendering Huss to the will of the priests. “Breach of
faith,” says Milman, “admits of no excuse; and perfidy is twice perfidious
in an emperor.” Others affirm that in thus sacrificing Huss, he heaped up
for himself many troubles which came upon him during the remainder of
his reign. But what shall we say of the future — of the dark future under
the fearful shadow of that heartless abandonment of a true servant of
Christ to the merciless priests of Rome? The Master will not forget to
own in that day His identification with His servant, and that in the most
touching way — “Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it
unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” But
if such be the guilt of the emperor, what must be the guilt of the pope and
the prelates? We must leave the answer to the great white throne.
Already the most gloomy forebodings were gathering around the pope. In
the first session of the council, it was proposed that the three popes
should resign, prior to the election of a new pontiff. John, the only one
of the three present, promised to resign for the peace of the church, and to
 745
read his own abdication the following day. But promises, or oaths, or
honor, were nothing to John. By the. assistance of some friends he
escaped from Constance in the disguise of a postillion. The emperor was
betrayed and indignant. There was a hot pursuit after John; he was caught
in Switzerland and brought back a prisoner; but unlike his victim, Huss, he
was conscience-stricken, without honor, without dignity, without courage.
He was now compelled to give up the insignia of universal spiritual power,
the papal seal, and the fisherman’s ring. Robert Hallam, bishop of
Salisbury, at the head of the English, in a burst of righteous indignation,
declared that a pope so covered with crime deserved to be burned at the
stake. He was taken to the castle of Gotleben, where the good John Huss
had been pining in irons for some months. There pope John languished till
the close of the session, which was nearly four years; but, after humbling
himself at the feet of the reigning pontiff, he was raised to the rank of a
cardinal, and permitted to close his days in peace. But no such leniency
was exercised towards the righteous and blameless Reformer, whose
examination and execution we will now briefly trace.

THE EXAMINATION OF JOHN HUSS

In the first movement against Huss, the archbishop of Prague instituted a
vigilant search for the translations of Wycliffe’s writings; and having
collected about two hundred volumes, many of them richly bound and
decorated with precious ornaments, he caused them to be publicly burnt in
the market-place at Prague. Much was said as to the identity of the
doctrines of Huss with those of Wycliffe, which the council condemned as
heretical under forty-five propositions; and decreed that his bones should
be taken out of their grave and burned. Huss was also charged with being
“infected with the leprosy of the Waldenses.” Under these two general
heads, Wyeliffism and Waldensianism, a vast number of special charges,
grossly offensive to the hierarchy, were contained.
The council, although bent on the destruction of Huss, would willingly
have avoided the scandal of a public examination. Certain passages which
his enemies had extracted from his writings were thought sufficient for his
condemnation without a public hearing. Accordingly, he was continually
harassed and persecuted in his cell by private visits, urging him to retract
or confess; and not unfrequently taunted and insulted. He remonstrated
 746
against this inquisitorial secrecy, and demanded for his defense an audience
of the whole council. His faithful friend, John of Chlum, with other
Bohemian noblemen, requested the emperor to interfere, and with his
assistance the object of the fathers was defeated, and a public trial was
obtained.
On the 5th of June, 1415, John Huss was brought in chains into the great
senate of Christendom. The charges against him were read. But when he
proposed to maintain his doctrines by the authority of the scriptures and
the testimony of the Fathers, his voice was drowned in a tumult of
contempt and derision. The assembly was compelled to adjourn its
proceedings. Two days after he was brought up again, and Sigismund
himself attended to preserve order.
The accusers of Huss were numerous, though less clamorous than the
previous day. With the exception of two or three Bohemian noblemen, the
reformer stood alone. He was greatly exhausted by illness, and enfeebled
by long confinement, but his noble spirit refused to bend before the
violence of his persecutors. He answered with great calmness and dignity,
“I will not retract unless you can prove what I have said to be contrary to
the word of God,” was his usual reply. When charged with having
preached Wycliffite doctrines, he admitted that he had said, “Wycliffe was
a true believer, that his soul was now in heaven, that he could not wish his
own soul more safe than Wycliffe’s.” This confession drew forth a burst
of contemptuous laughter from the reverend fathers; and, after some hours
of turbulent discussion, Huss was removed, and the assembly broke up; he
went to his prison, and they, at least many of them, to their scenes of
grossest dissipation.

THE COUNCIL EMBARRASSED

The following day Huss stood a third time before the council. Thirty-nine
propositions were produced and read, alleging errors which he had
advanced in his writings, his preachings, and his private conversations.
Huss, like most reformers, held the doctrine of salvation by grace without
works of law. He affirmed that none were members of the true church of
Christ whatever their dignity, whether popes or cardinals, if they were
ungodly. “True faith in the word of God,” he said, “is the foundation of all
 747
virtues.” He appealed to the honored name of Augustine on these points;
and maintained that the only title of churchman, prelate, or pope to
apostolic succession was to possess the virtues of the apostles. “The
pontiff who lives not the life of St. Peter is no vicar of Christ, but the
forerunner of antichrist.” He quoted a sentence from St. Bernard which
gave great weight to this solemn saying: “The slave of avarice is the
successor not of St. Peter, but of Judas Iscariot.” The council was
embarrassed, as no churchman would venture to turn into ridicule the
sayings of such honored Fathers.
The propositions treated chiefly of two things: —
1, The false theology of Rome — Huss had denounced the popish
doctrine of salvation by works, in the many ways which the church
prescribes;
2, The false ecclesiastical system of popery with its glaring abuses —
these he exposed and condemned in the most unsparing terms.
But his condemnation seems to have hinged on his boldly maintaining that
no office, king or priest, availed in God’s sight, if the king or the priest
lived in mortal sin. When interrogated on this point by the cardinal of
Cambray, who saw his perilous position in the presence of the emperor;
Huss repeated his words aloud — “A king in mortal sin is no king before
God.” These words sealed his fate. “There never lived,” said Sigismund, “a
more pernicious heretic.” “What!” exclaimed the cardinal, “art thou not
content with degrading the ecclesiastical power? wouldst thou thrust kings
from their thrones?” “A man,” argued another cardinal, “may be a true
pope, prelate, or king, though not a true Christian.” “Why, then,” said
Huss, “have you deposed John XXIII.?” The emperor answered, “For his
notorious misdeeds.” Huss was now guilty of another sin — discomfiting
and perplexing his adversaries.
It would be tedious and uninteresting to notice all the false charges and
calumnies which were heaped upon him, and the firm answers which he
gave; but the following may be considered as the substance of his long
trial. He was vehemently pressed to retract his errors, to own the justice
of the accusations, to make unqualified submission to the decrees of the
council, to abjure all his opinions. But neither promises nor menaces
 748
moved him. “To abjure,” he said, “is to renounce an error that has been
held. As to the opinions imputed to me, which I have never held, those I
cannot retract; as to those which I do indeed profess, I am ready to retract
them q to renounce them with all my heart — when I shall be better
instructed by the council.” The fathers replied to the conscientious
integrity of their victim, “The province of the council is not to instruct but
to decide, to command obedience to its decisions or to enforce the
penalty.” The tender shepherds of Constance now loudly demanded a
universal retraction, or to burn alive the atrocious heretic. The emperor
condescended to argue with him; the most able and subtle of the doctors,
both in philosophy and theology, reasoned with him; but Huss replied
with firm humility that he sought instruction; that he could not abjure
errors of which he was not convinced. He was carried back to prison; the
faithful Bohemian knight — John of Chlum — a true Onesiphorus —
followed to console his worn and weary friend. “Oh, what a comfort to
me,” said Huss, “to see that this nobleman did not disdain to stretch out
his arm to a poor heretic in irons, whom all the world, as it were, had
forsaken.”

THE JUDGMENT OF SIGISMUND

The court being cleared of the prisoner, the emperor rose and said, “You
have heard the charges against Huss, some confessed by himself, some
proved by trustworthy witnesses. In my judgment each of these crimes is
deserving of death. If he does not forswear all his errors, he must be
burned...the evil must be extirpated root and branch; if any of his partizans
are in Constance, they must be proceeded against with the utmost
severity, especially his disciple Jerome of Prague.” When Huss was
informed of the emperor’s judgment, he merely replied, “I was warned not
to trust to his safe-conduct. I have been under a sad delusion; he has
condemned me even before mine enemies.”
After this mockery of a trial and final audience, he was left in prison for
nearly a month. During this time, persons of the highest rank visited him
and entreated him to abjure the errors which were imputed to him. It was
hoped that, through increasing bodily infirmity and private importunity he
might be overcome. But not so. He who enabled him to stand firm before
public threatenings and insults was with him still. “If I abjure errors,” he
 749
said, “that were falsely laid to my charge, that would be nothing less than
perjury.” He regarded his fate as sealed, although all through his trial and
imprisonment he professed himself willing to renounce any opinion that
could be proved untrue from scripture. The real object of these private
solicitations on the part of the prelates was to shake his constancy, and
induce him to retract. With the view so beautifully expressed by
Waddington we entirely agree:
“Many individuals of various characters, but alike anxious to save
him from the last infliction, visited his prison, and pressed him
with a variety of motives and arguments; but they were all blunted
by the rectitude of his conscience and lhe singleness of his
purpose. One of his bitterest enemies, named Paletz, was among
the number; but though his counsels had been successful in
degrading the person of the reformer, they failed when they would
have seduced him to infamy.”
On the eve of the day destined for his execution, he was visited by his true
and faithful friend, John of Chlum — a name which is worthy to be
everywhere recorded with all honor — a name that stands almost alone for
christian feeling and virtue in that vast assembly of professedly christian
teachers, and that redeems our common humanity from treachery and
cruelty. “My dear master,” said the noble disciple, “I am unlettered, and
consequently unfit to counsel one so enlightened as you. Nevertheless, if
you are secretly conscious of any one of those errors which have been
publicly imputed to you, I do entreat you not to feel any shame in
retracting it; but if, on the contrary, you are convinced of your innocence, I
am so far from advising you to say anything against your conscience, that
I exhort you rather to endure every form of torture than to renounce
anything which you hold to be true.” Huss was greatly overcome by the
wise and affectionate counsel of his faithful friend, and replied with tears,
“That God was his witness how ready he had ever been, and still was, to
retract an oath, and with his whole heart, from the moment he should be
convinced of any error by evidence from holy scripture.”
It is perfectly evident from all history, that in the sufferings and the
fortitude of Huss there is no trace of pride or stubbornness. He was firm,
but he was humble; he expected death, he prepared to meet it, but never
 750
planned or schemed to escape it. “I have appealed,” he said, “to Jesus
Christ, the One all-powerful and all-just Judge; to Him I commit my cause,
who will judge every man, not according to false witnesses and erring
councils, but according to truth and man’s desert.” This was the crowning
act of his wickedness; the fatal hour was now come.

THE CONDEMNATION OF HUSS

On the morning of July 6th, 1415, the council met in the cathedral. Huss,
as a heretic, was detained in the porch while Mass was celebrated. The
bishop of Lodi preached from the text, “That the body of sin might be
destroyed.” (Romans 6:6.) It would be difficult to say, whether from gross
ignorance or malice he perverted the word of God to the purpose of the
council. It was a fierce declamation against herestes and errors, but chiefly
against Huss, who was pronounced to be as bad as Arius, and worse than
Sabellius. He closed with adulatory praise to the Emperor. “It is thy
glorious office to destroy herestes and schisms, especially this obstinate
heretic,” pointing to the prisoner, who was kneeling in an elevated place
and in fervent prayer. About thirty articles of accusation were read. Huss
frequently attempted to speak, but was not allowed. The sentence was
then passed: — “That for several years John Huss has seduced and
scandalized the people by the dissemination of many doctrines manifestly
heretical, and condemned by the church, especially those of John Wycliffe.
That he has obstinately trampled upon the keys of the church and the
ecclesiastical censures; that he has appealed to Jesus Christ as sovereign
judge, to the contempt of the ordinary judges of the church; and that such
an appeal was injurious, scandalous, and made in derision of ecclesiastical
authority. That he has persisted to the last in his errors, and even
maintained them in full council. It is therefore ordained that he be publicly
deposed and degraded from holy orders as an obstinate and incorrigible
heretic.” Huss prayed for the forgiveness of his enemies, which called
forth derision from some members of the council; but in the midst of it all
he lifted up his hands, and exclaimed, “Behold, most gracious Savior, how
the council condemns as an error what thou hast prescribed and practiced,
when, overborne by enemies, thou committedst thy cause to God thy
Father, leaving us this example, that when we are oppressed we may have
recourse to the judgment of God.” In his closing remarks he turned and
 751
looked steadily at Sigismund, and said, “I came to this council under the
public faith of the Emperor.” A deep blush passed over his face at this
sudden and unexpected rebuke.

THE DEGRADATION AND EXECUTION OF JOHN HUSS

The archbishop of Milan and six assisting bishops performed the
inglorious ceremony of degradation. Huss was clothed in priestly
garments, the sacramental cup was put into his hand, and he was led to the
high altar as if about to celebrate Mass. The devoted martyr calmly
observed, “that his Redeemer had been arrayed with royal robes in
mockery.” The bishops appointed then proceeded to the office of
degradation. He was stripped, one by one, of his sacred vestments, the
cup was taken from his hand, the tonsure was obliterated by the scissors,
a paper crown, daubed over with demons, was placed on his head, and
with the superscription, Heresiarch. The prelates then piously devoted
his soul to the regions of eternal woe. “Accursed Judas, who, having
forsaken the counsel of peace, art entered into that of the Jews, we take
this holy cup from thee, in which is the blood of Jesus Christ.” But God
stood by His faithful servant in a remarkable way, and enabled him to cry
aloud, “I trust, in the mercy of God, I shall drink of it this day in His
kingdom.” “We devote thy soul to the infernal demons,” said the prelates.
“But I,” said Huss, “commit my spirit into Thy hands, O Lord Jesus
Christ; unto Thee I commend my soul which Thou hast redeemed.”
In the most awfully solemn mockery and daring hypocrisy, the false
church thought to rid itself of the stain of blood by declaring Huss to be
cut off from the ecclesiastical body, released from the grasp of the church,
and consigned as a layman to the vengeance of the secular arm. The
Emperor now took charge of the outcast, and commanded his immediate
execution. The Elector Palatine, with eight hundred horse, and a great
multitude from the city, conducted the martyr to the stake. They stopped
before the bishop’s palace, where a heap of his books which had been
condemned by the council were burning. He only smiled at this feeble act
of vengeance. He endeavored to speak to the people and the imperial
guards in German, but the Elector prevented him and ordered him to be
burned. But nothing could disturb the peace of his mind: God was with
him. He chanted the psalms as he went along, and prayed with such
 752
fervor, that the people of the town said, “What this man has done, we
know not; but we hear him offer up most excellent prayers to God.” On
reaching the place of execution, he kneeled down, prayed for the
forgiveness of his enemies, and commended his soul into the hands of
Christ.
Even after Huss was tied to the stake, and the wood piled around him, the
Elector asked him if he would not now recant and save his life. He nobly
replied, “What I have written and taught was in order to rescue souls from
the power of the devil, and to deliver them from the tyranny of sin, and I
do gladly seal what I have written and taught with my blood.” The faggots
were then lighted; he remained firm and suffered with unshaken constancy,
but his sufferings were brief. The Lord permitted a rising volume of smoke
to suffocate his faithful martyr before the fire had scorched him. With the
last feeble accents of his voice he was heard singing the praise of Jesus
who died to save him. His ashes were carefully collected, and thrown into
the lake, but his happy soul was now with Jesus in the paradise of God.
The faithful piety of his affectionate followers tore up the earth from the
spot of his martyrdom, carried it to Bohemia, moistened it with their tears,
and preserved it as a relic of one whose name is never to be forgotten, but
ever to be loved.
Thus died, thus slept in Jesus, one of the true harbingers of the
Reformation. It is admitted by historians generally that he was one of the
most blameless and virtuous of men, that the records of his constancy are
not infected by a single stain of mere philosophical stoicism, or tainted by
vanity, in anticipating a martyr’s crown. But his death has affixed the
brand of eternal infamy on the council that condemned him, and on the
Emperor that betrayed him. His beloved friend and brother in Christ,
Jerome of Prague, soon followed him to his home and rest on high.

THE ARREST AND IMPRISONMENT OF JEROME

The news of the imprisonment of Huss greatly affected his friend and
fellow-laborer, Jerome of Prague. He followed him to the council; but being
warned by Huss of his danger, and finding that a safe-conduct could not be
obtained, he left for Bohemia; but he was arrested, and brought back to
Constance in chains. Immediately after his arrest, and laden with many
 753
chains, he was examined before a general congregation of the council. There
were many to accuse and taunt him; among them was the far-famed
Gerson of Paris. But the prisoner firmly declared that he was willing to lay
down his life in defense of the gospel he had preached. At the close of the
day he was remanded till the case of Huss was settled, and committed to
the care of the archbishop of Rigo. This cruel monster of a priest treated
him with great barbarity. Jerome was a master in theology, though a
layman, and a man of acknowledged piety, learning, and eloquence. The
body of this catholic christian gentleman, who held a high place in the
highest circles in Bohemia, was fastened to a tall upright beam, his head
left to hang down, his arms and his feet bound. Several months of weary
confinement, in chains, in darkness, on low diet, and none to comfort or
strengthen him! — his mind and spirit failed under his sufferings. He was
persuaded to make a full retraction of all errors against the Catholic faith,
especially those of Wycliffe and John Huss.
Poor Jerome! having abjured the opinions which had been imputed to
him, he was entitled to liberty; but there was neither feeling, faith, honor,
nor justice in the assembly. He was thrown back into prison under alleged
suspicions as to the sincerity of his recantations. This opened the eyes of
Jerome. God used it to the restoring of his soul. He bitterly repented his
recantation; communion with God was again enjoyed: he rejoiced once
more in the light of His countenance. Fresh charges were brought against
him, that he might be seduced to a deeper humiliation. But the locks of the
Nazarite had grown in his loathsome prison. At his final examination,
being allowed to speak for himself, he surprised his enemies by asserting
that his condemnation of Wycliffe and Huss was a sin which he deeply
repented. He began by calling upon God to govern his heart by His grace,
that his lips might advance nothing but what should conduce to the
blessing of his soul. “I am not ignorant,” he exclaimed, “that many
excellent men have been borne down by false witnesses, and unjustly
condemned.” He then ran down the long list of scripture, noticing such
cases as Joseph, Isaiah, Daniel, the prophets, John the Baptist, the blessed
Lord Himself, His apostles, and Stephen. He then dwelt on all the great
men of antiquity who had been the victims of false accusation, and who
had laid down their lives for the truth.
 754
The glowing eloquence of Jerome excited the wonder and admiration of his
enemies, especially when they considered that for three hundred and forty
days he had been immured in a dungeon. All his calm intrepidity had
returned, or rather, he now spoke in the power of the Holy Spirit. He
declared that no act of his life had caused him such remorse as his
cowardly abjuration. “This sinful retraction,” he exclaimed, “I now fully
retract, and am resolved to maintain the tenets of Wycliffe and Huss to
death, believing them to be the true and pure doctrines of the gospel, even
as their lives were blameless and holy.” No further proof of his heresy was
required — he was condemned as a relapsed heretic. The bishop of Lodi
was again called upon to preach the funeral sermon. His text was, “He
upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart,” applying it
especially to the incorrigible heretic before him. (Mark 16:14.) In reply
Jerome addressed the council, and said, “You have condemned me without
having convicted me of any crime; a sting will be left on your consciences,
a worm that shall never die. I appeal to the Supreme Judge, before whom
you must appear with me to answer for this day.” Poggius, a Roman
Catholic writer then present, declares, “Every ear was captivated, and
every heart touched; but the assembly was very unruly and indecent.”
Like Paul before Agrippa, Jerome was no doubt the happiest man in that
vast assembly. He was enjoying the promised presence of His blessed
Lord and Master.

THE EXECUTION OF JEROME

On the 30th of May, 1416, Jerome was delivered to the secular arm. The
council vainly thought that, by making the civil magistrate the executioner
of its unrighteous decrees, it would avoid the enduring stain of blood; but
God is not mocked. He hath said of the mother of harlots,
“And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of
all that were slain upon the earth.” (Revelation 18:24.)
There the God of judgment will find the blood of Huss and of Jerome.
Aeneas Sylvius, afterwards pope, in writing to a friend, says, “Jerome
went to the stake as to a joyful festival; and when the executioner would
have kindled the faggots behind his back, ‘Place the fire before me,’ he
exclaimed; ‘if I had dreaded it, I would have escaped it.’ Such was the end
 755
of a man incredibly excellent. I was an eye-witness to that catastrophe,
and beheld every act.” Such is the testimony of two Roman Catholic
writers — Poggius and Sylvius — and members of the council. They bear
witness to the indecent conduct of the council, and to the moral heroism of
the two martyrs. Jerome continued to sing hymns, with a “deep
untrembling voice,” after he was bound to the stake. He raised his voice,
and sang a paschal hymn, then very popular in the church.
Hail! happy day, and ever be adored,
When hell was conquered by heaven’s great Lord.

He continued to live in the flames a quarter of an hour. “Thou knowest,

Lord, how I have loved Thy truth,” were amongst the last words of
Jerome of Prague. Not a word fell from his lips that discovered the least
timidity. Both he and Huss sang in the flames to their last breath. And
bright angels in waiting carried their happy souls to heaven, where they
would be present with the Lord.

REFLECTIONS ON THE CHARACTER OF THE COUNCIL

The reader can be at no loss to judge of the principles which govern
Roman Catholics in their treatment of Protestants, or heretics, so-called,
with the Council of Constance before him. The character of Jezebel
never changes; as it then was, so is it today, and so it shall ever be. The
only question is the opportunity for its display. And we must bear in
mind that the burning of those two venerable heralds of the Reformation
was not under a papal edict, or a decree of the court of Rome, but by an
ecclesiastical council, representing the whole church of Rome — indeed all
the powers of the Roman world, civil and ecclesiastical.
The utter contempt for the retraction of the enfeebled Jerome, and the
unblushing violation of the safe-conduct of the Emperor to Huss, are alike
iniquitous and perfidious. What dependence can be placed on the word,
the promise, or the most sacred oath, even of a mitred head, holding such
principles? We must leave the reader to judge for himself; but what
language could adequately express the base, cowardly, traitor-like character
of such principles and actions? Truth, righteousness, honor, justice,
humanity, are all publicly sacrificed on the altar of ecclesiastical dominion.
 756
The heresy of Huss and Jerome has never been clearly defined. They seem
to have retained to the last their early impressions of transubstantiation,
the worship of the saints and the Virgin Mary. They testified against the
power of the clergy, which had so long ruled and enslaved the minds of
men, and exposed their avarice and corruptions. By these public appeals
they struck at the very foundations of the whole papal system, for which
also they were honored with the crown of martyrdom. But God, who is
above all, was overruling these events for the spreading forth of the long-
hidden gospel, and for the ripening of Europe for the approaching changes
in almost all the relations of both Church and State which were
accomplished in the sixteenth century. We must now glance for a moment
at the fearful effects of the decrees of this general council.

THE BOHEMIAN WAR

The martyrdom of the Bohemian doctors had aroused a general feeling of
national as well as religious indignation. The Emperor, the pope, and the
prelates had very soon to pay bitterly for their flagrant injustice and the
fires of Constance. Retribution swiftly followed. Four hundred and fifty-
two nobles and knights of Bohemia and Moravia attached their seals to a
letter addressed to the council, protesting against the proceedings of the
assembly, and the imputations which had been cast on the orthodoxy of
Bohemia, by burning the most illustrious of their teachers. But the council
refused to listen to these reasonable remonstrances, and resolved to make
no concessions. The holy fathers, as they are profanely called, cared much
more for their own sinful pleasures than for the welfare of the people.
Although professedly assembled for the reformation of the church, the real
effect of their four years’ sojourn in Constance was the demoralization of
the whole city and its suburbs. The licentiousness and profligracy of this
council has never been equalled.
In the year 1418, just before the council was dissolved, Martin V., now
sole and undisputed pope, sent forth a bull of crusade against the
contumacious heretics, requiring all authorities, ecclesiastical and civil, to
labor for the suppression of the heresics of Wycliffe, Huss, and Jerome.
The question was now fairly committed to the decision of the sword.
Cardinal John, of Ragusa, was sent as legate to Bohemia. He was a violent
man, and talked of reducing the country by fire and sword. In his character
 757
as legate he burned several persons who opposed his authority. The
Bohemians, by such atrocities, were roused to fury. The followers of Huss
united and became a strong party. They bound themselves in the most
solemn manner to carry out the reformation principles of their martyred
chief. Huss had strongly condemned the practice of the church in
withholding the cup from the laity: this they adopted as the symbol of
their community, and displayed the eucharistic cup on their banners.
Headed by Ziska, the one-eyed, a knight of great military genius, they
moved about the country, everywhere enforcing the administration of the
sacrament in both kinds — the wine as well as the bread.
The churches of Prague having been refused to the clergy who followed the
doctrines of Huss, they began to look for places where they could enjoy
freedom of worship. A great meeting of Hussites was convened in the
month of July, 1419, on a high hill, south of Prague, where they were
formally united by the celebration of the communion in the open air. It
must have been an imposing sight, but alas! the sequel of their history
draws et dark shadow over it. On the spacious summit of that hill three
hundred tables were spread, and forty-two thousand, consisting of men,
women, and children, partook of the sacrament in both kinds, A love-feast
followed the communion, at which the rich shared with the poor, but no
drinking, dancing, gaming, or music, was allowed. There the people
encamped in tents, and, being fond of the use of scripture names, called it
Mount Tabor, whence they obtained the name of Taborires. They spoke
of themselves as the chosen people of God, and stigmatized their enemies,
the Roman Catholics, as Amalekites, Moabites, and Philistines.
The luxury, pride, avarice, simony, and other vices of the clergy, were
denounced on the hill of Tabor, and Ziska and his followers exhorted the
communicants to engage in the work of church reformation. This great
assembly, under Ziska, first marched to Prague, where they arrived at
night. The following day, a Hussite clergyman, walking at the head of a
procession, with a cup in his hand, was struck with a stone as he passed
the town hall, where the magistrates were sitting. Thus insulted, many of
them rushed furiously into the hall; a fierce struggle ensued: the
magistrates were overpowered, some were killed, some fled, and some
were thrown from the windows. The alarm spread, the people of the old
religion rose to arms, the reformers fought against them as the enemies of
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the true faith. Ziska and his followers proclaimed themselves to be the
servants of God, and their mission the reformation of His church. But alas
they commenced with the work of destruction rather than of reformation.
Convents were attacked and plundered, monks were slaughtered, churches
and monasteries were reduced to ruins; images, organs, pictures, and all the
instruments of idolatry, as they were called, were broken to pieces. The
movement spread to other places, and the most desolating war followed,
which continued for many, many years.

THE VICTORIES OF THE TABORITES

Wenceslaus, King of Bohemia, died just at this time from a fit of apoplexy;
and as he left no heir, Bohemia fell by inheritance to his brother Sigismund.
This change was the signal for open war on the part of the reformers.
Sigismund was execrated as a traitor; he had lured Huss to Constance; he
had abandoned him to his merciless foes, the enemies of the true faith.
With the fury of religious fanaticism they demolished and defaced
everything that bore the stamp of the Romish religion. The Emperor, as
soon as possible, turned his special attention to his newly-inherited
kingdom, but in place of a loyal welcome, his sovereignty was repudiated
everywhere. The first crusading army was defeated by the victorious
Ziska, and Sigismund was obliged to flee from the walls of Prague.
The followers of Ziska, being chiefly peasantry, had at first no other
weapons of warfare but their agricultural implements, such as flails, clubs,
pitchforks, and scythes; so that Sigismund tauntingly designated them
threshers; but he was soon made to feel their irresistible power, and the
deadly wounds which they inflicted. Ziska taught them to load their
implements with iron, and to range their rough carts in the battle-field in
such a manner as to serve the purpose of a fortress, and of the ancient
war-chariots. Martin V., now safe in Rome, heard from a distance of Ziska
carrying fire and sword in all directions — massacring clergy and monks,
burning and demolishing churches and convents, wreaking vengeance on
the enemies of the true faith, and rooting out idolatry, as his divine
mission. A bull was issued at the Emperor’s request, summoning the
faithful to rise for the extirpation of Wycliffism, Hussism, and other
heresics, and promising full indulgences to those who should take part in
the enterprise either personally or by substitute. An army was collected
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from nearly all European countries; which is variously estimated from one
hundred thousand to one hundred and fifty thousand.
The spirit of the Hussites was strengthened on all such occasions by
following the example of the hill of Tabor. They celebrated the
communion, swearing to spend their property and their blood to the
utmost in defense of the Reformation so-called. The eucharistic chalice
was not only represented on the banners of the Taborites, but it was
carried by their clergy at the head of their armies. Sigismund entered
Bohemia at the head of the crusading hosts; and determined to over-awe
the rebellious into obedience, he burned without scruple the heretical
teachers, and dragged others at the tails of his horses. But the hour of
vengeance was near. Burning with indignation and religious enthusiasm,
Ziska and his exasperated followers surprised the crusaders, and defeated
them with great slaughter on a hill near Prague, which still bears his name.
A second campaign saw the imperial army break up and, panic-stricken,
flee before the renowned Ziska. A third and a fourth time the Emperor
invaded the country at the head of vast forces — in one case, it is said,
two hundred thousand men; but each time the armies of the church fled in
confusion and disgrace before the invincible Taborites. In some instances
they pursued and massacred, rather than routed, the enemies of God and
of the true faith. The cruelty on both sides became excessive. The
Taborites who chanced to fall into their enemies’ hands were burned alive
or sold as slaves. It was a war of revenge, of extermination; and considered
to be the holiest of duties to seize the property and spill the blood of
God’s enemies.

THE TOTAL DEFEAT OF THE PAPAL ARMY

The broken-hearted Emperor was now accused of personal cowardice. A
fifth crusade was resolved upon; it was to be conducted by a cardinal.
Preparations were made on a very great scale. Four large armies, amounting
to about two hundred thousand men, crossed the Bohemian frontier. The
force which the Taborires were able to muster amounted to thirty-one
thousand. But the great papal enterprise ended in the most disgraceful
failure. The Germans, on coming in sight of Ziska with his wild war-
chariots, were seized with a panic; the Cardinal Julian alone conducted
himself with courage. As he was advancing, he met his troops fleeing in
 760
abject terror. With crucifix in hand, he eritreated them by the most solemn
considerations of religion to rally, but in vain. He himself was constrained
to fly; he hardly escaped in the disguise of a common soldier, and left
behind him the papal bull, his cardinal’s hat, and his pontifical robes.
These trophies were preserved for two centuries in the church of Taas,
and the captured banners were hung in the Tron church in Prague. The
Germans lost ten thousand men in this scandalous flight, besides many
more who, in their retreat, were pursued and slain by the peasantry.
After carrying on the war for thirteen years, Ziska died. So greatly was
he lamented by the TaborRes, that they changed their name to Orphans.
He was succeeded by Procopius, a name almost equally famous in the
history of the Bohemian war. But the Emperor was not disposed to
continue so ruinous a contest. The retributive sword of Ziska had shorn
him of his glory in the field, and frustrated his intentions of strengthening
the church. At the battle, or rather the slaughter, of Aussig in 1426, the
estimated loss of the Germans varies from nine to fifteen thousand men,
while the Bohemians lost only fifty. And almost every outward vestige of
the Romish religion had been swept away by the overwhelming flood.
Churches were burnt with those who had taken refuge in them. Sylvius,
the Roman historian, describes the churches and convents of Bohemia as
more numerous, more magnificent, more highly adorned, than those of any
other European country; but, with few exceptions, all were demolished by
the irresistible Taborites. More than five hundred churches and
monasteries, with all their symbols of idolatry, were utterly destroyed.
Such was the terrible retributive providence of God in His righteous
dealings with the murderers of Huss and Jerome. The fearful visitation fell,
and with the most withering severity, on both the empire and the church
of Rome.

INTERNAL DIVISIONS
The Hussites were not all of one mind as to a proposed treaty; so they
divided and formed two parties. The Calixtines — from Calix, a cup — the
more moderate party, were disposed to waive all other subjects of
complaint, provided the cup was restored to the laity, with permission to
read the word of God. The Taborites went much farther; they adhered to
the doctrines of Huss. Besides the celebration of the Lord’s supper in both
 761
kinds, they contended for a complete reformation of the church — the
abolition of all popish errors and ceremonies, and the establishment of a
scriptural system of doctrine and discipline.
Treachery, the unfailing resource of Rome, now saw her way clear to
encompass the ruin of the Taborites. At the council of Basle, Rokyzan, a
bishop of the moderates and an eloquent man, was raised to the
archbishopric of Prague, that through his influence their ends might be
gained. Four articles were agreed upon, called the Compact; the obedient
Calixtines were received back to the bosom of the church; but the
privileges thus granted were soon afterwards annulled by the pope. The
Taborites, refusing to sign the Compact, were persecuted both by their old
friends the Calixtines and the Catholics. But, in place of resisting by means
of the carnal sword as in the days of Ziska and Procopius; they were led
to see that faith in God, patience, perseverance in well-doing, believing
prayer, were the proper arms of a christian soldier. Rokyzan, who had still
some kindly feeling for his old friends, obtained permission from the
sovereign for the persecuted Taborites to withdraw to the lordship of
Lititz, on the confines of Moravia and Silesia, and there to establish a
colony and regulate their own worship and discipline.

THE UNITED BRETHREN

The first migration to Moravia was in 1451. Many of the citizens of
Prague, with some of the nobility and learned men, and even some of the
most pious of the Calixtines, joined them. They now assumed the name of
Unitas Fratrum, or the United Brethren. This was the origin of a
community which has continued to our own day. For the space of three
years they enjoyed peace and liberty of conscience. The missionary spirit,
by which the Moravians have always been so distinguished, displayed
itself at that early period of their history. Now the silver line of the
Savior’s love and their christian zeal shines brightly. We could not see a
trace of it when they were using carnal weapons for the defense of the
truth of God. But no sooner did grace shine and their numbers increase,
than the Romish priests eyed them with suspicion. Many souls were
converted through their preaching, and congregations were formed in
different parts of the country.
 762
False accusations were circulated by the monks and friars — evil work
which always suited their lying tongues. Sedition! was the cry. The
Moravians are gathering numbers, said the monks, that they may renew
the Taboritc wars and seize the government. The King was alarmed; the
unprincipled Rokyzan, afraid of losing his dignity in the church, sided
with the Catholics and influenced the Calixtines to turn against their
brethren. They were denounced as incorrigible heretics. A bitter
persecution broke out in all its fury on the missionary brethren. But the
tares seem to have been separated from the wheat, for, unlike the days of
Ziska, the new generation of the old Hussites determined to use no carnal
weapon in defense of themselves or their religion. But the undaunted
courage, which characterized their forefathers in the battle-field, was now
displayed in their patient endurance of suffering for Christ’s sake. Under
their heaviest afflictions their energy never failed them. They were
declared to have forfeited the common rights of subjects; their property
was confiscated; they were even driven from their homes in the depth of
winter, and compelled to wander in the open fields, where many perished
with cold and hunger. All the prisons in Bohemia, especially in Prague,
were crowded with the brethren. Various sorts of tortures were inflicted
on the prisoners: some had their hands and feet cut off; others were torn
on the rack, burned alive, or barbarously murdered. These outrages
continued for nearly twenty years with little abatement; but the death of
the King in 1471, and the remorse of Rokyzan, the archbishop, brought a
measure of relief. They were no longer exposed to torture, but were driven
out of the country.
The United Brethren, thus compelled to leave their homes in Lititz and
other towns and villages, were obliged to live in forests and under the
shelter of rocks, kindling their fires at night. And, singular as it may seem,
they not only employed themselves in comforting each other, but in
perfecting, what they called, the constitution of the church; forgetting, as
many others have done, that God had perfected the constitution of the
church at Pentecost, and revealed it to us in His holy word. About seventy
persons held a synod in the woods. Two resolutions were adopted which
marked the future character of the Moravians: —
1, That it was necessary to provide fit men for the ministerial office;
 763
2, That they were to be chosen by lot like Matthias in Acts 1:24-26.
As a fundamental principle, the Brethren held, “that the holy scriptures
are the only rule of faith and practice.” At the same time a distinction was
made between essentials and non-essentials, which leaves ample room for
both the human will and the imagination. Essentials belong to the question
of man’s salvation; non-essentials, to the externals of Christianity, such as
rites, ceremonies, customs, and ecclesiastical regulations. And, further,
these may be altered according to the best of human judgment, so that the
great work of the gospel may be promoted. This is human, not exclusively
Moravian. It is, practically, the common saying, “The end justifies the
means.” But surely what God has revealed can never be nonessential, and
what He has not revealed should never be introduced into His assembly.
The Brethren who had been banished from Moravia were kindly received
in Hungary and Moldavia; and were greatly distinguished by their
missionary and other religious labors. About the year 1470, they
published in the Bohemian language a translation of the whole Bible.
This is the second translation upon record of the Bible into one of the
European tongues. It passed through several editions rapidly, and in this
way these interesting and devoted people prepared the way for Luther,
Melancthon, and Calvin.

THE CONNECTION OF THE WITNESSES

Before leaving the Moravians, we may recall to the reader’s mind the
interesting fact of an early connection between them and the Waldenses, if
not the Paulicians. Bohemia and Moravia continued in heathenism as late
as the ninth century when they received the gospel from Eastern
missionaries; probably also from the Paulicians. Peter Waldo, in the
twelfth century, driven from Lyons by persecution, found a refuge in
Bohemia, where he labored for twenty years with great success. In the
fourteenth century his followers in Bohemia and Passau are said to have
amounted to eighty thousand, and throughout Europe to about eight
hundred thousand. The court of Rome, irritated by the zeal and offended
by the practices of the united Paulician, Waldensiam Bohemian, and
Moravian Christians, resolved on their subjugation to the Roman yoke.
Celibacy was enjoined, the cup forbidden to the laity, and the church
 764
service performed in Latin. A struggle commenced, the Bohemians
protested, Rome persecuted, and though many continued firm, others
gradually declined, and lost much of their original purity of doctrine and
simplicity of worship. So things continued for about three hundred years,
when John Huss and Jerome of Prague again raised the standard of truth,
witnessed against the corruptions of Rome, and kindled by the flames of
their martyrdom a light which soon spread throughout Europe, and which
continues to shine in our day, through the good providence of God. The
mysterious way by which the light traveled, we must now trace.3
 765

CHAPTER 32
THE CAPTURE OF CONSTANTINOPLE

In the year 1453, after a close siege of fifty-three days, the capital of
Eastern Christendom fell into the hands of the victorious Turks. The
Emperor, who bore the name of the founder of Constantinople, displayed
great valor in the siege; he threw off his purple and fought in the breach,
till he, with the nobles that surrounded him, fell among the slain. This was
the last of the Constantines, and the last christian Emperor of
Constantinople. Most of the inhabitants that remained were either sold as
slaves or massacred; and five thousand Turkish families were brought into
the city as settlers. Destruction, violence, and profanity, far exceeding the
power of description, followed. The ancient church of St. Sophia was
stripped of all the valuable offerings of ages, the images were broken to
pieces, and, after having been the scene of gross profanations, was turned
into a mosque. The treasures of Greek learning — to the extent, some say,
of one hundred and twenty thousand manuscript books — were destroyed
or dispersed. The conquest was complete, and Mahomet II. at once
transferred the seat of government to Constantinople.
But the unbounded ambition of the fierce Ottoman was far from being
satisfied; he contemplated nothing less than a conquest of all Christendom.
And from his rapid and easy victories over many of the lesser christian
principalities in the East, it would appear that, if death had not relieved
the world of such a tyrant, he might have pursued his path of conquest
through the heart of Europe. What city, what kingdom, what power,
would arrest the fierce invader? All Europe trembled, especially Italy. The
death of Nicholas V. was hastened, it is said, by the news of the capture of
Constantinople. Grief and fear broke the old man’s heart. But after
overturning empires, kingdoms, and cities without number, Mahomet II.
died, at the age of fifty, from internal pains, supposed to be the effects of
poison.
 766
Tidings of these heavy calamities in the East spread a deep gloom over all
the West. But that which threatened to arrest the progress of civilization
and the spread of Christianity was overruled by an all-wise and good
Providence for the furtherance of both in a marvellous way. The falling of
Constantinople into the hands of the infidels drove many learned Greeks
into Italy, and from Italy into many other countries in Europe. It so
happened, just at this time, that the reigning pope, Nicholas V., was
distinguished by his love of literature, which he greatly promoted by his
position and his wealth. The refugees had brought such books with them
as they had been able to rescue from the ruins of their fallen empire. The
study of Greek was revived by such means and became exceedingly
popular. Among these students it pleased God to raise up men of highly
cultivated minds and devout hearts, who did much in preparing the way
for the great Reformation.

INVENTION OF PRINTING — IMPROVEMENT OF PAPER

Just at this period the Lord was making “all things work together: for
good” ill a most remarkable way. Two silent agents of immense influence
and power were ordained to precede the living voices of His gospel-
preachers — the invention of printing and the manufacture of paper.
These harmonious inventions were brought to great perfection during the
latter half of the fifteenth century, for which we can lift up our hearts in
praise and thanksgiving to God.
We have now reached a turning point in our history; and not only in the
history of the church, but of civilization, of the social condition of the
European states, and of the human family. It is well to pause on such an
eminence and look around us for a moment. We see a divine hand for the
good of all gathering things together, though apparently unconnected. The
falling of an empire, the flight of a few Greeks with their literary treasures,
the awakening of the long dormant mind of the western world, the
invention of printing from moveable types, and the discovery of making
fine white paper from linen rags. Incongruous as “linen rags” may sound
with the literature of the Greeks, and the skill of Guttenberg, both would
have proved of little avail without the improved paper. Means, the most
insignificant in man’s account, when used of God, are all sufficient. By
miraculous power, a dry rod in the hand of Moses shakes Egypt from
 767
center to circumference, divides the Red Sea, and gives living water from
the flinty rock: a smooth pebble from the brook, or an empty ram’s horn,
accomplishes great deliverances in Israel. The power is of God, and faith
looks only to Him.
It is a deeply interesting fact to the Christian, that the first complete book
which Guttenberg printed with his cut metal types was a folio edition of
the Bible in the Latin vulgate, consisting of six hundred and forty-one
leaves. Hallam, in his Literary History beautifully observes: “It is a very
striking circumstance, that the high minded inventors of the great art tried
at the very outset so bold a flight as the printing an entire Bible, and
executed it with great success... We may see in imagination this venerable
and splendid volume leading up the crowded myriads of its followers, and
imploring, as it were, a blessing on the new art, by dedicating its firstfruits
to the service of heaven.”1
Although it scarcely falls within the line of our “Short Papers” even
briefly to sketch the history of the great discovery, yet for the sake of
some of our readers who may not have such histories at hand we must
mention a few particulars, as it was one of the most powerful agents of the
Reformation.
From an early period the mode of printing from blocks of wood had been
practiced. Sometimes the engravings, or impressions, were accompanied
by a few lines of letters cut in the block. Gradually these were extended to
a few leaves and called block-books. An ingenious blacksmith, it is said,
invented in the eleventh century separate letters made of wood. The
celebrated John Guttenberg, who was born at a village near Mentz, in the
year 1397, substituted metal for the wooden letters; his associate Schaeffer
cut the characters in a matrix, after which the types were cast, and thus
completed the art of printing as it now remains.
Parchment, preparations of straw, the bark of trees, papyrus, and cotton
had sufficed for the printer and transcriber, till the fourteenth century. But
these preparations would have been utterly inadequate to supply the
demand of the new process. Happily, however, the discovery of making
paper from rags coincided with the discovery of letter-press printing. The
first paper-mill in England was erected at Dartmouth by a German named
Spielmann, in 1588, who was knighted by Queen Elizabeth.
 768
THE FIRST PRINTED BIBLE
All historians seem to agree, that Guttenberg, having spent nearly ten
years in bringing his experiments to perfection, had so impoverished
himself that he found it necessary to invite some capitalist to join him.
John Faust, the wealthy’ goldsmith of Mentz, to whom he made known
his secret, agreed to go into partnership with him, and to supply the
means for carrying out the design. But it does not appear that Guttenberg
and his associates, Schoeffer and Faust, were actuated by any loftier
motive in executing this glorious work, than that of realizing a large sum of
money by the enterprise. The letters were such an exact imitation of the
best copyists, that they intended to pass them off as fine manuscript
copies, and thus to obtain the usual high prices. Those employed in the
work were bound to the strictest secrecy. The first edition appears to have
been sold at manuscript prices without the secret having transpired. A
second edition was brought out about 1462, when John Faust went to
Paris with a number of copies. He sold one to the king for seven hundred
crowns, and another to the archbishop for four hundred crowns. The
prelate, delighted with such a beautiful copy at so low a price, showed it
to the king. His majesty produced his, for which he had paid nearly double
the money; but what was their astonishment on finding they were identical
even in the most minute strokes and dots? They became alarmed, and
concluded they must be produced by magic, and the capital letters being in
red ink, they supposed that it was blood, and no longer doubted that he
was in league with the devil and assisted by him in his magical art.
Information was forthwith given to the police against John Faust; his
lodgings were searched, and his Bibles seized; other copies which he had
sold were collected and compared: and finding they were all precisely
alike, he was pronounced a magician. The king ordered him to be thrown
into prison, and he would soon have been thrown into the flames, but he
saved himself by confessing to the deceit, and by making a full revelation
of the secret of his art. The mystery was now revealed, the workmen were
no longer bound to secrecy, printers were dispersed abroad, carrying the
secret of their art wherever they found a welcome, and the sound of
printing presses were soon heard in many lands. About 1474 the art was
introduced into England by William Caxton; and in 1508 it was
introduced into Scotland by Walter Chepman.
 769
Before the days of printing, many valuable books existed in manuscript,
and seminaries of learning flourished in all civilized countries, but
knowledge was necessarily confined to a comparatively small number of
people. The manuscripts were so scarce and dear that they could only be
purchased by kings and nobles, by collegiate and ecclesiastical
establishments. “A copy of the Bible cost from forty to fifty pounds for
the writing only, for it took an expert copyist about ten months’ labor to
make one.” Although several other books issued from the new presses, the
Latin Bible was the favorite book with all the printers. They usually
commenced operations, wherever they went, by issuing an edition of the
Latin Bible. It was most in demand and brought high prices. In this way
Latin Bibles multiplied rapidly. Translators now began their work; and by
individual reformers in different countries, the word of God was translated
into various languages in the course of a few years. “Thus an Italian
version appeared in 1474, a Bohemian in 1475, a Dutch in 1477, a French
in 1477, and a Spanish in 1478; as if heralding the approach of the coming
Reformation.”

ROME’S OPPOSITION TO THE BIBLE

But, as usual, the great enemies of truth and light and liberty took the
alarm. The archbishop of Mentz placed the printers of that city under
strict censorship. Pope Alexander VI. issued a bull prohibiting the printers
of Mentz, Cologne, Treves, and Magdeburg from publishing any books
without the express license of their archbishops. Finding that the reading
of the Bible was extending, the priests began to preach against it from their
pulpits. “They have found out,” said a French monk,” a new language
called Greek: we must carefully guard ourselves against it. That language
will be the mother of all sorts of heresies. I see in the hands of a great
number of persons a book written in this language called, ‘The New
Testament;’ it is a book full of brambles, with vipers in them. As to the
Hebrew, whoever learns that becomes a Jew at once.” Bibles and
Testaments were seized wherever found, and burnt; but more Bibles and
Testaments seemed to rise as if by magic from their ashes. The printers
also were seized and burnt. “We must root out printing, or printing will
root out us,” said the vicar of Croydon in a sermon preached at Paul’s
Cross. And the university of Paris, panic-stricken, declared before the
 770
parliament, “There is an end of religion if the study of Greek and Hebrew
is permitted.”
The great success of the new translations spread alarm throughout the
Romish church; she trembled for the supremacy of her own favorite
Vulgate. The fears of the priests and monks were increased when they saw
the people reading the scriptures in their own mother tongue, and observed
a growing disposition to call in question the value of attending mass, and
the authority of the priesthood. Instead of saying their prayers through
the priests in Latin, they began to pray to God direct in their native
tongue. The clergy, finding their revenues diminishing, appealed to the
Sorbonne, the most renowned theological school in Europe. The sorbonne
called upon parliament to interfere with a strong hand. War was:
immediately proclaimed against books, and the printers of them. Printers
who were convicted of having printed Bibles, were burnt. In the year
1534, about twenty men and one woman were burnt alive in Paris. In 1535
the Sorbonne obtained an ordinance from the king for the suppression of
printing. “But it was too late,” as an able writer observes; “the art was
now full born, and could no more be suppressed than light, or air, or life.
Books had become a public necessity, and supplied a great public want:
and every year saw them multiplying more abundantly.” 2
While Rome was thus thundering her awful prohibitions against the liberty
of thought, and lengthening her arm to persecute wherever the Bible had
penetrated and found followers, at least all over France, God was
hastening by means of His own word and the printing press, that mighty
revolution which was so soon to change the destinies of both Church and
State. But had the catholics succeeded in their wicked designs, we should
still have been groping our way amidst the thick darkness of the middle
ages. Rome has ever been hostile to new inventions and improvements;
especially if they tended to the diffusion of knowledge, the promotion of
civilization, the diminishing of the distance between the clergy and the
laity, or in any way weakening the power of the priesthood. Ignorance,
slavery, superstition, blind subjection to priestcraft, are the chief elements
of her existence. Of all inventions, none has exercised a greater influence on
society than that of printing; and not only so; it is the preserver of all
other inventions. Thus no thanks are due to the catholics for our modern
civilization, and for the privileges of our civil and religious liberties. But
 771
the living God is above all the hostility of Rome, and will accomplish all
the purposes of His grace.
The darkness of the middle ages is rapidly passing away. The rising sun
of the Reformation will ere long dispel the gloom of Jezebel’s long reign
of a thousand years. Her boasted universal supremacy is no more, and will
never again return. The pillars of her strength are already shaken, and
many causes are combining to hasten her complete overthrow. With these
causes we shall soon become more familiar.

THE IMMEDIATE PRECURSORS OF LUTHER

We have traced with some care the chain of witnesses from the earliest
period of the church’s history till the beginning of the sixteenth century;
we have only further to notice a few names which connect the noble line
with the name and testimony of the great Reformer. There is no missing
link in the divine chain. Of these the most noted were Jerome Savonarola,
John of Wesalia, and John Wessilus of Groningen.
Jerome Savonarola, the descendant of an illustrious family, was born in
1452, at Ferrara. He was in early life the subject of deep religious feelings,
and supposing he had been favored with heavenly visions as to his
mission, he retired from the world and entered the Dominican order at the
age of twenty-one. He devoted himself to the study of the holy scriptures,
with continual prayers, fastings, and mortifications. He appears to have
been greatly interested in the prophetic scriptures, especially in such
portions as the Apocalypse, which he was fond of expounding, and
confidently maintained that the threatened judgments were near at hand.
Having spent seven years in the Dominican convent of Bologna, he was
removed by his superiors to St. Mark’s at Florence. After some years he
was elected prior, when he introduced a thorough reformation, and a return
to the earlier simplicity of food and dress.
Savonarola was unequalled in his power as a preacher; but like many
others at that time, he combined the politician’s with the preacher’s
character. Reform was his one theme — reform and repentance he
proclaimed as with the voice of a prophet. Reform in the discipline of the
church, in the luxury and worldliness of the priesthood, and in the morals
of the whole community. The Italians being peculiarly sensitive to all
 772
appeals respecting their rights as citizens, the vast cathedral of Florence
was soon crowded by multitudes who eagerly hung on his words. His
preaching assumed the form of prophecy, or of one authorized to speak in
the name of God; although it does not appear that his predictions were
more than the result of a firm conviction in the government of God and in
the fulfillment of prophecy according to the principles revealed in the holy
scriptures. But though he was more or less mixed up with the political
factions in Italy, he was an earnest Christian and a true reformer. He
unsparingly denounced the usurpation of Lorenzo de’ Medici, the
despotism of the aristocracy, and the sins of the prelates and clergy; he
mourned over the cold indifference to spiritual things which marked the
character of the age. “The church had once,” he said, “her golden priests,
and wooden chalices; but now the chalices were gold and the priests
wooden — that the outward splendor of religion had been hurtful to
spirituality.” So resistless was his eloquence, which partook of a
prophetic character, as if he were the messenger of an offended God whose
vengeance was already impending over Italy, that the multitudes believed
in his heavenly mission. The people were so controlled by his appeals that
the moral effect of his warnings was speedily perceptible throughout the
city. “By the modesty of their dress,” says Sismondi, “their discourse,
their countenance, the Florentines gave evidence that they had embraced
the reform of Savonarola.”
But his course was watched with the evil eye of Jezebel. Such a fearless
witness was not fit to live, especially in Italy. The light must be quenched;
but how to accomplish it was the difficulty, as many of the citizens were
ready to pass through the flames as the substitutes of Savonarola. The
church of Rome, backed by the partisans of the Medici, addressed herself
to this fiendish work. As usual, her plans were founded on treachery and
ended in persecution. The deceitful Alexander VI. invited Savonarola in
courteous language to visit him at Rome, that he might confer with him on
the subject of his prophetic gifts. But he knew the pope was not to be
trusted notwithstanding his flattering words, and refused to obey. He next
proposed to raise him to the cardinalate in the hope of getting him under
his power; but Savonarola indignantly declared from the pulpit that he
would have no other red hat than one dyed with the blood of martyrdom.
The mask was now thrown off; blandishments were exchanged for
 773
threatenings and excommunications. He was denounced as a “sower of
false doctrine.” His destruction was determined. The Franciscans, already
jealous of the great fame of a Dominican, entered the conspiracy. An
account of their plottings would be uninteresting to the reader; but they
succeeded in diverting the people, and in accomplishing the downfall of
their rival.
In the year 1498 Savonarola, and his two friends, Dominic and Silvester,
were: seized, imprisoned, and tortured. The nervous system of the great
preacher, both from his labors and his ascetic exercises, had become so
sensitive that he was unable to bear the agonies which were inflicted on
him. “When I elm in torture,” he said, “I lose myself, I am mad: that only
is true which I say without torture.” In the meantime, two legates arrived
from Rome with the sentence of condemnation from Alexander; the
prisoners were taken the following day to the place of the signory, and,
after the usual ceremony of degradation, were first hanged and then burnt.
Their ashes were carefully collected by the Franciscans, and cast into the
Arno; yet relics of Savonarola were preserved with veneration among his
many friends and followers.

REFLECTIONS ON THE LIFE OF SAVONAROLA

The prior of St. Mark’s is spoken of in history, as the most faithful public
witness for Christ that had yet appeared in Italy; but there was much in
his course that was contrary to the spirit and calling of a true Christian,
especially in his mixing up politics with religion. It is said that he thought
to combine the characters of Jeremiah and Demosthenes — to weep over
sin and denounce God’s judgments like the one, and to stir up the people
to struggle for their liberties like the other. This was his mistake, owing to
his ignorance of the teaching of the New Testament; and that which led to
his dishonor and his downfall. But great allowance must be made for his
education, circumstances, and the spirit of the age. Many of the later
reformers fell into the same snare. They had not learnt, in those
revolutionary times, that the calling of the Christian is a heavenly one —
that while the Jew was blessed with all temporal mercies in a pleasant
land, the Christian is blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ. They did not see that the purpose of God in the present period
is to gather out from among the nations a people for His name by the
 774
preaching of the gospel. (Acts 15.) But how few even in the present day
see that the church of God is an out-calling, and so ought to walk in
separation from the world!
The highest good that the preacher can accomplish for his fellow men is to
gather them out of the world to the rejected Savior. But such preachers are
neither popular nor understood, even in the last quarter of the nineteenth
century: indeed we may raise the question — Is the state of “the
churches” generally, as regards politics, in advance of the ideas of
Savonarola? He interfered in the direction of public affairs in order that the
republic of Florence might be to the honor of his Lord and Master. His
motives were doubtless good, but he was entirely mistaken in thinking he
could unite heavenly and earthly things. His grand idea is seen in the fact,
that one of the coins struck whilst Florence was under his influence bore
the inscription, “Christ our king.” But not only did this remarkable man
desire to see a great Reformation in both Church and State, he also longed
for the salvation of souls, while his own heart rejoiced in the glorious
doctrine of justification by faith alone.
The following extract from his meditations on Psalm 31 during his
imprisonment will give the reader an idea of his inmost thoughts as guided
by the Holy Spirit of God. “No man can boast of himself; and if, in the
presence of God, the question were put to every justified sinner, ‘Have
you been saved by your own strength?’ all would with one voice exclaim,
‘Not unto us, O Lord, but unto Thy name be the glory!’ Therefore, O
God, I seek Thy mercy, and I bring Thee not my own righteousness: the
moment Thou justifiest me by Thy grace, Thy righteousness belongs to
me; for grace is the righteousness of God. So long, O man, as thou
believest not, thou art, because of sin, deprived of grace. O God, save me
by Thy righteousness, that is, by Thy Son, who alone was found
righteous before Thee.” As taught of God, with what holy and lofty
thoughts his mind must have been filled from the study, in a prison, of
that most beautiful psalm of sorrow and triumphant praise!3
 775
Ah1 fairest city, who hast seen expire
Three chosen martyrs in devouring fire,
Who, linked together, amidst scorn and pain,
In dying smiled, and proved “to die is gain:” —
Thy rich and honored stream, whose bosom wide
Doth those; blest ashes, as its treasure hide,
Shall see the tyrant-chief at last expire.
And every infidel destroyed by fire;
Shall see all vice and evil come to nought,
And hail new light from heavenly regions brought.

John of Wesalia, a doctor of divinity at Erfurt, was distinguished for his

boldness, energy, and opposition to Rome. He incurred the indignation of
the monastic orders by preaching that men are saved by grace through
faith, and not by a monastic life; that a man is eternally safe who believes
in Christ though all the priests in the world should condemn and
excommunicate him. He pronounced indulgences, the holy oil, and
pilgrimages, to be of no avail; that the pope, bishops, and priests were not
instruments of salvation. He was what would now be called strictly
calvinistic in his views of grace. The archbishop of Mentz ordered his
imprisonment; he was brought to trial before a council of priests in the
year 1479, and notwithstanding his age, ill health, and feebleness, he was
subjected to a puzzling examination of his opinions, which lasted five
successive days. Some things he explained, some he disavowed, and some
he retracted; but his judges had no mercy, though he was bending beneath
the weight of years; he was condemned to perpetual penance by the holy
Inquisition and soon perished in its dungeons.
John Wesselus, a native of Groningen, in Holland, was undoubtedly the
most remarkable of the immediate forerunners of the Reformation. He was
one of the most learned men of the fifteenth century. But happily for John
Wesselus himself, and for thousands more, his light was not only that of
human learning — he was taught of God. The light of the glorious gospel
of the grace of God burned brightly in his heart, in his words, in his life.
He was doctor in divinity successively at Cologne, Louvain, Heidelberg,
and Groningen; and he boldly exposed many of the evil doctrines and
flagrant abuses of the church of Rome. He was also for some years
professor of Hebrew at the university of Paris, and even there he spoke
out boldly. “All satisfaction for sin,” he declared, “made by men is
blasphemy against Christ.” But the following testimony of Luther to the
 776
writings of John Wesselus makes it unnecessary to particularize his
opinions.
About thirty years after the death of Wesselus, Luther was preaching the
same doctrines which his forerunner had committed to writing, though he
had not then seen any of his works. They had been led and taught by the
same Holy Spirit, and instructed out of the same holy book, and fitted for
the same work. The great reformer was so astonished and delighted when
he first met with some of the writings of Wesselus, that he wrote a preface
for a printed edition of his works in 1522, in which he says,
“By the wonderful providence of God I have been compelled to
become a public man, and to fight battles with those monsters of
indulgences and papal decrees. All along I supposed myself to
stand alone; yet have I preserved so much animation in the contest,
as to be everywhere accused of heat and violence, and of hitting
hard. However, the truth is, I have earnestly wished to have done
with these followers of Baal among whom my lot is cast, and to
live quietly in some corner, for I have utterly despaired of making
any impression on these brazen foreheads and iron necks of
impiety. But behold, in this state of mind, I am told that even in
these days there is in secret a remnant of the people of God. Nay, I
am not only told so, but I rejoice to see a proof of it. Here is a new
publication by Wesselus, of Groningen, a man of an admirable
genius, and of an uncommonly enlarged mind. It is very plain he
was taught of God, as Isaiah prophesied that Christians should be:
and as in my own case, so with him, it cannot be supposed that he
received his doctrines from men. If I had read his works before, my
enemies might have supposed that I had learnt everything from
Wesselus, such a perfect coincidence there is in our opinions. As to
myself, I derive not only pleasure but strength and courage from
this publication. It is now impossible for me to doubt whether I am
right in the points which I have inculcated, when I see so entire an
agreement in sentiment, and almost the same words used by this
eminent person, who lived in a different age, in a distant country,
and in circumstances very unlike my own. I am surprised that this
excellent christian writer should be so little known; the reason may
 777
be that he lived without blood and contention, for this is the only
thing in which he differs from me.”
We will only further relate an anecdote respecting Wesselus, which proves
how thoroughly the spirit of the gospel had satisfied and filled his heart,
and raised him above the most powerful temptation.
When Sixtus IV. was raised to the pontifical throne, not forgetful of an
acquaintance which he had formed with Wesselus in France, he offered to
grant him any request he would make. The pious Dutchman gravely
replied, “May he who is regarded as the supreme shepherd of the church
on earth so act as that, when the Chief Shepherd shall appear, he may hear
Him say, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’... That must be my care,”
replied Sixtus; “but do you ask something for yourself.” “Give me, then,”
said Wesselus, “out of the Vatican Library a Greek and a Hebrew Bible.”
“You shall have them,” replied the pope; “but is not this folly? Why do
you not ask for a bishopric, or something of that sort?... Because,” said the
unambitious professor, “I do not desire such things.”
He was allowed to end his days in peace in the year 1489, having reached
the age of seventy. His last words were, “God be praised! all I know is
Jesus Christ and Him crucified.”4
Ulric von Hutten, a German knight, having a reforming zeal, and being a
great admirer of Luther, has found a place in most of the histories.
Descended from an ancient family, and of brilliant talents, he distinguished
himself in early life as a soldier, and afterwards as a literary adventurer,
but greatly wanting, we fear, in moral weight. He published an acrimonious
invective against Erasmus, and a most effective satire against the court and
tyranny of Rome. “Few books,” says Hallam, “have been more eagerly
received than Hutten’s epistles at their first appearance in 1516.” But he
was not long spared, either to unveil the abuses of popery, or advocate the
doctrines of the Reformation. He died in 1523 at the; early age of thirty-
five. “He forms the link,” says D’Aubigne, “between the knights and the
men of letters.” He was present at the siege of Padua in 1513, and his
powerful book against popery appeared in 1516.
Reuchlin and Erasmus — these famous names — may be conveniently and
appropriately introduced here. Although not reformers, they contributed
 778
much to the success of the Reformation. They were called “Humanists” —
men eminent for human learning. The revival of literature, but especially
the critical study of the languages in which the holy scriptures were
written — Hebrew, Greek, and Latin — rendered the highest service to the
first reformers. As in the days of Josiah, Ezra, and Nehemiah, the great
Reformation was in immediate connection with the recovery and study of
the written word of God. The Bible, which had lain so long silent in
manuscript beneath the dust of old libraries, was now printed, and laid
before the people in their own tongue. This was light from God, and that
which armed the reformers with invincible power. Down to the days of
Reuchlin and Erasmus the Vulgate was the received text. Greek and
Hebrew were almost unknown in the West.
Reuchlin studied at the university of Paris. Happily for him, the
celebrated Wesselus was then teaching Hebrew at that renowned school of
theology. There he received, not only the first rudiments of the language,
but a knowledge of the gospel of the grace of God. He also studied Greek,
and learned to speak Latin with great purity. At the early age of twenty he
began to teach philosophy, Greek, and Latin, at Basle; “and,” says
D’Aubigne, “what then passed for a miracle, a German was heard speaking
Greek.” He afterwards settled at Wittemberg — the cradle of the
Reformation — instructed the young Melancthon in Hebrew, and
prepared for publication the first Hebrew and German grammar and
lexicon. Who can estimate all that the Reformation owes to Reuchlin,
though he remained in the communion of the Romish church!
Erasmus, who was about twelve years younger than Reuchlin, pursued
the same line of study, but with still higher powers and greater celebrity.
From about 1500 to 1518, when Luther rose into notice, Erasmus was the
most distinguished literary person in Christendom. He was born at
Rotterdam in 1465; was left an orphan at the age of thirteen; was robbed
by his guardians, who, to cover their dishonesty, persuaded him to enter a
monastery. In 1492, he was ordained a priest, but he always entertained
the greatest dislike for a monastic life, and embraced the first opportunity
to regain his liberty. After leaving the Augustinian convent at Stein, he
went to pursue his favorite studies at the university of Paris.
 779
With the most indefatigable industry he devoted himself entirely to
literature, and soon acquired a great reputation among the learned. The
society of the poor student was courted by the varied talent of the time.
Lord Mountjoy, whom he met as a pupil at Paris, invited him to England.
His first visit to this country, in 1498, was followed by several others,
down to the year 1515, during which he became acquainted with many
eminent men, received many honors, formed some warm friendships, and
spent most of his brightest days. He resided at both the universities, and,
during his third and longest visit, was professor of Greek at Cambridge.
All acknowledged his supremacy in the world of letters, and for a long
time he reigned without a rival. But our object at present is rather to
inquire, “What was his influence on the Reformation?”
Under the gracious, guiding hand of Him who sees the end from the
beginning, Erasmus bent all his great mental powers, and all his laborious
studies, to the preparation of a critical edition of the Greek Testament.
This work appeared at Basle in 1516, one year before the Reformation,
accompanied by a Latin translation, in which he corrected the errors of the
Vulgate. This was daring work in those days. There was a great outcry
from many quarters against this dangerous novelty. “His New Testament
was attacked,” says Robertson; “why should the language of the
schismatic Greeks interfere with the sacred and traditional Latin? How
could any improvement be made on the Vulgate translation? There was a
college at Cambridge, especially proud of its theological character, which
would not admit a copy within its gates. But the editor was able to shelter
himself under the name of Pope Leo, who had accepted the dedication of
the volume.”
To question the fidelity of the Vulgate, was a crime of the greatest
magnitude in the eyes of the Roman Catholic church. The Vulgate could no
longer be of absolute exclusive authority; the Greek was its superior not
only in antiquity, but yet more as the original text. At this time, Erasmus
stood at the head of scholars and men of letters. He was patronized by the
pope, many prelates, and by the chief princes of Europe. Sheltered behind
such an ample shield, he was perfectly secure, and, knowing this,
fearlessly went on with his great: work. 5
 780
To give the reader some idea of the popularity of this singularly great, yet
in some respects weak man, we may just notice that his book, entitled
“Praise of Folly,” went through twenty-seven editions during his lifetime;
and his “Colloquies” were so eagerly received, that in one year twenty-
four thousand copies were sold. In these books he assailed with great
power, and the most bitter satire, the inconsistencies of the monks their
intrusiveness and rapacity in connection with deathbeds, wills, and
funerals — and thus indirectly served the cause of the Reformation.6
Erasmus had many tempting offers as to pensions and promotion, but his
love for his learned labors led him to prefer comparative poverty with
perfect liberty. In 1516 he took up his abode at Basle, where his works
were printed by Froben, and he diligently labored in correcting proofs, and
otherwise assisting that learned printer with his fine editions of classical
works.
But the great work for which he seems to have been specially fitted by
God was his Greek New Testament. “Erasmus,” says D’Aubigne, “thus
did for the New Testament what Reuchlin had done for the Old.
Henceforward divines were able to read the word of God in the original
languages, and at a later period to recognize the purity of the reformed
doctrines. The New Testament of Erasmus gave out a bright flash of light.
His paraphrases on the Epistles, and on the Gospels of St. Matthew and
St. John; his editions of Cyprian and Jerome; his translations of Origen,
Athanasius, and Chrysostom; his “Principles of True Theology,” his
“Preacher,” and his commentaries on various psalms, contributed
powerfully to diffuse a taste for the word of God, and for pure theology.
The result of his labors even went beyond his intentions. Reuchlin and
Erasmus gave the Bible to the learned; Luther gave it to the people.”7
The chain of witnesses was now complete. Wesselus, Reuchlin, Erasmus,
and Luther were linked together. The silver line of God’s grace is thus
traceable from the days of the apostles, or at least from the days of
Constantine, to the time of Luther. There was no room for a separate line
of witnesses till after the union of Church and State. The existence and
testimony of the Waldenses have been traced back to these early times.
Then we have witnesses for Christ in the Paulicians, the Albigenses, the
Wycliffites, the Bohemians, the Moravians, or United Brethren;
 781
Savonarola, and other individual Protestants in the different nations of
Europe.
And now, having pursued our dreary way through the dark ages till the
beginning of the sixteenth century, we find the Bible in the original
languages, and the printing press standing ready to multiply copies by
thousands and tens of thousands, and broad-cast them over the face of
Christendom.
The way was thus prepared for the great change which was at hand. The
unblushing wickedness of Rome, the blood of God’s martyred saints, and
the vast multitude of souls who were perishing for lack of knowledge, all
cried aloud for the hand that would shorten the dominion of the papacy,
and rescue the nations of Europe from the darkness and bondage of a
thousand years. This was now to be done, but not by mere scholarship, or
by men of polite literature, but by faith in the word of God, through the
power of the Holy Spirit.
 782

CHAPTER 33
THE REFORMATION IN GERMANY

The exclusive dominion of the Latin or Roman church was now drawing
to a close. Since the pontificate of Gregory the Great, or for nearly a
thousand years, she had reigned supreme. But the oppressed Teuton was
now raising the arm of rebellion against the tyranny of the Roman. The
warfare ended in a great secession of the Teutons, in wresting from the
papacy a large portion of her dominions, and in the breaking up of
Christendom, like the ship in which Paul sailed to Rome.
It has been our desire to present to the reader a fair view of the real
character and ways of the church of Rome during the long period of her
dominion, and he must judge whether the history warrants our
interpretation of the epistle to Thyatira. Our own convictions are a
thousandfold deeper at the close than they were at the commencement of
the history, that we have given a true interpretation, and made a just
application of the words of the Lord to the church in Thyatira. We have
only Him to serve and Him to please in writing this history. For no one
else would we have waded through these thousand years. The amount that
we write bears little proportion to the amount that must be read in order
to be satisfied as to the truthfulness of what is written. Besides, a very
large proportion of papal history is wholly unfit for our pages, or to come
before the eye of civilized people, far less the eye of the Christian. Her
adulteries and abominations are better left on the page that was written in
a ruder age, as they will surely be consigned to a place peculiarly dark in
the regions of hell.
For nearly three hundred years, by means of schools, new translations,
versions, printing-presses, and the intolerance of the church, the Lord had
been preparing the way for the accomplishment of His purpose; and, this
being done, the feeblest instrument was sufficient to bring all these
agencies into full action. “When the train is properly laid, an accidental
spark may cause the explosion.” To effect great results by small means is
 783
the way of divine providence, that the power may be seen to be of God,
and not of man. An occasion was furnished, and Luther was the prepared
instrument to reap the glorious harvest of the great Reformation. But much
labor was bestowed on the field by many noble hearts and hands which
were not privileged to gather its fruits, at least in this world. These may
have been the agents, Luther was the instrument.
During these thousand years, we have been chiefly engaged with popery
and the witnesses for Christ; now it must be popery and protestantism.
But if the reader would rightly understand the difference between the two,
he must carefully consider what popery was down to the time of Luther’s
appearance.

POPERY AND MANKIND

Comparatively few in our peaceful times have any idea of the real nature
and the comprehensive grasp of popery. During the long period of the
middle ages it was fully developed; but its nature remains unchanged until
the present hour. Times and circumstances have changed, not popery. The
clergy, including the monks and friars, were a distinct class, and stood
entirely apart from the rest of mankind. A broad, deep, impassable line
separated the two communities — the clergy and the laity. The lives, the
laws, the property, the rights, and the social duties of the one were not
only different from those of the other, but often antagonistic.
Education, such as it was, had become the exclusive privilege of the clergy.
Whoever had any desire for knowledge, could neither obtain nor employ it
but in connection with the churchman or the monastery. The younger sons
of the nobility, and even of royalty, as the church became wealthy and
powerful, joined the clerical community. By this means the most famous
names in the land were found among the clergy, and the Church and State
were thus welded together. The universities, the schools, the whole
domains of the human intellect, were in their possession. The other great
division of mankind — the laity — were kept in utter darkness and
ignorance. And woe betide the man who would venture to point out some
new road to intelligence, freedom, and power. The faintest glimmer of light
was instantly extinguished, and the discovery denounced as magical and
forbidden.
 784
The priests alone could read, write, draw up State papers, or treaties, and
frame laws. From the sacredness of their character, and their intellectual
superiority, they were admitted to the courts and the councils of kings;
they were the negotiators and the ambassadors of sovereigns. But royal
secrets and compacts were not all they knew; the confessional laid open
the whole heart of every one, from the highest to the lowest, before the
eye of the priesthood. No act was beyond their cognizance, hardly any
thought or intention was secret. There might be smothered murmurs at the
avarice, pride, and licentiousness of the priest, still he was a priest, a
bishop, a pope; his sacraments lost not their efficacy, his verdict of
condemnation or absolution was equally valid. Those who openly doubted
the power of the clergy in such matters were heretics, outcasts,
proscribed, only fit fuel for the flames both now and evermore.
The pope, as was universally believed, combined in his own person all the
attributes of supreme power in matters of religion and of government. The
power of emperors and kings was derived, his was original. He was armed
with divine authority to depose monarchs, to absolve subjects from their
allegiance and from every other obligation; and, if needful, to dissolve all
the bonds of society. But above all, he was empowered to maintain the
integrity of the faith as transmitted to him from his predecessors or
defined by himself as head of the church; to repress dissent in every
shape; to persecute to extermination all who ventured to dispute this
supreme prerogative, as rebels and traitors to God and His church; and at
any time to call upon the secular government, without compensation, to
lavish life and money, labor and feeling, to enable him to maintain the
integrity of the spiritual empire.1

THE STATE OF THE CHURCH AT THE BEGINNING

OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
Such, as we have now described, was the unlimited power of the Romish
priesthood at the beginning of this century. No man was independent of
the priest. He was lord of the human conscience. His power was absolute
both over body and soul, over time and eternity. None could afford to
incur his displeasure or to lie under his censure. Excommunication cut the
man off, whatever his rank or station, from the church, beyond whose pale
there was no possibility of salvation.
 785
It is not a little remarkable that just at this time no danger seemed to
threaten this towering, monstrous system of iniquity. From the Vatican
down to the smallest congregation the sovereignty and tranquillity of the
church appeared to be completely secured. The various herestes and
commotions which had disturbed her for centuries had been suppressed by
fire and sword; the complaints and petitions of her most faithful children
had been rejected with insolent impunity; and the warnings of her sincerest
friends were neglected or despised. Where were now the Waldenses, the
Albigenses, the Beghards, the Lollards, the Bohemians, and the various
sectaries? They had been silenced or extinguished by papal management.
True, there were many private murmurs against the injustice, frauds,
violence, and tyranny of the court of Rome; also against the crimes,
ignorance, and licentiousness of her whole priesthood; but the pontiffs had
grown accustomed to these murmurings, and could either conciliate with
their favors, or defy with their censures, as best suited their policy.
We can imagine the false woman, according to the language of St. John,
surveying with exultation the pillars and bulwarks of her strength. “For
she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no
sorrow.” She heeded not the voice that had said,
“Her sins have reached unto heaven,
and God hath remembered her iniquities.” (Revelation 18.)
God’s time was come for at least a partial fulfillment of this prophecy.
The word of arrest had gone forth. Just when she thought everything was
safe and settled for ever, the end of her uncontrolled domination was at
hand. But how was this to be accomplished? A reformation of the church
in its head and members had been the general cry for ages; but all such
demands and complaints she set at defiance. What now was to be done?
Must some mighty angel come down from heaven to overthrow the
despotism of Rome, and break the yoke of popery which has so long
bound in fetters the bodies and souls of men? No! such agencies were not
required and not used, that God may be glorified. That which the most
powerful sovereigns with their armed legions utterly failed to effect, God
fully and gloriously accomplished by an obscure monk in Saxony, single-
handed.
 786
This was Martin Luther of Eisleben. He was the voice of God that
awoke Europe to this great work and called the laborers into the field. But
if we would form a just estimate of God’s chief instrument in this mighty
work, and of the grace that qualified him, we must glance at what is
important in the early life of the great Reformer. D’Aubigne, in his love of
Luther, speaks of him as having experienced in his own soul the different
phases of the Reformation before they were accomplished in the world;
and exhorts his reader to study his life before he proceeds to the events
that changed the face of Christendom.

THE FIRST PERIOD OF LUTHER’S LIFE

Martin Luther was descended from a poor but virtuous family, which had
long dwelt in the domains of the Counts of Mansfeld, in Thuringia. “I am
the son of a peasant,” he used to say; “my father, my grandfather, and my
great-grand-father, were honest peasants.” His father, John Luther, soon
after his marriage removed to Eisleben in Saxony. There Luther was born,
November 10th, 1483. It was on St. Martin’s eve: the following day he
was christened by the name of Martin, in honor of the saint on whose
festival he was born.
His father was an upright and industrious man; frank in his manner, but
disposed to carry the firmness of his character even to obstinacy. He was
fond of reading, and improved his naturally strong understanding by
studying such books as came within his reach. His wife, Margaret, was a
humble, prayerful, pious woman, looked up to by her neighbors as a
pattern of virtue.
The following summer, or when Martin was about six months old, the
family removed back to Mansfeld, where they endured great poverty.
“My father was a wood cutter,” says Luther, “and my mother has often
carried the wood on her back that she might procure the means of bringing
up her children.” But the Lord was not unmindful of these honest labors
and raised them above such drudgery in due time. John became connected
with the iron-mines at Mansfeld, and, by his habits of industry and the
general respect he acquired by his good sense, he was brought into
comparatively easy circumstances. He was chosen a member of the town
 787
council; and by the superior character of his mind he easily found his way
to the best society in the district.
The father’s fondest ambition was to make his eldest son a scholar; but he
did not forget his early domestic education. As soon as he was old enough
to receive instruction, his pious parents spoke to him about the Lord Jesus
and prayed with him by his bedside. Martin was sent very young to
school. His first instructor was one George Emilius, the schoolmaster of
the place. There he was taught the catechism, the commandments, the
creed, the Lord’s prayer, and the rudiments of Latin. But, according to the
manners of the age, poor little Martin acquired his first religious education
through many and severe floggings. From an early age he was trained in the
school of poverty, hardship, and suffering, for a future life of warfare. On
one occasion, as he himself relates, he was flogged by the unsparing
Emilius fifteen times in the same day. His treatment at home was not more
merciful.
“His father administered with conscientious rigor,” says one of his
biographers, “what was long considered as the only instrument of moral or
intellectual cultivation; and even his mother engaged in the system with so
much zeal as to draw blood by her chastisements.” Martin’s warm and
resolute temper gave frequent occasions for punishment on this principle.
“My parents,” he said in after life, “treated me harshly, so that I became
very timid. My mother one day chastised me so severely about a nut, that
the blood came; but they sincerely thought they were doing right.”2

THE SECOND PERIOD OF LUTHER’S LIFE

At the age of fourteen Martin had learned all that could be taught at
Mansfeld, and having given some promise of proficiency, his father sent
him to the Franciscan school at Magdeburg. But the severity of Luther’s
education did not cease when he left his father’s house and the hard
discipline of Emilius. He found himself at Magdeburg in the midst of
strangers, without friends, without means, and without food enough to live
upon. His spirit was crushed; he trembled in the presence of his masters,
and had to employ the intervals of study in begging bread. When, with his
young companions, he went at Christmas through the neighboring villages
singing carols, all were so timid, by reason of the menaces and tyranny
 788
with which teachers were then accustomed to rule over their pupils, that
they ran away from a kind peasant, who came out with some food for
them. Frightened at the sound of a loud voice calling, “Boys, where are
you?” they fled. It was only his repeated calls and assurances that brought
them back to partake of his bounty.
Here Luther remained about a year, but his difficulty in finding food was
so great that, with the consent of his parents, he left and went to
Eisenach, which contained a good school, where also his mother’s
relations resided. But his kindred who dwelt there either neglected him or
were unable to help him. So hard were his circumstances that it seemed
likely he would have to leave. But again, when pinched by hunger, he tried
singing from door to door for a morsel of bread. This custom is still
preserved in many German cities; and in some places the choral boys are
expected to solicit contributions in aid of the funds of the institution. Such
a mode of earning his bread was most humiliating to the mind of Luther.
The frequent repulses he met with well-nigh broke his spirit; he shed
many tears in secret, and indulged anxious thoughts about the future.
“Must I abandon all my fond hopes of education, of improvement, of
advancement? must I go back to Mansfeld and be shut up in the mines for
ever?” Such questions had become present realities to the young student.
But there was One who was watching over him, though as yet he knew
Him not; and who had destined him to work in other mines than those at
Mansfeld. A Father’s hand was directing and weighing every trial; the
enemy could not add a grain to their weight beyond the divine measure. He
was training His future servant in the school of adversity; and when he had
learnt his lesson the reward would come. A crisis in his history was at
hand; the Lord’s time for relief had arrived.

LUTHER AND THE PIOUS URSULA

One day, as Luther was returning from his labors, greatly disappointed
and disheartened, having sung before three successive houses unrewarded,
a door suddenly opened; a woman appeared on the threshold, who invited
him to come in, and relieved his wants. This was the kind-hearted Ursula,
the wife of Conrad Cotta. She had noticed him before and had been struck
with the sweetness of his voice and the seriousness of his expression.
 789
Conrad approved of his wife’s benevolence, and they agreed that he
should remain with them as an adopted son. Relieved from his temporal
cares, and enjoying the many privileges of a christian family, the naturally
fine mind of Luther awoke to new sympathies, new joys, new hopes — to
a new and happy existence. God in mercy had opened the hearts and the
home of the good Ursula and her husband for the spirit-broken youth. We
need scarcely add, that their love was engraven on the heart of Luther, and
recorded in heaven to be rewarded for ever.
To his literary and scientific studies — which he now pursued with fresh
vigor — he added the charms of music. In gratitude to his adopted mother,
he learned in his hours of recreation to play on the flute and the lute, and
to sing to the latter, for she was passionately fond of the melody of his
voice as an accompaniment to the lute. Thus began that love of music
which continued even to old age, and was often a solace to him in times of
trouble and temptation. He composed tunes for many songs, and also the
words as well as the airs of some very beautiful hymns.
In the genial atmosphere of the Cotta family, it was only natural that the
character of Luther should undergo a great change. His anxieties were
removed, his timidity disappeared, his mind was peaceful, his ways were
cheerful and happy, and his remarkable talents made him the special
favorite at the Franciscan school. Thus he spent four happy years. “He
surpassed all his fellows,” says Melancthon, “in eloquence, and
compositions both in prose and verse.” Trebonius, the superior of the
convent and the head of the college, always raised his cap to salute the
pupils when he entered the schoolroom. His colleagues, not adopting the
same custom, expressed their surprise at his condescension. “There are
among these boys,” he replied, “some whom God will one day make
burgomasters, chancellors, doctors, and magistrates. Although you do not
yet see them with the badges of their dignity, it is right that you should
treat them with respect.” The youthful Luther was present, and no doubt
often remembered the words of his esteemed teacher.
Encouraged by his early triumphs at Eisenach, and feeling that his course
of study was secured, he thirsted for more extensive means of intellectual
advancement and distinction. A university education was his great desire.
 790
His father, whose circumstances were improved, agreed to this, but wished
him to study the law.

LUTHER ENTERS THE UNIVERSITY AT ERFURT

In the year 1501, Luther arrived at the University in Erfurt, then the most
distinguished in Germany. He had reached his eighteenth year and entered
with great eagerness into the studies of manhood. “My father,” says
Luther, “maintained me there with much love and faithfulness, and
supported me by the sweat of his brow.” One of his biographers,
moralizing on this grateful record of the son, observes: “And assuredly all
the volumes of the history of mankind contain no record of a parent’s
manual toil being recompensed by so glorious a harvest as that which
sprang from the persevering industry of the miner of Mansfeld. Every
drop that fell from that brow was converted by a watchful providence to
the furtherance of its purposes, and made the means of fertilizing the
mind, which it had ordained to change the predominant principles of the
christian world.”3
There is reason to believe that other thoughts besides the cultivation of his
intellect were exercising the mind of Luther at this time. The merciful
intervention of God in the kindness of the Cotta family, and what he had
seen and learnt there, made a deep and lasting impression on his inmost
soul. He strongly objected to the study of Aristotle, although his system
was in great repute at the college, and represented as the best, or rather the
only, discipline for his reason. “Had Aristotle not been a man,” he used to
say, “I should not have hesitated to take him for a devil;” so great was his
aversion to the philosophy of the learned Greek. The works of the great
scholastics of former ages, such as Scotus, Aquinas, Ockham, and
Bonaventura, were recommended to him as the only means of piety and
learning; but these, for meeting the need of a troubled conscience, were
little better than the logic of Aristotle. Nevertheless, in the wisdom of
God, it was necessary that he should become conversant with these
writings that he might be the better able, and have the better ground, to
expose their utter worthlessness as to the service and worship of God. He
also studied the best Latin authors, and, being blessed with great powers
of penetration, perseverance, and a retentive memory, he made rapid
 791
progress in his studies, and early acquired the reputation of an expert and
skillful dialectician.
In the year 1503 he took his first academical degree of Bachelor of Arts;
and in 1505, he took that of Doctor in Philosophy. Having made
considerable proficiency in several branches of literature, he began, in
obedience to his father’s wishes, to turn his attention to the subject of
jurisprudence. But the Lord had other work for Luther: grace was already
working in his heart. He was about that time given to much prayer; and
used to say, “that prayer is the better half of studying” — a good maxim
for all christian students.

LUTHER’S FIRST SIGHT OF A BIBLE

In a state of trembling anxiety about the salvation of his soul, he was one
day searching the library at Erfurt for something new, when the hand of
God directed him to a Bible. He read the title page — it is indeed the Holy
Bible! He was greatly excited and interested as he rapidly turned over its
leaves. He was then twenty years of age, and had not so much as seen the
precious volume before. Let the Protestant reader note this — he had been
brought up by pious parents, lived four years in a christian family, and
had not even seen a Bible! The same ignorance of the word of God prevails
in Roman Catholic communities to this hour. The Bible forms no part of a
Catholic priest’s education, and the people are forbidden to read it. Tens
of millions are now in circulation, but in a strictly Roman Catholic district
it would be difficult to find a single copy. Some extracts are used in the
church service, and even pious Catholics are ready to believe that these
extracts contain the substance of the whole Bible. Such is the narrow and
precarious foundation on which their faith is built, and such the blinding,
ruinous power of that fearful system of darkness and idolatry.
But we have also, as Protestants, to remember that the Bible is not its own
power, or its own interpreter. For “what man knoweth the things of a man
save the spirit of a man which is in Him? even so the things of God
knoweth no man but the Spirit of God.” Without the teaching and power
of the Holy Spirit, through faith in Christ Jesus, there can be no right
understanding of the word of God, and no true subjection of heart to its
absolute authority. Hence some of the protestant axioms, though sounding
 792
well and of importance as contrasted with popery, are nevertheless
incorrect and misleading, such as, “The Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing
but the Bible.” This is quite true when speaking of the Bible as a standard;
but if it be meant that the Bible is its own power and interpreter, it is
false; for the Holy Spirit would be thereby practically excluded. “The right
of private judgment” has also been much talked of by Protestants; but its
effects have been most mischievous. Pride of intellect, the competency of
human reason, and insubjection to the revealed will of God, are some of
the evil fruits of this Protestant parent principle; although it was originally
intended to contrast with the boasted infallibility of the Romish
priesthood, and the enslaved mind of the laity.
How can a lost sinner, condemned already, have any private or individual
rights? He has no rights save to a place among the lost. But if God is
pleased to speak to him, he is bound to listen — only to listen; he has no
right to reason on what God may be pleased to say; he can have no
opinion of his own on divine things. People do not really believe that they
are lost; they believe that they have sins — that they are guilty; but they
do not believe that in their present state they are “condemned already.”
Most people know neither that they are lost, nor that they are saved;
hence they talk of their rights as free men. But some may inquire, “What
then is the use of our reason if we are not to exercise it?” To read, search,
and learn the mind of God from His word, is surely the highest exercise of
the human mind, and the richest privilege. But hear what another says: —

HOW TO STUDY THE BIBLE

“Scripture in hand, diligent in study, what is my safeguard as to
understanding it? My own competency? Its suitability to what is in me
and around, which is most divinely true? Oh, no!... Let man humbly take
his place of subjection, and God will not deny Himself — the Spirit never
fails to honor the Lord Jesus; and it is written, ‘If any man will do His
will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God.’ Blessed ground
this for man’s soul to rest upon in contrast with the neologian or infidel
ground of human competency and human diligence. To the spirit of
obedience and subjection all is sure.”4 Doing, according to the word of the
Lord, must go before knowing. There must be a readiness to do His will if
we would kno/v or understand His doctrine; but the pride of man would
 793
put it the other way — I must know His word, before I yield obedience to
His will.
To Romanist as well as to Protestant, the oracles of God had been
committed; and that Sacred Book will be the ground of men’s judgment
before the great white throne; but, historically, the one kept it laid up in
the napkin, affirming that it was too sacred for the eyes of men to see or
the ears of men to hear; the other brought it forth to the light, broadcast it
over all lands, and caused its voice to be heard on the open highway, and in
the streets and lanes of the city. Thus was the Reformation accomplished.
Deep in the credulity and devotion of the multitude had Rome struck her
roots; and she stood firm and unshaken until access was gained to the
minds of the common people. And this was done by the free circulation of
the Bible. “The movement was from above, in the great grace of God. The
Spirit, still testifying to Jesus, Lord of all, gave its tongue and voice to the
word. God was with it in the vessels He had afore prepared for the work:
and whether in quickening, throwing light upon the path to glory, and
upon those that traveled in it; or convicting and discovering Satan, with his
slaves on their downward march of rebellion towards hell, it was the Holy
Spirit who was the power of understanding, and proclamation, and
application of the word.” We now return to the history of Luther.
Again and again, Luther found his way to the library in the monastery.
With increasing delight he examined the unsoiled pages of the Latin Bible,
and wished in his heart that he might some day possess such a treasure.
He was astonished at the mass of knowledge it contained, and arrested by
its simple narratives, especially such as the history of Hannah and the
young Samuel. But attractive as the word of God became to him, and much
as he enjoyed reading it, he was far from seeing the way of salvation. The
excessive labor which enabled him to pass his examinations with honors
occasioned a dangerous illness. When death seemed approaching, what was
his refuge? “0 Mary, help me!” he kept calling loudly through the night.
He knew not a more powerful savior than the Virgin Mary. “Had I died at
that time,” he said years after, “I should have died relying upon Mary.”
The true ground of a sinner’s pardon and salvation had never been
presented to him; and he had received the most perfect education which
home and the church, with her universities could give.
 794
LUTHER BECOMES A MONK
Encouraged by the dignities and the popularity which he had gained, he
felt disposed, with returning health, to apply himself entirely to the study
of law; and began to teach the ethics of Aristotle with other branches of
philosophy. While thus engaged in secular pursuits, a singular and solemn
event occurred which gave a new direction to his whole future life. One of
his favorite, college friends, Alexius, was cut off suddenly, and probably
by the hand of violence; but the particulars of his death are uncertain: the
results however were certain and important. Luther trembled. What would
become of my soul, were I thus called away without warning? The terrors
of death which had affected him before returned with redoubled violence
and took possession of his whole soul. While in this state of mental
agitation, and the solemn question of his soul’s salvation still unsettled, he
was overtaken by a dreadful thunderstorm near Erfurt. The lightning
flashed, the thunder rolled, the terrified Luther threw himself upon the
ground, imagining that the hour of death, judgment, and eternity were
come. Encompassed with the terrors of death and ignorant of his way to
God by the faith of Jesus, he called upon St. Anne, and made a vow that,
if the Lord would deliver him from this danger, he would abandon the
world, and shut himself up in a convent for the rest of his days.
The storm passed, Luther re-enters Erfurt, but not to resume his lectures,
not to pursue the study of the law: his vow was upon him; he resigned his
brilliant prospects for the obscurity of a cloister. This was the customary
usage in those days for all who became seriously religious, in the hope of
obtaining a holiness that would fit them to meet God. He knew it would
greatly distress his father, and this thought pained him exceedingly, but his
resolution was unalterable. About a fortnight after the event, on the 17th
of August, 1505, he invited a few of his university friends to supper. As
usual, music and conversation enlivened the social meeting. At an advanced
hour in the evening Luther communicated his intention. This was his
farewell entertainment — his farewell to the world. That same night, in
spite of every remonstrance, he entered the Augustinian convent at
Erfurt.
Luther could do nothing coldly or feebly. See him now leaving his friends,
his books, his clothes, and in the darkness of the night hastening to the
 795
convent gate. “Open to me, in the name of God,” he cried. “What do you
want?” replied the friar. “To consecrate myself to God.” The gate opened;
Luther entered, and it closed again. He was now separated from his
parents, his friends, his studies, the world; but, according to the notions of
that time, his soul was now perfectly safe, he was alone with God.

LUTHER’S EXPERIENCE AS A MONK

The motives by which Luther was actuated in taking this hasty step he
thus explains about sixteen years later: “I was never in heart a monk, nor
was it to mortify the lust of my fleshly appetites, but, tormented with
horror and the fear of death, I took a forced and constrained vow.”
Immediately after his entry into the convent, he sent back to the
university his robe and ring of office; he parted with the clothes he had
worn up till then, that nothing might remain that could remind him of the
world he had renounced. His father was greatly grieved by all these
proceedings, and his friends at Erfurt were utterly astonished. Only the
monks rejoiced; they were no doubt flattered by so distinguished a doctor
becoming one of their order.
But the lingering desire of Luther’s heart for more reading and
contemplation was not to be indulged in the monastery. No sooner had he
entered than he was subjected, notwithstanding his high reputation in the
university, to the most degrading monastic drudgery. He was ordered to
sweep out the dormitories, to wind up the clock, to open and shut the
gates, to perform the duties of porter, and to be the menial servant of the
cloister. But this was not all. He must be publicly mortified; the high-
minded student must be humbled. When the poor monk was tired with his
manuel labors, and expecting rest and some time for reading and study, he
was urged to turn out with his wallet and beg for the convent. He was told
that it was not by study that he would benefit the community, but rather
by begging bread, corn, eggs, fish, meat, and money. And thus he wandered
forth with his sack through the streets of Erfurt, begging from door to
door; but not now as a poor singing boy, but as a Master of Arts and a
Doctor of Philosophy.
This was a severe education for Luther, but it was no doubt permitted and
overruled by an all-wise providence, that he might gain through personal
 796
experience a more minute acquaintance with monastic life, and a keener
sense of its delusions, than he could have learnt in any other way. But the
enemy, as he often does, went too far. The university was ashamed to see
one of its late honorable members laden with the monastery’s breadbag,
and begging, it might be, at the doors of his old friends. The prior of the
convent was spoken to, and Luther was released from those errands of
mendicity.

LUTHER’S CONVERSION
Having obtained some relaxation from his menial duties, Luther now
returned to his studies with fresh zeal. Reading and meditation were his
delight. The works of the Fathers, especially of St. Augustine, attracted
his attention. In a certain spot of the convent there was a Bible fastened
by a chain, and thither the young monk often resorted to read the word of
God, though as yet he had no spiritual discernment of its meaning. One; of
the friars, named John Lange, with whom Luther became acquainted,
possessed considerable knowledge both of the Greek and Hebrew,
languages which Luther had not yet found time to study. But his
opportunity was now come, and he embraced it with great eagerness and
industry. It was thus, in the seclusion of his cell, and with the help of John
Lange, that he began to learn Greek and Hebrew, and thereby laid the
foundation of the greatest and most useful of all his works — the
translation of the Bible into the German tongue. Reuchlin’s Hebrew
Lexicon had just appeared, which greatly assisted him.
But Luther’s reading and exercises of mind on the scriptures, from not
understanding them, only increased his distress. To have the assurance of
salvation was the one great desire of his agitated soul. Without this nothing
could give him rest. He had entered the cloister, he had become a monk, he
had struggled unceasingly against the evil of his own heart, he had spent
whole nights on his knees on the floor of his cell, he had exceeded all his
brethren in watchings, fastings, and mortifications, but in monkish
perfection he had found no relief; it only plunged him into deeper despair,
and well nigh cost him his life. Through the rigor of his asceticism he
weakened his body till his mind wandered, and then he imagined that he
saw and was surrounded with ghosts and demons. But why was this?
some may inquire; was he not sincere? Most surely; but he sought to
 797
obtain peace with God by means of his own religious exercises, and in this
he was bitterly disappointed. He was attempting to do the work for
himself which Christ had done for him — and done perfectly. And are not
thousands in the present day doing the very same thing that Luther did,
only less sincere, less earnest, less self-denying? They are looking to
themselves — it may be only to their feelings, or it may be to their doings
or their reasonings, or their realizings. Still, self is the object before the
mind, not Christ and His finished work. “Look unto me,” says the blessed
Lord; and what will the immediate result be? Salvation! — instant,
complete, personal salvation!
“Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am
God, and there is none else.” (Isaiah 45:22.)
And to this truth every soul must bow before it can taste the sweetness of
peace with God. But Luther was still ignorant of the sublime simplicity
and the moral glory of the gospel of the grace of God.
At this period of Luther’s history, he thought nothing too great a sacrifice
that might enable him to attain that holiness which would secure salvation
now, and heaven at last. He really thought to purchase eternal happiness
by his own exertions; such is the darkness of the church of Rome, and
such was the delusion of one of her most faithful sons. In after years,
when he knew better, he wrote to Duke George of Saxony: “I was
indeed a pious monk, and followed the rules of my order more strictly
than I can express. If ever monk could obtain heaven by his monkish
works, I should certainly have been entitled to it. Of this all the friars who
have known me can testify. If it had continued much longer, I should have
carried my mortifications even to death, by means of watchings, prayers,
readings, and other labors.” Admission into heaven by his own merits was
the end at which he aimed, and which he pursued with a zeal that
endangered his life.
From the strictness and abstemiousness of his monastic life he became
subject to fits of depression. On one occasion, overwhelmed with a sense
of his own wretchedness and sinfulness, he locked himself up in his cell,
and for several days and nights refused to admit any one. A friendly monk,
who knew something of the state of his mind, burst open his cell, and was
alarmed to find him with his face on the ground, and in a state of
 798
insensibility. He was, after some difficulty, restored by the sweet singing
of a few chorister boys, but he fainted again — the burden was still there.
He required, not the soft music of a huron, but the sweeter music of the
gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And this, through the mercy of
God, was near at hand.

LUTHER AND STAUPITZ

John Staupitz, whom the Lord sent to Luther with a message of mercy,
was vicar-general of the Augustines for all Germany. Historians speak of
him in the highest terms. “He was indeed of noble descent,” says one, “but
he was far more illustrious through the power of his eloquence, the extent
of his learning, the uprightness of his character, and the purity of his life.”5
It is matter of thankfulness, and worthy of note, to find such a godly man
filling such an important office even in the last stage of papal degeneracy.
His influence was great and good. He possessed the esteem of Frederick
the Wise, Elector of Saxony, who founded the university of Wittemberg
under his direction.
A visitation of this good man — the vicar-general — to inspect the
monastery at Erfurt was announced just about the time when the anguish
of Luther’s mind had reached its height. The wasted frame, the melancholy
appearance, yet the earnest resolute look of the young monk attracted the
attention of Staupitz. From past experience he knew well the cause of his
dejection, and most kindly instructed and comforted him. He assured
Luther that he was entirely mistaken in supposing that he could stand
before God on the ground of his works or his vows; that he could only be
saved by the mercy of God, and that mercy must flow to him through
faith in the blood of Christ. “Let your principal occupation be the study
of the scriptures,” says Staupitz; and along with this good advice he
presented Luther with a Bible, which of all things on earth he most
desired.
A ray of divine light had penetrated the dark mind of Luther. His
conversations and correspondence with the vicar-general greatly helped
him, but he was still a stranger to peace with God. His bodily health again
gave way under the conflicts of his soul. During the second year of his
residence in the convent he became so dangerously ill, that he had to be
 799
removed to the infirmary. All his former terrors returned at the approach
of death. He was still ignorant of the value of the finished work of Christ
to the believer, and so were his teachers. The frightful image of his own
guilt, and the demands of God’s holy law, filled him with fear. Not being a
common-place man, and passing through an experience which common-
place men could not understand, he was alone; he could tell his griefs to
none.
One day, as he lay, overwhelmed with despair, he was visited by an old
monk, who spoke to him of the way of peace. Won by the kindness of his
words, Luther opened his heart to him. The venerable father spoke to him
of the efficacy of faith, and repeated to him that article in the Apostles’
Creed, “I believe in the forgiveness of sins.” These few simple words,
with the Lord’s blessing, seem to have turned the mind of Luther from
works to faith. He had been familiar with the form of these words from his
childhood, but he had only repeated them as a form of words, like
thousands of nominal Christians in all ages. Now they filled his heart with
hope and consolation. The old monk, hearing him repeating the words to
himself, “I believe in the forgiveness of sins,” as if to fathom their depth,
interrupted him by saying that it was not a mere general but a personal
belief. I believe in the forgiveness, not merely of David’s sins, or of Peter’s
sins, but of my sins. Even the devils have a general but not a personal
belief. “Hear what St. Bernard says,” added the pious old monk, “The
testimony of the Holy Ghost to thy heart is this, thy sins are forgiven
thee.” From this moment divine light entered the heart of Luther, and, step
by step, through the diligent study of the word and prayer, he became a
great and honored servant of the Lord.

REFLECTIONS ON THE CONVERSION OF LUTHER

This is the simple stow of Luther’s conversion, and a genuine conversion
it was, through the grace of God; but, so far as Luther’s mind was
concerned, it was not a very solid work. The measure and character of the
truth presented by Staupitz and the old monk could not have fortified him
against the attacks of the enemy. With so little knowledge of the mind of
God, the love of Christ, the completeness of His work, of deliverance
through death and resurrection, a converted soul might soon be filled and
harassed with doubts and fears. And this is what we find on all hands in
 800
the present day. Very few have settled peace with God. They hope, they
trust, that they are saved, but there is very little of the full assurance of
faith. And why? Just because of defective views of their own lost state
and of the work of Christ as perfectly meeting that state. Take one text as
an illustration: “For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that
are sanctified.” (Hebrews 10:14.) Surely, if we rightly apprehended the
dignity and the glory of the sufferer, what would our faith be in the value
of His sacrifice, of His one offering? There is no repetition, no second
application, of the blood; it can never lose its efficacy. We may be daily
cleansed with the water of purification; but the idea of a second
application of the blood of propitiation is unknown in scripture. Once
washed in that precious blood, the conscience is perfect for ever. That
word, “for ever,” means not so much eternally, as continuously,
permanently, uninterruptedly perfect before God, even as Christ always
is. God can never overlook that which has so perfectly blotted out sin, so
perfectly glorified Himself, so perfectly vanquished every foe, and so
perfectly obtained eternal redemption for every believer.
Up till the time that Luther met with Staupitz and the aged monk, he was,
to use his own words, “in the swaddling-bands of popery, and had not
seen its evils.” And this is true, in a certain sense, of thousands still. They
are in the swaddling-bands of their respective systems of doctrine and
church-standing, without having ever carefully examined these things by
the word of God. Consequently they are strangers to that happy liberty
wherewith Christ makes His people free. Luther was converted, but he
was by no means out of the house of bondage. The unswathing of his soul
was, through unbelief, a slow process. He knew almost nothing of the
privileges and blessings of the children of God, and of their standing in
Christ. But we know from scripture what his blessings were, and what the
blessings are of every converted soul. Immediately the woman touched the
hem of the Redeemer’s garment, the fountain of her disease was dried up.
By the slender touch of faith the virtue that was in Jesus was made her
own. Beautiful illustration of the newly-converted soul standing before
God in all the virtue, the excellencies, the life, the righteousness, the peace,
the joy, the happy liberty of Christ Himself! Eternal life has taken the
place of spiritual death, divine righteousness of humall sin, and nearness to
God of moral distance. Such is the blessing of every soul the first moment
 801
of its conversion, though it may be on the borders of despair from the
darkness of its condition, as Luther was.
Take another illustration — the penitent thief on the cross. A few
moments after his conversion he enters heaven with Christ, and as fitted
for that holy place as Christ Himself. “Today shalt thou be with Me in
paradise.” The immediate consequence of faith in Christ is meetness for
the inheritance of the saints in light. See also Luke 23:39-43; Mark 5:25-
34; Colossians 1:12, 13, 14.

LUTHER A PRIEST AND A PROFESSOR

He had spent three eventful years in the cloister at Erfurt. But these years
were not lost to him. The general cultivation of his mind, the discipline of
his soul, his study of Hebrew and Greek, were so many branches of
needed education for his future career in the Lord’s service. Besides, it was
the place of his spiritual birth, and the place where he first heard of
justification by faith — that divine doctrine on which so much of his
subsequent work was built.
In the year 1507 he was ordained a priest, at which ceremony his father’
was present though still dissatisfied with the course of his son. Luther had
now received power from the bishop to offer sacrifice for the living and
the dead, and to convert, by muttering a few words, the unleavened cake
into the real body and blood of the Lord. Luther submitted to and accepted
these popish pretensions, though against his convictions, and with fear
and trembling; but his soul never completely recovered from the effects of
this blasphemous ordination. A judicial blindness as to the scriptural
simplicity of the Lord’s supper settled down upon his mind. He was
enabled, by the grace of God, to throw off and denounce many of Rome’s
superstitions, but never fully her crowning enormity, transubstantiation.
Staupitz, the faithful friend and patron of Luther, placed him, at the age of
twenty-five, in a position suited for the display of his powerful and active
mind, and the further development of his character. He was invited by the
Elector Frederick, at the suggestion of the vicar-general, to occupy a chair
of philosophy in his rising university. He removed to Wittemberg in the
year 1508. But though called to be a professor he did not cease to be a
monk; he lodged in a cell in the Augustinian convent. The subjects on
 802
which he was appointed to lecture were the physics and dialectics of
Aristotle. This was uncongenial employment for one who was hungering
and thirsting after the word of God. Neither physical science nor moral
philosophy suited the spirit of his mind. But again, we may say, it was
part of his needed education. He who had passed through the cloister must
now occupy for a time the chair of scholastic philosophy, that he might be
better fitted to expose the evils, and combat the errors, of both systems,
and emancipate the minds of men from their influence.
In the mean time, though he was attracting the youths of Wittemberg by
the force and style of his lectures, he was zealously applying himself to
the study of Greek and Hebrew. His desire was to drink at the fountain;
and He who saw the great desire of his heart and the labor of his life
opened up the way for him. In a few months after his arrival at the
university he obtained the degree of Bachelor of Divinity, which entitled
him to lecture on theology, or on the Bible. He now felt himself in his
proper sphere, and determined to communicate that only which he learnt
from the word of God. His first discourses were on the Psalms, and then
he passed to Paul’s Epistle to the Romans.
His precious meditations on these portions in his quiet cell, both at Erfurt
and Wittemberg, gave a character to his lectures altogether new. He spoke,
not merely as an eloquent schoolman, but as a Christian who felt the
power of the great truths he taught. When he reached, in his expositions,
the last clause of Romans 1:17, “the just shall live by faith,” a light, we
may say, beyond the brightness of the sun, filled his whole soul. The
Spirit of God clothed the words with light and power to the understanding
and to the heart of Luther. The grand doctrine of justification by faith
alone he received into his heart as from the voice of God. He now saw that
eternal life was to be obtained not by penance but by faith. The whole
story of the German Reformation is connected with these few words. In
their light he explained the scriptures of the Old and New Testament; by
their truth he exposed the falsehoods of popery, he thrilled the heart of
Europe, he brought the reign of imposture to an end, and accomplished the
great Reformation. Alone he stood before all authority — before all the
world — on the truth of the word of God, “the just shall live by faith.”
God’s word is true, popery is a lie; the one must fall, the other must
triumph; truth is health to the soul, a lie is deadly poison. These principles
 803
of eternal righteousness were now firmly fixed in the heart of Luther by
the Spirit of God; and, simple as they may appear, he was enabled,
through faith in the word of God, to triumph over popes, bishops, clergy,
kings, and emperors, raising the standard of salvation through faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ, without works of law.
The great work was now begun, but the workman had still some lessons to
learn.

LUTHER VISITS ROME

Some disputes having arisen between the vicar-general and several of the
Augustinian monasteries, Luther was selected as a fit person to represent
the whole matter before His Holiness in Rome. It was necessary, in the
wisdom of God, that Luther should know Rome. As a monk in the far
north, he only thought of the pope as the most holy father, and of Rome
as the city of the saints; and these prejudices and delusions could only be
dispelled by personal observation: intelligence did not circulate then as
now.
In the year 1510, penniless and barefoot, Luther crossed the Alps. A meal
and a night’s rest he begged at the monasteries or the farm-houses as he
went along. But scarcely had he descended the Alps, when he found
monasteries of marble and the: monks feeding on the most sumptuous fare.
All this was new and surprising to the frugal monk of Wittemberg. But
when Friday came, what was his astonishment to find the tables of the
Benedictines groaning with dainty meats? He was so moved with
indignation that he ventured to say, “The church and the pope forbid such
things.” For this remonstrance, some say, he nearly atoned with his life.
Having received a friendly hint to be off, he quitted the monastery,
traveled through the burning plains of Lombardy, and reached Bologna,
dangerously ill. Here the enemy turned his thoughts in upon himself, and
he became greatly troubled with the sense of his own sinfulness, for the
prospect of death filled him with fear and terror. But the words of the
apostle, “the just shall live by faith,” like a ray of light from heaven,
chased the dark clouds away, changed the current of his thoughts, and
restored his peace of mind. With returning strength he renewed his
journey, and after passing through Florence, and toiling under an
 804
oppressive Italian sun through the long tract of the Apennines, he at length
drew near to the seven-hilled city.
We must preface Luther’s entry into Rome by reminding our readers
that, though he had received the truth of the gospel, he was still a papist,
and that his devotion to the papacy partook of the vehemence of bigotry.
Rome, to the rude German, was the holy city, sanctified by the tombs of
the apostles, the monuments of saints, and the blood of martyrs. But alas!
the Rome of reality was widely different from the Rome of his
imagination. As he approached the gates, his heart beat violently. He fell
on his knees, and, with his hands raised to heaven, he exclaimed, “Holy
Rome, I salute thee! Blessed Rome, thrice sanctified by the blood of thy
martyrs!” With all sorts of affectionate and respectful terms he thus
saluted the metropolis of Christendom. And under the influence of this
wild enthusiasm he hastened to the holy places, listening to all the legends
by which they are consecrated; and all that he saw and heard he most
devoutly believed. But his heart was very soon sickened with the
profanity of the Italian priests. One day, when he was repeating Mass
with great seriousness, he found that the priests at an adjoining altar had
already repeated seven Masses before he had finished one. “Quick!
quick!” cried one of them, “send our Lady back her Son,” making an
impious allusion to the transubstantiation of the bread into the body and
blood of Jesus Christ. Profanity could scarcely reach a higher pitch.
Luther’s disenchantment was complete, and the purpose of God in his
education was accomplished.
Luther had expected to find in Rome an austere religion; “her brow circled
with griefs, resting on the bare earth, quenching her thirst with the dew of
heaven, clothed like the apostles, making her way along stony paths, and
the gospel under her arm; but in place of this he saw the triumphal pomp
of the pontiff; the cardinals in litters, on horseback, or in carriages,
glittering with precious stones, and covered from the sun by a canopy of
peacocks’ feathers. The gorgeous churches, and the more gorgeous rituals,
and the pagan splendor of the paintings, were to Luther, whose heart was
heavy with thoughts of the priests’ profanity, utterly unbearable. What
was the Rome of Raphael, of Michael Angelo, of Perugino, and
Benvenuto, to the poor German monk, who had traveled four hundred
 805
leagues on foot, expecting to find that which would deepen his devotion
and strengthen his faith?”
Yet such was the power of educational superstition in Luther,
notwithstanding his knowledge of scripture, and his bitter disappointment
in Roxne, that one day, wishing to obtain an indulgence promised by the
pope to all who should ascend on their knees what is called Pilate’s
staircase, he was humbly creeping up those steps, which he was told had
been miraculously transported from Jerusalem to Rome, when he thought
he heard a voice, loud as thunder, crying, “The just shall live by faith.”
Amazed, he rises from the steps up which he was dragging his body;
ashamed at seeing to what a depth superstition had plunged him, he flies
with all haste from the scene of his folly.
Having transacted the business on which he was sent, he turned his back
for ever upon the pontifical city. “Adieu! Rome,” he said; “let all who
would lead a holy life depart from Rome. Everything is permitted in Rome
except to be an honest man.” He had no thought then of leaving the Roman
church, but, perplexed and troubled, he returned to Saxony.
Soon after Luther’s return to Wittemberg, on the pressing solicitation of
Staupitz, he took the degree of Doctor in Divinity. The Senate also gave
him the pulpit of the parish church, which opened up for him at once a
sphere of the greatest usefulness. But Luther, alarmed at the
responsibility, showed some reluctance to accept a dignity of such
spiritual importance. As his friendly vicar sought to remove his scruples,
and pressed the service upon him, he submitted, and in the performance of
his pulpit duties he had the rare opportunity of preaching the word of
God and the gospel of Christ in the cloisters of his convent, the chapel of
thee castle, and in the collegiate church. His voice, says history, was fine,
sonorous, electrifying; his gesticulations were easy and noble. A bold
originality ever marked the mind of Luther, charming many by its novelty,
and overpowering others by its force. He had acquired during the last four
or five years a respectable acquaintance both with Greek and Hebrew; he
had read deeply the New Testament; he was fully assured that
justification by faith was the peculiar doctrine of the gospel; that the word
of God was the primary and fundamental means of the revival and
reformation of the church.
 806
From the year 1512 to the memorable year 1517 Luther was a bold
intrepid herald of the word of life. In all things he longed only to know the
truth, to shake off and cast from him the falsehoods and superstitions of
Rome. And thus we leave Luther for the present, engaged in his glorious
work, while we must refer for a few moments to the state of things in the
church which brought John Tetzel and his indulgences into the
neighborhood of Wittemberg.6
 807

CHAPTER 34
THE FIRST PAPAL JUBILEE

The avarice of the Roman clergy, and the superstition of the people, had
been greatly excited by the Crusades. For two hundred years these were
the source of enormous wealth and power to the church, and of
incalculable misery, ruin, and degradation to the nations of Europe. In
these so-called holy wars about six millions of Europeans perished, and
about two hundred millions of money were expended; besides, the
property of the crusader was commonly placed during the expedition
under the bishop’s protection, and in case of his death — which generally
happened — it remained in his hands. But happily that which “stands
singularly marked in the temple of history as a monument of human
absurdity, of unanimous infatuation,” came to an end with the close of the
thirteenth century.
In the year 1291 Acre, the last military station held by the Christians in
Palestine, fell into the hands of the Turks. The unbelievers were then in
possession of the sepulcher of Christ, and of all the holy places and
objects of pilgrimage. Thus ended the great papal scheme and the boasted
glory of the Crusades to the Holy Land.
Two grave questions now arose: How is the papal treasury to be filled,
and the desire of the people for indulgences to be satisfied? The pope
wants money, the people want their sins forgiven and are willing to pay
for it. To meet these two important objects, the pope discovered a new
and most successful way. We have reached the last year of the thirteenth
century, said Boniface; let the first year of the fourteenth be a year of
Jubilee. Palestine was irrecoverably lost; the cross and the Savior’s
sepulcher were in the hands of the Saracens; but; the holy city of Rome,
and the tombs of the apostles were open to the pilgrims. By skilfully
changing the place of pilgrimage from Jerusalem to Rome the desired end
was gained. Never was superstition more successful.
 808
On the 22nd of February, 1299, a bull was issued, promising indulgences
of extraordinary fullness to all who, within the following year,: should,
with due penitence and devotion, visit the tombs of St. Peter and St.
Paul — the Romans once a day for thirty successive days, and strangers
for fifteen. The bull was immediately promulgated throughout
Christendom. It asserted that all who should confess and lament their sins,
and devoutly make pilgrimage to the tomb of the “chief of the apostles,”
should receive a plenary indulgence; or, in other words, a complete
remission of all sins, past, present, and to come. An indulgence of this kind
had hitherto been limited to the crusaders; the consequence was that all
Europe was in a frenzy of religious excitement. Multitudes hastened to
Rome from all parts. The welcome sound of the Jubilee drew all western
Christendom into this vast peaceful crusade. “Throughout the year, the
roads in the remotest parts of Germany, Hungary, Britain, were crowded
with pilgrims of all ages, of both sexes, who sought to expiate their sins,
not by an armed and perilous pilgrimage to Jerusalem, but by a less costly,
and a less dangerous, journey to Rome.”

THE GOLDEN YEAR

The calculations of the number cannot be easy or accurate; but we are
assured by those who assisted at the ceremony, that there were always
about two hundred thousand present in the city, and the total concourse of
the year has been fixed at two millions. The wealth which flowed into the
papal coffers from the Jubilee was enormous. Supposing that each
individual gave only a small sum, what a royal treasure must have been
collected! But offerings were heaped up on the altars. It was called by the
Romans the Golden Year. An eye-witness tells us that he saw two
priests with rakes in their hands, employed day and night in raking,
without counting, the heaps of gold and silver that were laid on the tombs
of the apostles. Nor was this tribute, like offerings or subsidies for
crusades, to be devoted to special uses, such as provisions or freight of
armies, but it was entirely at the free and irresponsible disposal of the
pope. But from the benefits of this indulgence the enemies of the church
were to be excluded, or rather the enemies of Boniface.
Christendom, with the exception of a few noted rebels against the See of
Rome, had now received the gift of pardon and eternal life, and in return,
 809
of its own accord, heaped up at the pope’s feet this extraordinary wealth.
The authorities had taken wise and effective measures against famine for
such accumulating multitudes, but many were trampled down, and
perished by suffocation.
The experiment far exceeded the expectations of the pope and his
partisans. Boniface had proposed that the Jubilee should be celebrated
every hundredth year; but the advantages to the church were so great, that
the interval was naturally thought to be too long. Clement VI., therefore,
repeated the Jubilee in 1350, which drew vast multitudes of pilgrims to
Rome, and incredible wealth. The numbers were nearly as great as in 1300.
The streets leading to the churches which were to be visited — St. Peter’s,
St. Paul’s, and St. John Lateran — were so crowded as to admit of no
movement, except with the stream of the multitudes. High prices were
charged by the Romans for food and lodgings, many had to spend their
nights in the churches and streets, and not a few of the poor deluded
pilgrims perished. Urban VI., in 1389, reduced the interval to thirty-three
years, the supposed length of time to which the life of our Lord on earth
extended. Finally, Paul II. in 1475, established that the festival of the
Jubilee should be celebrated every twenty-five years, which continues to
this day to be the interval at which the great festival is observed.
With the great religious impostures of the dark ages, and the sin of
deluding a credulous people, we have become familiar; but it is truly heart-
breaking to find that such blasphemies are believed and practiced in our
own day, notwithstanding the state of education and the number of
witnesses to the truth of the word of God and the finished work of Christ.
The following extract from a bull that was issued by the pope in 1824,
appointing the Jubilee for the ensuing year, will explain what we mean.
“We have resolved, by virtue of the authority given to us from
heaven, fully to unlock that sacred treasure composed of the
merits, sufferings, and virtues of Christ our Lord, and of his virgin
mother, and of all the saints which the Author of human salvation
has entrusted to our dispensation. To you, therefore, venerable
brethren, patriarchs, primates, archbishops, bishops, it belongs to
explain with perspicuity the power of indulgences; what is their
efficacy in the remission, not only of the canonical penance, but
 810
also of the temporal punishment due to the divine justice for past
sin; and what succor is afforded out of this heavenly treasure, from
the merits of Christ and His saints, to such as have departed real
penitents in God’s love, yet before they had duly satisfied by
fruits worthy of penance, for sins of omission and commission,
and are now purifying in the fire of purgatory.”1

THE SALE OF INDULGENCES

Leo the tenth ascended the papal throne in the year 1513. He was the
third son of Lorenzo de’ Medici, the Magnificent, and brought with him to
the pontifical court the refined, luxurious, and expensive style of his
family. Besides, Michael Angelo had furnished him with finished design of
St. Peter’s, which was then in progress, and greatly increased his
expenditure. The important question now was, how to find money to
complete the grand cathedral, and to replenish the papal treasury for the
purposes of Leo’s pontificate?
The letters of Luther to this pontiff are misleading. He seems not to have
known Leo’s character, though he had so much to do with him; they have
all the appearance of flattery. While Leo has the reputation of being one of
the most polished and cultivated men of his day, he was far from being
even a moral man. His court was gay, he was devoted to pleasure, and
utterly careless of the duties of religion. Compared with his immediate
predecessors — the dissolute Alexander VI., whose name can never be
mentioned without loathing — and the wild warrior-pope, Julius II.,
whose stormy career filled a great part of Europe with blood and
massacres — compared, we say, with such popes, the person and court of
Leo would present a favorable contrast; and Luther no doubt addressed
him under his superstitious veneration for the head of the church, and
because of his fame as a man of learning.
To meet the various and heavy expenses of the extravagant Leo, the cry
for money became louder and louder. “Money! money!” was the cry. “It
was money,” says one, “not charity, that covered a multitude of sins.”
Necessity suggested that the price of indulgences should be lowered, and
that clever salesmen should be employed to push the trade all over
Europe. The plan was adopted; but God overruled the shameless traffic
 811
for the accomplishment of the Reformation, and for the overthrow of the
despotism of Rome. Germany, it was agreed, should be the first and
especially favored place with the sale of indulgences, as the geographical
position of the country might have prevented many of the faithful from
reaping the advantages of the Jubilee in Rome.
The original idea of indulgences seems to have been nothing more than a
shortening of the outward penance imposed on penitents by the payment
of a fine, such as we have constantly decreed in our courts of law — say,
“Fined in fifty pounds, or six months’ imprisonment.” If the money is
paid, it is placed to the credit of the criminal, and he is released and
receives his discharge. In like manner the poor deluded papist supposes
that the indulgence which he buys is placed to his credit in the statute-
book of heaven, which balances the account against him for lies, slanders,
robberies, murders, and wickedness of all kinds; or, as some have
compared it, to a letter of credit on heaven, signed by the pope, in
consideration of value received. Of course, if the delinquent’s sins are great
and many, he must pay heavily for his indulgences.
This pardon system expanded, and was so worked by the priesthood,
that it became the means of enormous wealth to the papacy. Works meet
for repentance were demanded from the sinner — and all were sinners —
works such as fasting, castigation, pilgrimages, and after death so many
years in purgatory. But the sinner was reminded that the burden of these
works might be removed, and the years of purgatorial fire shortened,
through the power delegated by Christ to the blessed Peter and his
successors, on certain conditions. The easiest of these conditions to the
penitent, and the most convenient to the pope, was “money! money!”

THE POPE’S AGENTS — JOHN TETZEL

The speculation of Leo was a great commercial success. He sent out
suitable agents into different parts of Europe with sacks of indulgences
and dispensations. For a given amount a dispensation could be purchased
to eat meat on Fridays and fast days, to marry one’s near relation, and to
indulge in every forbidden pleasure. The pedlars moved on; they extolled
their wares with shouts and jokes; they assured the people that pardon
and the salvation of their souls could now be purchased at greatly reduced
 812
prices. Crowds of buyers came forward, and the money of the faithful
flowed in plentifully. At length they appeared in Saxony. The Archbishop
of Mayence, and other spiritual dignitaries, had promised the pope their
support in this shameless and iniquitous traffic, in consideration that they
would receive a share of the profits; so business went on increasingly and
uninterruptedly until the noisy hawkers came near to Wittemberg.
Amongst the many salesmen in this great papal fair, one man in particular
attracted the attention of the spectators; this was the Dominican monk,
John Tetzel, a name which has acquired an odious notoriety in European
history. These dealers traversed the country in great state, lived in good
style, and spent: money freely. When the procession approached a town,
a deputy waited on the magistrate, and said, “The grace of God and of the
holy father is at your gates.” Such a proclamation in those times of
superstition was enough to move the quietest cities of Germany to the
greatest excitement. The clergy, priests, nuns, town-councils, and trades
with their banners, men and women, old and young, went out to meet the
merchants, bearing lighted tapers in their hands, and advancing to the
sound of music. The streets everywhere were hung with flags; bells were
pealed; nuns and monks walked in procession, crying, “Buy! buy!” The
great merchant monk himself sat in a chariot, holding a large red cross in
his hand, and with the papal bull on a velvet cushion before him. The
churches were the sale-rooms; the arms of the pope were hung on the red
cross, and placed before the altar. Tetzel now ascended the pulpit, and
loudly extolled in rude eloquence the efficacy of indulgences.2

A SPECIMEN OF TETZEL’S PREACHING

Take the following extracts as a specimen of the blasphemous speeches of
this daring impostor, and all under the sanction of the pope and the
archbishop of the place.
“Indulgences are the most precious and the most noble of God’s
gifts. Come, and I will give you letters, all properly sealed, by
which even the sins that you intend to commit may be pardoned. I
would not change my privileges for those of St. Peter in heaven, for
I have saved more souls by my indulgences than the apostle by his
sermons. There is no sin so great that an indulgence cannot remit.
 813
But, more than this, indulgences avail not only for the living but for
the dead. Priest! noble! merchant! wife! youth! maiden! do you not
hear your parents and your other friends who are dead, and who
cry from the bottom of the abyss? We are suffering horrible
torments! a trifling alms would deliver us; you can give it, and you
will not! Oh, stupid and brutish people, who do not understand
the grace so richly offered! Why, the very instant your money
rattles at the bottom of the chest, the soul escapes from purgatory,
and flies liberated to heaven. The Lord our God no longer reigns,
He has resigned all power to the pope.”
The wild harangue of the coarse bellowing monk being over, the terrified
and superstitious crowd hastened to purchase the pardon of their sins and
the deliverance of their friends from the fires of purgatory. From the royal
family down to those who lived on alms, all found money to buy
forgiveness. Money poured ill plentifully; the papal chest over-flowed;
but alas! alas! the moral effects were fearful. The easy terms on which men
could obtain the pope’s licence for every species of wickedness, opened
the way to the grossest immorality, and insubjection to all authority. Even
Tetzel himself was convicted of adultery and infamous conduct at
Innspruck, and sentenced by the Emperor Maximilian to be put into a sack
and thrown into the river; but the Elector Frederick of Saxony interfered,
and obtained his pardon. The unblushing Dominican proceeded on his way
as the representative of his holiness the pope, just as if nothing had
happened.

LUTHER’S PUBLIC APPEAL A.D. 1517

Things were now coming to a crisis. Luther, who had been watching
narrowly the progress of Tetzel, stepped forward; made his grand appeal
to the common sense and to the conscience of the German people; nailed
his theses to the church door at Wittemberg, and in ninety-five
propositions challenged the whole Catholic church to defend Tetzel and
the sale of indulgences.
The axe was now laid at the root of the tree. The germs of the Reformation
were contained in these propositions. “The pope’s indulgence,” said
Luther, “cannot take away sins; God alone remits sins, and He pardons
 814
those who are truly penitent without help from man’s absolutions. The
church may remit penalties which the church inflicts. But the church’s
power is in this world only, it extends not beyond death. Who is this man
who dares to say that for so many crowns the soul of a sinner can be
saved? Every true Christian participates in all the blessings of Christ, by
God’s grace, and without a letter of indulgence.” Such was the style of
Luther’s noble protest, though mixed with much that still savoured of
Catholicism.
Luther had now entered the field against the doctrine and the abuses of the
church of Rome. The university and the whole city of Wittemberg were in
commotion. All read the theses; the startling propositions passed from
mouth to mouth; pilgrims from all quarters then present in Wittemberg,
carried back with them the famous theses of the Augustinian monk,
circulating the news everywhere. “This was the first electric flash,” says
Pfizer, “from the torch that was kindled at the funeral pile of the
Martyred Huss, and, reaching the remotest corner of the land, gave the
signal of mighty future events.” In less than fourteen days, it is said, these
theses were read through every part of Germany; and, ere four weeks had
elapsed, they had overspread the whole of Christendom, as if the angels of
heaven had been the messengers to exhibit them to universal gaze.
Rome clamored for fire and faggot. “The religious houses all Germany
over,” says Froude, “were like kennels of hounds howling to each other
across the spiritual waste. If souls could not be sung out of purgatory,
their occupation was gone. But to the young laymen, to the noble spirits
all Europe over, Wittemberg became a beacon of light shining in the
universal darkness.” Had Luther not been guided by the wisdom of God,
he might have been swept away by his sudden popularity; but of himself,
through grace, he thought very little, and remained quietly at his post in
the Augustinian church at Wittemberg, waiting till God in His own time
and way called him forth.

LUTHER AT HEIDELBERG
In the spring of 1518 a general assembly of the Augustinian order was held
at Heidelberg: Luther, by invitation, was present. His friends, knowing the
designs and treachery of the Dominicans, did all they could to dissuade
 815
him from going; but Luther was not the man to be hindered by the fear of
danger from the accomplishment of what he believed to be his duty. His
trust was in the living God. So favorable an opportunity for preaching the
gospel, the spread of the truth, and the diffusion of his propositions, was
not to be neglected. He started on the 13th of April, with a guide who
assisted him to carry his baggage, and performed the greater part of the
journey on foot.
General curiosity, the name of Luther, the fame of his theses, attracted
large crowds to the city and the university of Heidelberg. Here, before a
large assembly, he disputed with five doctors of divinity on a variety of
subjects, but relating chiefly to theology and philosophy. His knowledge
of scripture, of the traditionary dogmas of the church, his want of respect
for the name and system of Aristotle, his great argumentative power,
proved to his opponents that he was a polemic of no common order. He
returned to Wittemberg, well protected and accompanied by many friends.
The wonderful effect produced by these controversies moved Tetzel to
attempt a reply to Luther’s attack on the sale of indulgences. Full of vain
boasting and blasphemy, he asserts and reasserts the power of the pope,
and of the clergy as deputed by him, fully and for ever to forgive all sins.
In answer to these daring assertions, Luther wrote a further series of
propositions which he termed “Resolutions,” or explanations of his
former theses. In this treatise the Reformer is more distinctly seen. He
brings prominently forward the great truth of the Reformation — that man
is justified by faith alone without deeds of law.
“For he hath made him [Christ] to be sin for us, who knew no sin;
that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
(2 Corinthians 5:21.)
Luther now challenges the decision of the pope himself. He sent him a
copy of his Resolutions, accompanied by a very humble letter, dated May
30th, 1518. Utterly careless as Leo really was as to the interests of
religion, he could not treat with entire indifference the letter of Luther;
especially as the emperor Maximilian had solicited his interference about
the same time. He ordered Luther to be sent to Rome and there to answer
for his audacity. Luther refused to obey the summons, declaring, however,
his readiness to appear and defend his cause before pious, impartial, and
 816
learned judges in Germany. The pope, finding that Luther was under the
protection of Frederick elector of Saxony, wrote to that prince desiring
him to deliver the heretical monk to the Cardinal Thomas Cajetan, who
had full instructions how to act with regard to the disobedient doctor. But,
to the praise of that singularly wise and excellent prince, he refused to
obey the pope’s orders and protected Luther. The pope was now obliged
to propose less hasty, less blood-thirsty, and more formal measures.
Accordingly the citation to Rome was changed into a summons to
Augsburg, which Luther declared his intention to obey.

LUTHER AT AUGSBURG
Some of his friends, concerned for the safety of his valuable life, attempted
to dissuade him from his purpose; but regardless of danger, and confiding
in the watchful care of divine providence, he was determined to appear. In
his monk’s brown frock, he started on foot from Wittemberg, and
accompanied by the citizens, high and low, to the gates, he cheerfully
walked to Augsburg.
The cardinal assumed the appearance of a tender and compassionate
father, and addressed Luther as his dear son; giving him to understand,
however, in plainest language that the pope insisted on recantation, and
that he would accept of nothing else. “Condescend then,” said Luther, “to
inform me in what I have erred.” The cardinal and his Italian courtiers, who
had expected the poor German monk to fall down on his knees and plead
for pardon, were astonished at his calm but dignified manner. “I am here to
command,” replied Cajetan, “not to argue.” “Rather,” answered Luther,
“let us reason on the points in dispute and settle them by the decisions of
sacred scripture.” “What!” exclaimed the cardinal, “do you think the pope
cares for the opinion of a German boor? The pope’s little finger is stronger
than all Germany. Do you expect your princes to take up arms to defend
you — you, a wretched worm like you? I tell you, No! and where will you
be then — where will you be then?”
Mark the noble answer, not of a poor monk merely, but of the man of God
in trying circumstances. “Then, as now, in the hands of Almighty God.”
Rome was vanquished. The court dissolved. “To the amazement of the
proud Italian, a poor peasant’s son — a miserable friar of the provincial
 817
German town — was prepared to defy the power and resist the prayers of
the sovereign of Christendom.” Though armed with full power to crush his
victim, he had to return to Rome and report his defeat, and tell his master
that neither remonstrances, threatenings, entreaties, nor promises of the
highest distinction could move the stubborn German from his wicked
herestes. The faithful witness, finding his person in extreme peril, secretly
left the place and returned to Wittemberg.
Incensed to the utmost by this failure, the pope wrote again to the Elector,
entreating him to render up the criminal to justice or expel him from his
dominions. Frederick hesitated. Many serious questions were involved in
an open collision with the pope. Rather than bring his prince into trouble,
Luther seriously thought of escaping to France. But He who “turneth the
hearts of kings whithersoever he will,” led the good Elector to throw the
shield of his protection over his subject.
As nothing satisfactory had resulted from the mission of Cajetan, Leo
dispatched another agent in the person of the papal nuncio, Charles von
Miltitz. This emissary brought with him a golden rose, richly perfumed,
as a present from the pope to the Elector Frederick. This gift was usually
esteemed as a special token of the pontiff’s favor, but in this instance it
was doubtless intended as a bribe to the hesitating Frederick.
On reaching Saxony, Miltitz met with his old friend Spalatin, who made
him acquainted with the real state of things in Germany. He assured the
legate, that the divisions of the church were chiefly owing to the
falsehoods, impostures, and blasphemies of Tetzel the indulgence-seller.
Miltitz appeared to be astonished, and summoned Tetzel to appear before
him at Altenburg and answer for his conduct. But things were greatly
changed with the Dominican; he was no longer going from town to town
with his papal bull and gilt car, but was hiding from the anger of his
enemies in the college at Leipsic. “I should not care,” he wrote to Miltitz,
“about the fatigue of the journey if I could leave Leipsic without danger to
my life; but the Augustinian, Martin Luther, has so excited and aroused
the men of power against me, that I am nowhere safe.” What an end, and
what a picture, of those who engage to be the servants of men against God
and His truth! With a bad conscience, and as a mean coward, he died
shortly after this in great misery. But mark the contrast in the moral
 818
courage of the servant of God and of His truth, travelling on foot from
Wittemberg to Augsburg.

LUTHER AT ALTENBURG
The papal legate soon saw the general popularity of Luther’s cause, and
adopted a course directly opposite to that of the haughty Cajetan. He
approached him with great demonstrations of friendliness, addressing him
as “My dear Martin.” His grand object was to allure the Reformer by
flattery and deception to recant, and so bring the dispute to a close. And
so far the crafty nuncio succeeded. He was a cunning diplomatist and a
fawning papist, and Luther for the moment was caught in the snare.
“I offer,” said Luther, “on my part, to be silent for the future on this
matter, and to let it die away of itself, provided my opponents are silent
on their part.” Miltitz accepted the offer with overflowing joy, kissed the
heretical monk, induced him to write a penitent letter to the pope, and
lavished on him every expression of affection and kindness. Thus the great
controversy between truth and falsehood, between the papacy and the
dawning Reformation, seemed on the point of being terminated; but the
Reformation was not to be hindered by Luther’s apparent reconciliation to
Rome.
Just at this time, when Luther was silenced, when he had concluded an
unworthy peace with Rome, another voice is heard. Doctor Eck, the
author of the Obelisken, and the champion of the papacy, challenged
Carlstadt, the friend of Luther, to a public disputation on the contested
points of theology, and Luther’s declaration on indulgences. This aroused
the energies, and awoke the eloquence, of Luther once more. A public
discussion was conducted soon after at Leipsic, which lasted several
weeks. Doctor Eck contended for the papacy, and Luther and Carlstadt for
the Reformation. These celebrated discussions were overruled by God for
the spread of the truth, not only over Germany, but over all Christendom.
Luther’s appeals to scripture created in the minds of many — especially
in the minds of the students of the universities of Leipsic and Wittemberg
— a spirit of inquiry which nothing short of the solid truth of God could
satisfy. Thus the work of the Lord progressed, and the mind of Europe
was prepared for the great revolution which was so soon to take place.
 819
DISTINGUISHED MEN OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
Here we may pause for a moment and note some of the great actors which
now crowd the scene of this busy apoch. The age of the Reformation is
one of the most remarkable in history for great men and great events.
Martin Luther, the one whom the Spirit of God is especially using, stands
before us the most central and the most prominent figure. In his situation
of peculiar danger, he might think that he was almost done; but God was
gathering around him some of those distinguished men who early declared
their entire sympathy with his position, and engaged all their powers in its
defense. In the year 1518 Philip Melancthon was appointed professor of
Greek in the university at Wittemberg; and from that period he became the
intimate friend and the faithful fellow-laborer of the Reformer, even to the
end of his life. Oecolampadius, professor at Basle, Ulric Zwingle, doctor
of divinity at Zurich, Martin Bucer, and many others, did a gracious
providence raise up just at this time, who have ever since been numbered
among the most illustrious instruments of the Reformation.
The imperial throne falling vacant by the death of Maximilian in January
1519 proved favorable to the cause of Reform. The attention of the court
of Rome was diverted from the affairs of Luther to the more pressing
business of the new emperor. And Frederick, during the interregnum as
vicar of the empire, was able to afford Luther a still more secure
protection. The imperial crown was offered by the electors to Frederick,
but he declined the perilous distinction, not caring to trouble himself with
the weight of empire. The election fell on Maximilian’s grandson Charles
— grandson also of Ferdinand the Catholic. The youthful, handsome, and
chivalrous princes, — Henry VIII. king of England, and Francis I. king of
France, — aspired also to the imperial dignity; but the hereditary claims
and possessions of Charles speedily turned the balance in his favor. He
was sovereign of Spain, of Burgundy and the low countries, of Naples and
Sicily, of the new empire of the Indies, and the discovery of America by
Columbus added, to his many kingdoms, the new world. Since the days of
Charlemagne, no monarch had swayed a scepter over such vast dominions.
The pope, though at first opposed to the elevation of Charles, from the
conflicting interests of the Vatican, withdrew his objections, seeing he
 820
would be elected; and Charles was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle, on the
22nd of October, 1520.
Thus at the early age of nineteen, as Charles V. emperor of Germany, he
assumed the imperial power. He is described as a youth of great
intelligence, with a strong natural taste for military exercises. He was
remarkable for a gravity and sedateness far beyond his years, and most
amiable when it suited him. He possessed the subtlety and penetration of
the Italian, with the taciturnity and reserve of the Spaniard; and withal he
was a firm and devoted Catholic. “He was pious and silent,” said Luther;
“I will wager that he does not talk so much in a year as I do in a day.”
This is the man to whom Luther’s case must now be referred. No fitter
man could have been found to execute the decrees and do the work of the
Vatican. The pious reflections of D’Aubigne on this change of government
are worthy of the warm-hearted biographer of Luther. “A new actor was
about to appear on the scene. God designed to bring the Wittemberg monk
face to face with the most powerful monarch that had appeared in
Christendom since the days of Charlemagne. He selected a prince in the
vigor of youth, and to whom everything seemed to announce a long reign...
and to him he opposed that lowly Reformation, begun in the secluded cell
of a convent at Erfurt by the anguish and the sighs of a poor monk. The
history of this monarch and of his reign was destined, it would seem, to
teach the world an important lesson. It was to show the nothingness of all
the strength of man when it presumes to measure itself with the weakness
of God. If a prince, a friend to Luther, had been called to the imperial
throne, the success of the Reformation might have been ascribed to his
protection. If even an emperor opposed to the new doctrines, but yet a
weak ruler, had worn the diadem, the triumph of this work might have
been accounted for by the weakness of the monarch. But it was the
haughty conqueror at Pavia who was destined to vail his pride before the
power of God’s word; and the whole world beheld the man who found it
an easy task to drag Francis I. a prisoner to Madrid obliged to lower his
sword before the son of a poor miner!”3
 821
LUTHER AND THE BULL OF EXCOMMUNICATION
We return to Luther and the close of the debate at Leipsic. Dr. Eck, the
famous papal theologian, irritated by his defeat, and burning with rage
against Luther, hurried away to Rome that he might obtain a bull of
excommunication against his opponent. Unable to refute the earnest and
fervent appeals of the Reformer to the word of God, he immediately
sought his condemnation and destruction. Such has ever been the way of
the emissaries of Rome.
Overcome by the clamorous and the importunate applications of Eck and
his friends, especially the Dominicans, Pope Leo, most unwisely, as most
think, issued the desired bull on the 15th of June, 1520. Luther’s writings
were condemned to the flames, and he himself delivered over to Satan as a
wicked heretic, unless he recanted and implored the clemency of the
pontiff within sixty days. But the time was past for Luther and his friends
to be silenced by ecclesiastical thunders. Had such a thing happened fifty
years before, it would have been widely different. But neither Leo,
Charles, Henry, nor Francis, knew the state of the public mind in
Germany, or the silent but sure effects of the printing press throughout
Europe. He who saw Guttenberg pulling at his press, Columbus returning
from the discovery of America, Vasco di Gama from having doubled the
Cape of Storms, or the learned Greeks scattered over the nations of
Europe after the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, saw events which
revived learning, which expanded the human mind, and which aroused it
from the lethargy into which it had fallen during the long dark night of the
middle ages.4
Before the bull of Leo reached Wittemberg, the best part of Germany was
at heart with Luther, but especially the students, the artisans, and the
tradesmen. He saw the ground on which he stood. The decisive step must
now be taken. Open war must be proclaimed. He had written the most
submissive and pacific letters to the pope, the cardinals, the bishops, the
princes, and the learned men; he had appealed from the pontiff to the
supreme tribunal of a general council, but all to no purpose. He now
determined to withdraw from the church of Rome and publicly to resist
her authority. On the 10th of December, 1520, at nine in the morning,
public notice having been given, Luther took the bull, together with a copy
 822
of the pontifical canon law, and some of the writings of Eck and Emser,
and in the presence of a vast crowd of spectators committed them to the
flames. This being done without the city walls, Luther re-entered,
accompanied by the doctors of the university, the students, and the
people. Having thus thrown off the yoke of Rome, he addressed the
people as to their duty with great energy. The public caught his fire and
the whole nation rallied around him. Luther was now set at liberty. The tie
which had so long bound him to Rome was broken. From this time he
assumed the attitude of an open and uncompromising antagonist of the
pope and of his emissaries. He also published many pamphlets against the
Romish system and for the truth of God.

LUTHER AND CHARLES THE FIFTH

Leo, son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, thus defied by Luther, son of the
miner of Mansfield, turned to Charles for help. He reminded the youthful
emperor of the vows he had just taken — as the advocate and defender of
the church; and called upon him to inflict due punishment upon that
audacious and rebellious monk — Martin Luther. Considerable anxiety
prevailed in many quarters as to what would be the policy of the new
emperor. Will he sympathize with the principles of progress which are
everywhere at work in literature, politics, and religion? or will he be the
pliant instrument of the papal power? were questions of great importance
at that moment.
Charles was reserved. He had many things in hand. Two years elapsed
before he was at leisure to take up the question. The interval was
profitably employed by Luther and his friends. During the years 1518-19-
20, the numerous pamphlets and expositions of the word of God, which
issued from the press, had done their work. By the good providence of
God, the new opinions were making rapid progress not only in Germany,
but in Switzerland, France, and England. The deeply-rooted prejudices of
many centuries were being overturned in the minds of multitudes in many
parts of Europe.
Charles at length found that something more than polemical discussion
was required to arrest the progress of a movement which threatened to
overthrow the religion of his ancestors and disturb the peace of his empire.
 823
His first diet, or assembly of the States of the German monarchy, was
appointed to be held at Worms. Before this assembly he cited Luther to
appear and answer for his contumacious conduct. The pope and his party
now expected that by fair means or foul, they would certainly get rid of
their adversary. But the Elector, knowing the treachery of the ecclesiastics,
and suspecting that Luther might meet with the fate of John Huss and
Jerome of Prague, when they attended the Council of Constance, would
only consent to his subject going to Worms on two conditions: —
“1, That he should have a safe-conduct under the Emperor’s hand and
seal;
2, That Luther, if judgment went against him, should be free for the
time to return to the place from which he had come; and that he, the
Elector, should determine afterwards what should be done with him.”
Luther himself was ready to obey the citation when the Elector was
satisfied as to his safety.

THE DIET OF WORMS A.D. 1521 — JANUARY TILL MAY

The monk of Erfurt, armed with the word of God, and confidence in the
divine presence, had put to flight the army of indulgence-sellers, had
gained an easy victory over the pope’s legate at Augsburg, and the
champions of the papacy in the halls of Leipsic. He had also replied to the
thunders of the pope by burning his bull at Wittemberg. Rome was para-
lysed. Her strength was spent. Her threatenings were disregarded. The so-
called church could no longer carry things in the old style. Men had begun
to think for themselves, and to think how far such orders should be
obeyed. But a good Catholic prince was now on the throne of the empire,
and the final struggle must be with him.
Charles, the faithful servant of St. Peter, opened the diet on the 28th of
January, the festival of Charlemagne. Never before, in any age of the
world, had so many kings, princes, prelates, nobles, and powers of this
world, met together in diet. “Electors, dukes, archbishops, landgraves,
margraves, counts, bishops, barons, and lords of the realm, as well as the
deputies of the towns, and the ambassadors of the kings of Christendom,
thronged with their brilliant trains the roads that led to Worms. Great
 824
questions, affecting the peace of Europe, of the world, and the triumph of
truth, were here to be fully and gravely discussed.” But we have chiefly to
do with Luther and the Reformation.
Aleander, the pope’s nuncio, a man of great eloquence, addressed the
Emperor, the princes, and the deputies, for about three hours. He had
Luther’s books before him and the papal bulls. He had said all that Rome
could say against the books and their author. He maintained that there
were errors enough in Luther’s writings to burn a hundred thousand
heretics. The power of his oratory and the enthusiasm of his language
produced a deep impression on the assembly. Murmurs soon arose from
every quarter against Luther and his partisans. But it is perfectly clear
from Aleander’s long oration, that his one grand object was to prevent the
bold Reformer from being cited to appear. The papal party dreaded the
prominence which would necessarily be given to the new opinions by the
presence of Luther in so august an assembly. Leo wrote himself to beg that
Luther’s safe-conduct should not be observed. The bishops agreed with
the pope that safe-conducts could not protect heretics.

LUTHER’S SUMMONS AND SAFE-CONDUCT

The young Emperor was encompassed with difficulties. Placed between
the papal nuncio and the Elector, to whom he was indebted for his crown,
what must he do? He wished to please both: to spare or to sacrifice a
monk was a small consideration with Charles, but not so in the sight of
Him who overrules all rulers. Luther must bear witness for the truth of
God and against the lie of Satan in that great assembly. The Emperor at
length made up his mind. Luther’s appearance before the diet seemed the
only means likely to terminate an affair which engaged the attention of all
the empire. At last the summons and safe-conduct were sent, and Luther
prepared to obey the imperial mandate.
On the 2nd of April, Luther took leave of his friends and began his
journey. He rode in a modest conveyance, accompanied by his friends
Sehurff, Amsdorf, and Suaven; the imperial herald with the safe-conduct
rode in front. Luther discovered at every stage of his journey, that gloomy
forebodings filled the hearts of all friends. He was warned that “foul play
was intended, that he was condemned already, that his books had been
 825
burned by the hangman, and that he was a dead man if he proceeded.” But
Luther, undismayed, replied, “I trust in God Almighty, whose word and
commandments I have before me.” He preached at several places on his
way, and accepted the entertainment of his friends. But as he drew near to
Worms, the storm which he had raised became more violent. The enemies
of the Reformation were boiling with indignation when they heard he was
approaching the city. Spalatin, the Elector’s chaplain, and Luther’s faithful
friend, sent a messenger to meet him with these words, “Do not enter
Worms!” But the intrepid monk, full of holy courage, turned his eyes on
the messenger, and said, “Tell your master, I will go if there are as many
devils in Worms as there are tiles on the roofs of the houses.” On the
morning of the 16th of April, he discovered the walls of the ancient city.
Noblemen of high rank went out to meet him, and more than two thousand
accompanied him to his lodgings. From the pavement to the roofs of the
houses, every place seemed covered with spectators.
The following day he was conducted to the diet by the marshal of the
empire, Ulrich of Pappenheim. The crowd that filled the streets to see him
pass along was so great that it was necessary to lead him through private
houses and gardens to the hall of audience. Many of the knights and nobles
who thronged the body of the hall spoke encourag-ingly to Luther as he
pressed his way to the council chamber. One, who probably had received
the truth and loved the Savior, reminded him of the Master’s words,
“When they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak,
for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.” Another,
though clad in gleaming armor, touched him on the shoulder with his
gauntlet, saying, “Pluck up thy spirit, little monk: some of us here have
seen warm work in our time; but neither I nor any knight in this company
ever needed a stout heart more than thou needest it now. If thou hast faith
in these doctrines of thine, go on in the name of God.” “Yes, in the name
of God,” said Luther, throwing back his head, “in the name of God
forward!”

LUTHER APPEARS BEFORE THE ASSEMBLY

To one who had been educated and trained amid the retirement of a
cloister, the sight of such an assembly must have been overwhelming.
There sat Charles, sovereign of half the world. And there on either side of
 826
him were ranged the peers and potentates of the German empire —
bishops and archbishops, cardinals in their scarlet robes, papal nuncios in
their official magnificence, ambassadors from the mightiest kingdoms of
Christendom, to say nothing of deputies and officials. Such was the
assembly of the States-General at Worms. And gathered, the reader may
ask, for what? It was really to hear the trial and judge the son of a poor
miner. Dressed in his monk’s frock and hood, pale-faced and worn with
the fatigues and hazards of his recent life, he stood silent and self-
possessed in the midst of more than five thousand spectators. “Yet
prophet-like that lone one stood, with dauntless words and high,”
answering all questions with force and modesty.
After a moment of intense stillness, the chancellor of Treves addressed
him in a loud voice, first in Latin and then in German: “Martin Luther,
You are called upon by his imperial Majesty to answer two questions:
first, Do you admit that these books,” pointing to about twenty volumes
placed on a table, “were written by you? Secondly, Are you prepared to
retract these books, and their contents, or do you persist in the opinions
you have advanced there?” Then Luther replied: That, in respect to the
first question, he did undoubtedly acknowledge these books, and would
never disclaim any one of them. As to the second, he asked that some
further space for consideration might be granted him, that he might so
frame his answer as neither to offend the word of God nor endanger his
own soul. One day was granted. Whatever may have been Luther’s reason
for this request we need not stay to inquire: one thing is certain, that it
was overruled by God to discover and reveal the secret springs of Luther’s
strength and courage, and the strength and courage of faith in all ages. That
wonderful prayer which was offered up shortly before his second
appearing, is the most precious document in the whole history of the
Reformation. We cannot characterize it; we give it from D’Aubigne’s
history.

LUTHER’S PRAYER
For a moment Luther felt troubled; his eye was off the blessed Lord; he
was thinking of the many great princes before whom he had to stand; his
faith grew weak; he was like Peter when he looked at the waves in place of
the Person of Christ; he felt as if he would sink. In this state of soul he fell
 827
on his face and groaned deep thoughts which could not be uttered. It was
the Spirit making intercession for him. A friend hearing his distress,
listened, and was privileged to hear the broken cries of a broken heart
ascending to the throne of God.
“O Almighty and Everlasting God! How terrible is this world!
Behold, it openeth its mouth to swallow me up, and I have so little
trust in Thee!... How weak is the flesh, and Satan how strong! If it
is only in the strength of this world that I must put my trust, all is
over!... My last hour is come; my condemnation has been
pronounced!... O God! O God! ·. . O God! Do Thou help me
against all the wisdom of the world! Do this; Thou shouldest do
this... Thou alone., for this is not my work, but Thine. I have
nothing to do here, nothing to contend for with these great ones of
the world! I should desire to see my days flow on peaceful and
happy. But the cause is Thine... And it is a righteous and eternal
cause. O Lord! help me! Faithful and unchangeable God! in no man
do I place my trust. It would be vain! All that is of man is
uncertain; all that cometh of man fails... O God! my God! hearest
Thou me not?... Thou hidest Thyself! Thou hast chosen me for
this work. I know it well!... Act, then, O God!... Stand at my side,
for the sake of Thy well-beloved Jesus Christ, who is my defense,
my shield, and my strong tower.”
After a short time of silent struggling with the Lord, he again broke out in
those short, deep, broken utterances, which must be experienced before
they can be understood. It is the breaking of the bones of carnal confidence
and self-importance; this is being broken down in the presence of God
“Lord! where stayest Thou?... 0 my God! where art Thou?...
Come! Come! I am ready!... I am ready to lay down my life for
Thy truth... patient as a lamb. For it is the cause of justice — it is
Thine!... I will never separate Thyself from me, neither now nor
through eternity!... And though the world should be filled with
devils... though my body, which is still the work of Thy hands,
should be slain, be stretched upon the pavement, should be cut in
pieces... reduced to ashes... my soul is Thine?... Yes! Thy word is
 828
my assurance of it. My soul belongs to Thee! It shall abide for ever
with Thee... Amen... O God! help me!... Amen.”
This prayer explains the state of Luther’s mind and the character of his
communion with God, better far than any description from the pen of his
biographer. Here the living God is qualifying His servant for His work by
giving him to taste the bitterness of death. (2 Corinthians 4:7-12.) Luther
was but emerging from the darkness of superstition; he had not fully learnt
the blessed truth of death and resurrection, of his oneness with Christ, of
his acceptance in the Beloved. But his nearness to God, the power of his
prayer, and the reality of his communion, refresh our hearts after an
interval of three hundred years.

LUTHER’S SECOND APPEARANCE

The fruits of his prayer were soon to be seen. Finding himself again
standing before Charles, the chancellor began by saying, “Martin Luther,
Yesterday you begged for a delay, which has now expired... Reply,
therefore, to the question put by his Majesty. Will you defend your
books, or will you retract them?” Luther turned towards the Emperor, and
with a serious countenance, wherein modesty, mildness, and firmness,
were strikingly blended, he entered fully into the contents of his books.
Much that he said must have been very gratifying to the Germans, but
most galling to the Romans. Take the following as an example: — “In one
class of my books I have written against the papacy and the doctrines of
the papists, as of men who by their iniquitous tenets and examples have
desolated the christian world both with temporal and spiritual calamities.
Their false doctrines, their scandalous lives, their evil ways, are known to
all mankind. And is it not evident that the human doctrines and laws of the
popes entangle, torment, and grieve the consciences of the faithful, while
at the same time the crying and perpetual extortions of Rome swallow up
the wealth and the riches of Christendom, and especially of this illustrious
nation!” But such explanations of his books were not what the diet
required. He was pressed for a distinct avowal of retractation. “Will you
or will you not retract?” exclaimed the orator of the diet.
Luther now replied without hesitation. “Since your most serene Majesty
and the princes require from me a clear, simple, and precise answer, I will
 829
give it thus: — I cannot submit my faith either to the pope or to the
councils, because it is as clear as day that they have frequently erred and
contradicted each other. Unless therefore I am convinced by the testimony
of scripture, or by the clearest reasoning, and unless they thus render my
conscience bound by the word of God, I cannot and I will not retract, for
it is unsafe for a Christian to speak against his conscience.” And then,
looking round on the assembly — on all that was mighty in power, on all
that was venerable for antiquity — he nobly said, “Here I take my stand; I
cannot do otherwise: may God be my help! Amen.”
Astonished at a display of courage and veracity entirely new to them,
many of the princes found it difficult to conceal their admiration, while
others were utterly confounded. But, as some have said, in these words, in
Luther’s honest protest, the whole heart and meaning of the Reformation
lay. Were men to go on for ever saying that this and that was true, because
the pope affirmed it? or were the decrees of popes and the canons of
councils thenceforward to be tried, like the words of other men, by the
ordinary laws of evidence, by the infallible standard of the word of God?
The death-knell of Absolutism was rung.
When Luther had ceased speaking, the chancellor said, “Since you do not
retract, the Emperor and the States of the empire will consider what course
they must adopt towards an obstinate heretic. The diet will meet
tomorrow morning to hear the Emperor’s decision.”
The general effect produced on the diet both by the address and the
demeanour of Luther was unquestionably favorable to his position. He
gave his enemies cause to fear him. In the presence of so many powerful
ecclesiastics, who were thirsting for his blood, he feared not to denounce in
his usual vigorous style the iniquities of popery. But what was even more
for the cause of Reform, he inspired his friends with his own confidence in
the truth. After a night of restless anxiety and discussion by all parties, the
morning came, and with it heavy tidings for Luther. The policy of the
Vatican prevailed in the councils of Charles. The following edict he
presented to the diet: —
“Descended from the christian emperors of Germany, from the
Catholic kings of Spain, from the archdukes of Austria, from the
dukes of Burgundy, who have all been renowned as defenders of
 830
the Roman faith, I am firmly resolved to imitate the example of my
ancestors. A single monk, misled by his own folly, has risen
against the faith of Christendom. To stay such impiety, I will
sacrifice my kingdoms, my treasures, my friends, my body, my
blood, my soul, and my life. I am about to dismiss the
Augustinian Luther, forbidding him to cause the least disorder
amongst the people; I shall then proceed against him and his
adherents, as contumacious heretics, by excommunication, by
interdict, and by every means calculated to destroy them. I call on
the members of the States to behave like faithful Christians.”
Severe as this sentence may appear, it was far from satisfying the papists.
They endeavored to procure the violation of the safe-conduct, and re-enact
the tragedy perpetrated by their ancestors at Constance. “The Rhine,” said
they, “should receive his ashes as it had received those of John Huss a
century ago.” But these treacherous suggestions were overthrown by the
spirit of national honor which prevailed among the German princes, and
which animated the greater part of the diet. There remained now one only
hope for the papal party, and that — we blush to write — assassination.
“A plot,” says Froude, “was formed to assassinate Luther on his return to
Saxony. The insulted majesty of Rome could be vindicated at least by the
dagger. But this, too, failed. The Elector heard what was intended. A party
on home, disguised as banditti, waylaid the Reformer upon the road, and
carried him off to the Castle of Wartburg, where he remained out of harm’s
way till the general rising of Germany placed him beyond the reach of
danger.”5

REFLECTIONS ON THE APPEARANCE OF LUTHER AT WORMS

That such a thing should have happened at all, was of itself a signal
victory over the papacy. His entry into Worms was like a triumphal
procession. There, although a twice-condemned, excommunicated heretic
and cut off from all human society, he is privileged to stand before the
most august assembly in the world. The pope had condemned him to
perpetual silence, and he is now invited, in most respectful language, to
speak before thousands. And, by the good providence of God, he was
permitted to address attentive hearers from all parts of Christendom, at
considerable length and with great boldness, yet without interruption and
 831
almost without reproof. “An immense revolution,” says D’Aubigne, “had
thus been effected by Luther’s instrumentality. Rome was already
descending from her throne, and it was the voice of a monk that caused
this humiliation.” The mere fact of his trial at Worms announced to the
world that the spell of popery was broken, and that the victory of the
Reformation was secured. A poor, persecuted, friendless, solitary monk
sets himself against the majesty of the triple crown. The secular arm is
called in, but the Emperor refuses to execute the pope’s decree. The ban
falls to the ground. A spiritual power superior to both prevails, and the
shout of triumph is heard in many lands.
It is perfectly clear that neither pope, prelate, nor sovereign knew the real
condition of the public mind. A generation had grown up to manhood who
had been taught by the men of letters to think for themselves and to have
opinions of their own. Luther knew that his own thoughts about popery
and the word of God were the thoughts of thousands. Nevertheless he
stood alone in that assembly as God’s witness for the truth. He
maintained the private right of reading and interpreting the word of God,
the duty of submitting to its authority, in the face of the high-handed
assumption of both church and emperor. Among all the princes present
Luther had not so much as one openly-avowed protector, or even a single
advocate of any rank or influence, in the assembly. But the God who
strengthened Elijah to withstand the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel, and
who stood by Paul when he appeared before the nobles and princes of this
world, and before Caesar himself, gave a wisdom and power to the monk
of Wittemberg which nothing could overcome, and which made all men to
see that true spiritual power and happy liberty were only to be found in a
good conscience, through faith in the truth, but more especially through
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the presence and power of the Holy
Spirit.6
 832

CHAPTER 35
LUTHER AT WARTBURG

The sudden and mysterious disappearance of Luther caused no small

anxiety to his friends and triumph to his foes. The most extraordinary
rumors were circulated throughout the provinces, so that Luther’s name,
and character, and works, were more eagerly talked of now than ever. But
as secrecy was necessary to his safety, friends as well as enemies were
kept for some months uncertain as to the place of his concealment.
Wartburg castle, the place of his captivity, and which he called his
“Patmos,” had been the ancient and impregnable residence of the
landgraves of Thuringia, and overlooked, from its mountain situation, the
neighborhood of Eisenach, the place of his mother’s nativity, and the scene
of his own early education. That no suspicion might be excited as to his
real character, he was obliged to throw off his frock and cowl, allow his
beard and hair to grow, and assume the attire and the title of a country
gentleman — Squire George. For the rigid monk, the active Reformer, the
daring antagonist of Rome, the change was extreme. He was frequently
visited with severe attacks of bodily illness and mental distress. In some of
his letters, dated from the Isle of Patmos, he complains bitterly of the
indolent habits he was contracting, and the consequences of his sumptuous
fare. But though he was cut off from his public labors in the university and
the pulpit, he was most diligent with his pen. His enemies thought him a
great deal too active in his retreat. He labored with indefatigable industry,
and published many new books. It was in this retirement that he
commenced the greatest and the most useful of all his works — the
translation of the Bible into the German language. During his solitude, in
the summer months of 1521, he actually finished the New Testament; and
he also took great pains to improve his knowledge of the Greek and
Hebrew languages, for the purpose of rendering his intended version of the
whole Bible more complete.
 833
REFLECTIONS ON LUTHER’S CAPTIVITY
Here we may pause a moment, and learn a useful lesson. Like a chained
eagle, Luther sits all day in the midst of the dark forests of Thuringia,
gloomily brooding over the degraded state of the church and clergy, and
violently agitated as to the results of the diet of Worms, the welfare of his
friends, and the progress of truth. The chain galls him; he has not accepted
it from the Lord; his health suffers; he passes whole nights without sleep;
the melancholy tendencies of his mind increase, and he imagines that he
is incessantly assaulted by Satan. “Believe me,” he writes, “I am delivered
over to a thousand imps of Satan in this solitude; and it is much easier to
contend with incarnate fiends — that is, men — than with wicked spirits
in high places.” He longs to be at liberty, and to stand in the front of the
battle; and, fearing lest he should be accused of deserting the field, he
exclaimed, “I would rather be stretched on coals of fire than lie here half
dead.” And all mankind would say, “a crisis has come; the active efforts,
the resistless appeals of Luther are more needful now than ever; for if the
leader of this mighty movement be constrained to retire at such a moment,
the cause of truth must suffer, and its enemies triumph. But in spite of all
human reasoning, the Master says, No. My ways are not as your ways,
nor My thoughts as your thoughts. The captivity of My servant shall be
the liberty of millions.” And so it proved. No event in his history tended
so much to enrich his mind, or mature his views as to the nature and extent
of the reform which the condition of things around required, besides the
books which he wrote, and the scriptures which he translated. May we
learn to bow, well-pleased, when the Master’s orders are to be quiet, as
well as when He says, Go forth and serve in the field to which I have
called you, and for which I have fitted you. Moses in Midian, Paul in
Arabia, and John in Patmos, are divine lessons for all the Lord’s servants.

LUTHER RETURNS TO WITTEMBERG

During his absence at the Wartburg there was found no one among his
followers who was properly qualified to maintain the reformed doctrines,
or direct the reformed community. The mild and peaceful scholar, Philip
Melancthon, had a gentle and fruitful mind well fitted to enrich others but
unsuited for the tumult and the storm of republican notions, combined
with religious fanaticism. Andrew Carlstadt, a doctor of Wittemberg, an
 834
early friend of Luther, and by no means ignorant of the truth, was induced
to head a few fanatical persons who fancied they were in immediate
communication with deity, and arrogated to themselves the title of
prophets and apostles. Their numbers increased; youths from the
university joined them. They denounced Luther’s attempt at Reformation
to be neither sufficiently extensive, nor thorough. In their extravagant
enthusiasm, they proclaimed, “Woe! woe! woe!” to the false church and
corrupt bishops. They entered churches, broke and burnt images, and
proceeded to other excesses, which endangered the dawn of liberty and the
peace of the commonwealth. The civil authorities interfered, and several of
the zealots were cast into prison.
The cry for Luther was universal. He heard it at Wartburg. Without the
consent of the Elector, and with much danger to his life, he hastened to the
scene of confusion. Among the names who have obtained a memorial in
history by this folly, we are most familiar with Nicholas Stork, Mark
Stubner, Martin Cellary, and Thomas Munzer. The latter — Munzer —
appears again in 1525, at the head of a rebellion of the peasants, which
was called the peasants’ war.
Luther returned from his Patmos to Wittemberg in the month of March,
1522. He was received by doctors, students, and citizens, with sincere
demonstrations of joy and affection. His triumph was easy, but all by
moral power. “I will preach,” he said, “I will speak, I will write; but I will
constrain none, for faith is a voluntary act. I stood up against the pope,
indulgences, and papists, but without violence or tumult. I put forward
God’s word, I preached and wrote — this was all I did.” He ascended the
pulpit, and his powerful voice resounded once more through the agitated
multitudes. On seven following days he delivered seven sermons. “They
were followed by the most complete success,” says the historian. “Every
symptom of disorder immediately disappeared; the city was restored to
its former tranquillity, the university to its legitimate studies and rational
principles; and Carlstadt, the unfortunate author of the confusion,
overwhelmed by the predominance of a superior genius, withdrew not long
afterwards from the field of his disgrace.” Luther was greatly opposed to
violence. His fine principle was — before you can advantageously remove
the objects of idolatry, such as images, you must first remove the errors
from the minds of the worshippers. And this he sincerely believed could
 835
only be done by the word of God, which he longed to present to his nation
in their own forcible tongue.

LUTHER AND THE GERMAN BIBLE

When peace was established he turned to his favourite object — the
translation of the New Testament; and after it had undergone the more
critical revision of Melancthon, he published it in the September of 1522.
The appearance of such a work, and at a time when the minds of all men
were in a most excited condition, produced, as might be supposed the
most extraordinary effects. As if carried on the wings of the wind, it
spread from one end of Germany to the other, and to many other
countries. “It was written,” according to D’Aubigne, “in the very tone of
the holy writings, in a language yet in its youthful vigor, and which for the
first time displayed its great beauties; it interested, charmed, and moved
the lowest as well as the highest ranks.” Even the papal historian,
Maimbourg, confesses that “Luther’s translation was remarkably
elegant, and in general so much approved, that it was read by almost
everybody throughout Germany. Women of the first distinction studied it
with the most industrious and persevering attention, and obstinately
defended the tenets of the Reformer against bishops, monks, and Catholic
doctors.” It was a national book. It was the book of the people — the
book of God. This work served more than all Luther’s writings to the
spread and consolidation of the reformed doctrines. The Reformation was
now placed on its own proper foundation — the word of God which
liveth and abideth for ever.
The following statistics show the wonderful success of the work: “A
second edition appeared in the month of December; and by 1533
seventeen editions had been printed at Wittemberg, thirteen at Augsburg,
twelve at Basle, one at Erfurt, one at Grimma, one at Leipsic, and thirteen
at Strasburg.”
Meanwhile Luther proceeded in the accomplishment of his great work —
the translation of the Old Testament. With the assistance of Melancthon
and other friends, the work was published in parts as they were finished,
and wholly completed in the year 1530. Luther’s great work was now
done. Hitherto he had spoken, but now God Himself was to speak to the
 836
hearts and consciences of men. Vast, wonderful, mighty thought! The
divine testimonies of truth presented to a great nation, which had hitherto
been “perishing for lack of knowledge.” The divine word no longer to be
concealed under an unknown tongue; the way of peace no longer to be
obscured by the traditions of men; and the testimony of God Himself
concerning Christ and salvation rescued from the superstitions of the
Romish system.

THE GENERAL PROGRESS OF THE REFORMATION

The mighty movement on which we have now entered knew no limit, no
end. The awakening in the German empire, the revival of the gospel, and
the rising interests of the Reformation, had deeply affected the general
state of Europe. Sweden, Denmark, Holland, Switzerland, Belgium, Italy,
Spain, France, and the British isles, were drawn into the stream of the
great religious revolution. It soon ceased to be a merely local, or even a
national, question; it became the great overwhelming topic of the time.
Every government found that the Reformation formed part of its scheme
and policy, willingly or unwillingly, and that the constitutions of the most
ancient kingdoms were shaken by this new contest about religion.
Men were passing to and fro, and ever carrying fresh tidings of the
wonderful things that were being done. Vessels were arriving at all
harbours, and secretly discharging packages of new translations, and of the
pamphlets and sermons of the Reformers. The interest became universal.
But it was not to be expected that the old church, when backed up by the
civil power, would allow the new opinions to grow up in her very bosom
without a struggle to crush them. Nevertheless, earnest-minded men,
seeing that a Reformation was needed, and quite unable to stifle their
convictions, preached Christ boldly. Some true, honest hearts were found
in those sifting times beneath the monkish gown, men who dared to preach
Christ as the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth
— that God only could forgive sins through faith in the precious blood of
Christ. The clergy, perceiving that such doctrines were destructive of their
power, their privileges, their very existence, raised the loud cry of
“Heresy! Heresy!” Church excommunications were followed by royal
edicts; persecution was waged against the preachers, apprehensions
became frequent, the torture was applied, the flames were kindled, and
 837
from this time the thrilling stories of Protestant martyrs and martyrdoms
begin. For a time bigotry triumphs, the godly suffer, but the power of the
Lord and His truth mightily prevail.
But out on these troubled waters we cannot venture at present. We must
return for a short time to Germany, and witness the rise of
Protestantism, which gave a new direction to the spiritual history of
mankind.

THE REFORMATION AND HENRY THE EIGHTH

The rapid diffusion of Luther’s New Testament, and the immense effect
which it produced in the homes of the people, awakened the deepest
apprehensions of the papal party. The temporal powers, influenced by
the ecclesiastics, prohibited, under the most severe penalties, the
circulation of the condemned book. One of the greatest kings of
Christendom now rose up against the audacious monk of Wittemberg. The
gallant Henry VIII. of England, who had been destined by his father for
the church, thought the present a good opportunity to show his talent, and
wrote a book on the seven sacraments, in answer to Luther’s treatise on
the “Babylonish Captivity.” None of the Reformer’s compositions so
excited the indignation of the papists as his “Babylonish Captivity.” Need
we wonder, then, that such an advocate was flattered and caressed by the
pope, and complimented with the name, “Defender of the Faith,” which
is still one of the titles of the English crown? In reply to his royal
assailant, Luther was not remarkable for his moderation, but betrayed by
his irritable temper to use an abusive style of language which would have
been better repressed.
Towards the close of the year 1521, an important change took place in the
policy of the Vatican. Pope Leo died. Yes, the brilliant but notoriously
immoral Leo died — died, no longer to judge, but to be judged; no longer to
roll out his thunders against heretics, but to be himself measured by the
standard of eternal truth, and weighed in the balances of the sanctuary. He
died denouncing the doctrine of justification by faith, as destructive of all
moral obligations, while he and his dissolute cardinals were dissipating
their time and health in prodigal and luxurious pleasures, and in promoting
expensive and licentious spectacles at the theater. He was succeeded by
 838
Adrian VI., a man more rigid in his morals than Leo, but no less opposed
to the truth of the gospel.

LUTHERAN CHURCHES
Soon after Luther’s return from Wartburg, the States of the empire
assembled in Diet at Nuremberg. The bishops, who formed a numerous
portion of the assembly, called loudly for the execution of the sentence
which had been given against the arch-heretic. But after some altercation,
and without coming to any agreement, the diet was adjourned till the
autumn following.
Meanwhile the Reformer, in open defiance of the papal excommunication
and the imperial edict, was going on steadily with his own proper work,
preaching and writing, and Melancthon with his theology. It may be justly
said of this period that “the word of God mightily grew and prevailed.”
Monks left their monasteries, and became active instruments in
propagating the gospel; and Luther mentions, in a letter to Spalatin, the
escape of nine nuns from their convents, among whom he speaks of
Catherine von Bora, who afterwards became his wife. New services of
worship were being gradually introduced into what were now termed
Lutheran churches, but with great delicacy and tenderness. As a wise man,
Luther exercised great patience towards those who were but creeping
slowly out of the old system into the new. After his noble stand at
Worms, he appears very little in what we may call the outworks of the
Reformation. There he witnessed for God and His truth as few men have
ever done. There is a grandeur and a moral sublimity in his position on that
occasion which stands alone in his history. The true moral glory of the
Reformation declines from that moment. The political element enters, and
soon predominates. The outward aggressive action and the protection of
the reformed churches fall into the hands of the temporal princes. This
was the failure, the sad failure, the original sin, of the Reformers. But we
shall see it more fully when we examine the epistle to Sardis.
The attention of the new pope, Adrian VI., had been turned to the affair of
Luther, and to the restoration of the peace of the church. He professed to
lament the great abuses of the papal See under his predecessor, and
decided on adopting a different line of policy. On the 25th of November,
 839
1522, he addressed a “Brief” to the diet re-assembled at Nuremberg. He
deplored the ravages of the church through the perversity of a heretic,
whom neither the paternal admonition of Leo nor his condemnation,
confirmed by the edict of Worms, had been able to silence. He entreated
the sovereigns to have recourse to the sword; he reminded them how God
had punished Dathan and Abiram for their resistance to the high priest,
and pressed upon them the noble example of their pious ancestors, who
had, by an act of perfect justice, delivered the world from the heretics,
Huss and Jerome, who were even at this moment revived in Luther.

“THE HUNDRED GRIEVANCES”

The papal, party rose up in a body, and shouted for vengeance on Luther;
but the great body of the temporal princes judged rather that the moment
had arrived when they might shake off the burden and the bondage of
Rome under which they had so long groaned, and of which they had so
often complained, but to no good purpose. Thus it was that, while
contending for the doctrines of the Reformation, they prepared the
memorial of “The Hundred Grievances,” so celebrated in the annals of
Germany.
The contrast between the temporal and the spiritual elements now became
manifest in the great Reformation movement, though acting together for
the humiliation and overthrow of the universal oppressor. It was no longer
the friendless, the single-handed, monk meeting, in the power of God and
His truth, the Goliath of popery, or the peaceful triumphs of Worms; but
angry, political strife, and military enterprise. The light and truth of God
in connection with the Reformation seem to have been arrested at this
period of its history. We fail to discover any advancement in the farther
apprehension of truth by the Reformers from the time that the princes
came forward to extend it by the sword. Though Luther was a man of the
most genuine faith, he failed to see the effects of the co-operation of the
princes for their own selfish ends. But it wrought a spiritual blight on the
results and triumphs of faith.
The “Grievances” need not be enumerated here; they were chiefly of an
ecclesiastical character, and such as all other nations in Christendom
groaned under. Oppressive taxation, perpetual levies of tenths under false
 840
pretences, the intrusion of cardinals into the best benefices, the ignorance
and entire incapacity of the resident pastors, the pernicious
superabundance of festivals, the profusion of absolutions and indulgences,
the exactions of the clergy for the administration of the sacraments; indeed
the universal venality of things sacred, and the general immorality of the
spiritual order. “But though the object of the princes,” says Waddington,
“was no more than to reform the externals of the church, while that of
Luther was to regenerate the religion at any peril to the church, yet the
diversity of their views might not at the moment be perceptible to either,
through the ardor of a common hatred, and, to a certain extent, a common
cause.”1 Nevertheless, we may add, the results were ruinous to the
progress of light and truth.

EVENTS ADVERSE TO THE REFORMATION

While the Reformation, through the instrumentality of Luther, was
gathering strength, and spreading rapidly in all parts of Europe, several
evils arose to retard its progress and disgrace its character.
In the autumn of 1524 the German peasants, long oppressed by the
exhausting, consuming, system of popery, rose in rebellion against their
ecclesiastical tyrants. Besides the pomp and luxury of the higher clergy,
the whole swarm of inferior clergy was likewise to be supported. But this
was not all; new orders were perpetually rising up, and the old mendicants
spread like locusts over the whole surface of the country, and devoured
with impunity the substance of the people. There had long been deep
murmurings and partial outbreaks, but the universal excitement of the
moment seemed to give the signal for a general rising. Nearly all the
provinces in Upper Germany were in a state of insurrection. Like some
sudden tornado, they fell on the religious houses, plundered monasteries,
demolished images, and were guilty of other similar excesses. As was usual
in those times, the spiritual nobles and the locust friars had given the
greatest provocation to revolt, so they were the first against whom the
torrent of popular indignation was directed.
The greatest part of this furious rabble consisted of peasants, and hence
the calamity has been called the war of the peasants. The sedition, at its
commencement, was altogether of a civil nature, for these poor peasants
 841
only wished to be relieved from some part of their burdens, and to enjoy
greater freedom. But some pernicious fanatics joined them, and turned it
into a religious and holy war. The storm raged violently for some time,
but, as usual, it passed off in the defeat and slaughter of the insurgents. In
the unfortunate battle of the peasants with the army of the German
princes, at Mulhausen, 1525, Thomas Munzer, their principal leader,
was taken prisoner and publicly executed.
The papists and the enemies of the Reformation endeavored to identify
these wild tumults with the principles of Luther, but entirely without
ground. They were unconnected with his followers, and not directly
occasioned by his writings.

THE ANABAPTISTS
After the death of Munzer and the destruction or dispersion of the
peasants, another sect arose, usually called Anabaptists, because they
immersed all their converts after they had been already christened. This
sect greatly troubled and perplexed the Reformers. What the Gnostics
were to the Fathers, what the Manicheans were to the Catholics, such
were the Anabaptists to the Reformers. They were purely fanatical. “The
leaders claimed the gift of immediate inspiration, the privilege of direct and
frequent intercourse with the Deity; and their deluded followers believed
them. They had their visions and revelations of the past and the future;
their numbers increased with great rapidity, and they followed everywhere
in the train of the Reformation.” Everywhere it was the cry of these
enthusiasts, “No tribute, no tithes, all things in common, no magistrates;
the kingdom of Christ is at hand, the baptism of infants is an invention of
the devil.” They sorely tried the spirit of Luther, as they spoke of
themselves as the true and thorough Reformers. He observes concerning
them: “Satan rages; the new sectarians called Anabaptists increase in
numbers, and display great external appearances of strictness of life, as
also great boldness in death, whether they suffer by fire or by water.”
In the course of two years these fanatics had spread ill considerable
numbers over Silesia, Bavaria, Swabia, and Switzerland. But as some of
their principles tended to the overthrow of social order, political decrees
were issued against them. Persecution began; and as both the Saxon and the
 842
Swiss Reformers were opposed to them, they were everywhere visited by
the civil power with the greatest severtries. But they bore their sufferings
with unconquerable fortitude. Neither sword, nor fire, nor gibbet, moved
them to retractation of the show of fear. With the capture and the
execution of their leaders at Munster, in 1536, the sect seems to have been
suppressed.

THE SACRAMENTARIAN QUESTION

In the same year that the Anabaptists made their appearance (1524), a
long and pernicious controversy arose among those who had withdrawn
from the Romish communion, respecting the manner in which the body
and blood of Christ are present in the sacred supper. Luther and his
adherents, while they renounced the papal error of transubstantiation —
that the bread and wine after consecration remained no longer, but were
transmuted into the body and blood of Christ — yet did maintain that
persons coming to the sacred supper participated truly of the body and
blood of Christ, together with the bread and wine. This doctrine gave rise
to the term, consubstantiation. Ulric Zwingle, the Swiss Reformer, and
his adherents were much more simple, being more fully delivered from the
traditions of Rome. They maintained that the body and blood of the Lord
are not present in the holy supper, but that the bread and the wine are
merely symbols or emblems by which people should be moved to
remember the death of Christ, and the blessing flowing therefrom.
As nearly all the Swiss divines, and not a few in Upper Germany,
followed the teaching of Zwingle, and Luther and his friends contended
strennously for his doctrine, great disunion was created among the true
friends of the Reformation, which was artfully fomented by the papists.
But more of this afterwards, if the Lord will. We now turn to the

POLITICAL CHIEFS OF THE REFORMATION

The troubled state of the European nations, the frequent wars between
Charles V. and Francis I., and the threatening attitude of the Turks, so
occupied and perplexed the Emperor, that during several years he could
not give much attention to the concerns of Germany, and especially to the
difficult subject, the new heresy. In all this the hand of the Lord is most
 843
manifest. While Charles was keeping vigilant watch over his French,
Spanish, and Italian affairs, Luther and his associates, by their writings,
lectures, and admonitions, were spreading the truth, and deepening its hold
on the hearts of the common people; and the political chiefs, or evangelical
princes, were drawing closer and closer together for the defense of their
faith and their political liberty.
The perfidious pope, Clement VI., and his able nuncio, Campeggio,
were determined to have the edict of Worms enforced and the complete
extirpation of the Lutheran heresy. But this could not be done without the
co-operation of powerful sovereigns. Charles had been slow in obeying
papal orders. But a variety of circumstances seemed to combine at this
moment which favored the policy of the Vatican, and threatened to
extinguish the infant Reformation. But God is above all. “The kings of the
earth set themselves, and the rulers take council together, against the Lord,
and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast
away their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the
Lord shall have them in derision.” (Psalm 2:2-4.) The sword of the
Emperor that was whetted for the slaughter of the Reformers, was turned
through the treachery of the pope against Rome itself. Thus it
happened:—
At the battle of Pavia, in 1526, Francis I. was vanquished by Charles V.
and made his prisoner. As the captive King of France could be of no
further service to the pope, he immediately transferred his friendship to
his conqueror. An alliance was formed with the Emperor, the King of
England, and the Archduke Ferdinand. The principal article of this treaty
was — “That all parties should unite their forces and march in arms
against the disturbers of the Catholic religion and the insulters of the pope,
and avenge every outrage committed against the See of Rome.” By the
craft of Satan, the same spirit prevailed in other negotiations of the great
powers at this same moment. The treaty of Madrid, which restored
Francis to liberty, provided that he should join the alliance. The three most
powerful princes of Europe were now in association with the pope for the
express purpose of executing the decrees of Worms, and for the
extermination by fire and sword of the Lutheran confederacy.
 844
THE FIRST DIET OF SPIRES
The Diet of Spires, which opened in June 1526, was to strike the decisive
blow. Ferdinand, the Emperor’s brother, presided. The oft-repeated
imperial message to the diet was read. It demanded that all contentions
respecting religious subjects should cease; that the church customs should
be maintained entire; that the edict of Worms should be speedily executed,
and that the Lutherans should be forcibly destroyed. The princes of
Germany, from not oniy a common object but a common danger, drew
closer together. The chief of these were — John, Elector of Saxony; Philip,
Landgrave of Hesse; the Archduke of Prussia; George and Casimir,
Margraves of Brandenburg; the Elector Palatine; the Dukes of Lunenburg,
Pomerania, and Mecklenburg; and the Princes of Anhalt and Henneberg.
They met in conference and passed the following resolution: —
“That they would use their utmost exertions to advance the glory
of God, and to maintain a doctrine in conformity with His word,
rendering thanks to Him for having revived in their time the true
doctrine of justification by faith, which had been long buried under
a mass of superstition; and that they would not permit the
extinction of the truth, which God had so lately revealed to them.”
This is the virgin resolution of the princes, and the simplest and the
purest they ever promulgated. There is nothing political, social, or
financial here. The firmness of the evangelical party, their refusing to obey
the edict of the Emperor, astonished the papists. But a voice from Him
who is above all and over all, brought the discussions of the diet to a
speedy termination. Ambassadors arrived from the King of Hungary,
representing the calamities with which that country was overwhelmed, and
the danger which threatened all Europe from the triumphant progress of
the Turks. This drew the attention of Ferdinand off Luther, and hurried
him to his own dominions which lay in that quarter.
What the victorious arms of Solyman accomplished in the case of
Ferdinand, the treachery of Clement did in the case of Charles. Scarcely
had Francis I. escaped from his captivity, when the pope, dreading the
power of Charles in Italy, entered into an alliance with the French, the
Duke of Milan, and the Venetians, against Charles. At the same time he
absolved Francis from his oath, and authorized the violation of the treaty
 845
of Madrid. This so inflamed the resentment of the Emperor, that the
abolished the pontifical authority throughout Spain, made war upon the
pope in Italy, captured the city by his general, Charles of Bourbon; which
was given up to all the horrors of a sack. The life and property of Rome
were in the hands of the infuriated German and Spanish soldiers. The pope
himself was treated with much personal abuse and indignity. There are few
passages in history in which the overruling hand of a retributive
Providence is more plainly manifested.
In the midst of these perplexities, a resolution was duly passed, which
turned out most favorable for the Reformers. It was to this effect: “That a
petition should be presented to the Emperor, urging him to call a free
council without delay; and that in the meantime every one should be at
liberty to manage the religious concerns of his own territory, in the manner
he saw fit, yet under a due sense of his accountability to God and to the
Emperor.”
The Reformers, returning home, diligently improved this opportunity for
strengthening and extending the cause of reform. Great changes were
effected in their forms of worship and in the regulation of their religious
affairs; and many inveterate superstitions were expelled. The princes and
the people became more and more declared; and the foundation of the
future division into Catholic and Protestant States, was laid in the history
of the Reformation from 1526 to 1529.

THE SECOND DIET OF SPIRES

In the early spring of 1529, the Emperor called the famous Second Diet of
Spires. The states of the empire assembled with great readiness. “The
papal party especially mustered all their forces and assumed a warlike and
insulting attitude. Never on any like occasion had there appeared so large
an assemblage of spiritual nobles; and these more than any betrayed by
their looks and manners the malignity of their designs. One or two princes,
who had hitherto been considered neutral or even favorable to the
Reformation, now declared against it. Others came, attended by
considerable escorts of cavalry, breathing hatred and defiance. Nothing less
was meditated than the immediate extinction of the heresy by the sword.”
 846
The imperial message assumed a high and despotic tone. The Emperor
complained of the changes in religion, and the disrespect which had been
shown to his own authority: for he claimed to be the chief of the christian
world, and demanded unresemred obedience to his decrees. He observed
that the religious innovations which he had proscribed were daily
increasing in numbers, and that too under the pretext of the edict of Spires
in 1526, which edict, by virtue of his absolute power, he abrogated as in
direct opposition to his orders.
The decree of the Emperor was highly offensive and grievous to the
German nobles. It struck at the very root of their privileges and their
independence. The evangelical princes and the deputies of the free cities
took up a strong but a just position. They affirmed that the edict of Spires
had been drawn up according to the usual forms; that the commissioners to
the Emperor had consented to it in his name; that it was the legal act of the
whole body of the Republic; and that it was beyond the imperial power to
annul it.

THE PROTEST
The discussions which arose on this subject were long and often furious.
The Catholics had their most able and artful disputants present, such as
the celebrated Eck. To the oft-repeated cry, “The execution of the edict of
Worms,” was now added, “The abrogation of the edict of Spires.” But the
Reformers were firm and united, and they reasoned with great justice. At
length, Ferdinand, who presided in the diet, demanded with an imperious
tone, the unconditional submission of the German princes to the decision
of the Assembly. The Reformers protested. This was on the 19th of April,
1529. That simple act being disregarded by the papists, the Reformers
presented on the following day, in writing, a second and more elaborate
remonstrance, and appealed to the Emperor and a future council. On that
account the Reformers received the designation of The Protestants. This
is the origin of the term which is now used to denote all those numerous
churches and sects which protest on principle against the doctrines, rites,
and ceremonies of the church of Rome.
This noble manifesto, which no doubt perplexed the papal party by its
firmness and its justice, was signed by John, Elector of Saxony, Philip,
 847
Landgrave of Hesse, George of Brandenburg, Ernest and Francis of
Lunenberg, Wolffgang of Anhalt, and by the deputies of fourteen imperial
cities. But the signatures of no theologians, no doctors of divinity, no
university professors, appear. The great Reformation, or religious
revolution, has passed into the hands of the powers of this world. There
was no Luther at Spires as at Worms. Still both he and his friends were
laboring in their studies, their pulpits, their universities, for the peaceful
progress of the word of God, and the triumphs of the gospel of His grace.
And the Lord knows how to estimate and reward the labors of His
servants.
“Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who
both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make
manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have
praise of God.” (1 Corinthians 4:5.)
Here papal Christianity receives its deadly wound. The reign of Jezebel,
as to her absolute authority, is now judged an intolerable tyranny. The
Teutonic mind, which never entirely threw off its native independence,
now throws off the galling yoke of Rome. Historically the Thyatiran
period closes here. The Protestant period commences, as shadowed forth
in the epistles to Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea, though all four run on
to the end. Then every true Christian in all the different systems in
Christendom will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air; and in due time
come with Him in full manifested glory; when divine judgment will be
executed on a ripened apostasy.
 848

CHAPTER 36
PROTESTANTISM

The Protest of the Reformers at the second Diet of Spires, in 1529, forms
a distinct epoch in the history of the Reformation and of the church. At
the same time, we must bear in mind that Protestantism is not a novelty.
The antiquity of the Roman Catholic religion is one of the vain boasts of
her advocates. Popery, they say, is the offspring of antiquity; but
Protestantism is the child of yesterday — of Luther and Calvin. The term,
we may admit, in its acceptation in the sixteenth century was a novelty,
but not that which it represented. The truth of God and its authority over
the conscience were what the Protestants contended for. In this sense,
Protestantism is as old as Christianity; and has always existed, though
overlaid, from the time of Constantine to the sixteenth century, by a mass
of error and ever accumulating superstitions.
During this dark and dreary period we have many Protestants. Despotism
and error reigning, the faithful and the truth of God existing, necessarily
brought out the principles of Protestantism. Besides the Paulicians, the
Nestorians, and the Armenians in the East; we have our well-known
friends in the West — the Waldenses, the Albigenses, the Wycliffites, and
the Bohemians. There were others distinguished by various appellations,
such as the Cathart, Leonists, etc.; but these were the four great branches
of the noble stock of witnesses for Christ and His gospel; and though
called by different names, had one common origin and one common faith.
The Protestantism with which we have now to do, historically, dates from
the second Diet of Spires, 1529. Then it drew its first breath. But in a
short time it was embodied in the national constitution of Germany, and
stood armed in defense, if needed, of religion and liberty. This was
Protestantism in its political form, which alas! savoured not of
Christianity, or of the church of God, the body of Christ.
But here we must pause for a little, and meditate on the Lord’s address to
the church in Sardis. The commencement of the Protestant part of
 849
Christendom is the right moment to introduce it. There we have the
estimate, not of the partial or prejudiced pen of the historian, but of the
Lord Himself. This is deeply solemn, but unspeakably precious. May He
give us to see His own mind on this great subject!

THE EPISTLE TO THE CHURCH IN SARDIS

“And unto the angel of the church in Sardis write; These things
saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars; I
know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art
dead. Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are
ready to die: for I have not found thy works perfect before God.
Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold
fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on
thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come
upon thee. Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not
defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for
they are worthy. He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in
white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of
life, but I will confess his name before My Father, and before His
angels. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto
the churches.” (Revelation 3:1-6.)
We have seen the general state and the active agehcies of popery during the
middle ages: we have now to contemplate an entirely new period of the
history of the church, and a new order of things as the result of the great
Reformation. Many of the moral features of the former periods no doubt
exist in Sardis, but its character is sufficiently distinct to mark it as a fresh
epoch in ecclesiastical and civil history.
The first four churches, which we have looked at, describe the state of
things before the Reformation; the last three represent the general aspect
of the professing body after the days of Luther. But we must be careful to
distinguish between that positive work of the Spirit of God by means of
the reformers, and that lifeless formalism which so soon appeared in the
Lutheran and reformed churches, and which too plainly corresponds with
the sad condition of Sardis. Scarcely had they tasted the blessings of
deliverance from the oppression of Rome when they fell into a state of
 850
bondage to the governments of the world, and consequently, a state of
spiritual deadness. The Lord Jesus touchingly refers to the same state of
things in His address, “I know thy works, that thou hast a name that thou
livest, and art dead.” This is the condition of that which is known as
Protestantism, after the days of the first reformers. True Christians, of
course, are not dead, their “life is hid with Christ in God,” but the systems
they are in, the Lord here declares to be without vitality. An orthodox
creed, outward correctness, a name to live, the unclean spirit of popery
gone out, the house swept and garnished, characterises Protestantism; but
— that awful word from the lips of Jesus — thou art dead, stamps its real
character as seen by Him. The various systems of our national churches,
and of the great professing bodies of dissenters, are described by that fatal
word, “dead,” — the living reality is gone.
But a glance at the different parts of the Epistle to Sardis will enable us to
understand more fully the Lord’s estimate of the various Protestant
systems by which we are surrounded.
1. As usual in these epistles, the character which the Lord takes is divinely
suited to the condition of those whom He is addressing. “These things
saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God, and the seven stars.” Here the
Lord presents Himself as having for faith, all the fullness of the Holy
Spirit, and all authority in government, seven being the symbol of
perfection. And this plenitude of spiritual blessing which is in Christ and
at His disposal, remains for ever unaltered by the failure or outward ruin
of the church, so that both the body corporate, and individual Christians
are without excuse if they flee for help to mere human resources.
But alas! this was the very snare into which the reformers fell. It
happened in this way, and as we still see around us the effects of that
mistake, we shall do well to examine it carefully.
2. The two things — the spiritual and the ecclesiastical — which we here
see united in Christ, were separated by the reformers. This was the great
error of the Reformation. They never saw or understood this truth. In their
anxiety to obtain complete deliverance from the threatening power of the
pope, backed by Catholic princes; the reformers placed themselves under
the protection of the Protestant princes. This was their failure; and from
the first Diet of Spires in 1526, they almost disappear from the notice of
 851
history. They overlooked the grand truth, that all needed power for the
church, both inward and outward, spiritual and governmental, dwells in the
Head, and that neither the tyranny of Rome, nor the feebleness of a few
reformers, weaken in the least this blessed reality. “Whatever the failure of
the church may be,” says one, “however it may have coalesced with the
world, this remains always true, that the full divine competency of the
Holy Ghost in His various attributes is its portion, under Him who is the
Head of the church which He cares for, loves, and watches over.”1 He has
also the seven stars. It is not said here as it is in the address to Ephesus,
“He that holdeth the seven stars in His right hand;” but “He that hath the
seven stars.” In Sardis, although the stars are not seen “in His right hand,”
the blessed Lord had not given them up; this He could never do; He still
has them under His hand, we may say, though not in it. “These things
saith He that hath the seven stars.”
But it may be necessary, in explanation of the stars, before going farther,
to say a few words.
“The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches.” Throughout
scripture “stars” symbolize subordinate power, just as the sun symbolizes
supreme power; and the “angels” give the idea of representation.2 “Then
said they, It is his angel,” or the representative of Peter, whom they
believed to be in prison; and surely the angel whom Jacob wrestled with
was the angel of Jehovah, for Jacob called the place “the face of God.”
(Acts 12; Genesis 32.) The instruction, then, which we gather from the
meaning of these two words, is perfectly plain and most important;
namely, that the angel of the church ought to be the display of spiritual
power, as representing Christ on the earth. The responsibility of the
professing church is thus placed in the most solemn point of view.
Whatever may be the condition of things in the professing church, the
Lord Jesus is the one who has the seven Spirits of God, and who has the
seven stars; or in other words, all the power of the Spirit, and all
ecclesiastical authority. This is what Christ is in His own fullness of
blessing for the church, and for the individual Christian also; and surely we
ought to be a fair expression of Him who is our life, our wisdom, and our
power in this world. May we be kept more in the spirit of obedience and
dependence — nearer to Him, in His right hand.
 852
3. We think it scarcely necessary to add, after what has been said, that the
titles “star” and “angel” give no sanction to the idea of clericalism or
humanly appointed ministers. The system which has prevailed since the
Reformation leaves a wide door for even unconverted men, if intellectual.
But how different the divine system is as seen here! The “stars” have a
character of authority under Christ, and act in His name, who is the Head
of government, and as “angels” are representatives of the churches, and
characterize them to the eye of Christ. What a sublime picture, we may
exclaim, of moral identification with Christ and the assembly of God, these
titles give! And one man was both. “The seven stars are the angels of the
seven churches.” He was the expression of Christ to the church in
subordinate power, and of the church to Christ in its moral condition. To
such divinely appointed and divinely qualified ministers, there could be no
objection in any age or in any country. For such we should never cease to
pray.
Having now seen, as we believe, the mind of Christ as to what He is in
Himself for His church in all ages and conditions, we shall be better able to
understand the position of the Reformed churches as shadowed forth by
the state of things in Sardis.
4. In the old Catholic system, salvation was made a question, not merely
of faith in Christ Jesus, but of church privilege. Every blessing was made
to depend on connection with the church of Rome. There was no pardon
of sin, no peace with God, no eternal life in Christ, no salvation for the
soul, outside of her communion. It was this daring blasphemous dogma
that gave her such enormous power during the dark ages, and which made
her excommunications the most insupportable inflictions that could
possibly be laid on either persons or nations. When the church uttered her
voice of censure, the victim of her thunders knew no power of resistance.
There was not a man, from the haughtiest monarch to the meanest subject,
that did not tremble where the bolt fell. War, famine, pestilence, were
tolerable, being temporal calamities; but the pope’s curse blasted the soul
for ever, and doomed it to an endless hell. No matter how genuine a man’s
faith and piety might be, if he did not belong to the holy Catholic church,
and enjoy the benefit of her sacraments, salvation was impossible. This
fearful doctrine, which was then believed, made the church everything —
teacher, lawgiver, savior — and fellowship with her the only way to
 853
heaven whatever the individual character might be. She also claimed the
privilege of saying who were to be called saints and who were not; who
were to go direct to heaven after death, and who were to go to purgatory,
and how long they were to be detained there. Every man’s place and
importance, both in time and in eternity, could only be settled by that
which called itself the church, the spouse of Christ.
But this monstrous evil which was concealed for centuries in the most
congenial darkness, was brought to light at the Reformation. The ripened
mass of corruption could escape the execration of mankind no longer.
Many rose up in rebellion against it, declared the whole system of popery
to be the lie of Satan, and the protest of Luther to be the truth of God. But
the reformers, in place of trusting in Christ who presents Himself to faith
as superior to all circumstances, and making Him their refuge and strength,
fell into the snare of looking to the civil magistrate as a sheltering arm from
the persecutions of Rome, and as the one who should regulate the
movements of the seven stars. Ecclesiastical authority — the appointment
of ministers — passed into the hands of the powers of this world. This
was the failure of Protestantism from the beginning. Take the testimony of
another.
“Thus Protestantism was always wrong, ecclesiastically, because
it looked up to the civil ruler as the one in whose hand
ecclesiastical authority was vested; so that if the church had been,
under popery, the ruler of the world, the world now became, in
Protestantism, the ruler of the church...Sardis describes what
followed the Reformation, when the glow and fervor of truth and
the first flush of blessing had passed away, and a cold formalism
had set in... In Protestant lands, there has always been a measure of
liberty of conscience. But the object of God is not merely to
deliver either from gross evils, or from mere details, but that the
soul should be right with God, and should allow the Lord to have
His way and glory — liberty for the Lord to work by the Holy
Ghost according to His will. When He is allowed His right place,
there is the blessed fruit of it in love and holy liberty. It is hot a
human liberty derived from the power of the world that we want
— though God forbid that we should speak a word against the
powers that be, in their own sphere — but the liberty of the Holy
 854
Ghost. It is the sin of Christians to have put the powers that be in
a false position. The Lord Jesus touches the root of the whole
matter in the way He presents Himself to the church of Sardis.
Whether it is spiritual power or the outward authority flowing
from it, the Lord claims it all as belonging to Himself... When there
is faith to look to Him in His place as Head of the church, He will
assuredly supply every need. If He listens to the simplest cry of
His lambs, does He not enter into the deeper need of His church,
which is always His most beloved object? He took His Headship
of the church only in heavenly glory, and He went there not merely
to be, but to act, as the Head.”3
5. In renouncing the errors of popery with reference to the power of the
church, the reformers were drawn into an opposite mistake in attaching
too much importance to individual opinion. On the Catholic principle, the
church makes the Christian; on the Protestant principle, Christians make
the church; and consequently, practically viewed, Christ loses His right
place in both. A man, the priest would say, can only receive good to his
soul from his present connection with Holy Mother Church; the moment
he ceases to belong to her, he is lost; the only means of pardon and
salvation being the holy sacraments. To be cast out of the church is like
being cast into hell; of course, if there be repentance, or ground of some
kind for priestly absolution, the soul may be delivered from its awful
doom, and restored to the favor of the church, which is eternal life. But
man’s place in heaven, on earth, or in hell, must be determined and settled
by the church. This is the great foundation principle of Roman
Catholicism, and that which gives the priesthood such unlimited power
over their deluded votaries. But this kind of influence is not confined to
Romanism; it prevails more or less wherever the priestly element is
owned: and has done so since the early days of the fathers.
The results of the unhallowed power in the hands of the Romish
priesthood became utterly intolerable to all classes of society about the
beginning of the sixteenth century. A protest was raised; it soon
overspread the whole of Christendom; the Bible was appealed to as of
absolute authority; justification by faith alone without the deeds of the
law became the watchword of the reformers. The galling yoke of Rome
was thrown off. This was the work of God’s Spirit, and the energy that
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accomplished the Reformation was all of Him. One result of this great
revolution, and that which characterized it, was the transfer of power and
importance from the church to the individual. The idea of the church as the
dispenser of blessing was rejected; and every man was called upon to read
the Bible for himself, examine for himself, believe for himself, be justified
for himself, serve God for himself, as he must answer for himself. This
was the new-born thought of the Reformation — always right, but it had
long been denied by the usurpation of Romanism — individual blessing
first, church formation afterwards, was the new order of things; but alas!
the true idea of the church of God was then completely lost, and not
recovered till the present century, as we shall see by-and-by, the Lord
willing.
So far, the reformers were right. The Lord only builds living stones on the
rock-foundation; but the Lord’s own place and work in the assembly by
the Holy Ghost being lost sight of, men began to unite and build churches,
so-called, after their own minds. A great variety of churches or religious
societies speedily sprang up in many parts of Christendom; but each
country carried out its own idea as to how the church should be formed
and governed: some thought that church power should be vested in the
hands of the civil magistrate; others thought that the church should retain
that power within herself; and this difference of opinion resulted in the
national and innumerable dissenting bodies which we still see everywhere
around us. But the mind of Christ as to the character and constitution of
His church, so largely taught in the epistles, seems to have been entirely
overlooked by the leaders of the Reformation. Individual faith, as the grand
saving principle for the soul, was everywhere insisted on, thank the Lord;
and men’s souls were sawed and God was thereby glorified; but that being
secured, men might combine and make churches to suit their own mind.
Nothing is more manifest to the student of church history with his New
Testament before him than this painful fact.
For example, we read in Ephesians 4, “There is one body, and one spirit;”
but according to Protestantism we should read, “There are many bodies
and one spirit.” But there cannot be more than one of divine constitution.
Again, we read, “Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit.” This plainly
means the unity of the Spir’lt’s forming — the Holy Ghost being the
formative power of the church which is Christ’s body. Christians are the
 856
units formed by the Holy Spirit into a perfect unity. This we are to
endeavor to “keep,” not to make — to endeavor to maintain, exhibit, carry
out in practice.
“For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the
members of that one body, being many, are one body; so also is
Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether
we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been
all made to drink into one Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:12, 13.)4
6. Not only are the religious systems represented by Sardis without life,
but the works of those who belong to them are incomplete. “I have not
found thy works perfect before God,” saith the Lord Jesus. He looks for
fruit according to the standard given, and the resources placed at the
disposal of faith. He presents Himself as the One who has all perfectness
in spiritual power and energy for His church, and as looking for fruit
which answers to Himself. He cannot lower His standard in dealing with
our shortcomings. “Remember therefore,” He says, “how thou hast
received and heard, and hold fast, and repent.” He calls their attention in
this solemn warning to the grace they had received, and the word they had
heard. He looks for works complete, according to the measure of grace
received, and the truth communicated. But, alas, under the plea of “there is
no perfection” either in the church or in the individual, the idea of
obedience according to the word of God has lost its proper place in the
minds of Christians generally.
Take an example of what we mean — a common case.
A young man is converted through the visit of an evangelist. He has no
associations or friends in one place of worship more than in another; but
now he must attend somewhere. He is recommended to visit the different
churches within reach of his residence, and settle down where he thinks he
will receive the most good. This is the criterion he is to judge by — his
own good. Our own blessing is, no doubt, a most important thing, and
ought not to be overlooked; but when it is made the chief things, rather
than the will of Christ, it must result in darkness of mind and barrenness
of soul. Obedience to the word of God would surely be a deeper spring of
blessing to our souls than merely seeking our own good, to the neglect of
God’s mind about the church as revealed in the epistles. But, alas, the
 857
common saying is, “There is good in all denominations, but none are all
good; therefore we must judge for ourselves, and choose the one we think
the nearest to scripture — there is no system perfect.” But this trite
saying, however plausible, can only apply to human systems of religion.
God’s system must be perfect; and no system will suit Him that is not
perfect. The imperfections of those who are in God’s system, or
endeavoring to carry it out, do not affect its divine perfection.
The distinction between a system and those who are in it, is often lost
sight of. Supposing that a few weak or even faulty Christians were
gathered to God’s center; that would not make the center weak or faulty;
but supposing, on the other hand, that a company of the best Christians in
all Christendom were gathered to a human center, that would not make it
divine. Christ is God’s center, and those who are gathered to that center
by the power of the Holy Ghost are on God’s ground, in His presence,
and will surely receive His blessing. This should be our chief object — to
be where God is, in the full assurance of faith, and trust Him for the good
of our souls.
“For where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I in the
midst of them.” (Matthew 18:20; Ephesians 4:3, 4.)
The difference between the great system of Sardis, and those who were in
it, is very manifest in the Lord’s message to them. “I have not found thy
works perfect before God. Remember therefore how thou hast received
and heard, and hold fast and repent.” The church must be judged, not by a
lifeless system, but by the resources which it has in Christ the head. The
painful fact that things are not now as they were at the beginning, is no
reason why Christians should make churches after their own minds and
govern them by their own laws. But this has been the sin and practice of
Protestantism until their name is legion. “Remember therefore how thou
hast received and heard,” is the Lord’s most solemn warning to Sardis, and
to Protestants generally. The revealed word of God should be our only
guide and authority, and the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ our only
power. He recalls the church to these two grand points — grace received,
truth heard. These form the measure of her responsibility, and the
standard by which He must judge the great system of Sardis.
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7. The coming of the Lord is here spoken of as if the church had fallen to
the level of the world. “If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on
thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.”
This is very similar to what is said with regard to the world in 1
Thessalonians 5:2: “The day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.”
The Lord looks for His people to take a distinct path in separation from
the world; but in this Sardis failed. “I have not found thy works perfect
before God.” There was great conformity to the world. Even in Thyatira,
the saints of God are commended for their earnestness, notwithstanding
the evil, and for their last works being more than the first. But the idea of
obedience to the word of God and separation from the world is little
known in Protestantism. Therefore they must share the world’s portion.
“I will come on thee as a thief.” As such He will come on the mere
professing mass, but not so on the true believer.
“Thou hast a few names,” He says, “even in Sardis, which have not defiled
their garments; and they shall walk with me in white; for they are
worthy.” This is real comfort to those who are walking with the Lord in
separation from the world. It is the world as a moral scene that defiles the
Christian’s garments. The few names here signify individuals. The Lord
knows each one by name who is walking faithfully on the earth, and
assures them that they will walk with Him in heaven. Blessed are the
overcomers; instead of a blotted name, He will confess them by name
before His Father and before His angels.
Having thus examined the meaning of the message to Sardis, and its
application to what took place after the Reformation, we now return with
mingled feelings to its history. Unfeignedly thankful for that great work of
God’s Spirit; unfeignedly sorry for the failure of man which so soon
appeared. But it may be well to refresh the reader’s mind with a glance at
the successive conditions of the professing church of God on earth, before
going further.
In Ephesus, we have the church cooling down in her love to Christ. “Thou
hast left thy first love.” This is the origin of all the failure that has since
followed. In Smyrna, suffering under persecution from Satan. In Pergamos,
worldliness; the church dwelling in the world where Satan’s throne is. In
Thyatira, corruption: suffering the prophetess Jezebel to teach, to seduce
 859
the Lord’s servants to commit fornication and to eat things sacrificed unto
idols. In Sardis, deadness; Jezebel is not here, Sardis had got away from
her and her corruptions. A great name to live — a great profession and
appearance of Christianity, but no vital power.

THE LUTHERAN CHURCHES A.D. 1526-1529

In illustration of our exposition of the Epistle to Sardis, and in proof of
what we have said of the constitution of the Lutheran churches, we will
now refer to their original organization. And that the truth on this point
may be fairly and fully stated, we will quote from D’Aubigne, who has
said all for Luther and the Reformation that can be said.
“The reform needed some years of repose that it might increase
and gain in strength: and it could not enjoy peace unless its great
enemies were at war with each other. The madness of Clement VII.
was as it were the lightning-conductor of the Reformation, and the
ruin of Rome built up the gospel. It was not only a few months’
gain; from 1526 to 1529 there was a calm in Germany by which the
Reformation profired to organize and extend itself.
“The papal yoke having been broken, the ecclesiastical order
required to be re-established. It was impossible to restore their
ancient jurisdiction to the bishops; for these Continental prelates
maintained that they were in an especial manner, the pope’s
servants. A new set of things was therefore called for, under pain
of seeing the church fall into anarchy. Provision was made for it. It
was then that the evangelic nations separated definitely from that
despotic dominion which had for ages kept all the west in bondage.
“Already on two occasions the Diet had wished to make the
reform of the church a national work. The Emperor, the pope, and
a few princes were opposed to it. The Diet of Spires had therefore
resigned to each state the task that it could not accomplish itself.
“But what constitution were they about to substitute for the papal
hierarchy?
 860
“They could, while suppressing the pope, preserve the episcopal
order; it was the form most approximate to that which was on the
point of being destroyed.
“They might, on the contrary, reconstruct the ecclesiastical order,
by having recourse to the sovereignty of God’s word, and re-
establishing the rights of the christian people. This form was the
most remote from the Roman hierarchy. Between these two
extremes there were several middle courses... Evangelical Germany,
at the moment in which she began to try her hand on ecclesiastical
constitutions, began with that which trenched the deepest on the
papal monarchy.” 5
The reader will plainly see from these few extracts, that the princes of
Germany, in re-constituting the church, were guided by expediency, or
political principles. Although they may have been sincere in desiring to act
in conformity with the word of God, yet it never seems to have crossed
their minds that God has given a constitution for His church in the New
Testament. He has not given to man the liberty of adding to, or altering a
single word of, that divine constitution, any more than He gave to the
Jews the liberty of adding to, or altering a single pin in the tabernacle. But
as we have gone very fully into the question of the inauguration,
constitution, and discipline of the church in the early part of our first
volume, we need say nothing more on that subject here. Everything should
be tried by the standard of God’s word, and whatever has not the sanction
of that word should be given up.

THE FIRST PLANTING OF THE LUTHERAN CHURCHES

The Reformation in Germany can hardly be said to have begun with the
lower classes. In Switzerland the movement was democratic, in Germany
it was imperial. The princes stood in the front rank of the battle, and sat
on the first bench in the council. “The democratic organization,” says
D’Aubigne, “was therefore compelled to give way to an organization,
conformable to the civil government.” This is a full admission that the
constitution of the Lutheran churches was purely human, purely political.
Christ as the center, and the Holy Ghost as the gathering power to that
center, are entirely overlooked. Therefore the Lord pronounces all such
 861
systems as “dead.” Christ, the Holy Spirit, the word of God, are all talked
of and believed in, but none of them have their right place in the Lutheran
or the reformed churches: consequently, they are without vitality. It was
particularly among the higher classes that Luther found his supporters.
“He admitted the princes as representatives of the people; and
henceforward, the influence of the state became one of the principal
elements in the constitution of the evangelical church.”
Re-formation, we have to bear in mind, is not formation. The original
proclamation of the truth and the formation of the church at Pentecost,
should be the Reformer’s guide. Re-formation is the turning of our
thoughts to the beginning, or to the word and grace of God, and Re-
forming the church in accordance with His grace and truth. And surely, if
the church was formed in the first century without the princes of this
world, could it not be Re-formed without them in the sixteenth or
nineteenth? D’Aubigne very naturally asks this question, which shows
that he felt there was a serious defect somewhere; for why call in a power
to Re-form, which was not required in forming the church at the beginning?
The idea of the church, as the assembly of God, or as the body of Christ,
was now completely lost. Even the Catholics, though in a wicked and
corrupt way, speak of maintaining the unity of the church. The
Protestants started wrong on this point, and from that day until now, they
have been going farther and farther from the truth as to the “one body.”
Philip, Landgrave of Hesse, an enterprising and magnanimous prince, has
the reputation of being the first in completing an ecclesiastical constitution
for the churches of his hereditary states, and which was set forward as a
model for the new churches of Christendom.

THE DEATH OF FREDERICK

In the year 1525, Frederick the Wise, Elector of Saxony, died. He had
been the friend and protector of Luther, though not much of a reformer.
John, his brother and successor, was of a very different character. He was
a thorough Lutheran and reformer. In ecclesiastical matters he assumed an
absolute supremacy. He caused the constitution and government of the
churches, the form of public worship, the duties and the salaries of the
clergy to be drawn up by Luther and Melancthon, and to be promulgated
 862
by his deputies in the year 1527. “Being fully satisfied as to the truth of
Luther’s doctrines, and clearly perceiving the utter impossibility of
preserving them, if the pontiff’s authority were maintained, he took upon
himself an entire jurisdiction in religious matters. He made provision for
placing pious and competent teachers over all the churches, and for the
removal of unsuitable ones. His example was soon followed by the other
princes and states of Germany, that had cast off the dominion of the
Roman Pontiff.”6 Such was the foundation or first planting of the Lutheran
and reformed churches.
The effect of such decided measures, as may easily be supposed, was soon
manifest. Dissensions among the princes immediately followed. The
moderation of Frederick had kept them tolerably united; but the
proceedings of John made it: obvious, that he was determined to separate
the churches of his territory from the church of Rome. This awoke the
fears of the Catholic princes, and led them to consult together for the
defense of the old religion, and for the punishment of the daring
innovators. An alliance was also formed by the Lutheran princes, and it
was only the troubled state of Europe that prevented a civil war. The
hands of Charles being full with his wars in different places, the Reformers
were left undisturbed till the year 1529 — the year so famous in the
history of the Reformation, and second only to the one we are now
approaching, 1530. But we must notice one or two things which led to its
importance. And first of all

THE APPEAL OF THE PRINCES

By the efforts of the popish party at the second Diet of Spires in 1529,
the edict issued against Luther at Worms in 1521 was confirmed, and all
innovations in religion were forbidden. Against this decision the majority
of the evangelical princes entered their solemn and deliberate protest.7 But
not satisfied with merely expressing their dissent from the decree of the
Diet, the protesters re-assembled immediately after its dissolution, and
had a document drawn up in due form, in which they review what had
passed in the assembly, state their grievances, assign reasons in
justification of the step they had taken, and with respectful firmness re-
assert the sacred rights of conscience on matters of salvation, and finally
appeal to the Emperor and to a future General Council. The document
 863
concludes as follows: “We therefore appeal for ourselves, for our subjects,
and for all who receive or who shall hereafter receive the word of God,
from all past, present, or future vexatious measures, to his imperial
majesty, and to a free and universal assembly of holy Christendom.” This
document filled twelve sheets of parchment; the signatures and seals,
which were nearly the same as had been affixed to the protest, were now
affixed to the appeal.8
A copy of this remonstrance was immediately despatched to the Emperor
under the charge of three deputies. Charles was then on his way from
Spain to Italy. They found him at Placentia, but met with the most
discouraging reception. He was much irritated with this freedom and daring
opposition to his will. The spirited tone of the memorial wounded his
pride, and in a rage he ordered the deputies to be placed under arrest, and
commanded them not to leave their apartments, nor to write a line to the
Protestant princes, on pain of death. But in a short time he softened down,
set them at liberty, and went on his way to Bologna, where he spent
several months with the pope, Clement VII.
Meanwhile the Protestant chiefs were not inactive; they were employing
the most effectual means for the furtherance of the Reformation and for
the strengthening of their own position with the people. On the fifth of
May, eleven days after the appeal was drawn up, it was printed and
published by the Landgrave, and on the thirteenth, by the Elector. The
great question between the Catholics and the Protestants had now taken a
definite form, and was fairly before all Christendom.

MEETINGS OF THE PROTESTANTS

The apprehensions of the princes, as to the intentions of the Emperor,
were now confirmed. His violent treatment of the deputies, and his
present friendship with the pope, were significant signs of the severe
measures he was meditating. The Protestant leaders now thought that it
was high time for them to consult for their protection against the offended
and indignant Charles. Meetings were held in the summer of 1529, at
Rothach, Schwabach, Nuremberg, and Smalcald, but nothing definite was
agreed upon, in consequence of the diversity of opinion which prevailed
on the subject of the Lord’s supper. It was formally decided at one of their
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meetings, “that unity on the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist was
essential to any religious alliance among Christians.” But, alas, alas, the
Reformers were already two camps by means of the sacramentarian
controversy.
The papal party were well acquainted with the bitter pamphlets which
had already been written by Luther and Zwingle on this subject, and were
artfully using them to widen the breach between their followers. During
the sitting of the Diet of Spires, the Reformers were continually taunted
by the Catholics on this point: “You boast of your attachment to the pure
word of God, and yet you are nevertheless disunited.” The Landgrave of
Hesse was deeply pained by these public taunts, and determined to use
every means possible to accomplish a reconciliation between the Swiss
and Saxon Reformers. For this purpose he appointed a Conference to be
held at Marburg in 1529, and invited Luther and Zwingle, and some other
principal doctors and theologians of both parties.
 865

CHAPTER 37
THE SACRAMENTARIAN CONTROVERSY

The doctrine of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist had been
established in the Romish church since the fourth Lateran Council in the
year 1215. For three hundred years the mass and transubstantiation had
been the principal bulwarks of Rome, and her greatest blasphemy. The
idea of the corporeal presence of Christ in the holy supper threw a halo of
sacred importance around it, excited the imagination of the people and
fixed it deeply in their affections. It was the origin of many ceremonies and
superstitions, of great wealth and dominion to the priesthood; and the
most stupendous miracles were said to be wrought by the consecrated
bread, both among the living and the dead. It thus became the corner stone
of the papal edifice.
Luther, as a priest and a monk, firmly believed in this mystery of iniquity,
and never was, throughout his whole career, delivered from its delusion.
He sinned against God and his own conscience when he accepted priestly
ordination, and from that period a judicial blindness seems to have rested
on his mind as to the power of the priest over the elements.
Transubstantiation, or the actual conversion of the bread and wine into
the real body and blood of Christ, by priestly consecration, was then, as it
still is, the recognized doctrine of the church of Rome. Those who doubt
this are denounced as infidels.
As a reformer, Luther gave up the term transubstantiation and adopted, if
possible, the still more inexplicable term of consubstantiation. He
renounced the papal idea that the bread and wine after consecration
remained no longer, but were changed into the material body and blood of
Christ. His strange notion was, that the bread and the wine remained just
what they were before — real bread and real wine — but that there was
also together with the bread and wine, the material substance of Christ’s
human body. No invention of man, we may freely affirm, ever equalled
this popish doctrine in absurdity, inconsistency and irreconcileable
 866
contradictions. “The hands of the priest,” said the Pontiff Urban, in a great
Roman Council, “are raised to an eminence granted to none of the angels,
of creating God, the Creator of all things, and of offering Him up for the
salvation of the whole world. This prerogative, as it elevates the pope
above angels, renders pontifical submission to kings an execration.” To all
this the sacred synod, with the utmost unanimity, responded, Amen.
Surely this is the last test of human credulity, and the consummation of
human blasphemy.1

ZWINGLE’S EARLY VIEWS

Ulric Zwingle, the great Swiss Reformer, and compeer of Luther, differed
entirely from both the teaching of Rome and the Saxon Reformers as to the
real presence of Christ in the holy supper. The Swiss had long held
opinions contrary alike to the Roman and the Saxon. At an early period of
Zwingle’s christian course, his attention had been attracted by the
simplicity of scripture on the subject of the Lord’s supper. In the word of
God he read that Christ had left this world and gone to His Father in
heaven; and that this was to be a matter of special faith and hope to His
disciples. This we find clearly taught in the Acts of the Apostles: “And
while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two
men stood by them in white apparel; which also said, Ye men of Galilee,
why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up
from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him to
into heaven.” Thus we see that the blessed Lord ascended personally,
bodily, visibly; and that He shall return in like manner, but not until the
close of the present dispensation, or church period.
“Whom the heaven must receive until the times
of restitution of all things.” (Acts 1:10, 11; 3:21.)
The words of our blessed Lord; “This is My body,” — “This is My
blood;” Zwingle maintained to be figurative in their character, and to imply
nothing more than that the sacramental bread and wine were simply
symbols or emblems of Christ’s body; and that the ordinance or
institution is commemorative of His death for us.
 867
“This do in remembrance of Me... For as often as ye eat this bread
and drink this cup, ye do show forth the Lord’s death till He
come.” (1 Corinthians 11:22-28.)
For several years, Zwingle had privately entertained these views of the
Lord’s supper, but knowing the hold that the old church doctrine had on
the minds of the ignorant and superstitious people, he did not openly
avow them. But believing that the time would soon come for the public
promulgation of the truth, and foreseeing the opposition he would have to
encounter, he diligently, though in a private way, sought to spread the
truth and strengthen his position. Letters on the subject were sent to many
learned men in Europe, so as to influence them to examine the word of
God, even if they did not agree with the views of the Swiss Reformers.
But while Zwingle was thus quietly waiting for the right moment to speak
aloud, another, with more zeal than wisdom, imprudently wrote a
pamphlet against Luther’s doctrine of the Lord’s supper, and raised the
storm of controversy, which raged with great violence for four years.

CARLSTADT, LUTHER, AND ZWINGLE

Andrew Bodenstein, better known as Dr. Carlstadt, once a professor at
Wittemberg, commenced the attack. This man has the reputation of having
been both able and learned, and really devoted to the cause of the
Reformation;. but from his extreme views on that subject and the
impetuosity of his spirit, his measures were sweeping and revolutionary.
He would have all the images destroyed, and all the rites of popery
abolished at once. We have met with him before. He was one of the earliest
and warmest friends of Luther, but he had rejected Luther’s notion of the
real presence in the Eucharist, and that was the unpardonable sin in the
eyes of the Reformer. He had also given too much countenance and
encouragement to the excesses of the Anabaptists, or “the celestial
prophets” as they were called, and this gave Luther a show of reason for
visiting with the same condemnation the Sacramentaries and the
Anabaptists. But this was most unjust, as Zwingle and his followers were
as opposed to the fanaticism of the so-called prophets, as were Luther and
his colleagues.
 868
In refutation of Dr. Carlstadt, Luther wrote a pamphlet against these
prophets in 1525, in which he says: “Dr. Carlstadt has fallen away from
us, and become our bitterest foe. Although I deeply regret this scandal, I
still rejoice that Satan has shown the cloven foot, and will be put to shame
by these his heavenly prophets, who have long been peeping and
muttering in concealment, but never would come fairly out until I enticed
them with a guilder: that, by the grace of God, has been too well laid for
me to rue it. But still the whole infamy of the plot is not yet brought
forward, for still more lies concealed which I have long suspected. I know
also, that Dr. Carlstadt has long been brewing this heresy in his mind,
though till now he has not found courage to spread it abroad.”
Zwingle was now persuaded that the time for silence was past. Although
he sympathized with Carlstadt’s views of the Eucharist, he greatly
objected to his offensive style and levity.
He published in the year 1525, an important treatise “concerning true and
false religion.” His own views of the Eucharist are fully and clearly stated
in this book, besides his utter condemnation of the seditious spirit of the
Anabaptists, and the errors of the papists on the subject in dispute. An
opponent soon appeared in a pamphlet, “against the new error of the
Sacramentaries.” To this Zwingle replied in the same year, 1525; and took
occasion to remind his opponents, the Lutherans, that they should be less
personal in their abuse, and more rational and scriptural in their arguments.
There was a mildness and respect in the writings of the Swiss, which the
Saxons were utter strangers to; even Melancthon, at times, became the
reflection of his violent master.
OEcolampadius, the intimate friend of Zwingle, was preaching the simple
doctrine of the New Testament, as to the Lord’s supper, at Basle, just
about this time. But finding that his enemies were associating him with
Carlstadt, he published and defended his own views. The effect of this
book was great: written in such a christian spirit, so full of the closest
reasoning, and the fairest arguments, both from the scriptures and the most
eminent among the fathers, that many were drawn to consider the new
opinions. Erasmus himself was well nigh converted by the book. “A new
dogma has arisen,” he writes to a friend, “that there is nothing in the
Eucharist but bread and wine. To confute this is now a very difficult
 869
matter; for John OEcolampadius has fortified it by so many evidences and
arguments, that the very elect might almost be seduced by it.”
An abusive reply to this book very soon appeared, signed by fourteen
German theologians, with a preface written by Luther. Zwingle was
deeply offended, and complained of the insults offered to a brother
reformer by his German brethren. “I have seen nothing in this age,” he
says, “less praiseworthy than this reply, on account both of the violence
offered in it to Holy Writ, and of its immoderate pride and insolence.
OEcolampadius, of all men the most harmless, a very model of every sort
of piety and learning, he, from whom most of them have learnt what they
know of literature, is so infamously treated by them, with such filial
ingratitude, that we are called upon, not for reproaches, but for
execrations.”2
Thus the controversy went on. Luther was deeply grieved and astonished
to find so many learned and pious men holding the same views as Zwingle;
and many of whom he had entertained the highest opinion now expressed
themselves favorable to the new views. This was gall and wormwood to
the spirit of Luther, and filled him with inexpressible grief and anger. In his
letters and writings at this time he expressed himself in the most
unmeasured and unguarded terms. He calls them “his Absaloms,
sacrament-conjurors, in comparison with whose madness the papists are
mild opponents — the Satanic instruments of my temptation.” Luther’s
followers took up the tone of their master, and he transferred to this
controversy all the vehemence and obstinacy of his own nature. From
about the close of the year 1524 till the year 1529, Luther had written so
violently against the Swiss, and so little against the papists, that it was
sarcastically said by Erasmus, “the Lutherans are eagerly returning to the
bosom of the church.”

SUMMONS TO MARBURG
Such were the christian doctors, and such their feelings, whom the political
Landgrave sought unweariedly to reconcile. The thought is a truly
humiliating one, and casts a dark shade over the character of Luther. Philip,
in his pacific exertions, showed much more of a christian spirit on this and
former occasions than the great Reformer, though it may not have been
 870
from the Christian’s point of view. But we do not judge motives; there is
One who will judge the secrets of all men.” (1 Corinthians 4:5.)
The connection of this great dispute with the political movements of
Germany, made it one of intense interest and anxiety to the Protestant
chiefs. It was the one great hindrance to their union; and without unity
what could be done in lhe presence of such powerful adversaries as Rome
and the Emperor? The papal theologians had been watching with malicious
satisfaction the growth and bitterness of this disgraceful dissension, and
were using all their art to profit by it. The Landgrave evidently grieved
over this division more than the theologians of Wittemberg, and now
determined without further delay to bring about a conference, and if
possible, a reconciliation between the leaders of the different parties. On
the great fundamental truths of revelation, the German and the Swiss
reformers were agreed. Only on one point did they differ — the manner in
which Christ is present in the bread and wine of the holy Eucharist. It
appears that Philip thought the whole question little more than a dispute
about words, as he says, “The Lutherans will hear no mention of alliance
with the Zwinglians; well then, let us put an end to the contradictions that
separate them from Luther.” Accordingly, he summoned the principal
divines of Saxony, Switzerland, and Strasburg, to meet together at
Marburg in the autumn of 1529.
Zwingle accepted the invitation with all gladness, and made ready to
appear at the time appointed. But Luther — generally so bold and
dauntless, as we have repeatedly seen — expressed the greatest
unwillingness to meet Zwingle. The several pamphlets that had passed
between them on the subject in question had produced such an impression
on his mind of the power of Zwingle, that he sought by the most
unworthy means to avoid meeting him. The Landgrave’s repeated
entrearies, however, at length prevailed. Thus wrote Luther to Philip: —
“I have received your commands to go to Marburg to a disputation with
OEcolampadius and his party, about the Sacramentarian difference, for the
purpose of peace and unity. Though I have very faint expectation of such
unity, yet as I cannot too highly commend your zeal and care thereon, so
will I not refuse to undertake a hopeless, and to us, perhaps, a dangerous
office; for I will leave no foundation for our adversaries to say that they
 871
were better inclined to concord than myself. I know very well that I shall
make no unworthy concession to them... And if they do not yield to us, all
your trouble will be lost.” His private letters at this time express the same
opinion and breathe the same spirit. The whole question was discussed,
and closed in the mind of Luther before he started on his journey. But his
mind was far from being at ease. he had a certain conviction that the
victory would be awarded to the Swiss. This conviction is fully proved by
the following propositions.
1. Luther wrote to say for himself and Melancthon, that they could only
attend the conference on condition that “some honest papists should be
present as witnesses against those future Thrasos and vain-glorious
saints... If there were no impartial judges the Zwinglians would have a
good chance to boast of victory.” This is a strange passage in the history
of the Saxon divines, and exhibits a backward movement from the
principles of the Reformation; but especially in the case of the author of
the “Babylonish Captivity,” and the denouncer of Antichrist. Had Luther
forgotten that the papists were pledged to the real presence more than any
other party in Christendom? And yet he proposes them as impartial
judges. What a change, at least for the moment, in that great man! How can
we account for this? Luther is no longer standing on the sure ground of the
word of God, but on the false ground of an absurd superstition. He could
not have the sense of the divine presence or approval. And little wonder
that he manifested such weakness and inconsistency. In place of trusting
in the living God and setting at nought popes and emperors, he pitifully
turns to his old enemies to be his friends and refuge in the approaching
discussion. What a solemn lesson for all Christians! May the written and
living Word be our resource and refuge at all times. We need only further
add, that Philip was too warm an antipapist to give any heed to Luther’s
proposal; it therefore fell to the ground, leaving to its authors the disgrace
which impartial history has assigned to it.
2. In a letter, generally ascribed to Melancthon, written to the Prince
Elector as early as May 14th, he goes farther still. “Let the prince refuse
to permit our journey to Marburg, so that we may allege this excuse.”
“But the Elector,” says D’Aubigne, “would not lend himself to so
disgraceful a proceeding; and the reformers of Wittemberg found
themselves compelled to accede to the request of the Landgrave.”
 872
3. Another proposition was suggested, which shows still more the fear and
misgiving of the Saxon divines — “that among the theologians to be
summoned from Switzerland to the controversy, Zwingle should not be
one.” But neither could this proposal be entertained; the invitations had
been given, and Philip was already too much offended by the obstinacy of
Luther to listen to his requests. These little matters are only worth
recording as showing the difference of the same man when he stands for
the truth of God, and when he contends for the foolish dogma of
consubstantiation. In the former case he stands by faith, and grace gives
him moral courage, firmness, and nobility of bearing; but in the latter, we
find him exhibiting the most pitiful features of weakness, distrust, and
dissimulation. It is the presence of God and faith in Him that makes the
vast difference; as the poet sings:
“Is God for me? I fear not, though all against me rise;
When I call on Christ my Savior, the host of evil flies,
My friend, the Lord Almighty, and He who loves me, God!
What enemy shall harm me, though coming as a flood?
I know it, I believe it, I say it fearlessly,
That God, the highest, mightiest, for ever loveth me,
At all times, in all places, He standeth by my side;
He rules the battle’s fury, the tempest, and the tide.”

THE CONFERENCE AT MARBURG

The senate of Zurich had positively refused to allow Zwingle to go to
Marburg, lest any harm should befall him. But he felt that his presence at
the conference was necessary for the welfare of the church, and that he
must go! Accordingly he prepared for his journey, and started during the
night, with only one friend to accompany him — Rodolph Collin, the
Greek professor. He left the following note for the Senate, “If I leave
without informing you, it is not because I despise your authority, most
wise lords; but because, knowing the love you bear towards me, I forsee
that your anxiety will oppose my going.” They arrived safely at Basle,
where they were joined by OEcolampadius; and at Strasburg, where they
were joined by Bucer, Hedio, and Sturm. The company reached Marburg
on September 29th. Luther and his friends on the 30th. Both parties were
courteously received by Philip, and entertained in the castle at his own
table.
 873
The Landgrave, not ignorant of the bitter feelings which the late
controversy had produced between the chiefs of the parties, wisely
proposed, that previously to the public conference, the theologians should
have a private interview for the purpose of paving the way to
reconciliation and unity. Knowing the tempers of the men, he directed
Luther to confer with OEcolampadius, and Melancthon with Zwingle. But
so many accusations as to false doctrine were brought against the Swiss by
the Saxon divines, that little progress was made towards unity, and the
main question became more complicated. The public disputation was
accordingly appointed for the following day, October 2nd, 1529.
The general conference was held in an inner apartment of the castle, in the
presence of the Landgrave and his principal ministers, political and
religious, the deputies of Saxony, Zurich, Strasburg, and Basle, and of a
few learned foreigners. A table was placed for the four theologians —
Luther, Zwingle, Melancthon, and OEcolampadius. As they approached,
Luther, taking a piece of chalk, steadily wrote on the velvet cover of the
table, in large letters, HOC EST CORPUS M EUM — “This is my body.” He
wished to have these words continually before him, that his confidence
might not fail, and that his adversaries might be confounded. “Yes,” said
he, “these are the words of Christ, and from this rock no adversary shall
dislodge me.”
All parties having assembled, the Chancellor of Hesse opened the
conference. He explained its object, and exhorted the disputants to a
christian moderation, and the re-establishment of unity. Then Luther,
instead of proceeding at once to the question of the Eucharist, insisted on a
previous understanding concerning other articles of faith; such as the
divinity of Christ, original sin, justification by faith, etc., etc. The Saxon
divines professed to regard the Swiss as unsound on these and other
subjects. What Luther’s object could be, in seeking to widen the field of
debate, we pretend not to say; but the Swiss replied that their writings
bore sufficient evidence, that on all these points there was no difference
between them.
The Landgrave, to whom belonged the direction of the meeting, signified
his assent, and Luther was compelled to give up his project; but he was
evidently angry and ill at ease in his own mind, and said, “I protest that I
 874
differ from my adversaries with regard to the doctrine of the Lord’s
supper, and that I shall always differ from them. Christ said, ‘This is My
body.’ Let them show me that a body is not a body. I reject reason,
common sense, carnal arguments, and mathematical proofs. God is above
mathematics. We have the word of God; we must adore and perform it.”
Such was the commencement of this celebrated debate. The impetuous
headstrong Saxon, had writlen his text on the velvet, and was now pointing
to it, and saying, “No consideration shall ever induce me to depart from
the literal meaning of these words, and I shall not listen either to sense or
reason, with the words of God before me.” And all this was done and said,
be it observed, before the deliberations were so much as opened, or a single
argument had been advanced. This declaration, coupled with the notorious
obstinacy of its author, was enough to crush every hope of a satisfactory
termination to the conference.
But the Swiss, notwithstanding Luther’s high-handed style, did not decline
the argument. They no doubt knew his measure, cared little for his
arrogant assertions, and probably never counted on his conversion. “It
cannot be denied.” said OEcolampadius mildly, “that there are figures of
speech in the word of God; as John is Elias, the rock was Christ, I am the
vine.” Luther admitted that there were figures in the Bible, but he denied
that this last expression was figurative.
OEcolampadius then reminded Luther that the blessed Lord says in John
6, “It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing.” “Now
Christ who said to the people of Capernaum, the flesh profiteth nothing,
rejected by these words, the oral manducation of the body. Therefore he
did not establish it at the institution of the supper.”
“I deny,” retorted Luther vehemently, “the second of these
propositions. There was a material eating of Christ’s flesh, and
there was a spiritual eating of it. It was the former, the material
eating, of which Christ declared that it profiteth nothing.”
OEcolampadius hinted that this was in effect to surrender the argument. It
admitted that we were to eat spiritually, and if so, we did not eat bodily,
the material manducation being in that case useless.
 875
“We are not to ask of what use,” replied Luther; “everything that
God commands becomes spirit and life. If it is by the Lord’s order
that we lift up a straw, in that very action we perform a spiritual
work. We must pay attention to Him who speaks, and not to what
He says. God speaks: Then, worms, listen!God commands: let the
world obey! And let us all fall down together, and humbly kiss the
word.”
We may just notice in passing, that there is no ground for supposing that
the question of the Eucharist is referred to in John 6. It was not even
instituted for some time after this. Incarnation, death, and ascension are
the fundamental truths which the Lord is here unfolding to the Jews, as the
only means of eternal life and of all spiritual blessings. “Himself the
eternal life which was with the Father before all worlds, He took flesh that
He might not only reveal the Father, and be the perfect pattern of
obedience as man, but that He might die in grace for us, and settle the
question of sin for ever, glorifying God absolutely, and at all cost, on the
cross. Except the corn of wheat (as He Himself taught us) fall into the
ground and die, it abides alone; dying it brings forth much fruit. His death
is not here regarded as an offering to God, as elsewhere often, but the
appropriation of it by the believer into his own being... He only is life, yet
this not in living, but in dying for us, that we might have it in and with
Him, the fruit of His redemption, eternal life as a present thing but only
fully seen in resurrection-power, already verified and seen in Him,
ascended up as man, where He was before as God, by-and-by to be seen in
us at the last day, manifested with Him in glory.
“Jesus, therefore, come down to earth, put to death, ascending
again to heaven, is the doctrine of this chapter. As come down and
put to death, He is the food of faith during His absence on high.
For it is on His death we must feed, in order to dwell spiritually in
Him and He in us.”3
We now return to Marburg.
Zwingle, just at this moment, interfered in the discussion. He pressed and
greatly troubled the spirit of Luther by his reasoning from the scriptures,
science, the senses, etc.; but he took his stand first on the ground of
scripture. After quoting a number of passages in which the sign is
 876
described by the very thing signified, he introduced the argument which
had been started by OEcolampadius in the morning, namely, John 6.
Concluding that, in consideration of our Lord’s declaration, the flesh
profiteth nothing, we must explain the words of the Eucharist in a similar
manner.

Luther. — “When Christ says the flesh profiteth nothing, He

speaks not of His own flesh, but of ours.”

Zwingle. — “The soul is fed with the Spirit, and not with the
flesh.”

Luther. — “It is with the mouth that we eat the body; the soul
does not eat it; we eat it spiritually with the soul.”

Zwingle. — “Christ’s body is therefore a corporeal nourishment,

and not a spiritual.”

Luther. — “You are captious.”

Zwingle. — “Not so; but you utter contradictory things.”
Luther. — “If God should present me wild apples, I should eat
them spiritually. In the Eucharist, the mouth receives the body of
Christ, and the soul believes His words.”
There was now great confusion and contradiction in the language of
Luther; as if the four words were to be taken neither “figuratively nor
literally; and yet he seemed to teach that they were to be taken in both
senses.” Zwingle thought that an absurdity had been reached, and that no
good could be attained by proceeding farther in this line of argument. He
maintained from a wider view of the scriptures, that the bread and wine of
the holy Eucharist are not the very body and blood of the Lord Jesus, but
only the representatives of that body and blood.
Luther was, however, by no means shaken. “This is My body,” he
repeated, pointing with his finger to the words written before him. “‘This
is My body,’ and the devil himself shall not drive me from that. To seek to
understand it is to fall away from the faith.”
 877
But although no favorable impression was produced on the mind of
Luther, many of the hearers were struck by the clearness and simplicity of
Zwingle’s arguments, and many minds were opened to the truth on this
important subject. Francis Lambert, the principal theologian of Hesse,
who had constantly professed the Lutheran doctrine of the Eucharist, was
amongst the most notable of the converts. He was the personal friend and
a great admirer of Luther, but conscience moved him to confess the truth.
“When I came to this conference,” he said, “I desired to be as a sheet of
blank paper on which the finger of God might write His truth. Now I see it
is the Spirit that vivifies, the flesh profiteth nothing. I believe with
OEcolampadius and Zwingle.” The Wittemberg doctors greatly lamented
this defection; but turned it off by exclaiming, “Gallic fickleness!... What!”
replied the ex-Franciscan, formerly of Avignon, “was St. Paul fickle
because he was converted from Pharisaism? And have we ourselves been
fickle in abandoning the lost sects of popery?”
Great agitation now prevailed in the hall, but the hour to adjourn had
arrived, and the disputants retired with the prince to dinner.
In the afternoon the conversation was resumed by Luther, who said, “I
believe that Christ’s body is in heaven, but I also believe that it is in the
sacrament. It concerns me little whether that be against nature, provided
that it is not against faith. Christ is substantially in the sacrament, such as
He was born of the virgin.”
OEcolampadius, quoting 2 Corinthians 5:16, said, “We know not Jesus
Christ after the flesh.”
“After the flesh means,” said Luther, “in this passage, after our
carnal affections.”
“Then answer me this, Dr. Luther,” said Zwingle, “Christ ascended
into heaven; and if He is in heaven as regards His body, how can
He be in the bread? The word of God teaches us that He was in all
things made like unto His brethren. (Hebrews 2:17.) He therefore
cannot be at the same instant on every one of the thousand altars at
which the Eucharist is being celebrated.”
“Were I desirous of reasoning thus,” replied Luther, “I would
undertake to prove that Jesus Christ had a wife; that he had black
 878
eyes, and lived in our good country of Germany. I care little about
mathematics.”
“There is no question of mathematics here,” said Zwingle, “but of
St. Paul who wrote to the Philippians, that Christ took upon Him
the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men.”
Finding himself in danger of being moved or drawn away from his original
position, he flew back to his four words, exclaiming, “Most dear sirs, since
my Lord Jesus Christ says, Hoc est corpus meum, I believe that His body
is really there.”
Wearied with the inflexible obstinacy and unreasonableness of Luther,
Zwingle moved rapidly towards him, and striking the table, said to him:
“You maintain then, doctor, that ChrisCs body is locally in the Euchaist;
for you say, Christ’s body is there — there — there. There is an adverb of
place. Christ’s body is then of such a nature as to exist in a place. If it is in
a place, it is in heaven, whence it follows that it is not in the bread.”
“I repeat,” replied Luther warmly, “that I have nothing to do with
mathematical proofs. As soon as the words of consecration are
pronounced over the bread, the body is there, however wicked be
the priest who pronounces them.”
Let the reader note this saying. It is certainly blasphemy, though not
intentionally so by this deluded man. According to this dogma, the Lord,
willing or not willing, must descend into the idolatrous bread of the priest,
however wicked he may be, the moment he mutters the words of
consecration. This is popery in its most daring blasphemy.
The Landgrave, perceiving that the discussion was growing hot, proposed
a brief recess. As reason and fairness are all on one side, there is little
interest in watching the progress of the debate. Zwingle and
OEcolampadius had established their propositions by scripture,
philosophy, and the testimony of the most ancient fathers; but all were
met by the one unvarying answer, “This is My body.” And as if to insult
and exasperate the Swiss divines, Luther seized the velvet cover on which
the words Hoc est corpus meum were written, pulled it off the table, held
it up before their eyes, saying, “See, see, this is our text; you have not yet
driven us from it, as you had boasted, and we care for no other proofs.”
 879
After such an exhibition of weakness and folly, with the assumption of
infallibility, there was no hope of drawing Luther from his hold, and no
good reason for prolonging the conference. The discussion, however, was
resumed the following morning, but at the close of the day the hostile
parties were no nearer a reconciliation. A severe epidemic, in the form of
the sweating sickness, had broken out in Germany about this time, and
had reached Marburg during the conference, and no doubt hastened its
termination. The ravages of the plague were frightful; all were filled with
alarm and anxious to leave the city.
“Sirs,” exclaimed the Landgrave, “you cannot separate thus; can
nothing more be done to heal the breach? Must this one point of
difference irreconcilably divide the friends of the Reformation?... Is
there no means,” said the chancellor, “of the theologians coming to
an understanding, as the Landgrave so sincerely desires?”
“I know of but one means for that,” replied Luther, “and this it is; let our
adversaries believe as we do.” “We cannot,” replied the Swiss. “Well
then,” said Luther, “I abandon you to God’s judgment, and pray that He
will enlighten you.” “We will do the same,” added OEcolampadius.
Zwingle was silent, motionless, but deeply moved while these words were
passing. At length his lively affections gave way, and he burst into tears in
the presence of all.

A PROPOSAL FOR TOLERATION AND UNITY

The conference was ended, and nothing had been done towards unanimity.
Philip and other mediators endeavored at least to establish an
understanding of mutual toleration and unity. The theologians, one after
another, were invited into his private chamber: there he pressed, entreated,
warned, exhorted, and conjured them. “Think,” said he, “of the salvation
of the christian republic, and remove all discord from its bosom.”
Politically, things were threatening: Charles V. and the pope were uniting
in Italy; Ferdinand and the Roman Catholic princes were uniting in
Germany. Union among all the Protestants seemed the only thing that
could save them. So Philip believed, and toiled exceedingly to accomplish
it; but the intractable and imperious disposition of Luther stood in his
way.
 880
The Swiss doctors entered most heartily into the wishes of the Landgrave.
“Let us,” said Zwingle, “confess our union in all things in which we are
agreed, and as for the rest, let us forbear and remember that we are
brethren. Respecting the necessity of faith in the Lord Jesus, as to the
grand doctrine of salvation, there is no point of discord.”
“Yes, yes!” cried the Landgrave, “you agree! give then a testimony of your
unity, and recognize one another as brothers.”: ‘There is no one upon
earth,” said Zwingle, “with whom I more desire to be united than with
you, approaching the Wittemberg doctors.” OEcolampadius, Bucer, and
Hedio said the same.
This most christian movement seemed for the moment to produce the
desired effect. Many hearts were touched even among the Saxons.
“Acknowledge them! acknowledge them!” continued the Landgrave,
“acknowledge them as brothers!” Even Luther’s obduracy seemed to be
giving way. The keen eye of Zwingle seeing what he hoped was a measure
of relenting, he burst into tears — tears of joy — approaches Luther,
holds out his hand, and begged him only to pronounce the word “brother.”
But, alas! that glowing heart was doomed to a cruel disappointment. When
all eyes were fixed on the two leaders, and all hearts full of hope that the
two families of the Reformation were about to be united, Luther coldly
rejected the hand thus offered, with this cutting reply, “You have a
different spirit from ours;” which was equal to saying, “We are of the
Spirit of God, you are of the spirit of Satan.” “These words,” says
D’Aubigne, “communicated to the Swiss, as it were, an electrical shock.
Their hearts sank each time Luther repeated them, and he did it
frequently.” “Luther’s refusing to shake hands with Zwingle,” says
Principal Cunningham, “which led that truly noble and brave man to burst
into tears, was one of the most deplorable and humiliating, but at the same
time solemn and instructive, exhibitions of the deceitfulness of sin and the
human heart the world has ever witnessed.”4
A brief consultation now took place among the Wittemberg doctors, but
the result was not more conciliatory. Luther, Melancthon, Agricola, Brenz,
Jonas, and Osiander, conferred together.
Turning towards Zwingle and his friends, the Saxons said, “We hold the
belief of Christ’s bodily presence in the Eucharist to be essential to
 881
salvation, and we cannot in conscience regard you as in the communion of
the church.”
“In that case,” replied Bucer, “it were folly to ask you to recognize
us as brethren. We think that your doctrine strikes at the glow of
Jesus Christ, who now sits at the right hand of God. But seeing
that in all things you acknowledge your dependence on the Lord,
we look at your conscience, which compels you to receive the
doctrine you profess, and we do not doubt that you belong to
Christ.”
“And we,” said Luther, “declare to you once more that our
conscience opposes our receiving you as brothers.”
“Well, doctor,” answered Bucer, “if you refuse to acknowledge as
brethren those who differ from you in any point, you will not find
a single brother in your own ranks.”
The Swiss had exhausted their solicitations. “We are conscious,” said they,
“of having acted as in the presence of God.” They were on the point of
leaving: they had manifested a truly Catholic christian spirit; and the
feeling of the conference was in their favor and also of their doctrine.
Luther perceiving this, and especially the indignation of the Landgrave,
appeared to soften down considerably. He advanced towards the Swiss
and said; “We acknowledge you as friends, we do not consider you as
brothers and members of Christ’s church; but we do not exclude you from
that universal charity which we owe even to our enemies.”
Although this concession was only a fresh insult, the Swiss resolved to
accept what was offered them without disputation. The Swiss and the
Saxons now shook hands, and some friendly words passed between them.
The Landgrave was overjoyed that so much had been gained, and at once
called out for a report of this important result. “We must let the christian
world know,” said he, “that except the manner of the presence of the body
and blood in the Lord’s supper, you are agreed in all the articles of faith.”
This was resolved upon, and Luther was appointed to draw up the articles
of the Protestant faith.
A “Formula of Concord” was immediately drawn up by Luther. It
consisted of fourteen articles; rather general in their character — such as
 882
the Trinity, Incarnation, Resurrection, Ascension, Original Sin,
Justification by faith, the Authority of the scriptures, the Rejection of
tradition, and lastly, the Lord’s supper, which was spoken of as a spiritual
feeding on the very body and very blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. To the
thirteen articles as they were read, one by one, the Swiss gave their hearty
amen. And although the terms in which the fourteenth was expressed
appeared to them objectionable, yet being somewhat obscure and capable
of different interpretations, they agreed to sign the articles without causing
further discussion. This important document received the signatures of
both parties on October 4th, 1529. A desire was expressed to cherish
towards one another the spirit of christian charity, and to avoid all
bitterness in maintaining what each deemed to be the truth of God.
The confession of Marburg was now sent to the press. Its appearance
gave the Saxons some ground for saying that the Swiss had signed Luther’s
creed; that they had recanted all their errors; that on the Eucharist alone
excepted. That they were prepared to retract even that, but they had been
deterred by fear of the vulgar; and that they had produced no argument
against the doctrine of Luther, except their own inability to believe it.
Reports such as these flew rapidly through every part of Germany; but
they were false reports. The reader must have observed that the courage
and confidence of the Swiss increased as the contest advanced, and that
their fairness and gentleness were mightier far than the unreasonableness
and haughtiness of their adversaries.
On Tuesday, October 5th, after a four days’ conference, the Landgrave left
Marburg early. The doctors and their friends soon followed; but the
amount of truth which had been brought out, and the opinions expressed,
were widely propagated in Germany, and many hearts were turned to the
simplicity of the New Testament in observing the Lord’s supper.

REFLECTIONS ON THE CONFERENCE AT MARBURG

With feelings of the deepest gratitude and the most unfeigned humiliation,
we would pause awhile, and meditate on the late scenes at Marburg. With
gratitude to God for having given such publicity to the teaching of
scripture on the subject of the Lord’s supper; but with mourning and
humiliation over the inconsistency of one who had so much influence
 883
there. The doctrines so clearly taught by the Swiss, had been little known
in Germany till that time. Consubstantiation having been adopted by
Luther and his followers, the true meaning and object of that sacred
institution were unknown. Great interest was awakened in all parts by the
newly-discovered truths, which were embraced by an immense number of
persons. It spread rapidly throughout all Germany, and may have been an
everlasting blessing to thousands of precious souls. Lambert, as we have
seen, was converted to the views of Zwingle; and the Landgrave himself, a
short time before his death, declared that the conference had induced him
to renounce the error of consubstantiation.
Thus God in His own goodness overruled these unseemly debates for the
spread of the truth, and for the accomplishment of His own gracious
purposes. Little did Luther contemplate the merciful use that God would
make of that conference; and that, when he, Luther, was caring only for his
own reputation, God was caring for the advancement of the Reformation.
But alas! what is man — fallen, self-seeking man! Where is now the Luther
of the early days of the Reformation? Why has the heart that was so large,
liberal, and considerate of all, so soon degenerated into the most
undisguised and intolerant bigotry? The answer is plain — then he stood
for God by faith; now he stood in pride as the head of a party. And this
explains not only the wonderful change that had come over the spirit of
Luther, but the ignoble failure of many distinguished men from that day
until now. At the Diet of Worms and other places, Luther, almost alone,
fought for the truth of God against the lie of Satan; but at Marburg he
fought for the lie of Satan, in the form of his new dogma, against the truth
of God. Some may be ready to say that he was fighting for the truth
according to his conscience; so far it may have been so. But it will be
remembered that he resisted all peaceful investigation of the truth, all
reasonable means for arriving at a proper understanding of those “four
words” — This is my body — and seemed only to care for the maintenance
of his own authority and power as the chief of his party. There was no
concern manifested by either Luther or any of the Saxons for the general
interest of the gospel, or for the triumph of the Reformation. Thus was the
great and blessed work of Luther marred and vitiated by the most absurd
and foolish dogma ever proposed to the credulity of man.
 884
The position and danger of a party leader in the things of God, are clearly
expressed in the following opinion of Luther. “At Marburg, Luther was
pope. By general acclamation the chief of the evangelical party, he
assumed the character of a despot; and to sustain that part in spiritual
matters, it is necessary to create the prejudice of infallibility. If he once
yielded any point of doctrine — if he once admitted that he had fallen into
error — the illusion would cease, and with it the authority that was
founded on it. It was thus at least with the multitude. He was obliged by
the very position which he believed he occupied, or which he wished to
occupy, to defend in the loftiest tone every tenet that he had once
proclaimed to the people...
“Upon the whole, he lost both influence and reputation by that
controversy. By his imperious tone, and elaborate sophistry he
weakened the affections and respect of a large body of intelligent
admirers. Many now began to entertain a less exalted opinion of
his talents, as well as of his candour. Instead of the self-devotion
and magnanimity which had thrown such a lustre over his earlier
struggles, a vain-glorious arrogance seemed to be master of his
spirit; and but for the indulgence of this ignoble passion, the
mantle, which might have wrapped Germany and Switzerland in
one continuous fold, was rent asunder. He was no longer the genius
of the Reformation. Descending from that magnificent position,
whence he had given light to the whole evangelical community, he
was now become little more than the head of a party, then, indeed,
the more conspicuous and powerful section of the reformers, but
destined in after times to undergo reverses and defections, which
have conferred the appellation of Lutheran on an inconsiderable
proportion of the Protestant world.”5
 885

CHAPTER 38
THE COUNCIL OF BOLOGNA

When we last parted with the Emperor and the pope, they were spending
the winter months together at Bologna. Charles arrived in great state on the
5th of November, 1529. When the news of his approach reached Rome,
Clement hastened, in full ecclesiastical pomp, to meet his majesty. The
Emperor was escorted by five-and-twenty cardinals — who received him
on the frontiers — besides crowds of nobles, Spanish and Italian, with
their brilliant equipages. The pope, overcome by the presence of his
dutiful son, saluted him three times; and the Emperor, affecting the
reverence due to his “holy father,” fell on his knees, kissing his feet, then
his hands and his face.
Such was the meeting of the two chiefs of Romish Christendom, whose
main object was to consult as to the most effectual means of rooting out
the herestes which had sprung up in Germany. The lips of the priest, true
to his character, urged the immediate adoption of the most violent
measures; but the soldier, though backed by a powerful army,
recommended some further delay, and suggested that there should be an
opportunity given for free deliberation in council on the present aspect of
affairs in the church. Clement, who dreaded above all things the public
discussion of such questions, employed every argument to dissuade the
Emperor from his purpose. He assured him that his forbearance would
only make the heretics more presumptuous; that the state of things in
Germany was desperate and called for force and chastisement. But the
policy of the soldier led him to milder measures. He may have cared as
little in heart for the Reformation as Clement, but he became daily more
convinced that menaces would not subdue the spirit of the Protestants,
and he was not prepared for actual warfare. He endeavored to persuade the
pope to call a general council, but the angry pontiff thought of nothing but
crushing by military power the stubborn enemies of the catholic faith.
 886
To those who have become familiar with the principles of the papacy,
the character of these consultations will be no surprise, however
humiliating to contemplate. Impartial history has been careful to record the
sad contrast. “On the one side was the prince and the soldier, the natural
advocate of arbitrary and coercive proceedings; on the other the peaceful
ecclesiastic, the representative of the religion of the God of mercy; and
yet, whatever piety or virtue may be found in the above dialogue,
whatever justice or pretense to justice, whatever principle of sound
morality, whatever generosity of political sentiment, whatever regard for
the rights or for the happiness of man, whatever respect for the trite and
manifest precepts of Christ — whatever, in short, ought to have
proceeded from the minister of concord and charity, was uttered by the
secular despot; while the direct recommendation of violence and bloodshed
issued from the lips of the spiritual priest.”1
The crafty pope was well aware that the reformers were then weak and
divided, and therefore pressed Charles to carry into execution without
delay the sentence of Leo, together with the decree of the Diet of Worms.
But Charles was not the man to give up his own will, even to his holy
father. He now instructed his chancellor, Gattinara, to explain his views
and intentions to the conference; who spoke to the following effect: —
The Emperor had regarded with deep affliction the dissensions which had
arisen in his day, and of which the violence appeared to be increasing
rather than abating; and that, among all the duties which providence had
imposed upon him, none was nearer his heart than that of restoring the
tranquillity of the church; that there was no expedient more salutary to the
church, or more worthy of the sovereign pontiff and of a christian prince,
than to convoke a general and free council for the scriptural determination
of all controversies; that this council should be assembled immediately,
and composed of the most eminent doctors of all nations; that perfect
freedom of debate should be allowed; and that the articles there
recommended, after receiving the sanction of the pope, should become the
established doctrine of the christian world, and be supported, if necessary,
by the interference of the civil powers.
Clement viewed the proposed convocation with great aversion. The
proceedings of the councils of Pisa and Constance, which had deposed the
 887
popes Benedict XIII., Gregory XII., and John XXIII., excited his fears. He
had many personal motives for dreading an assembly of Christendom.
“Large congregations,” he replied, “serve only to introduce popular
opinions. It is not with the decrees of councils, but with the edge of the
sword that we should decide controversies.” He promised, however, to
reflect on what had been said.

THE DIET OF AUGSBURG

The Emperor at length came to the conclusion that it would be unjust to
follow the Council of the Vatican, and a violation of the imperial laws of
Germany, to condemn worthy citizens unheard, and to make war against
them. He, accordingly, in the month of January, 1530, sent his mandatory
letters into Germany, summoning a diet of the empire to be held at
Augsburg in the following April.
In the meantime, during his stay at Bologna, Charles expressed his desire
to be crowned by the Pope as many of his ancestors had been. ‘He
appointed the 22nd of February for receiving the iron crown as King of
Lombardy, and resolved to assume the golden crown as Emperor of the
Romans, on the 24th of the same month — his birthday and the
anniversary of the battle of Pavia.” We notice this fact because Charles
was a different man after he sealed by a false oath his coronation vows.
The pontiff having anointed him with oil, and given him the scepter,
presented him with a naked sword, saying, “Make use of this sword in
defense of the church against the enemies of the faith.” Next, taking the
golden orb, studded with jewels, he said, “Govern the world with piety
and firmness.” Then came the golden crown enriched with diamonds.
Charles bent down, and Clement put the diadem on his head, saying,
“Charles, Emperor invincible, receive this crown which we place on your
head, as a sign to all the earth of the authority that is conferred upon you.”
The Emperor then kissed the white cross embroidered on the pope’s red
slipper, and exclaimed, “I swear ever to employ all my strength to defend
the pontifical dignity, and the Church of Rome.” But Charles, at this time,
was neither inclined, nor able if he had been inclined, to carry matters with
that high hand against the reformers, which the pope so earnestly desired.
For thirteen years the Lord had so overruled the councils of kings and
 888
pontiffs, and all agents and events, that the Reformation had been
sheltered from outward violence, and so nourished it by His grace, that it
gradually acquired that root and establishment which no human power
could subvert. Most distinctly do we see the gracious hand of a good
providence at this moment in protecting the reformers from the cruelty of
the pope and the power of the Emperor.
The rivalry long existing between Charles V. and Francis I., the intrigues of
the popes with these princes, and the threatening advances of the Turks,
have been frequently used of God for the peace and prosperity of the
Reformation. The work was His and He watched over it.

THE CONFESSION OF AUGSBURG

When the Emperor’s reasons for the convocation of the diet were known,
the elector instructed the divines of Wittemberg to prepare a formula of
confession. Up to this time no standard of the faith of the reformers had
been publshed; and as the Emperor was surrounded by all the prejudices
and misrepresentations of the papacy, the only hope of removing these
prejudices, and of obtaining justice, was by a public and straightforward
proclamation of the real principles of the Reformation, and the real objects
of the reformers. Luther, with the assistance of Jonas, Pomeranus, and
Melancthon, re-examined the seventeen articles which had been drawn up
and signed by the Lutheran party at Schwabach in 1529, and thinking them
sufficient, presented them to the Elector at Torgau; whence they are called
the articles of Torgau. From these articles as a basis, Melancthon, by order
and authority of the princes, prepared a more orderly and elaborate
statement of their doctrines and observances, and also assigned reasons for
their opposition to the Roman pontiffs. This document has ever since
been well known as “The Confession of Augsburg.”
But as religious concord was the Emperor’s professed object in convening
the assembly, it was necessary to have the confession drawn up in terms
as little offensive to the papists as faithfulness to God and His truth
would permit. The pious Elector had recommended the theologians to
distinguish between such articles as must, at any cost, be maintained, and
such as might, if it were necessary, be modified or conceded. While this
celebrated confession was to speak the truth as believed by all Protestants,
 889
it was, at the same time, the lowest statement they could consent to make
for the sake of peace, rather than the highest they were prepared to give on
the authority of the word of God.
As the time drew near for the assembling of the diet, considerable anxiety
was manifested by some of the princes as to the real intentions of the
Emperor, and the safety of the Elector. He stood first among the princes in
Germany, and first as to his faith in God, his love for the Reformation, his
opposition to popery, and his avowed protection of Luther against papal
and imperial vengeance. But John pursued the wiser and bolder course, and
was the first prince who arrived in Augsburg.
The assembling of the diet was postponed till the 1st of May, and the
Elector appeared on the 2nd, accompanied by a military, train or suite of
one hundred and sixty horsemen, and several of his most eminent divines.
Luther was left at Coburg. The Elector feared that Luther’s presence at the
diet would exasperate the papists and drive Charles to extreme measures.
He had been excommunicated by the pope, condemned by the Emperor,
and viewed as the author of all those dissensions which were now so
difficult to compose. But at the same time John was determined to keep
Luther within reach, that he might be able to consult him.
It was about this time that Luther published his catechisms, Greater and
Lesser, which are of authority in the Lutheran churches, even until this
day; and in his castle at Coburg he was made acquainted with all that was
going on, and gave his opinions and directions by his numerous letters. He
also published just before the opening of the diet, “A remonstrance to the
Spirituals assembled at the Diet of Augsburg.” The object of this
composition was to vindicate the position of the reformers, deny the false
charges brought against them, and point out the abuses of the papacy as
the ground of their persistent opposition.
On the 12th of May, Philip of Hesse arrived with an escort of one
hundred and nineth horsemen; and just about the same time the Emperor
reached Innspruck, in the Tyrol, accompanied by his papal court of
princes, cardinals, legates, and nobles of Germany, Spain, and Italy. We
learn from Dr. Robertson, the able biographer of Charles, that he was
deeply thoughtful when on his journey towards Augsburg. “He had many
opportunities of observing the disposition of the Germans with regard to
 890
the points in dispute, and found their minds everywhere so much irritated
and inflamed, as convinced him that nothing tending to severity or rigor
ought to be attempted until all other measures proved ineffectual.” It
appears that he remained some considerable time at Innspruck, for the
purpose of studying the situation of Germany, and how he might best
ensure the success of his schemes.
Meantime, large parties were finding their way to Angsburg from all
quarters. “Princes, bishops, deputies, gentlemen, cavaliers, soldiers in rich
uniforms, entered by every gate, and thronged the streets, the public inns,
churches, and palaces. All that was most magnificent in Germany was
about to be collected there. The critical circumstances in which the empire
and Christendom were placed, the presence of Charles V. and his kindly
manners, the love of novelty, of grand shows, and of lively emotions, tore
the Germans from their homes.”2
It is interesting to notice here, that at this moment, when the leading
reformers were assembled at Augsburg, and the enemy close at hand, and
while the storm was thus actually impending, the noble and generous
Landgrave made one final effort to reconcile the two grand divisions of the
reformers. But though Luther was absent, his spirit was there, and burnt
with equal ardor among his disciples. They assured the Landgrave that
they could never acknowledge as brothers those who persisted obstinately
in error; and that by an alliance with Zwinglians, they should expose
themselves to all the hatred that attached to the latter, and thus endanger
the success of the Reformation. The Landgrave could not understand how
a single error, admitting it to be one, or an obscure question, should be a
sufficient reason for exclusion from communion. But his reasoning with
the Lutherans was all in vain. No fear of danger, no hope of success, could
induce them to have any fellowship with the Zwinglians.3
As the Emperor did not arrive till June 15th, and the city of Augsburg was
crowded with inquirers, the Protestant princes resolved to place their
preachers in the pulpits of some of the principal churches. This step was
taken in expectation of the Emperor’s opposition; but the Elector and the
Landgrave thought the opportunity for confessing Christ was too
favorable to be neglected. John instructed one of his theologians to preach
daily with open doors in the church of the Dominicans, and of St.
 891
Catherine. Philip of Hesse appointed his chaplain Snepff to preach the
gospel in the cathedral. Every day, through the mercy of God, salvation by
grace without works of law, was preached in these places to immense and
attentive crowds. The greater part of the population were already
Lutherans.
This was a bold step; it was a grand means of converting those whom the
Emperor had drawn together. The Catholics were astonished. They had
expected to see the Protestants looking like criminals, and afraid to lift up
their heads when the savior of Catholicism was at the gates of the city.
But what was to be done? The bishop of Augsburg ordered his preachers
to ascend the pulpits and address the people. But the Romish priests were
not good preachers — they never were. They understood better how to
say mass than to preach the gospel. The Romanists were angry; they
hastened to acquaint Charles of what was going on. He immediately sent
orders from Innspruck, that the offensive sermons should cease. The
Elector replied, that it was impossible for him to impose silence on the
word of God, or refuse himself the consolation of hearing it; nothing is
proclaimed in the sermons but the glorious truth of God and never was it
so necessary to us. We cannot therefore do without it.
The Protestants very naturally thought that such a reply would hasten the
arrival of the Emperor. Melancthon was still at work on the confession.
Timid and alarmed, he weighed every expression, softening it down,
changing it with such minute anxiety, that his bodily strength was nearly
exhausted. Luther thought all this superfluous, and enjoined Philip, under
pain of anathema, to take measures for the preservation of “his little
body,” and not “to commit suicide for the love of God.”
While the friends of the Reformation were preparing for the struggle at
Augsburg, Luther was not idle at Coburg. Numerous letters and pamphlets
issued from his stronghold, his second Wartburg. The castle stood on the
summit of a hill, and his apartments were in the upper story, so that he
sometimes dated his letters from the region of birds. Impatient at seeing
the diet put off from day to day, he wrote to his friends that he had
resolved to convoke one at Coburg. “We are already in full assembly,” he
says, in his own playful style; “you might here see kings, dukes, and other
grandees, deliberating on the affairs of their kingdom, and with
 892
indefatigable voice, publishing their dogmas and decrees in the air. They
dwell not in those caverns which you designate with the name of palaces.
The heavens are their canopy; the leafy trees form a floor of a thousand
colors, and their walls are the ends of the earth. They have a horror of all
the unmeaning luxury of silk and gold; they ask neither coursers nor armor,
and have all the same clothing. I have neither seen nor heard their Emperor,
but if I can understand them, they have determined this year to make a
pitiless war upon the most excellent fruits of the earth... But enough of
jesting — jesting, which is, however, necessary to dispel the gloomy
thoughts that prey upon me.” For many months he maintained a struggle,
full of darkness and mental agony, such as he passed through at the
Wartburg.

THE ARRIVAL OF CHARLES AT AUGSBURG

Gattinara, the Emperor’s chancellor, died at Innspruck. This was
considered a great loss to the reformers. He was a man of good sense and
moderation, and decidedly opposed to the sanguinary views of the papal
party. He possessed great influence over the mind of the Emperor, and
was the only man who dared to resist the pope. The timid Melancthon
exclaimed on hearing of his death, “With him all the human hopes of the
Protestants vanish.”
Two days after Gattinara’s death, Charles quitted Innspruck. He arrived at
Munich on the 10th of June, and at Augsburg on the 15th. He made his
public entry into the city with extraordinary pomp. Never, according to
the historians, had anything so magnificent been seen in the empire.4 We
only notice that which shows the firmness of the Protestants. The Elector,
the princes, and their councillors left the city at three in the afternoon to
meet Charles on his way. When he had come within fifty paces of the
German princes, they all alighted. Perceiving the Emperor preparing to do
the same, some of them advanced and begged him to remain on horseback;
but Charles dismounted without hesitating, and approaching the princes
with an amicable smile, shook hands with them cordially. The Roman
legate remained proudly seated on his mule; but seeing the graciousness of
Charles, he raised his hands and blessed the great personages thus
assembled on the road. Immediately, the Emperor, the king, the princes,
the Spaniards, Italians, and all who submitted to the pope, fell on their
 893
knees; but the Protestants, like Mordecai, bowed not. They remained
standing in the midst of this prostrate crowd. How galling it must have
been to the papal party! But Charles did not appear to notice it, though he
must have understood well what it meant. After the usual formalities, the
great procession moved on — two thousand imperial guards leading the
way.
The Emperor was now thirty years of age: of distinguished bearing and
pleasing features; pale and delicate-looking, with a weak voice, but winning
manners, having the air of a courtier more than of a warrior. He marched
straight to the cathedral as a humble worshipper, amidst the gorgeous
parade of ecclesiastical wealth and display, and the military pride and
warlike show of many nations and many crowned heads. When he reached
the altar, he fell on his knees, and raised his hands to heaven, as if all he
cared for were there, and himself a pilgrim and a stranger on the earth. A
gold embroidered cushion was offered him, but he refused it, and knelt on
the bare stones of the church. All the assembly knelt with him; the Elector
and the Landgrave alone remained standing. They required to be present
officially, but they acted according to their faith in God and His word.

THE CHIEFS OF THE AUGSBURG DIET

Before the business of the diet commences, it may be well to place in order
the principal leaders on both sides. On that of the papists there were the
Emperor, his brother Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria and King of
Hungary and Bohemia, the pope’s legate Campeggio, two nuncios
Pimpinella and Vergerio, Joachim Elector of Brandenburg, George Duke of
Saxony, and William of Bavaria. These were all vehement Roman
Catholics, and took an active part in the diet. Their principal divines were
Faber, Eck, Cochlaeus, and de Wimpina.
On the side of the Protestants were John, Elector of Saxony, and his son,
John Frederick; Philip Landgrave of Hesse, George Margrave of
Brandenburg, Anspach, Ernest, and Francis, Dukes of Lunenburg,
Wolfgang Prince of Anhalt, Albert Count Mansfeld, and Count Philip of
Hanover, besides the deputies of several imperial cities. Their chief divines
were Melancthon, Justus, Jonas, Spalatin, Snepff, and Agricola. There
 894
were also several of the Swiss divines, and Bucer, Hedio, and Capito from
Strasburg.5
The firmness and principle of the Protestants were now to be thoroughly
tested. The Emperor, on his arrival at Augsburg, repeated his order for the
removal of the preachers. “We cannot,” said the Landgrave, “deprive
ourselves of the food of the word of God, and deny His gospel; and we
entreat your majesty to withdraw your order, for our ministers preach
only the pure word of God.” Charles being much displeased and getting
angry, said, in a positive tone, that he could not desist from his demand.
“Your conscience,” replied the Landgrave, “has no right to command
ours.” The Margrave, who had been silent until then, having received a
sharp answer from Ferdinand, placed his hand on his neck, and said with
deep emotion, “Rather would I instantly kneel down, and in the
Emperor’s presence, submit my neck to the executioner, than prove
unfaithful to God, and receive or sanction antichristian error.” Charles was
moved and surprised, but replied with mildness and address, “that there
was no intention to take any man’s life.” The Emperor then proposed that
the preachers on both sides should be silenced, and that the selection of
others during the diet should be left to him. The matter in debate was then
deferred till another opportunity, but D’Aubigne and others speak as if
the Protestant divines continued to preach, though, in all probability, with
less provoking publicity.
Ferdinand, who had frequently tried his strength with the princes at
former diets, set another snare for their feet, or rather for their necks. The
day following that of the Emperor’s entrance into Augsburg was the
festival of the Holy Sacrament — Corpus Christi. The king was well
aware that the Protestants had discontinued, as idolatrous, the ceremonies
observed by the church on this occasion, and that their refusal to attend
would irritate and inflame the mind of the Emperor. The snare was thus
skilfully laid: of victory there can be no doubt, thought the legate. Besides,
late in the evening, the Emperor sent for the Protestant princes, and
signified to them his pleasure that they should attend him in the
procession of the ensuing day. The princes begged to be excused. “Christ,”
they said, “did not institute this sacrament to be worshipped.” Charles
persevered in his demand, but gave them till the following morning to
prepare their reply.
 895
At the hour appointed the princes appeared before the Emperor. He
repeated his demands, and they repeated their refusal. He even used
entreaties, but to the same effect. Charles, who had not expected such
resistance, was greatly agitated, and the legate endeavored to exasperate
him. The Margrave of Brandenburg again took speech in hand. “You
know,” he said, “how at the risk of our lives my ancestors and myself
have supported the house of Austria; but in the present cause, which
pertains to God, I am compelled to resist all impositions of this kind,
whatever may be the consequence; since it is written, We ought to obey
God rather than man. For the confession, therefore, of the doctrine, which
I know to be the word of Christ, and eternal truth, I decline no danger —
not even that of life itself, which, I hear, is threatened by some.” The
wisdom of God again appears, in making the wrath of man to praise Him.
The Emperor, his brother, the legate, and others must hear the truth. The
sacrament of the supper, the princes answered, was for spiritual blessing
to Christians; “not to be paraded in pompous pageantry about the streets,
as an object of adoration to the vulgar. They maintained that the festival
had no authority in the word of God, and that they deplored any indecent
degradation of so holy an institution.”
It was already beyond the time appointed for the procession, and the
Emperor and his party left the room, but the princes returned full of hope
and joy to their palaces, and the festival was celebrated without them.
The defeat of the Emperor and the triumph of the Protestants were as gall
and wormwood to the heart of the papal legate. But he had yet another net
to spread and determined, if possible, that they should be caught. The
opening of the diet was fixed for the 20th of June, and the occasion was to
be solemnised by the celebration of mass.
The Elector of Saxony was Grand Marshal of the empire, and in virtue of
his office, he was bound to carry the sword before the Emperor on such
occasions. “Order him, therefore,” said Campeggio to Charles, “to perform
his duty at the mass of the Holy Ghost, which is to open the sittings.”
This, the legate thought, would not only be attending, but assisting at
popish ceremonies. The Elector was requested to attend. His first impulse
was to refuse; but on the representation of his theologians, that in this
case, he was called to the discharge of a civil office, not to the performance
 896
of a religious duty, he consented to attend. But he was careful to inform
the Emperor that in so doing he was making no religious concession.
By an overruling providence, he was once more to be a witness for the
truth of God, and against the superstitions of popery, and that in its very
citadel. The Grand Marshal of the empire, bearing the sword, standing near
the altar, remained upright, together with his friend the Margrave, while all
the rest of the congregation fell down on their knees at the elevation of the
host. Two men dared to stand in that vast assembly at the moment of
adoration, and that in the presence of a hostile power, both papal and
imperial.
“These mere skirmishes,” says one, “though followed by no personal
consequences, are very deserving of the notice of the historian, not only as
indicating the resolution with which the reformers approached the conflict,
but as unquestionably productive of some effect on the mind of Charles.
He was unacquainted with their principles and their character. It was a
new thing for him to be resisted, and resisted by princes, and in his
presence, on the ground of religious conscience.” Whatever Charles may
have thought or felt of this third resistance to his orders, he left the church
immediately mass was over, entered his carriage, and repaired to the town-
hall, where the sittings of the diet were to take place.

THE OPENING OF THE DIET OF AUGSBURG

The great religious controversy, which commenced with an obscure
humble monk on Saxony, now gathered around the avowed defender of the
faith forty-two sovereign princes, besides many ambassadors, counts,
nobles, bishops, deputies from the cities, etc., etc., forming a most
illustrious assembly.
The diet was opened with a long speech, in the Emperor’s name, read by
the Count Palatine. It turned principally upon two subjects — war with
the Turks, and the religious dissensions. Under their Sultan Solyman the
Turks had taken Belgrade, conquered Rhodes, besieged Vienna, and
threatened all Europe. Hence the necessity of adopting vigorous measures
to arrest their progress. But the unhappy religious differences in Germany
formed the important point in the Emperor’s speech. It was observed that
the language in his address was more hostile to the Protestants than his
 897
letters of convocation led them to expect. But Charles had been crowned
since he wrote those letters; he had sworn to defend the pontiff and the
Church of Rome, and his many private interviews with Clement at
Bologna, would not improve his spirit towards the reformers. His tone
was greatly changed. He referred to the old and oft-repeated story of the
Diet of Worms. “He deplored the non-execution of that edict, and the
ineffieacy of all subsequent exertions for the same purpose during his
absence in Spain. He was now returned to his German dominions, to
institute a personal investigation, and to attend to the complaints and
arguments of all parties, when they should be duly delivered to him in
writing.”
It was now proposed that the immediate attention of the diet should be
directed to the subject of religion. The Emperor, therefore, gave notice to
the Elector and his friends, that at the next session, to be held on the
twenty-fourth, they should deliver to him a summary of their faith, of the
ecclesiastical abuses of which they complained, and of the reformation
which they demanded.
This arrangement gave the princes an interval of two days. They met at
the Elector’s on the twenty-third, to reconsider the Confession, or, as it
was then called, The Apology; and also to commit their whole way unto
the Lord. It was a time of much anxiety and prayer. The following day the
diet met; but it was evidently planned by the papists that no opportunity
should be given for the reading of the Apology. It was three o’clock in the
afternoon before business commenced. Then much time was spent by
Campeggio in presenting his credentials, and delivering his master’s
message. The Ambassadors of Austria and the adjoining provinces were
also introduced, who occupied some time in representing the calamities
which they had suffered from the Turks, and in urging the adoption of
measures for the protection of these provinces. The length of these
preliminary matters gave the Emperor a plausible pretext for objecting to
hear the Apology read; he said it was too late. The legate, no doubt,
thought he had gained his point; the Catholics, from the pope downwards,
dreaded the public reading of the Protestants’ Confession. The princes,
however, were firm, and equally determined that it should be read aloud in
a full diet, that it might have all possible publicity.
 898
A violent struggle now took place between the two parties; or rather, we
should say, between the powers of light and of darkness. The father of lies
used every means to quench the light, to stifle this manifestation of the
truth, if he could not accomplish the death of the witnesses. But a handful
of faith~ ful men, by the grace of God, nobly withstood the powers of
darkness in the persons of the great Emperor, the cardinals, prelates, and
catholic princes, and triumphed over them. “Deliver your Confession to
the appointed officers,” said Charles, “and rest assured that it shall be
duly considered and answered.” “Our honor is at stake,” said the princes;
“our souls are endangered; we are publicly accused, and we ought publicly
to answer.” On the continued resistance of Charles to hear the Confession,
the princes became bolder and firmer. They assured the Emperor that they
had no other motive in attending the diet than this, and that they must
retain their papers in their own hands until they had permission to read
them publicly.
Charles was surprised at the respectful but unyielding constancy of the
Protestants, and saw that some concession was necessary. “Tomorrow,”
said the Emperor, “I will hear your summary — not in this hall, but in the
chapel of the Palatine Palace.” The princes agreed to this, and returned to
their hotels, full of thankfulness to the Lord, while the legate and his
friends now saw, to their sorrow, that the public reading of the Confession
was inevitable.
The chapel where the Emperor agreed to hear the Apology was much
smaller than the town-hall, and would contain only about two hundred
persons. This was the enemy’s device to exclude numbers from hearing it;
but it was not very successful. All those whom it was most important to
undeceive and enlighten on the principles of the Reformation were
accommodated in the chapel, and the adjacent chambers were crowded
with anxious listeners.
On the 25th of June, 1530 — a day of great interest in the history of the
Reformation, of Christianity, and of mankind — the Protestant chiefs
stood before the Emperor. Christopher Beyer, the Elector’s chancellor,
held in his hand a German copy, and Pontanus, his late chancellor, held a
Latin copy of the Confession. The Emperor wished the Latin copy to be
read; but the Elector most respectfully reminded the Emperor that, as they
 899
were in Germany, they should be allowed to speak in German. The
Emperor consented. The Elector and his companions proposed to stand
during the reading, but the Emperor desired them to take their seats. The
chancellor, Beyer, then read the Confession. It is said that he read slowly,
clearly, distinctly, and with a voice so loud and sonorous, that he was
heard in all the adjoining places. Two hours were occupied in reading all
the papers, but the most profound attention prevailed during the whole
time.
The two copies of this celebrated Confession, being duly signed by the
princes and the deputies of the imperial cities, were handed to the
Emperor’s secretary by Pontanus, who said, in an audible voice, “With the
grace of God, who will defend His own cause, this Confession will
triumph over the gates of hell.” Charles took the Latin copy for himself,
and assured the Elector and his allies that he would carefully deliberate on
its contents.
The effect produced by the public reading of this document was such as
might have been expected. The less prejudiced portion of the listeners
were astonished to find the doctrines of the Protestants so moderate, and
“many eminently wise and prudent persons,” says Seckendorf,
“pronounced a favorable judgment of what they had heard, and declared
they would not have missed hearing it for a great sum.” Father Paul also
observes, “that the archbishop of Salzburg, after hearing the Confession,
told everyone that the reformation of the mass was needed, the liberty of
meats proper, and the demand to be disburdened of so many
commandments of men just: but that a poor monk should reform all was
not to be tolerated — he would not have reform by means of a poor
monk.” Such is the pride and prejudice of the human heart. The archbishop
might have remembered that God has chosen the foolish things of the
world to confound the wise; and the weak things of the world to confound
the things which are mighty; that no flesh should glory in His presence.
But who is completely above the attractions of personal influence? It
matters little to some what may be said, unless spoken by the teacher who
is in favor for the time. This is a serious evil in the professing church, and
has been the origin of many factions and schisms; besides, it takes
multitudes off the ground of faith in the word of God and leads them to
trust in the word of man. The great work of God’s Spirit was
 900
acknowledged by the archbishop to be needed and good, but he rejected it
because it was accomplished by means of a poor monk.
But many consciences were touched and many hearts were exercised by
means of the Confession. The Lord caused the truth to be felt. For the
moment it seemed to have triumphed. “All that the Lutherans have said is
true,” exclaimed the bishop of Augsburg, “we cannot deny it.” The Duke
of Bavaria, the great upholder of the papacy in Germany, after hearing the
Confession, said to Eck; “Well, doctor, you had given me a very different
idea of this doctrine and of this affair: but, after all, can you refute by
sound reasons the Confession made by the Elector and his friends?” “No,”
replied the popish advocate, “by the writings of the apostles we cannot;
but by the writings of the Fathers and the canons of councils we can.” “I
understand,” replied the duke in a reproachful tone, “according to you, the
Lutherans have their doctrine out of scripture, and we have our doctrine
without scripture.”
The joy of Luther was boundless when he heard of the Lord’s goodness to
his friends. “I thrill with joy,” he wrote, “that my life is cast in an epoch
in which Christ is publicly exalted by such illustrious confessors and in so
glorious an assembly. Our adversaries thought they had succeeded to
admiration when the preachers were silenced by an imperial prohibition;
but they do not perceive that more is done by our public Confession than
perhaps ten preachers could have accomplished. Truly Christ is not silent
in the diet. The word of God is not bound. No: if it is prohibited in the
pulpits, it shall be heard in the palaces of kings.”
The day following the reading of the Confession, Charles convoked the
states faithful to Rome. “What reply should be made to the Confession?”
said he to the senate around him. Three different opinions were proposed
by his advisers.
1. The men of the papacy — the pure churchmen — in accordance with
the customs and views of the age, and with the violent counsels of the
Romish church, had nothing to propose but immediate vengeance. “Let
us not discuss our adversaries’ reasons,” said they, “but let us be content
with executing the Edict of Worms against the Lutherans, and with
constraining them by force of arms to give up their errors and return to the
communion of the church of Rome.”
 901
2. Another party — called the men of the empire — proposed that the
Confession should be submitted to the consideration of moderate and
impartial men, and that the final decision should be given by the
Emperor.
3. The men of tradition, so called, advised, that the Confession should first
receive a public refutation, and that the Protestants should be compelled
to conform to the established doctrines and ceremonies, until a council
should decide otherwise.
The last proposal was adopted with the Emperor’s consent. Faber, Eck,
and Cochlaeus, the old champions of Rome and the bitter enemies of the
Reformation, were appointed to draw up a confutation of the Protestant
Confession, and to have it ready for the diet within the period of six
weeks. Meanwhile the secret emissaries of Rome were actively employed
in Germany to practice her usual arts of bribery and corruption; which she
frequently found to succeed after the defeat of her public exertions.
Since the Confession of Augsburg is the most celebrated document in the
history of the Reformation, and has been adopted as a public standard of
faith by the general body of Protestants, it may be well just to give the
subjects of which it treats. The entire Confession is composed in twenty-
eight articles, or chapters. In the first twenty-one is comprehended the
profession of their faith. The other seven recount the errors and offensive
abuses of the church of Rome, on account of which they had withdrawn
from her communion.

THE ARTICLES OF FAITH

The Trinity — Original sin — The Person and work of Christ —
Justification — The Holy Spirit and the word of God — Works, their
necessity and acceptance — The Church — Unworthy members —
Baptism — The Lord’s supper — Repentance — Confession —
Sacraments — Ministering in the church — Ceremonies — Civil
institutions — Judgment and the future state — Free will — The causes of
sin — Faith and good works — Prayer and the invocation of saints.
 902
THE ARTICLES CONCERNING ABUSES
The Mass — The Communion in both kinds — Auricular Confession —
The distinction of Meats and Traditions — The Marriage of Priests —
Monastic vows — The Ecclesiastical Power.
In chapter 10 the Lutherans plainly assert that the real body and blood of
Christ are truly present in the Eucharist, under the elements of the bread
and wine, and distributed and received. In consequence of this plain
assertion of the dogma of Consubstantiation, the Reformed, or Zwinglian
party refused to subscribe the Augsburg Confession. Hence the imperial
cities of Strasburg, Constance, Lindau, and Memmingen, offered a separate
confession, called the Confession of the Four Cities — Confessio
Tetrapolitana. It agreed substantially with the Augsburg Confession,
except in regard to the corporeal presence; but the Emperor would not
allow it to be read in public.6

THE PERPLEXITIES OF THE PROTESTANTS

As six weeks must elapse before we can hear the refutation of the
Confession, we may turn our attention to the proceedings of the
contending parties during that period.
It was indeed a time of trial and suspense to the Protestants. They were
perplexed and harassed on every side and in every way. Rome’s system of
promises and threatenings was immediately put in practice. Favours were
offered and threatenings were applied to different individuals in a way
most likely to gain their deceitful ends. Even the great Emperor
condescended to a policy of meanness and cruelty towards the Elector of
Saxony, and the Margrave of Brandenburg, with the view of separating
them from the interests of reform. And the Landgrave of Hesse he
endeavored to seduce by the tempting offer of a crown. “What would you
say if I elevated you to the regal dignity?” said Charles to Philip; “but,” he
added, “if you show yourself rebellious to my orders, then I shall behave
as becomes a Roman Emperor.”
On the Emperor’s conduct at this moment, his biographer, Dr.
Robertson, makes the following just observations. “From the divines,
among whom his endeavors had been so unsuccessful, Charles turned to
 903
the princes. Nor did he find them, how desirous soever of accommodation,
or willing to oblige the Emperor, more disposed to renounce their
opinions. At that time, zeal for religion took possession of the minds of
men, to a degree which can scarcely be conceived by those who live in an
age when the passions excited by the first manifestation of the truth, and
the first recovery of liberty, have in a great measure ceased to operate.
This zeal was then of such strength as to overcome attachment to their
political interests, which is commonly the predominant motive among
princes. The Elector of Saxony, the Landgrave of Hesse, and other chiefs
of the Protestants — though solicited separately by the Emperor, and
allured by the promise or prospect of those advantages which it was
known they were more solicitous to attain — refused, with a fortitude
highly worthy of imitation, to abandon what they deemed the cause of
God for the sake of any earthly acquisition.” 7

THE SORROWS AND FEARS OF MELANCTHON

The Emperor having failed to draw away the leading princes from the
Evangelical Confession, the legate and his deputies used every exertion to
gain over some of the leading divines, especially Philip Melancthon. He
had manifested great uneasiness at the secret conferences between the
Emperor and the princes, and proposed to reduce the demands of the
Confession, with the view of accomplishing a reconciliation. Flattered by
the attentions of the legate, alarmed by the threats of war and the general
appearance of affairs, he lost his balance for a moment and was driven to
the very borders of recantation. Even D’Aubigne observes that “he
thought it his duty to purchase peace at any cost, and resolved in
consequence to descend in his propositions as low as possible.” But we
must bear in mind that the position of Melancthon was one of extreme
difficulty. The responsibility of drawing up the Confession rested almost
entirely with himself. It was no easy task to show sufficient causes for the
secession of the reformers, and yet to avoid all unnecessary grounds of
offense to the papists. He was thus exposed to the insults of his enemies,
and to the reproaches of his friends. He had to deal with the princes on the
one side, the theologians on the other, and the crafty emissaries of Rome.
The mild and tender spirit of Melancthon was in every way unfitted to
contend against all these anxieties. He had neither the inflexible nature nor
 904
the religious enthusiasm, of his master Luther. Historians vie with each
other in their praise of his great talents, his extensive learning, and his
characteristic modesty. “Melancthon,” says Dr. Robertson, “seldom
suffered the rancour of controversy to envenom his style, even in writings
purely polemical.” But that which chiefly troubled his soul during those
wearisome six weeks was an intense desire to make further concessions to
conciliate the Roman Catholics, without the compromise of truth or the
violation of conscience. The following letter to the legate shows
Melancthon in his lowest state of despondency. Here he ventures to
affirm that the Protestants were prepared to refuse no conditions on which
peace and concord might be secured to them.

THE LETTERS OF MELANCTHON AND LUTHER

“There is no doctrine,” writes Melancthon to Campeggio, “in which we
differ from the Roman Catholic Church; we venerate the universal
authority of the Roman pontiff, and we are ready to obey him, provided
he does not reject us, and that of his clemency, which he is accustomed to
show towards all nations, he will kindly pardon or approve certain little
things that it is no longer possible for us to change...Now then, will you
reject those who appear as suppliants before you? Will you pursue them
with fire and sword?... Alas! nothing draws upon us in Germany so much
hatred, as the unshaken firmness with which we maintain the doctrines of
the Roman church. But with the aid of God, we will remain faithful, even
unto death, to Christ and to the Roman church, although you should reject
us.” Thus did Melancthon, the head of the evangelical theologians, lower
himself in the presence of Rome and of all mankind. But there was one
who was watching over the interests of the Reformation, and overruling
His servant’s failure for the accomplishment of His own purposes and the
glory of His holy name.
Melancthon had come down so low, as to entreat the Elector to demand
only the two kinds in the Eucharist and the marriage of priests. Had these
two things been granted, the Reformation, humanly speaking, would have
been arrested, and a reconciliation with Rome accomplished. But the legate
would grant nothing. The papists now accused the reformers of having
dissembled their heresy in the Apology. Melancthon, filled with shame at
 905
the advances he had made to the legate, by whom he was deceived, found a
place, we doubt not, of repentance and restoration.
Luther was still at Coburg, but he was constantly hearing of all that was
going on, and constantly writing to his friends, especially to the Elector
and Melancthon. His letters about this time breathe a very different spirit
from those of Melancthon. But as Waddington justly observes, “The wild
and lofty solitudes of Coburg were far more favorable to those exclusive
spiritual impressions than the crowded halls and courts of Augsburg: and
that perpetual contact with the weaknesses and disquietudes of friends,
that unwearied wariness necessary against an ever-plotting enemy, would
have shaken a firmer resolution than Melancthon’s; and had Luther himself
been as long exposed to those trials, they would have disturbed his
equanimity, though they might not have broken his courage.”8
The following extracts from the letters of Luther during this crisis will
give the reader some idea of his christian principles and the soundness of
his judgment.
“It is your philosophy, my Philip, which vexes you so, not your
theology...Self is your greatest foe, and it is you who supply Satan
with arms against you... I, for my part, am not very much
disturbed respecting our common cause. God has power to raise up
the dead; He has power then to support His cause while falling, to
restore it when fallen, to advance it while standing upright. If we
are not worthy to be His instruments, let the work be done by
others; but if we are not to find comfort and courage in His
promises, who are there now on earth to whom they more
properly pertain?”
Two days afterwards he wrote,
“What displeases me in your letter is this, that you describe
yourselves as having followed my authority in this affair. I do not
choose to be, or to be said to be, your mover in this cause. If it be
not also and equally your cause, I do not at least choose that it
should be called mine and be imposed upon you. If the cause is
mine alone, I alone will act in it... Assuredly I am faithful to you,
and present with you in my groans and prayers, and I would I
 906
were also present in body... But it is in vain I write thus; because
you, following the rules of your philosophy, persist in directing
these things by reason, that is, in being rationally mad; and so you
wear yourself to death, without perceiving that this cause is placed
altogether beyond your reach and counsel.”
Again on the 13th of July he writes to his son in the faith,
“I think that you must be this time have had enough and more than
enough of experience not to see, that Belial can by no devices be
reconciled to Christ, and that there is not any hope of concord
from a council, so far as doctrine is concerned... Assuredly, I, for
my part, will neither yield, nor suffer to be restored, so much as a
hair’s breadth. I will rather endure every extremity. Concede so
much the less, as your adversaries require so much the more. God
will not aid us until we are abandoned by all. If it were not
tempting God, you would long ago have seen me at your side.”
On the 21st he thus wrote to Justus Jonas:
“I am delighted that Philip is beginning to find out by experience
the character of Campeggio and the Italians. That philosophy of
his believes nothing except from experience. I, for my part, would
not trust the least, either to the Emperor’s confessor, or to any
other Italian. For my friend Cajetan was so fond of me, that he was
ready to shed blood for me — to wit, my own blood. An Italian,
when he is good, is of all men the best; but such is a prodigy as rare
as a black swan... I could wish to be the victim of this council, as
Huss was the victim of that of Constance, which was the latest
papal triumph.”
From these extracts the reader will plainly see that Luther was not a party
to the humiliating letter of Melancthon. It is also plain from all history
that Luther’s letters were used of God for strengthening and confirming his
friends at Augsburg during that very critical interval. Though all the
resources of papal diplomacy had been brought into action, the papists
could not boast of a single apostate. The Elector had been especially
tampered with by the Emperor, believing that, if he fell, the Confession
would fall with him. But the Lord enabled his servant to triumph. “I must
 907
either renounce God or the world,” said John. “Well! my choice is not
doubtful. I fling myself into His arms, and let Him do with me what shall
seem good to Him... I desire to confess my Savior.” Noble resolution!
Invincible warrior of light against the powers of darkness! No weapon of
carnal temper could prevail against those which are spiritual and wielded
by faith. Here the Elector and his friends were victorious. Would to God
they had ever maintained this moral elevation! But alas! for the day when
they stepped down to the world’s arena of strife and conflict; then all was
defeat and degradation. We shall see the mighty contrast between the two
classes of weapons by-and-by.
 908

CHAPTER 39
THE POPISH REFUTATION

On the 13th of July, or rather less than three weeks after the reading of the
Protestant Confession, the popish divines presented their reply to the
Emperor. It consisted of two hundred and eighty pages; but the style was
so abusive and violent, that Charles would not allow it to be read in the
diet. He was much displeased, and ordered another to be drawn up, shorter
and more moderate. The document having been so altered as to suit the
mind of the Emperor, he caused it to be read in full diet on the 3rd of
August. The first copy was in accordance with the counsel of the pope,
the second with the policy of Charles.
The Count-Palatine, after admitting, in a general way, that many abuses
had crept into the church, and that the Emperor by no means defended
them, delivered the following message: “That the Emperor found the
articles of this Refutation orthodox, catholic, and conformable to the
Gospels; that he therefore required the Protestants to abandon their
Confession, now refuted, and to adhere to all the articles that had just been
set forth; that, if they refused, the Emperor would remember his office,
and would know how to show himself the advocate and defender of the
Roman Church.”
These words could not be misunderstood by the Protestants. They
breathed force and violence. This was the boasted clemency of the
Emperor. Each party now stood on its own proper ground. The
Protestants had taken their stand on the word of God; the Catholics on the
word of man — the fathers, the popes, and the councils. These were, and
are, and ever must be, the essential features of divine and human ground, of
true religion and false. Once allow a lower, or another, standard than the
truth of God, and where may the professor soon find himself? He may
never reach Rome, but he is on the way to it. Those who maintain the pure
truth of God as the only ground of faith and practice — of walk, worship,
and testimony — may often have to lament their shortcomings. So much
 909
imperfection, mingled with the Christian’s purest services; but the
important question with every Christian should be, Can I allow, admit, or
accept a lower standard than the mind of God as revealed in His word? “It
is written,” was the unfailing refuge of the Lord Himself in the day of His
temptation; by which word He completely overcame the tempter. Christ
is the Christian’s one grand lesson, as the apostle says, “But ye have not
so learned Christ; If so be that ye have heard Him, and have been taught
by Him, as the truth is in Jesus.” And the same apostle makes the rule of
the Christian’s life still more simple in that all comprehensive saying, “For
to me to live is Christ.” As if he had said, For me to live is to have Christ
always before me as my object, my motive, my power; so that the life of
Jesus might be made manifest in my life while here. Thus would the eye be
single, the heart undivided, and the whole path full of light. Ephesians
4:20, 21; Philippians 1:21; Galatians 2:20; 2 Corinthians 4:10.
But we must return to our history.
The Refutation wholly rejected the doctrine of justification by faith,
without the merit of good works. And with respect to the marriage of
priests, the Catholics wondered that the Protestants could demand such a
thing, seeing it had never been the practice for priests to marry since the
days of the apostles. With regard to the mass, it was affirmed to be a
sacrifice for the living and the dead; “that Daniel had prophesied long ago,
that when Antichrist should come, the daily offering should cease; but as
yet this had not come to pass in the Holy Catholic Church. Nevertheless,
in those places where mass was despised, altars destroyed, and images
burned, there that prophecy was fulfilled.” Such were the enlightened
arguments of the popish doctors. The moment they refer to scripture,
they prove that they are blinded by the god of this world.
Such was the character of the Refutation which Charles invited the
Protestant princes to accede to, out of deference to his own authority, as
protector of the integrity of the Roman Church, and the religious unity of
the empire.

A COPY OF THE REFUTATION REFUSED

John, the good Elector of Saxony, nobly answered for himself and his
friends, “That they would do anything for peace which they could do with
 910
a safe conscience; and, if convicted of any error by scriptural authority,
they would readily renounce it. But he desired a copy of the Refutation,
that they might consider it at leisure, and show on what points it was not
satisfactory to them; which would be in conformity with the fair and
candid discussion to which they had been invited by the edict of
convocation.” This reasonable request, however, was refused. The
Refutation was not published, and no copies of it were to be given to the
Protestants. But they persisted in demanding a copy; and Charles agreed
to give them one on the following conditions, namely, “that the
Protestants should not reply; that they should speedily agree with the
Emperor and submit to his decision; that no transcript of it should be
made; and that it should not be communicated to any other persons, as the
Emperor would have no further debate.” On such conditions they declined
to receive it, and appealed to God and to His truth.
The firmness of the princes greatly irritated the Emperor. They thus
refused all that he had proposed to them, even what he considered a favor;
and he had utterly failed, with all the craft of Rome, either to gain or
disunite them. “Agitation,” says D’Aubigne, “anger, and affright were
manifested on every bench of that august assembly. This reply of the
evangelicals was war — was rebellion. Duke George of Saxony, the Princes
of Bavaria, all the violent adherents of Rome, trembled with indignation.
There was a sudden, an impetuous, movement, and an explosion of
murmurs and hatred.”1

PRIVATE NEGOTIATIONS
So violent was the tumult produced in the diet by the Protestants rejecting
the Emperor’s proposals, that the Electors of Mayence and Brandenburg
interposed, and requested the Emperor to accept their offices for the
private and amicable arrangement of the differences. This being agreed to,
mediators were appointed. They were six in number — all violent
enemies of the Reformation — the Elector of Brandenburg, the
Archbishop of Saltzburg, the Bishops of Strasburg, Wurtzburg, and
Bamberg, and Duke George of Saxony. The affair was now placed on new
ground, but no nearer a peaceful settlement. Had Charles been left to his
own convictions, there would have been little difficulty in coming to
peaceful terms with the reformers. He wanted both money and men from
 911
Germany, and could not see the policy of desolating the country, and
exterminating his subjects because they refused obedience to the pope.
Besides, it is thought by some historians, that the nearer he contemplated
the principles of the Reformers, the more did they strike a chord in his
own spirit. And it is certain that his own sister, Mary, who was married
to Christtern, King of Denmark, was a pious princess, and probably a
Lutheran. Like Margaret with her brother Francis I., she often pleaded
with her brother Charles on behalf of the Protestants.
But the Emperor was in a difficulty; he must play the politician. He was
under the most solemn oath to defend the Roman Church and the
pontifical dignity; he had therefore to assume a position that would be
gratifying to the pope and his party. But as he was slow in his
movements, messages were sent from Rome of the most violent character,
and Campeggio redoubled his zeal. “Let the Emperor,” said the legate,
“conclude a treaty with the Catholic princes of Germany; and if these
rebels equally insensible to threats and promises, obstinately persist in
their diabolical course, then let his majesty employ fire and sword, let him
take possession of all the property of the heretics and utterly eradicate
these poisonous pests. Then let him appoint holy inquisitors, who shall
go on the track of the remnant of reform, and proceed against them as in
Spain against the Moors.” Besides all this, the University of Wittemberg
was to be excommunicated; the heretical books burned, and those who had
studied there were to be declared unworthy the favor of pope or Emperor.
“But first of all,” said the crafty legate to Charles, “a sweeping
confiscation is necessary. Even if your majesty confines yourself to the
leaders of the party, you may extract from them a large sum of money,
which is at all events indispensable to carry on the war with the Turks.”2
Such were the counsels of Rome, and by such the mediators were
animated. In the first conference which was held, they addressed the
Protestants after the style of their party — repeating to them the mildness
of the Emperor, his desire to establish unity, and correct some abuses
which had crept into the Christian church, in conjunction with the pope.
“But,” said the Elector of Brandenburg, “how contrary to the gospel are
the sentiments you have adopted! Abandon then your errors, do not any
longer remain separate from the church, and sign the Refutation without
delay. If you refuse, then, through your fault, how many souls will be lost,
 912
how much bloodshed, what countries laid waste, what trouble in all the
empire!” And, turning to the Elector of Saxony, he said in plain terms,
“that if he did not renounce and anathematize the new-fangled doctrine
which he had embraced, the Emperor would by force of arms deprive him
of his dignities, his possessions, and his life; that certain ruin would fall
upon his subjects, and even upon their wives and children.” The prince,
now old and infirm, was, for the moment, much affected by such
outrageous language, but speedily recovered his wonted resolution. The
princes remained firm and unanimous, though surrounded by the imperial
guards, and the city almost in a state of siege.
Immediately after the first meeting, the Landgrave of Hesse left Augsburg.
His sudden departure caused a good deal of uneasiness to the Emperor, the
princes, and the whole diet. His intentions were unknown; but he left a
note with his Chancellor for the Elector, in which he assured him of his
unalterable constancy in the cause of the gospel, and his determination
rather to shed the last drop of his blood than abandon it. He also exhorted
his allies to permit themselves in no manner to be turned aside from the
word of God. His ministers remained in the diet, instructed to give their
vigorous support to the Protestant cause.3
Philip, who was a man of a quick and discerning mind, probably saw that
the dispute was now placed on more dangerous and more hopeless ground
than ever, and, becoming weary of the insolence of the papists, longed for
home. And, as the result proved, his judgment was right. The whole of the
month of August was spent in long conferences, but without effect. The
differences did not admit of arrangement; toleration could not be thought
of by the Church of Rome, nor could the unreserved submission which the
Catholics demanded be thought of by the Protestants. At the end of the
month, the controversy was referred back to the Emperor, in the same
state in which the Electors had taken it out of his hands.

THE TERMINATION OF THE DIET

What divines and princes had failed to accomplish, the great Charles, no
doubt, thought would soon be done by his personal influence. But he was
bitterly disappointed. He probably never understood the real nature of the
dispute; at least he could not understand the power of conscience
 913
enlightened by the word of God. It was a new word and a new power to
the soldier. His only idea of arrangement was by concessions from both
parties, or the entire submission of one. But he soon had to prove that
conscience was beyond the reach of his personal influence and the power
of his sword.
Finding private means, with all the ingenuity of papal diplomacy, utterly
ineffectual, he sent for the chiefs of the Protestant party, on the 7th of
September, to meet him in his audience chamber. Only his brother, and a
select number of his confidential advisers, were present. The princes and
deputies having been introduced, he expressed to them, by the mouth of
the Count-Palatine, his surprise and disappointment at their conduct: —
“That they, who were few in number, should have introduced novelties,
contrary to the ancient and most sacred custom of the universal church;
should have framed to themselves a singular kind of religion, differing from
what was professed by the Catholics, by himself, his brother, and all the
princes and states of the empire; nay, utterly disagreeing with all the kings
of the earth, and of their own ancestors. Being desirous, however, of
peace, he would use his interest with the pope and the other princes to
procure a general council, as soon as the place could be agreed upon; but
still, on this condition, that they should, in the meantime, follow the same
religion which he and the rest of the princes professed.” In reply the
Protestants most respectfully declined his terms. They “denied that they
had stirred up new sects contrary to the holy scriptures; thanked him for
the proposal of a council, but that nothing could compel them to re-
establish in their churches the abuses which they had condemned in their
Confession, nor, even were they so disposed, could they force them upon
subjects now too enlightened to receive them.”
Charles was embarrassed. He did not desire war, and yet how could he
avoid it with honor? “He could not understand how a few princes,
inconsiderable in power, should reject the conciliatory and condescending
proposals he had made to them. It was their duty to abide by the decision
of the majority, and not arrogantly to prefer their own opinion to that of
the church, and their own wisdom to that of the pope and all the other
princes of Christendom.” He begged the Protestants to renew the
conference, and hoped that the work of concord might be completed in
other eight days. But they declined to renew the conference, as only
 914
occasioning useless delay; and on the 9th of September all direct
communication between them and Charles terminated.

THE FINAL DECREE

The Emperor now ordered a committee to be chosen for framing a decree,
and required the Elector of Saxony to stay four days longer, that he might
hear the draft of it. The commissioners appointed for drawing up this
decree, were the Electors of Mayence and Brandenburg, the Archbishop of
Saltzburg, the Bishops of Strasburg and Spires, George, Duke of Saxony,
William, Duke of Bavaria, and Henry, Duke of Brunswick — comprising
all the most violent enemies of the Reformation.
On the 22nd of September the decree was read to the Protestants. It
affirmed that the Confession of the Elector and his associates had been
publicly heard, and confuted; that in the subsequent conferences those
princes had retracted part of their new doctrines, but still retained the rest;
that space was now allowed them, till the 15th of the ensuing April, to
return to the doctrine of the church, at least till the decision of a council;
and that they were to make known their final resolution before that day.
Meanwhile they were commanded to live peaceably, to permit no changes
in religion, to publish no new religious works, to prevent none of their
subjects from returning to the ancient faith, and to join with the other
princes of the empire to suppress the Anabaptists and Sacramentarians;
assuring them that within six months the Emperor would send out his
summons for a council, to commence the next year.
The tone of this resolution is extremely moderate, compared with the
violent language which we have frequently heard from the papal party;
but, whatever may have been their object, the Protestants replied with
their usual firmness: — “That they could never admit that the Confession
had been refuted; on the contrary, they were more than ever convinced
that it was conformable to the word of God, which they would more fully
have demonstrated, had a copy of the Refutation been allowed them.”
Here Pontanus presented to the diet an “Apology for the Confession,”
which had been composed in reply to the Refutation, so far at least as the
substance of it could be recollected by those who heard it. After referring
to their oft-repeated willingness to abandon every opinion not founded on
 915
scripture, and their most profound assurances of loyalty to the Emperor
and the empire, they concluded by requesting a copy of the proposed
decree, that they might make up their minds respecting it, before it passed.
On the morning of the 23rd of September, the Elector had his audience of
leave; the Emperor then gave his hand to the princes, and allowed them to
depart.
The diet continued its sittings for at least a month after the departure of
the Protestant princes, chiefly engaged in providing supplies for the
Turkish war. The “Recess,” or final decree, of the diet was published on
the 19th of November. After comparing several abstracts of this important
document, we think Waddington’s the clearest and simplest for modern
readers; it is as follows: —
“Those who denied the corporeal presence were proscribed; the
restoration of the ancient sacraments, rites, and ceremonies, in the
places where they had been abolished, was commanded; so was the
degradation of all married priests; nor were any other to be
substituted for them, or instituted anywhere, without the
approbation of the bishop. The images, which had been removed,
were to be restored, the freedom of the will was to be asserted, and
the opposite doctrine prohibited as insulting to God; so was the
doctrine of justification by faith alone; obedience to the civil
authorities was diligently inculcated; the preachers were
commanded to exhort the people to the invocation of the saints,
the observance of feasts and fasts, and attendance at mass; the
monks were to obey the rules of their order; the clergy to lead a
reputable and decorous life. All who should attempt any change in
doctrine or worship were made liable to personal inflictions. The
destroyed monasteries were to be rebuilt, and their revenues
restored to the monks. The decree was to be executed by military
force, wherever it might not find voluntary obedience, and the
States of the empire were to unite their forces with those of the
Emperor for that purpose. The ‘imperial chamber’ was to pursue
the rebels, and the neighboring States to execute its sentences. The
pope was to be solicited to convoke a council, within six months,
to be assembled within a year from the date of convocation.”
 916
Two days after the public reading of the Recess, Charles V. quitted
Augsburg. According to the opinion of D’Aubigne, he was greatly
distressed in his mind, and knew not how to escape from the labyrinth in
which he was caught. As the head of the State, he had interfered for the
protection of the church, and the suppression of her enemies. But the
opposite had been the result. “If he did not execute his threatenings, his
dignity was compromised, and his authority rendered contemptible.... .The
ruler of two worlds had seen all his power baffled by a few Christians; and
he who had entered the imperial city in triumph, now left it gloomy, silent,
and dispirited. The mightiest power of the earth was broken against the
power of God.”4

REFLECTIONS ON THE DIET OF AUGSBURG

No study is dry and barren, and no time is misspent, that leads us to a
deeper knowledge of God, and to a more intimate acquaintance with His
ways. To see His hand guiding and overruling the most complicated affairs
of men for the accomplishment of His own gracious purposes, is truly
refreshing and edifying to the soul. “Whoso is wise, and will observe these
things, even they shall understand the lovingkindness of the Lord.” “And
we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to
them who are the called according to his purpose.” (Psalm 107:43; Romans
8:28.) Historians may expatiate with wonder and admiration on the results
of such a contest — at the triumph of the few over the many, of the weak
over the strong; but while we would seek to speak impartially of each
combatant, we would have our eye especially on Him who is “Head over
all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth
all in all.”
The reader must have observed that the pontifical ministers, guided by the
subtle and experienced Campeggio, and countenanced by the Emperor,
completely failed to gain any important advantage over the comparatively
rude provincial princes. Like the waves breaking against the rock, their
craft, duplicity, and evil counsel fell powerlessly on the Elector and his
allies. By faith and constancy in the word of God, they stood firm amidst
the angry passions and threatenings of their enemies. The pope, the
Emperor, the legates, the princes, with all their experience in diplomacy,
were utterly astonished to perceive how little they could accomplish.
 917
“Day after day,” says a close observer, “their designs were penetrated,
and their artifices eluded, by men of no pretensions to political skill, by
Germans, natives of obscure provinces, subjects of petty princes,
unpracticed in the arts of courts, uninstructed even in the rudiments of
intrigue. It was in vain that they taxed their ingenuity for some fresh
expedient to succeed those that had failed — it was defeated by the same
considerate and suspicious sagacity.”
In reflecting on the proceedings of the Diet of Augsburg, we are
forcibly reminded of the Diet of Worms, and of the great changes which
had taken place during those nine years.
1. At that time Luther stood alone as the representative of the
Reformation. Not a single prince had then declared for the new doctrines.
At Augsburg all is changed. In place of a solitary monk, we see a numerous
and well-organized body of princes, nobles, and theologians, and all of
them men of weight and respectability. But Rome was not more humbled
and perplexed by the latter than by the former. She could no more silence
the single monk than the host of princes. Such was the manifest power of
God in connection with His own word. Then she sent forth an edict
similar to the Recess of Augsburg, but which she never was able to
execute. What could be more convincing, as to the strength of the
Reformation, and the weakness of her enemies!
2. The effects, or results, of the Augsburg diet were evidently favorable
to the Protestants. The one grand object of the papal party at this time
was to crush and root out, by the sword of Charles, the very seeds of the
Reformation from the soil of Germany; but in place of accomplishing its
Satanic design, Protestantism was immensely strengthened, and delivered
from gross misrepresentation. The calm, sober, respectful, and dignified
behavior of the princes led many of the papists to think more favorably of
them, and ultimately to unite with them. “Among the most important
converts were Hermann, Archbishop of Cologne; Frederic, Count Palatine,
first minister of the Emperor, and afterwards Elector; Eric, Duke of
Brunswick; the Dukes of Mecklenburg and Pomerania; Joachim, Prince
Elector of Brandenburg, who soon after succeeded his father; and George
Ernest, son of Prince William of Hennenberg. Some free cities, hitherto
papal or neutral, declared in favor of the Reformation; and even the
 918
Emperor and his brother carried away with them a less bigoted aversion
for the faith and name of Protestant, than they had imbibed from the
lessons of their ecclesiastical counsellors.”
3. A considerable amount of truth was kept before the mind of that
august assembly for nearly six months. This was an immense point gained.
Many dignitaries both in church and state heard the pure truth of God for
the first time. Besides the great Confession of the Lutheran churches, two
others were presented to the diet. One was sent by Zwingle, the other was
called the Tetrapolitan, deriving its name from having been signed by the
deputies of the four imperial cities, Strasburg, Constance, Memmingen,
and Lindau. Bucer has the credit of drawing up the Tetrapolitan, as
Melancthon has of the Lutheran Confession. Thus God had ordained that
the truth should be established by three noble confessions. They were
substantially the same as to the great fundamental truths of the word of
God; they only differed on the doctrine of the real presence, or, concerning
the manner in which Christ’s body and blood are present in the Eucharist.
4. It would be easy to point out many blessed truths in the word of God
which were not referred to in these confessions of faith, but our present
object is to speak thankfully of what the Lord enabled these noble men to
do, and with so much grace. The truth of God as to the church, the body
of Christ, and her heavenly relations; the operations of the Holy Spirit; the
difference between the righteousness of God and the righteousness of the
law; the believer’s oneness with an exalted Christ; the hope of the Lord’s
coming for His saints, and afterwards with His saints to reign in millennial
glory, were comparatively, if not altogether, unknown to the Reformers.
Nevertheless, they were faithful to what they knew and held it firmly in
the face of every danger. It was by faith that the victory was won.
The history of the Reformation, morally viewed, is now accomplished.
There will still be conferences and discussions; leagues, failures, and
desolating wars; to say nothing of endless persecutions and martyrdoms;
but the emancipating truth of salvation through faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ, without the merit of good works has taken so deep a hold of the
European mind, that neither the sword of the empire, the conspiracies of
popery, nor the powers of hell, shall ever be able to extinguish it.
 919
THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD IN THE AFFAIRS OF CHARLES
There is nothing more interesting, in connection with the history of the
Reformation, than the overruling hand of a divine providence in the midst
of its enemies. The persons, the writings, and the testimony of God’s
chosen witnesses are guarded and protected by means the least thought of
and the most remote. He only could convert the disputes of monarchs and
the armies of the Turks into instruments for the furtherance of the gospel
of peace. And this He did from the very commencement.
Immediately after the promulgation of the Edict of Worms against the
Reformers, war commenced between the Emperor and Francis, king of
France. “How desirous soever the Emperor might be to put a stop to
Luther’s progress,” says Dr. Robertson, “he was often obliged, during the
Diet at Worms, to turn his thoughts to matters still more interesting, and
which demanded more immediate attention.” The great object of his
ambition at this time was to oppose the power of Francis. According to
civil history both Charles and Francis laid claim to the duchy of Milan,
which had been lost by Louis XII. after he had obtained it by conquest.
“For a time Francis was successful; but, about the year 1525, Charles
again brought it under his own power. Charles, on his part, laid claim to
Artois as part of the Netherlands; while he had to defend Navarre, which
his grandfather Ferdinand had taken from France. In addition to which,
Francis asserted his right to the two Sictiles.” Here we have an explanation
of the Emperor’s backwardness to commence hostilities against the
Germans. But these quarrels and contests between the leading powers of
Europe so occupied their attention for many years, that the Reformation
was allowed to spread far and wide, and the oft-repeated threatenings of
the papal powers were from time to time diverted and deferred.
Again, the severity of the Edict of Augsburg very naturally excited the
most serious apprehensions of all the members of the Protestant body —
of all Germany. There was only one expectation throughout the whole
country, that of an immediate civil war — the destruction of the
Protestants. Such was the outward aspect of affairs; but God had ordained
otherwise. The heart, as well as the position of Charles, was unfavorable
to persecution at that time. His familiar intercourse with the Protestants
for nearly six months had taught him that they were not the dangerous
 920
fanatics or the domestic enemies he had understood them to be. He must
have been greatly impressed with the fairness and justness of their cause,
though he could not understand the civil and religious liberties which they
claimed; yet he saw no reason why he should chastise them as rebels for
the pleasure of the pope. Clement and all his Italian adherents were greatly
disappointed that the Emperor had not assumed his proper character as
defender of the church, and had not waged war against the incorrigible
heretics. But in the providence of God this was impossible, even if Charles
had been as blood-thirsty as Clement.
Despatches from the East greatly perplexed the Emperor, and relieved the
Protestants. Solyman had again invaded Hungary at the head of three
hundred thousand men, and for the avowed purpose of dethroning
Ferdinand and placing another on his throne. Such intelligence drew the
thoughts of the Emperor entirely away from Germany. But here we must
leave him for a moment, and notice the position of the Protestants.

THE LEAGUE OF SMALCALD

Immediately after the dissolution of the Diet of Augsburg, and the issuing
of its menacing decree, the Elector of Saxony and his associates proceeded
to adopt such measures as appeared most likely to avert its effects, and to
prepare without delay for the worst extremities. The dread of those
calamities falling on the Reformers, oppressed the feeble mind of
Melancthon, even to the borders of despair; but Luther was neither
disconcerted nor dismayed. By his letters, written from his seclusion at
Coburg, he comforted and encouraged his friends. Convinced that the work
was the work of God, he exhorted the princes to stand firm on the ground
of eternal truth, to trust in the protection of God, and to concede nothing
of the pure gospel to the enemy.
As early as the month of November, 1530, the Landgrave of Hesse, more
impetuous than the rest, and less averse to the doctrines of the Swiss
reformers respecting the Lord’s supper, entered into an alliance for six
years with the cantons of Zurich, Berne, and Basle, and the city of
Strasburg. On the 22nd of the following month, the Landgrave and the
other Protestant leaders met at Smalcald, in Upper Saxony, and laid the
foundation of the famous league, known in history as the “Articles of
 921
Smalcald.” The Landgrave, who had never desisted from his favorite
object of union, took great pains to have the Swiss included in the
Confederacy; but Luther and those who followed him absolutely refused
to admit them.
The Protestant states of the empire, in virtue of this league, were now
formed into one body for their mutual defense. But Luther, and some
others who had written and spoken strongly against any confederacy, even
for the defense of their cause, had great scruples as to the alliance. The
jurists were consulted as well as the divines respecting its legality. The
former affirmed “That there were certain cases in which the laws
permitted resistance to the imperial authority; for, by virtue of the
compact between the Emperor and the states, the Emperor engaged not to
infringe upon the laws of the empire, and the rights and liberties of the
Germanic Church. This compact the Emperor had violated; and therefore
the states had a right to combine together against him.” Luther replied, that
he had not been aware of this, but, being now persuaded that it was so, he
had no objections to make; for the gospel did in no respect invalidate civil
institutions. Yet he could not approve of any offensive war. Here we may
notice in passing that this is the first and fatal downward step of the
Protestants. Through fear of the enemy they are taken off the ground of
faith. Even Luther falls. In place of conscience and the word of God, they
combine to repel force by force.
An affair, not connected with religion, happened about this time, which
furnished the Protestants with a political ground of resistance to the
Emperor. Charles, whose ambitious views enlarged in proportion to the
increase of his power, expressed his desire that his brother Ferdinand
should be elected King of the Romans. Accordingly the Emperor
summoned the electoral college to meet at Cologne for this purpose. The
Elector of Saxony refused to be present; but instructed his eldest son to
appear there, and to “protest against the election as informal, illegal,
contrary to the articles of the Golden Bull, and subversive of the liberties
of the empire.” But the protest was disregarded. The other electors whom
Charles had been at great pains to gain, chose Ferdinand King of the
Romans, who, in a few days after, was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle.
 922
THE SECOND MEETING AT SMALCALD
On the 29th of March, 1531, the Protestants opened their second
assembly at Smalcald. The league, though at first limited to Protestant
electors, princes, and states, was now extended so as to include those,
who, whatever might be their religious sentiments, were opposed to the
Emperor, and protested against the election of Ferdinand. They also took
measures to bring the kings of France, England, and Denmark, as well as
other princes and states, into the Confederacy. The Dukes of Bavaria, and
others who had not been present at the first meeting, now joined the
league. Regulations were made for the levying of supplies and soldiers to
be ready in case of need.

CHARLES SEEKS TO CONCILIATE THE PROTESTANTS

The warlike aspect of the confederates, and the position of Charles in his
Turkish war, led him to court the friendship of the Protestants rather than
to provoke hostilities with them. He greatly needed their assistance, and
sent his order for men and money. But they refused to furnish their
contingent unless peace were secured to them. They reasonably replied,
that it would not be wise in them to place their means of self-defense at
the disposal of their persecutors; accordingly they required, that the
hostile proceedings of the Imperial Chamber — the executive council of
the empire — should be stopped. Charles was now in a great difficulty.
To make this concession would amount to a virtual repeal of the decree of
Augsburg.
After various consultations, the Elector of Mayence and the Prince
Palatine interposed as mediators between the parties. They met at
Schweinfurt, the following articles being proposed by the mediators:
“That the Confession of Augsburg, without further innovation, or any
connection with Zwinglians or Anabaptists, should be the doctrine of the
Protestants until the decision of a council; that these should make no
attempts to diffuse their tenets in the Catholic states, or to disturb the
jurisdiction or ceremonies of the church; that they should furnish supplies
for the Turkish war; that they should submit to the imperial decrees and
tender their allegiance to the Emperor and to the King of the Romans.” The
Protestants objected, but chiefly on account of the elevation of Ferdinand.
 923
They refused to acknowledge the validity of his title, and on this ground
they were supported by some of the Catholic princes and by the Kings of
France and England.

THE PEACE OF RATISBON

The Protestants, now conscious of their own strength, replied to the
mediators, “That the Emperor should proclaim forthwith a general
religious peace; that the two parties should be prohibited from offering
any sort of insult or molestation to each other; that the Imperial Chamber
should be instructed to suspend the execution of the sentences pronounced
on religious matters. If these should be accorded, they promised on their
side not in any way to innovate into their confession; not to interfere with
the ecclesiastical jurisdiction in places where it was still established; to
render the most zealous obedience to the Emperor; and to furnish all
possible supplies for the Turkish war.” After some discussion, when no
agreement seemed possible, the Conference was adjourned to the 3rd of
June, 1532, at Nuremberg.
Meanwhile the Turks were advancing nearer to Austria, and the heart of
the empire was in danger. Such was the state of things when the
Conference resumed its negotiations at the time appointed. But the
discussions and difficulties were speedily disposed of: “The arguments of
the diplomatists were silenced by the march of Solyman; and the
conditions proposed by the Protestants were accepted. The Emperor was
awaiting the result at Ratisbon, and it is recorded that, when the treaty
was at length brought to him, without so much as examining the document,
he affixed his signature.” August 2, 1532.

THE OPINIONS OF HISTORIANS

It may be interesting to notice here, how uniformly historians attribute
this great triumph of the Reformers to the direct intervention of God. “It
is indeed true,” says Waddington, “that it was not by the physical power
of the Protestants, still less by the moral authority of their doctrine, but
solely by that stronger providential dispensation, which converted the
very arms of the infidel into an instrument for the revival of the gospel.
Still it was an advantage of most essential importance. The edicts of
 924
Worms and Augsburg were now virtually suspended; and the interval of
their suspension was indefinite.” Scultetus calls upon us to admire “the
providence of God, which made the Turkish Sultan the great instrument of
annulling, or at least suspending the execution of the decrees of Augsburg
against the Reformation.” Melancthon says, “By the tacit commandment
of God, the Emperor was called away from his designs against the
Germans by the Turkish war. The dogs lick the sores of Lazarus. The
Turk mitigates the edict of Augsburg. No race of men were ever in greater
peril than we were: no party was ever subjected to animosities more bitter
than ourselves. There was no aid but from God.”
And the testimony of the civil historian, Dr. Robertson, is even more
weighty than that of the ecclesiastical historians. He says, “In this treaty
it was stipulated, that universal peace be established in Germany, until the
meeting of a general council, the convocation of which within six months
the Emperor shall endeavor to procure: that no person shall be molested
on account of religion; that a stop shall be put to all processes begun by
the Imperial Chamber against Protestants, and the sentences already
passed to their detriment shall be declared void. On their part, the
Protestants engaged to assist the Emperor with all their forces in resisting
the invasion of the Turks. Thus by their firmness in adhering to their
principles, by the unanimity with which they urged all their claims, and by
their dexterity in availing themselves of the Emperor’s situation, the
Protestants obtained terms which amounted almost to a toleration of their
religion: all the concessions were made by Charles — none by them; even
the favorite point of their approving his brother’s election was not
mentioned; and the Protestants of Germany, who had hitherto been
viewed only as a religious sect, came henceforth to be considered as a
political body of no small consequence.”5
How far their attainment of political importance was conducive to the
interests of Christianity, is another question, and for our own opinion on
that subject we must refer the reader to our exposition of the epistle to
Sardis at the beginning of the volume. The politician and the theologian
should never be united in the same person. The Christian’s citizenship is
in heaven, the principle of his position here is strangership — that of a
pilgrim and a stranger. (1 Peter 2:11; Philippians 3:20.)
 925
The princes nobly redeemed their pledge to Charles. They brought forces
into the field which exceeded the numbers expected. The Imperial army,
by the fresh levies, was increased to ninety thousand well disciplined foot,
and thirty thousand horse, besides a prodigious swarm of irregulars. The
Emperor took the command in person; and mankind waited in suspense
the issue of a decisive battle between the two greatest monarchs in the
world. More than half a million men, of nearly all nations, looked each
other in the face for a time, and closely watched each other’s movements:
but what were the results? The great Sultan, Solyman the Magnificent,
with three hundred thousand men, seemed to have been deprived of
energy, of decision, or to have been intimidated by this display of power,
and quickly withdrew his formidable army without coming to a battle. It is
remarkable, that in such a martial age, this was the first time that Charles,
who had already carried on such extensive wars, and gained so many
victories, appeared at the head of his troops. “In this first essay of his
arms,” says his able biographer, “to have opposed such a leader as
Solyman was no small honor; to have compelled him to retreat, merited
very considerable praise.”
But who, we think, can fail to see a higher hand in this bloodless victory
than the young Emperor’s? When the Turk had terrified Charles into
submission by his appearance, his work was done. The God who rules
over all sent him home. The empire must still be saved for the sake of the
Reformation. Solyman had made great preparations for this campaign, but,
unaccountable to all, save to faith, it ended without any memorable event.
Charles returned to Spain, to superintend his vast military preparations.
The Reformers returned to their peaceful and christian occupations; the
church had rest from persecution, and the period of her tranquillity was
prolonged for well nigh fifteen years.
The Reformation having now gained, through the Lord’s watchful care, a
great triumph and a solid footing in Germany, we may turn for a little and
examine the rise and progress of the reform movement in Switzerland.
 926

CHAPTER 40
THE REFORMATION IN SWITZERLAND

In studying the history of the Reformation in Germany, and that of

Switzerland, the heart is greatly refreshed in observing the perfect unity of
the Spirit’s operations in both countries. Nationally, politically, and
socially, they were widely different. The great monarchical system of
Germany, and the thirteen small republics of Switzerland were contrasts.
In the former, the Reformation had to struggle with the imperial power, in
the latter with the democratic. But, as if by concert, the great work of
God’s Spirit commenced in both places about the same time, and with
precisely the same character of truth. This was clearly of God, and
demonstrates the divine origin of the Reformation. “I began to preach the
gospel,” says Zwingle, “in the year of grace, 1516, that is to say, at a time
when Luther’s name had never been heard in this country. It is not from
Luther that I learnt the doctrine of Christ, but from the word of God. If
Luther preaches Christ, he does what I am doing; and that is all.”
D’Aubigne is the only historian — so far as we know — who takes
particular notice of this interesting fact in its divine aspect. And as he has
now gone to his rest and his reward, it gives us unfeigned pleasure to bear
testimony to the piety of the historian who could thus walk with God in
the midst of his abundant labors. The ways of God in government as well
as in grace are truly edifying if we study them in communion with
Himself. But the most spiritual subjects will prove barren if He fills not
our thoughts. Thus D’Aubigne writes, “Zwingle had no communication
with Luther. There was, no doubt, a connecting link between these two
men; but we must not look for it on earth; it was above. He who from
heaven gave the truth to Luther, gave it to Zwingle also. Their bond of
union was God.”1
But although the Reformation in both places — and in other states of
Europe — derived a striking unity from the One Spirit, the national
features of each are not difficult to discern! In Germany the person of
 927
Luther, as of lofty stature, towers above all his fellow-reformers. He is
seen, he is heard, he is prominent, everywhere and on all occasions.
Nothing can be done, nothing can be settled without him. He is the
acknowledged head of a party. But in Switzerland there was no such
leader. It pleased God to reveal His truth, and to exercise many minds in
different cantons at the same time. A number of noble names, resembling a
republican senate, stood forth as champions of the faith; Justus,
Wittenbach, Zwingle, Leo Juda, Capito, Haller, Farel, OEcolampadius,
Oswald Myconius, and Calvin. But though none of them assumed the
command, one name rises above all the others — Ulric Zwingle.
As the great branch of the professing church, commonly called “The
Reformed Churches,” originated in the Swiss Reformation, it demands a
careful and distinct notice, though comparatively brief. The church
histories best known in the families of this country are Mosheim’s and
Milner’s; but in neither is there any history of the Reformation in
Switzerland. Mosheim, a Lutheran divine, almost ignores it: Milner merely
remarks on some of the leading men in passing. But before we attempt to
trace the history of the Reformation, it may be well to renew our
acquaintance with the religious condition of Switzerland previously to that
great moral revolution.

CHRISTIANITY INTRODUCED INTO SWITZERLAND

Christianity was first introduced into that country of mountains and lakes,
in the seventh century, by St. Gall, a native of Ireland, and a follower of
the great abbot Columbanus.2 After the death of Gallus or St. Gall, his
disciples and other missionaries from Ireland continued to labor for the
conversion of the Swiss, for the founding of monasteries, and for the
propagation of the gospel. A Helvetian church was formed, strictly
Romanist in its character, and yielding submission to papal power. About
the middle of the eleventh century two hermits found their way from St.
Gall to a distant valley on the lake of Zurich. By degrees the valley was
peopled around their cells, and on an elevation of two thousand feet above
the level of the lake, a church was built, and afterwards the village of
Wildhaus. The bailiff or magistrate of this parish, about the end of the
fifteenth century, was a man named Zwingle, the father of our Reformer.
 928
Thus we can trace the light of truth from Ireland to the continent, indeed
throughout Europe and throughout Christendom.
The position of Switzerland, in the bosom of its own mountains, in the
very heart of Europe, has been compared to a military school, through
which the surrounding nations learnt to perfect themselves in the art of
war. The reputation of the Swiss soldiers for courage and endurance, led to
the ruinous habit of enlisting extensively in the service of foreign countries.
Though strongly attached to their native mountains and their native
liberty, the charms of foreign gold induced many to quit their Alpine
pastures for the service of strangers.
This practice became a great national evil. Husbandry was neglected,
families were bereaved of father and son, thousands who left never
returned, and those who did were demoralized, so that the ancient
simplicity of the people was gradually disappearing. But sad to relate —
though recorded by all chroniclers that we know — the great foster-father
of this national calamity was the Roman Pontiff. In his contentions with
other nations he frequently found it necessary to solicit that help from the
cantons, which his own subjects, either from a want of courage or fidelity,
refused to give him. The apostolical treasury supplied the sinews of war,
and the poor but brave Swiss often determined the fortunes of the pope on
the battle-field of northern Italy. The priests, stationed in various parts of
Switzerland, were instructed to prepare the people for this form of
obedience to the holy father. “The deluded mountaineers were taught, that
it was a holy thing to gird their loins for battle, and a glorious martyrdom
to fall in the service of the church.” But such was the growing venality of
the Swiss, that the highest bidders for their services were sure to obtain
them: this led the pope to great liberality in the distribution of indulgences
and benefices; which naturally resulted in the moral corruption and
degradation of both priests and people. From this time, the intense
reverence which the Swiss church had so long entertained for the See of
Rome, rapidly diminished.
“At the commencement of the sixteenth century, the church of
Rome had attained such a height of grandeur and power, that it
seemed impossible that it should be disturbed. Especially in
Switzerland any change of religion appeared hopeless, on account
 929
both of the strict alliance which existed with the pope, and of the
extreme ignorance and corruption which prevailed. But it is in such
circumstances that God is pleased to work, that all the glow may
be given to Him. His righteousness could not permit Him longer to
tolerate the frightful excess of disorder which reigned in the
churches of Europe... But God must have His true worshippers,
who shall worship Him in spirit and in truth.”3
Such was the state of things in general as the new day began to dawn in the
valleys of the Alps. Ulric Zwingle has been styled the apostle of the Swiss
Reformation. He was no doubt the chief instrument in commencing and
carrying on this great work, though some had been in the field before him.
He was possessed of a strong and clear judgment, an ardent lover of the
truth, earnest in its propagation, and animated with a noble zeal for the
glory of God and the good of His church. In many things he was mistaken,
as the best of the Lord’s servants may be, but he is well-fitted to rank
with such men as Luther and Calvin, or the most illustrious names in
ecclesiastical history.

THE BIRTH AND EDUCATION OF ZWINGLE

The family of the Zwingles was ancient, respectable, and at this time in
great esteem in the county of Tockenburg — a small district of lofty
mountains and narrow valleys, covered with wood and pasturage. Ulric
was the third son; he had five brothers and a sister. He was born on New
Year’s day, 1484, in an obscure village on the lake of Zurich, which, from
its mountainous situation, was called Wildhaus, or the Wildhouse.
The father and sons were chiefly engaged with their flocks and herds —
the chief riches of the district. And beyond the narrow sphere of
Tockenburg, Ulric might never have stepped, had not the promising
dispositions of his childhood determined his father to consecrate him to
the church. Before he was ten years of age he was placed under the care of
his uncle, the dean of Wesen. His uncle gave such an account of his
abilities to his father, that with his sanction and assistance he studied
successfully at Basle, Berne, Vienna, and then again at Basle. From the
remarkable progress which he made in his studies and the promising
dispositions he displayed, he was a great favourite with all his masters.
 930
While at Berne, the Dominicans had remarked the beautiful voice of the
young mountaineer, and hearing of his precocious understanding, prevailed
upon him to come and reside in their convent. When the father heard of
this step, he strongly expressed his disapproval and ordered his son
forthwith to leave Berne and proceed to Vienna. The unsuspecting youth
thus escaped from those monastic walls within which Luther suffered so
much, and from the moral effects of which he suffered all his life.
During Zwingle’s second visit to Basle, he studied theology under the
justly celebrated Thomas Wittenbach. From this able theologian, who did
not conceal from his pupils the errors of the church of Rome, Zwingle
seems to have learnt, what Luther about the same time learnt from
Staupitz, the great doctrine of justification by faith. “The hour is not far
distant,” said Wittenbach, “in which the scholastic theology will be set
aside, and the old doctrines of the church revived.” He assured those
earnest young men who flocked around him “that the death of Christ was
the only ransom for their souls.” The warm heart of Zwingle drank in the
truth, and like his master and some of his fellow-students, eagerly rushed
into the new field of conflict.4
Here too, he formed some of his warmest friendships which continued
through life and which death itself could not destroy. Leo Juda, the son of
an Alsatian priest, and Capito, were now the intimate friends of Ulric.
Like the mountaineers in general, and like his compeer, Luther, Zwingle
was a musician, and could play on several instruments: the lute, harp,
violin, flute, dulcimer, and hunting horn, were familiar to him, and were
often applied to in hours of heaviness, or as a relaxation from severer
studies.

ZWINGLE, PASTOR OF GLARIS

After having gone through his course of theology, and taken the degree of
Master of Arts, he was chosen — the same year, A .D . 1506 — by the
community of Glaris to be their pastor. There he remained for ten years,
faithfully discharging his professional duties while diligently studying the
Holy Scriptures. During this time he seems to have acquired in knowledge
and experience the needed preparation for his future services to the Lord
and to His church. “A most interesting manuscript,” says one of his
 931
biographers, “still exists in the library of Zurich — a copy of all St. Paul’s
epistles in the original Greek, with numerous annotations from the
principal fathers, which Zwingle wrote with his own hand, and then
committed entire to memory.” At the end of the MS. is written, “copied
by Ulric Zwingle, 1514.” He also studied the Latin classics, and collected
from the writings of the fathers — especially from Origen, Ambrose,
Jerome, Augustine, and Chrysostom — the doctrines and practices of the
early church. “I study the doctors,” he said, “not as authorities, but with
the same end as when we ask a friend: How do you understand this
passage?” The writings of Wycliffe and Huss he also knew, but like all
students of his age, he devoured the writings of Erasmus as they
successively appeared.
From this time, the ecclesiastical abuses which Rome had introduced
became obvious to his mind; and, while expounding the scriptures from the
pulpit, he faithfully and fearlessly exposed the innovations and
corruptions of the Romish system. This was the dawn of the
Reformation in Switzerland. Zwingle was maintaining the absolute
authority of the truth of God and denouncing the falsehoods of Rome.
While thus engaged, he was obliged to leave his more sacred duties, and
accompany the confederate army on an Italian expedition. Threatened by
Francis I. who vowed to avenge in Italy the honor of the French name, the
pope, in great consternation, entreated the cantons to come to his aid. It
was then the custom in Switzerland for the Landamman, or chief
magistrate of the canton, and the pastor of the parish to take the field with
the troops on such campaigns. In the years 1513 and 1515, Zwingle was
compelled to follow the banner of his parish to the plains of Italy. On the
former of these occasions, the French were defeated by the confederates at
Novara; and monks and priests proclaimed from their pulpits that the
Swiss were the people of God, who avenged the bride of the Lord on her
enemies. But, on the latter occasion he witnessed a signal defeat of his
countrymen on the fatal field of Marignan. There, says history, the flower
of the Helvetian youth perished. And Zwingle, who had been unable to
prevent the great disaster, and overcome by his national feelings and
patriotism, seized a sword and threw himself into the midst of danger.
This was natural, and in those times it was considered noble, but it was
 932
not christian. He forgot for the moment that as a minister of Christ he
should fight only with the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God.
“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal,” says the apostle,
“but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds;
casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself
against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every
thought to the obedience of Christ.” (2 Corinthians 10:4, 5.)
Zwingle now felt more keenly than ever the necessity of reform in both
church and state. He had seen the consequences of the practice long
prevalent among his people, of letting out their soldiers to fight the battles
of other nations, and to settle quarrels which did not belong to them. The
sight of so many of his brave countrymen being slaughtered beyond the
Alps in defense of a faithless and ambitious pope, filled him with
indignation. He raised his voice against the practice; and, through his
means, it was given up by several of the cantons. He also saw when in
Italy, as Luther had seen, the pride and luxury of the prelates, the avarice
and ignorance of the priests, and the licentiousness and dissipation of the
monks. His future course was decided. He ascended the pulpit with a
holier determination to preach the word of God more clearly, more fully,
comparing scripture with scripture; and soon a fresh spirit of inquiry
began to breathe on the mountains and in the valleys of Switzerland.
The question of priority between Zwingle and his Saxon ally, as to their
aggressions on the papacy, has been raised by some historians. Both seem
to have received the truth about the same time, especially the knowledge
of salvation by grace through faith alone; but as a Reformer, Luther
evidently was first in the field. When Zwingle was preaching the gospel in
a comparatively quiet way, Luther was publicly raising the standard of
truth against the dominion of error, and causing his voice to be heard in all
parts of Christendom.

ZWINGLE AT EINSIDLEN
In the autumn of 1516, Zwingle received an invitation from the governors
of the Benedictine monastery of Einsidlen, in the canton of Schweitz, to
be pastor and preacher in the church of the Virgo Eremitana — “Our Lady
of the Hermitage.” The hand of the Lord in bringing his servant to
 933
Einsidlen is very manifest. It was the grand resort of superstition for all
Switzerland, for nearly all Christendom. “It may be called,” says Ruchat,
“the Ephesian Diana, or the Loretto of Switzerland.” Legends of the most
marvellous kind crowd its early history. Here the great Reformer was to
have a nearer view of the idolatrous worship of Rome. The great object of
attraction was an image of the virgin, carefully preserved in the monastery,
and which had, it was said, the power of working miracles. Crowds of
pilgrims flocked to Einsidlen from every part of Christendom, to pay their
devotions and present their offerings.
Over the gate of this abbey the blasphemous inscription was engraven on a
tablet, and supported by the figure of an angel, “Here a plenary remission
of sins may be obtained.” This delusion brought pilgrims from all quarters
to merit this grace by their pilgrimage, at the festival of the virgin. “The
church, the abbey, and all the valley were filled with her devout
worshippers. But it was particularly at the great feast of ‘the consecration
of the angels’ that the crowd thronged the Hermitage. Many thousand
individuals of both sexes climbed in long files the slopes of the mountain
leading to the oratory, singing hymns or counting their beads. Such was
then, and is even to the present day, the scenes at ‘our Lady of the
Hermitage.’ It is computed that not less than a hundred thousand poor
deluded votaries visit this place yearly. Such is popery, even in the
present hour, where it is dominant; and that in a free country, surrounded
by an enlightened population, and within sight of Protestant
establishments.”5
After what we have said of the extraordinary sanctity of this monastery,
the reader may be surprised to find that the abbot, Conrad of Rechburg,
was the most celebrated huntsman and breeder of horses in the whole
country. He was greatly averse to superstition, therefore he preferred his
stud and the field to the Hermitage. When urged by the visitors of the
convent on one occasion to celebrate the sacrifice of the mass, he replied,
“If Jesus Christ is really present in the host, I am unworthy to look upon
Him, much less to offer Him in sacrifice to the Father; and, if He is not
there present, woe unto me if I present bread to the people as the object of
their worship instead of God... I can only cry with David, ‘Have mercy
upon me, O God, according to Thy Loving kindness,’... ‘and enter not into
judgment with Thy servant.’ I desire to know nothing more.”
 934
The manager of the temporalities of the abbey, Baron Geroldseck, was a
man of another order. He is represented as mild in character, sincere in
piety, and a zealous patron of learning. His favorite habit was to invite
learned men to his convent, and, influenced by the fame of Zwingle’s
learning and piety, he had invited him to accept the office of minister of
the abbey church. In this seclusion the young Reformer enjoyed rest,
leisure, the advantages of a library, and congenial friends. The eloquence of
the new preacher and the character of the governor, drew a number of
learned men to Einsidlen. He soon acquired the confidence of the admirers
of Reuchlin and Erasmus, and contracted some of his most intimate and
tender friendships. On this page of his history we find the names of
Francis Zingk, Michael Sander, John OExlin, Capito and Hedio — men,
whose names are famous in the history of the Reformation. But although
he greatly enjoyed reading the scriptures, the fathers, Reuchlin and
Erasmus, with these intelligent men, his real work was Reformation, and,
in as far as he then understood it, he honestly pursued it.

ZWINGLE AND REFORM AT EINSIDLEN

He began with the governor. “Study the scriptures,” said Zwingle to
Geroldseck: “a time may soon come when Christians will not set great
store either by St. Jerome or any other doctor, but solely by the word of
God.” He acted on the prophetic words of the Reformer himself, and also
permitted the nuns in the convent to read the Bible in the vulgar tongue.
And so great was his esteem and affection for Zwingle, that he followed
him to Zurich, and died with him on the field of Cappel, October 11,
1531. The hunting abbot, too, appears to have profited by the
ministrations of the new preacher. He banished almost all superstitious
observances from his abbey, and died in 1526, confessing that he had
confidence in nothing but the mercy of God. Zwingle’s faithful and
energetic preaching drew crowds to the abbey church, and made a great
impression on their minds. He endeavored to lead them away from the
worship of images to faith in Christ; from human inventions and traditions
to the pure doctrine of the gospel. “Seek the pardon of your sins,” he
cried, “not from the blessed Virgin, but in the merits and intercession of
the Lord Jesus Christ.”
 935
What Luther learnt from his visit to Rome, Zwingle learnt from his
residence at Einsidlen. His whole soul was stirred within him when he saw
thousands of pilgrims from the most distant parts of Europe, coming there
to merit the forgiveness of their sins by presenting their offerings to the
patroness of the Hermitage. He did not hesitate between his conscience
and his interests, or the interests of the monastery, but boldly raised his
voice against the delusion. He struck at the very root of the evil, by
proclaiming a free salvation through faith in Christ, without the merit of
pilgrimages, indulgences, vows and penances. He appealed to the
multitudes on two grand fundamental truths more especially — that God
is the source of salvation, and that He is the same everywhere. “Do not
imagine,” said he from the pulpit, “that God is in this temple more than in
any other part of creation. He is as ready to hear prayers at your own
homes as at Einsidlen. Can long pilgrimages, offerings, images, the
invocation of the Virgin, or of the saints, secure for you the grace of God?
What avails the multitude of words with which we embody our prayers?
What efficacy has a glossy cowl, a smooth shorn head, a long and flowing
robe, or gold embroidered slippers?... God looks on the heart, but, alas!
our hearts are far from Him.”
At the same time he preached the doctrine of reconciliation through faith in
the precious sacrifice of Christ once offered on Calvary.
“Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did
beseech you by us; we pray you in Christ’s stead, be ye reconciled
to God. For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin;
that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”
(2 Corinthians 5:20-21.)

THE EFFECT OF ZWINGLE’S PREACHING

Admiring friends might have given a somewhat embellished representation
of Zwingle’s discourses, but the effects produced, according to the record
of the times, plainly prove his great power over the multitudes of pilgrims.
“Language so unexpected produced impressions difficult to describe.
Admiration and indignation were painted alternately on every face while
Zwingle was preaching; and, when at length the orator had concluded his
discourse, a confused murmur betrayed the deep emotions he had excited.
 936
Their expression was restrained at first by the holiness of the place; but,
as soon as they could be freely vented, some, guided by prejudice or
personal interest, declared themselves against this new doctrine; others felt
a fresh light breaking in upon them, and applauded what they heard with
transport Many,” it is said, “were brought to Jesus, who was earnestly
preached to them as the only Savior of the lost; and many carried back
with them the tapers and offerings which they had brought to present to
the Virgin. The grand motto of the preacher to the pilgrims — ‘Christ
alone saves, and He saves everywhere,’ was remembered by many, and
carried to their homes. Often did whole bands, amazed at these reports,
turn back without completing their pilgrimage, and Mary’s worshippers
diminished in number daily.”6
But although Zwingle thus uncompromisingly attacked the superstitions
of the crowd that surrounded him, his orthodoxy was still unsuspected by
the papal party. They saw the power which such a man would have in a
republican state, and their plan was to gain him; they had gained Erasmus
by pensions and honors, why not Zwingle? Besides, the court of Rome
was always politic enough to allow considerable latitude to eminent men,
provided they recognized the supremacy of the pontiff. Just about this
time — 1518 — Zwingle was flattered by the avowed estimation in which
he was held by Pope Leo X., who sent him a diploma, constituting him a
chaplain of the Holy See; and for two years after this he received his
pension from Rome. Both Luther and Zwingle were long in learning that
the Church of Rome could not be reformed, that it was corrupt, root and
branch, and that the voice of God to His people always is, “Come out of
her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive
not of her plagues.” When the Christian finds himself in a wrong position
ecclesiastically, the first thing he has to do is to leave it, trusting the Lord
for further light and future guidance. (Revelation 18:4; Isaiah 1:16, 17;
Romans 12:9.)

ZWINGLE REMOVES TO ZURICH

After remaining nearly three years in Einsidlen, Zwingle received an
invitation from the provost and canons of the cathedral church of Zurich
to become their pastor and preacher. During his residence at Einsidlen he
had become known to many persons of great consideration, and the
 937
number of his friends had greatly increased. But he had no friend more
devoted than Oswald Myconius, master of the public school at Zurich,
and in high esteem there for his piety, learning, and intelligence. In answer
to this call, and the earnest entreaties of Myconius, Zwingle went to
Zurich to talk over the matter, and weigh it well in the presence of the
Lord. Some of the canons, fearing the effects of the innovating spirit of so
bold a preacher, objected to his appointment. But his personal appearance,
as well as his reputation, was in his favor. He was a man of the most
graceful form and manners, his countenance agreeable beyond expression,
mild and gentle in his general bearing, pleasing in conversation, and
celebrated throughout the whole country for his eloquence, seriousness,
and discretion. He was elected by a large majority and removed to Zurich.
On the first day of January, 1519, being his thirty-fifth birthday, Zwingle
entered upon his new office. The divine Master had been educating His
servant during his residence at the Hermitage for this central sphere of
labor. He who had chosen the new university of Wittemberg for the Saxon
Reformer, selected for the Swiss the cathedral church of Zurich. The Lord
was overruling all things for the good of His church and the progress of the
Reformation. The city of Zurich was regarded as the head of the
Confederation. Here the Reformer would be in communication with the
most intelligent and energetic people in Switzerland, and still more with all
the cantons that collected around this ancient and powerful state. The new
and earnest style of Zwingle’s preaching attracted great crowds to the
church, and produced a strong impression on their minds. Soon after his
arrival he was reminded by the administrator of the temporalities that he
must make every exertion to collect the revenues of the chapter, and to
exhort the faithful, both from the pulpit and the confessional, to pay all
tithes and dues, and to show by their offerings their affection for the
church. But Zwingle was happily delivered from the spirit of the
rapacious priests, and bent all his energies in another direction.

ZWINGLE AND THE GOSPEL

Before accepting the office, he had stipulated that he should not be
confined in his preaching to the lessons publicly read, or to certain
passages appropriated to the festivals and different Sundays in the year;
but that he should be allowed to explain every part of the Bible. He saw
 938
that the habit of preaching from a few detached portions year after year
necessarily limits the people’s knowledge of the word of God. He
commenced with the Gospel of St. Matthew. “The life of Christ,” said he
to the Chapter, “has been too long hidden from the people. I shall preach
upon the whole of the Gospel of St. Matthew, chapter after chapter,
according to the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, without human
commentaries, drawing solely from the fountain of scripture, sounding its
depths, comparing one passage with another, and seeking for
understanding by constant and earnest prayer. It is to God’s glow, to the
praise of His only Son, to the real salvation of souls, and to their
edification in the true faith, that I shall consecrate my ministry.” Thus did
Zwingle nobly abandon the exclusive use of the mere scraps of the
Gospels which had been the textbook of the papal preachers since the time
of Charlemagne.
Language so novel, so bold, but obviously so consistent for a minister of
the New Testament, made a deep impression on the college of canons.
“This way of preaching,” exclaimed some, “is an innovation; one
innovation will lead to another; and where shall we stop?... It is not a new
manner,” replied Zwingle, “it is the old custom. Call to mind the homilies
of Chrysostom on St. Matthew, and of Augustine on St. John.” Unlike
Luther, he did not shock men’s minds by his rough and stormy replies; he
was mild and courteous in his intercourse with the heads of the church.
But in the pulpit — his own province — he proclaimed the glad tidings of
salvation with unmeasured heart and voice, and thundered against the
abuses of the times. He everywhere enforced the necessity of an undivided
and unreserved adherence to the written word of God as the only standard
of faith and duty. And so great was the impression which he had made on
the Zurichers, that in little more than a year after his settlement there, the
Supreme Council published an edict, enjoining all preachers and persons
having the care of souls, to teach nothing which they could not prove from
the scriptures, and to pass over in silence the mere “doctrines and
ordinances of men.”
Like a John the Baptist, he called most earnestly upon all classes to
repent. He attacked the prevailing errors and vices among his people —
idleness, intemperance, luxury, the oppression of the poor, and foreign
services. “He spared no one in the pulpit,” says Myconius, “neither pope,
 939
prelates, Emperor, kings, dukes, princes, lords, nor even the confederates
themselves. Never had they heard a man speak with such authority. All
the strength and all the delight of his heart was in God; and accordingly he
exhorted all the city of Zurich to trust solely in Him.” His labors were
attended with the most encouraging success. At the close of his first year
he could reckon upon as many as two thousand persons who had
embraced his opinions, and professed to be converted to the gospel which
he preached. There we leave them. God will judge the heart. But what a
moment for Zurich, for the souls of men! The Lord who is Head over all
things to His church, was sustaining and protecting His servant, and His
Spirit was at work in the hearts and consciences of the people.
Such was God’s chief instrument in the work of Reformation in
Switzerland. His rejection of the errors of the papal system and his
experience of the power of truth, was produced and sustained solely by
the instrumentality of the New Testament, which he diligently perused
with earnest prayer for the teaching of the Holy Spirit. From day-break
until ten o’clock he used to read, write, and translate. After dinner he
listened to those who required his advice; he then would walk out and visit
his flock. He resumed his studies in the afteiTloon; took a short walk after
supper, and then wrote his letters, which often occupied him till midnight.
He always worked standing, and never permitted himself to be disturbed
except for some important matter.” 7

ZWINGLE AND THE SALE OF INDULGENCES

In the month of August, 1518, the bull of Pope Leo X. for the sale of
indulgences throughout Christendom, was published in Switzerland. One
Bernardin Samson, a Franciscan monk of Milan, to whom the pope gave
his commission, crossed the Italian Alps with his long procession of
attendants. He executed the disgraceful traffic entrusted to him by “his
holiness,” with the same blasphemous pretensions, and the same
clamorous effrontery as the notorious Tetzel of Germany. Zwingle was at
that time pastor of the Hermitage, and fearlessly testified against the
imposture and against the personal conduct of Samson. Through the
opposition thus offered by our Reformer, Samson had little success within
the Canton of Schweitz. He thence proceeded to Zug, Lucerne, and
Unterwalden, where he had many purchasers. But being chiefly poor
 940
people, they could not give more than a few pence for an indulgence. This
did not suit Samsoh’s money chest, and he prepared to proceed. “After
crossing,” says the Genevese historian — whose pardonable love for his
native land leads him to embrace every opportunity to speak of its
grandeur — “after crossing fertile mountains and rich valleys, skirting the
everlasting snows of the Oberland, and displaying their Romish
merchandise in these most beautiful portions of Switzerland, they arrived
in the neighborhood of Berne.”
Here Samson was received with some reluctance; but eventually he
succeeded in gaining admission. He entered the town with a splendid
retinue, under banners displaying jointly the arms of the pope and of the
cantons. He set up his stall in St. Vincent’s church, and began to bawl out
his indulgences, varying in price from a few pence to the sum of five
hundred ducats. “Here,” said he to the rich, “are indulgences on parchment
for a crown.” “There,” said he to the poor, “are absolutions on common
paper for two batz” — three halfpence. Such were the shameless
impositions which the emissaries of the Romish church were permitted,
and even commissioned by the pope himself, to practice upon the pitiable
ignorance of its credulous devotees.
From Baden, where his traffic was turned into ridicule by the wits, he
entered the diocese of the bishop of Constance. Acting solely on the
authority of the pontifical bulls, he omitted to present his credentials to
the bishop or to ask his sanction. The bishop was offended at this
disrespectful conduct, and immediately directed Zwingle as the chief
pastor of Zurich, and the other pastors of his diocese to exclude the
stranger from their churches. The bishop was not sorry to have so good a
reason for rejecting the intruder. He was regarded as invading the rights of
bishop, parish priest, and confessor; for they were left short of their dues
by this exciting trade.
In obedience to this mandate, Henry Bullinger, rural dean of Bremgarten,
and father of the illustrious Reformer of the same name, refused to receive
the pope’s agent. After a severe altercation which ended in the
excommunication of the dean, Samson proceeded to Zurich. Meanwhile
Zwingle had been engaged for about two months — seeing the enemy
gradually approaching — in arousing the indignation of the people against
 941
the pope’s pardons. He knew in his own soul, and on the authority of
scripture, the sweetness of God’s forgiveness, through faith in the
precious sacrifice of Christ. Like Luther he often trembled because of his
sinfulness, but he found in the grace of the Lord Jesus a deliverance from
all his fears. “When Satan would frighten me,” he said, “by crying out,
You have not done this or that which God commands! forthwith the gentle
voice of the gospel consoles me by saying, That thou canst not do — and
certainly thou canst do nothing — Christ has done perfectly. Yes, when
my heart is troubled because of my helplessness and the weakness of my
flesh, my spirit is revived at the sound of the glad tidings, Christ is thy
sanctification! Christ is thy righteousness! Christ is thy salvation! Thou
art nothing, thou canst do nothing! Christ is the Alpha and Omega; Christ
is the first and the last; Christ is all things; He can do all things. All created
things will forsake and deceive thee, but Christ, the holy and righteous
One, will receive and justify thee... Yes!” exclaimed the enlightened, the
happy, the humble, but firm Reformer; “Yes! it is Christ who is our
righteousness, and the righteousness of all those who shall ever appear
justified before the throne of God.”
In the knowledge, enjoyment, and proclamation of such soul-emancipating
truths, the Zurichers in general were prepared to shut their gates against
the impostor. When he reached the suburbs, a deputation was appointed
to meet him outside the walls, who informed him that he would be allowed
to retire unmolested, on condition of his revoking the excommunication of
Bullinger. The legate, seeing the strong feeling that was against him,
speedily obeyed and retired. Slowly he moved off with a wagon drawn by
three horses, and laden with the money that his falsehoods had drained
from the poor, he turned towards Italy and repassed the mountains. The
diet immediately addressed a strong remonstrance to the pope, in which
they denounced the disgraceful conduct of his legate, and recommended his
holiness to recall him. Leo replied in about two months — April, 1519 —
with mildness and address. His experience of the Saxon revolution no
doubt led him to hope that by timely concessions he might prevent a
second in the Swiss cantons.
“The Helvetic Diet,” says D’Aubigne, “showed more resolution
than the German. That was because neither bishops nor cardinals
had a seat in it. And hence the pope, deprived of these supporters,
 942
acted more mildly towards Switzerland than towards Germany.
But the affair of the indulgences, which played so important a part
in the German, was merely an episode in the Swiss Reformation.”

THE RISING STORM

The zeal of Zwingle, in assailing and expelling the vendors of indulgences
from the diocese of the bishop of Constance, was much applauded by that
prelate. And John Faber, his vicar, then the warm friend of Zwingle, wrote
to him in terms of kindness and esteem; exhorting him “resolutely to
prosecute what he had auspiciously begun, and promising him the
bishop’s support.” Encouraged by such commendations, and in the hope
that the bishop was disposed to further the work which lay so near his
heart, he invited him both by public and private solicitations, to give his
support to the evangelical truth, and to permit the free preaching of the
gospel throughout his diocese. “I failed not,” says Zwingle, “with all
reverence and humility, publicly and privately, by written addresses to
urge him to countenance the light of the gospel, which he now saw
bursting forth so that no human power could avail to stifle or suppress it.”
But the Reformer soon found that a change had taken place in the mind of
the bishop and his vicar since the indulgence seller had left the country.
“They,” he adds, “who had lately excited me by their reiterated
exhortations, now deigned me no answer beyond these public and official
documents; yet the vicar in the first instance, expressly assured me, both
by word of mouth and by letter, that his bishop could no longer endure the
insolence and unjust arrogance of the Roman Pontiff.”
John Faber — whom we have seen at Augsburg, in association with Eck
and Cochlaeus — after this break with Zwingle, became one of the most
persevering enemies of the Reformation. The Reformer, from the
commencement of his ministry at Zurich, had labored unweariedly to
instruct the people in the meaning, object, and character of the gospel, and
at the same time to impress upon them the importance of being guided in
all their religious duties by the scriptures of truth only.
“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in
 943
righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, throughly
furnished unto all good works.” (2 Timothy 3:16, 17.)
Nothing can be a “good work” for the performance of which, scripture
gives us no information. Such views and such teaching Zwingle had soon
to prove, could not long be approved by the dignitaries of the papal
hierarchy. But by the blessing of God, from this time henceforward, he
was to place all his hopes and expectations on a surer foundation. Antonio
Pucci, the pope’s legate, endeavored to seduce him, but in vain. “He
conferred with me four times,” says Zwingle, “and made me many
splendid promises; but I told him that from that time forward I should
devote myself, by the divine grace, to the preaching of the word, as the
effectual means of shaking the power of the papacy.”
Thus prepared to proceed inflexibly on his course, he resigned in the
year 1520 a pension which he received from Rome for the purchase of
books, and as chaplain of the holy see. “Formerly,” he says, “I thought
myself permitted to enjoy the liberality of the pope, so long as I could
maintain with a pure and pious conscience his religion and his doctrines;
but after the knowledge of the Son had grown up in me, I renounced for
ever both the pontiff and his presents.”
The effects of Zwingle’s preaching upon the minds of the people, and the
influence of his presence in Zurich, were first displayed about this time.
Many of the ceremonies of the Roman church were disregarded and fell
into disuse. The fast of Lent, which had hitherto been kept with the
utmost strictness, was neglected by the townspeople. The civil authorities
became alarmed, and on the complaint of several priests some were thrown
into prison. The people maintained that in their liberty as Christians they
had given up such distinctions of meats. The bishop of Constance, hearing
of the unsettled state of things, instantly issued an edict against the
innovations and the innovators, exhorting the people by his agents to
remain stealfast to the church, at least till after the decision of the council
— the usual salvo. The monks, who had been ordered by an edict of the
senate, to preach the word of God only, were confounded. Most of them
had never read it. This decree became the signal for the most violent
opposition from every order of monks and priests. Plots began to be
formed against the head pastor of Zurich; his life was threatened.
 944
Sometimes it was considered necessary to place a patrol in the street to
protect the Reformer and his friends.
Zwingle now saw the storm gathering in all quarters and well he knew
against whom its fury would be directed. But this only aroused his zeal,
and led him to write pamphlets in vindication of the truth and his friends,
and to send them broadcast over the land. The principles of the
Reformation now made such progress throughout Switzerland, that
Erasmus, in a letter which he wrote in 1522 to the president of the court of
Mechlin, declared, that “the spirit of Reform had so much increased in the
Helvetic confederacy that there were two hundred thousand who abhorred
the See of Rome, and are to a great extent adherents of Luther.”
Seeing that the work of Reformation is thus hopefully commencing in
other parts of the Helvetic republic, we may here pause for a little, and
briefly notice some of these positions, and some of the principal men with
whom we shall become better acquainted as we proceed.
 945

CHAPTER 41
THE LEADERS OF THE REFORMATION IN
SWITZERLAND

Having rapidly traced the course of proceedings in the successive scenes of

Zwingle’s labors in the three cantons, Glaris, Schweitz, and Zurich, we
will now pass on to other scenes and make ourselves acquainted with
some of those devoted men whom God raised up and fitted for the same
blessed work of His sovereign grace and power in Switzerland.
John Hausschein, which in Greek is OEcolampadius, was born in the
year 1482 at Winsperg, in Franconia, about a year before Zwingle and
Luther. He was descended from a respectable family which had come from
Basle. His father at first destined him to business or the legal profession;
but his pious mother desired to consecrate him to God and His church; and
to this end she watched over him like Monica over Augustine. He was of a
mild and peaceful disposition, of excellent character, and from early life he
was distinguished above his contemporaries for his progress in learning.
He was sent to Heidelberg and hence to Bologna, where he studied
jurisprudence; but as this study was contrary to his own inclination and
the desire of his mother, his father was willing that he should devote
himself to theology.
In accordance with the wish of his parents he commenced his ministry in
his native place; but from an over-sensitive mind, he was persuaded that
he was not qualified for such a charge, and in a short time left for Basle. He
was appointed to the principal church there, and two years afterwards he
was promoted by the University to the dignity of doctor in theology. He
was a sincere Christian, an earnest and an eloquent preacher of Christ. He
was greatly loved and admired by his hearers, not only for his public
ministrations, but for his humility, meekness, and piety. Meanwhile he
made such unusual proficiency in the three languages of religion as to
attract the attention of Erasmus. Basle was then the great city of learning
and of the printing press. “Erasmus was at this time engaged in preparing
 946
his first edition of the New Testament, and obtained the assistance of
OEcolampadius in comparing the quotations from the Old Testament,
which are found in the New, with the Hebrew original.” OEcolampadius
soon became enthusiastically attached to Erasmus, and might have suffered
seriously in his soul from his ideas of a half-way Reformation; but the
Lord in His good providence called him away for a time to the quiet retreat
of his native place. Erasmus seems to have been equally fond of the
youthful preacher. He thus acknowledges the important service he
rendered him: “In this part I have received no little aid from the subsidiary
labors of a man eminent not for his piety only, but for his knowledge of
the three languages, which constitutes a true theologian. I mean John
OEcolampadius; for I had not myself made sufficient progress in Hebrew
to authorize me to pronounce on those passages.”
From Basle he removed to Augsburg, having received an invitation from
the canons of the cathedral church to become preacher there. Here he had
the opportunity of preaching Christ to large numbers of the people, but
again his timidity of mind pursued him and induced him to resign. Though
a Christian, he had not found perfect rest for his soul in the finished work
of Christ. Peace with God is the only remedy for such uneasy, restless
souls. It gives stability and consistency to the mind even in the ordinary
affairs of this life. We can look at things more calmly, weigh them up in
the presence of God, and estimate them in the light which makes manifest
the nature and reality of everything. “I have set the Lord always before
me,” says the psalmist, and what are the consequences? “He is at my right
hand, I shall not be moved, my heart is glad, my glory rejoiceth.” These are
the unfailing consequences of having the Lord always before us as our one
object: at our right hand, the place of strength; hence follow — stability of
mind, gladness of heart, always rejoicing. But like thousands more, and in
all ages, OEcolampadius had not left the corrupt system in which he found
himself. In place of ceasing to do evil, and then learning to do well (as
exhorted in the Old Testament), or abhorring that which is evil, then
cleaving to that which is good (as in the New Testament), he remained in
Rome and vainly desired a purification of Romanism. Disappointed and
despairing, as every sincere heart must be that tries to patch the old
garment in place of accepting the new one, he threw himself into a
monastery, proposing to spend his future days in retirement and study.
 947
There he remained for nearly two years, and there he became acquainted,
like Luther, with that monastic life which is the highest expression of the
papal system. After leaving the cloister of Saint Bridget, he found a refuge
in the castle of the celebrated Francis Sickingen, then the resort of so many
learned men; after his death he returned to Basle, where he engaged in good
earnest in the work of the Reformation, and where he spent the remainder
of his days.
Leo Juda is represented by historians as a man of small stature, but of a
heroic mind: as full of love for the poor, and of zeal against false doctrine;
indeed, it was said of Leo Juda, that whatever constitutes a good man was
not only found but abounded in him. He was born in the year 1482, and
was descended from a family of some rank in Alsace. After studying for a
time at Schlestadt, he removed in 1505 to Basle, and there became the
fellow-student of Zwingle under the excellent Wittenbach. His first
pastoral charge, like OEcolampadius, was in his own province, but like
him also he very soon left it and returned to Basle. Having preached for
some time in the church of St. Theodore, he succeeded Zwingle at
Einsidlen in 1518, and from thence he removed to Zurich in 1523, to
occupy the station of pastor of Saint Peter’s; and to become a true yoke-
fellow to Zwingle in the work of the Reformation. Besides being an earnest
preacher of the gospel, he was a diligent student of the writings of
Reuchlin, Erasmus, and Luther. He translated into the German language a
paraphrase of the New Testament by Erasmus; which was considered at
the time of great importance, as scarcely any exposition of the scriptures
in the vernacular tongue was then in circulation. He also employed his
knowledge of the Hebrew in the production of valuable translations of the
sacred writings into the German and Latin languages.
Conrad Kirsner, or Pellican, was also a native of Alsace, and born in the
year 1478. He was celebrated for his acquaintance with Hebrew and other
oriental literature, which he consecrated to the illustration of divine truth.
Much against the wishes of his friends he entered upon the monastic life at
the age of sixteen. At the age of twenty-four, his learning and piety
recommended him to the office of professor of theology at Basle; and two
years afterwards he received the degree of doctor in divinity by a bull from
the pope. He was taken ill at Milan on his way to Italy — where he was
to be crowned with higher honors — but he returned to Basle, and was
 948
employed by the bishop to draw up a summary of the chief points of
christian doctrine, directly from the sacred scriptures. His fame, influence,
and honors rapidly advanced, but with them a great and salutary change of
mind. He had now begun to distrust the reigning doctrines and figments of
popery — indulgences, confessions, purgatory, and the pope’s
supremacy. The writings of Luther began at this time to be spread abroad;
the ninety-five theses which that Reformer had published were put into
his hand, with which he agreed in the main, but hoped that Luther would
explain himself more fully. After this Pellican gradually prepared to
renounce his monastic cowl, and his prospects of advancement; he labored
to disseminate the pure truth of God for some time at Basle, and in the
year 1526 removed to Zurich, where he continued till his death in 1556.
Wolfgang Fabricus Koefflin, or Capito, was the son of an Alsatian
senator. His mother was of noble family. He was born at Haguenau in the
year 1478. Thus the province of Alsace has the honor of being the
birthplace of three most distinguished men and zealous Reformers.
Capito’s own inclination was the church, but as his father had a strong
dislike to the character of the clergy and the theology of the times, he
applied himself to medicine; indeed he successively studied physics,
divinity, and canon-law, and gained the degree of doctor in each; but after
his father’s death he confined himself to his original choice of the clerical
profession.
His career may be briefly stated. He was professor of philosophy for a
short time at Friburg, then preacher at Spires for three years; when on a
visit to Heidelberg, he formed an acquaintance with OEcolampadius which
was interrupted only by the death of the latter. In 1513 he found his way
to Basle. On the invitation of the senate, he accepted the office of minister
of the cathedral church of their city. Erasmus speaks of him as “a
profound theologian, a man eminently skilled in the three languages, and of
the utmost piety and sanctity.” When settled at Basle, he persuaded his
friend OEeolampadius to join him there. This was the dawn of the
Reformation in that place. These two devoted men labored abundantly in
the gospel and in the ministry of the word. Much good seed was sown,
which produced a rich harvest in the salvation of souls to the glory of God
the Father.
 949
For five years, ending with 1520, Capito had been happily engaged in
expounding the scriptures, especially the Gospel of Matthew, to large
congregations; and he thus announced, in that year, his progressive
success: “Here matters are constantly improving. The theologians and
monks are with us. A very large audience attends my lectures on
Matthew. There are some indeed who threaten dreadful things against
Luther; but the doctrine is too deeply rooted to be torn up by violence.
Some accuse me of favoring Lutheranism; but I carefully conceal from
them my inclination.” This smooth state of things did not long continue.
He was charged with the heresy of Luther; a conspiracy of priests and
monks was formed against him; and, being at that time solicited by Albert,
Archbishop of Mentz, to become his chancellor, he accepted the invitation
and left the place. The people hearing of this were greatly excited, their
indignation was roused against the priests and the monks, and a violent
commotion broke out in the city.
The fame of Capito as a man of learning and piety was now so great, that
Leo X., unsolicited, conferred on him a provostship. The Emperor,
Charles V., raised him to the rank of a noble; and Albert, the first prince of
the German Empire, gave him the appointment of ecclesiastical counsel-lor
and chancellor. But these high positions and honors did not suit the spirit
of his mind, the real desire of his heart; though at that time he little
understood the great work for which the Lord was preparing him.
Gradually, his eyes were opening to the discovery of the truth; the mass
became offensive to his conscience, and he refused to celebrate it any
more. After being about three years at the court of the cardinal archbishop,
he resigned, and joined Bucer at Strasburg as a humble preacher of the
gospel, where he continued till his death in 1541. This was the work in
which his soul delighted. He began to urge the necessity of a reformation,
and of vigorously prosecuting the work in dependence upon the living
God. He and Pellican, as early as 1512, were of one mind as to the Lord’s
supper being a memorial or remembrance of Christ. This was long before
the doctrine was taught publicly by the Swiss Reformers.
Caspar Hedio was a native of the Marquisate of Baden in Suabia. He was
educated and graduated at Basle. He labored long and successfully in the
gospel, first at Mayence, and then at Strasburg. When Capito left Basle,
Hedio was chosen as his successor. The papal party objected. “The truth
 950
stings,” says the indefatigable preacher, “it is not safe now to wound
tender ears by preaching it; but it matters not! Nothing shall make me
swerve from the straight path.” The monks redoubled their efforts. “He is
Capito’s disciple,” they cried, and the general disturbance increased. “I
shall be almost alone” wrote Hedio to Zwingle about this time, “left in my
weakness to struggle with these pestilent monsters. Learning and
Christianity are now between the hammer and the anvil. Luther has just
been condemned by the Universities of Louvain and Cologne. If ever the
church was in imminent danger, it is now.” He seems to have retired some
time after this to Strasburg, where his labors were less interrupted. He was
a man of a mild and moderate temper.
Berthold Hailer, the Reformer of Berne, was born at Aldingen in
Wurtemberg, about the year 1492. He studied at Pforzheim, where
Simmler was his teacher, and Melancthon his fellow student. The Bernese,
who had been hostile to the new opinions, and incensed at Zurich for the
countenance it had given to what they called Lutheranism, began to relax in
their prejudices under the gentle but evangelical preaching of Berthold
Haller. In the year 1520, he was appointed to a canonry and preachership
in the cathedral. He was joined in his labors by Sebastian Meyer, a
Franciscan, who had been a papist, but was now a zealous preacher of the
gospel of the grace of God. Hailer was possessed of considerable learning
and eloquence, and his powers as a preacher gained him great influence
with the citizens. By the united efforts of these two Reformers, the state
of religious feeling in a short time was such as to call for the interference of
the government.
Naturally timid and diffident, he applied to Zwingle for counsel in his
troubles, and confided to him all his trials; and Zwingle was well fitted to
inspire him with courage. “My soul is overwhelmed,” said he one day to
Zwingle, “I cannot support such unjust treatment. I am determined to
resign my pulpit and retire to Basle, to employ myself wholly, in
Wittenbach’s society, in the study of sacred learning.” “Alas!” replied
Zwingle, “And I too feel discouragement creep over me when I see myself
unjustly assailed; but Christ awakens my conscience by the powerful
stimulus of His threatenings and promises. He alarms me by saying,
‘Whosoever shall be ashamed of Me before men, of him shall I be ashamed
before My Father;” and He restores me to tranquillity by adding,
 951
‘Whosoever shall confess Me before men, him also will I confess before My
Father.’ Oh! My dear Berthold, take courage! Our names are written in
imperishable characters in the annals of the citizens on high. I am ready to
die for Christ... Oh! that your fierce bear-cubs would hear the doctrine of
Jesus Christ, then would they grow tame. But you must undertake this
work with great gentleness, lest they should turn round furiously, and rend
you in pieces.” Berthold’s courage greatly revived. The flame that burned
so brightly in Zwingle’s bosom rekindled that of Haller’s. He preached
with increasing zeal and power, and by the blessing of God, the pure
gospel was restored to the republic of Berne, whence it had so long been
exiled.
Oswald Myconius — to be distinguished from Frederick Myconius, the
disciple of Luther — was a native of Lucerne, and born in 1488. He
studied at Basle, where he became known to many learned men who then
formed the circle of Erasmus, but more especially to Zwingle. He presided
over the public school, first at Basle, then at Zurich, and afterwards in his
native town of Lucerne. From the strong military spirit which prevailed in
this canton, the preacher of the gospel of peace, who ventured to condemn
the practice of foreign service, or who sought to restrain their warlike
habits, was instantly met by the most determined and violent opposition.
“He is a Lutheran,” was the cry, “and Luther must be burned, and the
schoolmaster with him.” He was summoned to appear before the council,
and forbidden to read Luther’s works to his pupils, or ever to mention him
before them, or even to think of them. “But what need has anyone to
introduce Luther,” he answered, “who has the Gospels and the writings of
the New Testament to draw from?” His naturally gentle spirit was
wounded and depressed: “Everyone is against me,” he exclaimed, “assailed
by so many tempests, whither shall I turn, or how shall I escape them? If
Christ were not with me, I should long ago have fallen beneath their
blows.” In the year 1523, he was expelled from Lucerne, and after several
changes he became the successor of OEcolampadius at Basle, both in his
professorship and his pulpit; and continued in that situation till his death
in 1552. He labored much to disseminate the truth, and his services to the
cause of reform were great and valuable.
Joachim Von Walt, or Vadian, was a distinguished layman, a native of
St. Gall, where he was eight times raised to the consulate. He was
 952
intimately acquainted with almost every kind of learning; but at an early
period his mind became affected by the great question of Reform, and, by
the grace of God, he steadily, zealously, and with great wisdom and
prudence promoted the cause of the Reformation. He more than once
presided at the great public disputations by which the good work was so
materially advanced in Switzerland.
Thomas and Andrew Blaurer were of a noble family at Constance, and
both labored early in the cause of the Reformation. The latter, in
particular, is distinguished as the Reformer of his native city. This city, so
famous in the history of papal persecution and christian stedfastness, was
also favored with the devoted labors of Sebastian Hoffmeister and John
Wauner. They nobly maintained the doctrines of the Reformation in that
celebrated city, though they suffered for so doing.1

REFLECTIONS ON THE DAWNING

OF THE SWISS REFORMATION
Who could fail to see and adore the good providence and sovereign grace of
God in this noble array of witnesses for Christ and His gospel! So many
different men, in so many different places — as if by concert — all
studying the same truths, from the same motives, with the same desires,
and persuaded of the same results, and yet, for a time, without the
knowledge of each other, and independently of the same character of
movement in Germany. We have avoided bringing down the history of
these pioneers to a later period than about 1520 — a year before the Diet
of Worms — when the name and writings of Luther were beginning to find
their way into other lands.
The attentive reader must have noticed that most of the leaders we have
named were men of high character, of great learning and ability, with the
most flattering prospects as to preferments and honors; all of which they
willingly sacrificed that they might devote themselves entirely to the Lord
Jesus Christ and the service of His gospel. And God — who never forgets
to honor them that honor His Son — accepted the willing sacrifice, and
consecrated their learning, talents, and character, to the accomplishment of
His own great work. He made their moral weight to be felt by their most
prejudiced enemies. Here it may be truly said, “The Lord gave the word;
 953
great was the company of those that published it.” (Psalm 68:11.) And it
has been remarked, that these eminent men were like brethren dwelling
together in unity; that they were all firm and faithful friends, even unto
death; and not a discordant note was heard among them.
The heart of faith leaps with joy to see so manifestly the hand and power
of God working for the glory of His Son, and the emancipation of His
church from the thraldom of popery. There is nothing more wonderful in
this world than the triumphs of truth when the Spirit of God is working.
What have we before us now? As at the beginning, a few men, by the force
of truth alone, engage to change the religious views, feelings, and ways of
their contemporaries. The veneration of mankind for antiquity, for the
religion of their ancestors, and a thousand different interests arise to arrest
its progress; the kings of the earth and their armies, the pontiff and his
emissaries, combine to oppose the new doctrines and to silence the
witnesses by death: but this work is of no avail, unless it be to purify the
motives and deepen the zeal of the Reformers. To the natural eye the
obstacles must appear invincible; yet the cause of truth prevails, every
obstacle is surmounted, and without any visible means, save the preaching
of the word and prayer.
In proceeding with our history we shall see the truth of this. Whole
nations, obedient to the voice of the Reformers, abandon the worship of
their fathers, destroy their idols, and overthrow in one day the usages of
many generations. That which at first appeared to be a dispute, only
interesting to theologians, produced a great moral revolution, the influence
of which extended over the civilized world.2

PROGRESS OF THE REFORMATION — ZURICH A.D. 1522

It was in the course of the year 1520 — as we have already seen — that
the civil authorities of Zurich first interfered with the work of the
Reformation. The effect produced upon the middle and lower classes by
the preaching of Zwingle then began to display itself. In addition to the
subject of Lent, which then came before the senate, through the edict of
the bishop of Constance, Zwingle called the attention of the Zurichers to
the gross licentiousness which prevailed in Switzerland through the
celibacy of the clergy; and in a private letter to the bishop he entreated him
 954
not to promulgate any edict injurious to the gospel, nor any longer to
tolerate fornication, nor to enforce the celibacy of the priesthood. “In
some of the cantons the priests were required to keep concubines, and
everywhere that practice was permitted for money.” Instead, however, of
listening to the needed and respectful remonstrance of the Reformer, the
bishop began to persecute several of the clergy who were known to have
embraced the new opinions. They were branded as Lutheran heretics,
and denounced as holding opinions hostile to the See of Rome. Until this
time the Swiss Reformers had not met with any public or systematic
opposition: but now, the church implored the state to interfere and arrest
their progress everywhere.
But under the good providence of God, the opposition which now arose in
so many quarters was overruled for the deepening and the extension of the
work. The controversies and the public disputations were eminently used
in Switzerland for the furtherance of the Reformation. The wind of
persecution but scattered the good seed of the kingdom, and caused it to
take root all over the land. “The priests stood up,” says the Swiss
historian, “as in the days of the apostles, against the new doctrines.
Without these attacks, it would probably have remained hidden and
obscure in a few faithful souls. But God was watching the hour to
manifest it to the world. Opposition opened new roads for it, launched it
on a new career, and fixed the eyes of the nations upon it. The tree that
was destined to shelter the people of Switzerland had been deeply planted
in her valleys, but storms were necessary to strengthen its roots and
extend its branches. The partisans of the papacy, seeing the fire already
smouldering in Zurich, rushed forward to extinguish it, but they only made
the conflagration fiercer and more extensive.”3

THE MONKS CONSPIRE AGAINST ZWINGLE

In the year 1522, the new doctrines had made such progress at Zurich, as
not only to cause the bishop but the senate considerable anxiety. The
divisions and confusion that had prevailed for some time in the city were
evidently on the increase. And the monks, encouraged by their superiors,
raised the accustomed cry of heresy, sedition, and infidelity. There were
three orders of monks in the city — Dominicans, Franciscans, and
Augustinians. These formed a conspiracy against Zwingle, and charged
 955
him before the magistrates with “incessantly attacking their orders, and
exposing them in his discourses to the contempt and ridicule of the
people.” They petitioned the senate to silence the preacher, and to repeal
the edict of 1520; or at least to allow them to draw their sermons from
Aquinas and Scotus. The authorities not only refused the petition but
renewed the order — “that nothing should be introduced into the pulpit
which could not be clearly proved from the written word of God.” The
exasperated monks were no longer careful to conceal their intentions, but
vowed, that if Zwingle did not restrain his hostilities, they would be
driven to adopt more violent measures.
The bishop, about the same time, made his second and great appeal to the
senate. He laid before that body many and heavy charges against Zwingle.
A long exhortation was addressed to the clergy and magistrates of his
diocese, and also to the provost and chapter of the city. These
exhortations were accompanied by copies of the pope’s bull, with the
edict of Worms against Luther, and all were entrusted to three
ecclesiastical deputies.
When Zwingle stood up and replied to the various accusations of the
bishop, his adversaries were completely silenced. But he was so
distressed, so grieved in spirit, by the presence of his accusers, who were
once his intimate friends, and also by the general state of matters, that he
respectfully requested that a public conference should be held, at which he
might have an opportunity of defending himself and his doctrines.
Meanwhile he employed his pen with all diligence that he might make
more widely known the truths which he held and taught, and the errors
and abuses against which he testified.

THE PUBLICATIONS OF ZWINGLE

In July, 1522, he addressed to the members of the Helvetic Confederation
at large, a “Pious and Friendly Exhortation,” entreating them “not to
obstruct the preaching of the gospel, or discountenance the marriage of the
clergy.” “Fear nothing,” he said to the heads of the cantons, “from granting
us this liberty; there are certain signs by which everyone may know the
truly evangelical preachers. He who, neglecting his own private interest,
spares neither pains nor labor to cause the will of God to be known and
 956
revered, to bring back sinners to repentance, and give consolation to the
afflicted, is undoubtedly in unison with Christ. But when you see teachers
daily offering new saints to the veneration of the people, whose favor
must be gained by offerings, and when the same teachers continually hold
forth the extent of sacerdotal power, and the authority of the pope, you
may believe that they think much more of their own profit, than of the
care of the souls entrusted to them.”
“If such men counsel you to put a stop to the preaching of the
gospel by public decrees, shut your ears against their insinuations,
and be certain that it is their aim to prevent any attacks from being
made upon their benefices and honors; say that if this work cometh
of men, it will perish of itself, but that if it cometh of God, in vain
would all the powers of the earth league together against it.”4
After explaining the nature of the gospel, and showing that all salutary
doctrine is to be drawn from the scriptures alone, he touches on the
immorality thai prevailed among the ecclesiastics as one great prejudice to
the cause of Christianity; he pleads most earnestly against the prohibition
of marriage to the clergy — proving that it is a modern device, for the
purpose of aggrandising the church, by breaking the ties which should
attach the ministers of religion to the people, by rendering them strangers
to the domestic affections, and thus concentrating all their zeal upon the
interests of the particular body, or order, to which they belong, and the
upholding of the papal system.
He addressed a similar remonstrance about the same time to the bishop of
Constance; “in which,” says Hess, “he conjured the bishop to put himself
at the head of those who were laboring to accomplish a Reform in the
church, and to permit to be demolished with precaution and prudence,
what had been built up with temerity.” These two petitions were signed by
Zwingle and other ten of the most zealous advocates of the Reformation in
Switzerland.
The exhortation, or mandate, of the bishop to the chapter of Zurich, drew
forth from Zwingle another work which he called his “Archeteles,” a
word which signifies “the beginning and the end;” it was a summary of the
main points at issue between the Reformers and their adversaries. “This
work,” says Gerder, “exhibits a true picture of the Zwinglian Reformation
 957
— very different from what it has been represented by many writers.” It
obtained more celebrity than his previous pamphlets, and was highly
esteemed, not only in Switzerland, but in foreign countries, as proving the
author to be “mighty in the scriptures,” and one who united an intrepid
courage with true christian moderation.5
While these things were taking place in connection with Zurich, the
bishop, now distrusting his own power to repress the growing
dissensions, appealed to the national assembly held at Baden, and claimed
the interference of the entire Helvetic body for the execution of his
decrees. But the seeds of the Reformation were springing up there as
strongly as at Zurich, at least among the pastors, for they had come to the
unanimous resolution of preaching no doctrine which they could not prove
from scripture. “This appeal of the bishop,” says Waddington, “ended in
the persecution of a single and humble delinquent.” One Urban Wyss,
pastor of Visisbach, in the County of Baden, boldly preached against the
invocation of saints; he was seized and delivered over to the prelate; and a
long imprisonment, which he endured at Constance, has distinguished him
as the first of the Swiss Reformers who suffered for the truth’s sake.

ZWINGLE AND HIS BROTHERS

As we mentioned in connection with the early days of our Reformer, that
he had five brothers, it may be interesting to notice, that they were all alive
at this period of his history, and, hearing such reports concerning Ulric’s
apostasy, they manifested great uneasiness about their brother, and
wished to see and confer with him on the subject. Although their anxiety
seems to have been more for the respectability of their family than for the
salvation of his soul, it gave him an opportunity of writing most fully and
freely on the great subject of the gospel, and of expressing the deep
christian feelings of his heart.
After expressing his most sincere affection for his brothers, and the deep
interest he always feels in their welfare, he assures them that he will never
cease to discharge faithfully and diligently the duties of a christian pastor,
unmoved by the fear of the world or the powerful tyrants that rule in it.
“With respect to myself,” he says, “I am not at all solicitous; for I have
long since committed myself and all that concerns me to the hands of
 958
God... Be assured there is no kind of evil which can befall me, that I have
not fully taken into my account, and that I am not prepared to meet. I
know indeed that my strength is perfect weakness. I know also the power
of those with whom I have undertaken to contend. But as St. Paul says
concerning himself, I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth
me... But you — ‘What a disgrace would it be, and with what infamy
would it brand our whole family, should you be brought to the stake as a
heretic, or otherwise suffer an ignominious death? And what profit could
result from it?’ My dearest brothers, hear my answer, Christ the Savior
and Lord of all, whose soldier I am, hath said,
‘Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate
you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your
name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap
for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven.’ (Luke 6:22, 23.)
Hence learn, that the more my name is branded with infamy in this world
for the Lord’s sake, the more will it be had in honor in the sight of God
Himself... Christ the Son of God condescended to shed His blood for our
salvation: he, therefore, is a cowardly soldier of His, and unworthy the
name, who would not willingly sacrifice his life for the glory of his
commander; but rather, like one who, basely casting away his shield,
contemplates disgraceful flight...
“You are my own brothers, and as such I acknowledge you; but if
you will not be my brothers in Christ, I must grieve over you with
the deepest pain and sorrow; for the word of the Lord requires us
to forsake even father and mother if they would draw away our
hearts from Him. Rely on the word of God with an unhesitating
and assured mind. Carry all your sorrows and complaints to
Christ, pour out your prayers before Him; seek from Him alone
grace, peace, and the remission of your sins. Finally, be joined to
Christ by such an intimate tie and bond of union, that He may be
one with you, and you one with Him. God grant, that being
received under His guardian care, you may be led by His Spirit, and
under His teaching! Amen. I will never cease to be your faithful
brother, if only you will be the brethren of Christ. — At Zurich, in
great haste, in the year of Christ, 1522.”
 959
These deep breathings of the innermost soul of Zwingle must command
the grateful praise of every renewed heart to the God of all grace. What
devotion to Christ, to His gospel, to His church, to his own relatives, to
his country, to mankind! How evidently, how wonderfully, taught of
God! His knowledge of the way of salvation, and his deeper entrance into
the grand rest-giving truth of the believer’s identification with Christ, fill
our hearts with admiring delight. True, he did not understand deliverance
through death from sin, Satan, and the world, as taught in Romans 6 and
similar portions; nor could he have known the teaching of scripture on the
subject of the church as the body of Christ, according to that word —
“For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we
be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all
made to drink into one Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 12:13.)
But he understood that there was communion in grace and blessing
through faith in Christ’s precious sacrifice. Had he been more under “the
power of His resurrection” he would have been less of what his
biographers call “the christian patriot, the christian hero.” Not that he
would have loved his neighbor, his kindred, or mankind less, but he would
have manifested his love more in accordance with the spirit of one who is
not only dead, but risen in Christ, and joined unto the Lord by one Spirit
— the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Like Luther he held that justification
by faith alone is the key-stone of Christianity; though, evidently, he was
less under the power of prejudice, and had a much broader view of divine
truth than the Saxon Reformer, and a more elevated style of expressing it.

THE DISPUTATIONS AT ZURICH

In compliance with the request of Zwingle, already noticed, the senate of
Zurich proclaimed a conference for the discussion, or the composing, of
religious differences, to be held on January 29th, 1523. This was the first
of those public disputations which, under the overruling providence of
God, so rapidly advanced the progress of the Reformation. An invitation
was given to all persons who had anything to allege against the chief
pastor to come forward publicly and state their charges.
One noble stipulation, however, was announced by the senate — “that all
appeals must be made to the scriptures, as the sole rule of judgment, and
 960
not to mere custom or the traditions of men.” The clergy of the canton
were invited, and the bishop was especially entreated to appear in person,
or, if that were impossible, to send competent representatives.
That all parties might be well informed as to the subjects proposed for
discussion, and that none might plead that they were taken by surprise,
Zwingle published some time before, sixty-seven propositions,
embodying the chief doctrines he had preached, and which he was
prepared to maintain. These he had extensively distributed in good time.

THE THESES OF ZWINGLE

As the theses of Zwingle may be considered the creed of the Swiss
Reformers, it will be satisfactory to the reader, briefly to state the most
important of these propositions.
“That the gospel is the only rule of faith, and the assertion
erroneous that it is nothing without the approbation of the Church
of Rome; that Christ is the only head of the church; that all
traditions are to be rejected; that the attempt of the clergy to
justify their pomp, their riches, honors, and dignities, is the cause
of the divisions in the church; that penances are the dictates of
tradition alone, and do not avail to salvation; that the mass is not a
sacrifice, but simply the commemoration of the sacrifice of Christ;
that meats are indifferent; that God has not forbidden marriage to
any class of Christians, and consequently it is wrong to interdict it
to priests, whose celibacy has become the cause of great
licentiousness of manners. To give absolution for money is to be
guilty of simony; that God alone has power to forgive sins — the
word of God says nothing of purgatory. The assertion that grace is
necessarily derived from receiving the sacraments is a doctrine of
modern invention; that no person ought to be molested for his
opinions, as it is for the magistrate to stop the progress of those
which tend to disturb the public peace.”6

THE MEETING AT ZURICH

At an early hour on the morning of the 29th, great numbers, say the
chroniclers, thronged the hall of conference. All the clergy of the city and
 961
canton, with many others from distant parts, were present, and a
numerous company of citizens, scholars, men of rank, and other persons
of various descriptions. The consul of the Republic, Mark Reust, a man of
high character, opened the deliberations. He referred to the sixty-seven
propositions of Zwingle, and called upon any who dissented from them to
state their objections without fear. The grand-master of the episcopal
court, and the vicar-general Faber, with several theologians, were present
as the bishop’s representatives. All supposed that Faber would have
attempted a confutation of Zwingle’s theses, and a defense of the
established system; but Faber knew his opponent too well, and refused to
discuss any one of the articles. Zwingle pressed him to the disputation,
but in vain. “I was not sent here to dispute,” said Faber, “but to listen;
besides, this is not the place for so great an argument; that it was more
decorous to await the decision of a general council, which was the only
legitimate tribunal in doctrinal matters and which would shortly be
convoked; meanwhile, that he was commanded to offer his mediation for
the removal of the differences which distracted the city.”
Zwingle, who was urgent to have his doctrines subjected to the severest
examination was deeply pained by the evasive courtier-like style of Faber.
“What!” he exclaimed, standing in front of a table on which a Bible lay; “is
not this vast and learned meeting as good as any council? We have only to
defend the word of God.” After making this appeal — which produced a
solemn silence in the assembly — he addressed the meeting at some length.
“He complained of the calumnious charges with which his doctrines were
continually assailed; he challenged his slanderers to come forward on that
public occasion, appointed for that express purpose, and discuss with him
the articles in question.” But the Reformer found, that those who were
most prompt to accuse and defame him in secret preserved an obstinate
silence in public. But he had an upright conscience, and he wished to give
an account of his doctrine, publicly, before the senate of his country,
before his diocesan, and before the whole church of God, and to hear
whatever could be alleged against him — thankful to be corrected if he
were in error, but prepared to maintain what he believed to be the truth of
God.
Faber still refused to dispute with Zwingle before the great council, but
promised to publish a written refutation of his errors.
 962
As no other opponent appeared, the president then said, “If there be any
one here who has anything to say against Zwingle or his doctrines, let him
come forward.” This was repeated three times, but as no one presented
himself, the senate declared that the evangelical propositions had gained an
undisputed triumph, and immediately published an edict to the following
effect. “That since Master Ulric Zwingle had publicly and repeatedly
challenged the adversaries of his doctrines to confute them by scriptural
arguments, and since, notwithstanding, no one had undertaken to do so, he
should continue to announce and preach the word of God, just as
heretofore. Likewise that all other ministers of religion, whether resident in
the city or country, should abstain from teaching any tenet which they
could not prove from scripture; that they should refrain, too, from making
charges of heresy and other scandalous allegations, on pain of severe
punishment.”
On hearing the decree, Zwingle could not refrain from publicly expressing
his heartfelt joy. “We give thanks to thee, O Lord, who wiliest that Thy
most holy word should reign alike in heaven and on earth.” Faber, on
hearing this could not restrain his indignation. “The theses of Master
Ulric,” said he, “are contrary to the honor of the church and the doctrine of
Christ, and I will prove it.” “Do so,” said Zwingle, “but I will have no
other judge than the gospel.”
Leo Juda, Hoffmann, Meyer, and others, endeavored, as well as Zwingle,
to draw the papal party into a discussion, but beyond the slightest
skirmishing respecting the invocation of the saints, nothing passed
between them.

THE EFFECTS OF THE DECREE

The promulgation of this decree, according to Hess, gave a powerful
impulse to the progress of the Reformation in Switzerland. And the effect
of Zwingle’s address in the hall was most favorable to himself and his
doctrines. “His simplicity, firmness, and gentleness inspired his audience
with great veneration; his eloquence and knowledge carried away those
who were hesitating between the two parties; and the silence of his
adversaries, being regarded as a tacit proof of their weakness, served his
cause almost as much as his own arguments. From this time the friends of
 963
Reform multiplied rapidly in all classes of society.” Considering that the
times were still papal, the decree was most just and reasonable. It ordained
no pains, no penalties on religious grounds; Zwingle, and all the pastors,
were merely to be protected in going on to preach the word of God as
heretofore; and by that word the preachers were to stand or fall. A breach
of the peace, or what directly tended to it, was to be punished by the
authorities.
Faber, soon after the conference, writing to a friend at Mayence, expressed
in the following terms his apprehensions of Zwingle: “I have no news for
you, except that a second Luther has arisen at Zurich, who is the more
dangerous, as he has an austerer people to deal with. Contend with him,
whether I will or not, I must; I do it with the greatest reluctance, but I am
compelled. You will presently learn this, when I publish my book to
prove the mass to be a sacrifice.”7
But in proportion to the triumph of the Reformers and the confirmation of
their principles, was the vexation and disappointment of their opponents.
The most skillful advocates of the papacy had been silent before the great
council of their country — The Two Hundred. They were evidently
afraid to enter into debate with Zwingle. But unscrupulous Rome had
other weapons. It is stated by the most reliable historians, that the pope’s
legate, Ennius, and the bishop of Constance, employed emissaries to take
the life of Zwingle, if the opportunity could be found without too great a
risk. “Snares surround you on every side,” wrote a secret friend to
Zwingle, “a deadly poison has been prepared to take away your life. I am
your friend; you shall know me hereafter.” “Leave Zwingle’s house
forthwith; a catastrophe is at hand,” said another to a chaplain who lived
with him. But the man of God was calm and peaceful, trusting in Him. “I
fear my enemies,” said he, “as a lofty rock fears the roaring waves, with
the help of God.” But though both the poison and the poignard failed to
accomplish the foul deed, Rome had not exhausted her means; now she
tries flattery.
Soon after the decree was issued, Hadrian, who then filled the papal chair,
appeared to take no interest in the controversy at Zurich, though he was
thundering his anathemas in Saxony. He despatched a most flattering letter
to Zwingle, called him “his beloved son,” and assured him of “his special
 964
favor.” “And what has the pope commissioned you to offer him?” said
Myconius to the bearer of the papal brief. “Everything except the chair of
St. Peter.” Mitre, crossier, or cardinal’s hat were at his will; but Rome was
greatly mistaken with the Reformer of Zurich in this respect. All her
proposals were unavailing. Even D’Aubigne admits, “that in Zwingle the
Romish church had a still more uncompromising enemy than Luther.” He
had never been a monk; his conscience was less perplexed, his judgment
less enthralled by popish dogmas, and altogether he cared less for the
ceremonies of former ages than the Saxon Reformer. It was enough for his
Swiss ally if any custom, however innocent in itself, were not warranted
by scripture, he fell violently upon it. His jealous care for the dignity,
sufficiency, and authority of scripture was remarkable. “The word of
God,” he used to say, “should stand alone.” “Yet these convictions,” it has
been said, “were attained through fewer struggles, and burnt with less
violence, than in the heart of Luther.” This we can only see to be true in
the case of one doctrine — justification by faith alone. All will readily
admit, that although the Swiss Reformer believed this truth as sincerely as
the Saxon, it never was to the former what it was to the latter. As a divine
truth, it was the source of Luther’s convictions, strength, comfort, vitality,
and energy. The two men had been led of God by different paths, and
were differently furnished for their great work.

THE ZEAL OF ZWINGLE AND LEO JUDA

Notwithstanding the immense power and popularity which Zwingle
gained by the result of the conference in January, he was in no haste to
promote alterations. His great object was to instruct the people, remove
their prejudices, and bring them to oneness of mind before recommending
any great changes. He therefore devoted himself to the preaching of the
word with greater zeal and boldness than ever; and he was ably assisted by
his friend, Leo Juda, who had lately been elected a minister of Zurich. It is
not certain that Faber’s promised book on the mass ever appeared, but
Zwingle produced one in the same year, “On the canon of the Mass,”
arguing with great force against that cornerstone of the papal system.
About the same time a priest, named Louis Hetzer, published a treatise
entitled, The Judgment of God against images, which produced a great
sensation, and engrossed the thoughts of the people.
 965
The citizens of Zurich were now become warm friends of the Reformation;
and in their zeal some of the more ardent spirits expressed a determination
to purge the city of idols. Outside the city gates stood a crucifix
elaborately carved and richly ornamented. The superstition and idolatry to
which this image gave rise, moved the people to give vent to their
indignation. Some of the lower classes, having at their head an artisan
named Nicholas Hotringer — “a worthy man,” says Bullinger, “and well
read in the holy scriptures” — assembled and ignominiously threw down
this favorite idol. This daring and unlawful act spread dismay on every
side. “They are guilty of sacrilege[they deserve to be put to death!”
exclaimed the friends of Rome. The authorities were obliged to interfere,
and caused the leaders of this outbreak to be apprehended; but when
sentence was to be pronounced upon them, the council was divided. What
some regarded as a crime worthy of death, others considered to be a good
work, but done in a wrong way from inconsiderate zeal. During the
debates upon this sentence, Zwingle maintained in public that the law of
Moses expressly forbade images to be the objects of religious worship,
and concluded that those who had pulled down the crucifix could not be
accused of sacrilege; but he pronounced them deserving of punishment for
open resistance to the authorities.
The language of Zwingle increased the embarrassment of the magistrates;
the whole city was much divided; and the council again determined to
submit the question to a discussion, in the meantime retaining the
prisoners in custody.
Thus we see that, in the good providence of God, even such acts of
insubordination by the rude undisciplined children of the Reformation,
were the means of bringing to light not only the dark shades of popery,
but the truth of God on subjects of vital importance, and of securing fresh
triumphs and greater liberty to the Reformers.

THE SECOND DISPUTATION AT ZURICH

The 26th of October, 1523, was the day fixed for the second disputation;
and the subjects to be discussed were — “whether the worship of images
was authorized by the gospel, and whether the mass ought to be preserved
or abolished.” The assembly was much more numerous than the preceding;
 966
above nine hundred persons were present, from every part of Switzerland,
including the grand council of Two Hundred, and about three hundred and
fifty ecclesiastics. Invitations had been sent to the bishops of Constance,
Coire, and Basle, to the university of the latter city, and to the twelve
cantons, requesting them to send deputies to Zurich. But the bishops
declined the invitation: the humiliation of their deputies in January was
fresh in their mind, and they were not disposed to risk a second defeat.
Only the towns of Schaffhausen and St. Gall sent delegates, and these,
Vadian of St. Gall, and Hoffmann of Schaffhausen were chosen presidents.
The edict of convocation having been read, and the object of the meeting
stated, Zwingle and Leo Jude were requested to answer all who defended
the worship of images and the mass as a sacrifice.
With a devotion and piety, ever prominent in the spirit of Zwingle, he
proposed that the deliberations should be opened with prayer. He
reminded the friends of the promise of Christ, that “where two or three are
gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them.” (Matthew
18:20.) After prayer, and a few words from the president, enjoining upon
all who spoke to draw their argument only from scripture, Zwingle was
desired to commence the proceedings.
Before speaking on the first proposition — the worship of images — he
begged to offer a few remarks on the scriptural usage of the word church;
since on that depended the right and authority of their present
deliberations. He rejected the exorbitant claims of the church of Rome,
which asserted that nothing was valid in the whole christian world, but
what was done with her sanction. According to his view, the term “the
church,” designated, first, the universal body of the faithful; secondly,
any portion of that body meeting in the same province or city; such as the
church of Ephesus, of Corinth, the churches of Galatia, or the church of
Zurich. He denied that the term could be restricted to a convention,
consisting of the pope, cardinals, bishops, and other ecclesiastics
exclusively. His object was to overthrow the objections urged by the
Roman Catholics against the authority of such assemblies as the present;
and to show that every assembly, united together by faith in Christ, and
by the gospel, as the only rule of faith and practice, possessed the perfect
right to discuss and settle their affairs. Zwingle was thus withdrawing the
 967
church of Zurich from the jurisdiction of the bishop of Constance, and
separating it from the Latin hierarchy.
Here Zwingle paused; and an invitation was given to all who had anything
to object to his positions, to come forward and express their sentiments
without fear. The Reformers sought publicity, and feared not fair
discussion. One Conrad Hoffmann, a canon of Zurich, attempted a reply,
but as he spoke only of the authority of the pope’s bull, the Emperor’s
edict, the canons, and the impropriety of all such discussions, without any
reference to scripture, he was given to understand that he was not
observing the rule of the assembly. The prior of the Augustinians, a
famous preacher, and much attached to the ancient orthodoxy, confessed
that he could not refute the propositions of Zwingle, unless he were
allowed to have recourse to the canon law. Zwingle immediately referred
to a passage in the canon law, which showed that the scriptures alone were
to be relied upon. The monk thus silenced, resumed his seat, muttering to
himself, “The pope has decided: I abide by his decisions, and leave others
to argue.”
Leo Juda, to whom was entrusted the subject of the images, addressed the
assembly at some length, proving from the scriptures, “that images are
forbidden by the word of God; and that Christians ought not to make
them, set them up, or pay them any homage.” On the second day of the
Conference, Zwingle introduced the subject of the mass, showing from the
words of the institution, and from other portions of the New Testament,
that the mass is not a sacrifice, that no one man can offer to God a sacrifice
for another; and that the mode of celebrating the Eucharist in the church of
Rome is quite different from the institution of the Savior. The few feeble
attempts that were made to sustain the established practice and doctrine,
were immediately confuted by the two champions of the Reformation, to
the entire satisfaction of the Council.

THE WORD OF GOD PREVAILS

A deep and salutary impression was produced on the assembly. “Until
this hour,” exclaimed Schmidt, the commander of Kussnacht, “ye have all
gone after idols. The dwellers in the plains have run to the mountains, and
those of the mountains have gone to the plains; the French to Germany,
 968
and the Germans to France. Now ye know whither ye ought to go. God
has combined all things in Christ. Ye noble citizens of Zurich, go to the
true source; and may Christ at length re-enter your territory, and there
resume His ancient empire.” The aged warrior, Reust, turning to the
Council, gravely said, though in military language, “Now, then... let us
grasp the sword of God’s word, and may the Lord prosper His work.”
With such expressions of sympathy Zwingle was completely overcome.
“God is with us,” he said, with deep feeling, “He will defend His own
cause. Let us go forward in the name of the Lord.” Here his emotion was
too great for utterance; he burst into tears, and many mingled their tears
with his.
Thus the colloquy ended; it lasted three days; it was decisive in favor of
the Reformation. The victory was undisputed. The presidents rose;
Vadian of St. Gall, speaking on behalf of those who had presided with him,
observed, “that no definite sentence was to be pronounced as the decision
of the meeting. They had heard the testimony of God’s word in support
of the two propositions, and likewise what could be urged against them;
each person must judge for himself what was the conclusion to be formed,
and must follow the dictates of his own conscience.” Reust joined in the
exhortation, and “entreated all present to take the word of God for their
only guide, and to follow it, fearing nothing.” The meeting then closed.

REFLECTIONS ON THE CHARACTER OF THE CONFERENCE

All who know something of the value of the word of God, must reflect
with supreme satisfaction on the rule by which these disputations were
governed. We can never be too thankful for such an appreciation of the
holy scriptures. In this respect Zwingle did a great and a noble work. He
restored the Bible to its true place, and the people to their true
privileges. Perfect freedom of discussion was allowed to both parties, with
this stipulation — “that all arguments were to be derived directly from
scripture, the sole standard of judgment; that all merely verbal disputes,
and vain contentious subtleties, were to be instantly repressed.” And this,
let us bear in mind, this noble assertion of the authority and sufficiency of
scripture was publicly made at a time when nearly all classes were only
beginning to hear of the errors of popery, and of the character, if not of the
 969
existence, of the Bible. Many of the priests even had never seen one, and
scarcely any of them had read it.
It required more than the commanding presence of Zwingle — more than
his brilliant talents, his high cultivation, his natural eloquence, to maintain
such a position. Nothing less than faith in the living God, and in the divine
presence, could have sustained him at such a moment. Mere cleverness and
superstition could then give, as they can give now, a thousand reasons
why the dogmas of the papacy should be held supreme; but faith did then
— as it must now — assail the whole system of popery as the imposture
of Satan, and in direct opposition to the truth of God. In the face of nine
hundred members of the Roman Catholic church, lay and clerical, Zwingle,
Leo Juda, and others maintained, that the pure word of God, which should
be in the hands of the people, was the only standard of faith and morals,
and that all the time-honored customs and traditions of Romanism, though
sanctioned by the credulity of ages, and backed by the display of worldly
power, were the mere inventions of priestcraft, and ruinous to the souls of
men.
This was bold work, and at such a time; but when Christ has His right
place in the heart, His strength is made perfect in our weakness. The word
of God, we know, is the sword of the Spirit, by which all questions should
be settled, and to which alone all Christians should appeal. One line of
scripture far out weighs ten thousand reasons. But how far, we may ask, is
this rule observed by Christians in the present day? Where shall we find
such inflexible adherence to the plain truth of God? We know not where to
look for it. But we hear on all sides of questions being raised as to the
plenary inspiration of the scriptures; and that, as it is capable of various
interpretations by the learned, it cannot be appealed to as decisive. Hence
the invention of creeds and confessions as the bulwarks of the church in
place of the word and power of God. Such alas! alas! is the growing
infidelity of our own day, which will tend to the increase of Romanism,
and to the final apostasy of Christendom. Meanwhile let all who love the
Lord hold fast His word as unchanged and unchangeable. Thou, Lord, hath
“magnified Thy word above all Thy name.” And it still holds true, that,
“them that honor Me I will honor, and they that despise Me shall be
lightly esteemed.” The Lord give us grace to honor His name by faithfully
keeping His word, and, like the Master, be able to say as to all our
 970
religious observances, “Thus saith the Lord”... “It is written; it is written.”
(Revelation 3:8; Psalm 138:2; 1 Samuel 2:30; Matthew 4.)
 971

CHAPTER 42
THE RESULTS OF THE DISPUTATIONS

The authorities, though convinced that neither the mass nor the use of
images could be justified by the word of God, did not think it expedient to
abolish by law either the one or the other at that moment. Zwingle
prudently recommended great caution and moderation. “God knows,” he
said to the council, “that I am inclined to build up, and not to throw down.
I am aware there are timid souls who ought to be conciliated. The people
generally are not yet sufficiently enlightened to receive with unanimity
such extensive alterations.” The magistrates, following his advice, allowed
every minister to say mass or decline it, as he thought proper; reserving to
themselves the right of ordaining at a future time what they should judge
proper.
During this delay, the friends of the Reformation petitioned the council to
release the persons imprisoned for throwing down the crucifix. All were
set at liberty with the exception of Hottinger, who, because of the leading
part he had taken in the commotion, was banished for two years from the
canton of Zurich. This slight sentence, contrary to the intentions of those
who passed it, was soon followed by a violent and cruel death.

THE FIRST MARTYR OF THE SWISS REFORMATION

In proportion as the cause of the Reformation advanced, the rage of its
adversaries increased. At a diet held at Lucerne, in the month of January,
1524, all the cantons were represented with the exception of Zurich and
Schaffhausen. The clergy present endeavored to excite the council against
the new doctrines and those who had promulgated them. Alarmed at what
might be the consequences of the changes which were taking place at
Zurich, they were determined to be silent spectators no longer. Through
the influence of the partisans of Rome in the council, an edict was passed,
“forbidding the people to preach, or to repeat any new or Lutheran
doctrine in private or public, or to talk or dispute about such things in
 972
taverns or at feasts; that whatever laws the bishop of Constance enacted
respecting religion should be observed; that everyone, whether man or
woman, old or young, who saw or heard anything done, preached or
spoken, contrary to this edict, should give immediate information of the
same to the proper authorities.” Thus was the snare laid, through the
subtlety of Satan, for the feet of the Reformers; and, the council being
national, it was spread over all Switzerland. Hottinger was the first to be
caught in its toils.
When banished from Zurich, he repaired to the country of Baden, where
he lived by the labor of his hands. He neither sought nor avoided occasions
of speaking about his religion. When asked what the new doctrines were
which the Zurich pastors preached, he frankly conversed on the subject.
He was now narrowly watched, and reported to have said, “That Christ
was sacrificed once for all Christians; and that by this one sacrifice, as St.
Paul says, He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified; therefore
the mass is no sacrifice; and that the invocation of saints and the adoration
of images are contrary to the word of God.” This was more than enough to
condemn the unsuspecting man. He was denounced for his impiety to the
grand bailiff, and very soon arrested. When questioned as to his religious
belief, he did not conceal his convictions, and professed himself ready to
justify what he had stated. He was convicted before the tribunal of having
contravened an ordinance of the sovereign power, which forbade all
discussions on the subject of religion. He was then removed to Lucerne,
when he was condemned by the deputies of seven cantons to be
beheaded.
When informed of his sentence, he calmly answered, “The will of the Lord
be done! May He be pleased to pardon all who have contributed to my
death... “That will do,” said one of his judges, “we do not sit here to listen
to sermons; you can have your talk some other time.” “He must have his
head off this once,” said another of his judges, “but if he should ever get it
on again, we will then be of his religion.” “To Jesus also it was said,” he
replied, “‘Let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe
him.’ “A monk presented a crucifix to his lips, but he put it from him,
saying, “It is by faith that we must embrace Christ crucified in our hearts.”
He was greatly strengthened by the presence of the Lord when on his way
to the place of execution. Many followed him in tears. “Weep not for me,”
 973
he said, “I am on my way to eternal happiness.” He preached the gospel
to the people as one so near his end would, entreating them to look to the
Lord Jesus Christ, in whom alone pardon and salvation could be found.
His last words on the scaffold were, “Into Thy hands I commit my spirit,
O my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” In a few moments he was absent
from the body and present with the Lord.
The tranquillity, courage, and wisdom which Hottinger showed before his
judges, and on his way to the scaffold, give him a high place among those
who died for the cause of the Reformation. Calmly and firmly in his last
moments he prayed for the mercy of God in favor of his judges, and that
their eyes might be opened to the truth. Then turning to the people, he
said, “If I have offended anyone among you, let him forgive me as I have
forgiven my enemies. Pray to God to support my faith to the last
moment. When I shall have undergone my sentence, your prayers will be
useless to me.”1

THE BLOOD OF HOTTINGER INFLAMES

THE ZEAL OF THE PAPISTS
The council of Zurich had protested against the irregularity of its allies in
the condemnation of a fellow citizen; but in place of listening to
remonstrance, their persecuting zeal was evidently inflamed by the
execution of Hotringer; for scarcely was the blood of that innocent man
cold when the diet determined on more vigorous efforts to crush the
Reformation itself. They immediately resolved that a deputation should be
sent to Zurich, the seat of the mischief, calling upon the council and the
citizens to renounce their new opinions.
In accordance with this resolution an embassy was sent to Zurich on the
21st of March, 1524, in which all the cantons represented at Lucerne
united, with the single exception of Schaffhausen. The deputies, in the
most specious style of address, lamented that the unity of the ancient
christian faith should be broken, and that universal sorrow should be
occasioned by the unhappy changes which had lately been introduced: the
delightful repose of church and state, transmitted from all antiquity, had
been thus violently interrupted. “Confederates of Zurich,” said the
delegates, “join your efforts to ours; let us stifle this new faith; it had been
 974
well if this growing evil had been stopped in the beginning, and if, after the
example of our ancestors, we had vindicated the honor of God, the blessed
Virgin, and all the saints, at the expense of our lives and fortunes: the fruits
of the doctrine of Luther are everywhere apparent in the menacing aspect
of the people, who show themselves ripe for rebellion.” Thus the
deputation appealed to the Zurichers, and entreated them to dismiss
Zwingle and Leo Juda, the instruments of communicating this contagion to
the Swiss. That there were abuses in the ecclesiastical system, they readily
admitted. “They were all oppressed by the pope, and his train of
cardinals, bishops, and agents, who, by their usurpations, simony, and
indulgences, exhausted the wealth of the country. They were willing to co-
operate in any scheme for the correction of these evils and such as these;
but the states in assembly could no longer endure the innovations which
were sheltered and nourished by the Senate of Zurich.”
Thus spoke the adversaries of the Reformation: and what reply can the
council give to such fair speeches from so large a portion of the Helvetic
body? The answer was immediate, firm, and noble. The death of Hotringer
had not discouraged them, but rather raised their indignation against the
states which had perpetrated it.

THE ANSWER OF ZURICH TO LUCERNE

“We can make no concessions,” said the Zurichers, “in what concerns the
word of God. For five years past we have been listening to the sacred
instructions of our ministers: at first their doctrine did seem new to us, as
we had heard nothing of the like before. But when we understood and
clearly perceived that this was its end and scope — to make manifest
Jesus Christ as the author and finisher of our salvation; who died on the
cross as the Savior of mankind, and shed His precious blood to cleanse our
sins away; who is now in heaven as the only Advocate and Mediator
between God and man; — when we heard so salutary a message we could
not refrain from embracing it with great eagerness.” They then proceeded
to reply at some length to the representations of the delegates, to expose
the abuses of the Church of Rome, and to assert that all blessing to their
souls and all harmony in the states must spring from obedience to the
word of God. They reasserted that the single weapon for overthrowing the
 975
power, usurpations, and rapacity of the papists is the preaching of the
pure word of God.
How interesting to the Christian reader of the present day to find that
statesmen, warriors, and political bodies, so openly and with such
wondrous faith, referred to the word of God in those times. It was their
only standard of appeal and their sole rule in practice. It is too much taken
for granted now that all are secretly governed by it, therefore there is no
reference to it in our public assemblies. “There is nothing,” said the senate
in conclusion, “that we desire more ardently, than the universal prevalence
of peace, nor will we in any respect violate our laws and treaties of
alliance. But in this affair, which involves our eternal safety, we cannot act
otherwise than we do, unless we should be first convicted of error. We
therefore again exhort you, as we have already done, if you think our
doctrine opposed to scripture, to point it out, and prove it against us; but
we must entreat you not to delay the attempt beyond the close of the
month of May; till that time we shall expect an answer from you and from
the bishops, and from the university of Basle.”

THE DOWNFALL OF THE IMAGES

The appointed interval had elapsed, and as no reply was received from the
Roman Catholic cantons, the council of Zurich determined to proceed in
the work of Reformation. The decree for the demolition of images was
passed in January, but the authorities were in no haste to have it executed.
There is nothing more to be admired at this moment of our history, than
the patient and considerate way in which this delicate matter was
conducted by the magistrates. They delayed in the expectation that the
work would be accomplished by the general consent, and not by the open
violence, of the people.
At the request of the three pastors, Zwingle, Leo Juda, and Engelhardt, the
council published an order to the effect that, honor being due to God only,
the images should be removed from all the churches of the canton, and
their ornaments sold for the benefit of the poor; that the council prohibit
all private persons from destroying any image, without public authority,
except such as are their own property; that every separate church may
destroy its images after a prescribed method; that those persons whose
 976
families had erected images in the churches must have them removed
within a limited time, or they will be destroyed by public authority. By
these prudent and moderate measures, of which Zwingle was the
councillor, civil dissension was entirely avoided, and the work proceeded
as if by the unanimous determination of the citizens.
The appointed officers, consisting of twelve councillors, the three pastors,
the city architect, masons, carpenters, and other necessary assistants,
went into the various churches, and, having closed the doors, took down
the crosses, defaced the frescoes, whitewashed the walls, burned the
pictures, and broke in pieces or otherwise destroyed every idol, to prevent
their ever becoming again the objects of idolatrous worship. The country
churches, following the example of the capital, displayed even greater zeal
in destroying their ancient decorations and the objects of their recent
adoration. Zwingle speaks with a little playfulness of a famous stone
statue of the Virgin among the nuns in Altenbach, held in great reverence,
and of much miraculous celebrity. The monks affirmed that it could never
be removed from its place, or at least it could never he kept from its
venerated station. It had been repeatedly taken away, firmly fixed and
fastened elsewhere, and even locked up, but it always reappeared the
following morning on its former basis. But alas! it failed to vindicate the
prediction of the monks; it quietly submitted to be roughly removed, and
returned no more to its ancient position. Thus the idol lost credit with the
people.
“I rejoice, then,” exclaims Zwingle, “and bid all others to rejoice
with me, that this most iniquitous imposture was at length
removed from the eyes of men; for, when this was once
accomplished, all the other figments of popery were overthrown
more easily. To God, through whose power and grace all this has
been accomplished, be praise and glory for ever. Amen.”

THE SWISS AND GERMAN REFORMATION

Here, in the presence of such a mighty work of God’s Spirit, it may be
well to pause for a moment and contemplate the difference between the
two great leaders of the Reformation, the character of their principles and
action, and the consequent results. The difference has often arrested us,
 977
and sometimes we have referred to it, and as D’Aubigne, the warm-hearted
champion of Luther, has noticed the difference we refer to, we may draw
attention to it the more freely.
That which completely ruled Zwingle’s mind, and all his teaching and
actings as a Reformer, was his supreme regard for the holy scriptures. All
religious observances that could not be found in, or proved by, the word of
God, he boldly maintained should be abolished. His Hebrew Bible and his
Greek New Testament lay on the table before him in the halls of
discussion, and he would own no standard but these. Luther’s principle of
dealing with the old religion was of a widely different character. He desired
to maintain in the church all that was not directly or expressly contrary to
the scriptures. This is by no means a safe or a sound principle. It might be
difficult to prove that certain things are expressly forbidden in the word of
God, though it might be still more difficult to prove that they had any
place in scripture. Truth is definite and positive, this dogma is loose and
uncertain.
Even D’Aubigne admits that Luther rose up against those who had
violently broken the images in the churches of Wittemberg, while the idols
fell in the temples of Zurich by Zwingle’s own direction. The German
Reformer wished to remain united to the Church of Rome, and would
have been content to purify it of all that was opposed to the word of God.
The Zurich Reformer passed over the middle ages entirely, and reckoned
nothing of absolute authority that had been written or invented since the
days of the apostles. Restoration to the primitive simplicity of the church
was his idea of a Reformation. There was therefore greater completeness in
the mind of Zwingle as a Reformer.
Primitive Christianity had been transformed in its early days by the self-
righteousness of Judaism and the paganism of the Greeks into the
confusion of Roman Catholicism. The Jewish element prevailed in that
part of her doctrine which relates to man — to salvation by works of
human merit, or to trading in the salvation of the souls of men, as by
indulgences. The pagan element prevailed especially in that which relates
to God — to the innumerable false gods of popery; to the long reign of
images, symbols, and ceremonies; to the dethroning of the infinitely
blessed and all gracious God. “The German Reformer proclaimed the great
 978
doctrine of justification by faith, and with it inflicted a death-blow on the
self-righteousness of Rome. The Reformer of Switzerland unquestionably
did the same; the inability of man to save himself forms the basis of the
work of all the Reformers. But Zwingle did something more: he established
the sovereign, universal, and exclusive supremacy of God, and thus
inflicted a deadly blow on the pagan worship of Rome.”2

THE MARRIAGE OF ZWINGLE

Of the many innovations which were now introduced, none gave a greater
scandal to the papal party than the marriage of the clergy. It was setting
at defiance all ecclesiastical discipline, and by those who were naturally
expected to be its guardians. To live, as if married, was overlooked, if not
sanctioned, by the ecclesiastical authorities; but to marry was a mortal sin.
Such was the morality of popery. But the Spirit of God was now working,
and the eyes of many were being opened to the truth. One of the pastors
in the city of Strasburg, who had been living like many others at that time,
was led to see his sin and married immediately. The bishop, because it had
been done publicly, could not overlook the offense, and caused a great stir
to be made both in the church and in the senate. The time, however, was
past for the bishop to have all his own way: numbers approved of the new
doctrine, following the example of the pastor; and the magistrates refused
to interfere.
In the month of April, 1524, Zwingle availed himself of the privilege
which he had so often claimed for all the priesthood. His nuptials with
Anna Reinhart, widow of John Meyer, lord of Weiningen, in the county
of Baden, were publicly proclaimed, thereby setting a good example to his
brethren. Only two of several children survived him; Ulric, who became a
canon and archdeacon of Zurich; and Regula, who was married to Rudolph
Gaulter, a divine of eminence. The following year Luther was married to
Catherine of Bora. These events gave occasion to great calumnies; but as
Zwingle had not been a monk, or his bride a nun, the scandal was not so
enormous as in the case of Luther and Catherine.
 979
THE PROGRESS OF REFORM
The Lord greatly blessed the labors of the Reformers in Zurich at this
time, and stayed the cruel hand of their enemies. The word of the Lord had
found its right place in their hearts, and, through them, in the hearts of the
people. And God never fails to bless the people or the nation that honors
His word. It is ever the certain pathway to the richest blessings. He still
says,
“Them that honor Me I will honor.” (1 Samuel 2:30.)
The downfall of the images was immediately followed by the voluntary
dissolution of the two most important religious institutions in Zurich. The
first was that of an ancient and wealthy abbey, of royal foundation,
known by the name of Frauen-Munster, and used for the reception of
ladies of quality. It was distinguished not only by very high antiquity but
also by various immunities and privileges, and the possession of splendid
revenues. This extraordinary society of females exercised the sovereign
right of coining all the money circulated, and of nominating the persons
who should preside in the tribunals of justice. The lady-abbess, of her own
accord, surrendered all the rights and possession of the institution into the
hands of the government, on the understanding that the funds should be
applied to pious and charitable purposes, with a due respect to vested
rights. The abbess, Catherine Cimmern, retired on an honorable pension
and soon after married. In consequence of this change, the city of Zurich,
in the year 1526, for the first time coined money and established courts of
justice in its own name.
The chapter of canons also, of which Zwingle was a member, after
arranging with the government respecting their rights and revenues,
followed the example of the opulent nuns. The few remaining monks of
the three orders were collected into one monastery; the young to be taught
some useful trade, the aged to end their days in peace.
The news of these triumphs of the word of God rapidly spread over the
mountains and valleys of Switzerland. The Roman Catholic cantons were
exasperated. Facts were distorted; falsehoods were circulated; diets were
assembled unknown to the senate of Zurich, and the deputies of the
 980
cantons bound themselves never to permit the establishment of the new
opinions in Switzerland.
Meanwhile the pontiffs were not indifferent spectators. Clement VII
addressed a brief to the Helvetic republic generally, which he saluted with
the most profuse expressions of respect and benevolence. He also
addressed himself in the most flattering terms to all — lay and clerical —
who had exerted themselves in support of the catholic faith. Their zeal
was “more glorious than all the victories and military achievements of their
brave country;” and he further exhorted them to persevere in their laudable
course, until they had extirpated the “Lutheran doctrines” from the soil of
Switzerland.
Animated by this artful address, and roused by the proceedings at Zurich,
the ten cantons, which had not avowed the reformed faith, assembled at
Zug, in the month of July, and sent a deputation to Zurich, Schaffhausen
and Appenzel. The delegates were commissioned to acquaint these states
with the firm resolve of the diet to crush the new doctrines; and to
prosecute its adherents to the forfeiture of their goods, of their honors, and
even of their lives. Zurich could not hear such threatenings without deep
emotion; but she was ready with her usual reply: “In matters of faith the
word of God alone must be obeyed.” On receiving this answer, the
Catholic cantons trembled with rage. Lucerne, Uri, Schweitz, Zug,
Unterwalden, and Friburg, declared to the citizens of Zurich, that they
would never again sit with them in diet unless they renounced their novel
dogmas. The federal unity was thus broken by the partisans of Rome; and,
in spite of their oaths and alliances, they determined to arrest the progress
of truth by the sword of persecution.

THE WEAPONS OF ROME’S WARFARE

Matters now began to assume a more alarming aspect. An event soon
occurred which increased the misunderstanding of the confederates, and
gave Rome the opportunity of showing with what weapons she was
prepared to fight for the ancient faith.
The village of Stamheim, situated on the frontiers of Thurgan, was
dependent upon Zurich, except for its criminal jurisdiction, which was
vested in the bailiff of Thurgau. This village possessed a chapel dedicated
 981
to St. Anne, and enriched by the gifts of a multitude of pilgrims. But,
notwithstanding these great advantages to the inhabitants, they were
inclined to abandon their idolatrous practices and gains, and embrace the
principles of Reform. Stamheim was at that time governed by a vice-
bailiff, named John Writh, a worthy man, and an earnest Reformer. He had
two sons, young priests, John and Adrian, who had been stationed there
by the council of Zurich for the instruction of the people. Full of piety
and courage, and zealous preachers of the gospel, the citizens were taught
to regard the honors which were offered to the patroness of their village as
dishonoring to God and contrary to His holy word; and having received
the edict of the council of Zurich on the subject of images, they burned the
votive pictures that attested the miracles of St. Anne, and removed the
images which had been placed in the public situations of Stamheim.
For the moment the popular feeling was in favor of Reform, but there were
many still who clung to their idols with a tenacity peculiar to idolatry, and
murmured deeply for the blood of their destroyers. Such carried their
complaints to the grand-bailiff of Thurgau, named Joseph Amberg. This
unhappy man was at one time inclined to the opinions of Zwingle; but
when a candidate for the office of grand-bailiff, in order to obtain the
suffrages of his fellow citizens, all zealous Catholics, he promised to use
his utmost power to suppress the new sect in Thurgau. He would gladly
have seized and imprisoned the offenders, but Stamheim was beyond his
jurisdiction. His violent hatred, however, of the bailiff Writh and his sons
he took no pains to conceal, nor of his purpose to be avenged because of
the dishonor done to the images.

THE ILLEGAL ARREST OF OEXLIN

The evil genius of Rome came to the assistance of Amberg. He saw that
the minds of men were in that state of excitement which indicates a
readiness for tumult and violence. This was his snare and a fatal one it
proved. OExlin, a great friend of Zwingle’s, and the principal apostle of
the Reformation in Thurgau, was arrested in the hope of stopping its
progress. At midnight, on the 7th of July, 1524, the learned and pious
minister of Burg was seized by the bailiff’s soldiers and carried off, in
defiance of his cries and in contempt of the privileges of his position. The
inhabitants, hearing the disturbance, rushed into the streets, and the village
 982
soon became the scene of a frightful uproar; but their pastor was not
rescued, the soldiers were off, and the night was dark. According to the
custom of those times, the tocsin was rung — the alarmbell; and the
inhabitants of the adjacent villages were soon on the move and inquiring of
one another what was the matter.
When John Writh and his sons heard that their friend and brother had been
violently carried off, they hastened to join the pursuers. But they were too
late; the soldiers, hearing the alarm, redoubled their speed, and soon placed
the river Thus between themselves and the pursuing party. Application
was made to Areberg for the release of OExlin on bail, but their terms were
refused. Unhappily, a number of unprincipled, turbulent spirits, who
always make their appearance in such tumults, became unruly. They
applied for some refreshment at the convent of Ittingen, but not content
with what they received, they began to pillage and drank to excess. Writh
and his sons did their utmost to restrain them, but without success. It was
believed by the populace that the inmates had encouraged the tyranny of
Amberg, and that they should be revenged on the monks of Ittingen. While
revelling in the store-rooms and cellars, a fire broke out, and the monastery
was burned to the ground.

THE WRITHS FALSELY ACCUSED

This was enough for the evil purposes of the adversary. The grand-bailiff,
in giving an account to his government of the fatal event, blamed the
inhabitants of Stein and Stamheim, and above all, the bailiff Writh and his
sons, whom he accused of causing the tocsin to be sounded; of being the
authors of the excesses committed at Ittingen; of having profarted the host,
and burned the monastery.
In a few days the deputies of the cantons assembled at Zug. So great was
their indignation, that they would have marched instantly with flying
banners on Stein and Stamheim, and put the inhabitants to the sword. “If
any one is guilty,” said the deputies of Zurich with more reason, “he must
be punished, but according to the laws of justice, and not by violence.”
They also represented to the deputies of the cantons, that the grand-bailiff
had provoked the commotion, by violating the privileges of the town of
Stein in the illegal arrest of the pastor OExlin. In the meantime the Council
 983
of Zurich sent one of its members, with an escort of soldiers to Stamheim
— whose subjects they were — to seize the persons accused. Several
consulted their safety by flight; but Writh and his sons, who had returned
before the monastery was burned, and were living quietly at Stamheim,
refused to fly, depending upon their own innocence and the justice of their
government. When the soldiers made their appearance, the worthy bailiff
said to them, “My lords of Zurich might have spared themselves all this
trouble. If they had sent a child, I should have obeyed their summons.”
The three Wriths, with their friend, Burchard Ruteman, bailiff of
Nussbaum — a man of the same spirit — were taken prisoners, and
carried to Zurich.
After a three weeks’ imprisonment, they were brought up for examination.
They acknowledged that they had gone out at the sound of the tocsin, and
that they had followed the crowd to Ittingen; but they proved that, instead
of exciting the peasants to disorder, they had endeavored to dissuade them
from it, and that they had returned home immediately they knew that the
grandbailiff refused to set OExlin at liberty. Nothing could be proved
against them; they had only acted according to the republican principles of
their country, in turning out at the sound of the alarm-bell. They were
pronounced, after a full examination, to be entirely innocent.

THE ASSEMBLY OF BADEN

These proceedings were communicated to the cantons then assembled at
Baden, but they were not satisfied. Jezebel’s thirst for blood had been
whetted by having her prey so near her grasp, and she determined on
lengthening her arm, and making it secure. Contrary to the established
customs of the Confederation, she demanded the prisoners to be given up,
in order to be judged at Baden. The Zurichers refused on the ground that to
them belonged the right to judge their own subjects, and that the diet had
no right over the persons accused. On hearing this, the deputies trembled
with rage. “We will do ourselves justice,” they exclaimed, “if the accused
are not delivered up to us immediately, we will march our troops to Zurich
and carry them off by force of arms.” Knowing the state of feeling against
Zurich because of Zwingle and the Reformation, and dreading the
calamities of a civil war, the resolution of the Senate was shaken.
 984
Unhappy moment for the honor of Zurich! “To yield to threats,” said
Zwingle, “to renounce your just rights when the life of a subject is at
stake, is a criminal weakness, from which none but the most fatal
consequences can be expected. If the persons accused were guilty, I should
be far from wishing to save them from the sword of justice, but since they
have been judged innocent, why deliver them up to a tribunal, determined
beforehand to make the whole weight of its hatred against the Reformation
fall upon their heads?” The whole town was in agitation; opinions were
divided. At last it was supposed that a middle course had been found. The
prisoners were to be delivered to the diet, on condition that they would
only be examined with regard to the affair of Ittingen, and not as to their
faith. The diet agreed to this, and on Friday, August 18th, the three Wriths
and their friend, accompanied by four councillors of state, and several
armed men, quitted Zurich.
“A deep concern,” says the historian, “was felt by all the city at the
prospect of the fate which awaited the two youths and their aged
companions. Sobbing alone was heard as they passed along. What a
mournful procession! exclaimed one. God will punish us for delivering
them up, cried another. Let us pray Him to impart His grace to these poor
prisoners, and to strengthen them in their faith.” The churches were all
filled. Zwingle and others lifted up their voices; and who, we may ask, did
not bathe with their tears those first-fruits to God of the Reformation in
Switzerland?

THE WRITHS AND RUTEMAN FALSELY CONDEMNED

When the prisoners reached Baden, they were thrown into a dungeon. The
form of an examination began the following day; the bailiff Writh was first
brought in. The Catholics, acting upon their old motto, “that it is wrong to
keep faith with heretics,” immediately questioned the bailiff concerning the
removal of the images at Stamheim, and other points affecting his religion.
The deputies of Zurich protested, reminding the diet that this was a gross
violation of the conditions on which the prisoners were allowed to appear.
But expostulations were of no avail now. The Zurichers and their appeals
were treated with derision. The prisoners were put to the torture, in the
hope of extorting from them some confessions which might give a color of
 985
justice to the sentence which was already determined to be pronounced
upon them.
The most cruel tortures were inflicted on the father, without regard to his
character or his age; but he persisted in declaring his innocence of the
pillage and burning of Ittingen. From morning till noon they practiced their
cruelties on the old man. His pitiful cries to God to sustain and comfort
him, only called forth the impiety of his tormentors. “Where is your
Christ now?” said one of the deputies, “bid Him come to your relief.” His
intrepid son, John, was treated with still greater barbarity. But nothing
could move his constancy in Christ. He seems to have triumphed in his
sufferings, and gloried in his cross. Adrian was threatened with having his
veins opened one after another, unless he made a confession of his guilt.
But he could only confess to having preached the gospel of Christ, and
been married. When wearied with their work of torture, they sent back the
faithful confessors of Christ to a loathsome dungeon; their bodies wellnigh
racked to pieces, themselves strong in the consciousness of their
innocence, and sustained by the presence and power of their Lord and
Master, Christ Jesus.
The bailiff’s wife, Hannah Writh, and the mother of the two young
priests, hastened to Baden, carrying an infant child in her arms, to implore
the mercy of the judges. With floods of tears she pleaded for mercy to her
husband and her sons; she pleaded her large family, her husband’s past
services to the state and his country; but all in vain. Her entreaties, such as
only a wife and a mother could pour forth, instead of softening the judges,
irritated them more and more, and betrayed that Satanic hatred to the truth
which was the real cause of all their cruelties. One of the judges, the
deputy for Zug, was led in the providence of God to give the most
wonderful testimony to the character of Writh, and the treachery of his
judges. “You know the bailiff Writh,” said a friend of the distressed wife
to him. “I do,” he replied, “I have been twice bailiff of Thurgau, I never
knew a more innocent, upright, and hospitable man than John Writh. His
house was open to all who stood in need of his assistance; in fact, his
house was a convent, an inn, and a hospital; and I cannot imagine what
demon can have drawn him into this tumult. If he had plundered, robbed,
or even murdered, I would willingly have made every exertion to obtain his
pardon; but seeing he has burned the image of the blessed St. Anne, the
 986
mother of the Virgin, he must die; there can be no mercy shown him.” The
court broke up, the deputies returned to their cantons, the prisoners to
their cells, and did not meet again till that day month.

THE MARTYRDOM OF THE WRITHS AND RUTEMAN

At length those dreary four weeks passed away, and the deputies
assembled to deliberate on the sentence. In solemn mockery of all justice,
and with closed doors, the sentence of death was passed on the bailiff
Writh; on his son John — who was the strongest in the faith, and who had
led away others — and on the bailiff Ruteman. Adrian — it may have been
to color over the cruelty and injustice of this sentence — was given back
to his mother’s tears with a show of mercy.
The officers proceeded to the tower to bring the prisoners into court. On
hearing the sentence, Adrian burst into tears. His father calmly embraced
the brief interval, to exact from him a promise, that he would never, in any
way, attempt to avenge their death. “My brother,” said John to Adrian,
“the cross of Christ must always follow His word. Do not then weep, my
brother; resume your courage, preach the gospel of Christ, be constant in
the cause of Christ. I can render thanks to my Lord this day, that He has
honored me by calling me to suffer and die for His truth. Blessed be His
holy name for ever! His holy will be done!”
They were next conducted to the scaffold. The sufferings of these faithful
men from their long detention in unwholesome dungeons, and from the
tortures that were inflicted on them, made death a welcome messenger of
peace. But that noble son — to be remembered with admiration and
gratitude for ever — whose heart was filled with the tenderest anxiety for
his father, sought in every way to comfort and sustain him. Floods of tears
fell from all spectators, as he embraced his father, and bade him farewell
on the scaffold. “My dearly beloved father, henceforward you shall be no
longer my father, nor I your son. We are brethren in Christ Jesus, for the
love of whom we are about to die. But we are going to Him who is our
Father, and the Father of all the faithful; and in His presence we shall
enjoy eternal life. Let us fear nothing!... Amen,” replied the father, “may
God be glorified, my dearly beloved son and brother in Christ.” The bailiff
Ruteman prayed in silence.
 987
All three knelt down together in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ; and in
another moment their heads fell on the scaffold, and their happy souls had
found their home and rest in the blooming paradise of God.
The crowd gave loud utterance to their lamentations. The two bailiffs left
twenty-two children, and forty-five grandchildren. Hannah had brought up
a large family in the fear of the Lord, and was greatly respected for her
virtues throughout the whole district. But she had not yet drained the cup
of her bitter anguish. She was condemned to pay twelve crowns to the
executioner who had beheaded her husband and her son. Let the reader
note the refined barbarity, the ignoble littleness, the cowardly persecution,
the wanton cruelty, that delights in lacerating an already sorely wounded
woman’s heart.
“O my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly,
mine honor, be not thou united.” (Genesis 49:6.)
Adrian Writh was released, with orders to make a public confession of
his crime at Einsidlen; but he escaped to Zurich, where he found an
asylum, became pastor of Altorf, and was the father of the celebrated
Rudolph or Ralph, Hospinian, author of the Sacramentarian history.
OExlin was released, after having been put to the torture at Lucerne. He
likewise found a refuge in the canton of Zurich, and became a pastor
there.3
 988

CHAPTER 43
THE GENERAL PROGRESS OF REFORM

The Reformation in Switzerland had now been baptized in blood — the

blood of the martyrs of Jesus. The adversary of the gospel had done his
work — his cruel work; but it made all men thoughtful. The violence of the
blow was felt by all classes throughout Switzerland. The power of Rome
was weakened, the triumphs of the Reformation were accelerated. Even
the heads of the Catholic cantons, notwithstanding their hatred against the
Reformers, could not conceal from themselves, that the general corruption
of manners, and the glaring immoraltries of the clergy, rendered some
reform absolutely indispensable. And seeing the indifference of the
ecclesiastical authorities to all such matters, they resolved to provide for
the wants of the church, and for the tranquillity of their common country.
But the plan of the deputies was opposed by the whole clerical influence,
and they had neither energy nor authority to press it. The future general
council, so often demanded, so long promised, was again spoken of as the
only hope of pacifying Christendom.
While these things were agitating the heads of the Catholic cantons, those
favorable to the Reformation were drawing closer together. Zurich, Berne,
Glaris, Schaffhausen, and Appenzell, formed an alliance for the more
effectual spread of the truth, and for the protection of their rights and
liberties. Such were the favorable results of the martyrdom of the Wriths.
“Every time,” says D’Aubigne, “that Rome erects a scaffold, and that
heads roll upon it, the Reformation will exalt the holy word of God, and
throw down some abuses. When Hottinger was executed, Zurich
suppressed images, and now that the heads of the Wriths have fallen,
Zurich will reply by the abolition of the mass.”
Ever since the decision of the two conferences, the council of Zurich had
been resolved to abolish the superstitious rites of the mass; but it was
thought desirable to delay until the public mind should appear to be
prepared for the change. The mass was therefore allowed to remain
 989
untouched after the removal of the images, but no priest was compelled to
say it, nor any layman to hear it. It became generally neglected, and day by
day it fell more and more into disrepute, so that the proper time for its
total abolition seemed to have arrived.

THE ABOLITION OF THE MASS

On the 11th of April, 1525, the pastors, Zwingle, Leo Juda, and
Engelhardt, accompanied by Megander, chaplain of the hospital, and
Myconius, preacher in the abbey church, presented themselves before the
council, and recommended the immediate abolition of the sacrifice of the
altar. One advocate alone presented himself to defend the established
opinion. Engelhardt, formerly a doctor of pontifical law, explained the
difference between the service in the Latin church, and the Eucharist
according to the institution of Christ and the apostolic practice. All felt the
solemnity and importance of the resolution which the council was called
upon to take, and thought it well to adjourn the debate till the following
day. And then, after some further conference between the divines and the
senators, a decree was published to the following effect: “Henceforward,
by the will of God, celebrate the Eucharist according to the institution of
Christ, and the apostolic practice. Be it permitted to those infirm, and yet
rude in faith, to continue the ancient practice for this time only. Let the
mass be universally abolished, laid aside, and antiquated, so as not to be
repeated even tomorrow.” The altars were accordingly removed from the
churches, and replaced by communion tables; the great body of the people
communicated according to the new form; those who attended mass were
even less numerous than the Reformers expected. Thus fell that mystery
of iniquity, which had deeply impressed for centuries the feelings and the
credulity of mankind. Mass had been celebrated in the Latin Church from
an early period; but prostration at the elevation of the host, and other
ceremonies, were of a later date.

THE CELEBRATION OF THE LORD’S SUPPER

Zwingle, first of all, preached from the words, “It is the Lord’s passover.”
After the conclusion of the sermon a table was covered with a white cloth,
unleavened bread, and cups filled with wine, to recall the remembrance of
the last supper of our Lord with His disciples. The minister then
 990
approached the table. The words of institution from the epistle to the
Corinthians, and other portions were read aloud by the deacons. The
crowd was so great, and the services so prolonged, that several ministers
and deacons assisted. After prayer, and exhorting the people to self-
examination, the minister lifted the bread, and, with a loud voice, repeated
the institution of the Lord’s supper. He then delivered the bread, and
afterwards the cup, to the deacons, to present them to the people, and for
the people to distribute them to each other. While the elements were
passing round, one of the ministers read from the Gospel of St. John those
ever fresh and ever blessed discourses, held by the Lord with His
disciples, immediately following the feast of the passover, in chapter 13.
After the supper the congragation all knelt down, and offered up their
grateful adorations and thanksgivings; then hymns, full of the expression
of love and praise to their Savior and Lord, terminated this solemn and
affecting scene — the first celebration of the Lord’s supper by the
Reformers in Switzerland. It occupied three days — Thursday in Passion
Week, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday.
For the establishment of the good work in Zurich, and for the spread of
the truth elsewhere, Zwingle, Leo Juda, and other learned men, published
about this time, several useful works on the holy scriptures; such as the
Pentateuch, and other historical books of the Old Testament, besides an
able commentary on “True and False Religion.”
We may now leave Zurich for a time. Having given a somewhat minute
account of the work of God’s Spirit there, we must be brief with the other
places, as many fields still lie before us. Besides, there is a great similarity
in the work in the different places.

THE REFORMATION IN BERNE

Berne was one of the most influential states in the confederation; it
numbered many powerful friends of the gospel, and many formidable
adversaries. For the first few years after the appearance of Luther and
Zwingle, a strong opposition was manifested to the new opinions.
Nowhere was the struggle likely to be more severe. But under the
evangelical preaching of Haller and Meyer the more violent prejudices
began to soften down.
 991
By the blessing of God on the labors of these devoted, earnest, and
consistent men, the cause of truth prospered, and from an act of the
government in 1523, we may conclude that the balance inclined to the side
of the Reformation. It was decreed, “That as conflicting doctrines were
delivered to the people, and the preachers thundered against each other,
they should all of them thenceforward preach the same gospel, namely, the
doctrine revealed by God, and illustrated by the prophetical and
apostolical writings; that they should propound nothing contrary to Holy
Writ, whether on Luther’s, or on any other authority, and avoid every
discourse of a seditious tendency.”
By this decision of the senate, the preaching of the gospel in all its fullness
and simplicity was encouraged, and the word of God was established as
the only standard of appeal in discussion, the only test of truth. Thus was
the foundation surely laid of a true Reformation, and under the sanction of
the government. But these advantages, intentional or unintentional, were
sufficient to alarm the papists, and to drive them to their favorite weapons
of intrigue, treachery, and violence. The two faithful witnesses in Berne,
Hailer and Meyer, must be silenced by fair means or foul. They were
falsely accused, together with the famous Wittenbach, of having spoken to
some nuns with the view of inducing them to leave their conventual life,
and were sentenced to banishment from Berne. But when the plot was
discovered, the opposition on the part of the people was so great, that the
matter was carried before the Great Council, which reversed the decision
of the Smaller Council, and discharged the ministers, with an exhortation to
confine themselves to their pulpits, and not to meddle with cloisters. This
was all that these devoted men wanted — their pulpits. Thus the
Reformation gained a fresh victory, and her enemies were covered with
disgrace.

THE NUNS OF KONIGSFELDT

A few months after this occurrence, the principles of the Reformation
were greatly strengthened by the conversion of the nuns of Konigsfeldt.
This was a wonderful triumph of the gospel. The monastery stood near
the castle of Hapsburg, and was surrounded with all the magnificence of
the Middle Ages. From the family of Hapsburg the imperial house of
Austria sprang in the seventh century, and gave, in after years, many
 992
Emperors to Germany. Here the daughters of the nobles in Switzerland
and Swabia used to take the veil. Beatrice of Laudenberg, sister to the
bishop of Constance, was one of the inmates. But the truth of God, which
the bishop was seeking with all his power to suppress, was the means of
the conversion of many of the nuns in this imperial monastery. The
writings of Luther and Zwingle, and the holy scriptures, had found their
way into this institution, and the saving change was accomplished. Nor
need we wonder: God was working by His Holy Spirit, and the strongest
prejudices and the greatest difficulties were overcome. The following
letter, written by Margaret Watteville, a youthful nun, and sister to the
provost of Berne, will furnish a better idea of the fruits of the
Reformation, and of the christian spirit that existed in those pious women,
than any explanation we could give. She writes to Zwingle: —
“May grace and peace in the Lord Jesus be given and multiplied
towards you always by God our heavenly Father. Most learned,
reverend, and dear sir, I entreat you to take in good part the letter I
now address to you. The love which is in Christ constrains me to
do so, especially since I have learnt that the doctrine of salvation is
spreading day by day through your preaching of the word of God.
For this reason I give praise to the everlasting God for enlightening
us anew, and sending us by His Holy Spirit so many heralds of His
blessed word; and at the same time I offer up my ardent prayers
that He will clothe with His strength both you and all those who
proclaim His glad tidings, and that, arming you against all the
enemies of the truth, He will cause His divine word to grow in all
men. Very learned sir, I venture to send your reverence this trifling
mark of my affection: do not despise it; it is an offering of christian
charity. If this electuary does you any good, and you should desire
more, pray let me know; for it would be a great pleasure to me to
do anything that was agreeable to you; and it is not I only who
think thus, but all those who love the gospel in our convent at
Konigsfeldt. They salute your reverence in Jesus Christ, and we all
commend you without ceasing to His almighty protection. —
Saturday before Loetare.”
These pious ladies, believing that they could better serve the Lord outside
than inside the walls of a convent, petitioned the government for
 993
permission to leave it. The council, in alarm at this strange proceeding,
endeavored to induce them to remain, promising that the discipline of the
convent would be relaxed, and their allowance increased. “It is not the
liberty of the flesh that we require,” said they to the council, “it is the
liberty of the Spirit.” As they persisted in their petition, the government
found it necessary at length to yield. And the decree which restored them
to liberty contained a general provision for the liberation of all who, with
the consent of their parents, might desire it. The convent gates were now
thrown open, which greatly weakened the credit and power of Rome, and
manifested the triumphs of the Reformation, for many of those ladies were
in a short time honorably married.

THE CONFERENCE AT BADEN

But although the principles of the Reformation were gaining ground
rapidly, the Roman Catholic party was still very powerful and very
active. A more decisive battle must be fought before victory can be
declared.
Ever since the first conference held at Zurich, the bishop of Constance, or
rather John Faber, his grand vicar, had been constantly deliberating by
what means he could most effectually arrest the progress of the
Reformation. Experience had proved that bishops’ charges were little
regarded; that writing books was hopeless, as the Reformers surpassed
their adversaries in learning and talents; indeed, success seemed utterly
hopeless unless the destruction of Zwingle could be accomplished. His
popularity and influence were increasing day by day.
A political event which happened about this time yet further impressed
upon the Romanists the necessity of some instant and vigorous measure.
The battle of Pavia, fought between the French and the imperialists, threw
a dark shadow over Switzerland, but shed a bright gleam on the wisdom,
patriotism, and Christianity of Zwingle. More than ten thousand Swiss
mercenaries had fought on that field so fatal to France. Between five and
six thousand swelled the number of the slain; and five thousand were made
prisoners. When these were released and sent home, their maimed and
emaciated forms were like so many spectacles of horror wandering over
the land, and were everywhere met by the wailings of the widows and the
 994
orphans of the slain. The people now remembered how often Zwingle had
thundered against these foreign enlistments from the pulpit; and spoke of
him as the truest patriot and their best friend.
The Romanists now saw that the general feeling was in favor of Zwingle,
and that some means must be taken to check his growing influence. But
how is this to be done? Who can solve the problem? We must go wisely to
work. Jezebel, long in practice, came to their aid; and thus, we may say,
she counselled The first thing to be done is to induce Zwingle to leave
Zurich. Of course he will come to the conference. Once out of the territow
of that state, he would be in your power. You could seize him and burn
him, and the death of the champion would be the death of the whole
movement. The plan was approved, victory was certain. “The torrent
once stemmed, the waters of heresy will retreat to the abyss whence they
issued, and the ‘everlasting hills’ of the old faith, which the deluge
threatened to overtop, will once more lift up their heads stable and
majestic as ever.” Faber communicated his plan to Dr. Eck, vice-chancellor
of Ingolstadt, who had acquired great reputation with his party by
combating the opinions of Luther at Leipsic; and it was agreed that he
should take charge of the plot.
This notorious and unscrupulous advocate of the papacy addressed a
letter to the cantons, filled with invectives against Zwingle, and offering to
convince him publicly of his errors, if they would furnish him with a
favorable opportunity. “I am full of confidence,” he said, “that I shall,
with little trouble, maintain our old true christian faith and customs,
against Zwingle, who has no doubt milked more cows than he has read
books.” A diet was at length fixed to be held at Baden — a Romish city, in
May, 1526.
Zwingle and the other divines of Zurich were invited to attend; but the
senate refused compliance. To send Zwingle to Baden, said the council,
would be to send him not to dispute, but to die. There the blood of the
Wriths was shed, and there the popish cantons were all-powerful they had
burned his books at Friburg and his effigy at Lucerne, and they were only
thirsting to burn himself. Indeed the papal party took no pains to conceal
their intentions towards Zwingle, whom they denounced in their public
manifesto as a rebel, a heretic, and a perverter of scripture. With these
 995
threatenings before them, the council of Zurich decreed that Zwingle
should not go to Baden. They also protested against the resolutions that
might be taken by the diet, but offered Eck full security, if he would come
and confer with the Reformer at Zurich. This offer was rejected, and the
conference took place without the presence of Zwingle.

THE OPENING OF THE DIET

Faber, Eck, and Murner, accompanied by prelates, magistrates, and
doctors, robed in garments of silk and damask, and adorned with chains,
rings, and crosses, repaired to the church. OEcolampadius and Hailer, two
quiet timid men, were the only Reformers who appeared in the discussion.
The same dogmas which had been replied to over and over again, were
brought forward by Eck. The following are his seven propositions, as
given by the learned and candid Roman Catholic historian, Du Pin. They
will also place before the reader the figments of popery for which the
papists were fighting, and for which they were ready to shed the blood,
not only of their best citizens, but of the saints of God.
1. That the real body and blood of Christ are present in the sacrament
of the altar.
2. That they are truly offered in the sacrifice of the mass for the living
and the dead.
3. That we ought to call on the blessed Virgin and the saints, as our
intercessors.
4. That the images of Jesus Christ, and His saints, ought not to be
taken down.
5. That there is a purgatory after this life.
6. That infants are born in original sin.
7. That baptism takes away that sin.1
Eck alone spoke in defense of the popish doctrines; but the absence of
Zwingle greatly disconcerted him, and nullified the chief object of the diet.
“I thank God,” wrote OEcolampadius to Zwingle, “that you are not here.
The turn that matters take makes me clearly perceive that, had you been
 996
here, we should neither of us have escaped the stake. How impatiently
they listen to me! but God will not forsake His glory, and that is all we
seek.” The assembly, being entirely governed by Eck, pronounced an
excommunication against Zwingle and all his adherents, and particularly
required of the senate of Basle to deprive OEcolampadius of his office, and
to banish him. It also strictly prohibited the sale of the books of Luther
and Zwingle, and forbade all innovations — all change in worship or
doctrine, under severe penalties.
The papal party affected to make much of their victory at Baden; but
victory was only in appearance. OEcolampadius was received with open
arms at Basle, and Hailer was retained in the exercise of his functions,
notwithstanding the excommunications launched against him. The cantons
of Zurich, Berne, Basle, and Sehaffhausen, demanded permission to
inspect the acts of the assembly, but they were not allowed to see them:
on which account they refused all further concern with the official decision
of the diet.
A dispute, which immediately followed on the return of Hailer and the
deputies from Baden, fairly tested the strength of both parties. For six
months preceding the conference, the Reformer had suspended the
celebration of mass in Berne. The smaller senate, influenced by the decrees
of Baden, insisted on his restoring it. He firmly but respectfully refused,
and appealed to the larger senate. They no doubt felt the difficulty of their
position. Will they annul the generous edict of 1523, and confirm the
persecuting mandate of 1526. The populace came to their help. The
people, by whom Hailer was much loved, assembled in multitudes, and
expressed their determination not to be deprived of their christian pastor.
The senate, yielding to the popular commotion, decreed: That he should
resign his dignity, but continue in his ministerial functions, and that the
celebration of mass should not be required of him. The day was evidently
past for communities to be governed by papal edicts or alarmed by church
censures. The strength of public feeling, embittered by religious strife, was
far beyond their reach. The breach which separated the papal and the
Protestant parties was widening day by day, and the spirit and position of
each becoming more and more hostile.
 997
The Catholic cantons, or those most firmly attached to the faith of their
fathers, Lucerne, Uri, Sehweitz, Unterwalden, and Zug, which are
frequently spoken of as the five, perceiving the instability of Berne in the
case of Hailer, offered to the authorities to send deputies to assist in the
maintenance of the old religion. This message, fortunately, offended the
pride of Berne — a military state. The government replied: “That the
embassy proposed was quite unnecessary, since the people of Berne were
sufficient for the management of their own affairs, and the care of their
religion was of all others most especially their own.” They now revoked
any engagement they had come under at Baden by their deputies; they
confirmed the edict of 1523; and decreed that a public disputation should
be held in their city during the winter following, for the final decision of
the disputed questions.

THE GREAT CONFERENCE AT BERNE

The bishops of Constance, Basle, Zion, and Lausanne, together with all
their most eminent theologians, were summoned to appear at this great
conference, on pain of forfeiting such of their possessions as lay in the
Bernese territory. They commanded all their own divines to be present,
and stated that the holy scriptures would be the only standard of appeal.
At the same time they published ten articles, to be maintained by the
advocates of the Reformed churches, and to be the subject of the
conference.
1. That the church of which Jesus Christ is the only Head, sprang from
the word of God, and subsists by the same word.
2. That the church ought to observe no other laws, and is not subject
to the traditions of men.
3. That the death of Christ on the cross is a sufficient expiation for the
sins of the whole world, and they that seek salvation in any other way
deny Jesus Christ.
4. That it cannot be proved by any testimony of scripture, that the
body and blood of Jesus Christ is corporeally received in the
sacrament.
 998
5. That the sacrifice of the mass is opposed to scripture, and derogates
from the sacrifice of Christ.
6. That Christ is the only intercessor and advocate for His people with
God the Father.
7. That the existence of a purgatory cannot be proved from scripture;
therefore, the prayers, ceremonies, and annual services for the dead are
useless.
8. That the worship of images, statues, and pictures, is contrary to the
word of God.
9. That marriage is not forbidden to any order of men.
10. That all lewd persons ought to be put out of the communion of the
church, as the scriptures teach us; for nothing is more unbecoming the
order of priesthood than a lewd and unchaste celibacy.2
Haller, the real author of the ten articles, naturally turned to Zwingle for
help in their defense. “If you do not stretch out your hands to me,” he
wrote, “I fear all is over.” The contest seemed unequal. On the one side the
Roman hierarchy, with the sanction of ages, the prejudices of mankind,
and backed by the authority of the civil power; and on the other side,
Berthold Hallet, a modest, timid preacher of the gospel. But the sword of
the Spirit was invincible. Nevertheless the servant of the Lord had to
prove, through deep exercise of soul, his own weakness and where his
great strength lay. Zwingle, as well as OEcolampadius, promised his
assistance. The decisive moment was at hand. The success of the
Reformation throughout the whole of Switzerland was involved in the
approaching assembly.

THE OPPOSITION OF ROME

The Catholic party, apprehending the results of the conference, made great
efforts to prevent it. They assembled at Lucerne, and strongly opposed
the meeting, referring the Bernese to the disputation of Baden as having
sufficiently decided the questions at issue. The Catholics of Germany also
addressed a strong remonstrance to the government of Berne, dissuasive of
the conference. “They implored them not to be seduced unto those
 999
novelties by the influence of a few foreigners, but to adhere to the religion
of their fathers and forefathers, under the shadow of which they had
achieved so many glorious victories, and extended so widely the
boundaries of their dominions.” To this plausible appeal the senate of
Berne nobly replied: “That the religion of Christ, that the salvation of
souls, that the peace of the republic, were at stake; and that from a
resolution thus grounded no reasons could possibly move them.” Other
means of persuasion and intimidation were then attempted. The Friburgers
even endeavored to excite the people of Berne to rise against their rulers.
Passports were refused to the evangelical ministers; and all persons were
forbidden to pass through the territories of the Catholic cantons to the
meeting. Nor did the Emperor suffer his numerous engagements to prevent
his writing to the government of Berne, urging them to change their mind
and refer the whole question to a general council.
The reader must draw his own conclusions as to the motives of the
Catholics in uniting all their energies to prevent the proposed assembly.
They dreaded the light of plain scripture. Roman Catholicism can only
exist in gross darkness as to the truth of God. But their remonstrances and
menaces were all in vain. The senate was firm; and the evangelical
principles had made such manifest progress among all classes of the
inhabitants, that any attempt to arrest the cause of Reform would have
immediately ended in a popular commotion and bloodshed.

THE OPENING OF THE CONFERENCE

On the 7th of January, 1528, the great conference was opened. None of
the prelates, and very few of the higher powers who had been invited were
present; yet a great number of ecclesiastics and learned men assembled
from all parts of Switzerland and the surrounding countries. As many as a
hundred evangelical teachers from Glaris, Schaffhausen, St. Gall,
Constance, Ulm, Lindau, Isenach, Augsburg, Strasburg, and other places
proceeded first to Zurich, in order to go in a body with Zwingle. But so
suspicious were the Zurichers of papal treachery, and so anxious about the
safety of their own Reformer, that the magistrates sent forward his party
under a strong military escort.
 1000
More than three hundred and fifty ministers of the gospel were present at
the disputation. Many of those worthy men deserve a place in our history
for the Lord’s sake; but we can only give the names of a few. Haller was
supported by Zwingle, OEcolampadius, Capito, and Bucer, the flower of
the Swiss and Strasburg Reformation; there were also Pellican, Bullinger,
Blaurer, Hoffmeister, Megunder, Zingk, Schmidt, the burgomaster Reust,
and Vadian, consul of St. Gall. On the side of the papacy the cause was
left, says Waddington, “to the feeble protection of men without talents or
learning, or any sort of reputation or authority, not comparable to Eck and
Faber — Alexius Grad, Tregarius, Buchstab, Egidius — names which
appear on no other occasion on the page of history. But the positions of
Hailer were defended with much solid erudition and great and practiced
talents.” If we accept a few feeble attempts by the papal party to disturb
the unanimity of the Reformers, there was no feature of any remarkable
interest in the whole assembly, at least to readers in our day.

THE REGULATIONS OF THE CONFERENCE

Four presidents were appointed; and, that everything might be recorded
with unimpeachable fidelity, four secretaries were chosen — two by each
of the two parties — and sworn to give a faithful account of the
proceedings. The meeting took place in the church of the Franciscans, and
lasted from the 7th till the 28th of January. Two sessions were held daily,
and each session was opened with prayer. Perfect freedom of debate was
allowed to both parties, with this one condition, “That no proof should be
admitted but from scripture, nor any explanation of the proofs which was
not also supported by scripture — no judge being allowed but scripture
explained by itself, that is, by the comparison of more obscure parts with
those which are more clear.” The ten theses composed by Hailer were
successively discussed. Zwingle, OEcolampadius, Capito, Bucer, and
Haller defended them alternately with so much success, that a great
majority of the clergy of Berne, together with the canons the prior and
sub-prior of the Dominicans, signed the ten articles, declaring that they
judged them in perfect accordance with the sacred scriptures. The
presidents of the assembly then exhorted the magistrates to adopt such
measures for the interest of religion as they should deem wise and
practicable.
 1001
THE RESULTS OF THE CONFERENCE
The authorities proceeded immediately to act upon the advice of the
presidents. The altars were removed from the churches, and the images
were destroyed, yet without disorder or bloodshed. They published a
decree, with the concurrence of the citizens, proclaiming the ten articles as
the creed of all. They further, by this decree, deprived the four bishops of
all spiritual jurisdiction within their territories, ordering the removal of all
such rural deans as opposed the Reformation, and the abolition of the
mass and images at Berne for ever. Thus was the downfall of the papacy
throughout that extensive canton completely accomplished, and the idols
which had reigned for twelve hundred years were overthrown and
destroyed in one day!
When Constantine made the profession of Christianity a pathway to
worldly preferment, his heathen soldiers and senators eagerly rushed into
the church. But alas! they brought their idolatries with them. It was then
that statues, images, paintings, pomps, festivals, vestments, and the
demigods of paganism were introduced into the professing church; and all
this, that she might enjoy the favor of princes. From the fourth till the
sixteenth century, idolatry was supreme, and the word of God was
degraded and rejected by the dominant church. But now we see a greater
than Constantine — son of a herdsman in the valley of the Tockenburg —
the humble pastor of Zurich; standing before us, through grace, as the
noblest champion of the word of God, and the most uncompromising
enemy of the Judaism and the paganism of Rome, that the sixteenth
century has furnished us with. Luther was a great Reformer as to doctrine,
but feeble as to idolatry; Zwingle was valiant in both. Here, all praise be to
the God of all grace, and the power of His Holy Spirit, Zwingle restores
the long banished Bible to its right place, and purifies the church of its
inveterate abuses.
Before leaving Berne, he went to the cathedral, where twenty-five altars
and a great many images had been thrown down, and finding his way
through these “eloquent ruins,” he ascended the pulpit in the midst of an
immense crowd. In great emotion he said, “Victory has declared for the
truth, but perseverance alone can complete the triumph. Christ persevered
even until death. Stand fast, my brethren, in the liberty wherewith Christ
 1002
has made you free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.
Fear not! That God who has enlightened you, will enlighten your
confederates also, and Switzerland, regenerated by the Holy Spirit, shall
flourish in righteousness and peace.”
The work was severely complete. “The citizens were commanded,
without exception, to withdraw their obedience from the episcopal
authorities; deacons, pastors, and all other ministers of the church, were
absolved from their oaths of allegiance to the bishop; altars, images, and
masses were abolished throughout the territory, together with the long list
of pontifical observances and ceremonies, such as anniversaries of the
saints, dedications of churches, the use of sacred vestments, fast-days and
feast-days.” The capital adopted the new form of worship, and in the
space of a few months all the municipalities of the canton followed the
example.

THE MERCY OF THE GOSPEL

How seldom it has been our lot to witness a great victory celebrated by
acts of mercy! Alas! this is a new thing in Christendom. It has never been
so in the reign of Jezebel. Her disobedient children have either been
drowned in blood or consumed in fire. But the principles of the papacy are
essentially opposed to the mercy of the gospel. Fire and sword are the
arguments of the one, love and mercy of the other.
At Berne, we find that the great triumph of the truth was celebrated by
public rejoicings and deeds of mercy. The magistrates opened the prison
doors; two men condemned to death were pardoned; others who had been
banished from the republic were recalled — her exiles returned to their
homes. Thus charity followed in the footsteps of faith and victory. “A
great cry resounded far and wide,” writes Bullinger, “in one day Rome
had fallen throughout the country, without treachery, violence, or
seduction, by the strength of truth alone.” The monks resigned their
monasteries into the hands of the magistrates: the funds were appropriated
for benevolent and educational purposes, and the religious houses were
converted into schools and hospitals. And now we find the princely
monastery of Konigsfeldt was also devoted to the same useful purposes.
“If a king or Emperor,” said the citizens, “in alliance with us, were to enter
 1003
our city, would we not remit offenses, and show favor to the poor? And
now the King of kings, the Prince of peace, the Son of God, the Savior of
mankind, has visited us, and brings with Him the pardon of our sins, who
only deserve eternal banishment from His presence. And can we better
celebrate the advent of Him to our city than by forgiving those who have
trespassed against us?”
In the same strain followed a moral and political regeneration, which was
not among the least honorable or merciful accompaniments of the
Reformation. All mercenary service to foreign powers was prohibited, and
foreign pensions abolished.
At Easter, the Lord’s supper was celebrated for the first time according to
the institution of the blessed Lord, and the practice of the apostles. As to
Zurich, it was a time of great solemnity and deep interest. The citizens and
their wives, in quiet sober dress, gathered round the table of the Lord,
which recalled the ancient Swiss simplicity. The heads of the state, and the
people mingled together, and each one felt that the Lord was present with
them. “How can the adversaries of the word refuse to embrace the truth at
last,” said Hoffmeister, “seeing that God Himself renders it so striking a
testimony?”
Thus was the Reformation established at Berne, and thus it has continued
until the present day. If the disputation at Baden gave a temporary
ascendancy to the papal party, it was more than counteracted at Berne.
“The citizens of Constance, Schaffhausen, St. Gall, Glaris, Tockenburg,
and other places, in which the struggle was till that time undecided, now
boldly declared their adhesion to the Reformation, and gave the customary
proofs of their evangelical zeal by abolishing images, altars, and the
mass.”3

THE REFORMATION OF BASLE

According to all history, the triumphs of the gospel in Berne produced a
most sensible effect on several cantons; but more especially on those
where the Reformed doctrines had previously found an entrance. Indeed,
some venture to say that all Switzerland was moved by the decided part
which that powerful canton had taken in the Reform movement. “It gave
new life,” says Wylie, “to the Protestant cause in every part of the
 1004
country. On the west, it opened the door for the entrance of the Protestant
faith into French-speaking Switzerland. On the east, in German Helvetia,
the movement, quickened by the impulse communicated from Berne, was
consummated in those towns and villages, where for some time it had been
in progress. From the Grisons, on the Italian frontier, to the borders of the
Black Forest, where Basle is washed by the waters of the Rhine, the
influence was felt, and the movement quickened. The great mountains in
the center of the land where the glaciers have their seat, and the great rivers
their birthplace, were alone unmoved: yet not altogether unmoved, for the
victory of Berne sent a thrill of surprise and horror through the
Oberland.”4
But the Reformation of the learned city of Basle was the most important
consequence of the decisive step of the warlike Berne. In importance, it
was next to Zurich and Berne in the Swiss Confederacy. We have already
spoken of Basle in connection with the early days of Zwingle and Leo
Juda, when they sat at the feet of the famous Wittenbach — the first to
sow the good seed of the gospel in Helvetia. Capito and Hedio
successively watered that precious seed by their prayers, and the public
expositions of the gospel of the grace of God. And these were followed in
1522 by a yet greater evangelist, OEcolampadius. And here too, the
writings of Luther were printed by the famous Froben, and scattered over
Switzerland and other lands.

THE PEOPLE IN ADVANCE OF THE GOVERNMENT

For about six years, the gospel had been faithfully preached by the meek
and pious OEcolampadius; but with all his scholarly accomplishments, he
was wanting in decision and courage. It has been said by some, that what
Melancthon was to the dogmatic Luther, OEcolampadius was to the
prompt and courageous Zwingle. But the middle classes had been so
taught by their pastor, that they were more in favor of a change of religion
than the ruling powers. “There was,” says D’Aubigne, “a triple
aristocracy — the superior clergy, the nobles, and the university —
which checked the expansion of christian convictions.” And these
authorities, failing to discern the exact moment for concession to popular
opinion, were compelled to yield to the demands of the citizens, and to act
according to their dictation; that which ought to have been characterized as
 1005
a peaceful Reformation, was accomplished (through the temporizing of the
magistrates) by a violent revolution.
A few years previous to this fresh excitement in 1528, the senate issued an
edict, “That there should be a uniformity in the religious worship, and that
on some future day a public disputation should be held on the subject of
the mass, and the question of its continuance decided by vote.” By this
decree, the council flattered themselves that they had laid the foundation
of public peace; but, like all half measures in troublous times, it entirely
failed of its object. Both the Roman Catholics and the Reformers
continued to assail each other in public and private; but from the boldness
and bitterness of the popish preachers, and their increasing violence, the
citizens began to fear that they had their secret supporters among the
leading men in the senate. This suspicion aroused the Protestants. They
began to assemble in large numbers. But first of all they sent deputies to
remind the senate of the obligation of their decree.
This was perfectly legal, and consistent with republican principles. But
the friends of popery, who resided for the most part in Little Basle, which
lay on the other bank of the Rhine, assembled in arms, and brandishing
their swords and lances, endeavored to obstruct the passage of the
petitioners to the town hall. Meltinger, the burgomaster, and an intrepid
leader of the papists, had great influence in the senate, and haughtily
refused the petition. Meyer, who was also burgomaster, and an equally
zealous friend of the Reformation, had with him the majority of the
people. A collision became inevitable. “The fatal hour approaches,” said
OEcolampadius, “terrible for the enemies of God.” Much debate ensued
with no good results. The council affected to be neutral; trial was made of
soft words; both parties were advised to retire to their homes; but it was
too late: the tumult was gradually rising into a tempest. The deputies not
only stood firm, but proceeded to demand “that those senators who
encouraged the papal preachings, in contempt of the decree, and to the
promotion of disorder and discord, should be deprived of their dignity.”
This, the senate altogether refused; and from this moment the agitation
increased. Basle soon wore the appearance of a military camp, which an
accidental blow might have changed into that of a battlefield.
 1006
BASLE IN A STATE OF SIEGE
On the night of the 25th of December, the partisans of the bishop, alarmed
at the appearance of affairs, met under arms, and raised the cry that an
Austrian army was coming to their aid. This was the first formal departure
from the legal course. The Protestants hearing this terrible cry, hastily
arose from their beds, seized their arms, and repaired to the Gardeners’
Hall, the rendezvous of their party. The news of what was going on in
Basle brought many deputies from both Reformed and Catholic cantons,
to express their sympathy and offer their mediation. But the Reformed
citizens were anxiously awaiting the decision of the magistrates. Both
parties remained under arms for several days and nights. All the gates of
the city, except two, were closed; and strong guards were posted in every
quarter. The senate continued its sittings; one edict after another was
issued, but so temporising, that they increased rather than appeased the
violence of the crisis. The Protestants, considering what was due to the
glory of Christ, to public justice, and to the welfare of their posterity,
repeated their remonstrances to the council, and demanded an immediate
answer.
On the 8th of February, 1529, the senate replied, “That those senators
whose removal was required should refrain from voting on religious
questions, but should retain their seats and voices upon all others.” The
citizens began to fear from the delays required, and the half-measures
proposed, that some evil design was thereby concealed, and that their
liberties were in danger as well as their religion. This so incensed the
citizens, that they took military possession of the gates and towers of the
city, and demanded the removal of the suspected members without delay.
However contrary such proceedings were, and ever must be, to the gospel
of peace, we must bear in mind what the principles of a popular
government are, what the education of those men had been, and that they
were only emerging from the darkness of popery. But a merciful
providence so overruled this great commotion that no blood was shed,
though a great victory was gained.
For fifteen days the patience of the townspeople had been sorely tried by
the halting policy of the council. Basle was on the eve of a civil war, and,
what is worse, “a war of hearths.” The senate was suspected of
 1007
treachery. “The mass, the mass — or to arms! to arms!” was the Catholic
cry, accompanied with a storm of insults, invectives, and sanguinary
menaces. The Protestants replied, “No mass, no mass — not even a single
one more: we will die sooner!” The senate was embarrassed.
OEcolampadius retired to his pulpit, and preached meekness and patience
with such unction that the people were melted to tears. Prayer was offered
up to God that He would direct them to those measures that would be for
His glory and the deliverance of His people from the superstitions of
Rome. Sincerely believing that they were contending for their civil and
religious liberties, they resolved not to yield. Twelve hundred men, all well
armed, appeared before the senate house. “We must have your reply
tonight,” said they. It was nine of the evening. “Tomorrow,” said the
council, “we will give you an answer/’ and begged the citizens to retire in
peace to their homes. “No eyes shall be closed tonight in Basle,” was the
substance of their reply. The Protestants resolved not to separate, and
once more, and for the last time, they demanded the answer of the council
that very night. The lords of Basle began to think they had trifled long
enough; some concession must be made.
When near midnight they sent a messenger to say; “That all members of
senate who were relatives of priests would be excluded from that body,
and as to the rest of their demands, all things touching religion and policy
would be regulated according to their wishes.” This reply was so far
satisfactory, but the citizens viewed it as little better than a further
compromise, that their enemies might gain time; so they agreed not to
separate nor to relax their vigilance.

THE IDOLS DESTROYED

While both parties were thus deliberating as to the future, an apparent
accident speedily brought the whole matter to an issue. Those who had
been, appointed to patrol the streets, and to inspect all the posts in the
city, entered the cathedral church of St. Peter. One of the men, urged by
curiosity, opened a side door with his halberd, where a number of idols
had been stowed away. One of them falling on the stone pavement was
broken to pieces. The curiosity of the spectators was further moved by
the sight of the fragments, and they begma turning out the images one after
another that were concealed in this closet. The floor was soon covered
 1008
with heads, trunks, and broken limbs; the priests, who were not far off,
raised a great outcry, and attempted resistance, but this only hastened the
work of destruction. The rumor of a disturbance in the church flew rapidly
through the city. Hundreds of armed burghers were immediately on the
spot. The hour of religious fury had arrived. “Why should we spare the
idols that light up the flames of discord?” cried the Protestants; and the
cathedral was swept as by a hurricane. The altars were demolished, the
pictures were torn down, the idols were overturned, and the fragments
piled up, and set on fire in the public squares.
The priests, trembling with fear, hastened to conceal themselves from
public view. The senate came together in amazement, and attempted to
interpose their authority, and appease the tumult; but it was too late.
They had failed in the first requisite in the art of popular government —
the wisdom to discern the right time to meet the popular demand. The
citizens were long patient, but their determination gradually increased, and
the senate was blinded by the influence of a small faction within it; and
now they must listen to the haughty reply of the people. “We are doing in
one hour that on which you have been deliberating for these three years,
whether it should be done or not.” While the iconoclasts respected all
kinds of private property, no symbol of idolatry was spared. Under the
blows of these zealous burghers, all the idols in all the churches fell, and
were cast into the flames, so that they lighted up the darkness of the night,
and warmed the chilly and excited crowds.
The people carried the day; the senate submitted. Twelve members —
opposed to the Reformation — were dismissed to an honorable obscurity,
and the demands of the citizens were granted. “They decreed,
1, That the citizens should vote in the election of the members of the
two councils;
2, That from this day the idols and mass should be abolished in the
city and the canton, and the churches provided with good ministers to
preach the word of God;
3, That in all matters appertaining to religion and the commonwealth,
two hundred and sixty of the members of the guilds should be admitted
to deliberate with the senate.”5
 1009
Such were the triumphs of these two eventful days. They had secured the
establishment of the Reformed religion; and gained, what were in their
estimation, great civil advantages, and all without shedding one drop of
blood. The two objects, civil and religious, were generally combined in the
Swiss Reformation. “The commencement of the Reformation in Basle,”
says Ruchat, “was not a little tumultuous, but its issue was happy, and all
the troubles that arose about religion were terminated without injury to a
single citizen in his life or goods.” All the trades met on the 12th of
February, and took the oath, guild by guild, of fidelity to the new order of
things. The following Sunday the Reformed worship was introduced in all
the churches of Basle, with the singing of the Psalms in German: and in the
course of the week a general amnesty was proclaimed, covering all
offenses.

THE RESULTS OF THE REVOLUTION

Everything was now changed in Basle. The leaders of the papal party,
priests, scholars, and monks, prepared to leave it. Not however, from any
fear of bodily harm, but from their dislike to the Protestant faith. Many of
them were courteously entreated to remain; Erasmus especially — the
most eminent person who withdrew from Basle at this time. In writing to
his friend Pirkheimer, a little before his departure he says:
“OEcolampadius made me the offer of his sincere friendship; which I
accepted on condition that he would allow me to differ from him on certain
points. He would have persuaded me not to leave Basle. I told him that it
was with reluctance I quitted a city, which, on so many accounts, was
highly agreeable to me; but that I could not longer support the odium to
which a continuance there would expose me, as I should be thought to
approve the public proceedings of the place.” Soon after this friendly
interview he took his departure and removed to Friburg. His salaries, his
credit with the great, with the pope and the papal party, were in danger if
he remained any longer in that polluted residence. But so prone was this
great man of letters to sarcasm and jesting, that he could not restrain his
wit against the superstition of his own party. “So many were the insults
heaped upon the images and crucifixes,” he says, “as to make it strange,
that those holy saints, who had been wont to display such prodigies of
 1010
power on very slight offenses, should have refrained, in this important
emergency, from the display of their miraculous energies.”
New professors, to supply the place of Erasmus and others, were invited
to fill the vacant chairs in the university, and in particular, Myconius,
Phrygio, Munster, and Grynaeus. At the same time an ecclesiastical order,
or confession of faith, was published, which is considered one of the most
precious documents of this epoch.6

THE SACRAMENTAL DISPUTE

About the period at which we have now arrived, one of the most grievous
sources of discouragement to the Reformers, both in Germany and
Switzerland, was the dispute which arose about the sacrament of the
supper, commonly called the sacramentarian controversy. Luther, it will
be remembered,7 whom God used to raze to the ground almost every part
of the Romish system, retained to the end of his days a superstitious
reverertce for a certain materialism in the supper which he called
consubstantiation; that is, “he believed in the presence of the flesh and
blood of Christ with, in, or under, the bread and wine.” He did not believe
like the Romanist, that the Lord’s supper was a sacrifice, or that the body
of Christ in the, elements should be worshipped; but he maintained that
the body was there, and received, not merely by faith, but corporeally by
the communicant. Zwingle, on the other hand, was extremely simple in his
views; of the sacred supper. He maintained that its grand design was a
memorial or commemoration. “This do in remembrance of Me.” At the
same time he affirmed that it can only be properly commemorated in faith.
We show the Lord’s death — His death for us, the blood shed by which
our sins are washed away. We thus rest in faith upon His death as the sure
ground of our eternal life, and joyfully feed on the rich spoils of
accomplished redemption.
“His precious blood was shed,
His body bruised for sin;
Remembering this, we break the bread,
And, thankful, drink the wine.”

But as we have already described the conference of Marburg, we return

and take up the thread of our history.
 1011

CHAPTER 44
THE EXTENSION OF REFORM IN SWITZERLAND

The Reformation was now established in the three principal cantons,

Zurich, Berne, and Basle. The example of these powerful states, greatly
influenced a considerable part of German Switzerland. In many places
the citizens, who had been inclined to the Reformation but were
undecided, now boldly declared their faith in the new doctrines.
Schaffhausen, St. Gall, Glarus, Bienne, Thurgau, Bremgarten, Tockenburg,
Wesen, and other parts of less consideration, were entirely or partially
reformed. The effect of the discussions, followed by the zeal of those great
centres, was also felt in French Switzerland, “lying at the foot of the Jura,
or scattered amid the pine-forests of its elevated valleys, and which up to
this time had shown the most absolute devotion to the Roman pontiff.”

THE MINGLING OF SPIRITUAL AND POLITICAL AFFAIRS

But here we must pause for a moment and draw attention to the great and
common mistake of Protestantism from the beginning — that of looking
to the secular arm for protection, in place of simply witnessing for the
truth, and trusting in the living God. No sooner had the Reformers broken
with Rome, than they, as if terrified by her remaining power, stretched out
their hands to the civil governments and sought the shelter of their armies.
Luther, it is true, objected to the force of arms in the furtherance of the
truth, and looked for the triumphs of the gospel through the faithfulness of
its friends; yet, as we have seen, he agreed to the princes assuming the
entire control over ecclesiastical and spiritual affairs from an early period
of the Reformation. But Zwingle went much farther in this dangerous
course. When troubles arose, and dangers beset the vessel of the
Reformation, through the treachery of the Catholic cantons, he thought it
his duty, like a true republican or a christian patriot, to examine federal
questions, to counsel the senate, and to sanction an appeal to arms. But
the end of these unscriptural proceedings, as we shall soon painfully see,
 1012
was the inglorious death of the illustrious Reformer, and an almost fatal
blow to the evangelical cause in Switzerland.
From the time that the Reformed states assumed, or rather usurped the
functions of the church, and the ministers of the gospel interfered with
politics, the clouds began to lower and the storm to gather. Desirous no
doubt to strengthen the good work within their cantons, and of extending it
without, the magistrates of Zurich and Berne published several edicts,
prohibiting their subjects from attending mass and from speaking
unfavourably of the recent changes, and ordered a better attendance on
evangelical services: and also, for the purification of morals, they issued a
general proclamation against festivities, drunkenness, and blasphemy. But
while the civil authorities were thus enforcing their religion by edicts,
Zwingle descended from his sacred vocation to that of a political
diplomatist. From this time the almighty arm of a divine providence,
which had sheltered the great Reformer and the Swiss Reformation,
seemed to be withdrawn; and the council of Zurich, though for a time
boastful, was smitten with indecision, weakness, and folly.

THE FIRST FALSE STEP — “A CONFEDERACY”

Influenced, or rather misled, as we believe, by his republican education,
Zwingle thought it but right for the Refomners and the Reformation to
form a league of self-defense. Having long foreseen that the Reform
movement would eventually divide his beloved country into two camps,
he thought himself perfectly justified in promoting an alliance with the
evangelical states. In the year 1527 he proposed what was called a
Christian Co-Burghery, in which all the professors of the gospel might be
united in a new Reformed confederation. Constance was the first to
intimate her approval of the new league; Berne, St. Gall, Mulhausen,
Basle, Schaffhausen, and Strasburg followed. “But this Christian Co-
Burghery,” says D’Aubigne, “which might become the germ of a new
confederation, immediately raised up numerous adversaries against
Zwingle, even among the partisans of the Reformation.” The pastor of
Zurich was now on dangerous ground, which the end too speedily proved.
As a citizen he had been taught to consider the regeneration of his country
as a part of his religion, and the church in which he was cradled had for
 1013
centuries wielded two swords. Even in the present day we are surprised to
find how much Continental Christians are governed by what is national.
Luther, who was an imperialist, was entirely opposed to the policy of
carnal resistance. “Christians,” he said, “ought not to resist the Emperor,
and if he requires them to die they are to yield up their lives.”

THE FIVE CANTONS FORM A LEAGUE WITH AUSTRIA

The Roman Catholics, on hearing of this new alliance of the Protestants,
were filled with alarm and indignation. The five, or forest cantons,
Lucerne, Zug, Schweitz, Uri, and Unterwalden, remained firm in their
fidelity to Rome. The herdsmen of those mountains, long wedded to their
habits, their traditions, and their religion, heard with grief and dismay of
the terrible wickedness of the heretics in the plains below. As priests and
monks arrived in the Oberland from those scenes of daring impiety, and
told their wondrous stories to the excited mountaineers, they were
inflamed to madness. This cannot be borne with! this pestilent heresy
must be exterminated by fire and sword, was their first thought; and they
burned with desire to light the faggots.
Almost entirely ignorant of the meaning of the word Reform, we can
easily imagine their feelings when messenger after messenger came running
to tell them that the altars at which their fathers had worshipped were
being cast to the ground, that the images were ignominiously burnt in the
public squares, that mass was abolished, and that the holy priests and
monks were driven into exile. Their fanatical zeal being thus raised to the
highest pitch, and fanned by the artful monks, they were ready for
anything desperate; and they were only restrained from proceeding
immediately to open violence by the superiority, both in numbers and
power, of the Protestant cantons. The bishop of Constance also appealed
to them by letter, entreating them to act with firmness, or all Switzerland
would embrace the Reform.
What is to be done? was now the important question. We can sit still no
longer! To form an alliance with a foreign power without the consent of all
the other cantons would be a violation of the fundamental principles of the
Helvetic Confederation, and of the league of brotherhood. Nevertheless,
allies we must have, and the claims of the church are higher far than
 1014
fidelity to the nation. And knowing that Ferdinand, brother of Charles V.,
and Archduke of Austria, was distinguished for his hatred of the
Protestants, they entered into an alliance with this prince for the
extirpation of Reform, and the maintenance of Romanism.
This was unconstitutional, unnatural, and cruel. Austria was the ancient
oppressor and the natural enemy of the Swiss nation — the last quarter
from which a Swiss canton might have been expected to seek help. “Had
they forgotten,”’ exclaims a modern writer, “the grievous yoke that
Austria. made them bear in other days? Had they forgotten the blood it
cost their fathers to break that yoke? Were they now to throw away what
they had fought for in the gory fields of Morgarten and Sempach? They
were prepared to do this. Religious antipathy overcame national hatred.
Terror of Protestantism suspended their dread of their traditional foe.”1
The alliance was so contrary to all national feeling and prejudice, that the
Austrians had some difficulty in believing it to be in good faith. “Take
hostages,” said the mountaineers, “write the articles of treaty with your
own hands; command, and we will obey!” The league was concluded, and
sworn to on both sides, the 23rd of April, 1529, at Waldshut. It decreed,
“that all attempts at forming new sects in the five cantons should be
punished with death. And in case of emergency, Austria shall send into
Switzerland six thousand foot soldiers, and four hundred horse, with all
requisite artillery. And if necessary, the Reformed cantons shall be
blockaded, and all provisions intercepted.”
The report of these negotiations excited great distrust and alarm even
among the enemies of the Reformation. By leaguing themselves thus with a
foreign power, it was said, they were compromising the independence of
Switzerland, and, instead of an ally, they would find a master. But these
feelings, as the first blush of their patriotism, were soon extinguished by
their hatred of the Zwinglians. The men of Unterwalden and Uri, in their
fanatical zeal, suspended the arms of Austria with their own, and
decorated their hats with peacocks’ feathers — the badge of Austria. This
gave rise to the following lines which expressed the national feeling:
“Wail, Helvetians, wail,
For the peacock’s plume of pride
To the Forest-canton’s savage bull
In friendship is allied.”
 1015
The eight cantons not included in this alliance, with the exception of
Friburg, united in sending deputies to their mountain confederates, with a
view to reconciliation. But they were everywhere disrespectfully treated.
Feeling that they had the imperial army to fall back upon, the papists
offered every kind of insult to the doctrines and persons of the Reformers.
“No sermon, no sermon!” they cried; “would to God that your new faith
was buried for ever!” The deputies, retiring in astonishment, were still
further shocked in passing the door of the secretary of state, where they
saw the arms of Zurich, Berne, Basle, and Strasburg, hanging from a lofty
gibbet.

THE ROMISH CANTONS PERSECUTE THE REFORMED

Thus war seemed inevitable. All things were tending to an open and
immediate rupture. The men of the mountains became violent. In order to
defend the religion of their fathers, and to exclude the new doctrines from
their subjects, they began to fine, imprison, torture, and put to death the
professors of the Reformed faith. One of these cases, however, was so
atrocious, that it roused the feelings of mankind, and speedily brought
matters to a crisis.
James Keyser, a pastor of the canton of Zurich, and a father of a family,
was making his way on Saturday, 22nd May, to Oberkirk, in the parish of
Gaster, where he was to preach on the Sunday. When quietly and
confidently walking along a woody part of the road, which he had often
gone before, he was suddenly seized by six men, posted there to surprise
him, and carry him off to Schweitz. He was brought before the
magistrates, tried, and condemned to be burnt alive, on no other pretense
than that he was an evangelical ministel:. The remonstrance of Zurich, to
whose territory he belonged, was treated with derision, and the barbarous
sentence was carried into execution. When first the pious man heard his
sentence, he burst into tears; but before the hour of his martyrdom arrived,
the grace of God had so revived his courage, and filled him with joy, that
he walked cheerfully to the stake, fully confessed his faith, and thanked
the Lord Jesus in the midst of the flames, even to his latest breath, that He
had counted him worthy to die for the gospel. “Go,” said one of the
Schweitz magistrates, with a sarcastic smile, to the Zurich deputies, “Go,
 1016
and tell them at Zurich how he thanks us!” This was a defiant challenge to
the men of Zurich, and so they understood it.

WAR DECLARED
The Zurichers, exasperated at this outrageous conduct, and regarding it as
an affront to themselves, declared war against the five cantons. While it is
the duty of the magistrates to defend the oppressed against the oppressor,
it is the duty of the minister of Christ, to abide by his sacred calling, and
only bring into the field the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God.
But here alas! impartial history has recorded the sad departure of the great
Reformer from the gracious precepts of his Master, of which he ought to
have been a living witness. The burning pile of his brother minister kindled
the strongest passions of his soul as a citizen and a patriot. He raised a cry
against the bigotry and intolerance of the Forest-cantons which resounded
through all the Confederation.
He called for the most energetic measures on the part of the authorities. In
the council, in the pulpit, he exhorted them to take up arms, to be firm and
fear not. Identifying himself with the army, of which he was chaplain, he
exclaimed, “We thirst for no man’s blood, but we will clip the wings of the
Oligarchy; if we shun it, the truth of the gospel and the lives of ministers
will never be secure among us. We must trust in God alone; but when we
have a just cause, we must also know how to defend it, and, like Joshua
and Gideon, shed blood in behalf of our country and our God.”
Had Zwingle been a magistrate in the council, or a general in the army, his
appeals would have been consistent and inspiring; but he had forgotten
that he was a minister of the Prince of peace, and that the weapons of his
warfare were not to be carnal, but spiritual, and mighty through the power
of God. At the same time we must remember that it was against political
abuses, and not against a difference of faith, that he called for force. “As
for the mass, rites, idols, and superstitions,” he said, “let no one be forced
to abandon them. It is for the word of God alone to scatter with its
powerful breath all this idle dust. Let us propose to the five cantons to
allow the free preaching of the word of the Lord, to renounce their wicked
alliances, and to punish the abettors of foreign service.”2
 1017
MILITARY PREPARATIONS
Meanwhile the popish cantons were not idle. They knew what they had
done, and what they had to expect. The war of religion was begun. The
sound of the warhorn re-echoed in the mountains and the valleys: men
were arming in every direction; messengers were sent off in haste to
Austria; but Ferdinand, having been attacked by the Turks, could not
furnish them with the troops he had promised. Nevertheless, firmly united
among themselves, the men of the five cantons marched under the great
banner of Lucerne, on the 8th of June, to join battle with the Reformers.
Zurich saw there was not a moment to be lost. Four thousand men, on the
9th of June, well armed, issued from the gates of Zurich to meet the foe.
The walls and towers were crowded with spectators to witness the
departure, among whom was Anna, the wife of Zwingle. At nine in the
evening they arrived at Cappel, a village on the frontiers of Zurich and
Zug. At day-break, on the morning of the 10th, the Zurich warriors sent a
herald with a formal declaration of war, and of the rupture of the alliance.
Immediately the small town of Zug was filled with cries and alarm. The
sudden march of the Zurichers had taken them by surprise; great
consternation prevailed: men hasting to put on their armor, and women
and children in tears.
But just as the first division of the Zurich army, consisting of two
thousand men, was preparing to cross the frontier, a horseman was
observed spurring his steed up the hill at full gallop. It was OElbi,
Landamman of Glaris. “Halt!” he cried, with great emotion; “I am come
from our confederates. The five cantons are prepared, but I have prevailed
upon them to halt if you will do the same. For this reason I entreat my
lords and the people of Zurich, for the love of God and the safety of the
Confederation, to suspend their march at the present moment. In a few
hours I shall be back again. I hope, with God’s grace, to obtain an
honorable peace, and to prevent our cottages from being filled with
widows and orphans.”3
OElbi was thought to be an honorable man, and friendly to the gospel;
therefore the Zurich captains suspended their march. Many believed his
embassy to be peace, but Zwingle suspected treachery. Troubled and
uneasy in his camp, he beheld in OElbi’s intervention the subtlety of
 1018
Satan. Unable to obtain assistance from Austria at that moment, they
reigned a desire for peace in order to gain time. With something like a
prophetic vision, Zwingle went up to OElbi, whom he knew well, and
earnestly whispered in his ear, “Godson Amman, you will have to answer
to God for this mediation. Our adversaries are in our power; this is why
they give us sweet words. By-and-by they will fall upon us unawares, and
there will be none to deliver us.” No prophecy was ever more literally
fulfilled, as we shall soon see. “My dear godfather,” replied OElbi, “let us
act for the best, and trust in God that all will be well.” So saying, he rode
off to Zug, leaving Zwingle in deep thought, anticipating a dark and terrible
future. “Today they beg and entreat,” said he, “and in a month, when we
have laid down our arms, they will crush us.”

THE TREATY OF CAPPEL

The deputies of Zurich and of the Romanists, with the exertions of the
neutral cantons, were sixteen days in drawing up and agreeing to the
articles of peace. During this time the soldiers of both armies behaved in
the most orderly and friendly manner. They seemed to remember only that
they were all Swiss. In the camp of Zurich, Zwingle, or some other
minister, preached every day. “No oath or dispute was heard; prayers
were offered up before and after meals; and each man obeyed his
superiors. There were no dice, no cards, no games calculated to excite
quarrels; but psalms, hymns, national songs, and bodily exercise, were the
military recreations of the Zurichers. At length a treaty was concluded on
June 26th, 1529, which, as Zwingle thought, was only a suspension of the
storm. The warriors now struck their tents and returned to their homes.”
The terms of this treaty, though not all that the Protestants desired, were
nevertheless favorable to Reform, yet not unfavorable to the Catholics. It
was agreed that the Forest-cantons should abandon their alliance with
Austria; that liberty of conscience should be guaranteed to all subjects; and
that the smaller parishes should decide by a majority of votes which
religion they would profess. The people of Zurich — not Zwingle — were
elated with the success which had crowned their warlike demonstration.
The Bernese, who had contributed nothing towards this bloodless victory,
were becoming jealous of the growing influence of Zurich, and, unhappily,
 1019
a spirit of disunion sprang up between those powerful states, which led to
the great catastrophe of 1531.

ZWINGLE’S CHRISTIAN CONFEDERATION

Just at this time, when the mind of Zwingle was too much occupied with
politics, he fell into the snare of the enemy. Satan knew his weak point as
a Christian, and tempted him with grand ideas of the unity of all
Switzerland, and of the Reformed Christendom, by a unity of faith. His
motives, no doubt, were of the purest and loftiest character. Meditating
day and night how he might advance the Reformation, and overthrow that
terrible power which had held the nations of Europe so long in bondage,
the idea of a holy confederation, consisting of all the Protestant states and
nations of Europe, filled his active mind. All Christendom was under his
eye. No man of his day had such a comprehensive grasp of its condition
— political, military, and religious. But not seeing the difference between
the principle of law in the Old Testament, and of grace in the New, he
honestly thought that it was the duty of the Protestant states to put forth
their military power in defense of the gospel. “Why should not,” he said,
“all the Protestant powers unite in a holy confederation for the purpose of
frustrating the plans which the pope and the Emperor are now concocting
for the violent suppression of the Reformation?”4
This colossal scheme of the Reformer led him into many negotiations to
which we need not refer. While they would have done honor to a
statesman, they were a reproach to a christian minister. But whatever were
his projects, or whatever his mistakes, his object was one, and a noble one
— the spread and establishment of the pure gospel all over his native land.
This to Zwingle was clearer far than life; and the Master knows how to
give His servant credit for a good motive, even though He cannot approve
of his work. Besides, it is positively affirmed that Zwingle never abated
for a moment his pastoral labors; that he was present on all occasions
when his duty called him.

THE FIVE CANTONS VIOLATE THE TREATY

The popish cantons, enraged at the progress of the Reformation, and its
near approach to their own gates, were eager to find some pretext for
 1020
ridding themselves of the treaty of Cappel. This was not difficult to find.
They had never really kept it. What was called in the treaty “liberty of
conscience,” or what was beginning to be called by the Protestants “the
rights of conscience,” the Catholics never acknowledged. They knew no
distinction between religious and civil obedience. With this fundamental
position of the Protestants, the Catholics never could for a moment agree.
It necessarily became a principal matter of contention, and the source of
innumerable local jealousies and controversies, which daily increased the
irritation, and determined the mountaineers openly to violate the treaty.
The cup of Catholic indignation was at length full. Blood! blood! was
the cry. Nothing but the blood of living Christians could atone for the
destruction of the dumb idols; nothing but the burning piles of God’s
saints could answer for the ashes of their altars and images. Oh Rome!
Rome! when wilt thou be satisfied with the blood of God’s redeemed?
Thy thirst is unquenchable. The oceans which thou hast shed have only
inflamed it. On every possible occasion during thy usurped dominion we
see thee thirsting for blood. But what will it be when thy reign is ended,
and no more blood to shed? That awful word “remember” will throw thee
back over the past and fill thee with visions of blood, visions of the
dungeons of the Inquisition, and of the flames of thy innocent but helpless
victims. Then all will be changed. Unmingled, unending blessedness, shall
be their happy portion; but what of that place where the flames shall
never be quenched, where the worm shall never die, where the visions of
the past shall ceaselessly flit before thy sleepless restless soul, and where
one drop of cold water shall never be procured to cool thy burning tongue?
There we must leave thee to the fruitfulness of thy memory, the
accusations of thy conscience, and the upbraidings of those whom thou
didst deceive by thy sorceries, and drag down by thy delusions to those
regions of endless woe.

THE FLAMES OF PERSECUTION REKINDLED

Switzerland was now divided into two camps, and the gulf which
separated them was daily widening. The Forest-cantons, backed by the
Emperor of his brother Ferdinand, recommenced the persecution of the
Protestants with more fury than ever. They indulged in the most atrocious
barbarities. The preachers and the professors of the Reformed faith,
 1021
wherever they could find them, they imprisoned, confiscated their goods,
cut out their tongues, beheaded, and burned them alive. Those who
escaped their intolerance implored the protection of Zurich. Under these
circumstances, Zwingle thought it his duty to raise his voice and arouse
the confederate cantons. He visited many places in person, addressed large
assemblies, appealed to everything that could stimulate the zeal of the
people for the defense of the gospel and the liberty of the subject. “These
are Swiss,” said he, “whom a faction is attempting to deprive of a portion
of their liberty transmitted to them from their ancestors. If it would be
unjust to attempt to force our adversaries to abolish the Romish religion
from among them, it is no less so to imprison, to banish, and to deprive
citizens of their property, because their consciences impel them to
embrace opinions which are obnoxious to their oppressors.”
On the 5th of September, 1530, the principal ministers of Zurich, Berne,
Basle, and Strasburg — OEcolampadius, Capito, Megander, Leo Juda, and
Myconius, assembled at Zurich, and addressed to their popish
confederates an earnest and christian remonstrance, but it was utterly
disregarded. In a general diet held the following April at Baden, the
disputes were renewed with more than their former violence. In vain did
the mediating cantons entreat the two parties to banish every cause of
discord. The papal party, having made ample preparations, were now
determined to make open war. The Zurichers were importunate in their
complaints, and even called for a direct appeal to arms. Zwingle thought
this the speedtest way to bring the mountaineers to reasonable terms. The
men of Berne were more temperate; while they admitted that the five
cantons had broken the treaty of Cappel, and shamefully violated their
own promises, they urged that a milder expedient should be tried.

THE BLOCKADE
“Let us close our markets against the five cantons,” said the Bernese,
“let us refuse them corn, wine, salt, steel, and iron; we shall thus impart
authority to the friends of peace among them, and innocent blood shall be
spared.” This resolution was adopted, duly published, and rigorously
carried out. Situated, as these cantons were, on the mountainous part of
Switzerland, the measure was one of extreme severity. From the nature of
their country, the greater part of the people had little native produce
 1022
besides their flocks. They were dependent for their daily supplies upon
the harvests and markets of the plain. But now those markets were closed,
and roads leading to the towns were blockaded. The consequences of this
pitiless decree were most disastrous. Bread, wine, and salt, suddenly failed
from the chalets of the poor. Famine, with its invariable attendant, disease,
spread dismay and death among the inhabitants. The cry of distress which
arose from the mountains moved many hearts, and many voices were
raised against the interdict, both within the confederate cities, and outside
the limits of Switzerland; but it roused those who suffered from it to the
highest pitch of indignation and resentment.

ZWINGLE’S POLICY
As the part which Zwingle took in the political affairs of Zurich at this
time, has been much criticized by historians, and, we think, severely so by
D’Aubigne, we quote the opinion of Dean Waddington, who will not be
suspected of any leaning towards republicanism.
“It must here be mentioned, that Zwingle expressed his decided
opposition to these measures. Doubtless he too maintained that
just principle, so constantly asserted by Luther, that the cause of
reason and truth, when contending with proscriptive oppression,
has no enemy so dangerous as the sword. He even ascended the
pulpit and preached against the publication of the interdict. He
argued, that the insulting slanders of the papists ought to be
endured with christian forbearance; that an example of that great
evangelical virtue was especially required from those who
professed the gospel. But his fellow-citizens closed their ears for
once against his admonitions, and hastened whither their
inauspicious passion led them.”5
As a matter of policy, Zwingle maintained that, if the Catholic cantons
were to be punished as evil-doers, the means apparently the most violent,
were nevertheless the surest to bring them to a more submissive and
reasonable temper, and the most humane in the end. But to reduce a whole
population to famine would fill the land with the wail of suffering, and the
cry of indignation. He also clearly saw that delay would be ruinous to
Zurich. “By this measure,” he said, “we give the five cantons time to arm
 1023
themselves, and to fall upon us first. Let us take care that the Emperor
does not attack us on one side, while our ancient confederates attack us on
the other; a just war is not in opposition to the word of God; but this is
contrary to it — taking the bread from the mouths of the innocent as well
as the guilty: straitening by hunger the sick, the aged, children, and all who
are deeply afflicted by the injustice of our adversaries. We should beware
of exciting by this means the anger of the poor, and transforming into
enemies many who at the present time are our friends and our brothers!”6
But notwithstanding these truthful and powerful appeals of the Reformer,
the cantons, Berne in particular, were immovable.
The indignant mountaineers, on seeing themselves surrounded by a
formidable power, alone with barrenness and famine between their lakes
and their mountains, determined on violent measures. “They block up our
roads,” said they, “but we will make a way with our swords.” They first
had recourse to the observances of their religion. Prayers were directed to
be offered up, pilgrimages to be made, paternosters repeated, and hymns
to be sung. War would immediately have broken out, had not the Catholic
leaders found their advantage in delay. They knew that the Protestants
were not agreed among themselves, and by delaying the attack, they hoped
to widen their divisions.

THE MEDIATORS RENEW THEIR EXERTIONS

Several attempts were made at reconciliation, but without effect. Zurich
and Berne demanded that the preaching of the word of God should be
permitted, not only in the common parishes, but also in the five cantons.
This was asking too much under the circumstances; and as they persisted
in their demands, they only exasperated the proud and inflexible Catholics.
“No,” they replied, “we will not listen to any proposition before the
raising of the blockade.” Deputies from all the cantons met on five
different occasions between June 14th and August 23rd. The neutral
cantons continued their exertions, with the assistance of ambassadors from
foreign powers, until all the expedients thai prudence and humanity could
suggest were exhausted, yet they were unable to advance the parties a
single step towards reconciliation.
 1024
The situation of the Reformer was becoming every day more painful and
perplexing. It is impossible to contemplate his position at this moment,
without sharing the agonies of his broken heart. But alas! he was off the
direct line of the word of God, and without His divine guidance. In the
troubled state of affairs, as the senate could not move without him, he
allowed his natural feelings as a citizen, to displace those of the Christian
and the Reformer. But however well intentioned these services may have
been, they were inconsistent with his high and holy calling. The unnatural
union of church and state, which had corrupted Christianity from the age
of Constantine, was spreading confusion everywhere, and hastening the
ruin of the Reformation. The tendency of Zwingle’s policy, without
doubt, was to weld them together; still the word of the Lord remains the
same: “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers.” And if this
divine precept, this ever-abiding christian principle, be neglected, we may
have to reap the bitter fruits of disappointment and disaster. So it was
with this great and noble man. He mixed the Reformation with the strife of
politics, and it was now far beyond his power to avert the fearful
consequences.

THE POSITION OF ZURICH AND THE REFORMATION

Zwingle was anxious, disquieted, and filled with the most painful
forebodings as to the future. He saw the storm gathering on all sides.
Those who had been his friends turned against him; his enemies, taking
courage from the ebbing tide of affairs, beset and tormented him; for there
were many at Zurich whose hearts still clung to the hereditary despotism,
though they had professed some zeal for the principles of Reform. The
partisans of the monks, the friends of foreign service, pensioners, and the
malcontents of every class, united in pointing out Zwingle as the author of
all the sufferings of the people. Seeing his actions were misrepresented,
and the measures he had counselled were rejected, he felt he had only to
withdraw from public life.
The magistrates were dismayed. Both Zurich and the Reformation are
in danger if Zwingle cease to pilot the ship; they were now in the same
vessel, and on the stormy waters of religious contention. Immediately the
council sent to him a deputation of honor, and entreated him not to forsake
them at so critical a moment. Three days and three nights he spent in
 1025
prayer, earnestly seeking divine guidance. All the tenderness of friendship,
and all the ardor of patriotism were employed in vain by the deputies; but
when they represented to him the blow that the Reformation would
sustain if he left Zurich, he yielded and consented to retain his post.
By thus consenting to remain at the head of affairs, he had thought to
recover all his former influence and restore harmony and courage to Zurich;
but he was bitterly disappointed. A strange infatuation seemed to possess
both rulers and people. They daily became more and more indisposed
towards the war which they at first so importunately demanded, and
identified themselves with the passive policy of Berne. But as the
Conference still professing pacific objects was held at Bremgarten,
Zwingle, attended by two ecclesiastics, secretly repaired thither. He
endeavored to persuade his friends to raise the blockade; representing to
them the many evils which it had occasioned, and the fatal catastrophe in
which it was likely to terminate. But his pleadings, though with tears and
anguish of heart, were all in vain. On this occasion he took a mournful and
last farewell of his young friend Bullinger, the pastor of the place, and
commended to his charge the tottering church of God.

WAR DECLARED AGAINST ZURICH

During the course of the negotiations the Forest-cantons remained
intractable and warlike. Indeed the final proposals of the mediators would
probably have been received by the Protestants, but they were decidedly
rejected by the Catholics. Matters were now so much involved that war
became inevitable. The preparations of the five cantohs being completed,
they took the field on the 6th of October, 1531. They were the first in
arms. The defense of the church and the holy see were their real objects
for waging war, though the interdiction of commerce was the ostensible
grievance. The chiefs were closely united together, and the people, burning
with indignation against those who had taken away their food, and were
seeking to take away their religion, powerfully supported them. Their
common faith and sufferings, united them as by one spirit for one object,
which could not fail to impart resolution and courage in action. But no
alarm had yet been given: Zurich was asleep. All the passes were seized,
all communication between Zurich and the five cantons had been rendered
impossible. “The terrible avalanche,” says our Swiss historian, “was about
 1026
to slip from the icy summits of the mountain, and to roll over the valleys,
even to the gates of Zurich, overthrowing everything in its passage,
without the least forewarning of its fall.”
In the hope of dividing the Reformed, the Catholics declared war, not
against the body of the Reformers, but against Zurich only. The eye of
Jezebel was set upon the blood of Zwingle. Whoever may be saved, he
must be slain. So long as he lives, there can be no peace for holy mother
church in Switzerland. Let the battle be against the arch-heretic. Thus
inspired by the papal demon of war, the mountain warriors assembled in
their chapels, heard mass, and then, to the number of eight thousand, began
their march toward the Protestant frontier. A papal army, twelve thousand
strong, marched into the free parishes. The soldiers having entered the
deserted churches, and seeing the images and the altars broken down, their
anger was kindled to madness. They spread like a torrent over the whole
country, inflicting all the horrors of war wherever they came. The country
people, terrified, and running from chalet to chalet, calling aloud for help,
failed to arouse the bewitched Zurichers; yet in four days was the ruin of
Zurich accomplished.

THE INFATUATION OF THE COUNCIL OF ZURICH

On the evening of the 9th, the council was called together by the assurance
that war was begun. Only a small number assembled; and instead of
sounding the tocsin, or calling the people to arms, they despatched two
councillors to Cappel and Bremgarten to ascertain what was going on.
“The five cantons,” said they, “are making a little noise to frighten us, and
to make us raise the blockade.” But at daybreak, on the morning of the
10th, they were aroused from their slumbers by the positive intelligence,
that the enemy had crossed the frontier and seized upon Hytzkilch. Still,
the council was but partially aroused. The day was spent in making
speeches and lengthened tedious debates. A vanguard of six hundred men
with artillery was sent on to Cappel to oppose the invaders; the main
body was to follow. At seven in the evening the tocsin was sounded in all
the country districts.
It was a fearful night, as if nature herself shuddered at the blood that was
about to be shed. “The sun went down behind the Albis,” says Wylie;
 1027
“the city, the lake, and the canton were wrapped in darkness; with the
darkness came trembling and terror. The bells were rung to summon to
arms. They had hardly begun to toll when a tempest burst forth, and
swept in terrific fury over Zurich and the surrounding country. The
howling of the wind, the lashing of the waves of the lake, the pealing of the
steeple-bells, the mustering of the landsturin, and the earthquake, which
about nine o’clock shook the city and canton, formed a scene of horror
such as had seldom been witnessed. Few eyes were that night closed in
sleep. In the dwellings of Zurich there were tears, and loud wailings, and
hasty and bitter partings of those who felt that they embraced probably
for the last time.”7

THE EVIL FOREBODINGS OF THE PEOPLE

This dreadful night was to be followed by a still more dreadful day. The
morning came, the tempest was past, but a bright dawn could not dispel
the gloom that had settled in the hearts of the Zurichers. The sound of
trumpets, and the beating of drums, were calling the inhabitants to arms;
but hours passed away before a few hundred soldiers could be mustered.
“The irresolution of the council,” says Hess, “filled the citizens with
uneasiness, and lessened their submission; for the vacillation of a
government destroys all confidence, and orders given with hesitation are ill
obeyed.” Instead of an army of four thousand men, which the council had
decreed should march to Cappel, only seven hundred were under arms at
ten o’clock, and these were disorderly and agitated, without uniform and
inefficiently armed. Zwingle, at the command of the council, and in
conformity with the customs of his country, accompanied the army as
chaplain. With a broken and a bleeding heart he embraced his beloved wife
and his beloved children for the last time on earth. “I know,” he said,
“what all this means — it is all about me — all this comes to pass, in order
that I may die.” He did not deceive himself as to the issue of the
expedition, but he thought it his duty to obey the orders of his superiors,
without urging any objections. Calm himself in the midst of friends who
trembled for his life, he endeavored to comfort them. “Our cause is good,”
said he, “but ill defended. It will cost my life, and that of a number of
excellent men who would wish to restore Christianity to its primitive
simplicity, and our country to its manners. No matter! God will not
 1028
abandon His servants; He will come to their assistance when you think all
lost. My confidence rests upon God alone, and not upon men; I submit
myself to His sovereign will.”

THE BATTLE OF CAPPEL

At noon, under the drooping banner of Zurich, only seven hundred passed
through the gates. The affectionate Anna was seen on the ramparts
following her husband with her eyes so long as he was visible. But she had
also in that ill-omened army, a son, a brother, a great number of near
relations, and many intimate friends, of whose return she had no hope. She
shared the forebodings of her husband, and like him, believed that it was
for the holy cause of God and His truth that they thus exposed themselves
to danger and to death — it was martyrdom.
Zwingle was observed to fall behind his troops. Those who were near him
could hear that he was engaged in prayer. He thus rode mournfully alone,
praying for the welfare of the church of God, until he reached Mount
Albis.
Cappel is only three leagues from Zurich, but the road crosses Mount
Albis. On its summit they halted; and some proposed that they should
wait for reinforcements; but the roaring of distant cannon announced that
the battle had begun. This sound awoke the native feelings of Zwingle.
“Hear ye not the roar of the cannon beneath us?” he exclaimed, “they are
fighting at Cappel; let us hasten forward to the aid of our brethren.” The
words of Zwingle prevailed with the leaders, filled them with enthusiasm,
and they pushed forward.
Early on the morning of that day, the soldiers of the five cantons attended
divine service, heard mass; the host was offered up for the sins of the
people, and the army, eight thousand strong, began their march at nine
o’clock. The division posted at Cappel was attacked by this army at one
o’clock, but being ignorant of their force contended themselves with
keeping up a constant fire of artillery. In two hours the Zurichers bearing
the “great banner,” reached their comrades and joined in battle.
The Catholics, not knowing the extent of this reinforcement, would not
hazard a general engagement. The artillery of the Zurichers being
 1029
advantageously posted and well served, greatly disconcerted the Catholics,
who were spread out on a morass beneath them. It was four o’clock; the
sun was sinking rapidly. Loud murmurs were heard in the ranks of the
Catholics because of the tardiness of the chiefs. During this altercation, an
experienced and brave warrior of the canton of Uri, at the head of three
hundred volunteers, silently entered a wood on the left flank of the Zurich
army, which they had neglected to occupy, and perceiving the weakness of
the Protestant army, he immediately resolved to attack them. The
mountaineers coming to the knowledge of this oversight, climbed the hill,
and under cover of the beech-trees, opened a deadly fire on the men of
Zurich. They were within a short distance of them, and ordered to pick
out the men they desired to bring down. Having discharged their fire, they
rushed out of the wood, sword in hand, and furiously charged the
bewildered Zurichers, crying, “Heretics! image-breakers! we have you at
last!”

THE DEATH OF ZWINGLE

The weakness manifested and the errors committed by the Zurich leaders,
can only be accounted for on the principle of judicial blindness. They
had gone far away from the narrow path of the word of God, and He was
no longer with them. The church had become the state, and the state the
church, and the present army was composed of congregations and their
ministers rather than of Swiss soldiers. This was failure which God must
judge; and the Catholics were the rod in His hand to chastise the children
of His love. But what a moral! What a lesson for Christians in all ages!
Finding themselves ensnared and surrounded, the men of Zurich fought
desperately; but, being only as one to eight they were overpowered. And
to increase the confusion, some of the enemies’ spies joined the rear-guard
and raised the cry of treachery, which ended in a general flight; but all
those who fought in the first ranks, being thus deserted, were cut down.
The carnage was great; the Alps were echoing and re-echoing the wild roar
of battle, when the curtain of night fell, closed the scene of blood, and
more than five hundred of the flower of Zurich slept the sleep of death:
“the wisest of its councillors, the most christian of its citizens, and the
ablest of its pastors, were left on that fatal field.”
 1030
But it is with shame and sorrow that we have to record the melancholy
fact, that among the slain there were twenty-five christian ministers,
who had marched at the head of their flocks. In this respect, we doubt not,
the battle of Cappel stands alone in the history of battles. Surely this was
expression enough of God’s sore displeasure against the unholy mixture of
the church and the world, of the theologians and the politicians, which
obtained to such an extent in the Swiss Reformation.
But there was one death which affected Zurich and the Reformation in
Switzerland more than all the others — the death of Ulric Zwingle.
Scarcely had the action begun, when, stooping to console a dying man, he
received a wound on the head and fell to the earth. He attempted to rise,
but he was thrice overthrown in the press, and received several wounds.
He had: not drawn his sword, but he had raised his voice, which was heard
above all the uproar, to inspire the troops with courage, and to prevent
confusion. Exhausted, he lay with clasped hands in the attitude of prayer,
and was heard to say, “Alas, what a calamity is this! Well, they can indeed
kill the body, but they cannot touch the soul.” These were his last words.

THE CAMP FOLLOWERS

When the field of Cappel was in the possession of the Catholics, the
camp-followers, with lighted torches, began to prowl over the battlefield.
In turning over the bodies — for the purpose of stripping or robbing them
— when they found any who were still sensible, they said, “Call upon the
saints and confess to our priests.” If the Zuricher refused, he was instantly
despatched as a vile heretic with oaths and curses. Among those heaps of
slain was one, whose eyes and hands were raised to heaven; — “Do you
wish for a priest to confess yourself?” said one of those slayers of the
slain, holding the glimmering light of his torch against his expiring features.
He shook his head. “If you cannot speak,” said they, “invoke the mother
of God, and the other saints for their intercession.” He again shook his
head, keeping his eyes fixed on heaven. “This man too is an obstinate
heretic,” cried they. But a soldier, moved with curiosity, turned the head in
the direction of a fire that had been lighted on the spot and exclaimed, “I
think it is Zwingle!” whereupon, a Captain Tockinger, of Unterwalden,
who came up at that moment, hearing the name, drew his sword, struck
Zwingle on the throat, uttering many curses, and thus extinguished what
 1031
remained of that remarkable life. And thus too was that scripture fulfilled:
“All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” (Matthew
26:52.)
The night was cold; a thick hoar-frost wraped, as in a winding-sheet, the
bodies of the dead and the dying. At length the day appeared; the body of
Zwingle was recognized, and then the full hatred of his enemies —
especially the foreign service men — broke out against him. After offering
many indignities to the lifeless body, they held the mockery of a council,
and summoned it before them. It was condemned, on the double charge of
treason and heresy, to be burnt to ashes. The public executioner of
Lucerne carried out the sentence, and the fanatical pensioners flung the
ashes to the four winds of heaven.
The condition of Zurich, when a few wounded men found their way home
to tell what had happened, was beyond description terrible. But we dwell
not on the agitation, confusion, sorrow. We only refer to it for the purpose
of introducing one chief mourner — Anna Zwingle. She had heard from
her own house the repeated discharges of artillery. She feared the worst.
What hours of anguish! But at length she knows all: her husband, son, son-
in-law, brother, brother-in-law, and almost all her dear friends, lie cold on
the heights of Cappel. But though a woman, a wife, and a mother, she was
a true Christian, and committed herself and her young children to God’s
tender care, and sought to rejoice in the midst of her tears, that so many
whom she loved had received the crown of martyrdom.

REFLECTIONS ON THE LIFE OF ZWINGLE

As we have discussed pretty freely, in passing, the character and
principles of the great Swiss Reformer, we have little to add by way of
reflection. But we cannot bid farewell to this sad scene, without offering
our tribute of grateful respect to one whom God raised up and so
wonderfully used; and of expressing our deep sorrow that so great a light
should have deviated from the narrow path, and led so many after him.
In tracing his steps from the herdsman’s cottage in the Valley of the
Tockenburg, we have seen much to admire and imitate, for which also
posterity must be ever thankful. He pursued with constancy and
fearlessness the convictions of his own mind, as to the teaching of the
 1032
word of God, so far as he understood its spiritual meaning and application.
We can never forget nor undervalue the noble stand he frequently made for
the absolute authority of the word of God, and that, at a time, when its
existence was scarcely known, and had never been read, even by the
priests and monks. In those halls of public disputation, when he placed his
Hebrew Bible and his Greek New Testament on the table before him, and
appealed to these books as the only standard of faith and practice, God
was glorified, His power was manifested, and the Catholics were utterly
confounded, and driven back into the darkness of their superstitions.
Zwingle, as the representative man of his time, stood triumphant. The
light of the Reformation progressed rapidly, and seemed as if it would
soon shed its radiance over every mountain and valley in Switzerland. All
but the Forest-cantons had received the truth, either wholly or partially;
and had he gone on in simple dependence upon the living God and the
word of His grace, even the Oberland might soon have submitted to the
new faith. But from the time that Zwingle counselled Zurich to punish the
persecutors with the sword, he assumed the character of the politician.
And though he was still the sincere Christian and the earnest Reformer, he
thought it was his duty to study the cabinets of kings, the councils of the
people, and the movements of armies. This was the rock on which the
vessel of the Reformation struck, and struck with all sails set, and Zwingle
at the helm. We have seen the wreck; and surely it ought to be as a beacon-
light to all Christians in all ages. But instead of that, there are many of the
Reformed ministers so-called, even in the present day, who commend the
zeal of Zwingle as a patriot and a politician; and argue that he suffered
from the rashness of others.
True, he strongly objected to the blockade which led to the war; but he
advocated a direct appeal to arms, which is as far from the spirit of Christ
as a commercial interdict. And the two things for which the Reformer
urged the government of Zurich to take up arms were the slanders and the
persecutions of the papists. But what does the blessed Lord say? “Blessed
are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all
manner of evil against you falsely, for My sake. Rejoice and be exceeding
glad: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.” And
again, “Bless them which persecute you; bless, and curse not.” And
knowing the state of irritation which slander and persecution would
 1033
naturally produce, the gracious Lord condescends to approach the
oppressed in terms of the greatest endearment. “Dearly beloved, avenge
not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written,
Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore, if thine enemy
hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt
heap coals of fire on his head.” Surely both the blockade and the appeal to
arms meet their utter condemnation in these divine precepts of our Lord
and Master. (Matthew 5:11, 12; Romans 12:14, 19, 20.)
The Christian is saved by grace, he stands by grace, and he ought to be the
witness of grace, and that, under all circumstances. The last of these the
great Reformer never understood. He never saw the truth of the
Christian’s separation from the world by the death and resurrection of
Christ, or the heavenly relations of the church as the Bride, the Lamb’s
wife. Still, the word of God is plain enough, and we can find no shelter for
our ignorance. At the same time, more allowance must be made for
Zwingle than for many ministers of the gospel in our own day, who take a
leading part in the political affairs of the world. Emerging from the
darkness of popery which has no argument but the sword, and nurtured in
the midst of Swiss liberty, and in the histories of the ancient republics, he
honestly believed from his earliest days that tyrants should be opposed,
and that Christians should unite with the government in resisting them.
From not seeing, after his conversion, the heavenly calling and character of
the Christian, he acted on these principles as the leader of the Reformed
party.
D’Aubigne, we are glad to find, so far agrees with the views we have
expressed; thus he writes — “Zwingle, observing how all the powers were
rising against the Reformation, had conceived the plan of a co-burghery or
christian state, which should unite all the friends of the word of God in
one holy and powerful league. This political phase of his character is in the
eyes of some persons his highest claim to glory; we do not hesitate to
acknowledge it as his greatest fault. The Reformer, deserting the paths of
the apostles, allowed himself to be led astray by the perverse example of
popery. The primitive church never opposed their persecutors but by the
dispositions of the gospel of peace. Faith was the only sword by which it
vanquished the mighty ones of the earth.” But Zwingle himself appears to
have had some conflict in his mind on this subject, as he says, “No doubt,
 1034
it is not by human strength, it is by the strength of God alone that the
word of the Lord should be upheld. But God often makes use of men as
instruments to succor men. Let us therefore unite, and from the sources of
the Rhine to Strasburg let us form but one people and one alliance.”
As to his great intellectual powers, his literary and his theological works,
we will allow a competent witness to bear his testimony. Dean
Waddington, speaking of Zwingle, says, “when we regard the many
ingenious and elaborate compositions, polemical, exegetical, hermeneutical,
which he produced in little more than twelve years — years, too,
distracted by a thousand other cares and occupations — and which will
remain an everlasting memorial of an extensive erudition, a sound
judgment, a temper, upon the whole candid and charitable, a calm,
considerate, earnest faith; it is a matter of serious sorrow, even now, that
he was cut off thus unseasonably...
“Together with several just and profound views of scriptural
interpretation, his works contain many noble sentiments, flowing
from an enlarged and elevated spirit. Gifted with much penetration,
incited by an honest zeal, regulated by consummate prudence, firm
and forbearing, he did not stain these great qualities by a single
fault. He showed great sagacity in accomplishing his purposes; he
was never guided, either in his acts or in his writings, by any
factious spirit; and he was never suspected of any unworthy
motive.”8
Zwingle was not forty-eight years old when he died. He was in the full
vigor of life and the maturity of his understanding. With gifts so rich and
varied, what might he not have done for the Reformation in Switzerland,
and even in Europe, had he restricted himself to the ministry of the word
of God? But if we fail to do the Lord’s work in His way, it may be taken
from us and given to another.
“No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this
life; that he may please Him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.
And if a man strive also for masteries, yet is he not crowned,
except he strive lawfully.” (2 Timothy 2:4, 5.)
 1035
TREATIES OF PEACE
The news of the disgraceful treatment of the remains of Zwingle, aroused
the indignation and anger of Zurich. She rallied her forces, and the Bernese
gathered from all quarters for the support of their ally. The combined
army was very formidable; they assumed the offensive, and invaded the
canton of Zug; but the Lord was not with them. They again exhibited
every form of incapacity. With no combined plan of operation, they
commenced in rashness and disunion, and insubordination prevailed; while
the Catholics were orderly, united, and resolute. The victory was easy and
complete.
These successes, which far surpassed the expectation of the five cantons,
inspired them with religious confidence as to the holiness of their cause;
and the Reformers, from their reverses, became dispirited and disposed to
treat for peace. Negotiations were renewed; two treaties were drawn up
and signed by the Zurichers and the Bernese, on the 16th and 23rd of
November, which annulled the treaty of 1529, and gave decided advantages
to the enemies of the Reformation. These treaties are of great historical
importance, as they affixed a permanent boundary to the Reformation of
German-Switzerland; and no important change has been wrought among
the cantons from that day even until now.
It is said that Zwingle, on his departure for Cappel, in the mournful
conviction that he would never return, designated as his successor, the
younger Bullinger of Bremgarten, who, after a short interval, was
appointed chief pastor and professor of divinity, and filled the double
charge for forty years, with undisputed distinction, and rendered extensive
service to the church of Christ. The same calamitous autumn witnessed the
extinction of another of the brightest lights of the Reformation. The meek
and gentle, the learned and devoted OEcolampadius, on hearing of the
death of his friend, and the indignities which were cast upon his memory,
died shortly after of a broken heart, at the age of forty-nine. When he
perceived that his own departure was at hand, he assembled his friends
and colleagues around him, and exhorted them in the most pathetic and
affectionate manner to be stedfast, unmovable, always abounding in the
work of the Lord, that God might be glorified, and the blessed cause of
Christ become more resplendent through the light of their purity. Thus fell
 1036
asleep the pacific OEcolampadius. His death was like his life, full of light
and peace. He was succeeded at Basle by the learned and pious Oswald
Myconius.9
The history of the Reformation in French Switzerland, which was
somewhat later, and in which the names of William Farel and John Calvin
bear a prominent part, we must pass over for the present, and return to
Germany, that we may examine the last years and the closing scenes of the
life of the great German Reformer.
 1037

CHAPTER 45
THE REFORMATION IN GERMANY

We have already traced the history of the Reformation in Germany from

the year 1517, when Luther nailed his theses to the church door in
Wittemberg, down to the year 1532, when the Emperor signed the treaty
of peace at Ratisbon. The history of these fifteen years is certainly the
most important in the annals of mankind, if we except the early part of the
first christian century. We pass through a succession of events,
characterized by the grace and energy of the Holy Spirit, combined with
the hand of God in government, and emerge from the darkness and
superstition of Rome, into the light and liberty of the truth of God. We
know of no page in history, which so commands, not only our interest,
but our adoration.
And how, it may be asked, was this mighty revolution so speedily
accomplished? Not by philosophy, not by the school-men, not by the
Humanists, but simply by the truth of God acting on the conscience of
man, through the power of the Holy Spirit. On what ground did Luther
stand and triumph at the Diet of Worms? The word of God, sustained by
His grace. On what principle did the princes prevail at Augsburg?
Precisely the same. And by what means did Zwingle put to flight the
enemies of the truth at Zurich? By appealing to the word of God, and to
that alone; but when he shifted his position, giving up divine ground for
human, he became weak as other men. So long as conscience ruled in that
noble mind, and raised that powerful voice, the mightiest of Rome’s
champions were confounded, and fled ashamed from his dignified
presence. But alas! when he connected the civil sword with the sword of
the Spirit, the truth of God was dishonored; he had left the place of
strength, and became the weakest of the weak. He had a bad conscience,
his breastplate was gone; and that always robs a man of courage, peace,
and happiness. It is only by means of conscience that truth establishes its
dominion over the minds and ways of mankind.
 1038
This fact, historically viewed, is wonderful, and demands our devout
consideration. Luther was as free from fanaticism as he was far from
hypocrisy; he was perfectly simple; but his conscience was honestly
bound by the word of God, and his affections were kindled by it, and thus,
holding by that word, all Europe was shaken by a power which faith only
can understand. “To him that worketh not, but believeth on him that
justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” The two
exquisite properties of faith are, to exclude human power, and to bring in
divine. As the apostle says, “I can do all things through Christ which
strengtheneth me.” (Romans 4:5; Philippians 4:13.)
We will now glance for a moment at the effects of this power in the short
period of fifteen years.

A BRIEF SURVEY
The great truth which the early Reformers preached — salvation by faith
without works of human merit — spread with a rapidity resembling the
light of heaven. In a short time it had traveled over the greater part of
Europe. In the year 1530 Luther, writing to the Elector, speaks of his
dominions as if they were a millennial scene. “It gives me great pleasure,”
says the Reformer, “when I see that boys and girls can now understand,
and speak better concerning God and Christ, than formerly could have
been done by the colleges, monasteries, and schools of the papacy, or than
they can do even yet. There is thus planted in your highness’s dominions
a very pleasant paradise, to which there is nothing similar in the whole
world.” The ground had been cleared of monasteries and convents, and
covered with churches and schools.
Hesse, as well as Saxony, we have seen evangelized, and planted with
churches and schools, and all regulated by the government. In Franconia,
Silesia, East Friesland, Prussia, Brunswick, Luneburg, and Anhalt, the light
of the gospel was spreading. Many of the free cities had opened their gates
to the preachers of the new doctrines, and were now rejoicing in the truth,
and boldly witnessing for it. The rapid conquests of the Reformation in
Switzerland, which we have examined with some care, fall within the limits
of our period. Along the chain of the Jura, by the shores of Leman, to the
gates of Geneva, the light of the gospel had traveled. In Denmark and
 1039
Sweden the gospel had gained a firm footing, and Bohemia, Moravia, and
Hungary had been revived. Even in the court of Francis I. and in the
Sorbonne, renowned for its orthodoxy, there were true believers in the
doctrine of justification by faith alone; but the state ever was and is
Roman Catholic; and dearly she has had to pay in her terrible revolutions
for her rejection of the truth, and the persecution of its witnesses. In
England, the followers of Wycliffe were revived, and the persecuted
Lollards again lifted up their heads, and testified for the truth with fresh
courage. The king, the parliament, and the people threw off the yoke of
Rome in 1533, and Henry was declared supreme head of the British
church. The authority of the Roman pontiff was then abolished in
England. But the details of this important event will form a distinct theme
for our “Short Papers,” the Lord willing.
As early as 1528, Luther’s tracts and Tyndal’s New Testament had done
their blessed work in Scotland. The noble, gentle, and accomplished
Patrick Hamilton was burned at the stake in the center of the large area
before the gate of St. Salvator’s college, Aberdeen, on a charge of “holding
and maintaining divers heresics of Martin Luther.”1

A GREAT INCREASE
After the pacification of Ratisbon many, who had concealed their
opinions, now came boldly forward and declared for the great truths of the
Reformation. Princes, nobles, various regions and towns of Germany, year
after year, professed without fear to have given up the old faith, and to
have embraced the new doctrines.
An event, in its origin purely political, which occurred at this period, was
so overruled, as to increase greatly the strength of the Reformers. In the
year 1519, Ulrich, Duke of Wurtemberg, gave offense to the league of
Swabia, and was expelled from his dominions, which were afterwards
placed under the scepter of Ferdinand. The exiled prince, after a long
captivity of seventeen years, was restored, through the assistance of his
kinsman, Philip of Hesse, to the dukedom of his ancestors. It appears that
he attended the conferences at Marburg in 1529, and had received
impressions favorable to the Reformation. “Hence,” says Scultetus, “his
first object on the recovery of his dominions, was to throw them open to
 1040
the glory of Christ, and to introduce the preaching of the pure word of
God, and the administration of the sacraments, according to His
institution.” He also engaged the assistance of several theologians to
organize churches, establish schools, and arrange other details on the
principles of Protestantism. This must have been like life from the dead to
those extensive dominions which had been under the sway of the bigoted
catholic Ferdinand.
The Reformation of the Duchy of Wurtemberg, was followed by that of
Brunswick, Calenberg, Hanover, Pomerania, Mecklenburg, and the cities of
Augsburg, Bremen, and Hamburg. But there was one accession to the
Protestant cause about this time which demands a special notice as
illustrating the overruling providence of God in those eventful times.
On the 24th of April, 1539, George, Duke of Saxony, died. He was head of
the Albertine branch of the Saxony family and possessed, as Marquis of
Mesnea and Thuringia, extensive territories comprising Dresden, Leipsic,
and other cities now the most considerable in the electorate. From the
dawn of the Reformation he had been the most resolute and determined
enemy of what he styled Lutheranism. It is probable that his opposition
at first was from a sincere belief in the doctrines of Romanism; but it
became embittered by personal antipathy to Luther, and by the electoral
princes, the other branch of the family, being his unfailing friends. By his
death without issue, the succession fell to his brother Henry, whose
attachment to the doctrines of the Reformation surpassed, if possible, that
of his brother George to the papacy. Like Ulrich, he invited some
Protestant divines, and among them Luther himself, to meet him at
Leipsic. In the course of a few weeks the whole system of ancient rites
was over-turned, and the full exercise of the Reformed religion established;
and that with the universal applause of his subjects.
This was an event of great advantage to the Reformation. It removed an
inveterate enemy from the very center of the Reformed states, and
converted that which had been a point of weakness into a position of
strength. These providential, yet mysterious, accessions greatly
strengthened the Smakald league, extending the boundaries, and increasing
the numbers of the Protestants. The territories of the princes, and cities
 1041
attached to their cause now extended, in one great and almost unbroken
line, from the shores of the Baltic to the banks of the Rhine.2

THE GREAT ACTORS PASSING OFF THE SCENE

Many of the names with which we have become familiar, and who have
sustained a conspicuous part in the earlier history of the Reformation,
are now passing off the stage of time. “Having discharged the offices
assigned to them,” say’s Dean Waddington, “they had proceeded on their
fatal journey; and the grave which closed over their ashes might have
concealed the memories of most of them in a like oblivion, had they not
been cast upon one of those periods of revolutionary convulsion which
break in like tempests, upon the ordinary progression of human events,
and leave behind them such lasting traces of their operations on the
destinies of mankind, as to give an interest to the petty performances of
the humblest agents, even with a remote and intelligent posterity.” But
happy they, happy all, who act in the great drama of life with a good
conscience towards God and man — repentance towards God and faith
towards our Lord Jesus Christ — who care for the glory of the one and the
well-being of the other.
Conscience has much more to do with man’s future well-being than is
generally thought. A bad conscience forbids him accrediting the grace of
God in Christ towards the guilty. Man knows the difference between good
and evil, and, knowing that he has chosen the evil and refused the good, he
believes God is against him. In this state of mind he endeavors to keep out
of the way of all that which would bring him face to face with God.
Therefore as unbelief is cherished, the mind becomes darker and the heart
grows harder. The effects of self-complacency, through the power and
subtlety of the enemy are also most ruinous. Man is so blinded by the god
of this world, and so occupied with self, that he sees no moral beauty in
Jesus, no need of Him as a Savior, and no need of the salvation which is
pressed upon his acceptance. And thus it is that so many pass off the
scene, outwardly respectable, but inwardly heedless of the danger against
which they are so solemnly and so frequently warned.
We judge not the dead; but offer the result of our reflections for the benefit
of the living. May he not, as many do, slumber on under the influence of
 1042
an evil conscience, self-complacency, and the blinding power of Satan,
until he has played out his part; and then wake up, too late, to the
importance of the truth he has rejected, and the Savior he has slighted. But,
alas! the day of mercy is past, the door of mercy is closed; and, seeing his
loss to be irreparable, he sinks under the weight of hopeless despair.
John, Elector of Saxony, surnamed the Constant, died August 16th,
1532. During seven critical years, this illustrious prince, guided with great
wisdom and firmness the vessel of the Reformation. At Augsburg, it will
be remembered, he displayed a constancy superior to the wavering of
some of his theologians; yet so tempered by moderation as to preserve
him from immediate collision with the Emperor. At one time he was
cruelly menaced by Charles, at another, his honesty was tempted by
secret but flattering overtures; but, nobly free from personal motives, he
remained true to his convictions, and generously devoted to the great
public question of the sixteenth century, the Reformation. There can be no
question as to the genuineness of his piety. He was affectionately attached
to Luther, and on doubtful questions usually deferred to his opinion. He
took such delight in the holy scriptures, that he would frequently have
them read to him by youths of noble families, as much as six hours in the
day. Happily the Reformation lost nothing by his death. His son, John
Frederick, the new Elector, was in the flower of his youth, warmly
attached to the cause, and not less to the person of Luther, than his father.
He was characterized by piety and firmness in the trying circumstances
through which he was afterwards called to pass.3
As few of the antagonists of Luther survived him, notwithstanding the
high price that was set upon his life, we will notice some of the leading
ones.
Pope Clement VII. died September 27th, 1534. He died, even according
to Italian history, “Detested by his court, suspected by the princes, with
an offensive and hateful reputation; for he was esteemed avaricious,
faithless, and by nature indisposed to do good to mankind.” In addition to
the evil qualities here specified, others mention an obduracy and
inclemency, which grew with the decay of his frame, and the morbid
weakness of declining life. The virtues commonly ascribed to him are
gravity, parsimony, self-control, circumspection, or, dissimulation; for
 1043
indeed, the last was so essential a quality, at the court of Rome, that he
who excelled in that, in which all aspired to excel, deserved the sort of
praise attached to such pre-eminence.”4
Clement is familiarly known to our readers as professing his willingness to
call a council, yet persevering to the end of his life in the artifices which he
knew would delay, if not finally prevent, its convocation. His dark and
suspicious mind dreaded the thought of a general council. He was afraid of
the light; he knew that the circumstances of his own history, and his
elevation to the chair, were not free from reproach. How different the
character and the end of the chief prince of Germany to the chief pastor of
Rome! May we seek to imitate all that was of God in the former and avoid
all that was of Satan in the latter.
Cardinal Cajetan, one of Luther’s earliest antagonists, died the same
year as Clement. He was censured by many of the dignitaries of the church
for his unsuccessful contest with Luther at Augsburg, but not disgraced by
the Vatican. It is thought by some that he turned his attention more to the
study of the scriptures after his defeat; but he lived and died in the service
of the papacy.
Lorenzo Campeggio, the legate selected for the critical occasion of the
famous Diet of Augsburg, died in 1539. He ably represented his papal
majesty and the principles of the Vatican. Secretly and unceasingly he
urged Charles to violent measures against the Protestants. Fire and sword,
sweeping confiscations, the Inquisition, burning heretical books, were the
legate’s arguments behind the scene. Still he was far from exceeding his
orders.
Aleander, the great papal champion at the Diet of Worms, died in 1542.
For his great zeal in the pontifical cause, he received high ecclesiastical
honors; but his life was chiefly spent in the management of public
business, the affairs of state, and the councils of princes.
Erasmus, of high literary fame, and in some respects the forerunner of
Luther, died in 1536 at the age of sixty-nine. His name must ever be
associated with Luther and the Reformation, though latterly, Luther
considered him one of its greatest enemies, and the enemy of all true
religion. He lacked the essential principles of a Reformer. He was
 1044
insincere, unstable, without courage, and trembled at the results of his own
work. He was a reformer, until the Reformation became a great reality. He
fled from Basle when the Reformation was established on the destruction
of the images, and returned to it when tranquillity was restored. Yet,
notwithstanding his inconsistencies, he commanded great respect from his
literary reputation, his manners and accomplishments; and his death was
deplored as a great national affliction. He died, professedly, in the bosom
of holy mother church, and declaiming against the new evangelical
practices.
John of Eck, professor of Ingolstadt, closed his noisy career in 1543, at
the age of fifty-seven. He was the indefatigable champion of the dignity
and absolute supremacy of Rome papal. He was arrogant, vain-glorious,
and eminently gifted with the qualities which form an accomplished
disputant. “His unwearied zeal hurried him into every field where the
Reformers were encamped. Everywhere he was foremost in the strife;
everywhere he contended with force and energy, and on more than one
occasion with success... Thus was he confronted in a long series of
combats, during a space of twenty years, with all the chieftains of the
Reformation.” Thus he lived and thus he died, maintaining even with his
latest breath the loftiest pretensions of Rome.

THE LATTER END OF LUTHER

The public testimony of Luther and his associates, may be said to have
closed when they delivered the confession of Augsburg. The contest then,
if not before, changed its character. It was no longer between
excommunicated heretics bearing witness to the truth of God against the
falsehoods of Rome; but between the princes of Germany, united in league
and arrayed in arms, and the imperial confederacy. But, although retiring
from the notice of the public chronicler, they still labored unweariedly in
the duties of their special vocations, and had the gratification of seeing the
result of their labors, in the peaceful progress of the word of God. Of
Luther, however, one of his biographers remarks, “That though he
continued to discharge, with his accustomed zeal, his official duties as a
preacher and a professor, and published commentaries on various parts of
scripture, and showed no inclination to relinquish his former habit of
sending forth a popular treatise whenever circumstances in the state of
 1045
religion appeared to call for it; yet, amid those various occupations, it was
remarked that his enterprising spirit appeared to undergo abatement, and
that in his latter years he was found to hazard no new doctrine.”5
During these years the great Reformer, who has claimed so large a portion
of our attention, was chastened by long and painful sickness; and was
fast descending to his resting-place, where the rude contests of life, its
animosities and injuries, are all forgotten. Writing to a friend a few days
before he set out on his last journey, he says, “I am old, decrepit, sluggish,
weary, spiritless, and deprived of half my sight; yet, at a time when I had
hoped to have a reasonable share of rest, I continue to be overwhelmed
with business, writing, speaking, acting, and doing, as if I had never yet
acted, written, spoken, or done anything.”
In the January of 1546, the Counts of Mansfeld, having some difference
about boundaries and inheritance, invited Luther to Eisleben — his native
place — to decide it by his arbitration. Though not caring to meddle in
such matters he consented.
He left Wittemberg on the 23rd of January, accompanied by his three
sons, and his faithful friend, Justus Jonas. Though feeble and suffering, he
engaged in the business on which he had come for about three weeks, and
matters were arranged to the satisfaction of the lords of Mansfeld. He was
received by these noblemen with great honor; they met him with an escort
of one hundred horsemen, amidst the ringing of the bells in all the
churches. He occasionally preached in the church and partook of the
communion. Every night, as he took leave of his friends, he would say,
“Pray to God that the cause of His church may prosper, for the Council of
Trent is vehemently enraged against it.”
On the evening of the 17th of February he dined with his friends, including
his three sons — John, Martin, and Paul — and Justus Jonas. He was
persuaded to abstain from business that evening, and to keep quiet in his
study. He walked about the room, looked out at the window, looked
upwards, and prayed earnestly. Deep thoughts were passing through his
mind, but did not depress his spirits. There he had spent the morning and
there, he now felt, he was to spend the evening of his life. “I was born and
baptized here at Eisleben, Jonas,” he would say: “what if I should remain
or die here!”
 1046
THE DEATH OF LUTHER
Early in the evening he began to complain of an oppression in the chest;
but he was relieved by means of friction and warm applications. Feeling
better, he left his room and joined the party at supper. “During this last
meal he was sometimes playful, even jocular; sometimes profoundly
serious — such as he had ever been in the unreserved society of his
friends.” After supper, the oppression returned, yet he would not have
medical aid called in, but asked for a warm linen cloth for his chest. He fell
asleep about nine on a couch, and awoke about ten. Seeing so many friends
around him, he desired that they should retire to rest. He was then led to
his chamber; when he was placed in his bed; he exclaimed, “I go to rest
with God... Into Thy hands I commend my spirit.” And, stretching out his
hand to bid all good-night, he added, “Pray for the cause of God.” Having
slept about three hours, he awoke, feeling very ill. “Oh God!” he said,
“how ill I am! what an oppression I feel in my chest! I shall certainly die
at Eisleben!... My reverend father,” replied Jonas, “God our heavenly
Father will assist you by Christ, whom you have preached.” He removed
into his study without requiring assistance, and again repeating, “O my
God! into Thy hands I commend my spirit.”
Two physicians had been sent for, who presently arrived, and likewise
Count Albert, accompanied by his countess, who brought cordials and
other medicines. All Luther’s friends and his three sons were now
collected around him, and he seemed somewhat relieved; and having lain
down on a couch he fell into a perspiration. This gave the friends some
hope: but he himself said, “It is a cold sweat, the forerunner of death: I
shall yield up my spirit.” He then began to pray, nearly in these words: —
“O eternal and merciful God, my heavenly Father, Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ, and God of all consolation! I thank Thee that Thou hast
revealed unto me Thy Son, Jesus Christ; in whom I have believed, whom I
have preached, whom I have confessed, whom I love and worship as my
dear Savior and Redeemer, whom the pope and the multitude of the
ungodly do persecute, revile, and blaspheme. I beseech Thee, my Lord
Jesus Christ, receive my soul! O heavenly Father, though I be snatched
out of this life, though I must lay down this body, yet know I assuredly
that I shall dwell with Thee for ever, and that none can pluck me out of
 1047
Thy hands.” He then thrice repeated the words, “Into Thy hands I
commend my spirit: Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of truth.” Also
those words, “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten
Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have
everlasting life.” He then became silent, and his powers began to fail him.
The countess gave him some restorative, and he gently whispered “Yes, or
No.” And when Jonas raised his voice and said to him, “Beloved father,
dost thou confess that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, our Savior and
Redeemer?” he clearly and audibly rejoined, “I do;” and spoke no more.
With his hands clasped, a gentle respiration interrupted by sighs,
continued for a short time; and then, amidst the deep lamentation of his
surrounding friends, between two and three in the morning, he fell asleep
in Jesus.6

THE FUNERAL OF LUTHER

The Counts of Mansfeld would gladly have retained and interred the body
of Luther in his native place, but they submitted to the wishes of the
Elector, who directed it to be conveyed to Wittemberg. The body was
then removed into the largest church at Eisleben. Great excitement
prevailed. Jonas preached a funeral sermon to an immense concourse of
people; after which, the body was placed under the charge of ten citizens,
who were to watch it during the night. Early the following day the
procession moved towards Wittemberg. The citizens crowded along the
streets and beyond the gates. “There the countrymen, summoned by the
ringing of bells, joined, together with their wives and families, the sad
procession. It was met on the way by a deputation from the Elector, then
reached Wittemberg, on the 23rd of February. When the procession arrived
at the gate of the city, it was received by the senate, the rector, the
professors, and the students of the university, with all the principal
citizens; after which it advanced, attended by the whole population to the
church of All Saints. Then came the widow of Luther with her daughters
and three sons, and the little company of friends, Melancthon, Pontanus,
Jonas, Pomeranus, Cruciger, and others, the true yoke-fellows of the
departed, the veterans of the Reformation.
Suitable hymns were sung as the funeral proceeded through the streets of
the city. The body was deposited on the right of the pulpit; whence, after
 1048
some further verses had been sung, Pomeranus addressed the vast
multitude. Melanc-thon then pronounced a funeral oration. But it has been
remarked, as creditable to both orators, that their feelings were more
conspicuous than their powers of oratory, and that their pious attempts to
console the sorrows of others were little more than a hearty demonstration
of their own.”7

REFLECTIONS ON THE LIFE OF LUTHER

To study and estimate the different characters which pass before us in
history, contrasted in everything but their common design, and to trace
with the eye of faith the overruling hand of God in all their works and
ways, will be found both deeply interesting and highly profitable. It is the
study of what God is in government, and of what man is in himself,
however richly gifted or renewed by grace. Speaking of those great, we
must always add, but, fallible men. There is only One who is infallible,
and, thank God, we own no Head, no center, but Him; and no name but
His — the name of Jesus; and it is only from this elevated point of view
that we can rightly estimate the characters and events of history.
The life and death of Luther are full of the deepest instruction for the
thoughtful student, especially when contrasted with his great compeer,
Zwingle. Their object was one; but their ways of attaining that object were
as wide apart as the poles. It would be hard to say which had the greater
heart for the maintenance and spread of the truth of God; perhaps
Luther’s was the warmer and deeper, Zwingle’s the clearer and broader.
The one was war, the other peace; the one looked for victory only through
the energy of faith and the bold confession of the truth; the other thought
that the sword of the magistrate might, in some cases, be allied with the
gospel of peace; the one was destined to see his labors crowned with
almost universal success; the other was doomed to witness a catastrophe
which threatened to engulf his dearly loved Reformation; the one died in
peace, surrounded by his friends; the other by the blows of his enemies.
The principle of Luther, in this respect, is one of the essential principles
of Christianity. The fury of the persecutor is to be met by truth and
meekness — the martyr’s noblest crown — not by political edicts and
men-at-arms. These two great examples are no doubt intended by God to
 1049
be two great lessons to all future generations. If we follow Christ, we must
be characterized by His Spirit, and walk in His footsteps.
“He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk,
even as He walked.” (1 John 2:6.)

THE LORD’S CARE OF HIS SERVANT

We need no voice from heaven to assure us of the Lord’s watchful care
over His servant Luther. He trusted in God, and his faith was not
disappointed. There is no more wonderful instance of the preserving
power of divine providence on the page of history. Its lessons are well
fitted to strengthen our faith in Him who rules over all. An Augustinian
monk of humble condition, without authority, without protection, rose up
against the most degrading, firmly-seated despotism ever imposed on the
credulity of mankind, and alone he triumphed. We cannot be too often
reminded of this unseen, but invincible power. Faith is always in harmony
with the mind and government of God. This was the grand secret of
Luther’s victory. He had scarcely an avowed supporter when he stood
superior to kings, princes, popes and prelates, to all that was mighty in
power, and venerable for antiquity.
No human eye could discover any adequate motive for the strange position
he had taken. It was neither vanity, ambition, nor fanaticism. He never was
more, and he never cared to be more, than Dr. Martin Luther. It was also a
time of general peace and quiet submission to papal authority. Why then
trouble the still waters? There is but one answer to this question —
conscience. There was a power in the enlightened conscience of the monk
which the double sword of popery was powerless to overcome. Even the
natural man without conscience can never be a man in any high and noble
sense of the word. But faith placed the Reformer on the solid ground of
the word of God, by which he was taught the difference between truth and
falsehood, right and wrong, justice and oppression. Now he stood for the
truth of God; and God, in wisdom and power, stood with him. He boldly
maintained “that scripture was the only test of truth; that the
interpretation of scripture was of private right and privilege 8; that
conscience had her prerogatives, which were higher than all the powers of
earth; and that despotism, whether spiritual, ecclesiastical, or intellectual,
 1050
was contrary to the will of God, and to the happiness, prosperity, and
dignity of mankind.” On this foundation the Reformation was built; and
by the maintenance of these principles, that system of delusion, which
was deemed omnipotent, was shaken to its center by a single monk in his
brown frock and cowl.
To have accomplished the destruction of such a heretic, Rome would
gladly have given the half of her kingdom; but she could not touch a hair of
his head, or take a clay or an hour of his life from him. For well nigh thirty
years he defied her utmost malice, her loudest thunders, and all her
powers. Yes, the powers which, only a little time before, had made the
proudest monarchs to tremble on their thrones. But now there were bolts
forged at Wittemberg as well as at the Vatican, and hurled with as little
ceremony at popes and kings as at the Anabaptists or the revolutionary
peasants. What is to be done with the audacious monk? Will no man rid
His Infallibility of this pestilent enemy of the papacy? Where are the
daggers and the poisoned cups of Jezebel, which have so often come to her
aid? And yet, he is always at hand, always to be seen, always in action,
writing, speaking, uttering defiance to his adversaries, or inspiring his
friends with courage and resolution. But he has no designs of blood; his
object is life, not death. When he is most violent, it is in word only, and
that he may awaken Christendom from the slumber of ages; or rage against
the high ones of the earth because they have sought to arrest the progress
of the truth. Every hand that was engaged on the side of papal tyranny
was raised against him, yet not one of them could strike the fatal blow.
Such is the perfect security of the man who reposes under the shield of the
Almighty. Diet after diet of the German Empire may be convoked, aided
by the representatives of papal authority, but all in vain; Luther is beyond
their reach, yet always in sight. His door stands open; the poor may come
for alms; distinguished strangers from all parts of Europe may enter,
converse freely, and sup with the far famed professor; yet no man can be
found to do him harm. And so he lived in the unwalled town of
Wittemberg as safely as if he had been within the gates of heaven.
 1051
THE DOMESTIC AND INNER LIFE OF LUTHER
“Hitherto,” says a competent critic, “the too common idea of the great
Reformer’s character has been, that it was a mere compound of violence
and ruggedness. These features have been so prominent, that the finer lines
of his portrait have been completely shaded from sight. The lion and the
lamb were united in Luther. Nothing could exceed his submissiveness
and humility when a choice was left him whether to be humble or daring:
but when conscience spoke, no other consideration was for a moment
attended to, and he certainly did shake the forest in his magnificent ire...
We dwell not upon his constant contentment in poverty, and his contempt
for riches, because this is the characteristic of almost all great men who are
really worth more than gold can procure them; but his long unbroken
friendship with Melancthon — a character so opposite to his own, and in
some respects so superior, as he was the first to acknowledge himself —
has always struck us as a proof that he possessed much sweetness and
gentleness of disposition. Envy or jealousy never interrupted for a
moment the fraternal affection that subsisted between these great men. Of
those passions, indeed, Luther seems not to have been susceptible. Neither
did personal ambition come near him. He gave himself no air of grandeur or
importance, notwithstanding the great things he had performed. He seemed
to consider himself as a common man among common men.
“But this great simplicity of manners exhibits, not only his native
greatness, but that apostolic frame of mind, which all the
messengers of God, from Moses downwards, have displayed. Such
men are moulded at once by the hand that sends them. The
accidents of this world have no power — as they have upon others
— to change or modify their moral conformation. There is a
oneness, a wholeness of character in these elect instruments; they
are governed by one idea, and one only. Hence was begotten the
simplicity and homeliness of Luther’s walk in life. Had he acted
the great man, he would have proved that he was not the apostle.
In his family, and among his neighbors, he was pleasant,
affectionate, and pious; but his piety was not put on; it flowed in a
mingled stream with his everyday life and conversation.”9
 1052
LUTHER’S MARRIAGE
The marriage of Luther happening about a month after the death of his
friend and patron, Frederick of Saxony, and while all Germany was
bewailing the blood of her peasants, appeared to us so indiscreet, that we
purposely left it out of our narrative. His usual impetuosity was strikingly
manifested on this occasion.
The name of Catherine von Bora has long enjoyed a wide celebrity. She
was of a good family, and one of nine recluses, who, after studying the
scriptures, and finding that their vow was not binding, escaped from a
convent in Mesnia. Within the space of two years eight of the nine were
married; Catherine alone remained unmarried. During this time they had
been supported by the bounty of friends, which was administered by
Luther. In this way he must have known something of Catherine’s
character and disposition. He first proposed to unite her to one of his
friends, a humble evangelical pastor; but not falling in with this
arrangement, she remarked, with great simplicity, that had he proposed to
espouse her himself, or to affiance her to Amsdorf, she should have felt
less objection. Luther is represented to have been entirely overpowered by
so flattering a declaration. He decided at once to be married, and without
any notice of his intention, he caused the ceremony to be immediately
performed.
On the 11th of June, 1525, Luther went to the house of his friend and
colleague, Amsdorf. He desired Pomeranus, whom he styled The Pastor,
to bless their union. The celebrated painter, Lucas Cranach, and Dr. John
Apella, witnessed the marriage. Melancthon, the dearest friend of all, was
absent. For Luther to take such a bold step, while so many calamities were
hanging over the Reformation, overwhelmed him for the moment. But
when the clamor arose against his friend, he warmly defended his friend’s
marriage.
No sooner was this quiet marriage known, than a shout of indignation
arose, and all Europe was troubled. It afforded a fair opportunity for the
enemies of Luther to spread the most false and wild calumnies; and it was
regarded by his friends as a serious mortification. From this union of a
monk and a nun, the Catholics confidently predicted — according to
 1053
prophecy, they said — the birth of Antichrist; while the wits and scholars
assailed the nuptials with their sarcastic hymns and epigrams.
We can have no idea in our own day, of the effect of such a step on the
minds of men generally in that age. It was a rude violation of vows which
had been considered for centuries inviolable. Even many of the disciples of
the Reformation were scandalised by their chief marrying a nun. Early
prejudices are difficult to overcome. But hasty as the step was, Luther
was prepared to justify and defend it. He met the storm by a counterblast
of invectives and sarcasms: but we have chiefly to do with that which
seems to have become a matter of conscience. Marriage, he boldly
affirmed, was the ordinance of God; celibacy, the institution of man. “I do
not take a wife,” he said, “that I may live long with her; but seeing the
nations and the princes letting loose their fury against me, foreseeing that
my end is near, and that after my death they will again trample my
doctrine under foot, I am resolved, for the edification of the weak to bear a
striking testimony to what I teach here below.” The war of the peasants
had brought great reproach on the principles of the Reformation at that
time, and Rome appeared to be recovering here and there the ground she
had lost; she even flattered herself with the hope of victory; but the
marriage of the monk, who was under the anathema of the pope, and the
ban of the Emperor, spread terror and surprise through her ranks, and still
more fully disclosed to her the courage of the enemy she fancied she had
crushed.10

THE MARRIAGE FEAST

On the 15th of June, Luther says, in a letter to Ruchel, “I have made the
determination to cast off every shred of my former papistical life, and thus
I have entered the state of matrimony, at the urgent solicitation of my
father.” His friend was wealthy, and while inviting him to the marriage
feast on the 27th, he tells him, with characteristic frankness and
simplicity, “that any present he might choose to bring with him would be
acceptable.” In a letter to Spalatin about the same time, he says, “I have
silenced those who calumniated me and Catherine of Bora. If I am to give a
feast in celebration of these nuptials, you must not only be present
yourself, but you must send me a supply of venison. Meanwhile pray for
us, and give us your benediction.” To Wencelaus Link he wrote, “Quite
 1054
suddenly, and while I was thinking of anything rather than marriage, God
wonderfully brought me into wedlock with the celebrated nun, Catherine
of Bora.” He invited him to the feast, but stipulated that he should bring
no present, he being poor like Luther himself. The following was
addressed to Amsdorf: “The report is true, that I married Catherine, and
that in great haste, before the accustomed clamors of tumultuous tongues
could reach me, for I hope that I shall yet live some short time, and I could
not refuse this last act of obedience to the importunity of my father.” The
old couple from Mansfeld — John and Margaret Luther — were to be
present.
It will be seen from the above extracts, that one reason, by which Luther
attempted to justify his marriage, was the urgent importunity of his father.
“But when we remember the contempt,” says one of his fairest critics,
“with which he had treated the parental instances, twenty years before,
when he took the most important step in his early life in direct opposition
to them, we may question whether the actions of his mature age were
directed by that influence, and whether, with his present imperious
character and habits, even the persuasion of a father would have induced
him to take any step on which he was not previously determined... This
defense would have been sufficient for any man except Luther; but his
position was so preeminent before that of all his brother Reformers, his
achievements had been so splendid, his pretensions were so lofty, and
above all, his success had been so much advanced by the unquestionable
disinterestedness of his character and designs, that his followers had a right
to expect greater self-denial from him than from a Spalatin or a Carlstadt.
They had a right to expect, in return for the almost implicit obedience
which they yielded him, that he would sacrifice any private inclination,
however consistent with evangelical principles, rather than cast a certain,
though it might be an unmerited, scandal upon the cause over which he
presided... Thenceforward he ceased to stand apart from his brethren, and
came nearer to the level of their common humanity.”11
But though this imprudent affair unquestionably lowered Luther in public
estimation, it does not appear to have inflicted any serious blow upon the
cause of the Reformation. The work was of God, and too deeply founded
to be shaken by the infirmity of His servant; and twenty peaceful years of
 1055
domestic happiness may have amply remunerated the Reformer for some
loss of public reputation.

THE MARRIED LIFE OF LUTHER

The union of Luther and Catherine, though without the raptures of a first
affection, was no doubt a happy one. The Lord greatly blessed them. She
seems to have been a woman of great modesty, with tender affections, and
more than an ordinary share of good sense. She consoled him in his
dejection by repeating passages from the Bible, saved him all anxiety about
household affairs, contrived to sit near him during his leisure moments,
amused him by working his portrait in embroidery, reminded him of letters
he had to write; but sometimes she indulged rather more in general
conversation than suited the doctor, which called forth his most playful
sallies; such as “Did you say your Pater, Catherine, before you began that
sermon? If you had, I think you would not have been allowed to preach.”
And sometimes he addressed her as my Lord Ketha, and the Doctoress.
But his letters overflowed with tenderness for Catherine; and as age
advanced, his affection seems to have increased. He styles her his dear and
gracious wife, his dear and amiable Ketha.
They had six children, three sons and three daughters. Their daughter
Magdaline died at the age of fourteen. “Such is the power of natural
affection,” says the father, “that I cannot endure this without tears and
groans, or rather an utter deadness of heart. At the bottom of my soul are
engraven her looks, her words, her gestures, as I gazed at her in her lifetime
and on her death-bed. My dutiful, my gentle daughter! Even the death of
Christ — and what are all deaths compared to His? — cannot tear me from
this thought as it should. She was playful, lovely, and full of love.”
The Elector provided for the mother and the five children after the father’s
death.12

CONCLUSION
Before parting with the great Reformer, who has claimed so large a share of
our attention in tracing the history of the church, we will bring under
review the estimate formed of him by one of our most judicious writers
 1056
— the historian of Charles V.; and also, Dean Waddington’s review of the
extent of his work.
“As Luther was raised up by divine providence, to be the author of
one of the greatest revolutions recorded in history, there is not any
person, perhaps, whose character has been drawn with such
opposite colors. In his own age one party, struck with horror and
inflamed with rage, when they saw with what a daring hand he
overturned everything which they held to be sacred, or valued as
beneficial, imputed to him not only the defects and vices of a man,
but the qualities of a demon. The other, warmed with admiration
and gratitude, which they thought he merited as the restorer of
right and liberty to the christian church, ascribed to him perfections
above the condition of humanity, and viewed all his actions with a
veneration bordering on that, which should be paid only to those
who are guided by the immediate inspiration of heaven. It is his
own conduct, not the undistinguished censure, or the exaggerated
praise of his contemporaries, that ought to regulate the opinions of
the present age concerning him. Zeal for what he regarded as truth,
undaunted intrepidity to maintain his own system, abilities, both
natural and acquired, to defend his principles, and unwearied
industry in propagating them, are virtues which shine so
conspicuously in every part of his behavior, that even his enemies
must allow him to have possessed them in an eminent degree.
“To these may be added, with equal justice, such purity and even
austerity of manners, as became one who assumed the character of
a Reformer; such sanctity of life as suited the doctrine which he
delivered; and such perfect disinterestedness as affords no slight
presumption of his sincerity. Superior to all selfish considerations,
a stranger to the elegancies of life, and despising its pleasures, he
left the honors and emoluments of the church to his disciples,
remaining satisfied himself, in his original state of professor in the
university, and pastor of the town of Wittemberg, with the
moderate appointments annexed to these offices... His mind,
forcible and vehement in all its operations, roused by great
subjects, or agitated by violent passions, broke out, on many
occasions, with an impetuosity which astonishes men of feebler
 1057
spirits, or such as are placed in a more tranquil situation. By
carrying some praiseworthy dispositions to excess, he bordered
sometimes on what was culpable, and was often betrayed into
actions which exposed him to censure. His confidence that his own
opinions were well-founded approached to arrogance; his courage,
in asserting them, to rashness; his firmness, in adhering to them, to
obstinacy; and his zeal in confronting his adversaries, to rage and
scurrility. Accustomed himself to consider everything as
subordinate to truth, he expected the same deference for it from
other men; and, without making any allowances for their timidity
or prejudices, he poured forth, against such as disappointed him in
this particular, a torrent of invective mingled with contempt.
Regardless of any distinction of rank or character when his
doctrines were attacked, he chastised all his adversaries
indiscriminately, with the same rough hand; neither the royal
dignity of Henry VIII., nor the eminent learning and abilities of
Erasmus, screened them from the same gross abuse with which he
treated Tetzel and John of Eck.
“But these indecencies, of which Luther was guilty, must not be
imputed wholly to the violence of his temper. They ought to be
charged in part on the manners of his age. Some parts of Luther’s
behavior, which to us appear most culpable, gave no offense to his
contemporaries. The account of his death filled the Roman Catholic
party with excessive, as well as indecent joy, and damped the
spirit of all his followers; neither party sufficiently considering
that his doctrines were now so firmly rooted as to be in a condition
to flourish, independently of the hand which first had planted
them.”13
“But the most remarkable fact in the history of the Reformation,
and, in my opinion, one of the most so in the history of the world,
still remains to be mentioned — that the limits which the
Reformation won while Luther lived, were very nearly those which
divide the two religions at this day. Almost all that was
accomplished before his death endured: almost all that was
afterwards achieved was wrested back again by Rome. The
enthusiasm of a single generation attained, under his guidance, the
 1058
prescribed boundaries. No exertions of his disciples, no reverence
for his name and virtues, no wider diffusion of faith, and
knowledge, and civilization, and commercial activity, and
philosophical truth, during the course of three centuries of
progressive improvement, have made any lasting additions to the
work which he left. Such as when it passed from the hands of its
architect, or very nearly such, are its dimensions now. The form,
indeed, is somewhat altered, and the part, which he considered as
exclusively sacred, has been much narrowed by the change. But to
the uncompromising, unrelenting enemy of Rome, it was an
immortal triumph, that he extorted from her, with his own hands,
all that she was ordained, so far as we yet have seen, to lose, and
that he witnessed the utmost humiliation to which, even to this
hour, it has pleased Providence permanently to reduce her.”14
 1059

CHAPTER 46
THE OPENING OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT

For several years before the death of Luther, appearances were

unfavorable to the peace and religious liberty of the Protestants. This led
them, not so much to prayer and confidence in God as their shield and
protector, but to strengthen the league of Smalcald, and prepare for war.
They were now a thoroughly political body. This was the outward
character of Protestantism at that early period. The man who loved
peace was in his grave, and his counsels were forgotten by his followers.
He could not conceive a greater calamity befalling the cause of truth than
that the sword should be drawn in its defense. Better far be martyrs, he
thought, than warriors.
The jealous Emperor narrowly watched the increasing power of the league,
and pronounced it “an empire within an empire.” But his fatal expedition
to Algiers, his renewed war with Francis, and the successes of the Turks in
Hungary, led him to temporize, to conceal his feelings and intentions. He
held several diets of the empire for the avowed purpose of settling their
religious differences, and restoring peace and harmony, but with no good
results. The Protestants were deceived and thrown off their guard by fair
pretences and apparent concessions. In the Diet of Spires, in 1542, the
pontiff, Paul III., by his legate, renewed his promise of a council. He
signified that it should be held at Trent, a city in the Tyrol, subject to the
king of the Romans, and situated on the confines between Germany and
Italy. Ferdinand and the whole Catholic party expressed their immediate
satisfaction, and accepted the proposal. Not so the Protestants. They
rejected both the place and the council proposed by the pontiff;
demanding a general, or OEcumenical, Council. They protested that they
would pay no regard to a council held beyond the precincts of the empire,
called by the pope’s authority, and over which he assumed the right of
presiding. Regardless, however, of their protestations, and fortified by the
general consent of his own party, he published a bull for the convocation
 1060
of the council at Trent before the 1st of November, and named three
cardinals to preside as his legates.
At the appointed time, the pope’s legates, the imperial ambassadors, and a
few prelates appeared. But as a fierce war was then raging between the
Emperor and Francis, few ecclesiastics could travel with safety. It was
manifest from these circumstances, that nothing satisfactory could be
undertaken; and to avoid the ridicule and contempt of his enemies, the
pope adjourned for an indefinite time, the reopening of the council.
Unhappily for the dignity and authority of the papal See at this very time,
the Emperor and his brother Ferdinand, king of the Romans, found it
necessary, not only to connive at the conduct of the Protestants, but to
court their favor by repeated acts of indulgence. Ferdinand, who depended
on their assistance for the defense of Hungary against the infidels, not only
permitted their protestation to be inserted in the records of the diet, but
renewed in their favor all the Emperor’s concessions at Ratisbon, adding to
them whatever they demanded for their further security. Thus had the
Reformers rest, and the evangelical principles time to deepen and spread,
though not from the good will, but from the disturbed state of their
adversaries’ affairs.
As late as 1544, at the diet held in the same place, the politic Charles,
perceiving that the time was not yet come to offend the jealous spirit of
the Protestants, or to provoke the powers of the Smalcald Confederacy,
contrived to soothe the Germans by new concessions, and a more ample
extension of their religious privileges. Being still engaged in foreign wars,
and his hands not free, he employed all his powers of dissimulation to
court and flatter the Elector and the Landgrave, the heads of the Protestant
party, and through them to deceive the members of the confederacy.
Meanwhile his papal majesty was becoming day by day more jealous of
these negotiations and concessions. He was longing as ardently as his three
predecessors had done, for the rooting out, by force of arms, of this wide-
spreading, giant heresy. It had been the constant object of the Vatican,
from the beginning of the Reformation, to create a hostile breach between
the Emperor and the Protestants, and a consequent appeal to arms. But, so
far as we can judge, the consummation of these wicked designs was
prevented for nearly thirty years, in the providence of God, and chiefly in
 1061
answer to the prayers of one man. But he was now off the scene, and his
brethren were trusting to their military organization and numerical
strength. Besides, the determined position which they had taken with
reference to the proposed council, gave the pope and the Emperor every
opportunity to ensnare them; and so it turned out, as we shall soon see.
The avowed object of this famous council was, of course, the pacification
of the church, the healing of her diseases, the restoring of her unity, and
the blessing of her children; but its real object was the condemnation of
the doctrines of the Reformers, Luther, Zwingle, and Calvin, and the
immediate persecution of all who should oppose its decrees. This was the
secret arrangement between the pontiff and the Emperor, for they were
well aware that the Protestants would never subject themselves to the
council, or yield obedience to its canons.

THE TREATY BETWEEN THE POPE AND THE EMPEROR

In December, 1545, after so many years of intrigue, dissimulation, and
dispute, the long-promised council assembled at Trent, and continued
its sittings till 1563. 1
But the council which was to fix the destiny of Christendom was only a
part of a great plot for the suppression of Lutheranism. The Emperor had
ended his war with Francis by the peace of Crespy, he had patched up a
treaty with Solyman, and secretly gained over some of the Catholic
princes in Germany. He pushed on, but with great precaution, his
preparations for war. The pope, however much he had disapproved of the
Emperor’s late policy, or dreaded his power, most readily agreed that all
other matters should give place to that one which each accounted the most
important. A treaty was concluded, the main object of which was,
1. “That the pope and the Emperor, for the glory of God, and the
public good, but especially the welfare of Germany, have entered into
league together upon certain articles and conditions; and, in the first
place, that the Emperor shall provide an army, and all things necessary
for war, and be in readiness by the month of June next ensuing, and by
force of arms compel those who refuse the council, and maintain those
errors to embrace the ancient religion, and submit to the holy See.”
 1062
2. “The pope, on his part, in addition to one hundred thousand ducats
which he had already given, stipulated to deposit as much more in the
Bank of Vienna toward defraying the expense of the war; to maintain,
at his own charge, during the space of six months, twelve thousand
foot, five hundred horse, and to grant the Emperor for this year one-
half of the church revenues all over Spain; to empower him to alienate
as much of the Abbey-lands in that country as would amount to five
hundred thousand ducats; and that both spiritual censures and military
force should be employed against any prince who might seek to hinder
the execution of this treaty.”
3. “That the council, on its part, was to proceed at once to draw up a
confession of faith, wherein should be contained all the articles which
the church required its members to believe; that this ought to be the
first and principal business of the council: and that anathemas were to
be denounced in the name, and by the authority of the Holy Ghost,
against all who should disclaim the truth of the Confession.”2
Thus was the snare most artfully laid. It was the deep device of Satan for
the destruction of the Protestants, but vigorously carried out by him who
assumes the title of “most holy father,” and the character of “infallibility.”
The enemy saw that the Reformers had shifted from moral to political
ground. They were no longer merely “protesters” for the truth of God
against the errors of popery, but an armed confederacy, prepared to meet
the papal and imperial armies on their own ground. This was their fatal
mistake. God could not appear for them on the world’s ground; and their
own folly and weakness were soon manifested. Thus it happened.
The council commenced its deliberations — though only a few Spanish
and Italian bishops had arrived — with examining the first and chief point
in controversy between the church of Rome and the Reformers, concerning
the rule which should be held as supreme and decisive in matters of faith;
and, by its infallible authority, determined, “That the books to which the
designation of Apocryphal hath been given, are of equal authority with
those which were received by the Jews and Primitive Christians into the
sacred canon; that the traditions handed down from the apostolic age, and
preserved in the church, are entitled to as much regard as the doctrines and
precepts which the inspired authors have committed to writing; that the
 1063
Latin translation of the scriptures, made or revised by Jerome, and known
by the name of the Vulgate translation, should be read in churches, and
appealed to in the schools as authentic and canonical.”
This was an open attack on the first principles of Protestantism, a pre-
judging of every question at issue, and rendering hopeless all discussion
between the two parties. Luther and his followers, from the beginning, had
affirmed that the word of God was the only rule in judgment; that they
owned no authority in matters of faith but the one infallible standard of
holy scripture. This was the foundation and comer-stone of Protestantism;
but the first decision of the council was intended to undermine the
foundation, to adjudge and condemn the whole system.

THE SMALCALD WAR

The Protestants, perceiving that the real object of the council was not to
examine their demands, but to condemn their faith as heresy, and to draw
them into collision with the Emperor, that he might decide the question
with the sword, firmly rejected its decrees. At the same time they
published a long manifesto, containing a renewal of their protest against
the meeting of the council, together with the reasons which induced them
to decline its jurisdiction. But Charles was not yet prepared for hostilities;
therefore he pursued his policy of dissimulation. He had no wish to
increase the zeal of the council, or to quicken the operations of the league.
His first object was to deceive the Protestants, that he might gain time for
ripening his schemes. For this purpose he contrived to have an interview
with the Landgrave of Hesse, the most active of all the confederates, and
the most suspicious of the Emperor’s designs. To him he made great
professions of his concern for the happiness of Germany, and of his
aversion to all violent measures; he denied in express terms, having formed
any treaty, or having begun any military preparations which pointed to
war.
Such was the consummate duplicity of Charles, that he seems to have
dispelled all Philip’s doubts and apprehensions, and sent him away fully
satisfied of his pacific intentions. On his return to the confederates, who
were assembled at Worms, he gave them such a flattering representation of
the Emperor’s favorable disposition towards them, that they became
 1064
dilatory and undecided in their operations, thinking that the danger was
distant or only imaginary. Listening thus to the wiles of Satan, the
Protestant leaders were smitten with blindness and folly; even as the
men of Zurich were in 1531. They were off the ground of faith and
trusting to their own wisdom and strength, which led to their disgrace and
humiliation. From this time every step they take is in the wrong and
downward direction.
The conduct of the Emperor was everywhere directly opposite to his
professions of peace, and seen by all excepting those who ought to have
suspected him. Henry VIII. of England secretly informed the princes that
Charles, having long resolved to exterminate their doctrines, was diligently
employing the present interval of tranquillity in preparing for the
execution of his designs. The merchants of Augsburg, among whom were
some who favored the Protestant cause, learning from their correspondents
in Italy, that the ruin of the Reformers was intended, warned them of the
approaching danger. In confirmation of these reports, they heard from the
Low Countries that Charles, though with every precaution which could
keep the measure concealed, had issued orders for raising troops both there
and in other parts of his dominions. And seeing he was not at war either
with Francis or Solyman, or any other power, for what could he intend
such preparations, if not for the extinction of the Smalcald league, and the
herestes which had so long abounded in Germany?

THE POPE REVEALS THE DARK SECRET

The secret was now in many hands; the officers and the allies of Charles
kept no such mysterious reserve, but spoke out plainly of his intentions.
The pope, overflowing with joy, not doubting the issue of the enterprise,
began to sing the war-song, as in the days of Innocent III., exhorting the
faithful to take up arms in the holy cause and gain indulgences. “Proud,”
says Dr. Robertson, “of having been the author of such a formidable league
against the Lutheran heresy, and happy in thinking that the glow of
extirpating it was reserved for his pontificate, he published the articles of
his treaty with the Emperor, in order to demonstrate the pious intention of
their confederacy, as well as to display his own zeal, which prompted him
to make such extraordinary efforts for maintaining the faith in its purity.
Not satisfied with this, he soon after issued a bull, containing most liberal
 1065
promises of indulgence to all who should engage in this holy enterprise,
together with warm exhortations to such as could not bear a part in it
themselves, to increase the fervor of their prayers, and the severity of their
mortifications, that they might draw down the blessing of heaven upon
those who had undertaken it.”3
The pope being deeply grieved with Charles for endeavoring to make that
pass for a political contest which he ought to have gloried in as a war that
had no other object than the defense of the ancient faith, exposed the
treachery of his policy and declared the overthrow of Lutheranism as at
hand. The Emperor, though somewhat embarrassed by this disclosure, and
not a little offended at the pope’s indiscretion or malice, continued boldly
to pursue his own plan, and to reassert that his intentions were only that
which he had originally stated. Thus were the two heads of Christendom
— the fountain of truth and the fountain of honor, so-called —
proclaiming to the world that neither truth nor honor were to be found in
either. And thus they stand before all posterity, down to the latest
generation, a mere compound of craft, falsehood, hypocrisy, and cruelty.
But the artifices of Charles did not impose on all the Protestant
confederates. Some of them clearly perceived that he had taken arms for
the suppression of the Reformation, and the extinction of the German
liberties. They determined, therefore, to prepare for their own defense, and
resolved neither to renounce their religious liberties, nor to abandon those
civil rights which had been transmitted to them by their ancestors. A
deputation from the confederates waited on the Emperor, and wished to
know whether these military preparations were carried on by his
command, and for what end, and against what enemy? To a question put
in such a form and at a time when facts were too notorious to be denied, he
avowed the intentions which he could no longer conceal, but with such
fascinating duplicity as to deceive the deputies. True, he admitted, that it
was Germany he had in view in his preparations, but his only object was
to maintain the rights and prerogatives of the imperial dignity. His
purpose was, not to molest any on account of religion, but to punish
certain factious members, and preserve the ancient constitution of the
empire from being impaired or dissolved by their licentious conduct.
Though the Emperor did not name the persons whom he had destined as
 1066
the objects of his vengeance, it was well-known that he had in view John
Frederick, Elector of Saxony, and Philip, Landgrave of Hesse.
Transparent as this deception was, and manifest as it might have appeared
to all who considered the Emperor’s character, it nevertheless lulled to
sleep the timid and the wavering. They were furnished with an excuse for
inactivity, “seeing,” as they said, “the war does not concern religion, but is
a quarrel merely between the Emperor and some members of the league.”
And such was the dexterity with which he used this division of feeling
among the confederates, that he gained time and other solid advantages.

THE ARMY OF THE CONFEDERATES

The more energetic of the confederates, soon after this, met at Ulm to give
the necessary directions for their future proceedings. It was resolved that
they should repel force by force and make vigorous preparations for war.
They also determined, that having neglected too long to strengthen
themselves by foreign alliances, they would now apply to the Venetians,
the Swiss, and the kings of France and England. So far alas! had the leaders
of the Reformation, within the short period of thirty years from its
commencement, departed from the principles which triumphed at Worms
and Augsburg, to say nothing of the plain teaching of the word of God, as
to apply for help to such men as Henry and Francis; but we shall see with
what results.
Their negotiations with foreign courts were all unsuccessful; but the chiefs
had no difficulty in bringing a sufficient force into the field. The feudal
institutions, which subsisted in full force at that time in Germany, enabled
the nobles to call out their numerous vassals, and to put them in motion on
the shortest notice. “In a few weeks,” says the historian of Charles, “they
were enabled to assemble an army composed of seventy thousand foot
and fifteen thousand horse, provided with a train of a hundred and twenty
cannon, eight hundred ammunition wagons, eight thousand beasts of
burden, and six thousand pioneers. This army, one of the most numerous,
and undoubtedly the best appointed of any which had been levied in
Europe during that century, did not require the united effort of the whole
Protestant body to raise it. The Elector of Saxony, the Landgrave of
Hesse, the Duke of Wurtemberg, the princes of Anhalt, and the imperial
 1067
cities of Augsburg, Ulm, and Strasburg, were the only powers which
contributed towards this great armament. The Electors of Cologne, of
Brandenburg, the Count Palatine, and several others, overawed by the
Emperor’s threats, or deceived by his professions, remained neutral.
“The number of their troops, as well as the amazing rapidity
wherewith they had assembled them, astonished the Emperor, and
filled him with the most disquieting apprehensions. He was indeed
in no condition to resist such a mighty force. Shut up in Ratisbon
with an army searcely ten thousand strong, he must have been
overwhelmed by the approach of such a formidable army, which he
could not fight, nor could he even hope to retreat from it in safety.”
Fortunately for Charles the confederates did not avail themselves of the
advantage which lay so plainly before them. Time was wasted in writing a
letter to the Emperor, and a manifesto to all the inhabitants of Germany.
But, weak and perilous though the situation of Charles was, he assumed
the air of the haughty inflexible Emperor. His only reply to the letter of
the Protestants was to publish the ban of the empire against the Elector of
Saxony and the Landgrave of Hesse, their leaders, and against all who
should dare to assist them. By this sentence, they were declared rebels and
outlaws, and deprived of every privilege which they enjoyed as members
of the Germanic body; their goods were confiscated; their subjects
absolved from their oath of allegiance; and it became not only lawful but
meritorious to invade their territories. This tremendous sentence, according
to the German jurisprudence, required the authority of a diet of the
empire, but Charles overlooked that formality and assumed the power in
his own person.
The confederates, now perceiving that all hopes of accommodation were at
an end, solemnly declared war against Charles, to whom they no longer
gave any other title than pretended Emperor, and renounced all allegiance
to him. But, now that the moment for war had come, the league was
disunited and unprepared. The supreme command of the army was
committed in terms of the league to the Elector and the Landgrave, with
equal power. This proved disastrous from the very commencement. The
natural tempers and dispositions of the two princes were widely different.
The Elector was slow, deliberate, irresolute; the Landgrave was prompt,
 1068
enterprising, and wished to bring the contest to a speedy issue. But if
Philip was the better soldier, John was the greater prince; and could a
Landgrave command an Elector? All the inconveniences arising from a
divided authority were immediately felt. Much time was wasted and
dissensions multiplied. Meanwhile the Emperor had moved his camp to
the territories of the Duke of Bavaria, a neutral prince, leaving a small
garrison in Ratisbon. A few more days were spent in deliberating whether
they should follow Charles or attack Ratisbon. By this time the imperial
army amounted to thirty-six thousand men; and, through cowardly
defections, the Protestant army was reduced to forty-seven thousand.

THE FIRST OPERATIONS OF THE PROTESTANTS

As no foresight had been shown by the confederates to prevent the
Spanish, Italian, and other troops, from joining the imperial army, the
Emperor was enabled to send such a reinforcement to the garrison at
Ratisbon, that the Protestants, relinquishing all hope of reducing the town,
marched towards Ingoldstadt on the Danube, near to which Charles was
now encamped. “They complained loudly,” says Dr. Robertson, “against
the Emperor’s notorious violation of the laws and constitution of the
empire, in having called in foreigners to lay waste Germany, and to
oppress its liberties. It came to be universally believed among them, that
the pope, not satisfied with attacking them openly by force of arms, had
dispersed his emissaries all over Germany, to set on fire their towns and
magazines, and to poison the wells and fountains of water. These rumors
were confirmed, in some measure, by the behavior of the papal troops,
who, thinking nothing too rigorous towards heretics anathematised by the
church, were guilty of great excesses in the Lutheran states, and aggravated
the miseries of war by mingling with it all the cruelty of bigoted zeal.”
With passions so aroused, by the report of cruelties so great, we might
have expected to see a corresponding energy to bring such calamities to a
close. It was now in their power, and the campaign might have been ended
at the outset, had their leaders been united and firm. On their arrival at
Ingoldstadt, they found the Emperor in a camp not remarkable for
strength, with a small army, and surrounded only by a slight
entrenchment. But the great object pursued by Charles from the first was
to decline a battle, to weary out the patience of the confederates, and
 1069
induce them to separate, when his victory over each prince in succession
would be sure.
Before Ingoldstadt lay a plain of such extent, as afforded ample space for
drawing out their whole forces, and bringing them to act at once. No army
was ever more favorably situated; the soldiers were full of ardor and eager
to seize the opportunity of attacking the Emperor; but alas! through the
weakness or division of their leaders the advantage was lost, and so far as
their credit is concerned it was lost for ever. “The Landgrave urged that, if
the sole command was vested in him, he would terminate the war on that
occasion, and decide by one general action the fate of the two parties. But
the Elector urged, on the other hand, the discipline of the enemies’ forces,
the presence of the Emperor, the experience of his officers, and thought it
would be unsafe to venture upon an action.” While the Protestant leaders
were thus debating whether they ought to surprise the Emperor or not, the
imperial reinforcements arrived and the opportunity was gone.
But notwithstanding their vacillation, it was at length agreed to advance
towards the enemy’s camp in battle array, with the view of drawing the
imperialists out of the works. But the Emperor was too wise to be caught
in this snare. He was fighting on his own ground, and with his own
weapons, and as such, he was more than a match for all the Protestants in
Germany, who were on false ground and fighting with carnal, not with
spiritual, weapons. They commenced and continued firing for several
hours on the imperialists, but Charles adhered to his own system with
inflexible constancy. He drew up his soldiers behind the trenches;
restrained them from any excursions or skirmishes which might bring on a
general engagement; rode along the lines; addressed the troops of the
different nations in their own language; encouraged them not only by his
words, but by the cheerfulness of his voice and countenance; exposed
himself in places of greatest danger, and amidst the warmest fire of the
enemy’s artillery. Night fell; and the confederates, seeing no prospect of
alluring them to fight on equal terms, retired to their own camp.
The leisure was employed with great diligence by the imperialists in
strengthening their works; but the confederates, seeing they had lost their
opportunity, turned their attention — with as little success — towards
preventing the arrival of a powerful reinforcement from the Low
 1070
Countries. Upon the arrival of the Flemings the Emperor began to act more
on the offensive, though still with the greatest sagacity avoiding a battle.
He had often foretold, with confidence, that discord and the want of
money would compel the confederates to disperse that unwieldy body;
and for this he watched and waited with long patience. They had been on
the field from midsummer to the end of autumn, and little had been done,
and nothing gained on either side, when an unexpected event decided the
contest, and occasioned a fatal reverse in the affairs of the Protestants, and
prepared the way for the tragedy that followed.

THE TREACHERY OF MAURICE

Maurice was the son of Henry, and succeeded his father in the
government of that part of Saxony which belonged to the Albertine line.
“This young prince, then only in his twentieth year, had, even at that
early period, begun to discover the great talents which qualified him for
acting such a distinguished part in the affairs of Germany. As soon as he
entered upon the administration, he struck out into such a new and
singular path, as showed that he aimed from the beginning at something
great and uncommon.”4 He professed to be a zealous Protestant, but
objected to join the league of Smalcald under the pretense that its
principles were not sufficiently scriptural. He avowed his determination to
maintain the purity of religion, but not to entangle himself in the political
interests, or combinations to which it had given rise. Such was the
consummate duplicity and the Satanic policy of this young man. At this
very time, with great political sagacity, he was weighing both sides, and
foreseeing that the Emperor was most likely to prevail in the end, he
affected to place in him the most unbounded confidence, and to court his
favor by every possible means, and also the favor of his brother,
Ferdinand.
At the Diet of Ratisbon, in the month of May 1546, Maurice concluded a
treaty with the Emperor, in which he engaged to assist him as a faithful
subject, and Charles, in return, stipulated to bestow on him all the spoils
of the Elector, his dignities as well as his territories. But so little did the
Elector suspect treachery in his young relative and neighbor, who had
received many kindnesses from him, that, on leaving to join the
confederates, he committed his dominions to the protection of that prince;
 1071
and he, with an artful appearance of friendship, undertook the charge. The
whole plan being now completed, the Emperor sent Maurice a copy of the
imperial ban denounced against the Elector and the Landgrave, requiring
him, upon the allegiance and duty which he owed to the head of the
empire, instantly to seize and retain in his hands the forfeited estates of
the Elector.
This artifice, which made the invasion appear to be one of necessity rather
than of choice, was but a thin veil to conceal the treachery of both. After
some formalities were observed, to give a specious appearance to his
reluctance, Maurice marched into his kinsman’s territories, and, with the
assistance of Ferdinand, attacked and defeated the Elector’s troops, and
took all things under his own administration.

THE DISSOLUTION OF THE LEAGUE

When the news of these rapid conquests reached the good Elector, he was
filled with indignation and astonishment, and resolved at once to return
home with his troops, for the defense of Saxony. He was most unwilling
to withdraw, as he preferred the success of the common cause to the
security of his own dominions; but the sufferings and complaints of his
subjects increased so much, that he became most impatient to rescue them
from the oppression of Maurice, and from the cruelties of the Hungarian
soldiers, accustomed to the merciless modes of warfare practiced against
the Turks. This was the fatal blow to the league of Smalcald. This
diversion, which had been contrived with so much subtlety, was
successful, even to the desire of the heart of Charles.
The departure of the Elector caused a separation of the confederates; and,
once divided, they became an easy prey to the Emperor. A confederacy,
lately so powerful as to shake the imperial throne, and threaten to drive
Charles out of Germany, fell to pieces, and was dissolved in a few weeks.
How empty everything is if God is not in it; and how weak everything is
if He is not its strength! Charles saw his opportunity, put his army in
motion, and did not allow the confederates leisure to recover from their
consternation, or to form any new schemes of union. He assumed the tone
of a conqueror, as if they had been already at his mercy. The union being
dissolved, the princes stood exposed singly to the whole weight of his
 1072
vengeance. With the exception of the Elector and the Landgrave, almost all
the Protestant princes and states submitted, and implored the pardon of
the Catholic Charles in the most humiliating manner. And as he was in
difficulties from the want of money, he imposed heavy fines upon them,
which he levied with most rapacious exactness.5
With the exception of the Landgrave and the Elector, hardly any member
of the league now remained in arms. And these two the Emperor had long
marked out as the victims of his signal vengeance, so that he was at no
pains to propose to them any terms of reconciliation. Various
circumstances, for a short time, suspended the blow; but Charles, being
relieved from his apprehensions of a fresh war with France, by the death
of his great rival, Francis I., resolved to march against the Elector, who had
nearly recovered all his dominions from the traitor Maurice.
In the spring of 1547 there was some hard fighting between the Emperor
and the Elector at Muhlberg, on the Elbe, and at Mulhausen, but the latter
was defeated, wounded, and taken prisoner, which virtually terminated the
war. This decisive victory cost the imperialists only fifty men; but twelve
hundred of the Saxons were slain, and a great number were taken prisoners.
Maurice, as the reward of his treachery, was immediately put in
possession of the electoral dominions. The city of Gotha, and the small
territory attached to it, were settled on the Elector’s family; but he himself
was to remain a perpetual prisoner.
The Landgrave alone now remained in arms, and was not inclined to
surrender. But Maurice, his son-in-law, prevailed on him to submit,
assuring him that he and the Elector of Brandenburg, had the Emperor’s
guarantee for his personal liberty. But in all this Philip was cruelly
deceived. And there is every reason to believe that these two nobles, while
acting as mediators, were themselves deceived by the perfidious Charles.
His object was to gain possession of the person of Philip, that he might
have him absolutely at his disposal. But notwithstanding the assurances
and entreaiies of Maurice and Brandenburg, the Landgrave suspected the
intentions of the Emperor, and refused to appear at his court. His
reluctance, however, was at length overcome by these two princes signing
a bond, in which they pledged their own lives and liberties for his. His
 1073
doubts being thus removed, he repaired to the imperial camp at Halle, in
Saxony.
Charles, who had assumed the haughty and imperious tone of a
conqueror, was seated on a magnificent throne, with all the ensigns of his
dignity, and surrounded by a numerous train of the princes of the empire.
The Landgrave was introduced with great solemnity, and, advancing
towards the throne, fell upon his knees. The eyes of all present were fixed
on the unfortunate Landgrave — the most popular of the Protestant chiefs
in Germany. “Few could behold a prince,” says Robertson, “so powerful
as well as high-spirited, suing for mercy in the posture of a supplicant,
without being touched with commiseration, and perceiving serious
reflections arise in their minds upon the instability and emptiness of
human grandeur.” But there was one heart that remained unmoved by that
affecting scene: the unfeeling Spaniard, with Germany prostrate at his feet,
viewed the whole transaction with cold indifference.
He insisted on unconditional submission. “Philip was required to
surrender his person and territories to the Emperor; to implore for pardon
on his knees; to pay one hundred and fifty thousand crowns towards
defrayting the expenses of the war; to demolish the fortifications of all the
towns in his dominions, except one; to oblige the garrison which he placed
in it, to take an oath of fidelity to the Emperor,” etc., etc. The Landgrave,
being entirely at the Emperor’s mercy, ratified these conditions; and
flattering himself that he had thereby fully expiated his guilt, rose from his
knees, and advanced towards the Emperor, with the intention of kissing
his hand, but Charles turned away abruptly, without deigning to give the
fallen prince any sign of compassion or reconciliation.
Philip was allowed to retire, apparently at liberty, along with his friends
Maurice and Brandenburg, and was entertained by the Duke of Alva with
great respect and courtesy; but after supper, when he rose to depart, the
duke made known the orders he had to detain him. The unhappy prince
was struck dumb; his heart sank within him; then he broke out into those
violent expressions at the injustice and artifices of the Emperor, which the
circumstances naturally provoked, but all in vain. Brandenburg and
Maurice had recourse to the most bitter complaints, to arguments, and to
entreaties, in order to extricate the distracted prince out of the ignominious
 1074
situation into which he had been betrayed. They pleaded their own honor
and bond in the matter; but the Duke of Alva was inflexible. Philip was his
prisoner, and placed under the custody of a Spanish guard, and did not
obtain his release till, after a lapse of five years, and total reverse in the
affairs of the Emperor set him at liberty, and introduced a new epoch in
the history of the Reformation.

THE GERMANS TREATED AS A CONQUERED PEOPLE

The Emperor’s triumph was now complete. He was master of Germany.
In taking possession of Wittemberg he visited the tomb of Luther. While
silently gazing on the peaceful resting-place of the monk who had stirred
up all Europe to mutiny, and defied both the papal and the imperial
power, the Spaniards entreated him to destroy the monument of the
heretic, and to dig up his bones. But Charles nobly replied, “I have nothing
more to do with Luther; he has gone to another judge, whose province we
must not invade. I wage war with the living, not with the dead.” But how
different were his feelings when he turned from the memory of the man of
faith to those that had raised the arm of rebellion against him! The two
princes, Frederick and Philip, followed him in his train, and were thus led
about in triumph from city to city, and from prison to prison, exhibiting
them as a public spectacle to their former subjects, their families and
friends. This was a bitter humiliation to Germany. Loud complaints arose
from every quarter against this wanton abuse of power, and cruel
treatment of its two most illustrious princes.
But the day of adversity brought out the real character of these two
public men. Frederick, long a true Christian, accepted the affliction from
the hand of the Lord, and bowed to it. He looked beyond second causes.
He dropped the spirit of the warrior, and embraced that of the martyr. All
historians agree in bestowing upon him the highest praise for his
meekness, patience, and christian conduct. Even the Roman Catholic
historian, Thuanus, says of him, “In the judgment of all men, he rose
superior to his adverse fortune by the constancy of his mind.”
But alas! the conduct of the Landgrave was just the opposite to that of the
Elector. We have seen something of his profession of religion, and of his
zeal for the union of Christians, as at the conference at Marburg; but in
 1075
“the day of adversity his strength was small.” Such was his impatience
under his calamity that, in order to obtain his liberty, he voluntarily
offered to surrender, not his dignities merely, but his religious principles.
He never judged himself or his ways in the presence of God; therefore he
could not see His overruling hand in his trial. In these two men we may see
illustrated the mighty difference between a mere form of religion (even
when accompanied by an active, stirring mind) and the faith of the Lord
Jesus Christ which takes possession of the heart. The day of trial
discovers the essential difference. The one broods over the shameful
treachery by which he was deprived of his liberty, and the injustice with
which he is still detained, until he is driven to the wildest excesses of
passion. The other is not insensible to the unfeeling cruelty with which he
is treated; but he confesses his own failure, owns a wise and overruling
providence in it all, waits upon God, renews his strength, and daily waxes
stronger and stronger, until, through divine grace, he can rejoice in his
captivity, having the sweet sense of the presence of God with him, and
that it will all result in a brighter crown in heaven.
But we now return to the public transactions of the Emperor.
Many of the other princes were next made to feel the power of the
oppressor, though in a different way. He ordered his troops to seize the
artillery and military stores belonging to those who had been members of
the Smalcald league, and, “having collected upwards of five hundred pieces
of cannon, a great number in that age, he sent part of them into the low
countries, part into Italy, and part into Spain, in order to spread by this
means the fame of his success, and that they might serve as monuments of
his having subdued a nation hitherto deemed invincible, lie then levied, by
his sole authority, large sums of money, as well upon those who had
served him with fidelity during the war, as upon those who had been in
arms against him. By these exactions he amassed above one million six
hundred thousand crowns — a sum which appeared prodigious in the
sixteenth century.”6
The Germans, naturally jealous of their privileges, were greatly alarmed at
such extraordinary stretches of power, but so great was their
consternation, that all implicitly obeyed the commands of the haughty
Spaniard; though at the same time, the discontent and resentment of the
 1076
people had become universal, and they were ready to burst forth on the
first opportunity with unmitigated violence. While Charles was thus giving
laws to the Germans like a conquered people, Ferdinand was exercising the
same despotism over the Bohemians, and stripped them of almost all their
privileges.
 1077

CHAPTER 47
“THE INTERIM”

The Emperor, now complete master of the position, and having subdued,
as he thought, the independent and stubborn spirit of the Germans, held a
diet at Augsburg, when he demanded of the Protestants to submit the
decision of the religious dissensions which had arisen in Germany to the
council of Trent. The city and assembly were surrounded by the
Emperor’s victorious troops, no doubt to give effect to their master’s
wishes. He immediately took possession of the cathedral and some other
churches, and, after they had been duly purified, restored the popish
worship. But scarcely had the proceedings commenced, when Charles
learnt, to his deep mortification, that the council had been removed by the
pope from Trent to Bologna.
The great success and assumption of Charles in Germany, naturally
awakened the fears and jealousy of the pontiff. He foresaw that the
Emperor’s power in that country would greatly influence the decisions of
the council, and that he might employ it to limit or overturn the papal
authority. He therefore embraced the first opportunity to withdraw the
papal troops from the imperial army, and to translate the council to
Bologna, a city subject to the pope. This removal was strenuously
opposed by the Emperor and by all the bishops in the imperial interest.
The latter remained at Trent, while the Spanish and Neapolitan bishops
accompanied the legates to Bologna. Thus a schism commenced in that
very assembly which had been called to heal the divisions of Christendom,
and which issued in an indefinite adjournment of the council: nor were
means found of restor~ ing the council of Trent, till Julius III. succeeded
Paul III. in the papal chair, A .D . 1550; but the season was then past for the
purposes of Charles.
As the prospect of a general council was now more distant than ever, the
Emperor, in his pious concern for the religious dissensions of his northern
subjects, deemed it necessary, in the interim, to prepare a system of
 1078
doctrine, to which all should conform, until a council, such as they wished
for, could be assembled. This new creed was styled The Interim. It was
framed by Pflug, Sidonius, and Agricola, of whom the two former were
dignitaries in the Romish Church; the last was a Protestant divine, but
considered by his brethren as an apostate.

THE NEW CREED

This famous treatise contained a complete system of Roman theology;
though expressed for the most part in “softest words, or in scriptural
phrases, or in terms of studied ambiguity.” Every doctrine peculiar to
popery was retained; or, as Mr. Wylie sums it up, “The Interim taught,
among other things, the supremacy of the pope, the dogma of
transubstantiation, the sacrifice of the mass, the invocation of the saints,
auricular confession, justification by works, and the wole right of the
church to interpret the scriptures; in short, not one concession did Rome
make. In return for swallowing a creed out-and-out popish, the Protestants
were to be rewarded with two paltry boons. Clergymen already married
were to be permitted to discharge their office without putting away their
wives; and where it was the wont to dispense the sacrament in both kinds,
the custom was still to be tolerated. This was called meeting the
Protestants half way.”1
This document, which brought the most desolating calamities and
oppressions on the Protestants, was submitted by the Emperor to the
Diet of Augsburg on May 15th, 1548. Having been read in presence of the
diet, in due form, the Archbishop of Mentz, without giving time for any
discussion, rose up hastily, thanked the Emperor for his pious endeavors
to restore the peace of the church, and in the name of the diet signified
their approbation of the system of doctrine which had just been read to
them. This unexpected, unconstitutional declaration amazed the whole
assembly; but not one member had courage enough to contradict what the
archbishop had said. Overawed by the Spanish troops outside, the diet
was silent. The Emperor at once accepted the declaration as a full
ratification of the Interim, proclaimed it as a decree of the empire, to
remain in force till a free general council could be held, and to which all
were to conform under pain of his displeasure. The Interim was
immediately published in the German as well as the Latin language.
 1079
THE INTERIM OPPOSED BY PROTESTANTS AND PAPISTS
The Emperor, proud of his new scheme, and believing that he was on the
high road to victory, and the consummation of his plans, proceeded to
enforce the Interim. But to his great astonishment he found all parties
declaiming against it with equal violence. The Protestants condemned it as
a system containing the grossest errors of popery. The papists condemned
it because some of the doctrines of the holy catholic church were
impiously given up. But at Rome the indignation of the ecclesiastics rose
to the greatest height. They exclaimed against the Emperor’s profane
encroachment on the sacerdotal office, and compared him to that apostate,
Henry VIII. of England, who had usurped the title as well as the
jurisdiction belonging to the supreme pontiff.
Among the Protestant princes there was great diversity of feeling, into the
details of which we need not enter. Some yielded a reigned submission, but
there were others who made a firm stand and a faithful protest against the
Interim. Charles, well knowing the great influence which the example of his
prisoner, Frederick, would have with all the Protestant party, labored with
the utmost earnestness to gain his approbation of the scheme. But he was
not to be moved, either by the hope of liberty, or the threats of greater
harshness. He now met the Emperor with weapons mightier far than all
the imperial power — conscience and the word of God. And well would it
have been for the Protestants and the cause of Protestantism, had no
others ever been opposed to the threatenings of the pope and the
Emperor. Some might have been honored with martyrdom, but the country
would have been saved from the desolations of war, and the moral glory of
this divine principle would have been stamped on the Reformation.
After having declared his firm belief in the doctrines of the Reformation, he
added, “I cannot now in my old age, abandon the principles for which I
early contended; nor, in order to procure freedom during a few declining
years, will I betray that good cause on account of which I have suffered so
much, and am still willing to suffer. Better for me to enjoy, in this solitude,
the esteem of virtuous men, together with the approbation of my own
conscience, than to return into the world, with the imputation and guilt of
apostasy, to disgrace and embitter the remainder of my days.” For this
magnanimous resolution, in which he set his countrymen a noble pattern,
 1080
he was rewarded by the Emperor with fresh marks of his displeasure.
“The rigour of his confinement was increased; the number of his servants
diminished; the Lutheran clergymen, who had hitherto been permitted to
attend him, were dismissed, and even the books of devotion, which had
been his chief consolation during a tedious imprisonment, were taken from
him.”

MELANCTHON’S SUBMISSION
It is deeply to be regretted that the Wittemberg divines did not testify
more firmly for the truth, and against the popish scheme of the Interim.
But the feeble Melancthon, partly through fear of Charles, and partly
from his excessive complaisance towards persons of high rank, endeavored
to steer a middle course, and the other theologians followed him. he then
introduced the pernicious principle of essentials, non-essentials, and things
indifferent in religion. He decided that the whole instrument, called the
Interim, could by no means be admitted; but that there was no impediment
to receiving and approving it, so far as it concerned things not essential in
religion, or things indifferent. This decision gave rise to several long and
bitter controversies in the Lutheran Church. The genuine followers of
Luther could not account as indifferent, the teaching and object of the
Interim, and opposed with great fervor the Wittemberg and Leipsic
divines. They charged them, with giving up their Protestantism for the
Emperor’s religion. This lax principle has been doing its evil work in all the
Reformed churches from that day even until now. It is a convenient
covering for those who have no conscience as to the authority of the word
of God, and wish to serve their own ends. But surely no part of divine
truth can be either indifferent or non-essential. “The words of the Lord,”
says the psalmist, “are pure words; as silver tried in a furnace of earth,
purified seven times.” (Psalm 12:6.) How different is the estimate of the
Spirit of truth and theology as to “the words of the Lord..purified seven
times.”2

THE OPPOSITION OF THE FREE CITIES

The reception of the Interim in the different provinces depended entirely
on the nearness or distance of the Emperor’s power. Where his arm had
not reached, it was openly resisted; where his power was felt, there was at
 1081
least an outward compliance with it; but it was in the free cities that
Charles met with the most violent opposition to his new scheme. There
the Reformation had made the greatest progress; its most eminent divines
were settled in them as pastors, and schools and other seminaries for the
instruction of the young flourished within their gates. They petitioned and
remonstrated, but without effect; Charles was determined to carry into full
execution the resolution he had formed — universal compliance with his
odious Interim.
His first attempt was upon the city of Augsburg. “He ordered one body of
his troops to seize the gates; he posted the rest in different quarters of the
city; and assembling all the burgesses in the town-hall, he, by his sole
authority, published a decree abolishing their present form of government,
dissolving all their corporations and fraternities, and nominating a small
number of persons, in whom he vested for the future all the powers of
government. Each of the persons thus chosen took an oath to observe the
Interim.” Persecution immediately followed; for many sought to maintain a
good conscience before God and adhered to the truth of His word. The
Protestant pastors were forced into exile, or rendered homeless in their
native land; their churches were purified from Protestant defilement; the
old rites were restored — masses, vestments, crosses, altars, candles,
images, etc., and the inhabitants driven to mass by the soldiers of the
Emperor. “In southern Germany alone, four hundred faithful preachers of
the gospel fled with their wives and families, and wandered without food
or shelter; while those who were unable to escape fell into the hands of the
enemy, and were led about in chains.” This state of things continued for
nearly five years, during which time the sufferings and calamities of the
faithful were far beyond the record of the chronicler, and have no place in
the history of the church; but there was One who heard every sigh that
was heaved, and saw every tear that was shed:
“and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that
feared the Lord, and that thought upon His name. And they shall
be Mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my
jewels.” (Malachi 3:16, 17.)
 1082
A NEW TURN IN THE TIDE OF EVENTS
The period of their sufferings, or rather of their purifying was nearly
accomplished, and the day of their deliverance was nigh at hand; though
nothing was farther from the thoughts of the oppressor. He imagined that
his victories were complete, his plans consummated, and that now he
might rest a little from the toils of government, and taste the sweetness of
retirement and repose. For this purpose he went to Innspruck in the
Tyrol, with only a few of his guards. But some already saw the storm
gathering in various quarters, which was so soon to darken the whole
firmament of his dominion and glory, and leave the master of two worlds
without honor, and shut up in the solitude of a monkish cell. It happened
in this way:-
There were still four cities of note holding out against the authority of the
Emperor. These were Magdeburg, Bremen, Hamburg, and Lubeck. But as
the resistance of Magdeburg stands connected with events which changed
the whole face of affairs in Germany, we will speak of this city only.
In a diet held at Augsburg in the year 1550, it was resolved to send an
army against Magdeburg, and besiege it in form. By an artful dissimulation
of his real intentions, and by a seeming zeal to enforce the observance of
the Interim, the notorious Maurice of Saxony undertook to reduce the
rebellious city to obedience. This proposal received the sanction of the
diet, and the full approbation of the Emperor.
Deep thoughts had been revolving in the mind of Maurice and many
others, previous to this appointment. By the late successes of Charles, the
fears of many were awakened. The Vatican was the first to raise the alarm.
The pope repented of having contributed so largely to the growth of a
power that might one day become his master. Already Charles had shaken
the foundations of ecclesiastical authority, in presuming to define articles
of faith, and to regulate modes of worship. Efforts were made to form
alliances with foreign powers, that a vigorous resistance might be made at
once, before his power became too formidable to be opposed.
But it was now apparent to all, that Charles was bent on exacting a rigid
conformity to the doctrines and rites of the Romish Church, instead of
allowing liberty of conscience, as he had always promised. The nation felt
 1083
that they had been grossly deceived. They had been told over and over
again before the war began, that it was no part of the Emperor’s plans to
alter the Reformed religion. But now both the religion and the liberties of
Germany were at the feet of the perfidious monarch. This could not fail to
alarm the princes of the empire; and none more so than Maurice. He was
addressed in satires as “Judas,” and accused by his countrymen as the
author of these calamities. In this painful position Maurice made his
choice. Only one thing will atone for the betrayal of the Protestant
Confederacy — the complete overthrow of the Emperor’s power in
Germany; and this he resolved to accomplish.
“He saw,” says Robertson, “the yoke that was preparing for his country;
and, from the rapid as well as formidable progress of the imperial power,
was convinced that but a few steps more remained to be taken, in order to
render Charles as absolute a monarch in Germany as he had become in
Spain.” Maurice was a Protestant — politically — at heart, and by his
Electoral dignity, the head of the party. Besides, his passions concurred
with his love of liberty. He longed to avenge the cruel imprisonment of the
Landgrave, his father-in-law, who, by his persuasion, had put himself into
the Emperor’s hands.
When he divulged his bold purpose to the princes, they were slow to
believe him; but at length, being satisfied of his sincerity, they readily
promised to assist him. Having gained the confidence of the Protestant
party, he next applied all his powers of art and duplicity to deceive the
Emperor. The jealousy of Charles had been somewhat excited by hearing
of Maurice’s friendship with some of the Protestant princes; but now, by
his apparent zeal against the citizens of Magdeburg, all his suspicions
were allayed, and he was inspired with fresh confidence in Maurice. As
general of the army, he had a large force under his command, but he
managed to protract the siege of Magdeburg till his plans were matured.
He secretly formed leagues with several German princes, and entered into
an alliance with the powerful king of France, Henry II., who proved a
most effective ally, though a Catholic.
 1084
THE REVOLUTION IN GERMANY A.D. 1552
When Maurice’s preparations were accomplished, he published a
manifesto containing his reasons for taking arms against the Emperor,
namely, that he might secure the Protestant religion, which was threatened
with immediate destruction; that he might maintain the laws and
constitution of the empire; that he might deliver the Landgrave of Hesse
from the miseries of a long and unjust imprisonment. By the first proposal
he roused all the friends of the Reformation to support him, who had been
rendered desperate by oppression. By the second he interested all the
friends of liberty in his cause — Catholics no less than Protestants. By the
third he drew to his standard all the sympathy which had been universally
excited by the Landgrave’s unjust imprisonment, and by the rigor of the
Emperor’s proceedings against him. At the same time Henry of France
issued a manifesto, in which he assumed the extraordinary title of
“Protector of the liberties of Germany, and of its Captive Princes.”
The Emperor, as we have seen, was reposing at Innspruck, within three
days’ journey of Trent, and narrowly watching the proceedings of the
council now sitting there. Maurice, still concealing his designs under the
veil of the most exquisite address, despatched a trusted messenger to
assure the Emperor that he would wait upon him in a few days at
Innspruck; for which friendly visit the Emperor was in daily expectation.
But the time for action was now come. The trumpet of war was sounded;
and with a well-appointed army of twenty thousand foot and five
thousand horse, Maurice pushed on by secret and forced marches,
determined to surprise the Emperor and seize his person. The imperial
garrisons, by the way, offered no resistance, but tidings reached the
imperial quarters, that all Germany had risen, and was in full march upon
Innspruck.

THE EMPEROR’S FLIGHT

It was now late in the evening. The night was dark, and the rain falling
heavily; but danger was near, and nothing could save the Emperor but
speedy flight. He had been suffering for some time from a severe attack of
the gout, and was unable to escape on horseback. Placed in a litter, the
only motion he could bear, he traveled by the light of torches, taking his
 1085
way over the Alps by roads almost impassable. His courtiers and
attendants followed him with equal precipitation, and all in the utmost
confusion. In this miserable plight the late conqueror of Germany arrived
with his dejected train at Villach, a remote corner in Carinthia.
Maurice entered Innspruck a few hours after the Emperor and his
attendants had left it; but rather than pursue them, he abandoned all the
Emperor’s baggage, together with that of his ministers, to be plundered by
his soldiers. There was now nothing left for the fallen Emperor but
negotiation, or rather to submit to the terms proposed to him; and this he
committed to his brother Ferdinand. Maurice, backed by all Germany, was
absolute.

THE PEACE OF PASSAU

On the 2nd of August, 1552, the famous treaty of Passau was concluded.
By this treaty it was agreed that the Landgrave should be set at liberty,
and conveyed in safety to his own dominions; that within six months, a
diet should be held of all the states, to deliberate on the best means of
terminating the existing religious dissensions, and that in the meantime no
molestation whatever should be offered to those who adhered to the
Augsburg confession; that, if the diet thus to be held, should fail to effect
an amicable adjustment of their religious disputes, the treaty of Passau
should remain in force for ever. Thus was peace restored to the empire,
and entire freedom conceded to the Protestant faith. This was followed by
the “Recess of Augsburg” in 1555, which not only ratified the peace of
Passau, but enlarged the religious liberties of Germany. It was this
memorable convention which gave to the Protestants, after so much
slaughter and so many calamities and conflicts, that firm and stable
religious peace which they still enjoy. But alas! the youthful Maurice,
who played so conspicuous a part, both in the defeat and the triumph of
the Protestants, fell in battle, in less than a year after the peace of Passau,
so that he was not permitted to see the full results of his bold
undertaking.3
All these arrangements and treaties were deeply mortifying to the
disappointed ambition of Charles. Protestantism, which he had intended to
crush entirely, was flourishing throughout the empire. The mass-priests
 1086
were dismissed; the banished pastors were brought back with great joy to
their beloved flocks. The esteemed Frederick, who had been carried about
from place to place by the Emperor for five years, had found his way
home to his affectionate family and friends; but everything shaped itself in
dark and gloomy colors before the troubled mind of Charles. He never had
a heart for friendship, and, it is said, he never made a friend. Thus, faint
and weary, the friendless Emperor hid himself in the fastnesses of
Carinthia. From civil history we learn that, at this very moment, war was
going on in Hungary against the still advancing Turks. Henry II., according
to his agreement with Maurice, took the field early, with a numerous and
well appointed a~ny, and completely defeated the Spanish forces in
Lorraine and Alsace. Italy was on the eve of outbreak and anarchy. But the
Emperor was in exile; his treasury empty; his credit gone; his armies
scattered and dispirited; and, feeling himself rapidly falling from the lofty
elevation which he had so long maintained, he resolved to withdraw
entirely from the affairs of this world, in order that he might spend the
remainder of his days in retirement and solitude.
Accordingly, at the comparatively early age of fifty-six, he filled all
Europe with astonishment, by resigning the imperial crown to his brother
Ferdinand, and the remainder of his vast possessions in Europe and
America to his son Philip II., whom he had already, on his marriage with
Mary of England, invested with Naples and Sicily. The following year,
after settling his affairs, he retired to the monastery of St. Juste, near the
town of Placentia, in Spain. But he was still suffering so severely from the
gout, that he had to be conveyed sometimes in a chair, and sometimes in a
horse-litter, suffering exquisite pain at every step, and advancing with the
greatest difficulty. Like most of the religious houses in those days, the
monastery of St. Juste was beautifully situated: — “it lay in a little vale,
watered by a small brook, and surrounded by rising grounds covered with
lofty trees; from the nature of the soil, as well as the temperature of the
climate, it was esteemed the most healthful and delicious situation in
Spain.” Here Charles lived about two years, and died on the 21st of
September, 1558, in the fifty-ninth year of his age.
 1087
REFLECTIONS ON THE FOREGOING PAGES
On the cloister days of the Emperor we need not dwell. They were
chiefly spent in light and mechanical amusements when relief from the
gout permitted him. One of these was a kind of theatrical lamentation at
his funeral before his death. He ordered his tomb to be erected in the
chapel; his body was laid in the coffin with great solemnity, the monks
weeping (?); then marching in funeral procession with black tapers in their
hands to the chapel. The service for the dead was chanted, the coffin
sprinkled with holy water, the mourners retired, and the doors of the
chapel were closed. Then Charles rose out of his coffin and withdrew to
his apartment, full of those awful sensations which such a revolting farce
was calculated to create. He died almost immediately after.
Yes! he died — died to all his dignities and humiliation, to all his ambition
and disappointments, to all his plans and his policy! Yes! he who had
sacrificed hundreds of thousands of human lives, and spent millions of
money with the ultimate view of extinguishing Protestantism, died in the
narrow sphere of a monkish cell, while Protestantism was now filling the
vast firmament of human thought with its light and glory. There we leave
the great Emperor — the greatest perhaps, as to dominions, that ever sat
upon a throne. He is before the tribunal where motives as well as actions
are weighed, and where all must be tried by the divine standard.
But, alas! we search in vain for anything like repentance in that inveterate
enemy of the Reformers. Within the holy wails of St. Juste, so far from
repenting of his conduct towards them, his only regret was that he had not
treated them with greater severity. When informed that Lutheranism was
spreading in Spain, and that a number of persons had been apprehended
under suspicion of being infected with it, he wrote letters from the
monastery to his daughter, Joanna, governess of Spain, to Juan de Vega,
president of the council of Castile, and to the Inquisitor-general, charging
them to exert their respective powers with all possible rigor, “in seizing
the whole party, and causing them all to be burnt, after using every means
to make them Christians before their punishment; for he was persuaded
thai none of them would become sincere Catholics, so irresistible was their
propensity to dogmatize.” Again, he says, “If they do not condemn them
to the fire, they will commit a great fault as I did in permitting Luther to
 1088
live. Though I spared him solely on the ground of the safe-conduct I had
sent him... I confess, nevertheless, that I did wrong in this, because I was
not bound to keep my promise to that heretic... but in consequence of my
not having taken away his life, heresy continued to make progress;
whereas his death, I am persuaded, would have stifled it in its birth.”4
Here we have the real heart of Charles. There is no longer any reason
for artifice and dissimulation, or pretended toleration to the Protestants.
He has done with his wars and his politics; he has no longer a double part
to play; and the real spirit of the papist is openly expressed. The one
regret of his old age is, that he did not seize the prey in his youth. He
seems to gnash his teeth with rage when he thinks of Luther, and grieves
that he did not violate his promise. But there was One who was watching
over the life of Luther and the infant Reformation; and so kept the hands
of Charles full for upwards of thirty years, that he had no leisure to wage
war against the Lutherans. But some think that this was ever before him as
the one grand object of his life and his reign — the extermination of heresy.
But in that very contest on which he had staked everything, all was lost —
his dominions, his throne, his crown, his grandeur. Never was the hand of
God more strikingly displayed in the affairs of any prince. In one moment,
and by one stroke, all was changed. “His power collapsed when
apparently at its zenith. None of the usual signs that precede the fall of
greatness gave warning of so startling a downfall in the Emperor’s
fortunes. His vast prestige had not been impaired. He had not been
worsted on the battle-field; his military glory had suffered no eclipse; nor
had any of his kingdoms been torn from him.”5 Of all the great men who
started with him in life, such as Francis I., Henry VIII., Leo X., and
Martin Luther, he was the sole survivor. His rivals had passed away
before him, and none seemed left to dispute his possession of the field.
But the hand of the Lord in retributive justice was lifted up against the
oppressor of His people, and who could shelter him? Already a finger had
written on the walls of his palace, “Mene, Mene, God hath numbered thy
kingdom and finished it.” And, instantly, the brazen gates of his power
could no longer protect him, he was compelled to flee before a power
which his insidious and fraudulent policy had created. The rod which he
had thus prepared for the destruction of Germany was used of God for his
own complete and ignominious overthrow. What a reality is the
 1089
government as well as the grace of God in the earth! He controls the
movements of the mightiest monarchs, and cares for the smallest things in
creation. This, faith well knows, and finds its rest and consolation therein.
“The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open
unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do
evil.” (1 Peter 3:12.)

THE CALAMITIES OF THE PROTESTANTS

The other lesson so plainly written on the foregoing pages is this — that
God is a jealous God, and will not give His glory to another. He will have
His work done by His own means and in His own way. No greater
calamity could have befallen the Reformation than that its friends should
have given up the divine position of faith, and descended to the world’s
platform of diplomacy and arms. Had it triumphed by these means, it
would have lost its true character, or perished in the land of its birth, and
the Reformers would have become a mere political power. But God would
not have it so, and He suffered them to be shamefully defeated and
stripped, until they were utterly defenceless and cast upon Himself. They
had neither league nor sword, nor treasures, nor castles, nor any means of
defense. They were brought back to their first principles — faith in the
word of God, and martyrdom. But these divine and invincible principles
seemed to have died with their great leader and to have been buried in his
grave; and it was only through great suffering and humiliation that his
followers were led to see their mistake.
But no sooner were they brought to feel that they had no means of defense
but the word of God and a good conscience before Him, than deliverance
came. The Lord had said, “The rod of the wicked shall not rest upon the
lot of the righteous.” (Psalm 125:3.) Such is the goodness and the tender
mercy of our God. He withdraweth not His eyes from the righteous. But it
is always dangerous to give up the principles of God’s word, and to be
governed in our ways by the maxims and policy of this world; and this
holds true in all the affairs of life; but on the subject before us the word of
God is plain, as saith the apostle, “For the weapons of our warfare are not
carnal,. but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds,” yes,
“mighty through God.” And as the blessed Lord says,
 1090
“All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.”
(2 Corinthians 10:4; Matthew 26:52.)
The Reformation in Germany, embracing the Lutheran churches, was
now definitively established. But the Reformed churches, embracing the
followers of Zwingle and Calvin, were excluded from the privileges secured
in the treaties of Passau and Augsburg, nor was legal toleration extended to
them till the peace of Westphalia, nearly a century later. By this famous
treaty the pacification of Passau was confirmed to the members of the
Reformed churches, and the independence of Switzerland declared for the
first time. “The balance of power,” by which the weak amongst the
nations might be effectually protected, and the powerful restrained from
those aggressive schemes of ambition which had been too frequently
indulged, was one of the important results of the negotiations and
discussions in Westphalia.6

THE RISE OF THE JESUITS

Before taking our leave, finally, of the reign of Charles V., we must just
notice two memorable events which occurred during that reign, because
of the relation they bore to the Reformation, and the great religious
struggle which was then agitating all classes of society. We refer to the
Council of Trent and the rise of the Jesuits. Having said a little about the
former, we will only at present speak of the latter.
We can easily conceive that the enemies of the Reformation were now at
their wits’ end. What was to be done? That which had been looked
forward to for thirty years, as the sure means of crushing it, had not only
failed, but ceased to be an opposing power, while the Reformation was
rapidly increasing its area and multiplying its adherents. The pope had lost
immensely in dignity, influence, and revenues in the contest, and the
imperial power could no more be appealed to. The friars, black, white, and
grey, were dispersed and their monasteries destroyed: what was next to be
done? was a grave question for the evil heart of Jezebel, and those with
whom she took counsel. Men-at-arms had failed; peace and persuasion
must be our tactics now, suggested the presiding spirit. An army must be
raised whose uniform should be the priestly garb, whose vows must be
poverty, chastity, the care of Christians, and the conversion of infidels;
 1091
and the character of whose mission must be persuasive and pacific. Under
these appearances a counter-work to the Reformation must be
immediately instituted. This plausible proposal was unanimously agreed
to; and never was suggestion more plainly from beneath — even from the
depths of Satan; and never was there one more satanically executed, as the
history of the Jesuits proves. The springs of human feeling, sympathy,
and pity seem to have been dried up in every member of that society, and
the hell-inspired springs of bigotry and cruelty, which have no parallel in
history, most surely possessed them.

IGNATIUS LOYOLA
The Society of the Jesuits, a religious order of the Romish church, was
founded by Ignatius Loyola, the son of a Spanish nobleman, born in the
year 1491 at Guipuzcoa, in the province of Biscay. In his youth he was
employed as a page at the court of Ferdinand and Isabella, but he grew
weary of its gaieties, and longed to be engaged in the wars of his country.
In 1521 we find him defending Pampeluna against the French; but the
young intrepid Loyola was severely wounded in both legs. Fever followed,
and the future restorer of the papacy was nearly brought to a premature
grave.
By nature ardent, romantic, and visionary, he devoured greedily, during his
long illness, the romances of Spanish chivalry, founded on the conflicts of
his nation with the Moors; and when these were exhausted, he betook
himself to a series of still more marvellous romances — the legends of the
saints. With a morbid intensity he studied those books of mystical
devotion, until he resolved to emulate in his own life the wondrous virtues
ascribed to a Benedict, a Dominic, or a Francis. Accordingly, on his
recovery, he retired to a Benedictine monastery at Montserrat, near
Barcelona; and there he passed the night at the celebrated shrine of the
Virgin Mary. He suspended his lance and shield before an image of the
Virgin, vowed constant obedience to God and His church, thereby
abandoning a temporal for a spiritual knighthood.
To celebrate his self-dedication to Our Lady, he withdrew to the adjacent
town of Manresa. Holiness, in the view of such men, does not consist in
the moral likeness of the soul to Jesus, but in the mortification of the
 1092
body. Next to his skin he wore alternately an iron chain, a horsehair cloth,
and a sash of prickly thorns. Three times a day he laid the scourge
resolutely on his bare back. This was not to mortify the deeds of the
body, but the poor unoffending body itself. Such is the blinding power of
Satan, and such the suited darkness for his purpose. After travelling
barefoot to Rome, Jerusalem, and other places rendered sacred by the
Savior’s history, he eventually found his way to Paris. Here he met with
Francis Xavier, who afterwards became the great apostle of India. Other
kindred spirits joining them, a small band of zealous associates gathered
round Loyola, which gave origin to the society of Jesus — about eight or
nine in all.

COMMENCEMENT OF THE ORDER OF JESUITS

On the 15th of August 1534, being the festival of the assumption of the
Virgin Mary, in one of the subterranean chapels of Montmartre, and after
receiving the sacrament, they all took the usual vows of poverty and
chastity; and then took a solemn oath to dedicate themselves to the
conversion of the Saracens at Jerusalem, and the care of the Christians, and
to lay themselves and their services unreservedly at the feet of the pontiff.
“The army thus enrolled was little, and it was great. It was little when
counted, it was great when weighed. To foster the growth of this infant
Hercules, Loyola had prepared beforehand his book, entitled ‘Spiritual
Exercises.’ This is a body of rules for teaching men how to conduct the
work of their own conversion. It consists of four grand meditations, and
the penitent, retiring into solitude, is to occupy absorbingly his mind on
each in succession, during the space of the rising and setting of seven
suns... It professes, like the Koran, to be a revelation. ‘The Book of
Exercises,’ says a Jesuit, ‘was truly written by the finger of God, and
delivered to Ignatius by the Holy Mother of God.’”7
After some delays, the pope, Paul III., approving the plan of Loyola and
his companions, granted a bull in 1540, authorizing the formation of the
body under the name of “The Society of Jesus;” and in April of the
following year, Ignatius was installed as “The General Superior,” who was
to be subject to the pope only. The order had now a formal existence. Its
members were to dress in black, like the secular clergy; and not being
confined to cloisters, they were able to mix themselves up with all classes,
 1093
and were soon found occupying courts, confessionals, and pulpits,
superintending educational establishments, and otherwise securing the
affections and co-operation of the young. Crowds of enthusiastic converts
flocked to the new standard in all countries, and from all gradations of
society.

THE JESUITS’ REAL OBJECT

Thus far we have trodden on ground over which the real character of the
Jesuit does not appear — we have only had to do with vows intended to
deceive; but were we to pursue their history, we should have to trace in
every land the blood-stained footprints of the treacherous and cruel
followers of Loyola. Spreading themselves over the world, we find them
secretly executing the decrees and private wishes of the Vatican. Their one
grand object was to extend the power of the pope, and the one grand
fundamental principle of the fraternity was immediate, implicit,
unquestioning, unhesitating obedience to him, through their general, who
resides in Rome. The organization of their society is by far the most
comprehensive of any in existence. “The Jesuit monarchy,” it has been
said, “covers the globe.” In almost every province of the world they have
Generals Provincial, who correspond with the General Superior at Rome;
so that by means of the confessional, he sees and knows almost everything
that is done and said, not only in the Romish church, but in private
families, and throughout all parts of the habitable globe. No place is too
distant, no difficulties or dangers too great, and no means too nefarious for
the Jesuit, if there is the slightest hope of extending the power of the
papacy.
The Gunpowder Plot, which was planned to destroy at one blow the
nobility and gentry of England, is attributed to Jesuitical influence; and so
are many other plots which were intended to accomplish the death of
Queen Elizabeth. The gigantic wickedness of the Spanish Armada, and the
crowning slaughter of the St. Bartholomew massacre, to say nothing of the
many seditions, torturings, poisonings, assassinations, and massacres on a
smaller scale, must be attributed to the policy, and to the seed sown by
the Jesuits. So mighty did their power become, and so ruinous, that it was
often found necessary for the government to suppress them. According to
modern history, they were expelled from Portugal in 1759; France 1764;
 1094
Spain and Spanish America, 1767; the two Sicilies, 1768; and in 1773
suppressed by the pope Ganganelli, Clement XIV. But soon after he had
signed the order for their banishment, he fell a victim to their vengeance,
and died by poison. In 1801 they were restored by Pius VII.; in 1860 they
were dismissed from Sicily; but we need scarcely add, that they soon
found ways and means to return. The late pope, Pius IX., confirmed the
restoration of the order; so that they now occupy a very proud position in
Rome. They have the command of most of the collegiate establishments in
the city, and in so many other places, that merely to name them would fill
a page.8
Thus was the enfeebled power of popery greatly revived — its deadly
wound was healed. By means of the Reformation, many of the most
opulent and powerful kingdoms of Europe had thrown off their allegiance
to the pope. This was a fatal blow to his grandeur and power. It abridged
his dominions, abolished his jurisdiction within their territories, and
diminished his revenues. But more than this, it is well known that Charles
V. seriously contemplated the reduction, if not the subversion, of the
papal power. Such was the low, and almost expiring condition of the
papacy, when the army of the Jesuits came to its help, which may be
viewed as an illustration of Revelation 13:3, though far from the full
accomplishment of those solemn prophecies.
We now turn to our general history, and would briefly glance at the
progress of the Reformation in different lands.
 1095

CHAPTER 48
THE EFFECT OF THE REFORMATION IN
GERMANY ON THE NATIONS OF EUROPE

The position of the German Empire, which had been chosen by divine
providence as the scene of the early dawn and noonday glory of the
Reformation, was most favorable; and more likely than any other nation,
to affect by its revolutions, the general state of Europe. Germany was, we
learn, at that time, the connecting link between Asia and Europe, and the
highway for the commerce of the two hemispheres. It was also famous for
imperial diets, which always attracted crowds of dignitaries, both civil and
clerical; besides the peculiarity of its constitution, its numerous princes,
and its free cities, gave to its internal contests an interest and an
importance to all the surrounding countries. In all this we see the wisdom
of God, even as to locality; and how naturally and quickly the whole of
Christendom would be affected by the progress of the new opinions.
But not only the place, the time and circumstances were all ordered of the
Lord to give immediate effect to the proclamation of the revived gospel.
The mysterious charm which had bound mankind for ages was broken at
once, and for ever. The public mind which had so long been passive, as if
formed to believe whatever was taught, and meekly to bear whatever was
imposed, was suddenly aroused to a spirit of inquiry and mutiny, and
disdainfully threw off the yoke to which it had so long and so tamely
submitted. But it was not the human mind only that was agitated by the
new contest about religion; the political constitutions of the most ancient
kingdoms were shaken to their foundations.1
We will now trace its path in some of the countries most interesting to us.

SWEDEN AND DENMARK A.D. 1520 — 1530

In connection with the reign of Louis the Pious, king of France, we have
seen that the gospel was introduced among the Danes and Swedes as early
as the ninth century. The indefatigable Ansgarius labored about forty
 1096
years in those northern regions, and died in the year 865.2 Other
missionaries followed, but Christianity, in all probability, maintained a
questionable existence in those barbarous times, and in the midst of pagan
darkness. In the twelfth century Rome succeeded in completing the work
of conversion, and in adding the Swedish churches to the chair of St. Peter.
An ecclesiastical constitution, according to the mystery of iniquity, was
immediately imposed upon them, and soon, a flourishing priesthood, from
the archbishop to the mendicant friar, covered the land, followed, as it
always was, with decaying piety and an impoverished people.
At the dawn of the Reformation, the effects of the papal superstition
seemed to be nowhere more firmly rooted, nor more deeply felt than in
these countries. “The people were steeped in poverty, and ground down
by the oppression of their masters. Left without instruction by their
spiritual guides with no access to the word of God — for the scriptures
had not yet been rendered into the Swedish tongue... the people were
returning to the superstitious beliefs and pagan practices of old times.” As
in all other countries, the Romish hierarchy had swallowed up the wealth
of these kingdoms. The bishops possessed revenues which often exceeded
those of the ancient nobility, and sometimes equalled or exceeded those of
the sovereign; and not unfrequently they dwelt in castles and fortresses,
which set the power of the crown at defiance.
By an ancient law, the three kingdoms, Sweden, Denmark, and Norway,
like England, Scotland, and Ireland, were united under a common sovereign.
The cruel tyrant, Christtern II., brother-in-law to Charles V., filled the
throne of Denmark when the opinions of Luther began to spread in those
countries. Being poor, compared with the priesthood, he had been waiting
for an opportunity to reduce their power, that he might take possession of
their wealth. Quick-sighted enough to see that Protestantism might become
popular, he professed to favor the new religion; sent for Reinhard, a
disciple of Carlstadt, and appointed him professor of theology at
Stockholm. But he, dying shortly after, was succeeded by Carlstadt
himself. For some reason he only remained in Denmark a short time, when
Christtern invited Luther to visit his dominions, but the Reformer declined
the invitation. Meanwhile the conduct of Christtern was so tyrannical,
that the Swedes refused to acknowledge him as their king, and appointed
an administrator. He raised an army, being assisted with vast sums of
 1097
money from the Romish clergy, invaded Sweden, gained an advantage over
them, and treated the conquered with the greatest barbarity. Seventy noble
lords and senators he massacred in cold blood in an open square, the
archbishop of Upsala, it is said, approving of his vindictive cruelty.
Among the number of these noble victims was Eric Vasa, the father of
Gustavus Vasa, one of the most illustrious names in the annals of Sweden.
This noble youth, having escaped the murderous hands of Christiern, fled
into Germany. During his sojourn there, he studied and embraced the
principles of Luther. At length, emerging from his hiding-place, he raised
the standard of revolt, and roused the peasantry of the Swedish provinces
to attempt the restoration of their country’s independence. After a severe
struggle he defeated and overthrew the tyrant, delivered his country from
oppression, was elevated to the throne, and created Sweden into an
independent sovereignty in 1523. The Danes, following the example, broke
out in open rebellion. Christiern was deposed, and driven from the
kingdom in the year 1523. He fled to the low countries, and joined the
court of Charles V. Frederick, duke of Holstein, was raised to the throne.
This prince favored the Reformation, and ruled with equity and
moderation.
The truly patriotic king Gustavus, when firmly seated on his throne,
exerted himself in every fair and honorable way, to establish Lutheranism
in his own dominions. Instruction, not authority, for the conversion of his
subjects, was his motto. Olaus Petri and his brother Laurentius, who had
studied under Luther at Wittemberg, were the first preachers of the
Reformation in Sweden. They also accomplished the all-important work of
translating the scriptures into the vulgar tongue. At an assembly of the
states in 1527, Gustavus publicly declared, “that he would lay down his
scepter, and retire from his kingdom, rather than rule a people enslaved to
the orders and authority of the pope, and more controlled by the tyranny
of their bishops, than by the laws of their monarchs.” The king’s will
prevailed, the hierarchy was reduced in wealth and power, but tolerated. It
would be difficult for any one to believe in our day, that the Romish clergy
had gained possession, by their unhallowed influence, and were enjoying
the revenues, of more than thirteen thousand estates in Sweden in less than
a hundred years. But such was the prevailing power of the Protestant
element in the assembly, that it was decreed, “that the estates, castles,
 1098
farms, and lands, which had fallen into the hands of the church, should be
restored; part to be returned to the nation, and part to those nobles from
whose ancestors they had been wrested. The bishops submitted and
signed the decree. Thus was the Reformation widely introduced and firmly
established in Sweden.
The work in Denmark was very similar to that in Sweden. Frederick
procured an edict at the assembly of the state of 1527, declaring that every
subject of Denmark was free to adhere to the church of Rome, or to
embrace the doctrines of the Reformation. This was enough; the new
religion prevailed, teachers flocked from Wittemberg, the scriptures were
translated into the Danish tongue, the singing of hymns was introduced
into their public and private worship, and the Reformation advanced amid
the new sounds of melody and praise. “It is not easy adequately to
describe the change that now passed over Denmark. A serene and blessed
light arose upon the whole kingdom. Not only were the Danes enabled to
read the scriptures of the New Testament in their own tongue, and the
Psalms of David, which were also often sung, both in their churches and in
their fields, and on their highways, but they had likewise numerous
expounders of the divine word, and preachers of the gospel, who opened
to them the fountains of salvation.” 3

ITALY
In no country outside of Germany did the reforming opinions find so early
an entrance as in the provinces of Italy. In this we see the hand of the
Lord, and the silver line of His sovereign grace. But He had a people there,
and they must be brought to Jesus. Many believed and nobly witnessed
for the truth of the gospel, as the record of their martyrdoms abundantly
testifies. But the light was intolerable to Jezebel, who loves darkness, and
it was soon extinguished by the activity of her tribunals.
No people had so little respect for the papal dignity as the Italians. The
power of the pope was greater, and his commands were more implicitly
obeyed, in the countries most remote from the seat of his government. The
personal vices of the popes, the corruption of their administration, the
ambition, luxury, licentiousness, and deceitfulness which reigned in their
courts, fell immediately under the observation of the Italians. The main
 1099
object of almost every succeeding pope was to raise money by means of
the sacred mysteries, that he might enrich his sons, nephews, and other
relatives, with immoderate wealth, even with principalities and kingdoms.
Thus all thoughtful Italians, seeing the artifices by which the papacy was
upheld, and the impostures on which is was founded, were ready to
welcome something better.
“A controversy,” says Dr. McCrie,4 “which had been carried on for
several years with great warmth in Germany and which was at last brought
before the papal court for decision, contributed in no small degree to direct
the attention of the Italians, at an early period, to the reformed doctrines.”
A professed convert from Judaism, leagued with an inquisitor of Cologne,
obtained from the Imperial Chamber a decree ordaining all Jewish books,
with the exception of the Bible, to be committed to the flames, as filled
with blasphemies against Christ. John Reuchlin, the restorer of Hebrew
literature among the Christians, exerted himself, both privately and from
the press, to prevent the execution of the barbarous decree. But alas! the
clergy sided with the apostate, and sentence was pronounced against
Reuchlin, both by the divines of Cologne and the Sorbonne of Paris. He
appealed to Rome. Erasmus and other distinguished friends of learning in
all parts of Europe, wrote warmly in favor of Reuchlin, and determined to
make his cause a common one. The monks, who dreaded and hated
Erasmus and all men of learning, exerted themselves with the clergy, to
obtain the execution of the decree; but the court of Rome protracted the
affair from time to time, until the contention that arose between Luther
and the preachers of indulgences was carried to Rome for decision; and
thus the former controversy was lost sight of in the latter.

THE WRITINGS OF LUTHER

In this remarkable providential way, the attention of the Italians had been
directed to the Germans, and even to the great Reformer, who had taken
part with Reuchlin. “Within two years from the time of his first
appearance against indulgences his writings had found their way into Italy,
where they met with a favorable reception from the learned.” John
Froben, the celebrated printer at Basle, writing to Luther about this time,
says, “Blasius Salmonius, a bookseller at Leipsic, presented me, at the last
Frankfort fair, with certain treatises composed by you, which being
 1100
approved of by learned men, I immediately put to press, and sent six
hundred copies to France and Spain. My friends assure me that they are
sold at Paris, and read and approved of, even by the Sorbonists. Calvus, a
bookseller of Pavia, himself a scholar and addicted to the Muses, has
carried a great part of the impression into Italy... In spite of the terror of
pontifical bulls, and the activity of those who watched over their
execution, the writings of Luther, Melancthon, Zwingle, and Bucer,
continued to be circulated and read with avidity and delight in various
parts of Italy. Some of them were translated into the Italian language, and,
to elude the vigilance of the inquisitors, were published under fictitious
names...” “Hail! faithful in Christ,” wrote a Carmelite monk of Locarno to
the Christians in Switzerland, “think, O think of Lazarus in the Gospels,
and of the lowly woman of Canaan, who was willing to be satisfied with
the crumbs which fell from the table of the Lord. As David came to the
priest in a servile dress, and unarmed, so do I fly to you for the
shewbread, and the armor laid up in the sanctuary. Parched with thirst, I
seek the fountain of living water: sitting like the blind man by the wayside,
I cry to Him that gives sight. With tears and sighs, we, who sit here in
darkness, humbly entreat you who are acquainted with the titles and
authors of the books of knowledge, to send us the writings of such elect
teachers as you possess, and particularly the works of the divine Zwingle,
the far-famed Luther, the acute Melancthon, the accurate OEcolampadius.
The prices shall be paid to you through his excellency, Werdmyller. Do
your endeavor that a city of Lombardy, enslaved by Babylon, and a
stranger to the gospel of Christ, may be set free.” 5
These extracts plainly show — and many more might be given — what an
abundant entrance the gospel had into Italy, and at a very early period of
the Reformation. And for more than twenty years the followers of Luther
and Zwingle were allowed to spread the truth, publicly preach the gospel,
and otherwise witness for Christ, almost unmolested. The wars, which we
have had occasion to refer to in tracing the history of the Reformation in
Germany, greatly affected Italy. Engrossed by foreign politics, and deeply
involved in the struggle between Charles and Francis, the court of Rome
disregarded, or thought exaggerated, the representations that were made to
them of the progress of heresy. But these wars, so disastrous to the pope
and the patrimony of St. Peter, proved an inestimable blessing to
 1101
thousands of precious souls. Many of the German soldiers who followed
Charles V. in his Italian expeditions, and the Swiss auxiliaries who
followed the standard of his great rival, Francis I., were Protestants. “With
the freedom of men,” says Dr. McCrie, “who have swords in their hands,
these foreigners conversed on the religious controversy with the
inhabitants among whom they were quartered.”
The impressions made on the people’s mind, in favor of the new opinions,
were greatly strengthened by the bitter and never-ending contests between
the pope and the Emperor. We have seen Charles by turns an abettor of
the pope, and a restraint on his authority as the fluctuations of his contest
with Francis I. rendered it politic; but with the deceitfulness of Clement
VII. he was maddened to fury. He accused the pope of kindling the flames
of war in Europe, that he might evade, what was universally called for, a
general council for the Reformation of the church in its head and members.
It was at this time that he threatened to abolish the jurisdiction of the
pope throughout Spain; but, not satisfied with these threatenings, he sent
an army into the papal territories under the command of his general, the
Duke of Bourbon. Rome was besieged and sacked, and the pontiff taken
prisoner, in the year 1527. “The Germans in the Emperor’s army behaved
with great moderation towards the inhabitants of Rome after the first
day’s pillage, and contented themselves with testifying their detestation of
idolatry; but the Spaniards never relented in their rapacity and cruelty,
torturing the prisoners to make them discover their treasures.” Marching
up to the palace windows of the captive pontiff, a whole band of
Germans, raising their hands and voices, exclaimed, “Long live Pope
Luther! Long live Pope Luther!”
Thus were the hands of the pope and his counsellors filled with their own
troubles, and the Reformers left tolerably free to pursue their happy work
of conversion and instruction, by the good providence of God.

THE PERSECUTION OF THE CHRISTIANS

It was not until the year 1542 that the court of Rome became seriously
alarmed at the progress of the Reformed doctrines. By this time they were
widely spread in nearly every province of Italy. Some of the most
attractive and brilliant preachers: in that country had embraced the simple
 1102
gospel and were preaching to large audiences a free salvation through faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Among these, Bernardino Ochino, a Capuchin,
Peter Martyr, a canon-regular of the order of St. Augustine, and the
interesting Aonio Paleatto, a pious and learned professor. Spies were set
to watch their movements, listen to their sermons, and even then provoke
conversation, with the view of procuring evidence against them. Ochino
and Martyr saw their safety in flight, crossed the Alps, found an asylum
in Switzerland, and ultimately in England; but the career of Paleario was
crowned with martyrdom in his own country.
When asked by his accusers, ‘What is the first means of salvation given by
God to man?’ he answered, ‘Christ.’ ‘What is the second?’ he replied,
‘Christ.’ ‘And what is the third?’ he again answered, ‘Christ.’ From that
moment, having rejected good works as the second means, and the church
as the third, he was a doomed man. But that which gave the greatest
offense was a most influential treatise which he wrote on the Benefit of the
Death of Christ. When the Inquisitor at length arose to crush the Lutherans
and collect their heretical books, as many as forty thousand copies of this
book fell into his hands. Paleario was at last condemned on four charges:
1, For denying purgatory;
2, For disapproving of the dead being buried in churches;
3, For ridiculing the monastic life;
4, For ascribing justification solely to confidence in the mercy of God
forgiving our sins through Jesus Christ.
After an imprisonment of three years in the dungeons of the Inquisition,
his body was given to the flames in the year 1570, and in the seventieth
year of his age.
His sufferings were soon over and they would all soon be forgotten in the
unmingled blessedness of his Lord’s presence; but the fruit of his faithful
testimony will endure for ever. Who could estimate the effects, with
God’s blessing, of forty thousand copies of his book in the hands of the
Italians? But the fruit will all appear on that morning without clouds, and
like Paul with his beloved Thessalonians, he will find his Italians to be his
joy and crown of rejoicing, in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ at His
 1103
coming. What a mercy to the called of God, sustained by His grace, and
enabled to witness for Him in any age and in every sphere of life! Time
will soon be over, the Lord will soon be here, and bright will the future be
of all that have been faithful to Him. But His threatenings will be as surely
executed as His promises will be fulfilled. It has ever been the policy of
Rome to destroy the character, abolish the memory, and blot out the very
names of those whose lives she has taken away. But their record is on
high; and all that has been of grace will be revealed in the light to the utter
confounding, and eternal shame and anguish of their once haughty
inquisitors. And their remembrance in hell of the perfect happiness of their
innocent but helpless victims, must give vitality to the worm that never
dies and vehemence to the flames that will never be quenched.
A number of excellent men, whose only crime was their love to the Lord
Jesus, and their faith in His word, suffered about the same time as
Paleario. Commissioned spies, in the pay of the Vatican, were dispersed
over Italy, who insinuated themselves into private families, and the
confidence of individuals, conveying the information which they obtained
to the inquisitors. Assuming a variety of characters, they were to be found
in the company of the rich and the poor, the learned and illiterate. Many
excellent private persons were thus caught in the toils spread by these
pests of society. In a short time the prisons of the Inquisition were filled
with victims, including persons of noble birth, male and female,
industrious mechanics, and many of good reputation for learning and
piety. Multitudes were condemned to penance, the galleys, and the flames.
To give even an outline of the imprisonments, tortures, and deaths among
the Italian Protestants, would be to write a martyrology.
“Englishmen,” Dr. McCrie observes, “were peculiarly obnoxious to the
inquisitors. Dr. Thomas Wilson, afterwards secretary to Queen
Elizabeth, was accused of heresy, and thrown into the prisons of the
Inquisition at Rome, on account of some things which were contained in
his books on logic and rhetoric. He made his escape in consequence of his
prison doors being broken open during the tumult which took place at the
death of Pope Paul IV. Among those who escaped by this occurrence was
also John Craig, one of our Reformers, who lived to draw up the National
Covenant, in which Scotland solemnly abjured the popish religion. Dr.
Thomas Reynolds was less fortunate. In consequence of being subjected to
 1104
the torture, he died in prison. In the year 1595, two persons were burnt
alive in Rome, the one an Englishman, the other a native of Silesia.” But
enough for the present of these details of misery. A brief notice of those
who fled for their lives and liberties, will give the reader some idea of the
great and blessed work of God’s Holy Spirit in Italy during the sixteenth
century. Perhaps in no country in Europe did the word of God so prevail
from 1520 to 1550, as in that land of blind superstition, luxury, and
licentiousness. Such is the mercy of our God; where sin abounds grace
much more abounds, to His praise and glory.
“All that the Father giveth Me shall come to Me; and him that
cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.” (John 6:37.)

ITALIAN EXILES
Surely no truer testimony can be given to the reality and power of our
religious convictions, than a readiness to leave our homes and all that is
dear to us, in obedience to the word of God and the dictates of conscience.
The very sight of a number of foreigners, male and female, reaching our
shores as exiles, would produce an impression highly favorable to the
refugees, and deeply interesting to those among whom they had sought an
asylum. Such were the Italian exiles, and such the impression produced,
not only on their fellow Protestants, but on their adversaries the Roman
Catholics. They could not understand how men of illustrious birth, rank,
learning, position, civil and ecclesiastical, could voluntarily renounce their
wealth and honors, leave their dearest friends, encounter poverty with all
the hardships and dangers of a speedy flight, rather than do violence to the
voice of conscience.
The republic of the Grisons, owing to its proximity to Italy, was the
country they first visited. “It was calculated that, in the year 1550, the
exiles amounted to two hundred, of whom a fourth or fifth part were men
of letters, and those not of the meanest name. Before the year 1559 the
number had increased to eight hundred. From that time to the year 1568
we have ground to believe that the increase was fully as great in
proportion; and down to the close of the century, individuals were to be
seen, after short intervals, flying to the north, and throwing themselves on
glaciers of the Alps to escape the fires of the Inquisition.” Happily for the
 1105
exiles, and for the Grisons themselves, the Reformation had made such
progress there, that a statute law was passed, as early as 1526, securing
religious liberty to all classes in the republic. In a national diet it was
moved and agreed to, “That it shall be free to all persons of both sexes,
and of whatever condition or rank, within the territories of the Grison
confederation, to choose, embrace, and profess either the Roman Catholic
or the Evangelical religion; and that no one shall, publicly or privately,
harass another with reproaches or odious speeches on account of his
religion, under an arbitrary penalty. That the ministers of religion shall
teach nothing to the people but what is contained in the scriptures of the
Old and New Testament, and what they can prove by them; and that
parish priests shall be enjoined to give themselves assiduously to the
study of the scriptures as the only rule of faith and manners.” This noble
statute, notwithstanding some attempts that have been made to overthrow
it, remains to this day the charter of religious liberty in the canton of the
Grisons.
Many of the inhabitants in that part of Switzerland, who had come
originally from Italy, and had preserved their ancient language and
manners, were like a people ready for the ministrations of the exiles. And
these, finding themselves perfectly free and safe, grudged no labor in
communicating instruction privately and publicly, and were blessed of
God to the winning of many souls for Christ. Congregations were formed,
pastors appointed, the Lord’s supper celebrated, and worship conducted
on the principle of the Reformed churches. Others of the exiles made
themselves masters of the different languages of the canton that they might
be able to preach the gospel to the inhabitants. Their preaching was of the
most attractive and thrilling style. They detailed the cruelties of the
Inquisition; they laid bare the artifices, the superstition, ignorance, vices,
and corruption of the court of Rome and its priesthood, contrasting with
great enthusiasm the liberty of conscience and the pure preaching of the
gospel enjoyed in the Grisons.
Thus did Rome, by her short-sighted and cruel policy, reduce her own
strength at home, and send forth a band of her choicest subjects to expose
her wickedness, weaken her influence abroad, and instruct many in the
way of salvation. After a time many of these exiles spread themselves over
the other cantons, and passed into other countries, carrying the light of the
 1106
gospel with them; but alas, alas, their native and sunny Italy was doomed
to be the abode of darkness, for few of the disciples of the Reformed
doctrines were able to survive the barbarous and fiendish malice of the
Inquisition.6

SPAIN
The term heresy, about the time of the Reformation, was held in the
highest detestation by the Spanish nation. The loudest boast of the proud
Spaniard was purity of blood. The poorest peasant looked upon it as a
degradation to have a drop of Jewish or Moorish blood in his veins. Yet in
no country in Europe had there been such an intermixture of races. But
this pride of a pure old Christian, or holy Catholic, ancestry made them
peculiarly jealous of all forms of worship except their own. Besides, they
had succeeded in cleansing the land by expelling the Jews, the inveterate
enemies of Christ, from their courts; and they had overthrown the
Mahometan empire which had been established for ages in the fairest
provinces of their land; and would they now be traitors to the cross under
which they had conquered, and renounce their ancient faith for some new
opinions of an obscure German monk? Their successes at home, with their
wonderful discoveries abroad, so increased the wealth and raised the
reputation of Spain, that they began to think themselves the favorites of
heaven, and destined to propagate and defend the true faith throughout
their vast dominions.
To the discovery of America by Columbus, the other magnificent
territories by navigators of lesser name, must be added, the vast increase of
strength which the Spanish monarchy received by the succession of their
youthful sovereign, Charles V., to his paternal dominions in the Low
Countries, Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary, and his elevation to the
imperial throne of Germany.

THE INTRODUCTION OF THE REFORMED DOCTRINES INTO SPAIN

Such was the greatness and glory of the Spanish nation when the new faith
knocked at her gates for admission. But notwithstanding the national
antipathy to the German Reformation, there were many serious and
thoughtful men predisposed in its favor. The scandalous corruptions of
 1107
the clergy and the cruel energies of the Inquisition had alienated the hearts
of many from the old religion. Accordingly, we find the writings of Luther
translated and distributed in the peninsula as early as the year 1519. The
Reformer’s commentary on the Galatians, a work which exhibits his
doctrinal sentiments on the most important points, was translated into
Spanish in 1520. This was followed by translations of his treatise on
Christian Liberty, and his reply to Erasmus on free-will. These books
were read and approved of by many who were illustrious for their rank,
learning, and influence; and had not the throne and the Inquisition
combined to suppress both the books and their readers, Spain, we believe,
would have produced a noble band of thorough reformers. For the first ten
years at least, the papal briefs and the state-authorities seemed ineffectual
in arresting its progress.
“Headed by two brothers,” says Hardwick, “Juan and Alfonso de Valdes,
the reforming school increased from day to day in numbers and
importance. It had representatives among the retinue of Charles V. himself;
and both in Seville and Valladolid the crowd of earnest Lutherans was so
great that cells could hardly be at last procured for their incarceration.”
Many noble witnesses for the gospel follow these two leading brothers,
down to the year 1530, when Charles, with a great body of Spanish nobles
and clergy, had an opportunity of hearing for themselves the true doctrines
of the Protestants, from the confession of faith which was read to the
imperial diet of Augsburg. The public reading and examination of this
confession had the effect of dissipating the false ideas of the opinions of
Luther which had been industriously propagated by the monks. Alfonso
deraides, the Emperor’s secretary, of whom we have already spoken, had
several friendly interviews with Melancthon, and read the confession
before it was presented to the diet. A. de Virves, chaplain to Charles, was
also convinced of the truth of the protest and became what was called a
Lutheran. Valdes, Virves, and others on their return to Spain being
suspected of Lutheranism, were seized by the inquisitors, and thrown into
prison. A long list of nobles, priests, burgesses, monks, and nuns follow,
but for details of their imprisonment, tortures, and death, we have no
space.7
 1108
THE SUPPRESSION OF THE REFORMATION IN SPAIN
For a number of years the Lord in mercy sheltered the infant church in
Spain. The Christians were in the habit of coming together with great
secresy, and breaking bread in private houses. On no other principle could
we account for the truth spreading, the disciples multiplying, and the
church being edified, and all in the very place where the king, the pope,
and the Inquisition had sworn to keep Spain Roman Catholic. True, there
were many individual cases of persecution and imprisonment, but nothing
very definite, or on a large scale, was attempted till the year 1557.
The first thing which seems to have aroused the inquisitors from their
security was the sudden disappearance of a number of persons, who were
known to have settled in Geneva and different parts of Germany, where
they were at liberty to worship God according to His holy word. This led
to searching inquiries as to the cause of their departure; and, finding it was
the question of religion, the inquisitors naturally suspected that those who
had left were not the only persons who were disaffected, and immediately
set their whole police in motion to discover their brethren who remained
behind. Besides their vigilance at home, spies were sent to Geneva and
Germany, that they might, through feigning themselves to be friends,
obtain information as to those who had embraced Lutheranism.
This information, it is painful to relate, was obtained by the treachery of
One of the preachers’ wives through the wicked arts of the confessional.
At Valladolid, Juan Garcia, a goldsmith, being aware of the influence of the
priest over the superstitious mind of his wife, concealed from her both the
time and place of their assembling. But this poor deluded woman, in
obedience to her harlot-mother Jezebel, dogged her husband one night, and
having ascertained the place of meeting, communicated the fact to the
priest. Having made this important discovery, messengers were
despatched to the several tribunals throughout the kingdom; the
ramifications of heresy were to be diligently traced, guards were to be
placed at convenient places to seize such persons as might attempt to
escape; and by a simultaneous movement the Protestants were seized in all
parts of the country. In Seville and its neighborhood, two hundred persons
were apprehended in one day; and, in a short time, the number increased to
eight hundred. In Valladolid eighty persons were committed to prison, and
 1109
similar numbers by other tribunals. The common prisons, the convents,
and even private houses were crowded with the victims. The storm of
persecution burst with equal fury on the monasteries and nunneries that
were known to favor the Lutheran doctrines.
The cruel and heartless king, Philip II. and his inquisitors, were now
determined to strike terror into the minds of the whole nation, and
consequently, the unoffending prisoners were treated with the view of
accomplishing this fiendish end. Many suffered in body and mind from a
long imprisonment; others from the severity of the tortures ended their
days by a lingering and secret martyrdom; while some of the most
distinguished, either for rank, or of the clerical order, were reserved for a
public execution, or the Spanish auto-de-fe.8 But there was one family
amongst the Protestants of Seville whose tragical history is so touching
that we cannot withhold it from our readers.
“The widow of Fernando Nugnez, a native of the town of Lepe,
with three of her daughters and a married sister, were seized and
thrown into prison. As there was no evidence against them, they
were put to the torture, but refused to inform against one another.
Upon this the presiding Inquisitor called one of the young women
into the audience-chamber, and, after conversing with her for some
time, professed an attachment to her person. Having repeated this
at another interview, he told her that he could be of no service to
her unless she imparted to him the whole facts of her case; but if
she entrusted him with these, he would manage the affairs in such a
way as that she and all her friends would be set at liberty. Falling
into the snare, the unsuspecting girl confessed to him, that she had
at different times conversed with her mother, sisters, and aunt, on
the Lutheran doctrines. The wretch immediately brought her into
court, and obliged her to declare judicially what she had owned to
him in private. Nor was this all: under the pretense that her
confession was not sufficiently ample and ingenuous, she was put
to the torture by the most excruciating engines — the pulley and
the wooden horse; by which means evidence was extorted from
her, which led, not only to the condemnation of herself and her
relatives, but also to the seizure and conviction of others who
afterwards perished in the flames.”9
 1110
No language could describe the meanness, perfidiousness, fiendishness, of
one in human form that could do such a thing, and the reader may easily
imagine from the treatment of the widow, the fatherless children, and the
aunt, what the victims of the Inquisition (which could be counted by
thousands) had to endure, and all for the crime of believing the truth of
God and rejecting the lies of Satan.

REFLECTIONS ON THE POLICY OF SPAIN

It is difficult to conceive in our day, and in our land of civil and religious
liberty, what could have induced the church, aided by the government, to
persecute thousands of the choicest of her members, for a difference of
opinion on some points of religion. By far the greater part of those who
were apprehended, and thrown into a dungeon, or were burnt at the stake,
had not left the communion of the Romish church. They might have
accepted a New Testament in the Spanish language, or might have been
drawn into conversation on the subject of the new opinions, either of
which was sufficient to awaken the suspicion of the Familiars, and secure
them imprisonment. We must look deeper down than the blind and
infatuated policy of the government, or the tyranny of the papal tribunals.
The source is purely Satanic. The main object of this suicidal policy was
to perpetuate the reign of darkness. Popery could not live in the light;
therefore the true gospel — which ameliorates the condition of society,
generates a spirit of liberty among the people, discerns and corrects abuses
by its sure and divine light — must be suppressed, no matter what it may
cost.
The arch-enemy of God and man rules in the darkness and superstition of
popery, though at the same time God overrules. He saw from the
beginning that society, in all countries where the Reformation had been
received, was greatly improved and enlightened. It gave a higher tone to
morals, and imparted to the human mind a strong impulse of inquiry and
improvement. The progress of useful knowledge, the cultivation of
literature, and the extension of commerce, which exalt a nation, would be
the downfall of the papal power. Therefore every movement, intellectual,
civil, or religious, that would tend to raise the condition, or enlighten the
minds of the people, must be put down. The ruling clergy and the
inquisitors exercise the most rigid and vigilant inspection of the press and
 1111
the seminaries of education, that they may arrest the progress of general or
useful knowledge. This is abundantly proved by the lists of prohibited
books which they publish from time to time.
As the persecution grew hotter, the number of exiles increased. While the
Italians were crossing the Alps, the Spaniards were crossing the Pyrenees,
and not unfrequently met in the country of their adoption, and even united
in the same church. Thousands of the Spanish exiles found a happy
home in England, which the Lord has not forgotten. But the kindness
which they received here gave great offense to the bloodthirsty Philip and
the pope, and formed one of the charges against Elizabeth in the bull of her
excommunication. Philip wanted them to be sent back, not for their capital
or labor as useful citizens, but for their blood, that he might celebrate
another victory in a grand auto-de-fe. But England on this occasion proved
worthy of her well-known character for hospitality to the oppressed.
“The queen,” nobly writes bishop Jewell, “of her gracious pity,
granted them harbor. Is it become a heinous thing to show mercy?
God willed the children of Israel to love the stranger, because they
were strangers in the land of Egypt. He that showeth mercy shall
find mercy. But what was the number of such who came in unto
us? Three or four thousand. Thanks be to God; this realm is able to
receive them, if the numbers were greater. And why may not
Queen Elizabeth receive a few afflicted members of Christ, which
are compelled to carry His cross? Whom, when He thought good to
bring safely by the dangers of the sea, and to set in at our havens,
should we cruelly have driven them back again?... Would the vicar
of Christ give this counsel? Or, if a king receive such, and give them
succor, they live not idly. If they take houses of us, they pay rent
for them; they hold not our grounds but by making due
recompense. They beg not in our streets, nor crave anything at our
hands, but to breathe our air, and see our sun. They labor truly,
they live sparefully; they are good examples of virtue, travail, faith,
and patience. The towns in which they abide are happy, for God
doth follow them with His blessing.”
The reader will now see, what has so greatly interested us, that the work
of God’s Spirit in Catholic Spain must indeed have been a great and a
 1112
blessed work. If we think of the thousands who became the victims of the
Inquisition, and the thousands who found a refuge in England, besides
those who settled in Switzerland, Germany, the Low Countries, and
France, how great indeed must the work of the Spirit, by means of the
scanty truth which they possessed, have been; and that, too, in a very
short time! Towards the close of the century Spain boasted that she had
extirpated the German heresy from her territories. But she saw not in her
blindness, that she had inflicted a deeper and more fatal wound on herself
than on the unoffending victims of her tyranny, and had sown the seeds of
a national misery and despotism which she has been reaping ever since.
During the early part of the sixteenth century, her scepter extended over
nearly half the world; but what is her condition now? Prostrate, sunk, and
degraded, compared with the other nations of Europe. Holland, with no
land but what she rescued from the ocean, became rich and independent,
while Spain, with all her vast possessions, has become poor and
helpless.10
How true it is, not only with individuals but with nations, that,
“whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” This is the principle
of the government of God, however much grace may overrule the failure of
the Christian for his blessing; as in the case of David. Nevertheless the
sword was not to depart from his house. “Be not deceived,” says the
apostle, “God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he
also reap.” This is a hard saying, many will say, yet it is most true and
righteous. If a man sow tares in the spring, can he expect to reap wheat in
the autumn? And if he sow wheat, he will not have to reap tares. But,
thank God, grace reigns, not on the ruins of law and justice, but “through
righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.” No thanks be to
us when our failures turn to our deeper blessing, but to the grace of God
which freely meets us on the ground of the finished work of Christ. When
self is judged, the will broken, the eye of faith fixed on the blessed Lord,
there is not only peace, but joy, through the power of the Holy Ghost.
(Galatians 6:7; Romans 5:21.)
 1113
THE NETHERLANDS
For some time before the days of Luther, there had existed in the
Netherlands a spirit of religious inquiry, and a calm but firm resistance to
the domination of the Romish church. In the fifteenth century, a school of
pious mystics, represented by such men as Thomas a Kempis, had revived
a spirit of devotion in many countries of the west, especially in Flanders
and some parts of Germany.11 It was also the land of John Wessel, who, in
many things, anticipated Luther; and of Erasmus, at a later period. Most
of the Reformers’ books, both Swiss and Saxon, were translated, printed,
and sent out from Antwerp in large quantities. The provinces were
wealthy and prosperous from their extensive manufactures and commerce.
Antwerp was, in that age, the emporium of the world. Hence their great
facility in sending books into all parts, by concealing them in their bales of
goods. It was from Antwerp chiefly, that both Italy and Spain received the
new books. The writings of Erasmus against the monks may also have
helped to prepare the way for the deeper doctrines of Luther and Zwingle.
It was only natural, we may say, under these circumstances, that the light
of the Reformation should have penetrated the Low Countries at an early
period.

THE POLICY OF CHARLES

Such was the state of things in the hereditary dominions of Charles when
he ascended the throne of Spain in 1519. Indeed, the movement which
convulsed the whole of Germany, was early transmitted to all the other
territories of the Emperor. Being a Catholic king, this fact was no doubt
the cause of his double policy towards the Reformers from the Diet of
Worms in 1521. With Francis I., the pope, and the Turks watching his
movements on every side, and he theirs, he had no leisure to chastise the
heretics. Besides, the ample revenues, which flowed into the imperial
treasury from those wealthy provinces, made him unwilling to resort to
severe measures, with a view to check the progress of the new opinions.
At the same time, he did not fail to exhort those in power to use their
authority in suppressing heresy. This is evident from a placard which was
published in the name of that monarch, by Margaret of Austria, his
father’s sister, Governess of the Netherlands, in the year 1521. Luther is
there described as a “devil in the shape of a man and the habit of a monk,
 1114
that he may more easily occasion the eternal death and destruction of
mankind.” The placard is very long, giving strict orders for the prohibition
of all books which contained any allusion to the scripture or its doctrines,
and that no book was to be circulated without the approbation of the
faculty of divinity in the university.12

THE TRUTH PREVAILS IN SPITE OF THE FLAMES

The history of the Low Countries from this time is so full of
martyrdoms, that it is like a gradual extermination of the population.
Nevertheless the Spirit of God wrought wonderfully; and the holy courage
which was shown by many, proved the Lord’s presence with them in
sustaining grace and power. It was discovered that the Austin friars in the
city of Antwerp had read and approved the books of Luther. Many of
them were thrown into prison. Three of the monks were degraded and
condemned to the flames in 1523. While the fire was being lighted, they
repeated the creed, dlld then sang together the Te Deum in alternate verses,
until the force of the flames silenced their heavenly praise. Erasmus is
made to witness on this occasion, that these martyrdoms had the very
opposite effect which the persecutors intended. “The city of Brussels,”
where they were executed, he says, “had been perfectly free from heresy
till this event. But many of the inhabitants immediately after began to
favor Lutheranism.”
Persons of eminence, among both the clergy and the laity, ventured to
espouse the cause of truth, though the martyrdoms were constantly
occurring. This has always been the case. If persecution keep some at a
cold selfish distance, it brings the accession of a greater number, through
that instinct — in connection with the truth — which impels the human
conscience to rise against injustice, and incline to the side of the
oppressed. The fires were now kindled all over the country, and edict
following edict, with increasing severity, kept them burning. It was death
to read a page of the scriptures; death to discuss any article of the faith;
death to have in one’s possession any of the writings of Luther, Zwingle,
or OEcolampadius; death to express a doubt respecting the efficacy of the
sacraments, or the authority of the pope. In the year 1536, that good and
faithful servant of the Lord, William Tyndale, was strangled and burnt at
 1115
Vilvordi, near Brussels, for translating the New Testament into English,
and printing it in 1535.13
In the year 1555, Charles, though only fifty-five years of age, feeling
himself growing old, passed the scepter to his son. The scepter and the
faggot, it has been said, were closely united during the reign of the father,
but they were to be still more so under the reign of the son. And there was
this difference: Charles persecuted from policy, for he was burning
heretics at the very time he sacked Rome, and imprisoned the pope and his
cardinals. Philip persecuted from the convictions of his bigotry, and the
cool vindictiveness of his nature. It was under the reign of the latter that
more violent exterminating measures were devised and carried into
execution by the duke of Alva, and the persecution became so intolerable,
and so exasperated the people, that they ultimately rebelled, threw off the
Spanish yoke, and asserted their ancient laws and liberties. But this was
not done in haste; the people were slow to move, notwithstanding their
unparalleled sufferings.

THE ASSOCIATION OF THE NOBLES

In 1566 most of the nobles, though generally Catholics, entered into an
association to protect and defend the liberties of the country. The
Protestants, trusting to a promise of toleration from Margaret, began to
meet in great numbers in open day; and, being without places of worship
they assembled in the fields, where the preachers proclaimed the truths of
the gospel in the midst of overwhelming numbers. One of these field
preachers, named Dathen, is said to have gathered as many as fifteen
thousand at a time to listen to his discourses. But in the existing state of
things such assemblies were not likely to be continued without some
disturbances. A magistrate, on one occasion, furious in his bigotry,
attempted to disperse them, brandishing his sword, and making as if he
would apprehend the minister, but was saluted with such a plentiful
shower of stones that he barely escaped with his life. The psalms of David
were usually sung on such occasions; which, from the multitude of voices,
were heard at a great distance, and attracted great attention. The
enthusiasm of the Calvinists and the hostility of the Catholics were
thereby increased, and the danger of an outbreak became every day more
imminent. In order to avoid this, and prevent the need of field-preaching,
 1116
those who really knew and valued the truth had, in a short time, a number
of wooden churches erected. “Men of all classes engaged in the labor,
while the females sold their jewels and ornaments to provide the necessary
funds; and, had they been left to themselves, the power of the religion
they professed would soon have quieted the storm of passion, and healed
the evils of the land.”14
The Protestants, now one hundred thousand in number, respectfully
petitioned the king for toleration, having been led by the Governess,
Margaret, to expect it. By taking advantage of the brief period of repose
from the conciliatory spirit of the Governess, they had formed nearly
sixty congregations in Flanders, which were attended by nearly as many
thousand persons. Similar meetings were opened in Artois, Brabant,
Holland, Utrecht, Iceland, Friesland, and other places. But in place of
listening to the reasonable demands of so large and so respectable a body
of his subjects, the poor narrow-minded bigot utterly rejected the plea for
“freedom to worship God, and personal liberty by settled law.” Margaret
had recommended moderate measures, and, when the question came before
his own ministers, the Spanish council did the same; but all was in vain:
violence, duplicity, and bloodshed were the only features of his policy,
especially in the Netherlands. Rejecting Margaret’s advice as to
moderation; he directed her to raise an army of three thousand horse, and
ten thousand foot soldiers, to enforce the execution of his decrees.
Attempts were now made by the government to disperse the
congregations of the Protestants by force, so that the people went armed
to their places of worship. Such was the melancholy state of things
through the superstition and obstinacy of a single man. Many from
amongst the lowest classes of the people in different parts of the country,
excited by all that was going on, began to rise. They broke into churches,
tore down pictures and everything in the way of ornament; images, altars,
crosses, and stained windows, were broken to pieces; and the organ in the
cathedral at Antwerp, said to be the finest in the world, was subjected to
the same destructive enthusiasm. About four hundred churches were thus
plundered and defaced in a few days. The Christians in both the reformed
and Lutheran churches were deeply grieved because of this outbreak, and
drew up remonstrances to Philip; and while they condemned those violent
proceedings, they again petitlobed for the public exercise of their religion,
 1117
“in which they were resolved to live and die.” The prince of Orange, the
counts Egmont and Horn, endeavored to move Philip to some
consideration of the state of religious feeling in the Low Countries; but it
was all to no purpose. The troops were ordered to be distributed over the
distracted country, that his persecuting edicts might be enforced. The
Protestants were reduced to great straits; many were put to death, and
many fled the country; the association of the nobles melted away, and the
Netherlands had all the appearance of a conquered land.

THE DUKE OF ALVA

But the cold-hearted bigot was not yet satisfied. A second invasion was
arranged for exterminating the Reformed, tens of thousands though they
were. In the year 1567 the cruel duke of Alva was sent into the
Netherlands with an army of fifteen thousand Spaniards and Italians; and
the Inquisition was to put forth all its energies. This added greatly to the
general consternation. The reign of terror began. The very name of Alva,
and the mention of the Inquisition, made the whole land shudder. The
counts of Egmont and Horn, and other persons of eminence, suspected of
holding liberal opinions, were immediately arrested and executed. The
prince of Orange escaped to Germany, and crowds of Protestants forsook
their homes and fled to other countries. The foreign merchants,
manufacturers, and artisans fled from Antwerp and other once thriving
cities, as if the plague were raging within their gates. The wooden churches
were pulled down, and, in some places the beams were formed into a great
gallows on which to hang the minister and his flock.
As the inquisitors, by the authority of Charles, before his abdication were
doing their dreadful work, we will give particulars of a few cases, to show
the reader what was to be witnessed almost daily in the country for nearly
forty years; yet the word of God prevailed mightily, and thousands were
converted.
One of the inquisitors by the name of Titelmann, notorious for the
number of his victims, boasted that he only “seized the virtuous and the
innocent, because they made no resistance.” Thomas Calberg, tapestry
weaver, of Tournay, being convicted of having copied some hymns from a
book printed in Geneva, was instantly burned alive. About the same time,
 1118
1561, Walter Kapell, a man of property and benevolence, and greatly
beloved by the poor people, was burned at the stake for heretical
opinions. A most touching scene occurred as Titelmann’s officers were
binding him to the stake: a poor idiot, who had often been fed by his
kindness, called out, “Ye are bloody murderers; that man has done no
wrong, but has given me bread to eat.” With these words he cast himself
headlong into the flames to perish with his beloved benefactor, and was
with difficulty rescued by the officers. A day or two afterwards he visited
the scene of the execution, where the half-burnt skeleton of Walter Kapell
still remained. The poor idiot laid it upon his shoulders, and carried it to
the place where the magistrates were sitting in session. Forcing his way
into their presence, he laid his burden at their feet, crying, “There,
murderers! Ye have eaten his flesh, now eat his bones.” The fate of the
poor man is not recorded; but the testimony of so daring a witness would
most likely be effectually silenced.
The year following, Titelmann caused one Robert Ogier, of Ryssel, in
Flanders, to be arrested, together with his wife and two sons. Their crime
consisted in not going to mass, and in practising private worship at home.
They confessed the offense, for they protested that they could not endure
to see the profanation of their Savior’s name in the idolatrous sacraments.
They were asked what rites they practiced in their own house. One of the
sons, a mere boy, answered, “We fall on our knees, and pray to God that
He may enlighten our hearts and forgive our sins. We pray for our
sovereign, that his reign may be prosperous, and his life peaceful. We also
pray for the magistrates and others in authority, that God may protect and
preserve them all.” The boy’s simple eloquence drew tears even from the
eyes of some of his judges. The father and eldest son, were, however,
condemned to the flames. “O God,” prayed the youth at the stake,
“eternal Father, accept the sacrifice of our lives, in the name of Thy
beloved Son.” “Thou liest, scoundrel!” furiously interrupted a monk who
was lighting the fire; “God is not your father; ye are the devil’s children.”
As the flames rose about them, the boy cried out once more, “Look, my
father, all heaven is opening, and I see a hundred thousand angels rejoicing
over us. Let us be glad, for we are dying for the truth.” “Thou liest! thou
liest!” again screamed the priest, “all hell is opening; and ye see ten
thousand devils thrusting you into eternal fire.” Eight days afterwards, the
 1119
wife of Ogier and his other son were burned; so that they were soon
privileged to meet in the bright and happy regions above — in the perfect
repose of the paradise of God. Little did these ignorant and hardened
inquisitors think that they were sending so many of the children of God
home to their Father’s house on high, to be with Christ, which is far
better.

THE ADMINISTRATION OF ALVA

In the year 1567 “the council of blood,” as it was called, held its first
sitting. There are few readers who have not heard something of the
infamous character of Alva. “Such an amount of ferocity,” says Motley,
“of patient vindictiveness and universal bloodthirstiness was never found
in a savage beast of the forest, and but rarely in a human bosom.” It was
no longer the trial of ones and twos that occupied the council, as it was
thought more expeditious to send the accused at once in large numbers to
the flames. But no crime at that moment was so great as being rich. No
belief, no virtues, could expiate such guilt. Bloodshed and confiscations
were the daily amusements of the tyrant who thus gratified his avarice and
his cruelty. He boasted that a golden river, a yard deep, should flow
through the Netherlands, from confiscations, to replenish the treasury of
his master. In the town of Tournay alone, the estates of above a hundred
rich merchants were confiscated.
Blood now flowed in torrents. “Thus, for example, on the 4th of January,
eighty-four inhabitants of Valenciennes were condemned; on another day,
ninety-five from different places in Flanders; on another, forty-six
inhabitants of Malines; on another, thirty-five persons from different
localities. Yet, notwithstanding this wholesale slaughter, Philip, Alva, and
the Holy Office were not satisfied with the progress of events. A new
edict was issued, affixing a heavy penalty upon all waggoners, carriers, and
ship-masters, who should aid in the emigration of heretics. They had
resolved that none should escape.
Early in the second year of the council of blood, “the most sublime
sentence of death,” says Motley, “was promulgated, which has ever been
pronounced since the creation of the world. The Roman tyrant wished that
his enemies’ heads were all upon a single neck, that he might strike them
 1120
off at one blow. The Inquisition assisted Philip to place the heads of all his
Netherland subjects upon a single neck for the same fell purpose. Upon
the 19th of February 1568 a sentence of the Holy Office condemned all
the inhabitants of the Netherlands to death as heretics. From this universal
doom only a few persons, especially named, were excepted. A
proclamation of the king, dated ten days later, confirmed this decree of the
inquisition, and ordered it to be carried into instant execution, without
regard to age, sex, condition. This is probably the most concise death-
warrant that was ever framed. Three millions of people — men, women,
and children, were sentenced to the scaffold in three lines.”15
“This horrible decree,” says Brandi, “against a whole nation, drove
many with their wives and children to seek a place of safety in the
West-woods of Flanders, from whence, turning savages through the
solitude of the place, and the extinction of their hopes, they made
excursions on the priests and friars, serving themselves of the
darkest nights for revenge and robbery.”

THE REAL CHARACTER OF POPERY

Under this universal condemnation the reader will see the real spirit of
popery, and what all had to expect who did not yield an absolute, though
blind submission, to all her idolatries and superstitions. Men in the highest
and humblest positions were daily and hourly dragged to the stake. Alva,
in writing to Philip about this time, seeks to satisfy his master by assuring
him that the executions, which were to take place immediately after the
expiration of holy week, would not be less than eight hundred heads. To
prevent the victims on their way to the scaffold from addressing their
friends or the bystanders, the tongue of each prisoner was screwed into an
iron ring, and then seared with a hot iron.
The tendency of this monster’s policy was evidently to effect the utter
depopulation of the country. History informs us, that the “death-bell
tolled hourly in every village; not a family that was not called to mourn for
its dearest relatives; the blood of its best and bravest citizens had already
stained the scaffold; the men to whom the nation had been accustomed to
look for guidance and protection were dead, in prison, or in exile.
Submission had ceased to be of any avail, flight was impossible, and the
 1121
spirit of vengeance had alighted at every fireside. The mourners went daily
about the streets, for there was hardly a house that had not been made
desolate... The door-posts of private houses, the fences in the fields, were
laden with human carcases, strangled, beheaded, and burned. The orchards
in the country bore on many a tree the hideous fruit of human bodies.” It
was about this time that Don Carlos, the king’s son, died in prison, or, as
it was believed by some, was put to death by his father’s orders. “This
conduct of his in not sparing his only son, as being a favourer of heretics,
was highly extolled by Pope Pius V.”16
Such was the character of the reign of Alva for nearly six years. The heart
sickens in attempting to detail the atrocities of this furious tyrant. The
extent of the appalling massacres may be imagined from the boast of Alva
himself, who gloried in having caused eighteen thousand of the inhabitants
to perish, without reckoning those who fell in war. And it is thought that
more than a hundred thousand effected their escape, and fled into other
countries. Crowds flocked to the English ports, bringing with them that
industrial skill which amply repaid this country for the hospitality they
received.
We wonder that the church was not consumed in the flames or drowned in
blood. But God had mercy on the Netherlands in preserving many of His
faithful witnesses through their fiery trial that they might testify for Him
in a future day. When the grass began to grow in the streets of those cities
which had recently employed so many artisans, a national synod of the
Dutch Reformed Church was held at Dort in 1578; at Middleburg in
1581; and at the Hague in 1586. The very means which the royal bigot,
with his inquisitors and Jesuits, employed to preserve the old religion,
instead of securing it from the dangers to which it was exposed, occa-
stoned its total overthrow. The civil war, which broke out both by sea and
land, resulted in the formation of a new Protestant state in Europe, under
the title of THE SEVEN UNITED PROVINCES .

THE TRIUMPH OF TRUTH AND RIGHTEOUSNESS

The history of this long and deeply interesting struggle for liberty of
conscience belongs to the civil historian. We will only add, that William of
Nassau, Prince of Orange, or, as he was usually called, William “the
 1122
silent,” felt impelled to adopt more decisive measures to prevent the utter
ruin of his country. In this enterprise he was assisted by Elizabeth, Queen
of England; the King of France; and the Protestants in Germany. He also
sold his jewels, plate, and even the furniture of his house to raise the
necessary funds. But it was difficult to contend with the experience and
power of Alva, and for a length of time William was unsuccessful. His
brother Louis was defeated, and his brother Adolphus was killed; but
many of the towns were thrown into revolt, and Philip at length felt that
some change of policy should be tried. Alva was recalled, and even Philip
is said to have reproved him for his inhumanity. The war was renewed and
continued to rage, with brief intervals of peace, until the year 1580, when
the States-general, assembled at Antwerp, issued their declaration of
national independence, and threw off the Spanish yoke for ever. Thus the
infant republic, under the guidance of the Prince of Orange, secured that
freedom of person, and liberty of conscience which are the inalienable right
of all; and took its place among the nations of the continent.17
Philip now eyed the great patriot with the most deadly hatred. He saw in
him the animating soul of these struggles for liberty, and hence he sought
his life. “Five unsuccessful attempts had been made to assassinate
William; but Philip would not give up hope. In 1580 he published a ban of
proscription, in which he denounced the prince as guilty of the foulest
crimes, and declared that it was permitted to all persons to assail him in
his fortunes, person, and life; and promised twenty-five thousand golden
crowns, a pardon for all offenses whatsoever, and a patent of nobility, to
anyone who should deliver up to him this implacable monarch, William of
Nassau, dead or alive.” This infamous document soon did its work. On the
10th of July, 1584, a Jesuit, named Gerard, who had passed himself off to
the unsuspecting prince as one of the Reformed faith, shot him through the
heart, in the hall of his own house, with a pistol which he had bought with
money obtained from the prince himself a short time before. “God have
mercy on my soul, and on this unfortunate nation,” exclaimed the
wounded patriot and instantly expired. He had married the widow of
Teligny, the daughter of the brave Coligny, who both fell in the St.
Bartholomew massacre. Thus had she seen her first and second husband,
and her noble father, assassinated by her side.
 1123
Thus died one of the most unselfish, wise, courageous, and memorable
characters in history. “He had headed the armies of his oppressed
countrymen, and led them on to victory; he had regulated their treaties;
and though for twenty years he had spent his fortune, his ease, and his
health, for the common good, calumny has failed to show that he had in
any instance used his power for any selfish purpose; so that he well
deserves the title of ‘Father of his country.’ “The news of the atrocious
deed filled the land and all the surrounding countries with grief and
consternation. Vengeance was speedily executed on the assassin; but in the
midst of a deep and universal sorrow Philip rejoiced. Transported with
joy, he exclaimed, “Had it only been done two years earlier, much trouble
would have been spared me; but better late than never! better late than
never!”18

REFLECTIONS ON BIGOTRY AND CHRISTIANITY

It is difficult to close this paper without drawing the reader’s attention to
the effects of bigotry, and a bigotry dignified by the name of religion, or
zeal for the glory of God. We have seen what this Satanic delusion has
done in the Netherlands, and also in many other places. But what has
Christianity suffered from bigotry these thirteen hundred years and more!
The one is the religion of the New Testament, the other that of the dogmas
of Rome. The former is peace on earth, and good will to men; for as Christ
in Spirit says, “My delights were with the sons of men.” What could be
sweeter than this — more gracious, more softening, more likely to fill us
with love to all men, especially to them that believe? The latter is unfeeling
obstinacy, and inexorable cruelty; and this, be it observed, to those whom
they deem in error, or unsaved; so that they become the murderers, not
only of the body, but of the soul. In place of trying to convert the soul,
they hurry it out of this world, proclaiming it unsaved, and only fit for the
flames of hell.
Philip stands before us as the personification of the religion of bigotry —
the religion of the papacy. Never was there a man more suited for the
enemy’s purpose than this wretched king — a cold heart, a stern and
morose temperament, sullen and gloomy, with an incredibly small mind,
and millions of human beings at his mercy. He died in 1598, at the age of
 1124
seventy-two, after protracted and excruciating sufferings, under a
complication of dreadful maladies, said to be Herod’s disease.
Our only safety is to have Christ ever before us as our all-governing
object; and the more stedfastly we look on Him, the more will His
character be mirrored on our souls, and the more distinctly shall we reflect
it to others. In looking to Him, we are enlightened; to have any other
object before us is to be in darkness; and there are many shades of
darkness between the blindness of popish bigotry and the clouds that arise
in the Christian’s heart from self-occupation. To be true witnesses of a
heavenly Christ, we must be heavenly-minded, and heavenly in our ways.
And heavenly-mindedness is the result, not of trying to be so, but of
occupation with a heavenly Christ, according to the revelation which we
have of Him, through the power of the Holy Spirit. In what direction is
the eye? is always the important question, for the heart is sure to follow
the eye, and the feet the heart.
The following passage may be accepted as a practical view of Christianity,
both negatively and positively.
“For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all
men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we
should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;
looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the
great God and our Savior Jesus Christ; who gave Himself for us,
that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself
a peculiar people, zealous of good works.” (Titus 2:11-14.)
 1125

CHAPTER 49
THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND

In tracing the silver line of God’s grace, in the operations of His Spirit, we
are arrested by the different forms it takes in different countries. We have
just left a land where the sky was reddened with the flames of martyrdom,
and the earth soaked with the blood of God’s saints. Such is the history of
every land where the Inquisition was established. In Germany — and
where it never gained a footing — the struggle was with the princes and
the imperial power; but in Switzerland the question of retaining the
Romish, or adopting the Reformed faith, was not unfrequently decided by
vote. This mode of determining the religion of a state strikingly illustrates
the popular, or republican character of the Swiss government.
In German Switzerland, the principal Reformers — Zwingle,
OEcolampadius, Bullinger, Haller, Wittenbach, and others, were natives;
while the agents used of God for the conversion of French-Switzerland,
with a single exception, were foreigners. William Farel, a French-man, and
almost single-handed, had accomplished the overthrow of popery in
several French districts, before he reached Geneva or saw John Calvin.
D’Aubigne speaks of Farel as the Luther of French Switzerland, and of
Calvin as the Melancthon.
This remarkable man — William Farel — was born of a wealthy and
noble family at Gap, in Dauphiny, in the year 1489, and diligently
instructed by his pious parents in the faithful observance of the devout
practices of the Romish church. Naturally sincere, upright, full of ardor,
and true to his convictions, he invoked the Virgin and the saints night and
day, as he has himself related. He scrupulously conformed to the fasts
prescribed by the church, held the pontiff of Rome to be a god upon earth,
saw in the priests the sole channel of all celestial blessings, and treated as
infidels whoever did not exhibit an ardor similar to his own.1
 1126
THE EARLY HISTORY OF WILLIAM FAREL
After attending school for some time in Dauphiny, he obtained the
permission of his parents to finish his education at the university of Paris
— said to be the mother of all learning, the true light of the church which
never knew eclipse. James Lefevre, doctor of Etaples, then the most
renowned doctor of the Sorbonne, was professor of divinity. His genius,
piety, and learning greatly attracted the young Dauphinese. From the
center of the Sorbonne he fearlessly proclaimed, “That true religion has
but one foundation, one object, one head — Jesus Christ, blessed for
evermore. Let us not,” he continued, “call ourselves by St. Paul, Apollos,
or St. Peter. The cross of Christ alone openeth the gates of heaven, and
shutteth the gates of hell.” Thus, as early as 1512, the leading doctrines of
the Reformation were proclaimed in the presence of the most learned of
the Sorbonnists. The university was in a ferment; some applauded, some
condemned; and, daily, groups of men met, most anxious to discuss the
new doctrines.
But there was one amongst the listening crowds in the lecture room, whose
heart the Lord had prepared for the word of life. This was William Farel.
His soul was deeply agitated when he heard that salvation comes through
faith of Jesus Christ alone, and that works without faith are futile. He
thought of the lessons and the habits of his home; his early associations,
his tender recollections, his prayers, his hopes. But the declarations of
scripture had produced convictions, both deeper and firmer. In his search
after truth he studied the word of God in the original tongues; light broke
in upon his mind; he saw that it was Jesus only; Jesus only. “Now,” he
exclaimed, “everything appears to me in a new aspect; scripture is cleared
up; prophecy is opened; the apostles shed a strong light upon my soul. A
voice, till now unknown, the voice of Jesus, my Shepherd, my Master, my
Teacher, speaks to me with power. Instead of the murderous heart of a
ravening wolf, He has given me one of meekness and quietness, so great is
the change that has come over me. Now my heart is entirely withdrawn
from the pope, and given to Jesus Christ.”
William Farel, so far as we know, was the first person who professed the
Reformed religion in France, and was converted ill the university at Paris,
so renowned for its Romish orthodoxy. Farel and Lefevre conceived for
 1127
each other the closest friendship, which lasted through life; but we shall
meet with them again, when speaking of the Reformation in France. When
persecuted in Paris because of their doctrines, William Brissonnet, bishop
of Meaux, a pious and pure-minded man, invited them to visit him, and
preach the gospel to his people. Numbers came to hear, and when they
heard the preachers pressing them to give, not their money to the church,
but their hearts to Christ, the surprise and excitement of the inhabitants
became extreme. The priests and monks of the diocese, seeing their credit
weakening, and their revenues diminishing, aroused the demon of
persecution, and the preachers had to preserve their lives by a speedy
flight. Farel, on quitting Meaux, went to preach in Dauphiny. “Three of
his brothers,” says Felice, “shared his faith. Encouraged by this success,
he went preaching from town to town, and place to place. His appeals
agitating the whole country, the priests sought to excite the people against
him; but he was neither of an age nor of a character to be stopped by
persecution; his ardor increased with the danger. Wherever there was a
place to plant his foot — on the border of the rivers, on the points of the
rocks, in the bed of the torrents — he found one to preach the gospel. If he
was threatened, he stood firm; if surrounded, he escaped; if thrust from
one spot, he reappeared in another. At last, when he saw himself
environed on all sides, he retreated by mountain paths into Switzerland,
and arrived at Basle in the commencement of the year 1524.”

FAREL’S PREACHING IN SWITZERLAND

Having formed an intimate friendship with Bucer, Capito, OEcolampadius,
and others, which death only interrupted, he was obliged to leave Basle on
account of the hostility of the Roman Catholic clergy. He proceeded to
Montbeliard, where he labored with so much zeal and success under the
protection of the duke of Ulric, that within two years, the whole
principality professed the new opinions; and to this day the inhabitants in
general are Protestants. At Neuchatel the opposition was so violent that
he remained only a short time. Aigle was the next scene of his labors. The
town at that time was under the jurisdiction of Berne, and the Bernese
government, being favorable to the Reformation, sent him a patent
constituting him pastor of Aigle. Thus sanctioned by the powerful
government of Berne, he instantly commenced preaching, to the great
 1128
consternation of the monks, and the delight of many of the people who
heard him. “Though he had dropped from the clouds,” says history, “the
priests could not have been more aftrighted, nor the people more
surprised. His bold look, his burning eye, his voice of thunder, his words,
rapid, eloquent, and stamped with the majesty of truth, reached the
conscience, and increased the number of those in the valley of Aigle, who
were already prepared to take the word of God for their guide.”2
The priests, and the lower classes who followed them, raised a great
tumult, being secretly supported by the Syndic. Farel was insulted in
every way in their power; they refused to obey the Bernese in these
matters, and were determined to maintain their ancient religion. Many, by
this time, however, had received the gospel, professed themselves one
with Farel, and were ready to defend him. But to prevent the effusion of
blood, to which matters were fast tending, Farel quietly withdrew, and
preached the gospel in other places which were under the government of
Berne. The question, however, as usual, came to the vote, and Aigle had a
majority in favor of Reform.
In the spring of 1531 Farel returned to Neuchatel, determined to
complete his conquests there. Since his first visit the Reformed doctrines
had made great progress among the people. The priests clamoured as usual
and did all in their power to raise a tumult. They sounded the tocsin to
rouse the magistrates and the people, as if an invading army had reached
their gates. But many gathered round Farel, and forced him to ascend the
pulpit of the cathedral in spite of all opposition. His sermon was so
powerful, that all the people cried out at its close, “We will follow the
Protestant religion, both we and our children; and in it we will live and
die.” The priests and monks were furious, and sought the life of Farel. But
the people, determined to have the matter lawfully settled, presented
themselves before the governor and deputies of Berne, to vote on the
question, whether Romanism or Protestantism should be the religion of
Neuchatel. A majority of eighteen votes gave the victory to the
Reformation. No one was compelled to abandon popery, but the
Reformation was legally established.
Such was the character of Farel’s work in the French-speaking parts of
Switzerland, at the foot of the Jura, and on the shores of its lakes. But this
 1129
was no easy work in those days. Everywhere he met with violent
opposition from the Catholics; and the mob, instigated by the priests,
frequently raised tumults. This was an excuse for sounding the tocsin and
ringing the alarm-bells, causing the inhabitants to rush from their houses to
the scene of uproar. On such occasions it fared hard with Farel, and with
those who helped him in his work. At Vallengin he was seized, beaten,
struck with stones, forced into a chapel, and asked to kneel before the
images of the saints. On his refusing he was again beaten with such
violence, that the stains of his blood were long to be traced on the walls of
the chapel. He was then thrown into a dungeon, but afterwards released
through the intercession of his friends at Neuchatel. At St. Blaise he met
with similar treatment. He was so disfigured with bruises as scarcely to be
recognized by his friends; but after some care and nursing at Morat, he set
out for Orbe to evangelize.
On the other hand, those who had embraced the new opinions, were often
in too great haste to destroy the symbols of the old religion. This practice
generally assumed the character of popular vengeance. Churches were
entered, altars dismantled, images broken, pictures torn down, priceless
statues, precious relics, all fell before the fury of the multitudes. But there
was no Inquisition in that primitive country, no Familiars amongst the
simple people who were occupied in feeding their cattle on the mountains,
or in cultivating corn and the vine within their fertile valleys; and no Alva,
with his ruthless Spaniards, to slay, burn, and ravage. Their tumults
generally ended without bloodshed, the Reformed generally being the
stronger party.3

FAREL REACHES GENEVA

But Farel had Geneva before him; he was working his way to what he
considered the center of his operations. The Genevese had been contending
for some time with the duke of Savoy, and their unprincipled bishop for
political freedom. And in the struggle, Berthelier, Bonevard, and Levrier,
names of famous memory, suffered as martyrs of liberty. Now they were
to be drawn into a fresh contest, but for a higher and holier liberty.
Farel arrived in Geneva in the autumn of 1532, accompanied by
Anthony Saunter, like himself a native of Dauphiny, and
 1130
recommended by letters from the government of Berne. As Geneva
becomes, from this time, the second center in Reformed
Christendom, we will favor the reader with an extract from the
copious pen of the historian of Protestantism as to its situation
and ecclesiastical condition. “There is no grander valley in
Switzerland than the basin of the Rhone, whose collected floods,
confined within shining shores, form the Leman. As one looks
towards sunrise, he sees on his right the majestic line of the white
Alps; and on his left, the picturesque and verdant Jura. The vast
space which these magnificent chains enclose is variously filled in.
Its grandest feature is the lake. It is blue as the sky, and motionless
as a mirror. Nestling on its shores, or dotting its remoter banks, is
many a beautiful villa, many a picturesque town, almost drowned
in the affluent foliage of gardens and rich vines... Above the forests
of chestnuts and pine-trees soar the great peaks as finely robed as
the plains, though after a different manner — not with flowers and
verdure, but with glaciers and snows.
“But this fertile and lovely land, at the time we write of, was one of the
strongholds of the papacy. Cathedrals, abbacies, rich convents, and
famous shrines, which attracted yearly troops of pilgrims, were thickly
planted throughout the valley of the Leman. These were so many
fortresses, by which Rome kept the country in subjection. In each of these
fortresses was placed a numerous garrison. Priests and monks swarmed
like the locust... In Geneva alone there were nine hundred priests. In the
other towns and villages around the lake, and at the foot of the Jura, they
were not less numerous in proportion. Cowls and shaven crowns, frocks
and veils were seen everywhere. This generation of tonsured men and
veiled women formed the church. And the dues they exacted of the lay
population, and the processions, chants, exorcisms, and blows which they
gave them in return, were styled religion.”4
Such was the moral and ecclesiastical condition of Geneva when Farel and
Saunter entered it. And if we add to this account of its ecclesiastical
swarms, that the population at that time numbered only about twelve
thousand, we may well wonder how such a ravenous host could be
sustained. But a still greater wonder is, how could an evangelist, almost
single-handed, venture to assail such a host, and that on their own ground
 1131
— the region of darkness and wickedness? Only through faith in the living
God, we answer. Doubtless Farel was a great preacher, one of the greatest
in the sixteenth century. Still he required faith in the presence of God, and
in the power of His Holy Spirit through the word preached.

FAREL’S FIRST PREACHING IN GENEVA

The subject of Farel’s first sermon was the Holy Scriptures; he maintained
that they were the only source of divine knowledge, and the only
authority on earth to which the conscience of man was subjected. He
denounced the traditions of the Fathers and the decrees of Councils as
having no authority over the conscience in the sight of God. His second
subject was the full and free forgiveness of all sin, on the ground of the
work of Christ on the cross. This pardon was free to the chief of sinners,
through faith in Christ; papal pardons had to be bought with money or
with penance. We can imagine the burning zeal of the preacher, placing the
absolute truth of God in striking contrast with the mere superstitions of
the papacy, and many through grace believing.
When the canons and priests gained information of his proceedings, they
were in a state of great dismay. They had heard of his desolating work in
the Pays de Vaud. He was instantly arrested and carried before the council.
As usual on all such occasions, it was alleged that he was an enemy to the
civil government, a trumpet of sedition. Farel replied: “That he was no
instrument of sedition, but only a preacher of the truth; that he was
prepared to lay down his life for the divine doctrine; that the patronage of
Berne was a sufficient guarantee for his honesty; that he had a right to a
public and impartial trial; and that this could not be refused him without
offense to God, and to the gospel, and to the lords of Berne.” This last
consideration had weight with the council, as Geneva was in alliance with
Berne; so Farel was dismissed with an admonition to refrain from further
preaching.
But the clergy were not so easily satisfied as the town council. Farel and
Saunter were summoned to appear before the episcopal tribunal, under the
pretext of discussing the question in dispute. And then, indeed, William
Farel at least might have perished from private violence, had not two
magistrates accompanied them as deputies from the council. Some of the
 1132
clergy had arms concealed under their sacerdotal robes. But Farel was
undaunted, notwithstanding the unbridled fury of the clergy. He demanded
that his doctrines should be heard, assailed, and defended in public
disputation. This was, of course, refused. Farel, then, with great boldness
defended his doctrine, concluding with these words: “I have no authority
but that of God, whose messenger I am.” “He hath spoken blasphemy,”
exclaimed one of the judges, “What further need have we of witnesses? he
is guilty of death. Away with him! to the Rhone! to the Rhone! Better
that the wicked Lutheran die, than live and trouble the people.” “Speak the
words of God,” Farel quickly replied, “not the words of Caiaphas!” On
which all the assembly cried aloud with one voice, “Kill the Lutheran, kill
him!” They closed round the two evangelists, the priests were pulling out
their arms, and both must have perished, but for the interposition of the
two magistrates. They were ordered forthwith to leave the city.
But it was now too late. The Reform movement was really begun; God
was working and the priests were impatient to arrest the progress of His
grace. Nevertheless they were allowed to manifest the spirit of their leader.
When the evangelists left the episcopal tribunal, their were with difficulty
preserved from the fury of a mob of women, instigated by the priests,
who would have consigned the preachers, without trial or mercy, “to the
Rhone;” but as the Lord would have it, at the critical moment, a military
band came up which rescued the Reformers, and escorted them to their
lodgings.
It was now thought by the friends of Reform, that the preaching of Farel
was too powerful and his name too formidable, to begin the work in
Geneva; that he should retire for a time and that some unknown name
should carry on the work, now manifestly begun, in a quieter way. Farel
agreed, left the place, feeling he had done so little; but he had accomplished
more than he at that moment knew. Meanwhile several other preachers
had arrived; but we hear only of one Froment, or Fromentius, who turned
schoolmaster, seeking to introduce his doctrines to the parents through the
children and by means of classes, New Testaments, and books, which he
distributed. Still the Lord was working, and a number of influential people
were brought to the knowledge of the truth.
 1133
FAREL RETURNS TO GENEVA
In the December of 1533, Farel re-entered the gates of Geneva, determined
not again to leave it till the Reformation had been consummated there.
Peter Viret, of Orbe, arrived about the same time. Thus there were three
of the most powerful preachers of that period in Geneva — Farel, Viret,
and Froment. The internal struggle had been excited afresh by the
Reformers observing the Lord’s supper, according to its original
institution. Some of the rich and honorable of Geneva had united with
them, which caused great sensation. A fierce sedition was the consequence.
But the Catholics, still the stronger party, would listen to nothing but the
complete suppression of the new movement. They assembled with the
deliberate purpose of perpetrating a general massacre of the Reformers. “It
is affirmed,” says Waddington, “that they were conducted by no fewer
than five hundred armed priests; and that they were fortified by a carte
blanche from the bishop, expressing his approbation of every act that,
under any circumstances, they might be led to perform against the enemies
of the Catholic faith.” A number of women, with their aprons filled with
stones, helped to swell the Roman Catholic host. The tumult was allayed,
however, before much mischief was done. It happened that several
merchants from Friburg were in Geneva at that moment, and seeing the
Catholics brandishing swords and other weapons, they boldly interfered
and prevented them from carrying out their purpose. Two days afterwards
an edict of peace was issued by the Council of Sixty, which rather favored
liberty of conscience. Among other things they said, “It is forbidden to
preach anything that cannot be proved from Holy Writ.”
But these terms of pacification lasted but a short time. In less than six
weeks the Catholics broke forth again into a still ruder commotion,
attended by more serious consequences. Its instigator appears to have
been Canon Werali, a man of great strength, and a great warrior. It is said
that he could wield his battle-axe as he could fling about his breviary. He
headed the tumult, clothed in complete armor, and brandishing a two-edged
sword. After nightfall rumors of war were heard in the street, the tocsin
was sounded, and according to the habits of those times, most of the
inhabitants rushed into the street armed; but the darkness made it difficult
to distinguish between friend and foe. In the confusion, however, the great
 1134
papal champion was slain, and the Catholics dispersed. Werali being a
member of a noble and powerful family of the popish canton of Friburg,
that state had now a plausible pretext for interfering in the troubles of
Geneva by demanding the prosecution of the murderers of her citizen, and
for a general intervention in favor of the established religion. Thus were the
enemies of the Reformation greatly multiplied, and fresh troubles arose
through the violence of the Duke of Savoy, and the treachery of the
bishop. 5

A PUBLIC DISPUTATION
Many eyes, from all quarters, were now turned to the small town of
Geneva. Clement VII. and Charles V. were anxiously watching the struggle;
but God’s purpose was to bless, and He overruled all these commotions
for the accomplishment of His gracious object. After a great deal of
menacing and remonstrance between Berne and Friburg, the grand question
came to a public disputation.
On the 30th of May, 1535, the disputants met in the grand hall of the
Convent de Rive. Caroli, a doctor of the Sorbonne, and Chapuis, a
Dominican of Geneva, appeared as the champions of the church; while one
Bernard, a newly converted Franciscan, took the lead in defense of the
Reformed doctrines, supported by Farel, Viret, and Froment. Eight
members of council were appointed to preside, and four secretaries were
to take down all that was said on both sides. The disputation lasted four
weeks. Victory, as usual on such occasions, rested with the Reformers.
Indeed, it was so complete, that both Caroli and Chapuis acknowledged
themselves vanquished, and declared, in presence of the vast assembly,
their conversion to the Reformed faith. Multitudes professed their faith in
the truth as brought forward by the Reformers; and many ecclesiastics and
monks followed the stream.
But Rome’s resources were not yet exhausted; she had not given up hope.
The anathemas of the pope, the armed priests, the furious women, had all
failed; but to uphold the Catholic faith a darker deed was yet to be
perpetrated. It so happened that the three ministers, Farel, Viret, and
Froment, lodged in the house of Bernard, which gave a favorable
opportunity to cut off the three at once by poison. A woman was induced
 1135
to leave Lyons, on pretense of religion, and come to Geneva. She was
received into the house of Bernard as a servant. Shortly after she mixed her
poison with the dinner prepared for the ministers. Happily, however,
Froment dined elsewhere that day, and Farel, being indisposed, did not
dine; but Viret tasted the drugged dish, and was brought to the point of
death. He recovered, but the effects of the poison remained with him till
the end of his days. The wretched woman confessed the crime, but
accused a canon and a priest of having bribed her to commit the offense.
They denied the accusation by oath and were released, but the poor
woman was executed.
The miscarriage of this and several other cruel plots of the Catholics
opened the eyes of many, and tended greatly to hasten the downfall of the
Romish superstition in Geneva. The feeling of the public was now in favor
of Reform; but the council was disposed to check, rather than to encourage
the popular zeal. At length, however, after the sense of the great majority
of the citizens had been ascertained, the council of Two Hundred was
assembled, and the celebration of the mass was officially suspended. This
decree was followed by a general edict to the effect: “That the services of
God were thenceforward to be performed according to the statutes of the
gospel; and that all acts of papal idolatry were to cease altogether.” Ever
after that day the evangelical ministers preached with perfect freedom. The
monasteries were next invaded; and there were some startling revelations
of the frauds by which the people had been so long and so grossly
deluded, and the vast superstition upheld.

HOW THE MONKS DECEIVED THE PEOPLE

Many of these secret machinations and impostures are too vile to be
transferred to our pages; but one, which is more amusing than revolting,
we may quote. A number of strange lights, or small flames of fire, would
sometimes be seen moving about the churchyard at night, to the utter
amazement of the people. What could they be? was the question. “These,”
answered the priests gravely, “are souls from purgatory. They have come
to excite on their behalf the compassion of their living relatives. Will
fathers and mothers, husbands and wives, not freely give of their money
for prayers and masses that we may not have to return to the place of
torment? was their pitiful cry.” The effect of this imposture was another
 1136
golden harvest to the priests. But what were these livid lights and blue
flames really? They were simply a number of crabs with little bits of
candle stuck on their backs, the heat of which may have propelled their
movements. The enlightened public, indignant at having been so long
deceived, relieved the crabs of their fiery burdens, and threw them back
into the cool waters of the lake.6
Thus far the triumph of the Reformation was confined to the city of
Geneva. The next step was to extend it to the rural clergy. Ministers were
commissioned to instruct them, and to preach the new doctrines to their
congregations; and so effectual was this reasonable plan, that all the
dependent villagers speedily adopted the creed of the metropolis.

THE REFORMATION ESTABLISHED AT LAUSANNE

Lausanne and its territory are also to be included among the places in
which the Reformation was now established. In popish times this was a
city of great importance. It was the resort of pilgrims who flocked thither
to pray before the image of Our Lady, and to purchase indulgences; a
traffic which added greatly to the riches of the church. This city could
boast, besides its bishop, a chapter of thirty-two canons, a convent of
Dominicans, and another of Franciscans, and a numerous staff of priests;
but, with all the provision thus made for its religious instruction and
improvement, it was sunk even below the habitual ignorance, superstition,
and vice of the times. Farel’s first visit to Lausanne, in 1529, was
unsuccessful; but the current of ecclesiastical affairs had been running
strongly since then in favor of Reform; and when Viret visited the place in
the spring of 1536, the effect of his preaching was so great, that some
images were broken by the popular indignation, amidst the clamor of
priests and canons. After various negotiations between Berne and
Lausanne, a public disputation was called for by the Reformers. It lasted
eight successive days, and ended much the same as the one at Geneva had
done. Thus the triumph of the Reformation was also complete in
Lausanne.
The two chief results which generally followed these great religious
changes, and which were especially pursued by the Swiss Reformers, were
the purification of morality, and the advancement of education. Being
 1137
much in the spirit of Old Testament saints, the most rigid laws were
enacted against gambling, against blasphemous oaths, against farces, lewd
songs, dances, masquerades, and against every form of intemperance. We
find the enactment of such laws immediately following the triumphs of
Reform in all important places. It was particularly so at Geneva. There,
the citizens struck a new coin to commemorate the foundations of their
Protestantism, and adopted a new civic motto — “After darkness, light.”

THE ARRIVAL OF CALVIN IN GENEVA

During the August of 1536, amongst the crowds of exiles who were daily
arriving at the gates of Geneva, one presented himself, a Frenchman, a
native of Picardy, young, being only in his twenty-eighth year, of slender
figure, and pale face; he had come to rest for the night and depart on the
morrow. This man was John Calvin. But though young, and of a modest
bearing, he was not without celebrity, both as a scholar and a divine, nor
untried as a friend of the Reformation. He was on his way from Rome,
with the intention of fixing his permanent residence at Basle or Strasburg;
but the war, which was then raging between France and the Empire,
compelled him to take a circuitous route by Geneva. But the energetic
Farel thought that the author of the Christian Institutes was just the man
for Geneva, and urged him to remain. The God of all goodness, he thought,
had sent him at that critical moment.
Calvin replied that his education was yet incomplete; that he required still
further instruction and application before he should be qualified for so
difficult a position as the state of Geneva presented, and begged to be
allowed to proceed to Basle or Strasburg. On this, Farel raised his voice as
with the authority of a direct messenger from God, and said, “But I declare
to you on the part of God, that if you refuse to labor here along with us at
the Lord’s work, His curse will be upon you; since, under the pretense of
your studies, it is yourself that you are seeking, rather than Him.” Calvin
had hitherto thought that his proper sphere was his library, and the main
instrument of work his pen; but feeling overwhelmed by so authoritative a
declaration of the will of God, proceeding from so illustrious an apostle of
the Reformation, he did not dare to decline the yoke of the ministry
evidently imposed on him by the Lord. He gave his hand to Farel, and his
heart to the work of the Lord in Geneva. “He was immediately appointed
 1138
professor of theology, and soon afterwards minister of one of the principal
parishes. This double occupation afforded space enough for the display of
his great qualities, and opened the path to that singular influence, which he
afterwards acquired, both in church and state.”7 Here he labored for
twenty-eight years — with the exception of a brief banishment — and
became the great leader in the cause of Protestantism, and the most
illustrious chief of the Reformation.

THE EARLY HISTORY OF CALVIN

As the celebrated French Reformer is now established at Geneva, and will
be henceforth the central figure in the great Reform movement, it will be
interesting to the reader to know something of his early history. He was
born at Noyon in Picardy, July 10th, 1509. His parents were of moderate
fortune, but much respected by the people among whom they lived. His
father, Gerard, was secretary to the bishop, and was so esteemed by the
neighboring gentry, that his son John received his early education with the
children of a family of rank — the Mornors.
At the age of fourteen Calvin went to Paris, and had there for his Latin
tutor, in the college de la Marche, the celebrated Mathurin Cordier. One of
his books is still well known in some of our schools as Cordier’s
Colloquies. But he was more than an eminent teacher; he was a man of true
piety. Having embraced the Reformed faith, he ultimately removed to
Geneva, where he continued to labor as a teacher in the public college to
the end of his days. He died in 1564, about six months after his
distinguished pupil, at the advanced age of eighty-five.
Calvin, having fulfilled his course under Cordier, passed in 1526 to the
college of Montaigu, a seminary for the training of priests. As it was the
manner of those times for very young persons to hold even high
ecclesiastical offices, his father solicited, and obtained for him at the age of
twelve years, the chaplaincy of la Gesine, a small church in the
neighborhood. He had his crown shaven by the bishop, and, although not
yet admitted into priest’s orders, he became a member of the clergy.
 1139
CALVIN’S CONVERSION
It is with no small interest that we trace an intimate connection between
the conversion of Calvin and the Sorbonne of Paris. Lefevre, as we have
already seen, was the means of Farel’s conversion. ]it now appears that
another young man was listening to the lectures about the same time, and
brought to the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus. This was Peter
Robert Olivetan, born at Noyon, cousin to Calvin, and a few years older.
It was this same Olivetan who afterwards translated the Bible into French
from Lefevre’s version. When his cousin arrived in Paris, he made known
to him the gospel he had embraced. The young Calvin at that time was a
firm Romanist, and fortified himself against his cousin’s arguments by the
rigid observance of all the rites of his church.
“True religion,” said Olivetan, “is not that mass of ceremonies and
observances which the church imposes upon its followers, and which
separates souls from Christ. O my dear cousin, leave off shouting with the
papists, The fathers! The doctors! The church! and listen to the prophets
and apostles. Study the scriptures.” “I will have none of your new
doctrines,” answered Calvin, “their novelty offends me. I cannot listen to
you. Do you imagine that I have been trained all my life in error? No! I
will strenuously resist your attacks.” Olivetan put the Bible into his
hands, entreating him to study the word of God.
The Reformation at that time was agitating all the schools of learning.
Masters and students occupied themselves with nothing else — some, no
doubt, from mere curiosity, or to throw discredit upon the Reformers and
their new doctrines; but there was a general awakening of conscience, and a
readiness to believe the true gospel of the grace of God. Happily for
Calvin he was among the latter class. The Holy Scriptures, by the blessing
of God, separated him from Roman Catholicism, as they had done his
cousin Olivetan.
It is supposed that Calvin was under deep exercise of soul for more than
three years — from 1523 to 1527. D’Aubigne, who is the best authority
on this point, says, “Yet Calvin, whose mind was essentially one of
observation, could not be present in the midst of the great movement going
on in the world, without reflecting on truth, on error, and on himself.
Oftentimes, when alone, and when the voices of men had ceased to be
 1140
heard, a more powerful voice spoke to his soul, and his chamber became
the theater of struggles, as fierce as those in the cell at Erfurt. Through the
same tempests, both these great Reformers reached the haven of rest.” But
the conversion of Calvin lacks the thrilling interest which all have found
in the conversion of Luther, and chiefly from the absence of details. The
letters which he wrote to his father at this time, and also those of Olivetan
to his friends, have not been found. Theodore Beza, his most intimate
friend, says, “Calvin having been taught the true religion by one of his
relations named Peter Olivetan, and having carefully read the holy books,
began to hold the teaching of the Roman church in horror, and had the
intention of renouncing its communion.” Here, it is only the intention of
leaving Rome; but his own words in after life are positive: “When I was
the obstinate slave of the superstitions of popery,” he says, “and it
seemed impossible to drag me out of the deep mire, God by a sudden
conversion subdued me, and made my heart more obedient to His word.”
Thus we see the various spiritual links between the Sorbonne and the first
and greatest Reformers. “Farel,” says D’Aubigne, “is thepioneer of the
Reformation in France and Switzerland. He rushes into the wood, hews
down the giants of the forest with his axe. Calvin came after, like Melanc-
thon, from whom he differs indeed in character, but whom he resembles in
his part as theologian and organizer. These two men built up, settled, and
gave laws to the territory conquered by the first two Reformers.” And
Beza speaks of Lefevre as the man who “boldly began the revival of the
pure religion of Jesus Christ; and that from his lecture room issued many
of the best men of the age and of the church.”8

CALVIN A STUDENT OF LAW

The divine light which now filled the soul of Calvin, showed him the
midnight darkness of the church of Rome. That which once possessed to
his mind the most dazzling splendor, the weight of antiquity, and which he
believed to be the habitation of God and the very gate of heaven, was now
to his newly opened eyes the temple of idols and the very gate of
perdition. This we gather from the fact that he could no longer minister at
her altars, and he resigned his sacred office. Happily this was with the
consent of his father; and he immediately turned his attention to the study
of civil law at Orleans and at Bourges. But the lessons of the law, to which
 1141
he had now to listen, must have ill-suited the taste of one who had just
fled from the flames of martyrdom in Paris. “It is the magistrate’s duty,”
said his teacher, “to punish offenses against religion as well as crimes
against the state.” “What!” he would exclaim, “shall we hang a thief who
robs us of our purse, and not burn a heretic who robs us of heaven?” The
effect of such a maxim on the minds of the people, when taught and
amplified by the priests, would certainly destroy their sympathies, and
lead them to approve of the death of heretics. Such was the teaching of
Calvin and of Frenchmen at that time, and as it had an appearance of
justice, and professed to be applied for the protection of the true religion,
it took a firm hold of the superstitious mind, and may have left deeper
traces on Calvin’s own mind than he was aware of.

CALVIN GIVES UP THE STUDY OF CIVIL LAW

When at Bourges Calvin seems to have abandoned the study of the law,
and turned again to the church as he now saw it in the holy scriptures. He
applied himself to the study of the Greek language, and also to Hebrew
and Syriac, in order to the better understanding of the Old Testament, for
theology was still the favorite object of his attention. He was also most
willing to make known the truth to others in which he now believed and
delighted. Listeners flocked around him, and the solitude he loved became
impossible to him. “As for me,” he says, “inasmuch as being naturally
diffident and retiring, I have always preferred repose and tranquillity; I
began to seek for some hiding-place, and means of withdrawing myself
from the world, but, so far from obtaining my wish, every retreat and
every secluded spot were to me so many public schools.” But he was not
of those who are silent on what they believe. He preached in the secret
meetings at Bourges and at Paris. Theodore Beza says, “He advanced
wonderfully the cause of God in many families, teaching the truth not with
an affected language, to which he was always opposed, but with a depth
of knowledge and so much gravity of speech, that no man heard him
without being filled with admiration.”
Calvin once more ventured to Paris. He had fondly hoped that France
might be the sphere, and Paris the center of his work; but the violence of
the persecution compelled him to conceal both himself and his intentions.
He was now about twenty-four years of age, and full of zeal and activity.
 1142
One of his friends, Nicholas Cop, son of a citizen of Basle, who was first
physician to the king, and rector of the university of Paris, had to deliver
an oration according to custom on All Saints’ Day. What an opportunity,
suggested Calvin to his friend Cop, of having the gospel preached in the
most public of all the pulpits of Christendom! But, Cop feeling unequal to
the task of composing such an address, it was agreed that Calvin should
write and that Cop should read the oration. On the 1st of November,
1533, in the midst of the learned men of Paris, the rector delivered his
address to a silent and surprised audience. Calvin had forgotten to say
anything about the saints, though it was “All Saints’ Day,” but extolled
the grace of God as man’s only hope of pardon and salvation through the
precious sacrifice of Christ.
When the assembly rose, the storm burst forth. It was denounced as
treason against the saints, and a blow struck at the very foundations of
Rome. But Cop was the king’s first physician and a great favorite; what
was to be done? He was denounced by the Sorbonne to the parliament,
and to the executioner of heretics. Cop saw his danger in time, fled to
Basle, and so escaped the flames of martyrdom. Cop was gone, but his
friend Calvin was suspected of being the real author of the oration. The
lieutenant-criminal, the notorious John Morin, had orders to apprehend
him. While sitting safely, as he thought, in his obscurity, a fellow-student
rushed into his chamber, begging him to flee that instant; the serjeants were
at the outer gate. Dropping from the window by means of a sheet, he
escaped; and under the name of Charles Heppeville, clothed in a peasant’s
dress, with a garden hoe on his shoulder, he reached Angouleme, and was
received into the house of the Canon Louis du Tillet, where he stayed for
some time, and had a rich library at his service.

THE INSTITUTES PUBLISHED

Calvin was already occupied with his great work on the christian religion,
and may have collected some of his materials from Du Tillet’s library. But
being in peril of his life, he removed to Basle, the city of refuge for the
French exiles at that time. Here he completed and published the most
celebrated of all his writings, the Institutes of the Christian Religion.
The work appeared in the month of August, 1535.
 1143
“This was the first theological and literary monument of the French
Reformation,” says Felice. “Spreading abroad in the schools, the castles of
the gentry, the houses of the burghers, even the workshops of the people,
the Institutes became the most powerful of preachers. Round this book the
Reformers arrayed themselves as round a standard. They found in it
everything — doctrine, discipline, ecclesiastical organization; and the
apologist of the masters became the legislator of their children.” In his
dedicatory epistle to Francis I., he supplicated the king to examine the
confession of faith of the Reformers, so that, beholding them to be in
accordance with the Bible, he might treat them no longer as heretics. “It is
your duty, sire,” he says to the king, “to close neither your understanding
nor your heart against so just a defense, especially when the question is of
such high import, namely, how the glory of God shall be maintained on
earth... a matter worthy of your ears, worthy of your jurisdiction, worthy
of your royal throne.” But there is too good reason to believe that the king
never deigned to read the preface to the Institutes.
Calvin was now the acknowledged leader of the French Reformation.
Luther was too distant; Farel was too ardent; but Calvin had the solid
character and the lively sympathies suited to the French. He paid a visit
about this time to the justly celebrated Renee of France, daughter of Louis
XII., and duchess of Ferrara, one of the first provinces of Italy that
received the Reformation. Like her cousin, Margaret of Valois, she had
embraced the true gospel, and became the patroness of the persecuted
Reformers in Italy, for which she afterwards suffered severe persecution
though she was the daughter of a king. This visit established a friendship
which was never interrupted: we find Calvin addressing a letter to her
when on his death-bed.9
In 1536 Calvin was appointed pastor and professor at Geneva. The
religious, moral, intellectual, and even political revolution he brought into
that city with him, is beyond the limits of our “Short Papers.” His life and
labors have been often written. We will notice that which enters into the
plan of this history.
Calvin soon found that it was no easy post that he was called to occupy.
The people were just emerging from a state of ignorance, superstition, and
immorality, in which the city had been sunk for ages; and the corruption of
 1144
her “nine hundred” priests, had no doubt produced its own likeness in the
manners of the citizens. But all laxity of morals, and all amusements which
had that tendency, were sharply and sternly rebuked by Calvin and Farel
both publicly and privately. They were not only the avowed enemies of
the least vestige of popery, but they were strict disciplinarians. The
majority of the people were not yet prepared for such self-denial. They
had fought hard to cast off the yoke of Rome and the yoke of the Duke of
Savoy, and they were determined to resist what they thought the hardest
yoke of all — to give up all their pleasures and live according to a rigid
ecclesiastical discipline. Even many of those who had outwardly embraced
the Reformation doctrines were not in heart prepared for Calvin’s system.
His idea was to treat the state as a theocracy and compel the citizens to
conform to the law of God, under the threatened judgments of the Old
Testament.

CALVIN AND FAREL BANISHED FROM GENEVA

The Reformed ministers, as might have been expected, were soon involved
in stormy contests with their congregations. They were evidently
mistaken in seeking to bind a people, who had been accustomed to live
according to their own pleasure, to so rigid a system, without sufficient
moral training and preparation of heart by the grace of God. Immediately
after his settlement at Geneva, Calvin drew up a “Formulary of Christian
Doctrine and Discipline,” and set himself with the other ministers to
induce the citizens at large, in their popular assembly, to abjure popery,
and swear to observe the scheme of doctrine and order thus prepared for
them. Many objecting to do this, troubles arose, party spirit began to run
high; but as the ministers were unyielding, it resulted in their refusing to
celebrate the Lord’s supper among the people; and the citizens, on their
part, resolved to banish the ministers, and forbade them the use of their
pulpits.
In the year 1538, the two banished ministers, with sad hearts, left the city
on which they had bestowed much labor; but, as they have not informed
us, we will not conjecture their feelings as they turned their backs upon
Geneva. Farel went to Neufchatel, where he had formerly labored, and
where he remained till the end of his days. He there succeeded in
establishing the system of discipline which was opposed in Geneva; and
 1145
sought to serve the Lord and His church with all diligence till the year
1565, when he fell asleep in Jesus at the advanced age of seventy-six.

CALVIN AT STRASBURG — HIS WORK AND MARRIAGE

Calvin proceeded to Basle and thence to Strasburg, to which he had been
earnestly invited by the pastors of that city, Bucer and Capito. He was
immediately appointed a professor of divinity, and pastor of a
congregation composed of French refugees. Nothing could speak more
solemnly of the fierceness of the persecution which was at that time raging
in France than the fact that about fifteen thousand French exiles gathered
around Calvin to hear the gospel in their native tongue. And if fifteen
thousand were found in Strasburg alone, what numbers besides must have
fled to England, Germany, and other places! Here Calvin labored in
preaching and writing for three years. The advanced state of society, a
more polished congregation than the one he had left in Geneva, suited his
taste, and was as balm to his wounded heart. He republished his Institutes,
much enlarged, wrote his commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, and a
treatise on the Lord’s supper.
So happy was the stern severe disciplinarian in Strasburg, that he
consented to marry if his friends could find for him a suitable wife. The
first lady that was named was of noble birth and richly dowered; but
Calvin objected to marry one above his own degree; still, if the lady would
consent to learn the French language, he would give his final answer; but
this the lady refused to do, and that was the end of the first nomination.
Another lady was proposed, and Calvin, in this case, made certain
advances himself, but, happily, he discovered in time sufficient reasons for
not going farther. At last, by the advice of his friend Bucer, he married
Idolette de Bure, a widow of deep piety and christian courage. The reader
will readily recall and contrast the impulsive, hasty, and unseasonable
marriage of Luther, with the matrimonial negotiations of Calvin, so
characteristic of the two great Reformers.10

CALVIN’S RETURN TO GENEVA

But while Calvin was thus happily employed at Strasburg, everything was
falling into great disorder, both political and religious on the banks of the
 1146
Leman. The libertines, Anabaptists, and papists, now that the stern
Reformers were gone, became riotous and ungovernable, while some of the
magistrates, who had made themselves leaders in the violent proceeding
against the ministers, came to a most tragic end. These troubles and these
judgments, led the people to believe that they had sinned against God in
banishing His faithful ministers, and to cry aloud for their return. The
council of two hundred resolved in 1540, “in order that the honor and
glory of God may be promoted, to seek all possible means to have Master
Calvin back as preacher.” And it was ordered in the general council, or
assembly of the people, “to send to Strasburg to fetch Master Jean
Calvinus, who is very learned, to be minister in this city.”
Besides these assurances of a warm welcome, an honorable deputation was
sent to him from the council to solicit his return. But the very thought of
going back to Geneva greatly troubled him. He dreaded the coarse rough
abuse which he had received from his rude opponents — especially the
libertines. And was he again to leave his peaceful and happy situation in
Strasburg, and plunge into that sea of troubles. Yet he wished to do the
will of the Lord and to follow His guidance. Besides his official invitations,
he had letters from private christian friends urging him to return. One of
them, pressing his return, assures him “that he will find the Genevese a
new people — become such by the grace of God, and through the
instrumentality of Viret.” The pastors of Zurich also pressed his return,
urging the vast importance of the situation of Geneva, as situated on the
confines of Germany, Italy, and France.
At length he consented to return, but in real subjection of heart to what he
believed to be the will of his Lord and master. “There is no place under
heaven,” he said, “that I more dread than Geneva, yet I would decline
nothing that might be for the welfare of that church.” And writing to Farel,
informing him of his decision, he says, “Since I remember that I am not my
own, nor at my own disposal, I give myself up, tied bound, as a sacrifice
to God.” His departure took place on the l$th of September, 1541. A
mounted herald from Geneva rode before him; and the proceedings which
accompanied his reception were highly honorable to all parties
concerned.11
 1147
CALVIN AND SERVETUS
The condemnation and death of Michael Servetus, the arch-heretic, at
Geneva, have always been spoken of, both by Romish and Protestant
writers, as a deep stain on the otherwise unsullied reputation of the great
Reformer. But, in judging of Calvin’s connection with this melancholy
affair, we must bear in mind the mighty difference between the sixteenth
and the nineteenth centuries. Many of the leading Reformers, both in
Germany and Switzerland, believed it a duty to punish heresy with death.
Yet notwithstanding these considerations, Calvin’s conduct in the matter
must be utterly condemned by every enlightened Christian. And we are
apt to wonder, in the nineteenth century, why such a student of scripture
did not see the grace which shines throughout the New Testament. The
Christian is saved by grace, stands in grace, and ought, surely, to be the
witness of grace in an evil world. Besides, we have the example and
teaching of our Lord, “who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when
he suffered he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth
righteously.” And in his sermon on the Mount, he thus teaches his
disciples — “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to
them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and
persecute you; that ye may be the children of your Father which is in
heaven: for he maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and
sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust... Be ye, therefore, perfect, even
as your Father which is in heaven is perfect:” which simply means, Be ye
perfect according to the perfect pattern of grace which is here shown by
your heavenly Father.
But, strange to say, Calvin not only overlooked all such scriptures, but
considered “Nebuchadnezzar as highly hon-oured in scripture for
denouncing capital punishment against any who should blaspheme the
God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; and doubts not that, had a
pious and zealous christian magistrate been at hand, St. Paul would
willingly have delivered over Hymenaeus and Alexander to him, to receive
the chastisement they deserved.” But while charity is ready to grant that
these were more the errors of the age than of the man, we must bear in
mind, that unless we have Christ before us as our example and rule of life,
we shall not be effectually delivered from such legal thoughts in any age.
 1148
Moses and Elias must disappear, and Jesus be found alone. If we say that
we abide in Him, we ought also to walk even as He walked.

THE CHARACTER AND EXECUTION OF SERVETUS

Michael Servetus was a Spaniard, born in the same year with Calvin; of an
active, vigorous mind; capable of applying himself to various pursuits;
but, unfortunately, too speculative in divine things. He had studied
medicine, law, and theology; in the latter, he was led away by a daring,
self-confident spirit, into the wildest extravagances of pantheism,
materialism, and a virulent opposition to the doctrine of the Trinity. But
under all this heresy, like the Anabaptists — the celestial prophets — he
was seditious and revolutionary. Such men generally aim at the overthrow
of existing governments, as well as Christianity. This was the great sin,
and the real cause of the persecution of the Anabaptists in those days.
They followed the Reformers into every country, and sought to upset
their work by affirming that they only went half way, and that Christians
— like themselves — should rule the state as well as the church — that
the time was come for the saints to take the kingdoms of this world.
Just before Servetus came to Geneva, he had escaped from the prison at
Vienna, where he had been confined for the publication of an offensive and
blasphemous work, and where he was afterwards burned in effigy, with
five bales of his books. Calvin, who knew him well, and had exposed his
herestes years before this affair at Vienna, is represented as saying, “If
Servetus came to Geneva, and his influence could prevent it, he should not
go away alive.” Servetus did come, and Calvin informed the council of his
arrival, and drew up the articles of indictment from his writings, which led
to his condemnation and death. These charges he was required by the
council to retract, deny, explain, or defend, as he should see good. For this
preparation he was allowed all the time he demanded. But in place of
conciliating enemies, or making friends by a spirit of sobriety and
moderation when he made his defense, he conducted himself in the most
insolent manner. He gave to Calvin the lie direct over and over again, and
called him by such names as “Simon the sorcerer.” Particulars of this case
were sent to several other states for an opinion; and it was said, “With one
consent they all pronounced that he has revived the impious errors with
which Satan of old disturbed the church; and is a monster not to be
 1149
endured.” With these concurring opinions, and the council of Geneva being
unanimous, he was condemned to be led to Champel, and there burned
alive.
The wretched man, up to the last, showed no signs of repentance, but the
most dreadful fear of death. When Calvin heard the sentence, he was
greatly affected, and interceded with the council, not that Servetus might
be spared, but that his sentence might be mitigated; he prayed that the
sword might be substituted for the fire — decapitation for burning. But
this was refused; and on 27th of October, 1553, he was led to the summit
of Champel, where the stake had been fixed. At the first glare of the
flames, it is said, Servetus gave a shriek so terrible, that it made the crowd
fall back, and was heard at a great distance. His books were burned with
him, but the fire burned slowly, and he lived half-an-hour at the stake.12

CALVIN’S WORK
In the midst of the many conflicts in which Calvin was engaged, he was
unwearied in his pastoral labors, and in his endeavors to expose and to
counteract errors both in church and state, and to diffuse light and truth in
all the churches. “Through the fame and the influence of this distinguished
theologian, the Geneva church rapidly increased in numbers, and was
looked upon as the center of the Reformed cause. At his suggestion a
college was established by the senate in 1558, in which he and Theodore
Beza, along with others of great erudition and high talents, were the
teachers. This seat of learning soon acquired so great fame that students
resorted to it from England, Scotland, France, Italy, and Germany, in
pursuit of sacred as well as secular learning.” By this means, the principles
of the Reformation spread widely over the various countries of Europe.
“To John Calvin the Protestant churches must ever owe a deep debt of
gratitude, and, among Presbyterians in particular, his memory will be
embalmed, as having given to their system of church polity the weight of
his influence and name.” Along with this beautiful notice from “Faiths of
the World,” we are bound to add a line from the very solid Mr. Fry, an
episcopalian historian: “Geneva soon sunk in estimation with the church
of England, because of the countenance she gave to the Presbyterian form
of church government, and of the violent attack by some of her divines
 1150
upon the ancient episcopal government, which was still retained with
considerable splendor in England and in Ireland.” — Page 487.
The published works of Calvin are most voluminous. The Geneva edition
amounted to twelve volumes, folio. The Amsterdam edition — said to be
the best — by using larger paper, and printing closer, was reduced to nine
volumes. A translation has also been published by the “Calvin Society,” in
fifty-four volumes octavo. These contain his commentaries, expository
lectures, miscellaneous pieces, the Institutes, and the author’s
correspondence. The commentaries, no doubt, have formed the foundation
on which the young divines of the Calvin school, from that day until now,
have built up their studies; and in this respect, who can speak of the
greatness or the effects of his work? But besides these works that have
come down to us, we must bear in mind that a considerable amount of time
is spent with such public men in seeing visitors from all parts of the
world. Then there is the daily public ministration of the word, and public
business of every kind. His advice or counsel by letter, for the help of
other churches, is also expected. “When we think of his letters,” says one
of his admirers, “written on the affairs of greatest weight, addressed to the
first men of position and intellect in Europe; so numerous are they, that it
might have been supposed he wrote letters and did nothing besides. When
we turn to his commentaries, so voluminous, so solid, and so impregnated
with the spirituality, and fire, and fragrance of the divine word, again, it
would seem as if we had before us the labors of a lifetime.”13

CALVIN AND CALVINISM

Whether we agree with the doctrinal teaching of Calvin, and the style in
which he treated some of his subjects, we must give him full credit for
zeal, devotedness, and industry. In a feeble and sickly body, and in a
comparatively short lifetime, he accomplished a great work. It is to be
feared, however, that some of his extreme statements, and his harsh
language as to “reprobation,” and “the reprobate,” unsanctioned, we
believe, by scripture, have done much harm to many precious souls. “But
the fact, I believe is,” says Scott, “that there was a coldness and hardness
about Calvin’s mind, which led him sometimes to regard as objects of mere
intellect those things, which could not but deeply move the feelings of
minds differently constituted; and hence, I cannot but concur, he did not
 1151
duly appreciate the effect of the language he was using upon other
persons. And to these extreme statements and this obnoxious language, I
must think, is to be traced a considerable portion of that storm of obloquy
and odium which has not ceased to beat upon the head of Calvin and
Calvinism to this day.”14

THE CLOSING DAYS OF CALVIN

But, though we may not be able to follow the learned theologian in his vast
researches, or to receive the doctrines which he taught, we shall feel that he
is of one heart and one mind with us, as we gather around his death-bed.
His old and faithful friend, Farel, hearing of the serious illness of Calvin,
wrote to say he must come and see him. He was then seventy-five, and in
feeble health. Calvin, wishing to save him the fatiguing journey,
immediately dictated the following brief and affectionate reply: “Farewell,
my best and most faithful brother; and, since it is God’s pleasure that you
should survive me in this world, live in the constant remembrance of our
union, which, in so far as it was useful to the church of God, will still bear
for us abiding fruit in heaven. Do not expose yourself to fatigue for my
sake. I respire with difficulty, and continually expect my breath to fail me;
but it is enough for me that I live and die in Christ, who to His people in
life and death is gain. Once more, farewell to thee, and to all the brethren,
thy colleagues. — Geneva, May 2nd, 1564.”
The good old man, however, a few days afterwards, came to Geneva, and
spent a little time with his friend in his sick-chamber; but history has not
recorded what passed between them. Unlike Luther, who was always
surrounded with admiring friends, who immediately chronicled all he said
or did, and thereby gave a dramatic character to every incident of his life;
we know nothing of the homely, familiar social life of Calvin, which
greatly detracts from the interest of one who is made a central figure.
Having seen the members of the senate, and the ministers under the
jurisdiction of Geneva, and having faithfully and affectionately addressed
them, he felt that his work was done. The remainder of his days he passed
in almost perpetual prayer. As he was repeating the words of the apostle,
“The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with
 1152
the glow to be... ”without being able to finish, he breathed his last, May
27th, 1564.
“He lived,” says Beza, “fifty-four years, ten months, and
seventeen days; half of which time he passed in the sacred
ministry. His stature was of a middle size, his complexion dark and
pale, his eyes brilliant even unto death, expressing the acuteness of
his understanding. He lived nearly without sleep. His power of
memory was almost incredible; and his judgment so sound, that his
decisions often seemed oracular. In his words he was sparing, and
he despised an artificial eloquence; yet was he an accomplished
writer, and, by the accuracy of his mind, and his practice in
dictating to an amanuensis, he attained to speak little differently
from what he would have written... Having given with good faith
the history of his life and of his death, after sixteen years’
observation of him, I feel myself warranted to declare that in him
was proposed to all men an illustrious example of the life and death
of a Christian, so that it will be found as difficult to emulate as it is
easy to calumniate him.”15
 1153

CHAPTER 50
THE REFORMATION IN FRANCE

The history of the Reformation in France awakens, as we approach it, the

most mingled feelings. The wonderful progress of the truth in that gay,
frivolous, and dissolute kingdom, creates the deepest interest, gratitude,
and admiration, while the enemies’ opposition and triumph fill the heart
with deepest sorrow. It was then a great nation, and early blessed with the
doctrines of the Reformation. Four years before the voice of Luther or
Zwingle was heard, the university of Paris had been convulsed by the
proclamation of a free salvation to the chief of sinners, through faith in
Christ, without works of human merit. The doctrine of the Reformation
was not, therefore, imported from Germany or Switzerland, but was the
native fruit of French soil. We cannot but lament that a kingdom so great,
so central, so intelligent, did not throw off the papal yoke like England,
Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, and the half of Germany. But dearly she has
had to pay in her periodical revolutions for the rejection of the light. The
two elements, the gospel of the grace of God, and the superstitions of
Rome, strove mightily with each other, and produced the most violent
struggles and the most tragic scenes that history has recorded.
The awakening of souls by divine grace, to the importance of the truth,
evidently commenced, as we have already seen, by means of James
Lefevre, then nearly seventy years of age, and his youthful convert,
William Farel. Then came Olivetan; and he, in his turn, was the means of
leading Calvin to the knowledge of Jesus. In the commentary published by
Lefevre, as early as 1512, he says, “It is God who gives us, by faith, that
righteousness, which by grace alone justifies to eternal life.” These few
words — as in the case of Luther when he discovered the great truth —
“The just shall live by faith” — show us plainly that the doctor of the
Sorbonne, as well as the monk of Erfurt, was taught of God, that divine
light had: filled his own soul, and that this heavenly ray was sufficient to
illumine the souls of others. And thus we find it. While Lefevre was
sowing the seed of eternal life in his lecture room, Farel, now fully
 1154
emancipated from the superstitions of Rome, and well instructed in the
gospel of Christ, was preaching outside with great boldness. “Young and
resolute,” says Felice, “he caused the public places to resound with his
voice of thunder;” and being now master of arts, he had the privilege of
lecturing in the celebrated college of the cardinal Lemoine, one of the four
principal colleges of the theological faculty in Paris, equal in rank to the
Sorbonne. Other young evangelists were also engaged in preaching the
gospel and circulating the truth.
The priests and the doctors of the Sorbonne became greatly alarmed for
the interests of holy mother church; and the university issued a formal
declaration condemnatory of the new opinions. But before going farther in
the order of events, it may be well to notice the entrance upon the scene of
three persons, on whose will the destinies of France henceforth
depended; namely, Francis I., Margaret, his sister, and their mother,
Louisa of Savoy, countess of Angouleme.
The good king Louis XII., styled the father of his people, died on the 1st
of January, 1515. No sovereign of France had before been so honored and
loved; his death struck consternation into all hearts. When his funeral
passed along the streets to the cathedral of Notre Dame, the public criers
headed the procession, ringing their bells, and proclaiming in a voice almost
inaudible through tears, “Le bon rot Louis, pere du peuple, est mort” —
“the good king Louis, the Father of his people, is dead.” Judging from
circumstances, had the Reformation taken place during his reign, the whole
of France might have become protestant; but his successor was a prince of
a widely different character.
On the 25th of January, 1515, Francis of Angouleme, duke of Valois and
cousin to the king, was crowned at Rheims with great display. He was of
tall stature, handsome in person, possessed of every accomplishment as a
cavalier and a soldier, but of dissolute character, and following rashly
wherever his passions led him. His education, however, under de Boisy,
his tutor, had not been neglected, so that he was considered the most
learned prince in France, and greatly honored literature and learned men.
His queen, Claude, is little spoken of, but his sister Margaret, afterwards
queen of Navarre, always occupies a prominent place. She was his senior
by two years, had great influence over her brother, and being early
 1155
converted, and amongst the first to embrace the Reformed doctrines, she
often sheltered the persecuted, and succeeded in moving the king’s heart to
clemency. But state policy, his pretended zeal for the church, and the
influence of the parliament and the Sorbonne, frequently proved stronger
than his sister’s love. Like her brother, she was tall, extremely beautiful,
fascinating in her manners, and possessed of a great mind and ability, both
natural and acquired. But after her conversion, all her powers, due
allowance being made for the times and her position, were consecrated to
the Lord and His people.
In the history of these remarkable persons, we have an instructive and an
important illustration of the effect of grace and truth on the heart and in
the life. They were the only children of Louisa, who was only twenty
years old when she became a widow. Her daughter Margaret had not
attained her fourth year; while the infant Francis had just completed his
fifteenth month. Brave of heart, highly gifted, and strong in the
consciousness of duty, Louisa applied herself in every possible way to the
responsibilities of her position. Her two cherished children became the
objects of her affection and of her unceasing care, for which she was fully
repaid in after life by the devotion of her children; though, morally, they
pursued such widely different paths. But we must now return to the more
direct line of our history.

FIRST-FRUITS OF THE REFORMATION

Meaux was the first city in France that heard the doctrines of the
Reformation publicly expounded, and where the first-fruits of the gospel
were gathered. About twenty-five miles east of Paris, and not far distant
from the then Flemish frontier; it was a place full of working people —
mechanics, wool-carders, fullers, cloth-makers, and artisans. The bishop of
the place, William Brissonnet, a man of high rank, being count of
Montbrun, became a convert to the new doctrines. Being a man of noble
family, and of imposing address, he had been twice sent ambassador of
Francis I. to the Holy See; but he returned to Paris less a son of the church
than he had been before going. He may, like Luther, have had his eyes
opened to the dazzling wickedness of Rome, and to the utter hollowness
of her gorgeous ceremonies.
 1156
On his return from his diplomatic missions, he was astonished to find the
interest which had been awakened, and the change which had been wrought
by the preaching of the new doctrines. The universities were full of debate
and tumult on the subject, and the hearts of the artisans in his own diocese
were greatly moved by the tidings of the gospel which had reached them.
This was in 1521, four years after Luther had affixed his thesis to the door
of his cathedral, and the very year in which he appeared before the Diet of
Worms. The proximity of Meaux to Flanders, and the similarity of its
trade to that of the larger Flemish towns occasioned a degree of intercourse
between them, which doubtless contributed to the spread of the new
opinions.
The bishop, evidently a pious, humble, but timid man, sought an interview
with Lefevre, that he might be better instructed in the new doctrines. The
aged doctor placed the Bible in the prelate’s hands, assuring him that it
was the Bible, and the Bible only, which ever leads the soul back to the
truth as it was in the beginning of the gospel of Christ. Before there were
schools, sects, ceremonies, or traditions, the truth was the means, and the
Holy Spirit the power, of salvation. He searched the scriptures with great
diligence; and, with the Lord’s blessing, they became a source of great
happiness to him. Writing to Margaret, over whom he exercised a
wholesome influence, he says, “The sayour of divine food is so sweet,
that it renders the mind insatiable; the more one tastes, the more one
desires it. What vessel is able to receive the exceeding fullness of this
inexhaustible sweetness?”1

THE CONVERSION OF MARGARET

Many of the eminent men who composed the court of Francis at this time,
and who enjoy the confidence of the king, were favorably disposed
towards the doctrines of Lefevre and the bishop. They were literary men
whom Francis and Margaret had already encouraged and protected from
the attacks of the Sorbonne, which regarded the study of Hebrew and
Greek as the most pernicious of heresies. Francis, who loved learning,
invited into his states learned men, thinking says Erasmus, “in this manner
to adorn and illustrate his age in a more magnificent manner than he could
have done by trophies, pyramids, or by the most pompous structures.”
For a time he was carried away by the influence of his sister, by
 1157
Brissonnet, and the learned men of his court. He would often be present at
the conversations of the learned, listening with delight to their discussions.
It was then that he prepared the way for the word of God by founding
Hebrew and Greek Professorships.
But there is one thing to be borne in mind respecting the favor shown by
many learned men to the idea of Reform, at that time. They, no doubt, felt
the power and the truth of the doctrines set forth by the Reformers, but
were not prepared to separate from the communion of the church of
Rome. They felt and owned the need of Reform, and hoped that Rome and
her priesthood would take the lead in the needed Reformation, and iu this
way have their hopes realized. But there was one in that brilliant circle
whose convictions were deeper; whose conscience was at work, and who
was diligently reading the New Testament in the Greek tongue. Such was
the gifted Margaret of Angouleme. But she was unhappy; she was sad
at heart amidst the gateties of the court. Francis was passionately fond of
his sister whom he always called his “darling,” and Margaret was not less
devoted in affection to her brother. They had grown up together, wandered
in the fields and gardens together as children, and for a time their lives and
tastes were one. But the time was come when they must be parted —
parted morally at least.
The time, too, when this moral divergence took place, made it the more
trying. Her grace and beauty made her the ornament of her brother’s court,
and he wished her to be always at his side. “Francis,” says Wylie, “after
wavering some time between the gospel and Rome, between the pleasures
of the world and the joys that are eternal, made at last his choice, but, alas!
on the opposite side to that of his lovely and accomplished sister. Casting
in his lot with Rome, and staking crown and kingdom and salvation upon
the issue, he gave battle to the Reformation.” The mother alas! followed
her son in all the intrigues and dissimulation of state policy. She exercised
the most unbounded influence over the king, and some of the calamities of
France are attributed to her unjustifiable policy. He constituted her regent
of France, during his absence on his Italian campaign, to the great
mortification of his parliament.
Margaret, through divine grace, was led, chiefly by means of Brissonnet,
to clearer and fuller views of the gospel, and to a saving knowledge of the
 1158
Lord Jesus. This took place about the year 1521, just as the persecution
was beginning to burst forth, and many of the persecuted found within her
gates a shelter which a merciful providence had provided against the evil
days that were at hand.
The influence of Margaret’s conversion was felt among the high
personages of the court, and the literary circles of the capital. The surprise
was great, and all talked of the king’s sister embracing the new opinions.
Those who sought to arrest the work of the Lord sought the ruin of
Margaret. She was denounced to the king, but he pretended to think it was
untrue. Meanwhile, says Brantome, “she was very kind, mild, gracious,
charitable, affable, a great almsgiver, despising nobody, and winning all
hearts by her excellent qualities.” The heart loves to dwell on such an
instance of the rich sovereign grace of God, in the midst of the corruption
and frivolities of the court of Francis. But God would have His witnesses
and light-bearers even in the palace in the morning of the Reformation. The
dear young Christian, however, was severely tried. Her struggles between
conscience and what was expected of her were great and frequent. “The
timid heart of the princess,” says D’Aubigne, “trembled before the anger
of the king. She was constantly wavering between her brother and her
Savior, and could not resolve to sacrifice either... However, such as she is,
she is a pleasing character on the page of history. Neither Germany nor
England present her parallel.” Her light, we have no doubt, was often
clouded and her testimony silenced by the angry looks of the king, as he
manifested his hatred of the Reformation, and of the friends whom
Margaret loved. But the Lord was with her though her feminine character
may have sometimes drawn her into the shade.

THE REFORMATION OF BRISSONNET

The courtly bishop was a constant and welcome guest at the palace. It was
there he put the Bible into the hands of Margaret; and the friendship he
enjoyed with Francis gave him many opportunities of spreading the new
doctrines among the philosophers and scholars whom that monarch loved
to assemble around him. And being a bishop, and in such favor at court, he
had many listeners, and it may be to this period, and to such conversions
as Brissonnet and Margaret, that we should trace the inclination of so
many French nobles to embrace Protestantism. But the king and a large
 1159
majority of the people remained faithful to Rome, and many of the
nobility, intimidated by her threatenings and martyrdoms, hesitated, drew
back, until at length their convictions waned in their minds, and left them
captives to the darkness from which they lacked the moral courage to
extricate themselves.2
Brissonnet, now full of zeal for the Reformation of. the church, determined
to set the example by reforming his own diocese. On his return from Paris
to Meaux; he inquired into the lives and doctrines of the preachers, and
discovered that nearly all the pulpits were filled with Franciscan monks,
while the deans, the incumbents, vicars, and curates, spent their time in
idleness and their revenues in Paris. He ascertained that throughout his
diocese there were scarcely ten resident priests, and out of one hundred
and twenty-seven curates, there were only fourteen whom the bis.hop
could approve of or permit to officiate in his diocese; Then. the bishop,
turning towards men, who did not belongto his clergy, called around him,
not only his old friend Lefevre, but Farel, D’Arvande, Roussel, and
Francis Vatable. Thus the light of the gospel was gradually withdrawn
from Paris, where God in His sovereign grace had kindled its earliest
sparks; and thither the persecutors were determined to follow, but as yet
the tempest is forbidden to burst. The Reformers must be protected by
the hand of a divine providence until their work is more complete.3

THE BIBLE IN FRENCH AT MEAUX

Like our English Wycliffe, the aged Lefevre greatly desired that every man
in France should have the privilege of reading the holy scriptures in his
mother tongue. For this he labored, and with the assistance of Brissonnet,
the four Gospels in French were published in October, 1522; the remaining
books of the New Testament soon followed; and in October, 1524, a
complete edition of the New Testament was published at Meaux. There
the great fountain of light was first introduced which placed the work on a
solid basis, and there the first Protestant congregation publicly assembled.
The pious bishop greatly furthered this good work by his wealth and his
zeal. The word of God was speedily and widely circulated, the poor were
supplied gratis. Never did a prelate devote his income to nobler purposes,
and never did a seed time promise to bear a more glorious harvest. The
 1160
preachers transferred from Paris to Meaux, and finding themselves
unfettered, were acting with great liberty, while the word of God was
diligently read in the homes and workshops of the people. The effect was
sudden and great. Divine light had taken the place of papal darkness. The
new book became the theme of their constant conversation, for while they
handled their spindles and their combs, they could talk to each other of
some fresh discovery they had made in the Gospels or the Epistles; and so
the villagers in the vineyards, when the meal-hours came, one read aloud,
while the others gathered round him. “There was engendered in many,”
says a chronicler of that day, “an ardent desire for knowing the way of
salvation, so that artisans, fullers, and wool-combers took no other
recreation, as they worked with their hands, than to talk with each other of
the word of God, and to comfort themselves with the same. Sundays and
holidays especially were devoted to the reading of scripture, and inquiring
into the good pleasure of the Lord.”
The following quotation from a Catholic historian, though hostile, bears
witness to the positive influence of the word of God on the people.
“Lefevre, aided by the renown of his great learning, contrived so to cajole
and circumvent Messire Brissonnet with his plausible talk, that he caused
him to turn aside grievously, so that it has been impossible to this day to
free the city and diocese of Meaux from that pestilent doctrine, where it
has so marvellously increased. The misleading that good bishop was a
great injury, as until then he had been so devoted to God and to the Virgin
Mary.”4

THE BLESSED EFFECTS OF THE WORD OF GOD

These simple people soon became better instructed than their former
teachers, the Franciscan monks. Christianity had taken the place of
superstition, and the word of God had revealed Christ to their souls as the
sun and center of divine light. They now saw that praying to the saints is
idolatry; that Christ is the only Mediator between God and man; and that
the throne of grace is open to all. Meaux had thus become a focus of light;
tidings of the great work spread through France, so that it became a
proverb with reference to anyone noted for the new opinions that “he had
drunk at the well of Meaux.”
 1161
The preaching of the new ministers was for a time confined to private
assemblies; but as the number of their hearers increased, they gained
courage and ascended the public pulpits. The bishop preached in his turn;
he entreated his flock to lend no ear to those who would turn them aside
from the word of God; even if an angel from heaven were to preach
another gospel, be sure you do not listen to him. Lefevre, energetically
expounding the word on one occasion, exclaimed, “Kings, princes, nobles,
peoples, all nations should think and aspire after Christ alone!... Come
near, ye pontiffs, come ye kings, come ye generous hearts!...Nations
awake to the light of the gospel, and inhale the heavenly life. The word of
God is all-sufficient!” And this, henceforth became the motto of that
school: THE WORD OF GOD IS ALL-SUFFICIENT.
Thus the ray of light which we have seen shining through the darkness of
prejudice about the year 1512, when Lefevre proclaimed from the tribune
of the popish Sorbonne the futility of works without faith, declared the
one Mediator between God and man; and boldly denounced the idolatry of
those who invocated, and offered prayers to the Virgin and the saints.
That divine ray was not suffered to become extinct. Four nearly twelve
years it has been expanding until, like a beacon in the surrounding gloom, it
is showing thousands and tens of thousands the way of life and peace, and
how to avoid the ways of death and hell. 5

COMMENCEMENT OF PERSECUTION IN FRANCE

We must now look at the other side of the picture. If the young flock of
Meaux was peacefully feeding on the green pastures under the bishop’s
care, the monks, who cared little for the green pastures of the gospel, were
losing their influence and their revenues, and the begging friars were
returning home from their rounds with empty wallets. “These new
teachers are heretics,” said they; “and they attack the holiest of
observances, and deny the most sacred mysteries.” Then, growing bolder,
the most incensed among them proceeded to the palace. On being admitted
they said to the prelate, “Crush this heresy, or else the pestilence, which
is already desolating the city of Meaux, will spread over the whole
kingdom.” Brissonnet was moved, and for a moment disturbed by the
audacious monks, but did not give way. Yet admirable as were the piety
and zeal of the bishop, he was of a timid and temporizing nature when
 1162
danger assailed him. He lacked the firmness and constancy of spirit which
enables some men, in days of persecution, to yield life rather than
conscience and truth; and so he fell, yielding truth and conscience, and
saving his life and liberty.
The monks, enraged at their unfavourable reception by the bishop,
determined to lay their complaints before a higher tribunal. They hastened
to Paris, and denounced the bishop before the Sorbonne and the
parliament. “The city of Meaux,” said they, “and all the neighborhood, are
infected with heresy, and its polluted waters flow from the episcopal
palace.” Thus was the cry of heresy raised, and France soon heard the cry
raised of persecution against the gospel. The notorious Syndic, Noel
Bede, eagerly listened. War was his native element. Shortly before the
accession of Francis to the throne, he had been elected the head of the
Sorbonne; so that he felt bound to wage war against any assertion or
dogma at variance with the philosophy of the schools, or the articles of the
Romish faith. “He eagerly dissected the writings of the Reformers,” says
Miss Freer, “to drag forth their errors, and exhibit them in triumph to the
hostile Sorbonnists. His fiery oratory raged against the study of the Greek
and Hebrew languages; and Paris and the university rang again with the
angry protests of the irascible Syndic. His expressions of fanatic joy at the
prospect of the war he was about to wage, caused a thrill of horror to
pervade the university. No one dare pronounce himself, when the cruel
scrutiny of Beda might detect heresy, where none but himself even
dreamed that it existed.” Such was the man that the timid Brissonnet had
to face, along with others of a like spirit. “In a single Beda,” Erasmus used
to say, “there are three thousand monks.”
The defeat of Pavia, where the flower of the French nobility fell, and
where the knightly monarch was made the prisoner of Charles V., and
carried to Madrid, made Louisa, the king’s mother, Regent of France.6 This
augured badly for the Reformers; for she inherited the Savoy enmity to the
gospel, and had become the leader of a licentious gallantry, which not only
polluted the court of her son, but proved a great hindrance to the spread of
the pure gospel.
 1163
BRISSONNET ACCUSED OF HERESY
As regent, she proposed the following question to the Sorbonne: “By
what means can the damnable doctrines of Luther be chased and extirpated
from this most christian kingdom?” The answer was brief, but emphatic —
“By the stake.” And it was added, that if the remedy was not soon put in
force, there would result great damage to the honor of the king, and of
Madame Louisa of Savoy. Thus it was, according to a usual hollow
pretense to uphold the throne, maintain the laws and order, that the
authorities were compelled to unsheath the sword of persecution. The
parliament was convoked. Brissonnet was summoned to appear. Beda and
the monks of Meaux carried on the prosecution against the bishop and his
friends, the Reformers, with unflagging vindictiveness. He was accused of
holding Lutheran doctrines. The French edition of the New Testament, the
joint labor of Brissonnet and Lefevre, was vehemently denounced;
especially Lefevre’s preface, addressed “to all christian readers.” Beda had
extracted from this address, and other works published at Meaux, forty-
eight propositions which were declared by the faculty of theology to be
heretical.
Brissonnet now saw what was before him; he must abandon the new
doctrines, or go to prison, perhaps to the stake. He had not the courage
necessary for resistance. Naturally timid, the menaces of Beda terrified
him. Besides, he was persuaded by his friends to concede as much as
would satisfy Rome, and then carry on the work of the Reformation in a
less open way. He had also the powerful protection of Margaret to count
upon, who was at this moment at St. Germain. But alas! he was not
prepared to bear the scorn of the world, leave the church of Rome, and
give up his riches and his station for the truth’s sake. At last the power of
present things prevailed, and he yielded to the terms of the Sorbonne. He
accordingly issued, in October, 1523, his episcopal mandates.
1. To restore public prayers to the Virgin and the saints.
2. To forbid anyone to buy, borrow, read, possess, or carry about with
him, Luther’s works.
3. Not only to interdict the pulpits to Lefevre, Farel, and their
companions, but to expel them from the diocese of Meaux.
 1164
In addition to these stipulations, he had to pay a fine of two hundred
livres.
What a blow this first fall of their kind and munificent friend must have
been to both ministers and people! The flocks scattered, and the
shepherds with heavy hearts turning their backs upon Meaux. Lefevre
found his way to Nerac, where he terminated his career, under the
protection of Margaret, at the advanced age of ninety-two. Farel escaped
to Switzerland, where we have seen him happily engaged in the Lord’s
work. Gerard Roussel contributed to the progress of the Reformation in
the kingdom of Navarre. The members of the church were, by persecution,
dispersed throughout France; the rest of the flock, too poor to flee, had to
abide the brunt of the tempest.7

THE FIRST MARTYRS OF FRANCE

Brissonnet fallen, Lefevre and his friends compelled to flee, the Reformed
church at Meaux dispersed, the monks again in the pulpits; this was a
beginning of victory! But Rome was not satisfied, and never was, without
the blood of the saints. “The sacerdotal and the civil power, the Sorbonne
and the parliament, had grasped their arms — arms that were soon to be
stained with blood. They set to work again; and blood, since it must be so,
was ere long to gratify the fanaticism of Rome.” The Christians at Meaux,
though left without a shepherd, continued to meet in some private place
for the reading of the word and prayer. One of their number, John Leclerc,
a wool-comber, was so well instructed in the word, that he was soon
regarded as one whom the Lord had raised up to strengthen and encourage
them. True, he had neither received a college education, nor the imposition
of hands, but he had the credentials of heaven, and took the oversight of
the flock which the learned bishop had deserted.
Leclerc began well. He visited from house to house instructing and
confirming the disciples; but his spirit was stirred within him, as he
witnessed the monks so jubilant over their victory. Could he have
overthrown the whole edifice of popery, and filled France with the truth
of the gospel, the desire of his heart would have been answered. But like
many others of a similar spirit in those times, his zeal carried him beyond
the limits of prudence. He wrote a proclamation, styling the pope the
 1165
Antichrist, predicting the downfall of his kingdom, and that the Lord was
about to destroy it by the breath of His mouth. He then boldly posted his
“placards” on the gates of the cathedral. Presently, all was in confusion.
Priests, monks, and citizens gathered before the placards. Leclerc was
suspected, seized, and thrown into prison. His trial was finished in a few
days. The wool-comber was condemned to be whipped three days
successively through the city, and branded on the forehead. He was led
through the streets with his hands tied, and his neck bare, and the
executioners willingly fulfilling their office. A great crowd followed, the
papists yelled with rage; his friends showed him every mark of their
tender compassion. When the brand of infamy was imprinted on his
forehead with a hot iron, one woman drew near the martyr, with his
bleeding back and burning brow, and sought to encourage him — she was
his mother. Faith and maternal love struggled in her heart. At length, faith
triumphed, and she exclaimed with a loud voice, “Glory to Jesus Christ
and His witnesses.” The crowd, so thrilled with her emotional voice, made
way for her to return home unmolested, while her son was banished from
Meaux.
Leclerc found his way to Metz, where the Reformation had made some
progress. Though with the brand of heretic on his brow, his zeal was
unabated, his courage unabashed, and his prudence as greatly at fault. One
of the great festivals of the place was approaching. A little way outside
the gates of the city stood a chapel, containing images of the Virgin, and of
the most celebrated saints of the province, and whither all the inhabitants
of Metz were in the habit of making a pilgrimage on a certain day in the
year, to worship these gods of stone, and to obtain, the pardon of their
sins. The pious and courageous soul of Leclerc was violently agitated.
Tomorrow, he thought, the whole city, that should worship the one living
and only true God, will be bowing down before these blocks of wood and
stone. Without consulting the leading brethren there, he stole out of the
city before the gates were closed, and sat down before the images in great
conflict of mind. The passage in Exodus 23,
“Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do
after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and —
quite break down their images,”
 1166
he believed, was now brought home to his conscience by the Spirit of the
Lord; and, as Beza says, “impelled by a divine afflatus,” he broke down
the images, and indignantly scattered their fragments before the altar. At
daybreak he re-entered Metz.
In a few hours, all were in motion in the ancient city of Metz. Bells were
ringing, the population assembling, banners flying, and all, headed by
canons, priests, and monks, moved on amidst burning tapers and smoking
incense, to the chapel of Our Lady. But, suddenly, all the instruments of
music were silent, and the whole multitude filled with indescribable
agitation, as they saw the heads, arms, and legs of their deities strewn over
the area where they had expected to worship them.

THE MARTYRDOM OF LECLERC

The branded heretic was suspected. Death, death to the impious wretch
was the cry; and all returned in haste and disorder to Metz. Leclerc was
seized. He admitted his crime, and prayed the deluded people to worship
God only. When led before his judges, he boldly confessed his faith in
Christ, God manifest in the flesh, and declared that He alone should be
adored. He was sentenced to be burnt alive, and immediately dragged to
the place of execution. His persecutors contrived to render his
punishment most fearful and appalling. He beheld the terrible
preparation of his torture; but he was calm, firm, and unmoved as he heard
the wild yells of monks and the people; and through the marvellous grace
and power of God, no sign of weakness marred the glow of his sacrifice.
They began by cutting off his right hand; then tearing his flesh with red-
hot pincers; they concluded by burning his breasts. While his enemies
were in this way wearying themselves by their new inventions of torture,
Leclerc’s mind was at rest. He recited solemnly, and in a loud voice, the
words of the psalmist:
“Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They
have mouths, but they speak not: eyes have they, but they see not:
they have ears, but they hear not: noses have they, but they smell
not: they have hands, but they handle not: feet have they, but they
walk not: neither speak they through their throats. They that make
them are like unto them; so is every one that trusteth in them. O
 1167
Israel, trust thou in the Lord: He is their help and their shield.”
(Psalm 115:4-9.)
\After these tortures, Leclerc was burnt by a slow fire. Such was the death
of the first martyr of the gospel in France.8
But the priests of Metz were not satisfied with the blood of the poor
wool-comber. Dean Chatelain had embraced the Reform doctrines, and
could not be shaken from the faith. He was denounced before the cardinal
of Lorraine, stripped of his priestly vestments, and in a layman’s dress,
handed over to the secular power, which condemned him to be burnt alive:
and soon the minister of Christ was consumed in the flames. But the effect
of these tragedies, as might have been expected, was to cause Lutheranism
to spread through the whole district of Metz. “The beholders,” says a
chronicler, “were astonished; nor were they untouched by compassion;
and not a few retired from the sad scenes to confess the gospel for which
they had seen the martyrs, with so serene and noble a fortitude, lay down
their lives.”

REFLECTIONS ON THE FALL OF BRISSONNET

It is difficult to leave the ashes of Leclerc without a mournful thought of
the poor bishop. If Leclerc is to be condemned for his indiscretion, he
must be admired for his courage. But what of Brissonnet? Having many
friends at court, he saved his mitre, his palace, and his riches; but at the
cost of conscience, truth, and a crown of life. “What Brissonnet’s
reflections may have been,” says Wylie, “as he saw one after another of
his former flock go to the stake, and from the stake to heaven, we shall not
venture to guess. May there not have been moments when he felt as if the
mitre which he had saved at so great a cost, was burning his brow, and that
even yet he must needs arise and leave his palace with all its honors, and
by the way of the dungeon and the stake, rejoin the members of his former
flock who had preceded him, by this same road, and inherit with them
honors and joys, higher far than any the pope or the king of France had to
bestow. But whatever he felt, and whatever at times may have been his
secret resolutions, we know that his thoughts and purposes never ripened
into acts.”
 1168
Humanly speaking, we are disposed to attribute the fall of Brissonnet to a
natural weakness of character, the deceitfulness of riches, and the influence
of plausible friends. His case was conducted with closed doors before a
commission, so that it is unknown to what extent he renounced the faith
he had preached, and labored to diffuse with a zeal apparently so ardent
and so sincere. He remained in communion with Rome till his death —
which happened a few years after his recantation — and contrived so to
live, that there should be no more question about his orthodoxy.
By judging of such cases in the present day, there are many things to
consider. They were just emerging from the darkness, superstitions, and
indescribable wickedness of popery. Men of pure and pious minds, such
as Brissonnet really was, saw the great need of Reform, and honestly
wished to ‘promote it, although they may not have contemplated a
complete secession from her communion. The idea of separation as taught
by our Lord in John 17, where He gives the disciples His own place of
rejection on earth, and His own place of acceptance in heaven, formed no
part in the teaching of those early times. Luther, a man of deep convictions
and strong faith, was never really separated in spirit from the idolatry of
Rome. He was no image-breaker, and his doctrine of the sacraments
contradicted the truth he preached.
The heavenly relations of the Christian and the church not being seen,
there was very little separating truth in the teaching of the early
Reformers. It was chiefly doctrinal; comparatively little for the heart. The
dwelling of the Holy Spirit in the saints individually, and in the assembly
as the house of God, and the hope of the Lord’s return, were overlooked
by the Reformers in the sixteenth century. So that we must make great
allowance, and not think too hardly of some who hesitated, or even drew
back for a time, when they saw the stake; and, on the other hand, we must
admire the grace of God which triumphed in many who knew very little
truth. The Holy Spirit was their teacher, and they knew what was
necessary to their own salvation and the glory of God.

THE CONVERSION AND FAITH OF LOUIS BERQUIN

One of the most illustrious victims of those early times was Louis
Berquin, a gentleman of Artois, and an officer of the king’s body-guard.
 1169
“He would have been another Luther for France,” says Beza, “if he had
found in Francis another Elector of Saxony.” Unlike the knights of his
time, acquainted only with the helmet and the sword, he was learned,
contemplative, frank, open-hearted, and generous to the poor. He had
acquired a great reputation at the court of Francis; and, being sheltered by
the powerful patronage of his royal master, he studied diligently the works
of the Reformers, and soon became one of the most zealous of their
converts. His conversion, through the grace of God, proved to be genuine.
His learning, his eloquence, his influence, were from that hour all
consecrated to the service of the gospel. Many looked to him as the
Reformer of his native land. His leisure hours were spent in translating the
works of Luther, Melancthon, and Erasmus into French, and writing tracts
on the leading doctrines of the christian faith, which he privately printed
himself.
This heretic, thought Beda, is worse than Luther; but so unobtrusive was
this christian knight, that it was difficult to find a charge on which to
found an indictment of heresy. Spies were now employed. A rigorous
watch was kept over every word uttered by Berquin. At length witnesses
were found to prove that he had asserted it was heretical to invoke the
Virgin Mary instead of the Holy Spirit before the sermon in the mass.
This was enough; the Syndic, obtaining authority from the parliament to
search the dwelling of Berquin, made a forcible seizure of his books and
papers, which he laid before the faculty of theology. These were
condemned as having a heretical tendency, and Berquin was thrown into
prison. “This one,” said the sanguinary Bede, “shall not escape us, like
Brissonnet and Lefevre.” He was kept in solitary confinement,
preparatory to his formal trial and certain condemnation to the stake.
Margaret, who had ever professed admiration of Berquin’s talents, and had
distinguished him by marks of her regard, was immediately informed of his
fate, and asked to interest herself in his favor. With the unhappy case of
her friend Brissonnet before her, and dreading to see Berquin dragged to
the stake, she wrote to her brother. She represented to the king the
insolence of the Sorbonne in daring to arrest one of his officers upon so
frivolous a pretense, without having first ascertained his royal pleasure.
The suggestion touched the pride of Francis who broke out into violent
transports of passion, menaced the parliament, and sent an order for the
 1170
instant liberation of his officer. A second time he was imprisoned, and
again the king came to his rescue, advising him to be more prudent. But his
strong convictions of duty, as a witness for Christ, could not be
suppressed. He labored to spread the truth among the poor in the country,
and among his friends in the city, and at the court. But the burning desire
of his heart was to communicate his convictions to all France. A third time
he was imprisoned, and the Sorbonne thought that this time they had made
sure of their prey. The king was a prisoner at Madrid; Louisa was all-
powerful at Paris, and along with Duprat, the unprincipled chancellor,
supported the persecutors. But no: Margaret’s word again prevailed with
her impulsive brother, and a royal order, dated April 1st, 1526,
commanded the suspension of the matter until the king’s return.
When again at liberty, his lukewarm friends entreated him to avoid giving
offense to the doctors who had evidently marked him for destruction.
Erasmus, in particular, who, having learned that he was about to publish a
translation of one of his Latin works with the addition of notes, wrote to
him letter upon letter to persuade him to desist. “Leave these hornets
alone,” he said, “above all, do not mix me up in these things; my burden is
already heavy enough. If it is your pleasure to dispute, be it so; as for me,
I have no desire of the kind.” Again he wrote, “Ask for an embassy to
some foreign country; travel in Germany. You know Beda and his
familiars; a thousand-headed hydra is shooting out its venom on all sides.
The name of your enemies is Legion. Were your cause better than that of
Jesus Christ, they will not let you go until they have brought you to a
cruel end. Do not trust in the protection of the king. But in any case do
not commit me with the faculty of theology.” This letter, so characteristic
of the timid philosopher, who always steered a middle course between the
gospel and popery, only redoubled the courage of Berquin. He determined
to stand no longer on the defensive, but to attack. He set to work, and
extracted from the writings of Beda and his brethren, twelve propositions
which he accused before Francis of being false, contrary to the Bible, and
heretical.
The Sorbonnists were confounded. The outcry was tremendous. What!
even the defenders of the faith, the pillars of the church, taxed with heresy
by a Lutheran, who had deserved death a thousand times.9 The king,
however, not sorry to have an opportunity of humbling these turbulent
 1171
doctors, commanded them to condemn or to establish the twelve
propositions from scripture. This might have been a difficult task for the
doctors; the matter was assuming a grave turn, when an accident occurred
which turned everything in favor of the Sorbonne. An image of the Virgin
happened to be mutilated just at that moment in one of the quarters of
Paris. “It is a vast plot,” cried the priests; “it is a great conspiracy against
religion, against the prince, against the order and tranquillity of the
country! All laws will be overthrown; all dignities abolished: this is the
fruit of the doctrines preached by Berquin!” At the cries of the Sorbonne,
the priests, the parliament, and of the people, the king himself was greatly
excited. Death to the image-breakers! No quarter to the heretics! And
Berquin is in prison a fourth time.

THE SENTENCE OF THE SORBONNE,

AND THE MARTYRDOM OF BERQUIN
A commission of twelve, delegated by the parliament, condemned him to
make a public abjuration, then remain in prison without books, pen or
paper, for the rest of his life, after having had his tongue pierced with a hot
iron. “I appeal to the king,” exclaimed Berquin. “If you do not submit to
our sentence,” replied one of the judges, “we will find means to stop your
appeals for ever.” “I would rather die,” said Berquin, “than only approve
by my silence that the truth is thus condemned.” “Let him then be
strangled and burned upon the place de Greve!” said the judges with one
voice. But it was deemed advisable to delay the execution till Francis was
absent; for it was feared lest his lingering affection for his favorite and
loyal servant might be awakened, and that he might order Berquin’s release
a fourth time.
A week’s delay was craved in the execution of the sentence. “Not a day,”
said Beda; “let him be put to death at once.” That same day, April 22nd,
1529, Berquin was led forth to die. Six hundred soldiers and a vast stream
of spectators escorted him to the place of execution. Erasmus, on the
testimony of an eyewitness, thus describes his appearance. “He showed
no sign of depression. You would have said, that he was in his library
pursuing his studies, or in a temple meditating on things divine. When the
executioner, with husky voice, read to him his sentence, he never changed
countenance. He alighted from the cart with a firm step. But his was not
 1172
the stoical indifference of the hardened criminal; it was the serenity, the
peace of a good conscience.” As a peer of France, he was dressed according
to his dignity: “he wore a cloak of velvet, a doublet of satin and damask,
and golden hose;” there was no sign of mourning, but rather as if he were
to appear at court; though not the court of Francis, but the court of
heaven.
Wishing to make known the Savior to the poor people around him,
Berquin tried to speak to them, but he could not be heard. The monks gave
the signal, and instantly, the clamor of voices, and the clash of arms,
prevented the sacred words of the dying martyr being heard. But his death
spoke to all France, and that, in a voice which no clamours could silence.
The fire had done its work, and where had stood the noble of France and
the humble Christian, there was now a heap of ashes. “Berquin’s stake
was to be, in some good measure, to France, what Ridley’s was to England
— ‘a candle which by God’s grace, would not be put out, but would shine
through all that realm.’”10

THE RAPID SPREAD OF THE REFORM DOCTRINES

The two examples of martyrdom which we have given — one from the
humbler and one from the higher ranks of life — may be considered as
types of a vast crowd of others. Our limited space prevents us from
recording the patient sufferings and the triumphant death of many noble
witnesses for Christ. But notwithstanding the violence of the persecution
the converts were more numerous than ever. The fame of Francis I. as
showing favor to men of learning, and having, through the influence of his
sister, invited Melancthon to take up his residence in Paris, led many of
the Reformers in Germany and Switzerland to visit France and help on the
good work of the Lord. In this way the writings of Luther, Zwingle, and
others, found an entrance into that country, were extensively read, and the
new opinions made rapid progress among all classes of the people. Here
and there missionaries of the Reformation arose, congregations were
formed, and from time to time, one and another, torn from the prayer-
meeting or the scripture reading, went to seal his faith with his blood.
But in 1533 better days seemed to dawn on the Reformation. The queen-
mother, Louisa of Savoy, one of its bitterest persecutors, had just died.
 1173
Francis had made an alliance with the Protestants of the Smalcald league,
and the influence of Margaret had thence increased. Taking advantage of
this favorable moment, she opened the pulpits of Paris to Roussel,
Courault, and Bertault, who leaned towards the Reformed doctrines. The
bishop, John du Bellay, offered no opposition. The churches were
crowded; Beda and the doctors of the Sorbonne tried to raise the people,
but were prevented. Meanwhile Francis returned to Paris from Marseilles,
where he had an interview with Clement VII. for the marriage of his son
Henry with Catherine de Medici. His renewed friendship with the pope,
Catherine’s uncle, strongly bent his mind against the heretics. Many of
them were cast into prison, and the three suspected ministers interdicted
from preaching.
Such was Francis I., on whose humor so much depended. On the
important subject of religion he had never come to a decision; he neither
knew what he was nor what he wished. Still, from his natural hatred of the
monks, and the powerful influence of his sister, he had hitherto favored
the Reformers. But an incident, for which the latter were much to blame,
took place about this time, which ended the many struggles between
Margaret and her brother as to the conduct to be pursued towards the
Reformers, and also put an end to the king’s vacillation.
Many of the Reformers were led, or rather misled, to depend upon the
favor of the court for the furtherance of the gospel, and proposed to
proceed moderately, desiring to do nothing that might offend. These were
called Temporizers. The other party, called the Scripturalists, thought
that they should place no dependence on the favor of princes, but boldly
preach the gospel and resist everything that might bring back the
superstitions of Rome. The young church of France being thus divided,
they agreed to consult their old teachers, Farel and the other exiles. A
young Christian, by name Feret, accepted the mission and proceeded to
Switzerland. Scarcely had he crossed the Jura when a spectacle, so
different from Paris, met his eye. In the towns and villages the altars were
being demolished, the idols cast down, and all idolatry, removed from
public worship. This, as we have already seen was the work of Farel,
Viret, Saunier, Olivetan, Froment, and others. But France was altogether
different. A powerful prince and a haughty priesthood were there to
contend with a mere handful of Reformers.
 1174
“These medleys of the gospel and popery,” said the Swiss evangelists,
“can never exist together, any more than fire and water.” They
recommended bold measures. A vigorous blow must be struck at that
which is the citidel of the papal empire. The mass must be abolished. “If
the papal hierarchy was the tree whose deadly shade killed the living seeds
of the word, the mass was its root.” The writing and posting of placards
all over France was proposed.

THE YEAR OF THE PLACARDS

At length the evangelical protest was written. Farel has been commonly
credited with the authorship. Historians vie with each other in describing
the violence of its style. “Indignation guided his daring pen,” says one. “It
was a torrent of scathing fire;” says another. “It was a thunderbolt, fierce,
terrific, and grand, resembling one of those tempests that gather in awful
darkness on the summits of those mountains amid which the document
was written, and finally explode in flashes which irradiate the whole
heavens, and in volleys of sound which shake the plains over which the
awful reverberations are rolled.”11
When the placards reached Paris, many of the Christians thought the style
too bitter and violent, but the majority were in favor of their publication.
A night was fixed, October 18th, 1534, for the work to be done all over
France. The eventful night came, and the venerable walls of the university
of Paris, the public buildings of the capital, the church doors, and the
Sorbonne itself were covered with placards. The movement was
simultaneous throughout France. The placard was headed in large letters
— “True articles on the horrible, great and intolerable abuses of the popish
mass; invented in direct opposition to the holy supper of our Lord and
only Mediator and Savior Jesus Christ.” Popes, cardinals, bishops, monks,
and every distinguishing tenet of the Romish faith were attacked with
sharpest invectives. The long placard — which occupies over five pages in
D’Aubigne’s history — thus concludes, “In fine, truth has deserted them,
truth threatens them, truth chases them, truth fills them with fear; by all
which shall their reign be shortly destroyed for ever.”
No language can describe the one universal cry of rage and consternation
which resounded throughout France on the morning of the 19th. The
 1175
people gathered in groups around the placards. The priests and monks
kindled the rage. The Lutherans, it was said, had laid a frightful plot for
burning the churches, firing the town, and massacring every one; and the
whole multitude shouted, Death! death to the heretics! The king at the
time was living at the Chateau de Blots. A placard was pasted — no doubt
by the hand of an enemy — on the very door of the king’s apartment.
Montmorency and the Cardinal de Tournon drew the king’s attention to
the paper. The prince was greatly agitated, he grew pale and speechless.
He saw therein an insult, not only against his authority, but against his
person, and these enemies of the Reformation — Montmorency and
Tournon — so fixed this notion in his mind, that in his wrath he exclaimed,
“Let all be seized, and let Lutheranism be totally exterminated.” The
members of the faculties also demanded that by a general auto-de-fe the
daring blasphemy might be avenged.
Now it was that the storm, long held back by a good providence, burst
forth in awful fury. The king was fully committed to the system of
persecution. But, making every allowance for the times, the Reformers
were not free from blame. Would the apostles have written and posted
such placards? We have no standard of action, no guide but the word of
God. Yet there can be only one feeling towards the sufferers — that of
tenderest compassion. Orders were immediately issued by the king to
seize the Sacramentarians, dead or alive. By the help of a traitor, their
houses were pointed out and all were in a short time seized and thrown
into prison. The criminal officer having entered the house of one, named
Bartholomew Millon, a cripple, wholly helpless in body, said to him,
“Come, get thee up.” “Alas! sir,” said the poor paralytic, “it must be a
greater master than thee to raise me up.” The sergeants carried him out, but
so full of peace and holy courage was Bartholomew, that his companions
in captivity grew firm through his exhortations. Formerly, when lifted by
his friends, he felt pain in every limb, but the Lord in great mercy took
that sensitiveness away, so that in prison he used to say, “the roughest
handling seemed tender.”

THE EXECUTIONS
The trial of the Lutherans was soon over, and the executions began. An
expiation was required for the purification of France, and the heretics must
 1176
be offered in sacrifice. The burning piles were distributed over all the
quarters of Paris and the execution followed on successive days. Millon
was the first. The turnkey entered his cell, lifted him in his arms, and
placed him on a tumbril — a cart. The procession then took its course
towards the Place de Greve. Passing his father’s house, he smiled, bidding
adieu to his old home, as one in sight of that house not made with hands,
eternal in the heavens. “Lower the flames,” said the officer in command,
“the sentence says he is to be burnt at a slow fire.” He had to be lifted and
flung into the flames, but he bore his lingering tortures as if miraculously
sustained. Only words of peace, with great sweetness of spirit, dropped
from his lips, while his soul, ransomed by the precious blood of Jesus,
ascended on angels’ wings to the paradise of God.
A long list of names follows. Du Bourg, of the Rue St. Denis, Calvin’s
friend, was the next; and many persons of distinction suffered at that time,
and many, having warning, made their escape.
While these tumultuous scenes were convulsing the capital, Margaret was
residing at her castle of Nerac. The news filled her with dismay. Her
enemies, now that they had the ear of the king, labored to inflame his mind
against her. In times past, the slightest reflection on the reputation of his
beloved sister would have been instantly and vehemently silenced by
Francis. But now, in his gloomy state of mind, he listened to the
representations of his ministers. It was insinuated to the king, that “if he
had a mind to extirpate the heretics out of his kingdom, he must begin by
his court and his nearest relations.” Margaret was summoned to Paris. She
immediately obeyed, confident in the integrity of her intentions, the love
of her brother, and fearless of the hostile theologians, whom she neither
dreaded nor respected. For the first time, perhaps, in his life, Francis
received Margaret at the Louvre with cold severity, and reproached her for
the evils which her support of heresy had brought on his kingdom.
Margaret wept, but she concealed her tears from her angry brother. She
gently expostulated with him, and soon found that bigotry had not quite
extinguished his love for her. She became bolder, and ventured to suggest
that it was the intolerance of the fanatical party that had filled the kingdom
with discord. She was as grieved about the placards as he was, but felt sure
that none of the ministem whom she knew had any hand in their
publication.
 1177
Without entering into particulars, we need only further add, that her
entreaties obtained the liberation of the three preachers — Roussel,
Berthault, and Couralt; and that the king’s countenance was changed
towards those who had maligned the motives of his sister. Her presence in
Paris, for a time, hindered the designs of the persecutors; but as Francis
was determined to command a public procession through the streets of
Paris to cleanse away the pollution of the placards, she petitioned the king
to permit her departure into Bearn, which he reluctantly granted.

THE PROCESSION AND MARTYRDOMS

On the 21st of January, 1535, the “peace offering” procession marched
through the most public streets of Paris in gloomy majesty, and striking
awe into the hearts of all beholders. The houses along the line of
procession were hung with mourning drapery. All the religious orders of
Paris took part in the procession, bearing aloft the sacred relics possessed
by their respective convents — the head of St. Louis, the patron saint of
France, a piece of the true cross, the real crown of thorns, a holy nail, and
also the spear-head which had pierced the side of our Lord. On no former
occasion had so many relics been paraded in the streets of Paris. The
cardinals, archbishops, and bishops followed, wearing their robes and
mitres. They immediately preceded the host, which was borne by the
bishop of Paris, under a canopy of crimson velvet, supported by the
dauphin, the dukes of Orleans, of Angouleme, and of Vendome. Around
the holy sacrament marched two hundred gentlemen of the king’s
household, each bearing a torch. The king followed on foot with his head
bare, carrying a burning torch of white virgin-wax, surrounded by his
children and the princes of the blood royal. Afterwards came a countless
throng of all the noblemen of the court, princes, ambassadors, and
foreigners, each carrying a flaming torch. In front of their houses stood the
burgesses with lighted tapers, who sank on their knees as the holy
sacrament passed them. But the end of the procession was not yet; it still
moved on in mournful silence; the guilds of the capital, the municipality,
the officers of the courts, the Swiss guards, the choristers of the royal
chapels — amounting to several thousand persons, and every individual
carrying a lighted taper. This was the comedy of the fanatical frenzy of the
 1178
king; the tragedy was to follow, “to implore the mercy of the Redeemer
for the insult offered to the sacrifice of the mass.”
Having marched from the church of the Louvre to Notre Dame, the king
seated himself on a throne, and then pronounced a harangue against the
new opinions, as violent as thought could suggest, or words express. “If
my arm were infected with this pestilence,” he said, “I would cut it off. If
one of my children were so wretched as to favor this new Reform, and to
wish to make profession of it, I would sacrifice him myself to the justice
of God, and to my own justice.” From declamation he proceeded to action.
The same day six Lutherans were burned alive. The most courageous
had their tongues cut out, lest they should offer a word of exhortation to
the people, or be heard praying to God. They were suspended on a
moveable gibbet, which, rising and falling by turns, plunged them into the
fire, where they were left a few moments, then raised into the air, and
again plunged into the flames; and this continued until the ropes that
fastened them to the beam were consumed; then, for the last time, they fell
amid the burning faggots, and in a few moments their souls ascended, as in
a chariot of fire, to the bright realms of unmingled and eternal blessedness.

RETRIBUTIVE JUSTICE
The epoch of persecution and martyrdom was now solemnly inaugurated
in France. The 21st of January must be a date of evil omen in that land of
revolutions. Two hundred and fifty-eight years after Francis had devoted
to death the humble followers of Christ, one of the simplest and most
generous of the Bourbons was condemned to death by misguided and
furious men, and received-his death-blow on the twenty-first of January,
1793. The sight must have been beyond all conception pitiful. The poor
king, Louis XVI., unlike the martyrs of his predecessors, who laid down
their lives willingly for Jesus’ sake, was dragged by his gaolers to the
block, and held down by force till the axe gleamed in the air, and his head
rolled on the scaffold. But there is a third 21st of January, and the most
humiliating of the three to the pride of France. It is said that Paris resolved
to capitulate to the victorious Germans on the 21st of January, 1871. The
coincidence of these dates is most striking and suggestive, but we offer no
comments; those who have studied history aright, will surely believe in a
 1179
just and retributive providence. But God gives none account of His ways;
or, as the psalmist says,
“Thy way is in the sea, and Thy path in the great waters
and Thy footsteps are not known.” (Psalm 77:19.)
Felice, the historian of the Protestants of France, observes with reference
to this dismal day, “that it marks an important date in our history; for it
was from this moment that the Parisian populace took part in the contest
against the heretics; and once mounted on the stage, they never quitted it
until the end of the league. In the chain of events, this procession,
intermingled with executions, was the first of the bloody days of the
sixteenth century; the massacre of St. Bartholomew, the Barricades, the
murder of Henry III., and the assassination of Henry IV., could but
follow” — p. 36.
The Protestant princes of Germany, justly indignant when they heard of
the cruelties of Francis, threatened to ally themselves against him with the
house of Austria. Fearing a breach, he sent in the following spring an
ambassador to Smalcald. His excuse was that of all persecutors in every
age — “seditious tendency.” Those whom he had put to death were men
of a rebellious spirit, sacramentarians, and not Lutherans. He even
professed a strong desire for better information respecting their doctrines,
in order, no doubt, to effect a reconciliation with the league of Smalcald,
and requested that one of their most eminent divines might be sent to his
court. He attempted to induce Melancthon to take up his abode in Paris;
but his double dealings and hypocrisies availed little: Melancthon refused,
and the Smalcald league objected to an alliance with the persecutor of their
brethren.
The gloomy determination, which had now taken possession of Francis to
crush heresy, decided Margaret to leave Paris. She retired to her own little
kingdom of Bearn, an ancient province of France. Her court became the
asylum of the celebrated men who escaped from persecution. “Many
refugee fanlilies brought their industry and their fortunes. Everything
assumed a new face. The laws were corrected, the arts cultivated,
agriculture was improved, schools were established, and the people were
prepared to receive the teaching of the Reformation. In a short time, the
foundations were laid of that remarkable prosperity which made the little
 1180
kingdom in the Pyrenees resemble an oasis amid the desert which France
and Spain were now beginning to become.”12
Margaret, the pious queen of Navarre, died, 1549; and was deeply
lamented by the Bearnais, who loved to repeat her generous saying,
“Kings and princes are not the lords and masters of their inferiors, but
only ministers whom God has set up to serve and to keep them.” She was
the mother of Jeanne d’Albret, one of the most illustrious women in
history, and grandmother of Henry IV.
 1181

CHAPTER 51
THE GREAT PROGRESS OF THE REFORMATION

Towards the end of the reign of Francis, and under that of his son, Henry
II., the Reform movement made such rapid progress, that it becomes
utterly impossible in our “Short Papers” to follow it in all its details. We
can do little more than give a mere outline of the principal events from the
death of Francis I. till the massacre on the eve of St. Bartholomew.
Francis lived and died as kings generally do. He commenced his reign with
great splendor, but closed it in darkness and dismal forebodings. When he
ascended the throne, all was brilliant and loyal; he was surrounded by a
vast assemblage of gallant knights, and with few exceptions, chieftains of
the princely aristocracy of France; and the noblest ladies of the realm were
in attendance on their gentle mistress, queen Claude, or, rather, as the
female ornaments of his court. But how different when he descended from
the throne to the grave! The luxury of his court, its chivalry, its festivals,
its pageants, which were once the admiration of Europe, afford him no
comfort now. In excruciating agonies of body from the life he had led, and
in deep anguish of soul from what had been done by his orders; “He
groans deeply; his starts are sudden and violent. There flits at times,
across his face, a dark shadow, as if some horrible sight afflicting him with
unutterable woe, were disclosed to him; and a quick tremour at these
moments runs through all his frame.” He is heard to mutter, as if suffering
from an accusing conscience, “I am not to blame; my orders were
exceeded” — referring, no doubt, to the merciless slaughter of the
unoffending Waldenses. He was surrounded by a crowd of priests,
courtiers, and courtesans, but they cared nothing for the dying monarch;
they only increased the weight of his agony by their cold selfish
indifference.
The scene closes, the last groan is uttered, the line is crossed, and the soul,
under a responsibility entirely its own, appears before God. Solemn
thought! all is reality now. The judgment-seat cannot bend to royal
 1182
prerogative. There is no respect of persons with God; every man must be
judged according to the deeds done in the body. But what must be the
judgment of those who stand there with hands red, and garments stained
with the blood of God’s saints? Nothing but a timely repentance, and the
efficacy of the precious blood of Jesus could cleanse such guilt away. May
all those who are willing to pause a few moments over the melancholy
scene of these closing hours believe this, and turn to the Lord Jesus, God’s
Son, whose blood cleanses from all sin. “Him that cometh to Me, I will in
no wise cast out,” are His own words of gracious assurance. Three
hundred years have rolled away since Louisa, Francis, and Margaret died.
We cannot help lingering a moment over this solemn thought, that our
reader may be prepared for that change which admits of no succeeding
change for ever. Every tree is known by its fruits; and as the tree fails so it
lies. Who would not say that Margaret’s was the happiest course of the
three? True, she had in her lifetime to suffer reproach and shame for the
name of Christ, and be branded as a heretic, but she willingly identified
herself with the suffering saints of God, and great is her reward in heaven.
Better suffer for a few years, and even die at the stake, than be three
hundred years in hell,
“where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.”
(Mark 9:44-50; Matthew 5:10-12.)
Reader! O reader, beware! God is not mocked; as a man sows in time, so
shall he reap in eternity!

HENRY II
Francis I. died in 1547, and was succeeded by his son, Henry II., the
husband of the notorious Catherine de Medici, who, like Jezebel of old,
was well fitted and inclined to stir him up to persecute the Naboths, and
take possession of their vineyards. And this was actually done to a great
extent, and the confiscations applied in many instances to the most
shameful purposes. Surrounded by hostile and designing councillors,
besides the example of his father and the influence of his wife, he was
indeed stirred up to pursue a persecuting policy, and a great multitude of
martyrs fell during his reign. When the great battle of St. Quentin was lost,
and the Spaniards expected daily at the gates of Paris, the old pagan cry
 1183
against the primitive Christians was raised — “We have not sufficiently
avenged the honor of God, and God takes vengeance upon us.” The
disaster was ascribed to the mildness with which the heretics had been
treated. So it was when Rome was attacked by the barbarians; the pagans
accused themselves of having been too lenient towards the Christians.
The clergy, becoming alarmed at the unaccountable progress of the
Reformation, used every artifice to alarm the king. They assured him that
the Huguenots — as they were now called, from one Hugues, the name of
a Genevese Calvinist — were the great enemies of monarchs and of all
ecclesiastical and regal power; that, should they prevail, they would
trample his throne in the dust, and lay France at the feet of atheists and
revolutionists. The effect of these misrepresentations, which were chiefly
made by the cardinal de Lorraine, was to multiply the executions; and as
they were viewed as appeasing the wrath of heaven, the more the king
himself sinned, the more he burned to atone for his sins. But so great was
the energy of God’s Spirit in connection with the spread of Bibles and
religious books, that all the means used to exterminate the Huguenots
proved utterly fruitless. Exceeding great armies seemed to arise from the
ashes of the martyrs. “Men of letters,” says Felice, “of the law, of the
sword, of the church itself, hastened to the banner of the Reformation.
Several great provinces — Languedoc, Dauphiny, the Lyonnese, Guienne,
Saintonge, Poitou, the Orleanese, Normandy, Picardy, Flanders (the most
considerable towns in the kingdom) Bourges, Orleans, Rouen, Lyons,
Bordeaux, Toulouse, Montpellier, La Rochelle — were peopled with
Reformers. It is calculated that they comprised in a few years nearly a
sixth of the population, of whom they were the elite.”
And still the funeral piles blazed in all quarters of Paris, and in all towns of
France; and persons of all ages and both sexes fed the flames, suffering the
most fearful barbarities and tortures. But as the rigour of the persecutions
increased, the number of the disciples multiplied. Among these were now
enrolled princes of the blood, the king of Navarre, the duke of Vendome,
the Bourbons, prince of Conde, Coligny, Chatilion, and a great number of
the nobility and gentry of France. “Besides these,” says a catholic
historian, “painters, watchmakers, sculptors, goldsmiths, booksellers,
printers, and others, who, from their callings have some nobility of mind,
were among the first easily impressed.”1
 1184
Meanwhile, Farel and his fellow exiles, were inundating France with
religious books and Bibles from the printing presses of Geneva, Lausanne,
and Neuchatel, by means of pedlars, who hazarded their lives to introduce
the precious wares into the mansion of the noble, and the hut of the
peasant.
The king’s alarm grew great. A little longer, and all France would be
Lutheran. The first and most sacred duty of a prince, said his councillors,
was to uphold the true religion, and cut off its enemies. The irritated
prince proceeded to the House of Parliament to consult his senators as to
the best means of appeasing the religious differences in the realm. This
event happened on the 10th of August, 1559. Though the presence of the
king may have been intended to overawe the members, it did not prevent
them from speaking freely on the subject. The chief president, Gilles
Lemaitre, spoke in favor of burning, and recommended the example of
Philip Augustus to be followed, who had in one day caused six hundred of
the Albigenses to be burned. The men of middle course confined
themselves to vague generalities. The secret Calvinists, especially Annas
du Bourg, demanded religious reforms by means of a national council.
“Every day,” he said, “we see crimes committed that go unpunished, while
new torments are invented against men who have committed no crirne.
Should those be guilty of high treason who mentioned the name of the
prince only to pray for him? and should the rack and the stake be reserved,
not for those who raised tumults in the cities, and seditions in the
provinces, but for those who were the brightest patterns of obedience to
the laws, and the firrnest defenders of order? It was a very grave matter to
condemn to the flames men who died calling on the name of the Lord
Jesus.”
The angry king, stung; to fury by the honest speech of Du Bourg, ordered
him to be arrested in full parliament by the captain of his guards, and said
aloud that he would see him burned with his own eyes. He was thrown
into the Bastile, and other members were arrested the following day.
Fourteen days after this memorable visit to his parliament, Henry was
displaying his strength and skill as a cavalier, in a tournament, to the
admiration of many. He had resisted the attacks of the duke of Savoy and
the duke of Guise, the two best generals in the service of France, and might
have left the gay scene amidst the praise and acclamations of the ladies and
 1185
nobles of Paris; but he insisted on having a tilt with count Montgomery,
the captain of his guards. He meant, no doubt, to give the king the best of
the shock, like his other assailants, but by some mismanagement, the lance
of Montgomery broke in the king’s visor, and a splinter passed through
his eye to the brain: the king lay forward on his horse; a thrill of horror ran
through the spectators. He died soon after, but never saw with his eyes
the burning of Du Bourg; and, as the Lord would have it, the same hand
that arrested the senator dealt the death-blow to the monarch.

THE MARTYRDOM OF DU BOURG

The death of the king did not release the prisoners. Du Bourg heard his
sentence read without a change of countenance. As a criminal of the
deepest dye, his execution was reserved for the Christmas holidays,
December, 1559. “I am a Christian; yes, I am a Christian;” he said, “and I
will shout still louder for the glory of my Lord Jesus Christ.” When
suspended on the gibbet, he proclaimed the truth to the vast crowds
around him, and cried aloud, “My God, my God, forsake me not, that I
may not forsake Thee.”
Thus died this pious and illustrious magistrate at the age of thirty-eight.
He belonged to a good family; his uncle had been chancellor of France. He
was a man of great learning, integrity, and devotion to his duties. His only
fault was, that he had spoken in favor of the new religion. Florimond de
Ramond, then a student, avows, “that everyone in the colleges was moved
to tears; that they pleaded his cause after his death, and that his
martyrdom did more harm to the Catholic religion than a hundred ministers
could have done by their preaching.”

THE FIRST PLANTING OF THE REFORMED

CHURCH IN FRANCE
It was in the year 1555, that the first avowed French church on
Reformed principles was established at Paris. Forty years had passed
away since Lefevre first preached the gospel in the university; during
which time we have met with many noble disciples, confessors, and
martyrs, but no public congregations. There had always been secret
gatherings of the faithful, but without fixed pastors or regular
 1186
administration of the sacraments. Calvin was their acknowledged leader,
and he recommended them not to observe the Lord’s supper until they had
duly recognized ministers. In consequence of this, though they were a large
body in the aggregate, they were as isolated individuals, acting a part from
each other, without the knowledge of the grand uniting principle — the
presence and indwelling of the Holy Ghost. “For where two or three are
gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst of them,” ought to
have been warrant enough for remembering His love, and showing forth
His death in the breaking of bread.
A church was now formed in Paris on the Genevan or Presbyterian model,
with a minister, elders, and deacons. Poitiers, Angers, Bourges, and other
places soon followed the example. From this time, ttqe work or
organization went on vigorously, and in the short period of five years,
over a thousand Calvinistic congregations existed in France. The next
step to be taken was the uniting of these isolated churches into one general
church; and for this purpose a general Synod was convoked to meet at
Paris, which took place on the 25th of May, 1559. But the difficulties that
attended the ministers travelling from all parts of France was so great, that
only thirteen churches sent their deputies to the Synod: and these braved
an almost certain death. “There was in the deliberations of this assembly,”
says Felice, “a simplicity and moral grandeur, that fills us with respect.
Nothing of declamation or violence, but a calm dignity, a tranquil and
serene force prevailed, as if the members of the Synod debated in a
profound peace, under the guardianship of the laws.”
The ecclesiastical foundations of the French Reformation were then laid.
The basis consisted of four grades of power, or church courts.
1. The consistory, or kirk-session — composed of the elders and
deacons, the minister being their president; the affairs of the
congregation were the objects of their care.
2. The colloquy, or the congregations of a district consulting each other
by their deputies on their mutual interests.
3. The provincial Synod, or court of appeal from the kirk-session, in a
meeting of the churches of the province. If possible, the minister and
an elder from each were expected to be present.
 1187
4. The national assembly.
Two ministers and two elders were expected from each of the provincial
Synods. It was the highest court; it heard all appeals; determined all great
causes; and to its authority, in the last resort, all were subject.2

FRANCIS II
The new King, Francis II., was about sixteen years old when he ascended
the throne. He is represented as a sickly boy, feeble in body and mind; and
his wife, Mary Stuart of Scotland, a thoughtless beauty, spending her time
in pleasure, was about the same age. Thus was monarchy represented in
France in 1559; when a strong hand and a powerful will were required to
protect the royal authority. The profligacy and extravagance of the last
reign had borne their natural fruits. There was anger and discontent all over
the land; the court was a hot-bed of intrigue, and the nation, broken into
factions, was on the brink of civil war. Catherine de Medici, the Guises,
Chatillons, Bourbons, the constable Montmorency, all worked to their
own advantage these feeble children of royalty, and mingled with the
religious discussions, the quarrels of their political ambition.
The two Guises, the cardinal and the general, became managers of the
court. Uncles of the fair young queen, and guardians of the feeble
sovereign, they had the ear of both, which gave them immense advantages
over their rivals. But there was one at the foot of the throne who was a
match both for the general and the cardinal. The queen-mother, Catherine
de Medici, hated the Huguenots as much as the Guises — who were the
heads of the Roman Catholic party — but she also hated all who would
supplant her in power. Artful and vindictive, unscrupulous and ambitious,
without religious faith or moral feeling, the crafty Italian dissembled that
she might ruin the authority of the Guises, in order to consolidate her own.
This threw Catherine for a moment on the side of the Huguenot party,
which was overruled by a merciful providence to weaken the power of the
Guises, divide the strength of the popish party, and save the Reformers.
Affecting to hold the balance between the two parties, she was only biding
her time in all changes of circumstances, by turns embracing and deserting
all parties alike.
 1188
We now come to the wars of religion. Parties began to be formed from
political motives, which threw the whole of France into the most ruinous,
desolating, civil war, which lasted, with brief intervals, for many years —
we might say, centuries. All the liberalism of France became Huguenot,
which then simply meant antipapist. And thus, to their great injury and
final destruction, the French Protestants became a great political party in
the state. Meanwhile Francis II., after a reign of seventeen months, died;
and Catherine, emerging from the obscurity in which she had restrained her
ambition, claimed the custody of her next son, Charles IX., who was only
nine years of age; and before the court could assemble, assumed the
guardianship of the king, and in fact, if not in name, the regency of the
kingdom.

THE SAINT BARTHOLOMEW MASSACRE

The Italian mother, having thus become supreme in the kingdom, began to
mature her plans for stamping out heresy in the dominions of her son.
Possessed in an eminent degree of the family arts of dissimulation and
concealment, she pursued, with steadiness of purpose and recklessness of
means, the object before her. She has justly been compared to the shark
which follows the vessel through storm and calm in expectation of its
prey. The country was divided into two, apparently equally matched, and
irreconcilable camps. Several campaigns had been fought, and there was no
immediate prospect of the Catholics overcoming the Huguenots in the
field; therefore Jezebel has recourse to her old policy — which she
thoroughly understood — treachery and secret assassination. At the same
time, it is affirmed by Felice, that no state reason can be advanced in
justification of the massacre. Rome had no longer anything to fear for her
supremacy, or the crown for the maintenance of its political power. It was
fanaticism, resentment, Jezebel’s unquenchable thirst for the blood of
God’s saints, which led to the crushing of the minority in 1572.
The first and real authors of the massacre were Catherine, Pope Pius V.,
and Philip II. of Spain — none of them French. Others were drawn into
the plot, but nothing could be done without the sanction of the king. The
mother, with the assistance of the pope, accomplished this. By a gross
perversion of scripture, the crafty pontiff pointed out to the young king
that he was now in the position of Saul, king of Israel, who had received
 1189
the orders of God, by the mouth of Samuel the prophet, to exterminate the
infidel Amalekites, and not to spare one in any case. But as he did not
obey the voice of God, he was deprived of his throne and his life. Charles
saw the application of the allusion, and ultimately consented to kill all the
Huguenots, that not one might be left to reproach him with the deed.

THE KING’S SNARE TO ENTRAP THE HUGUENOTS

The next question was, How is it to be accomplished? The chiefs of the
Reformed were in the provinces. It was necessary to draw them out and
concentrate them, in order to get them into their power. The perfidious
Charles, who was now committed to the plot, pretended an earnest desire
for the establishment of a lasting peace, and proposed a marriage between
the young king of Navarre, afterwards Henry IV., and his sister, Margaret
of Valois. This was a grand alliance for the poor house of Navarre, but the
mother, Jeanne d’Albret, was not dazzled by it. She preferred the fear of
the Lord to great riches. “I would rather,” she said, “descend to be the
most humble maiden of France, than sacrifice my soul and that of my son
to grandeur.” But the greatest Reformer in France must be brought within
the toils of Catherine.
Jeanne d’Albret was the daughter of the accomplished and pious
Margaret of Angouleme; but the daughter in some respects was greater
than her mother; at least she was more decided as to the Reformation. But
it is due to Margaret to bear in mind that she was greatly hindered by her
dissolute brother and mother. In 1560 Jeanne d’Albret made open
profession of the Protestant faith; abolished the popish service throughout
her kingdom, and introduced the Protestant worship. When we remember
that her little kingdom lay on the slope of the Pyrenees, touching France
on the one side, and Spain on the other, we shall not consider her wanting
in courage. The popes thundered their anathemas against her, the powerful
kings of France and Spain threatened to invade her territory and rase it
from the map of Europe; but for twelve years the Lord protected this
pious queen, during which time she had the Bible translated into the dialect
of the country; established colleges and schools, studied laws like a
senator, and mightily improved the condition of her subjects.
 1190
The next person of great note was Admiral Coligny. He was a true
Christian, a really godly man, and the most skillful leader of the Huguenot
armies. The envoys of the court set before Jeanne, Coligny, and the chiefs
of the Huguenots, that this marriage would be the best guarantee of a solid
peace between the two religions. Charles declared that he married his
sister, not only to the prince of Navarre, but to the whole Huguenot party.
Coligny allowed himself to be deceived; the prospect was indeed bright;
the entire kingdom would be united; and he thought they should trust the
sincerity and oath of his majesty.

THE KING’S CONSUMMATE DUPLICITY

At last Jeanne d’Albret gave her consent to the marriage, and visited the
court at Blots in March, 1572; but leaving her son behind her from a
lingering feeling of distrust. The king and the queen-mother caressed her
with much apparent tenderness; especially the king, who called her his
great aunt, his all, his best-beloved, and entertained her with so much
honor and respect that everyone was astonished. She reached Paris in
May; on the 4th of June she fell ill, on the 9th she died. It was said that a
Florentine perfumer, Master Rene, known by the name of the “queen’s
poisoner,” had sold her some poisoned gloves. Her end was peace, she
was happy to go home, she uttered no complaints against her murderers,
and seemed only anxious for the spiritual welfare of her son Henry and her
daughter Catherine. Committing them to the Lord’s tender care, she fell
asleep in Jesus at the age of forty-four.
Admiral Coligny had also gone to court. In his first interview he knelt
before the king. Charles raised him up, called him his father, and embraced
the illustrious old man thrice. “We have got you now,” said the king, “and
you must remain with us. This is the happiest day of my life.” The other
chiefs of the Huguenots being assembled in Paris, the marriage was
celebrated with great splendor in the cathedral church of Notre Dame on
the 18th of August, 1572 the principal members of the nobility, Protestant
as well as Catholic, being present on the occasion. It was followed by a
succession of feasts and galeties, in which the leaders of both parties alike
participated; and the fears of the Huguenots were thus completely
disarmed. Charles by his dissimulation, and Catherine by her treacherous
smiles, had succeeded in deceiving all parties. Indeed all seemed to hope
 1191
that the age of bloodshed was closed, and that this marriage was the
harbinger of a peaceful and prosperous future for a country so long
afflicted with civil wars. But at that very moment, when all classes were
rejoicing and full of hope, a secret council was held, at which it was
determined to arrange a general massacre of the Huguenots.
Fifty thousand crowns was offered by the king for the head of Coligny;
whom Charles was embracing so warmly only a day before. To earn the
reward, one Maurevert lay in wait for the admiral on the 22nd of August,
in a house near the church of St. Germain. He was struck by three balls
shot from an arquebuse, which shattered the forefinger of his left hand, and
wounded his left arm. The assassin escaped; he is styled by historians of
that day “The slayer on the king’s wages, the common assassin.” Coligny
succeeded in reaching his hotel, where he was attended by the celebrated
surgeon, Ambrose Pare. The king and his mother, like two innocents,
visited the admiral, professed the greatest horror at the dastardly act,
swore that they would take such terrible revenge that it should never be
forgotten. “You bear the wound,” said the king, “and I the perpetual pain”
— unparalleled deceitfulness!

SAINT BARTHOLOMEW’S EVE

Meanwhile the day fixed for the general massacre drew near. Between two
and three o’clock in the morning of the 24th of August — the feast of St.
Bartholomew — as the king sat in his chamber with his mother and the
duke of Anjou, the great bell of St. Germain rang to early prayers. This
was the preconcerted signal. Scarcely had its first peal disturbed the silent
hour of midnight, when the firing commenced. Charles was greatly
agitated: a cold sweat stood upon his forehead; he started, and sent word
to the duke of Guise to precipitate nothing. It was too late. The queen-
mother, distrusting the constancy of her son, had commanded that the
hour for a signal should be anticipated. In a few moments every steeple in
Paris was sending forth its peals, and with the clamor of a hundred bells,
there mingled the shoutings, cursings, and howlings of the assassins; and
the shrieks, groans, and cries for mercy of the surprised Huguenots. To
distinguish the assailants in the dark, they wore a white sash on their left
arm, and a white cross on their hats. At the sound of the tocsin armed men
rushed out from every door, shouting, “For God and the king.” The streets
 1192
of Paris flowed with human blood, and the savage ferocity of the Catholics
knew no bounds.
The duke of Guise, accompanied by three hundred soldiers, hastened to
the dwelling of Coligny. He had been awakened by the noise of firing, and,
dreading the worst, was engaged in prayer with his minister Merlin. His
servants came rushing into his room, exclaiming, “Sire! the house is broken
into, and there is no means of escape!... I have been long prepared to die,”
answered the admiral calmly, “as for you, save yourselves if you can; you
cannot save my life.” Behem, a servant of the duke of Guise, was the first
to enter the room. “Are you not the admiral?” he demanded. “Yes, I am,”
replied Coligny, looking with great composure on the naked sword of the
assassin; and began to say a few serious words to the young man, who
instantly plunged his sword into the veteran’s breast, and gave him a
second blow on the head. Guise who was waiting impatiently in the
courtyard, called aloud, “Behem, hast thou done it?... It is done, my lord,”
was the reply. “But we must see it to believe it: throw him out at the
window.” In lifting up the body of the admiral, who was still breathing, he
clutched the window-frame, but was instantly flung into the courtyard.
The duke of Guise, wiping off the blood from his face, said; “I know him,
it is he;” and kicking the dead body with his foot, he hastened into the
streets, exclaiming, “Courage, comrades; we have begun well — now for
the rest.” Sixteen years afterwards, in the castle of Blots, this same Henry
of Guise was assassinated by order of Henry III., who, when the dead
body lay before him, kicked it in the face. Oh! the sovereign retributive
justice of God!
In that awful night, Teligny, son-in-law of the admiral, and five hundred of
the Protestant nobility and gentry, were sacrificed to the Moloch of
bigotry, and that in the sacred name of religion. “Thick grass is more easily
mown than thin,” was the proverb acted upon, and the leading Protestants
were lodged in the same quarter of Paris. This field was kept as the special
preserve for the grim, cruel duke of Guise. The retinue of the young king
of Navarre were lodged in the Louvre, as the special guests of the monarch,
but with the Satanic intention of having them all conveniently murdered.
They had come in the train of their royal chief to be present at the
celebration of his marriage with the sister of the king. One by one they
were called by name from their rooms, marched down unarmed into the
 1193
quadrangle, where they were hewn down before the very eyes of their
royal host, and piled in heaps at the gates of the Louvre. A more
perfidious cold-blooded butchery is not to be found in the annals of
mankind.
Over all Paris the work of massacre by this time extended. Ruffians by
thousands — armed with the poignard, the pike, the knife, the sword, the
arquebuse, every weapon of the soldier and the brigand — rushed through
the streets murdering all they met who had not the white cross on their
hats. They forced their way into the houses of the Protestants, slaughtered
the inmates in their night-clothes, men, women, and children, and threw
their mangled bodies into the streets. No pitiful wail for mercy was heard;
the ebscurest haunts were searched, and nobody was spared. By-and-by
the sun rose upon Paris. The wretched Charles, who had shuddered for
some moments at the commencement of the massacre, had tasted the blood
of the saints, and became as ravenous for slaughter as the lowest of the
mob. He and his blood-stained Italian mother, at the break of day went out
on the palace balcony to feast their eyes on the slaughtered heaps. Rivers
of blood flowed in the streets; corpses of men, women, and children
blocked up the doorways; on all sides the groans and death-cries of the
dying were heard, and the blasphemies and imprecations of the maddened
populace.
Some, however, who had managed to escape were seen struggling in the
river, in their efforts to swim across; and Charles seizing an arquebuse,
fired on his subjects, shouting, “Kill! Kill!... Two hundred and twenty-
seven years afterwards,” says Felice, “Mirabeau picked the arquebuse of
Charles IX out of the dust of ages to turn it against the throne of Louis
XVI.” Satan may rule for a time, but God overrules! On the same Sunday
morning, Charles sent for Henry of Havarre, his new brother-in-law, and
Henry of Conde; and, in the most furious tone said to them: “The Mass,
death, or the Bastile.” After some resistance, the princes consented to
attend mass, but no one believed in their sincerity. On the fourth day,
when the fury of the assassins had become satiated, and the Huguenots
were for the most part slain; there fell a dead silence on the streets of
Paris. The priests now followed the tragic scene with a play. On the
Thursday, ankle-deep in blood, the clergy celebrated an extraordinary
jubilee, and made a general procession to keep up the excitement. The
 1194
pulpits also re-echoed with thanksgiving, and a medal was struck with this
legend, “Piety has awakened justice.”

MASSACRE IN THE PROVINCES

But the thirst of Jezebel for blood was far from being satisfied. Orders
were sent from the court to all the provinces and principal cities to pursue
the same course. About a dozen of the provincial governors refused, and
one priest whose name deserves to be mentioned with thankfulness to the
Lord. When the king’s lieutenant called on John Hennuyer, bishop of
Lisieux, and gave him the order for the massacre of the Huguenots, he
answered, “No, no, sir; I oppose, and will always oppose the execution of
such an order. I am the pastor of Lisieux, and these people whom you
command me to slaughter’ are my flock. Although they have at present
strayed, having quitted the pasture which Jesus Christ, the sovereign
Shepherd, has confided to my care, they may still come back. I do not see
in the gospel that the shepherd can permit the blood of his sheep to be
shed; on the contrary, I find there, that he is bound to give his blood and
his life for them.” The lieutenant asked him for his refusal in writing,
which the bishop readily gave him.
At Rouen, Toulouse, Orleans, Lyons, and in nearly all the great towns of
the kingdom, the work of blood was renewed with undiminished fury; the
carnage went on without pity and without remorse for about six weeks.
Thousands of dead bodies were thrown into the rivers, which were either
washed on shore at different bends of the rivers, or borne to the sea. The
faithful of Meaux — our early friends — were slaughtered in the prisons;
and, the sword being too slow, iron hammers were employed. Four
hundred houses in the most handsome quarter of the town were pillaged
and devastated. But we grow weary, weary of this recital; and were it not
that the St. Bartholomew massacre is the greatest and darkest crime of
the christian era — and gives us, as nothing else does, a true picture of
the essential principles of popery — we should willingly have ended our
notice of the Reformation in France before coming to it. If ever the depths
and wiles of Satan were seen in human wickedness, it is here. The
premeditation, the solemn oaths of the king — which drew the Calvinists
to Paris — the royal marriage, and the dagger put into the hands of the
mob by the chiefs of the state, at a time of universal peace, represent a
 1195
plot which has no parallel in history. And then, from the pope
downwards, the Catholic community lifting up their hands to heaven, and
thanking God for the glorious triumph!
At Rome the news was received with transports of joy. The bearer of the
glad tidings was rewarded with a present of a thousand pieces of gold. The
pope caused the guns of the castle of St. Angelo to be fired, declared a
jubilee, and struck a medal in honor of the event. Philip II. of Spain, the
duke of Alva, and the cardinal of Lorraine, shared in these transports of
joy. But the impression produced by the massacre in Protestant countries
was altogether different. In England, Germany, and Switzerland, numbers
of exiles arrived, horror-struck and half-dead, to tell the sad tale; and the
petrified nations cursed the name of France. Geneva, tenderly related to
the seventy thousand victims whose bodies covered the plains of France,
or lay stranded on the banks of its rivers, instituted a day of fasting and
prayer, which is still observed. In Scotland, the aged Knox, in prophetic
strains, pronounced the divine vengeance against the house of Valois in the
following terms: “The sentence is gone forth against this murderer, the
king of France, and the vengeance of God will not be withdrawn from his
house. His name shall be held in execration by posterity; and no one who
shall spring from his loins shall possess the kingdom in peace, unless
repentance come to prevent the judgment of God.” In England, Elizabeth
put her court into mourning, and when the French ambassador sought an
audience to offer his hypocritical explanation, he was received with
profound silence. The lords and ladies of the court, in long mourning
apparel, suffered the ambassador to pass between them without saluting
him, or deigning to give him so much as a look.

THE NUMBER OF VICTIMS

The whole number that perished in the massacre cannot be accurately
ascertained. The victims in Paris were probably from three to four
thousand. Brantome says that Charles IX might have seen four thousand
bodies floating down the Seine. “There is to be found,” says Wylie, “in the
account-books of the city of Paris, a payment to the grave-diggers of the
cemetery of the hmocents, for having interred one thousand one hundred
dead bodies, stranded at the turns of the Seine, near Chaillot, Auteuil, and
St. Cloud. It is probable that many corpses were carried still further, and
 1196
the bodies were not all thrown into the river.” The number of victims
throughout the whole of France was probably about seventy thousand.
Perefixe, archbishop of Paris, in the seventeenth century, raises it to one
hundred thousand. “This last figure,” says Felice, “is probably
exaggerated, if we reckon those only who met with a violent death. But if
there be added those who died of misery, hunger, grief, the aged, who were
helpless and abandoned, women without shelter, children without bread,
the many wretched beings whose lives were shortened by this great
catastrophe, it will be confessed that the number given by Perefixe is still
below the truth.”3

THE END OF THE LEADING ACTORS IN THE MASSACRE

So wonderfully had the Spirit of God wrought in France by means of the
truth, that when men expected to see only the ruins of the crushed
Huguenots after the massacre, they were surprised to find them resolved
in many parts of the country to offer a determined resistance to the royal
troops. There can be no doubt that French Protestantism had become a
great political association; but not wholly so. There must have been many
thousands of real Christians amongst them, though led to believe that it
was right to oppose their oppressors, and fight for their lives, their
families, and their religion. In the siege of Sancerre, when nearly all the
young children died from hunger, we give one instance of perfect grace. A
boy of ten years old, drawing nigh unto death, seeing his parents weeping
near him, and handling his arms and legs, which were as dry as wood, said
to them, “Why do you weep to see me die of hunger? I do not ask you for
bread, mother. I know you have none. But since God wills that I must
thus die, we must be content. The holy Lazarus, did he not suffer hunger?
Have I not read that in the Bible?” Thus passed away that precious lamb,
with many others, to be folded in the everlasting embrace of the Good
Shepherd who died for them; of them may not it be truly said,
“they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither shall
the sun [of persecution] light on them, nor any heat. For the Lamb
which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead
them unto living fountains of waters, and God shall wipe away all
tears from their eyes.” (Revelation 7:16, 17.)
 1197
But not so died the perfidious and cruel king. The terrible crime in which
he had taken so prominent a part, weighed heavily on his mind to the last
moment of his life. Night and day he was haunted by the scenes he had
witnessed on St. Bartholomew’s eve. He imagined he saw his murdered
guests sitting at his bedside and at his table. Sleeping or waking, the
murdered Huguenots seemed ever present to his eyes with ghastly faces,
and weltering in blood. But, as the Lord would have it, he — who had
stipulated when giving his orders for the St. Bartholomew massacre, that
not a Huguenot should be left alive to reproach him with the deed — was
attended on his deathbed by a Huguenot physician, and waited upon by a
Huguenot nurse. He evidently had not the slightest confidence in any of
his former associates; he was even haunted by the terrible feeling that his
own mother was causing his death by slow poisoning. He died of a strange
and frightful malady, which caused his blood to ooze from the pores of his
body, in less than two years after the St. Bartholomew massacre, having
lived twenty-five years and reigned fourteen.
It is said that all the actors in the St. Bartholomew massacre, with one
exception, died by violence. But we need not trace their tragic history.
These bloody men were over-taken by divine vengeance, and brought
down to the grave in blood. Catherine de Medici lived to see the utter
failure of all her schemes, the death of all her partners in guilt, and the
extinction of her dynasty. The Cardinal of Lorraine was assassinated in
prison, and Henry III., the last of the Valois, fell by the dagger of the
assassin in his own tent, and thus was the prophecy of John Knox
fulfilled.
The vast materials furnished by the Reformation in France have detained
us a little longer, and occupied more of our space than we can well afford;
but the greatness of the Lord’s work there, the mighty struggle between
light and darkness, and the melancholy interest which all must feel in the
results of that work, give it a peculiar place in the great revolutions of the
sixteenth century.

THE COUNCIL OF TRENT

At the famous Council of Trent, which met in 1545, and continued its
sittings till 1563, during which the events we have rapidly described were
 1198
in progress, the laws of the Roman Catholic church were more accurately
defined, and measures were devised for the more effectual suppression of
heresy. Their deliberations and decisions must have been greatly affected
by the general state of Europe at that particular moment. But as the
original object and character of this council have been already noticed,4 we
need only add what has not been previously mentioned.
What particularly distinguished this council was not the framing of new
laws, but undertaking to define and fix the doctrines of the Romish church
in a more accurate manner than had ever before been attempted, and to
confirm them by the sanction of its authority. “The Trentine fathers,”
says Mosheim, “authorized nothing new; but it is equally true, that they
authorized much, hitherto thought, from its want of any sufficient
authority, open to individual acceptance or rejection. To these divines,
therefore, forming a body chiefly Italian and Spanish, sitting in the
sixteenth century... is the church of Rome indebted for the formal
authentification of her peculiar creed.” By the servility of the indigent
Italian bishops, the popes acquired such influence in the council, that they
dictated all its decrees, and framed them, not with any intention of healing
the divisions, reforming the ancient abuses, restoring unity and concord to
the church, but to establish their own dominion. “Doctrines,” says Scott,
“which had hitherto been considered as mere private opinions, open to
discussion, were now absurdly made articles of faith, and required to be
received on pain of excommunication. Rites — which had formerly been
observed only in deference to custom — supposed to be ancient, were
established by the decrees of the church, and declared to be essential parts
of its worship.”5

POPE PIUS’S CREED

Pope Pius IV. issued a brief summary of the doctrinal decisions of the
council, which is called by his name, and has ever since been regarded as an
authoritative summary of the Catholic faith.
“I profess also, that there are truly and properly seven sacraments
of the new law, instituted by Jesus Christ our Lord, and for the
salvation of mankind, though all are not necessary for every one;
namely, baptism, confirmation, eucharist, penance, extreme
 1199
unction, orders, and matrimony, and that they confer grace; and of
these, baptism, confirmation, and orders cannot be reiterated
without sacrilege.
“I also receive and admit the ceremonies of the Catholic church,
received and approved in the solemn administration of all the above
said sacraments.
“I receive and embrace all and every one of the things which have
been defined and declared in the holy Council of Trent, concerning
original sin and justification.
“I profess likewise, that in the mass is offered to God a true,
proper, and propitiatory sacrifice for the living and the dead; and
that, in the most holy sacrifice of the Eucharist, there is truly,
really, and substantially, the body and blood, together with the
soul and divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ; and that there is made a
conversion of the whole substance of the bread into the body, and
of the whole substance of the wine into the blood, which
conversion the Catholic church calls transubstantiation.
“I confess also, that under either kind alone, whole and entire,
Christ and a true sacrament is received.
“I constantly hold that there is a purgatory, and that the souls
detained therein are helped by the suffrages of the faithful.
“Likewise, that the saints reigning together with Christ, are to be
honored and invocated; that they offer prayers to God for us; and
that their relics are to be venerated.
“I most firmly assert, that the images of Christ, and of the mother
of God, ever virgin, and also of the other saints, are to be had and
retained; and that one honor and veneration are to be given to them.
“I also affirm that the power of indulgences was left by Christ in
the church, and that the use of them is most wholesome to
christian people.
“I acknowledge the holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman church,
the mother and mistress of all churches. And I promise to swear
 1200
true obedience to the Roman bishop, the successor of St. Peter, the
prince of the apostles, and vicar of Jesus Christ.
“I also profess, and undoubtedly receive all other things delivered,
defined, and declared, by the sacred canons and general councils,
and particularly by the holy Council of Trent. And likewise, I also
condemn, reject, and anathema-the, all things contraw thereto, and
all heresies whatsoever condemned, rejected, land anathematised by
the church.
“This true Catholic faith, out of which none can be saved, which I
now freely profess, and truly hold, I,N., promise, vow, and swear
most constantly to hold and profess the same whole and entire,
with God’s assistance, to the end of my life; and to procure, as far
as lies in my power, that the same shall be held, taught, and
preached by all who are under me, or are entrusted to my care, by
virtue of my office. So help me God, and these holy Gospels of
God.”
 1201

CHAPTER 52
THE WALDENSES
Having brought down the history of this interesting people to the year
1560,1 when they suffered so severely in their own valleys, and on the
plains of Calabria, we shall now briefly notice their history from that
period. Yet we must not expect to find in this remarkable people the grace
that should characterize the followers of the blessed Lord and His
apostles. Not that they did not believe in the Lord Jesus as their Savior,
and in His precious blood as the only and all-sufficient remedy for sin.
And had they been left unmolested in their beautiful valleys, they would
have been as harmless as their flocks and herds; but when assailed and
persecuted by the Catholics, they looked upon Joshua, Gideon, and David
as their models, not the Lord and His apostles. And being sincere and
honest, and believing that their God was the God of battles, they fought
under His banner, and believed that nothing was impossible to Him. It is
no doubt from this principle that their persecutions form one of the most
heroic pages in the church’s history. Like many in our own day, they did
not see the difference between law and grace; but being a God-fearing
people, He graciously heard and answered their prayers. Allegiance to
Christ ruled in their hearts, which, after all, is the chief thing. The Scotch
covenanters who fought for the crown and kingdom of Emmanuel resemble
them in this.
Such were “the poor men of the valleys.” They believed the Bible to be a
revelation from God, and were governed by it, so far as they understood it.
Their neighbors, the Catholics, on the other hand, believed that God had
given to the church of Rome and its head, dominion over the whole
christian world, and that all who refuse subjection to her authority are not
only heretics, but rebellious subjects, whom the sovereign has a right to
punish according to his pleasure. This was and is the established belief of
Rome; and, seeing it remains so, there could be no security for life or
liberty to any who dared to question her claims, had she the power to
execute her arrogant assumption. Sometimes the magistrate refused to
obey the priest, and the people were thereby spared; but the reader will
 1202
see how easily Rome could find a plausible pretext for persecution when it
suited her purpose, and how constantly the mitre prevailed over the
crown.
For some time after the desolating wars of 1560 the remnant of the
Waldenses were allowed to re-enter their native valleys, rebuild their
houses, and replant their vineyards. Their fruit trees had been cut down,
their hamlets and villages made a heap of ruins, and their fields left
uncultivated and unsown. Starvation stared them in the face; but a deeper
grief weighed on the hearts of many. Where are our parents, husbands,
sons, pastors, and many whom the enemy hath trodden down? They were
now with the Lord and the Lord, in His unfailing mercy, was with them;
and from the nature of the country, it was not difficult to exist for a time.
“Chestnut trees of luxuriant growth,” says Dr. Beattie, speaking of
the valley of Rora, “shade the inferior acclivities, and from these,
in seasons of scarcity, a wholesome bread is prepared, which, with
the luxury of new milk, furnishes a repast which the daintiest
appetite might partake of with a relish. Over the higher grounds
nature has spread a rich carpel; of vegetation; and thither, as the
pastoral season arrives, the inhabitants repair with their families
and cattle. After spending their summer on the hills, in a life of
patriarchal simplicity, they again descend to the valley as
symptoms of winter set in, and there prosecute those branches of
industry by which they may best satisfy the state, and minister to
their own mutual necessities.” Speaking of the valley of
Angrogna, the same poetical writer says, “When we describe it as
a picture in miniature of Switzerland, the reader will form a just
conception of its general features. All the ingredients of Alpine
landscape, torrents, rocks, precipices, gloomy ravines, and gushing
fountains, forests that at once afford shelter and sustenance,
verdant meadows to which the meandering streams carry freshness
and fertility, fields and gardens containing the produce of different
climates clinging to the very precipices, and evincing that
unwearied industry on the part of the inhabitants which has
purchased the means of life under the most unfavourable
circumstances.”2
 1203
Reflecting on the primitive simplicity of the natives of these valleys, their
peaceful lives, their industrious habits, their rigid morality, their strict
observance of the sabbath day, their exactness in paying their rents and all
claims, and the absence of drinking, swearing, and all such vices, we may
well inquire, Why should their prince and landlord seek to exterminate the
race? The answer will be found in what follows.

THE WARS OF EXTERMINATION

The brief periods of apparent peace which the Waldenses sometimes
enjoyed, were by no means intervals of security and repose; but rather, of
painful reflection and fearful anticipation. True peace, with security as to
their persons, their property, and liberty of conscience — the inalienable
rights of man, they knew not for hundreds of years.
In the year 1560 two events occurred which are sufficient to account for
the exterminating wars which followed that period.
1. The throne of Savoy was then filled by Charles Emmanuel II., a youth
of fifteen. He was a prince of a mild and humane disposition; but, like
Charles IX. of France, he was counselled by his mother, and she was of
the house of Medici, and granddaughter to that Catherine whose deeds of
blood have justly ruerired the execrations of mankind. The boy-sovereign
was ruled by his mother, who was regent during his minority, and she was
ruled by the Vatican.
2. The Society for the “Propagation of the Faith” was established in the
same year at Turin. Noble lords, ladies, laymen, priests, and people,
pressed to join the society, the inducement being a plenary indulgence to
all who should take part in the good work: the watchword reveals its
character — “The conversion or the extermination of heretics.”
The propagandists commenced their ruinous work under the fair pretext of
conversion. Ladies of the court, and others of inferior rank, with swarms
of monks, became zealous supporters of the society, visiting from house
to house. About this time convents were established in the valleys, and the
schools and colleges of the Vaudois were suppressed. The abduction of
males under twelve and of females under fourteen years of age, for the
 1204
purpose of conversion, was sanctioned by law. But these nefarious means
were soon followed by a violent persecution similar to that of 1560.
“The bloody edict of Gastaldo” — so named from its consequences-
appeared in January, 1655. In vain did the threatened inhabitants, by
every means of appeal and supplication to the different members of the
government, seek to avert the impending storm. More than a thousand
families, in the depth of winter, were driven from their homes and
properties to the shelterless heights of their ice-covered mountains. And
this they were commanded to do within three days on pain of death.
Anything more inhuman, more barbarous, under the circumstances, cannot
be imagined. A whole population, including little children, old men, the
sick, the feeble, and the bed-ridden, must leave their homes amidst the
terrors of an Alpine winter. Their journey ]ay through valleys buried deep
in snow, across rivers swollen with the flood, and over mountains covered
with ice. True, an alternative was offered them: they might go to mass.
The historian Leger informs us that he had a congregation of well-nigh two
thousand persons, and that not a man of them all accepted the alternative.
“I can well bear them this testimony,” he observes, “seeing I was their
pastor for eleven years, and I knew every one of them by name; judge,
reader, whether I had not cause to weep for joy, as well as for sorrow,
when I saw that all the fury of these wolves was not able to influence one
of these lambs, and that no earthly advantage could shake their constancy.
And when I marked the traces of their blood on the snow and ice over
which they had dragged their lacerated limbs, had I not cause to bless God
that I had seen accomplished in their poor bodies what remained of the
measure of the sufferings of Christ, and especially when I beheld this
heavy cross borne by them with a fortitude so noble?”3

THE TREACHERY OF PIANESSA

“Had the persecution ended here,” says Mr. Hugh Acland, “humanity
would yet have been saved from an indelible stain. The marquess of
Pianessa entered the valleys at the head of fifteen thousand men; the
consequent massacre is too horrible for detailed narration.” Only a part of
the Waldenses had suffered from the decree of Gastaldo, but the fixed
object of the propaganda was the extirpation of the entire race. The
marquess, being well aware of the desperate resistance he must encounter
 1205
if the Vaudois should flee and unite in the mountains, betook himself to
the o]d weapon of Jezebel — treachery. He feigned a wish for conciliation,
and invited deputies to confer on the necessary terms. The wiles of the
enemy alas! were successful. Well skilled in craftiness, he thoroughly
deceived the simple honest-hearted Vaudois, after treating them with great
kindness, and assuring them that all would be amicably settled, if they
would receive, as a token of fidelity on their part, a small company of
soldiers in the different villages. Some of the more sagacious, especially the
pastor Leger, suspected treachery; but the people in general, willing to
hope for a time of peace, opened the doors of their houses to the soldiers
of Planessa. Two days were spent in great friendliness; the soldiers and
the villagers eating at the same table, sleeping under the same roof, and
conversing freely together. These two days were employed by the enemy
in making preparations for the general massacre. The villages and roads
throughout the valleys were occupied by the soldiers.
At four o’clock on the morning of the third day, April 24th, a signal was
given from the castle, and the assassins began their work of death. But
with the exception of pastor Leger, no historian attempts to give details;
and he did it as a matter of duty, being an eyewitness, and had his
narrative verified by others. A priest and a monk accompanied each party
of soldiers, to set fire to the houses as soon as the inmates had been
despatched. “Our valley of Lucerne,” exclaims Leger, “which was like a
Goshen, was now converted into a Mount Etna, darting forth cinders, and
fire, and flames. The earth resembled a furnace, and the air was filled with
a darkness like that of Egypt, which might be felt, from the smoke of
towns, villages, temples, mansions, granges, and buildings, all burning in
the flames of the Vatican.” But here, it was not as in the St. Bartholomew
massacre, the instant despatch of their victims but the deliberate invention
of barbarities and cruelties hitherto unknown. As many of the: strongest
escaped by their knowledge of the hills, tiny children, their mothers, the
sick, and the aged were the chief victims of the soldiers of the propaganda.
But we would not subject our readers to the heart-sickening details of
Leger’s awful narrative.
 1206
THE FAITH AND HEROISM OF GIANAVELLO
During this terrible persecution which carried fire and sword into so many
of the valleys, Rora had its full proportion of calamity; but it called forth
one of those ardent spirits which from time to time God raises up to
exhibit those virtues which are seldom brought into action but in moments
of great emergency. We allude to Joshua Gianavello, a native of the
valley of Rora, but truly a mighty man of valor, whose genius and
intrepidity are the subject of unqualified admiration. On the morning of the
24th, which witnessed the merciless slaughter in the valleys of Lucerne,
Angrogna, La Torre, Villar, St. John, and others, a similar doom was
intended for Rora, and Count Christovel, with four hundred soldiers, was
charged with its execution.
Gianavello had narrowly watched their movements, and, seconded by a
small determined band, seven in all, he threw himself into the defile by
which the enemy was advancing upon Rora. There was not a moment to
lose. The soldiers — naturally thinking that the ruthless proceedings on
the other side of the Pelice had paralysed all further resistance, and
ensured them an easy entrance into Rora — advanced with little attention
to order. Under cover of the rocks and trees, Gianavello and his band could
hear the conversation, and as one of the soldiers, counting on their work
being easy, observed, that the people of Rora would only be waiting to bid
us welcome. “We do!” exclaimed a voice of thunder, when a volley of
musketry from right and left carried death into the advancing colnmn.
Seven of the troop were killed. Then, reloading their pieces, and quickly
changing their ground, they fired again with a like effect. No enemy was
visible; but the volume of curling smoke that rolled down the rocks,
convinced them that they were caught between two fires. Thrown into
utter confusion by this unexpected salutation, they began to retreat in
terror and precipitation. But Gianavello and his men bounding from cover
to cover kept up a deadly fire, until the superstitious soldiers began to feel
as if every tree discharged a bullet. Fifty-four of their number were left
dead behind them, and Rora was saved from the meditated destruction.
The disgrace which attached to this enterprise Pianessa resolved to retrieve
by a fresh attempt. He organized a battalion of nearly a thousand men to
cross the mountain. Fully aware that such would be the case, Gianavello
 1207
was on the watch and saw the enemy enter. His band was now increased
to seventeen men — eleven good marksmen and six expert slingers. When
the invaders had advanced to a certain point, this invisible army opened so
galling a fire upon them that they were again driven back to their quarters
with great loss.
The news of this second defeat was the signal for vengeance. To increase
his host, Planessa ordered detachments from the neighboring stations, and
having completed his muster, sent them once more on the pass to Rora.
The numbers were so overwhelming on this occasion that the patriot and
his band waited for a favorable moment. Meanwhile they knelt down in
prayer and gave thanks to God who had twice by their hands saved the
people, and prayed that their hearts and arms might be strengthened to
work yet another deliverance. A company of soldiers, laden with booty,
were immediately attacked; and, as if possessed by a superstitious terror,
endeavored to make their escape, throwing away their plunder. Their flight
became most disastrous; great pieces of rock were rolled down upon them,
mingled with deadly bullets; and many in their haste fell over the
precipices, so that only a few survived.
But in place of the blinded bigot, Pianessa, seeing in these events the finger
of God, he was only the more inflamed with rage, and jealous for his own
military character. He assembled all the royal troops — to the number of
eight or ten thousand men — and calling his officers together, he held a
council of war. What was to be done? A mere handful of peasants had
foiled the tactics of a disciplined army; and the troops were charged with
cowardice and incapacity. It was resolved that the whole army should be
divided into three separate companies, and, by a simultaneous movement
from every accessible avenue, secure the destruction of Rora. To meet this
overwhelming force, Gianavello was compelled to take up his position on
the summit of the pass, and while bravely combating with the first troop
of three thousand, the other divisions forced a passage in the opposite
direction.

THE MASSACRE
The village of Rora is now in the hands of the pope’s soldiers, who,
meeting with little resistance, abandoned themselves to the work of
 1208
destruction. The inhabitants consisted of old men, women and children;
the effective members of the community were now expanding their
patriotic efforts on the frontier. A general massacre followed. Nearly ten
thousand assassins fell upon the helpless and unoffending peasants with
all the impetuosity of wolves rushing upon a fold. No distinction was
made of age or sex. Happy they who were slain at once, and thus escaped
indignities and barbarities, to which we cannot give utterance. “Every
soldier,” says Dr. Beattie, “took upon himself the office of an executioner,
till the devoted hamlet presented the spectacle of a vast scaffold strewn
with victims, and streaming with blood. When the morning sun rose upon
the village, not a voice was heard, nor a hearth left standing; but a mass of
smouldering ashes, through which protruded at intervals the ghastly
features of the slain, carried its appeal to the gates of heaven” — page 56.
The wife and three daughters of Gianavello, Planessa spared from the
sword that he might work on the feelings of the father and husband. He
threatened to burn them alive unless he surrendered himself a prisoner and
abjured his religion. Gianavello nobly replied: “As for the first
condition, my wife and children are in thy hands, and if such be God’s
will, thou mayest accomplish thy threat; but this barbarous act can only
affect their bodies, for which their religion teaches them not to be over-
solicitous. If brought to the stake, they will be supported in the hour of
trial. Their faith is proof against terror, and enables the innocent to look
with complacent eye upon what is terrible only to the guilty. What was
once said to Pilate, I now say toPianessa: — ‘Thou couldest have no
power at all against me except it were given thee from above.’ As to the
question of apostasy; shall I abjure these principles I have so long
defended with my blood — principles unchangeable as the word of God?
Shall I desert His cause for the hopes of a renegade? No! in that cause
which I have thus feebly espoused, I am ready to perish. The. terrors of
the Inquisition are mild, compared with the upbraidings of conscience; and
I shall never incur the one by shrinking from the other.” He escaped to
Geneva.
What could Pianessa do? What could the papal armies do? What could the
legions of hell do against a religion that produced such faith in God, and
such champions for His truth? They might crush for a time the feeble few,
“the poor of the flock,” and seem to triumph; but God is in the midst of
 1209
them, and in the most wonderful manner preserves a remnant for Himself,
a seed to serve Him, the silver link in the unbroken chain of witnesses; and
the happy day will come when He will vindicate their cause in the
presence of an assembled universe, and lifting up their heads on high, He
will honor them with the martyr’s crown, while their enemies, covered
with shame and branded[with eternal infamy, will seek the darkest regions
of the lost that they may conceal the enormity of their guilt, and the
undying agonies of hopeless despair. Those shrieks and groans of the
dying which echoed and re-echoed among the Alpine hills shall be heard
again; and those quivering limbs of frightened children for whom there was
no pity shall be seen again, but in awful frightful vision. Haunted by such
sights and sounds, with a load of guilt which now oppresses the
imagination, what must that place of torment be? What vitality to the
worm that never dies, what vehemence to the flame that shall never be
quenched, must the recollection of such deeds for ever give! Still the grand
truth remains, that, by a timely repentance and a genuine faith in the Lord
Jesus, our sins, however many, are all washed away; but the soul that dies
impenitent is lost for ever!

THE SYMPATHY OF ENGLAND

The Protestant states of Europe were horror-struck when they heard of
these massacres. But nowhere did the cry from the valleys awaken a
deeper sympathy, or draw forth a stronger expression of indignation, than
in England. “Cromwell, who was then at the head of the state, proclaimed
a fast, ordered a collection for the sufferers, and wrote to all the Protestant
princes, and to the king of France, with the intent of enlisting their
sympathy and aid on behalf of the Vaudois. Milton, the Protector’s Latin
secretary, wrote the letters; and in token of the deep interest Cromwell
took in this affair, he sent Sir Samuel Morland with a letter to the duke of
Savoy.”4
The ambassador wisely visited the valleys on his way to Turin, and saw
with his own eyes the frightful desolations which they still presented.
After a partial allusion to the cruelties he was sent by the Protector to
complain of, he, with great plainness and fervor of speech, proceeded:
“Why should I mention more? Though I could enumerate infinitely more,
did not my mind altogether revolt from them. If all the tyrants of all times
 1210
and ages were alive again — I speak without offense to your royal
highness, as convinced that none of these things are to be attributed to
your highness — they would doubtless be ashamed to find that nothing
barbarous, nor inhuman, in comparison of these deeds, had ever been
invented by them. In the meantime the angels are stricken with horror!
Men are dizzy with amazement! Heaven itself appears astonished by the
cries of the dying, and the very earth to blush with the gore of so many
innocent persons! Avenge not Thyself, O God, for this mighty
wickedness, this parricidal slaughter. Let Thy blood, O Christ, wash out
this blood!”
Ambassadors from the cantons of Switzerland, Geneva, Holland, and the
Protestants of France, all denounced the late cruelties in the strongest
terms. “So deep an interest was perhaps never displayed on any other
occasion, neither as to the number of potentates partaking in it, nor as to
the vast sums contributed to relieve the greatly afflicted Waldenses.”5
The duke of Savoy, pretending to listen to such remonstrances, was
induced to propose peace to the “men of the valleys.” The youthful prince
found himself completely deceived by his mother and her advisers. He had
lost thousands of his best subjects, the best tillers of the ground, the best
rent-payers, the most faithful to his throne; but more — he had lost the
best of his army, and spent his treasure. He declared that “to kill one
Vaudois cost him fifteen soldiers.” But what was his advantage? It was all
loss in this life, but the priests assured him that he had secured the favor
of heaven.
When the “Grand Monarch,” Louis XIV. of France, was dying, he asked
his confessor, father Le Chaise, “By what good deed as a king, he might
atone for his many sins as a man.” “Extirpate Protestantism from France,”
was the Jesuit’s ready reply. He speedily complied, and revoked the edict
of Nantes, which led to the slaughter and banishment of tens — we may
say, of hundreds — of thousands of God’s witnesses in France. In this
way was the humane duke of Savoy influenced to send an armed force into
the valleys, in order to reduce the inhabitants to the Romish obedience, or
to exterminate them. But he saw his mistake, and we have no doubt was
willing enough to conclude a peace, such as it was. The death of Cromwell,
which took place in 1658, deprived the Waldenses of their sincerest friend
 1211
and most powerful intercessor. He had sanctioned a collection for them,
and contributed from his own purse two thousand pounds. The whole
amount collected at that time was thirty-eight thousand pounds.

THE PEACE OF 1655

The peace which followed the great massacre of 1655 lasted about thirty
years; but history speaks of this period as rest only, when contrasted
with the storms that preceded it. The Catholics still found many ways in
which to annoy and oppress those whom they could neither conquer nor
convert. The condition of the Vaudois, after the treaty of peace was
signed, is thus described by Sir Samuel Morland, the English ambassador:
“To this very day, they labor under most heavy burdens, which are laid on
their shoulders by those rigid task-masters of the church of Rome... Those
very valleys which they inhabit are no other than a prison or dungeon, to
which the fort of La Torre serves as a door. To all this I must add, that,
notwithstanding those large supplies which have been sent them from
England or foreign states, yet so great is the number of hungry creatures,
and so grievous the oppressions of their popish enemies, who lie in wait
to bereave them of whatsoever is given them, and snatch at every morsel
of meat that goes into their mouths, that verily ever and anon they are
ready to eat their own flesh for want of bread. The tongue of the suckling
cleaves to the roof of its mouth, and the young children ask bread and no
man gives it to them. The young and the old lie on the ground in the
streets. Their miseries are more sore, and grievous than words can express
— they are in a manner dying while they yet live. No grapes in their
vineyards, no cattle in their fields, no herds in their stalls, no corn in their
garners, no meal in their barrels, no oil in their cruse.”6

THE PERSECUTION AND EXPULSION OF THE WALDENSES

Thus the inhabitants of the valleys struggled on until the year 1686, when
a fresh war broke out under the sovereignty of Victor Amadeus II., but
chiefly through the influence of Louis XIV. of France. When joined by the
French auxiliaries, the united force amounted to between fifteen and
twenty thousand men. Though vast numbers of the invaders were killed,
the peasants were overpowered, and those who escaped the exterminating
vengeance of the sword were dragged to prison, and the valleys were quite
 1212
depopulated. We have no space for details, but would just add, that
treachery and atrocity, as usual, on the one side, and heroic devotedness
on the other, marked the progress of the war; but treachery accomplished
its end, and atrocities followed. “Fourteen thousand healthy
mountaineers,” says Henri Arnaud, “were thrust into the dungeons of
Piedmont. But when, at the intercession of the Swiss deputies, their
prisons were opened, three thousand skeletons only crawled out.” Such
were the tender mercies of Holy Mother Church; and such would be her
tender mercies today, were her opportunities the same. At a distance of
nearly two hundred years, the heart sickens, the imagination is oppressed,
recoiling from the contemplation of such cold-blooded heartless cruelties.
Eleven thousand perished in a few months from fetid air, cold, hunger,
disease, inhumanity and utter neglect. What must have been the state of
the atmosphere with such fearful mortality! But we cannot proceed
further.
The prisons were thrown open in the beginning of October; but only on
condition that the prisoners should immediately leave the country and
embrace perpetual exile. Winter was already advancing in all its terrors, but
no mercy could be shown to such heretics, and the famished band, the
same evening, was driven forth to the Alps. They commenced their dreary
march towards Mount Cenis; darkness soon overtook them, and before
sunrise, more than one hundred and fifty had perished on the road. But the
most afflicting spectacle in this harrowing procession, was that of the poor
mothers and their infants. They turned their backs to the storm, so as to
protect the child in arms, but many of them dropped with fatigue, and
were wrapped in the stern winding-sheet of the Alps. The distressed exiles
earnestly entreated the officer in command to let them rest for a day,
especially as the weather showed signs of an approaching hurricane. The
officer, however, had no authority to grant their prayer, and the dreary
march was resumed. “During the hurricane,” says Dr. Beattie, “the snow,
resembling pounded ice, is tossed furiously around — like waves of sea-
foam carried into the air — and deposited in overwhelming masses along
the traveller’s path. In its effect the snow-storm of the Alps is like the
sand-storm in the Great Desert, saturating the air with its particles, and
when blowing in the face, produced blindness and blistering of the skin.
Under such circumstances, every hour must have been marked by some
 1213
distressing incident — some new disaster that rapidly diminished their
number, and sickened their hearts.”7

THE ARRIVAL OF THE EXILES AT GENEVA

About the middle of December the survivors of this wayworn band arrived
at the gates of Geneva; but so exhausted, that several of them died
between the outer and the inner gates of the city, “finding,” as one has
said, “the end of their life at the beginning of their liberty.” Some could not
speak from their tongues being swollen, and others could not hold out their
hands to receive the kindness of their new friends, from their arms being
frost-bitten. All, however, that humanity could suggest, all that a christian
brotherhood could supply, was brought to their relief. But Geneva could
not contain them all, and arrangements were made for distributing the
exiles among the Reformed cantons. And the inhabitants of these cantons
— to their praise be it recorded — vied with one another in offering them
the most cordial sympathy, united with the most friendly ministries of
brotherly love. But neither present comforts nor future prospects could
make them forget their ancestral homes. As they wandered by the banks of
the Rhine, they were like the Jews of old by the rivers of Babylon — they
hung their harps upon the willows, and sat down and wept as they
remembered their much loved valleys with all their tender recollections and
cherished associations.
For the attainment of this grand object they made several attempts which
proved unsuccessful. The enterprise being discovered, the senates of the
different cantons in which the exiles resided, foreseeing that their departure
might compromise them with the papal powers, took measures to prevent
their embarkation. This was a great disappointment to the yearning heart
of the Vaudois, and though they returned to their different communes, and
resumed their industrious occupations, they were secretly engaged in
devising measures for renewing the enterprise under more favorable
circumstances. In the meantime the duke of Savoy, being made acquainted
with the intention of the exiles, caught the alarm, and kindling his signals
along the frontier, placed everything in a warlike attitude. He also ordered
two regiments of one thousand strong, commanded by officers of high
birth and merit, to take possession of the roads, bridges, and passes. While
yet deliberating on the best measure to be adopted in this painful dilemma,
 1214
their pastor and captain, Henri Arnaud, addressed them from the words
in Luke 12, “Fear not, little flock,” etc., which greatly revived their spirits
and their patriotism.

THE EMBARKATION OF THE EXILES

At length, however, many circumstances combined to lead the Vaudois to
believe that the hand of the Lord was opening the way for their return.
Tiheir place of appointed rendezvous was a large forest, in the Pays du
Vaud, near the town of Neon, on the northern shore of the Leman. When
all was ready, their chief offered up prayer to God in the midst of his
devoted followers, and committed the expedition to Him. They embarked
between ten and eleven o’clock, August 16th, 1689, and crossed the lake
by starlight. When all had arrived on the southern shore of the lake, they
numbered between eight and nine hundred. M. Arnaud — a man spoken of
in the highest terms for his piety, patriotism, courage, and skill in military
tactics — divided the whole into three bodies — advance-guard, rear-
guard, and center, according to the system of regular troops, which the
Vaudois always pursued. Thus they commenced their march back to their
native valleys, supposed by some historians to be one of the most
wonderful exploits ever performed by any people. Besides the natural
difficulties of the way, such as the height of the mountains, the depth of
the snow, the treachery of the glaciers, and the heavy rain, the roads were
covered, and the passes guarded by the duke’s soldiers, aided by the
French; so that every inch of the way was disputed, and they had to fight
their way right through to the valleys.
The feelings which sprung up in their hearts, when their native mountains
first burst upon their sight, will be more easily imagined than described.
Some could, no doubt, individualize the very peaks under whose shadow
they had spent their infancy and youth, with a thousand other tender
recollections, and for the recovery of which they had exposed themselves
these thirty-one days to every danger, hardship, and privation, which
could afflict the body or depress the mind.
 1215
“But now with that blest landscape in their view
No fears could daunt them, and no foes subdue.
A voice still whispered in their ear — Advance!
So heaven restores you your inheritance!
Beneath your mountains, where the sun goes down,
Your sires have bled, and martyrs won their crown;
But henceforth, at their hearths, and on their tombs,
Peace shall preside — the olive branch shall bloom;
And they who now lay watch to shed their blood,
Shall own at last one cause — one brotherhood!”8

The march of the Vaudois from the borders of the Lake of Geneva to
their native valleys, not only was signalised by incidents unsurpassed in
the history of events, but was crowned with success. As the Lord would
have it, a quarrel arose about this time between the king of France and
Victor Amadeus, which induced the latter to take this heroic band into
favor. “Hitherto,” said he, to the scattered remnant of his Piedmontese
subjects, “we have been enemies; but from henceforth we must be friends;
others are to blame more than myself for the evils you have suffered.”
This happy turn in their affairs was followed by treaties between the
English and the Piedmontese governments, in the reigns of William III.
and queen Anne. From that period to the present Great Britain has been
empowered, by virtue of these solemn compacts, to interpose for their
protection, and their churches ought to have had rest. But again and again,
under false pretences, these oppressed people have had to contend against
petty injuries and harassing grievances.9
During the French empire of Napoleon, when the iron crown of Italy was
placed upon the head of “the Corsican,” the Waldenses enjoyed equal
rights and privileges in common with the rest of their countrymen. But, at
the restoration of the House of Savoy to the kingdom of Sardinia, they
were replaced under their former disabilities. This was the effect of evil
counsel, for the restored prince acknowledged, on more occasions than
one, “the constant and distinguished proof which the Waldenses had ever
given to his predecessors of attachment and fidelity. I know,” he added
that I have faithful subjects in the Waldenses; and that they will never
dishonor their character.” But evil counsellors prevailed, and the yoke was
again placed upon their necks.
 1216
The chief difficulty with which the Waldenses have now to contend is
poverty, which need excite no surprise. But the Protestants of England
have not been inattentive to the condition of their brethren in the valleys
of Piedmont. Public collections have on several occasions been made
throughout the kingdom; and the Society for the Propagation of the
Gospel in Foreign Parts is the trustee of considerable funds raised on their
behalf.
Thus the Lord has watched over, preserved, and maintained a witness and
a testimony for Himself in these valleys from time immemorial. And still
the oil of His grace flows, and the lamp of His truth burns, while the
thrones of their oppressors have been cast to the ground, and their
dynasties extinguished for ever. Even the gates of Rome have been thrown
open, so that we leave the Waldensian church, through the wonderful
providence of God, in a wide and open field, for the exercise of their
christian zeal and missionary labors.10
 1217

CHAPTER 53
THE REFORMATION IN THE BRITISH ISLES IRELAND

Although we can scarcely speak of a Reformation in Ireland, we may

briefly notice the changes ill her ecclesiastical history. The connection of
Ireland with the crown of England originated, as we have already seen,1 in
a compact with Henry II., Pope Adrian IV., and the Irish prelates of the
day. “This treaty,” says Dr. Phelan, “would be memorable, if it had no
other claim to the consideration of posterity than the hypocrisy, the
injustice, and the mutual treachery of the parties; but their views and
pretensions, descending regularly to their successors, and exerting a
constant influence on Irish affairs, make it an object of nearer interest.
Without attention to these, it is impossible either to unravel the history of
Ireland, or to judge correctly of its state at the present crisis.” “The
acquisition of a superiority by Henry over Ireland was greatly aided,” says
Mosheim, “by a desire of the national hierarchy to attain that independent
and prosperous condition, which was then common to all clerical
communities closely connected with Rome.” Thus was the position of the
bishops greatly improved, and their revenues increased, though at the high
price of the independence of their nation.
In 1172 Henry completed his conquest of the country; the clergy
submitted to the papal dictation, agreed to pay Peter’s pence to Rome,
proclaimed Henry’s title to the sovereign dominion of Ireland, and took
the oath of fidelity to himself and his successors. “Adrian’s sentence,”
says a friend of Romanism, “violated the rights of nations, and the most
sacred laws of men, under the special pretext of religion and Reformation.
Ireland was blotted out from the map of nations, and consigned to the loss
of freedom without a tribunal and without a crime.” The hierarch,
however, did not regret the change. Hiffherto, the native chieftains had
exercised a power over the church, which tended to keep its clergy poor
and subservient; so that they welcomed the sovereignty of England and the
power of Rome as protection against the ravages of their lay-lords.
 1218
“Under the ancient system, an Irish prince was as absolute master of the
priesthood as of any other class among his followers. But a new order of
things was introduced by Henry II., and thenceforward kept regular pace
with the advance of British and papal power. All the privileges of the
English church, and all those vexatious pretensions, which had just
attained a temporary triumph in the canonization of Thomas-a-Becket,
were communicated to the Irish clergy, and maintained by them with more
pertinacity, in proportion to the weakness of the civil power.” From this
period the Irish church came to be essentially Romish, the papal
encroachments were tamely submitted to, and both the civil and spiritual
rights of the Irish prelates were at the entire disposal of the Roman
pontiff. Henry, in order to maintain his sovereignty over the Irish clergy,
filled up the vacant sees mostly with Englishmen, and the consequence
was, that a spirit of jealousy and bitter hostility began to be manifested
between the English and the Irish ecclesiastics. Disputes arose; the English
sovereign asserted his privilege in nominating whom he would; the Irish
clergy, meanwhile, appealed to Rome to decide the question, or rather, to
confirm their nomination. The mitre usually prevailed over the crown, and
the pope’s authority steadily increased.2
Thus the contest between the English sovereigns and the Irish clergy
commenced; the latter sought to transfer their allegiance as churchmen
from the sovereign of England to the pope of Rome, so that the struggle
for supremacy lasted for centuries, even until the era of the Reformation.

HENRY VIII. AND THE IRISH CHURCH

When Henry had secured the cordial compliance of his English subjects
with the principles of the Reformation, he resolved to obtain, if possible, a
like reception for the new doctrines in Ireland also; but to his deep
mortification, his proposal was treated with the greatest indifference and
neglect. The advocates of the pope’s supremacy in opposition to the
king’s were zealous and determined. George Cromer, a prelate of ability
and learning — who, being primate of all Ireland, filled also, at one time,
the high office of chan-cellor-headed the opposition to Henry’s proposed
assumption of papal privileges, defeated his purpose for a time, and
retarded the progress of what might be called the Reformation in Ireland.
 1219
The chief agent in forwarding the royal designs was George Brown, the
first Protestant prelate that held a see in Ireland, having been appointed by
Henry, archbishop of Dublin. His zeal for the doctrines of the
Reformation in opposition to the dogmas of the Romish church, met with
the most violent opposition from the bigoted Catholics, and his life was
frequently in imminent danger from the zealots of that party. At the
suggestion of Brown an Irish parliament was convened at Dublin in 1536,
by which all opposition was silenced, and the national religion was
formally changed, the Reformed faith being established as the recognized
religion of the country. “Various statutes were enacted with the view of
carrying out this great object. The king was declared supreme earthly head
of the church in Ireland: he was invested with the first-fruits of bishoprics,
and other secular promotions in the Irish church, as well as the first-fruits
of abbeys, priories, colleges, and hospitals; all appeals to Rome in spiritual
causes were forbidden; the authority of the pope was solemnly renounced,
and all who should dare to acknowledge it in Ireland were made subject to
praemunire — a heavy penalty: all officers of every kind and degree were
required to take the oath of supremacy, and the refusal to take it was
pronounced, as in England, to be high treason. Thus was Protestantism
declared to be the religion of Ireland by law established. The religious
houses were suppressed, and their lands vested for ever in the crown.”3
The popish party in Ireland was very indignant at the assumption of such
spiritual authority by the king of England. Numbers of the Irish chieftains
avowed their readiness to take up arms in defense of the old religion.
Special emissaries were secretly despatched to Rome to express the
devotion of Cromer and his party to the holy father, and to implore his
interposition in behalf of his spiritual authority in Ireland. Papal
commissioners were immediately despatched to encourage those who were
opposing the recent enactments, to rouse the chieftains of the north, and
more particularly O’Neil, to rally round the sacred standard of their
forefathers, and draw the sword in defense of the papal supremacy.
O’Neill joyfully accepted the part assigned him by his papal majesty. A
confederacy was formed for the suppression of heresy; an army was
raised; O’Neill had himself proclaimed head of the northern Irish on the
ancient hill of royalty, according to the custom of the native monarchs of
Ireland. But this idle display and pomp was soon brought to an end. The
 1220
deputy suspected a rising, and was prepared to meet it. The victory of
Bellahoe, on the borders of Meath, broke the power of the northern chiefs:
struck with an unaccountable panic, they all gave way and fled.
Several attempts were afterwards made to do battle in defense of the
pope’s authority, but the prompt measures of the government frustrated
every new scheme at insurrection, and the chieftains with their tumultuous
bands were dispersed in all directions. These repeated defeats weakened
the influence of the Ulster nobles, rendered the cause of the pope more
hopeless, and led some of the most turbulent of the chiefs to profess
reconciliation to the king’s government.

HENRY, KING OF IRELAND

The act of supremacy, which was passed in 1537, was followed in 1542
by another to recognize the sovereign as king of Ireland, instead of lord.
Hitherto the only title which the pope had allowed the sovereigns of
England to assume was the subordinate one of lord; but this term was now
changed by act of parliament into that of king. The alteration was
commemorated by conferring peerages on several of the heads of the great
families, thereby sinking the chieftain in the peer; and some of inferior note
were created barons. Thus was peace restored to Ireland in so far as the
great laymen were concerned, but the priesthood was not so easily won
over to the cause of Reform.
After the death of Henry, and the accession of Edward VI. to the throne,
the lord-deputy of Ireland received a royal order to see that the Romish
ritual was superseded by the new English liturgy. This fresh innovation
roused the clergy to a bold and determined opposition. An assembly of the
prelacy and inferior clergy was immediately convened; the new liturgy was
treated with the utmost scorn; Dowdale, the primate, was as violent in his
opposition to Edward’s liturgy, as Cromer had been to Henry’s
supremacy. This opposition, however, was not allowed to prevail; by
order of the government the English service was used in the cathedral of
Christ Church, Dublin, on Easter Day, 1551.
A new revolution, occasioned by the early death of Edward, and the
accession of Mary, added to this state of distraction and confusion. The
religion of the country was again changed. Dowdale, who had withdrawn
 1221
to the continent during the reign of Edward, was recalled to the primacy;
the most violent of his opponents fled the country, and many of the clergy
returned to their former faith. Liberty was given for the celebration of
mass without penalty or compulsion; and the Roman Catholic faith was
once more established in Ireland. The profession of Protestantism was
made penal by an Irish parliament in 1556, and the sanguinary spirit of
intolerance spoke of trampling down all opposition to the papacy by fire
and sword; but happily the slow pace of colonial business long delayed
the transmission of authority for commencing an active persecution. “At
length, however,” says Mosheim, “a commission for that purpose was
prepared, and Dr. Cole, one of the commissioners, left London with it for
Dublin. Exulting over the prospect of this crushing Irish Protestantism, he
indiscreetly boasted of his charge before a woman at Chester, who was a
staunch adherent of the Reformation and had a brother in the Irish
metropolis. She managed to steal the commission, and to place in its room
a pack of cards with the knave of clubs uppermost. Unsuspicious of his
loss, the talkative messenger went on to Dublin, where he landed, October
the 7th, 1558, and there, looking for his credentials, was confounded by
finding them so ridiculously supplanted... A new commission was, after
some delay, obtained, but before it reached Dublin, Queen Mary was
dead.”4
On the accession of Elizabeth at her sister’s death, the queen’s well-
known adherence to the cause of the Reformation, revived the hearts of
Protestants throughout her dominions, gave a new impulse to Irish affairs,
and set the whole country, lay and clerical, once more in motion. The
whole ecclesiastical system of Mary was reversed; Protestantism was
restored, and proclaimed to be henceforth the established religion of
Ireland.

IRISH PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

Having said thus much about the establishment of episcopacy in Ireland,
we must briefly notice the origin of Presbyterianism in that country.
When Elizabeth ascended the throne, she found the whole island, from the
restless ambition and jealousy of the chieftains, in a state of petty warfare.
During the latter part of her reign, as well as the early part of the reign of
 1222
her successor, James I., the northern provinces had been the scene of
incessant conspiracies and insurrections. One rebellion after another kept
the country ill a state of commotion, fomented always by the popes of
Rome, sometimes aided by Philip II. of Spain, and Cardinal Richelieu of
France. Bull after bull was issued, calling upon the princes, prelates,
nobles, and people of Ireland to contend for the recovery of their liberty,
and the defense of the holy church; and rather to lose their lives than take
that wicked and pestilent oath of supremacy, whereby the scepter of the
Catholic church was wrested from the hand of the vicar of God. Such
appeals, coming from the pope himself, could not fail to exert a powerful
influence upon an ignorant and superstitious people.
Details of these long continued civil wars, the extinction of titles, and the
confiscation of property, fall not within the limits of our “Short Papers;”
but we may just add, that by the death of some of the leaders of the
rebellion, and by the flight of others, nearly the whole of Ulster was
forfeited to the crown, and fell into the hands of King James. This vast
tract of land comprehended six northern counties, and spread over five
hundred thousand acres. The king resolved to remodel the province by
removing the ancient possessors, and introducing a colony of Scotch and
English settlers in their stead. This led to the plantation of Ulster, the
benefits of which are felt to this day. Industry, in a short time, changed the
face of the country. The lands were cultivated and improved, a number of
flourishing towns were established, and the province of Ulster became the
most prosperous district in Ireland. But that evil spirit of popish hatred
towards every aspect of Protestantism and England never ceased to plot,
until it burst forth in the great rebellion and the revolting massacre of 1641.
On the 23rd of October, the carnage began; on the 30th, the order for a
general massacre was issued from the camp of Sir Phelim O’Neill, and,
shortly after, the manifesto of the bishop MacMahon proclaimed the
commencement of a WAR OF REBELLION .5
William, prince of Orange, after the battle of the Boyne, commenced his
reign by assuring the Irish Protestants that he had come to Ireland to free
them from popish tyranny, and he doubted not, by the divine assistance,
that he would complete his design. The war was brought to a close, peace
was restored, and the Presbyterian church, being reinstated in all its
 1223
privileges, addressed itself to the great work of preaching the gospel and
spreading the truth to the blessing of many precious souls.

SCOTLAND
Having already noticed the religious condition of Scotland from the earliest
times down to the dawn of the Reformation,6 we may commence our
present sketch with the effects of that great revolution on the people of
that country; but we must retrace our steps for a moment, and renew our
acquaintance with the existing state of things.
Before the Reformation, which commenced in Germany, had found its
way to the distant shores of Scotland, a spirit of religious Reform had
begun to display itself in several districts, especially in the Lowlands.
Many of the Lollards, or disciples of Wycliffe, who had fled from the
persecution in England, found a refuge in Scotland and there remained.
These, meeting with the descendants of the ancient Culdees, may have
quietly formed a little missionary band, maintained unbroken the chain of
God’s witnesses, and kept the lamp of His testimony burning in that
benighted land. They denied the dogma of transubstantiation and the
power of the priesthood; affirming, “That there is a universal priesthood,
of which every man and woman who believes in the Savior is a member;
that the pope, who exalts himself above God, is against God; that it is not
permissible to take up arms for the things of faith; and that priests may
marry.”
Among the protectors of these enlightened Christians — compared with
many of the Reformers, especially as to universal priesthood and arms —
was John Campbell, laird of Cessnock, a man well versed in the scriptures,
but not equal to his wife, who could “set the dogmas of the priests face to
face with the holy scriptures, and show their falsehood.” “On the
testimony of both friend and foe,” says another historian, “there were few
counties in the Lowlands of Scotland where these Lollards were not to be
found. They were numerous in Fife; they were still more numerous in the
districts of Cunningham and Kyle; hence their name, The Lollards of Kyle.
In the reign of James IV. about 1494, some thirty Lollards were summoned
before the archiepiscopal tribunal of Glasgow on a charge of heresy. They
were almost all gentlemen of landed property in the districts already
 1224
named; and were charged with denying the mass, purgatory, the
worshipping of images, the praying to saints, the pope’s vicarship, his
power to pardon sin — in short, all the peculiar doctrines of Romanism.
Their defense appears to have been so spirited that the king, before whom
they argued their cause, shielded them from the doom that the archbishop,
Blackadder, would undoubtedly have pronounced upon them.”7
The flames of martyrdom had not yet been kindled, we may say, and the
spirit of burning had not yet taken full hold of the priesthood, or such
heretics would not have escaped. But such witnesses plainly prove, what
we have found in different countries, that the Spirit of God was working
and preparing a people in all parts of Europe for the great revolution in the
sixteenth century.

THE PROGRESS OF THE REFORMATION

As early as the year 1526, the doctrines of the Reformation had made
considerable progress in Scotland. Vessels from the continent were arriving
at Aberdeen, Montrose, Dundee, and Leith, bringing fresh tidings of the
progress of Protestantism, and secretly discharging packages of pamphlets
and sermons of the Reformers. In this way the shores of the Frith of Forth
were broad cast with the seeds of Lutheranism. When Tyndale had
translated the New Testament into English, large numbers were imported
from Flanders, and industriously circulated among the people. The
Reformation on a divine basis now began. The darkness that had so long
brooded over that country was being rolled away by the light of heaven.
Almost every person had a New Testament in his hand, and God was
using it in much blessing.
This was God’s great mercy to Scotland, for the clergy had become so
violent, that the living voice would have been instantly suppressed, though
this too was needed for the great work, but the people must first be
prepared by the teaching of the word of God. The Bible was Scotland’s
only missionary and Reformer at that moment. “With silent foot,” says
one, “it began to traverse the land; it came to the castle gates of the
primate, yet he heard not its steps; it preached in cities, but its voice fell
not on the ear of bishops; it passed along the highways and byways
unobserved by the spy. To the churchman’s eye all seemed calm... but in
 1225
the stillness of the midnight hour, men welcomed this new instructor, and
opened their hearts to its comforting and beneficent teaching. The Bible
was emphatically the nation’s one great teacher. It was stamping its own
ineffaceable character upon the Scottish Reformation; and the place the
Bible thus early made for itself in the people’s affections, and the
authority it acquired over their judgments, it was destined never to lose.”8
But however sacredly and firmly we believe this noble testimony of a
most reliable witness, the living voice, the confessor and martyr, were all
needed to arouse the nation from the deadly sleep of popery in which it
had been so long and so fatally sunk.

FIRST MARTYRS OF THE SCOTTISH REFORMATION

Few martyrdoms have had such a place in the human mind as Patrick
Hamilton’s. His youth, his accomplishments, his refinement, his learning,
his blameless life, his noble and gentle spirit, all united to make him an
object of universal pity. But he was guilty of Rome’s unpardonable sin.
On him was the honor conferred by his divine Lord and Master, to be the
first preacher of the glad tidings of salvation to his countrymen, and the
first to seal his testimony with his blood. But more, the cruel death of this
royal youth was made a great blessing to many, among both the learned
and the common people.
He was the son of Sir Patrick Hamilton, of Kincavil, and the great-
grandson, by both the father’s and the mother’s side, of James II. He was
born in the year 1504, and being designed for the church, the abbacy of
Ferne was conferred upon him in his childhood according to a custom
which prevailed at that time. He received his early education at St.
Andrew’s; and about the year 1517, he left Scotland, to pursue a course of
study in the University of Paris, where he acquired his degree of Master of
Arts. He may also have learnt something of the truth in the school of
Lefevre and Farel. In 1523, he returned to his native country, and entered
himself at St. Andrew’s University. From the character of his
conversation, and the free language which he used in speaking of the
corruptions of the church, he drew down upon himself the suspicions of
the clergy, and inquisition was made into his opinions. Under these
circumstances he again left Scotland, and, attracted by the fame of Luther,
repaired to Wittemberg. Having spent some time with Luther and
 1226
Melancthon, he went to pursue his studies at the University of Marburg,
then newly opened by the Landgrave of Hesse. There he had the advantage
of the friendship and instructions of the learned and pious Francis Lambert
of Avignon. The ex-Franciscan — whom we have met with before at
Marburg — conceived a strong attachment to the young Scotsman, and
had a powerful influence in moulding his character. But while he was daily
advancing in the knowledge of the scriptures, he became increasingly
desirous of imparting to his countrymen the knowledge of Christ and
salvation, which he found to be so precious to himself. “This young man,”
said Lambert to Philip, “has come from the end of the world to your
academy, in order to be fully established in God’s truth. I have hardly ever
met a man who expresses himself with so much spirituality and truth on
the word of the Lord.”
In 1527 he was in Scotland once more, and not ashamed of the gospel of
Christ. He proceeded to the family mansion of Kincavil, near Linlithgow,
and preached the gospel to his kinsfolk and neighbors. Many of the
nobility and the common people seem to have embraced the new religion.
He next resolved to carry the gospel to the church of St. Michael’s,
Linlithgow, termed by historians “the Versailles of Scotland.” The palace
was also a fortress and a prison; it was the pleasure house to which the
court used to retire for relaxation, and within its walls the unfortunate
Mary Stuart was born. Here the young evangelist brought the gospel
within the hearing of the priests of St. Michael’s and the members of the
royal family. The simplicity and elegance of his style were fitted to win
the hearts of his hearers, but the gospel he preached did not suit the
priests. He maintained that there was no salvation for the guilty but
through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, who died for the chief of
sinners; and that it is the anointing of the Holy Spirit that replenishes the
soul with grace, not the chrism of the church. Fie was denounced as a
pestilent Lutheran to archbishop Beaton of St. Andrew’s; and Beaton was
too zealous a churchman to let Lutheranism escape with impunity.
Still there were difficulties in the way. He was not a heretic of low degree,
but of royal lineage; and would no doubt be protected by the Hamilton
family and other nobility, and perhaps by the king himself. What was to
be done? Pretending to wish a free conference with him on some points of
church Reform, the cruel and crafty archbishop decoyed him to St.
 1227
Andrew’s. Both Hamilton and his friends suspected treachery, but he
thought it his duty to go. Fie had only been married to a lady of noble
birth a few weeks, who, with others besought him with tears to keep out
of Beaton’s way; but he seemed to feel that the Lord might make his death
of more service to his country than his life and labors, and so set out for
St. Andrew’s.
On his arrival he was received with every mark of consideration and
respect, the archbishop smiling on the youth he had resolved to sacrifice.
Knowing the difficulties which surrounded this case, Beaton required time
to prepare the way for success, and so allowed Patrick something like
liberty in the castle. Questions were freely discussed by the young
Reformer with the doctors, students, and priests, as if he had been on
equal terms with them; but Beaton was only biding his time, for the
opposition was great and powerful. The court in which he was tried and
condemned was surrounded by some thousands of armed men, which
showed the fears of the priesthood. He was found infected with divers
heresies of Martin Luther, condemned as a heretic, deprived of all
dignities, orders, and benefices, and delivered over to the secular arm to be
burnt alive. The priests decided that the sentence should be executed the
same day, as his brother, Sir James, was not far distant with a military
force, determined to rescue him. The condemnation had hardly been
pronounced, when the executioners’ servants were seen before the gates of
St. Salvator’s college, raising the pile on which the royal youth was to be
burnt.

THE MARTYRDOM OF PATRICK HAMILTON

At noon, on the last day of February, 1528, the noble confessor stood
before the pile. He uncovered his head, and, lifting up his eyes to heaven,
remained motionless for some time in prayer. He then turned to his
friends, and handed to one of them his copy of the Gospels — the volume
he so much loved. Next, calling his servant, he took off his gown, and gave
it to him, with his coat and cap — “Take these garments; they can do me
no service in the fire, and they may still be of use to thee. It is the last gift
thou wilt receive from me, except the example of my death, the
remembrance of which I pray thee to bear in mind. For albeit it be bitter to
the flesh, and fearful before man, yet is it the entrance to eternal life, which
 1228
none shall possess that deny Christ Jesus before this wicked generation.”
As the executioners passed the iron chain round his body, and fastened
him to the stake, he again exclaimed, “In the name of Jesus I give up my
body to the fire, and commit my soul into the hands of the Father.” By the
ignorance and awkwardness of his executioners, his sufferings were
protracted for nearly six hours. The details are too harrowing to be
transferred to our pages. Three times the pile was kindled, and three times
the fire went out because the wood was green. Gunpowder was then
placed among the faggots, which, when it exploded, shot up a faggot in the
martyr’s face, which wounded him severely. Turning to the deathsman, he
mildly said, “Have you no dry wood?” Dry wood was brought from the
castle, but it was six o’clock in the evening before his. body was reduced
to ashes; “but during these six hours,” says an eye-witness, “the martyr
never gave one sign of impatience or anger, never called to heaven for
vengeance on his persecutors: so great was his faith, so strong his
confidence in God.” His last words that were heard were, “How long, O
Lord, shall darkness cover this realm? How long wilt thou suffer this
tyranny of man? Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!”
So died the proto-martyr of the Lutheran Reformation. The rumor of his
death ran speedily over the whole land, and all heard it with a shudder.
People everywhere wanted to know the cause for which the young man
had suffered such a cruel death. All turned to the side of the victim. It was,
no doubt, around his funeral pile that the first decided movement of the
Scottish Reformation took place. His gracious manners, and the mildness,
patience, and fortitude which he displayed at the stake, combined to give
unusual interest to his martyrdom, and were well fitted to touch the heart
of the nation. “The murder of Hamilton,” says a modern historian, “was
afterwards avenged in the death of the nephew and successor of his
persecutor; and the flames in which he expired were, in the course of one
generation, to enlighten all Scotland, and to consume with avenging fury,
the Catholic superstition, the papal power, and the prelacy itself.”9
The overruling hand of the Lord is most distinctly seen in the whole
history of Patrick Hamilton. So far as we are able to judge, a life, long and
laborious, would not have served the cause of the Reformation so much as
his trial, condemnation, and death, all accomplished in one day. Nothing
less than the fiery stake of the confessor would have aroused the nation
 1229
from that sleep of death into which popery had lulled it. It began to bear
fruit immediately. Henry Forrest, a Benedictine in the monastery of
Linlithgow, was brought to a knowledge of the truth by the preaching of
Hamilton, and he is the first to come forward and repeat his martyrdom. It
was told the archbishop that Forrest had said that “Hamilton was a
martyr, and no heretic,” and that he had a New Testament. “He is as bad
as Master Patrick,” said Beaton: “we must burn him.” James Lindsay, a
wit, standing by, ventured to say, “My lord, let him be burned in a
hollow; for the reek of Patrick Hamilton’s fire has infected everyone it
blew upon.” The archbishop, not heeding the satire, had the stake of
Forrest planted on the highest ground in the neighborhood, that the
population of Angus and Forfar might see the flames, and thus learn the
danger of falling into Protestantism. Henry Forrest was Scotland’s second
martyr.

MANY OF THE CLERGY AND NOBLES

EMBRACE THE REFORMATION
It is a remarkable feature of the Scottish Reformation that it began among
the clergy, and was early embraced by the nobility and landed gentry.
Almost all her first martyrs and confessors were monks or parish priests.
Alesius, canon of St. Augustine at St. Andrew’s, was brought to the
knowledge of the truth, and confirmed in the faith of the gospel by the
testimony which Hamilton had borne to the truth during his trial, and by
the simple and heroic beauty of his death, which he had witnessed. The
death of Hamilton being the subject of much conversation among the
canons at that time, Alesius could not refrain from expressing what he now
felt and believed. He spoke of the wretched state of the church, her
destitution of men competent to teach her, and that she was kept from the
knowledge of the holy scriptures. This was enough; the canons could not
endure it. He was denounced to prior Hepburn, a base immoral man; he
was treated with the most brutal violence, and thrown into a foul and
unwholesome dungeon. When this was noised abroad, it excited great
interest both among citizens and nobles. The king was appealed to; but the
archbishop and the prior succeeded in detaining him in prison for about a
year, when the canons, who were friendly to him, opened his prison door,
and urged him to leave the country immediately, without saying a word to
 1230
anybody. This he did, though most reluctantly, and found a refuge on the
continent.
Alexander Seaton, a monk of the Dominican order, and confessor to the
king, was also brought to see that salvation is through faith in the Lord
Jesus Christ, without deeds of law. In 1532, having been appointed to
preach in the cathedral of St. Andrew’s in Lent, he resolved courageously
to avow the heavenly doctrine which was making exiles and martyrs. “A
living faith,” he said, “which lays hold on the mercy of God in Christ, can
alone obtain for the sinner the remission of sins. Christ is the end of the
law for righteousness, and no one is able by his works to satisfy divine
justice. But for how many years has God’s law, instead of being faithfully
taught, been darkened by the tradition of men!” The people wondered at
his doctrine, and why he did not speak about pilgrimages and meritorious
works; and the priests were afraid to say much, as he was the king’s
confessor, and a great favourite. But Beaton was not the man to hesitate.
“This bold preacher is evidently putting to his mouth the trumpet of
Hamilton and Alesius. Proceedings must be taken against him.” The
archbishop succeeded in turning the king’s mind against Seaton, so that he
saved his life by taking flight, went to London where he became chaplain
to the duke of Suffolk, and had the opportunity of preaching a full gospel
to large congregations.
Many of the students of the college and noviciates of the abbey, under the
teaching of Gawin Logie, principal of St. Leonard’s college, and John
Winram, sub-prior of the abbey, were convinced of the truth for which
Hamilton suffered, and embraced the doctrines of the Reformation. But the
blessed results of Patrick’s martyrdom were not confined to St. Andrew’s.
Everywhere persons were to be found who held that the young abbot of
Ferne had died a martyr, being no heretic, and that they believed as he did.
Alarmed at the progress of the new opinions, the clergy adopted the most
rigorous measures for their extirpation. David Straiton, a Forfarshire
gentleman, and Norman Gourlay, who had been a student at St. Andrew’s
and was in priest’s orders, were tried at Edinburgh in Holyrood house,
condemned, and taken to the rood of Greenside, and burned alive as
heretics. About this time a change took place in the see of St. Andrew’s,
but not for the better. James Beaton died, and was succeeded by his
nephew, David Beaton — a more cruel and bloodthirsty tyrant than his
 1231
uncle — whom the pope made a cardinal for his zeal, and to increase his
power.

THE FIERY ZEAL OF CARDINAL BEATON

Strict inquisition was now made after heretics. The flames of persecution
were kindled in all quarters of the country. From the year 1534, when
Straiton and Gourlay were burned, till the year 1538, the spirit of
persecution had greatly subsided, and the number of those who confessed
Christ as their only Savior and Lord, had greatly increased. This
prosperity of the gospel was most irritating to the new cardinal, who
resolved to suppress it by fire and sword. Dean Thomas Forrest, vicar of
Dollar, Sir Duncan Simpson, a priest, Keillor and Beveridge, black friars,
and Forrester, a notary, in Stirling, were immediately apprehended and
tried for heresy before a council held by cardinal Beaton, and were
condemned to the flames. A huge blazing pile was raised the same day on
the Castle hill of Edinburgh, and there five faithful men were seen in the
midst of it — serenely suffering, and rejoicing. To faith the fire had no
terror, because death had no sting. Other names might be given, who soon
followed the five martyrs on the Castle hill, and whose faith, confession,
and sufferings deserve a more prominent place than can be given in our
limited space; but their names are in the Lamb’s book of life, their record is
on high, and duly enrolled in the noble army of martyrs, and they will
receive, on the morning of the first resurrection, that crown of life
promised to all who are faithful unto death, with their Lord’s eternal
approving smile. In that day of His glory and theirs, all these sufferings
will be completely forgotten, save as the remembrance of His grace which
sustained them, and gave them the distinguished honor of suffering for His
sake. Already they have been “with Christ,” in the calm repose of paradise
for three hundred years, but then, in their bodies of glory, fashioned like
unto His own body of glory, what praise can they offer for the grace that
honored them with the crown of martyrdom? Heaven’s estimate of
Rome’s heretics and their persecutions will then be made manifest; for all
murderers shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and
brimstone: which is the second death. (Revelation 21:8.)
The fury of the clergy, now presided over by the tyrant David Beaton,
daily waxed greater and greater; and numbers, to escape the stake, fled to
 1232
England and the continent. Some of these were men illustrious for their
genius and learning, of whom were John Macbee, John Fife, John
Macdowal, John Macbray, James Harrison, Robert Richardson, and the
celebrated George Buchanan, who was surely helped by the Lord to
escape from prison, and saved his life by a speedy flight. He is well
known as the author of the metrical version of the Psalms, as used in
Scotland, and bound with their Bibles. A few, whose constancy was
overcome by the terrors of the stake, professedly returned to the old
religion, but the confessors of the truth rapidly increased. By the year
1540, many eminent men had received the evangelical doctrines. The earls
of Errol and of Glencairn, Lord Ruthven, Lord Kelmains, Sir David
Lindsay, Sir James Sandilands, Melville of Raith, and a large number of
other influential persons, appeared to be attached to the gospel by genuine
conviction.

CARDINAL BEATON’S PROSCRIPTION-ROLL

The circumstances of the Scottish king, James V., about this period were
peculiar and embarrassing. He was overwhelmed with sorrow at the loss of
his only children, Arthur and James; he was in debt, and much in need of
money; he had offended his uncle, Henry VIII. of England, by refusing to
make Scotland independent of Rome, as he had made England; he also
urged him to confiscate the property of the church, and in this way fill his
empty exchequer. But the influence of the hierarchy — Henry’s deadly
enemies — under whose power James had fallen, succeeded in producing a
rupture between the uncle and the nephew, which led to war and the death
of James.
Cardinal Beaton, on the other hand, proposed that the property of the
heretic nobles should be confiscated for the king’s benefit, and not the
sacred revenues of the holy church. “He drew out a list,” says
Cunningham, “of three hundred and sixty persons of property who were
suspected of heresy, and whose possessions, if confiscated, would amply
supply all the requirements of royalty.” Dr. McCrie, in his Life of Knox,
referring to the same period, says, “Twice did the clergy attempt to cut off
the Reformed party by a desperate blow. They presented to the king a list
containing the names of some hundreds, possessed of property and
wealth, whom they denounced as heretics; and endeavored to procure his
 1233
consent to their condemnation, by flattering him with the immense riches
which would accrue to him from the forfeiture of their estates.” D’Aubigne
and Wylie speak of a list, “compiled by Beaton, containing over a hundred
names, and among those marked for slaughter were Lord Hamilton, the
first peer in the realm, the Earls of Cassillis and Glencairn, and the Earl
Marischall.”10
This last list may be one of the two spoken of by Dr. McCrie, and may
have been revised and reduced to those who were intended for immediate
slaughter as well as plunder. As the statements of the different historians
vary, we have given all, but we have no doubt they are substantially
correct. Here the reader may pause for a moment: can he take in the
appalling thought? The alleged head of the church in Scotland, the chief
shepherd of the flock of Christ — who should be ready to lay down his
life for the brethren — a priest, in holy orders, coolly writes out a list
containing the names of some hundreds of the nobles and gentry of the
land, and endeavors to tempt the king to sanction their condemnation by
flattering him with the wealth of their possessions. Was ever plot more
deeply laid in hell, or more diabolical in its character? But it was not to
supply the king with money that hell moved in this matter; but to cut off
by violence all who were known to favor the Reformed opinions, quench
the light of truth for ever in Scotland, maintain the authority of the clergy,
and preserve inviolate those debasing corruptions from which they derived
their wealth.
When this proposal was first made to the king, he is said to have driven
the messengers from his presence with marks of strong displeasure. But so
violent was the dislike which he at last conceived against his nobility
especially after their meeting on Fala Muir, and so much had he fallen
under the influence of the clergy, that but for the watchful hand of an
overruling providence, it is highly probable he would have yielded to the
latter, and executed the deed of blood. Instead, however, of the nobility
and gentry, it was the poor king himself whom the clergy brought to an
early grave.
 1234
THE PERPLEXITY AND DEATH OF THE KING
Henry VIII. had been at great pains to bring about a personal interview
with James; and had obtained a promise that he should meet him at York.
Henry arrived according to appointment, and remained there during six
days, but no James appeared. The priests, dreading Henry’s influence
with James on the subject of the Reformation, prevailed upon him to
remain at home; which he did, but sent a courteous apology. But the
haughty revengeful English king was not to be so easily pacified. He
conceived himself slighted and insulted, and vented threatenings and curses
against the Scotch. A border war was the result. The priests instigated
James to go to war without summoning to his banner the proscribed
nobles. Bishops, priests, and their partisans were to form the army; and
when the king returned in triumph from the defeat of Henry, all those
suspected of heresy should be seized and executed as a thankoffering for
victory. But alas! when James was waiting in Lochmaben castle for the
news of triumph, some of the fugitives arriving made known the total rout
of his army on Solway Moss. His distress was unbounded. So great was
his agony of mind, he could hardly breathe, and only muttered some vague
cries. The high-spirited monarch could bear no more. He had been deceived
by that despicable man in whom he trusted, which disturbed him as much
as the victory of the English.
In this state of despair he shut himself up in Falkland palace, and the
violence of his grief soon induced a slow fever. While rapidly sinking,
intelligence was brought that his queen, who was at Linlithgow, had been
delivered of a girl, afterwards Queen Mary. This was a fresh wound as he
had no son; and feeling as if his family was extinct and his crown lost, he
muttered an old saying, “It cam wi’ a lass, and it will gang wi’ a lass.”’
Seven days afterwards the king died, on December 14th, 1542. When
disrobing him, the dreadful proscription roll was found in his pocket. The
nation then saw what a merciful providence had saved them from, and how
narrow its escape had been from so fearful a catastrophe. The discovery
helped not a little to increase the number of the Reformed, and to prepare
the way for the downfall of a religion which was capable of conceiving
such plans of cruelty and avarice.
 1235
The throne was now vacant, and “Cardinal Beaton lost no time in
producing a document purporting to be the will of the deceased monarch,
appointing him regent of the kingdom during the minority of the infant
queen;” but it was generally believed to be forged, and the Earl of Arran
was peaceably established in the regency by the nobles. Thus it was, by
the gracious overruling hand of God, the man whose name was first on the
list of nobles marked for slaughter, was now at the head of the
government, and used by the same providence to place the Bible in every
Scotchman’s hand. The change produced in the political state of the
kingdom by the death of James and the regency of Arran was favorable to
the Reformation.
The earl having formerly professed faith in the Reformed doctrines, was
now surrounded with counsellors of the same opinions. It is deeply
interesting to observe that, at this early stage of the Scottish Reformation,
the very flower of the nobility and gentry were on its side. Not that we
think of them all as true Christians; but at that time the prospect of
overturning the ancient religion was distant and uncertain, and they were
taking a step which exposed their lives and fortunes to the most imminent
hazard, so that we cannot attribute to them a lower motive than their
personal convictions.

THE BIBLE RESTORED TO THE NATION

In the month of March, 1543, an important step was taken by the
parliament toward the Reformation of the church, by making it lawful for
every subject in the realm to read the holy scriptures in his mother tongue.
Lord Maxwell, who brought the matter before the lords of the articles,
proposed that “It should be statute and ordained that it shall be lawful for
all our sovereign lady’s lieges to have the Holy Writ, to wit, the New
Testament and Old, in the vulgar tongue, English or Scotch, of a good and
true translation, and that they shall incur no crime for the having and
reading the same.” The bishops, as we may suppose, protested loudly
against this measure, but it was passed notwithstanding, and instructions
given to the Clerk of Register to have it duly proclaimed at the market-
cross; and sent into all parts of the kingdom by order of the regent. This
public act in favor of religious liberty was a signal triumph of truth over
 1236
error. The priests began to cry out with one voice: Heresy! heresy! and
that the regent was the promoter of heresy.
“The victory,” says Knox, “which Jesus Christ then won over the enemies
of the truth was of no little importance. The trumpet of the gospel gave at
once a certain sound, from Wigton to Inverness, from south to north. No
small comfort was given to the souls, to the families, who till then durst
not read the Lord’s prayer or the ten commandments in English, through
fear of being accused of heresy. The Bible, which had long lain hidden in
some out of the way corner, was now openly placed on the tables of pious
and well-informed men. The New Testament was indeed already widely
circulated, but many of those who possessed it had shown themselves
unworthy of it, never having read ten sentences in it through fear of man.
Now they brought it, and would chop their familiars on the cheek with it.
The knowledge of God was wonderfully increased by the reading of the
sacred writings, and the Holy Spirit was given in great abundance to
simple men.” This important act of the Scottish parliament was never
repealed.11
Hitherto the Reformation had been advanced in Scotland by books
imported from England and the Continent; but now the truth was
disseminated, and the errors of popery were exposed by books which
issued from the Scottish press. The poets and satirists were also busy.
With the poet’s usual license, they employed themselves in writing
ballads, plays, and satires, on the ignorance and iramoralities of the clergy,
and the absurdities and superstitions of the popish religion. Such
compositions in the Scottish language were read with great avidity by the
people, and operated powerfully in alienating the public mind from the
Catholic religion.

GEORGE WISHART
In the summer of 1544, shortly after Scotland had received the inestimable
blessing of a free Bible, one of the most remarkable characters we meet
with in ecclesiastical history, appeared on the troubled scene. We refer to
George Wishart. He was the son of Sir James Wishart of Pitarrow, an
ancient and honorable family of the Mearns. He had fled from the
persecuting spirit of the bishop of Brechin in 1538, and spent about six
 1237
years on the continent and at Cambridge, as a learner and a teacher. When
he returned, he is said to have excelled all his countrymen in learning,
especially in his knowledge of the Greek tongue. As a preacher, his
eloquence was most persuasive; his life irreproachable, he was courteous
and affable in manners; his piety fervent; his zeal and courage in the cause
of truth were tempered with uncommon meekness, modesty, patience, and
charity.
He immediately commenced preaching the doctrines of the Reformation in
Montrose and Dundee. But his reputation had gone before him, and great
crowds gathered to hear him. Following the Swiss method, he expounded
in a connected series of discourses the doctrine of salvation, according to
the epistle to the Romans; and his knowledge of scripture, his eloquence,
and his invectives against the falsehoods of popery, moved the populace
so mightily, that in Dundee they attacked and destroyed the convents of
the Franciscan and Dominican friars. So great was the excitement with the
clamor of the priests and monks, and the tumultuous state of the people,
that the magistrates had to interfere, and Wishart prudently retired to the
western counties, where his friends were all-powerful. Lennox, Cassillis,
and Glencairn were able to protect him, and secure him an entrance into
every parish church. But Wishart, being essentially a man of peace, when
any opposition was made to his preaching in the church, he refused to
allow force to be used, and retired to the market cross or the fields. But it
was a needless precaution to shut the church doors against Wishart, for no
church could have contained the thousands that flocked to hear him. He
preached at Barr, Galston, Manchline, and Ayr; but as the hired assassins
of Beaton were constantly on the watch for his life, he was generally
surrounded with armed men.

THE PLAGUE IN DUNDEE

Not long after Wishart had been driven from Dundee, the plague entered
the town. Hearing of this, with great devotedness, he hurried thither, was
unwearied in preaching the gospel, visiting the sick, and seeking to prepare
the dying for death. Those who were plague-stricken were kept outside
the east gate, while the healthy were inside. To reach his audience on both
sides, he mounted the gate — called the Cowgate, and, opening his Bible,
read from Psalm 107, “He sent his word and healed them.” The mercy of
 1238
God in Christ, he assured them, was free to all, and whosoever turned to
Him truly would receive the blessing — a blessing which the malice of men
could neither elk nor pair, add to nor diminish. Some of his hearers assured
him — they were so comforted by his sermon — that they were ready to
depart, and counted it more happy to go to Jesus than to remain behind.
The people were greatly troubled, lest “the mouth from which such
sweetness flowed should be closed.” They seemed to have a presentiment
that danger was near, and so it was.
A priest named Wigton, hired by cardinal Beaton to assassinate him, stood
waiting at the foot of the steps by which Wishart must come down. A
cloak thrown over him concealed the naked dagger which he held in his
hand; but the keen eye of the ewmgelist, as he came down the steps,
noticed the priest with his hand kept carefully under his gown, and read
murder in his face. “My friend,” said Wishart, “what would you do?” at
the same moment grasping the priest’s hand, and snatching the weapon
from him. The assassin fell at his feet and confessed his intention. “Deliver
the traitor to us,” cried the people, and they rushed on him; but Wishart
put his arms round the assassin, and said, “Whosoever troubles him
troubles me; for he has hurt me in nothing;” and thus saved the life of him
who sought his.12
Through the Lord’s mercy the plague began to abate; a new life was soon
felt in the stricken city; and Wishart exerted himself for the afflicted in
organizing measures for the distribution of food and medicine. While thus
employed, he received a message from the Earl of Cassillis to meet him and
some other friends from the west at Edinburgh for the purpose of having a
public disputation with the bishop. He obeyed the summons, although he
knew that cardinal Beaton was bent upon his destruction, and that a cruel
death awaited him. He arrived at Leith; but as that town is near Edinburgh,
his friends entreated him to conceal himself for a day or two. This he could
not endure. “What differ I from a dead man,” he said, “except that I eat
and drink? To this time God has used my labors to the disclosing of
darkness; and now I lurk as a man that was ashamed, and durst not show
himself before men.” “You know,” said his friends, “the danger wherein
you stand.” “Let my God,” he replied, “provide for me as best pleases
Him.”
 1239
Wishart began at once to preach in Leith; and afterwards proceeded to East
Lothian, where he was entertained by the lairds of Brunston, Longniddry,
and Ormiston. While here, he preached at Musselburgh, Inveresk, Tranent,
and Haddington. On these occasions, he was surrounded by the armed
retainers of his friends, and a sword was borne before him. It was here that
John Knox — who was then a tutor in the family of Douglas of
Longniddry — joined him. Previously to this, he had openly professed the
evangelical doctrine; now he attached himself to Wishart, waited
constantly on his person, and bore the sword before him. Wishart was
highly pleased with the spirit and zeal of Knox, and seems to have
presaged his future usefulness. After preaching at Haddington, he
proceeded to Ormiston House, where he was to lodge. Knox insisted for
liberty to accompany him, but the martyr dismissed him with this reply:
“Nay, nay; return to your bairns” — meaning his pupils — “and God
bless you. One is sufficient for a sacrifice.”13

THE APPREHENSION AND MARTYRDOM OF WISHART

Meantime Beaton had come to Edinburgh; and, hearing that Wishart was in
the neighborhood, resolved upon his instant apprehension. At midnight,
Ormiston House was surrounded by a troop of cavalry, under the
command of the earl of Bothwell, who demanded Wishart. But neither
promises nor threatenings could induce the laird to deliver up his guest.
Bothwell assured him on his honor, that he would be perfectly safe with
him, and that no power of the cardinal would be allowed to harm him.
Ormiston was disposed to confide in this solemn promise, and told
Wishart what had occurred. “Open the gates,” he replied, “the blessed will
of my God be done.” But alas! Bothwell violated his pledge, and the
victim of a faithless earl and a bloodthirsty pries; was hurried from
Edinburgh to St. Andrew’s, and thrown into prison.
The zeal of Arran in the cause of the Reformation by this time had greatly
declined; and the cardinal, who had great influence over the mind of the
weak and timid earl, was dominant in the nation. As it was contrary to the
canon law for clergymen to meddle in matters of blood, Beaton asked the
governor to appoint a lay judge, who might pronounce sentence of death
upon Wishart, if found guilty of heresy. But Arran, irresolute as he was,
refused to do this, and strongly urged delay. But Beaton was not a man to
 1240
be hindered by canon law, or by the expostulations of the regent. Wishart
was arraigned before a clerical tribunal, was found guilty of heresy, and
condemned to the flames.
On the 1st of March, 1546, a scaffold was erected before the castle of St.
Andrew’s, and faggots of dried wood were piled around it. As the civil
power refused to take part in the proceedings, the cardinal acted instead.
His men were equipped with lances, swords, axes, and other warlike array;
and the guns of the castle were brought to bear upon the spot, lest
Wishart’s many friends should attempt to rescue him. Meanwhile the
balcony of the castle was adorned with silken draperies and velvet
cushions, that Beaton and other prelates might enjoy at their ease the
spectacle of the pile, and the tortures of the holy sufferer. When all was
ready, two deathsmen brought Wishart from his prison. He was dressed in
black; small bags of gunpowder were tied to various parts of his body; his
hands were firmly tied behind him; a rope round his neck, and an iron
chain round his waist to fasten him to the stake. He knelt down and
prayed before the pile; then he exhorted the people to love the word of
God, and suffer patiently and with a comfortable heart for the word’s
sake, which was their undoubted salvation and everlasting comfort. “For
the true gospel,” he added, “which was given to me by the grace of God, I
suffer this day by men, not sorrowfully, but with a glad heart and mind.
For this cause I was sent, that I should suffer this fire for Christ’s sake.
This grim fire I fear not; I know surely that I shall sup with my Savior
Christ this night, for whom I suffer.” And many other beautiful words did
he say — according to Knox, Buchanan, and others.
When bound to the stake, he said, “Savior of the world, have mercy on
me! Father of heaven, into Thy hands I commit my spirit.” The fire was
lighted. The cardinal, Dunbar, and other prelates were on the balcony
watching the progress of the fire, and the sufferings of the martyr.
Wishart, catching sight of the cardinal and his courtiers, fixed his eyes on
the cardinal, and said, “He who in such state, from that high place, feedeth
his eyes with my torments, within a few days shall be hanged out at the
same window, to be seen with as much ignominy as he now leaneth there
with pride.” The rope round his neck was now tightened, so that he spoke
no more, and the fire reduced his body to ashes.
 1241
THE DEATH OF CARDINAL BEATON
The death of Wishart produced a powerful impression all over Scotland,
and excited feelings of the most diverse character. Churchmen extolled
Beaton as the great champion of Rome, and the defender of the priesthood.
Piety wept over the ashes of the martyr without a thought of revenge. But
there were men of birth, without sharing Wishart’s views, who declared
openly there must be life for life: the liberties of the subject were in danger
when the tyrant could set aside the authority of the regent, and suppress
the voice of the people. A conspiracy was formed against his life; and a
small, but determined band — some of whom were instigated by
resentment for private injuries; others were animated by a desire to
revenge his cruelties, and deliver their country from his oppression —
broke into the cardinal’s apartments in the castle of St. Andrew’s, beat
down the barricades with which he had attempted to defend his bedroom
door, and putting him instantly to death, hung out his naked and mangled
body over the window, as Wishart had predicted. They then seized the
castle, dismissed the household servants unharmed, and sent off a
messenger to the English court to inform Henry of their success. It is well
known that there was nothing for which the English monarch was more
anxious than the death of Beaton. He had been the great obstacle to the
accomplishment of Henry’s favorite project — the uniting of the two
crowns by a marriage between the infant queen and his son, Prince
Edward. Some say the conspirators were in the pay of England. 14

THE RESULTS OF CARDINAL BEATON’S DEATH

The murder of the cardinal-primate was followed by results the most
important. It removed from the head of affairs the most powerful and
unscrupulous enemy of the Reformation, and the greatest defender of
Romanism in Scotland. Like Wolsey, he was all but a king. His
government was characterized by political intrigue, energy, and resolution;
but his one main object was the persecution of the saints, the extinguishing
of the Reformation, and the definitive triumph of Rome. But the work of
God’s Spirit needed not the assistance of the assassin. The christian life
and martyrdom of Patrick Hamilton and George Wishart contributed far
more powerfully to the advancement of the work of God in Scotland than
the violent death of its enemy. The faith, the constancy, and the serenity
 1242
of the martyrs, rose far above the ferocity of their persecutors, and
through that instinct, which impels the human conscience to rise against
injustice, and incline to the side of the oppressed, numbers were added to
the ranks of the Reformed. One of the mistakes of the early Reformers, to
which we have repeatedly referred, was their trusting to the protection of
princes; but the Scotch Reformers had to learn through a long period of
suffering that their strength lay in an arm mightier far than the kings of the
earth, which alone could give victory to the weak and defenceless. Hence
their great idea was Christ as King; and the motto on the banners of the
Covenanters was, Christ’s Crown and Covenant.
“The new life,” says D’Aubigne, “which sprang up in the sixteenth
century, was everywhere the same, but nevertheless it bore a certain
special character in each of the countries in which it appeared. At
Wittemberg, it was to man that christian thought especially attached itself
— to man fallen, but regenerated and justified by faith. At Geneva it was
to God, to His sovereignty and His grace. In Scotland it was to Christ —
Christ as Savior through death, but above all as king, who governs and
keeps His people, independently of human power.” While we think the
Genevese historian very correct in his estimate of the character of the new
life in the different countries, we: must also add, that Christ is nowhere
spoken of in scripture as the King of the church, but everywhere as the
King of the Jews. He is spoken of as the Head of the church — of His
body the church, and as Head over all things to the church. A king gives
the idea of subjects, but as the church is One with Christ, — His body and
His bride, He is never spoken of as her King. He is a King, of course, and
as such He will reign when “the kingdoms of this world shall become the
kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ.” There are three ways in which
the glory of God will be revealed by Christ:
1. In grace, as when on earth and since then.
2. In government — this will be in the millennium, when the saints will
reign with Christ a thousand years.
3. In glory — also connected with government — this will be for ever;
“for all the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him amen, unto the glory
of God by us.” (2 Corinthians 1:20; John 1:17; Revelation 20:6; 21:1-8.)
 1243
JOHN KNOX
The vacant see of St. Andrew’s was soon filled by John Hamilton, abbot
of Paisley, and brother to the regent. But although he did not equal his
predecessor in vigor of mind, he equalled him in the unrelenting zeal with
which he pursued all who favored the Reformation; so that the persecution
did not abate in the absence of Beaton. The conspirators who had seized
and held the castle, welcomed within its walls all who were in danger of
their lives from having embraced the new doctrines. They were soon joined
by many adherents, both political and religious; and the place was
garrisoned by a band of determined men, who bade defiance to the regent
and his brother the archbishop. Among those to whom they opened their
gates, the most noted was John Knox, the great advocate and supporter
of the Reformation.
This remarkable man, whose name has long been a household word in
Scotland, and whose future career was connected with so many great
events, was now forty years old. He was born, according to the prevailing
opinion, at the village of Giffard, near Haddington, in 1505. It seems his
parents were in the middle rank of rural life, and wealthy enough to give
him a learned education; and had probably destined their son for the
church. From the grammar school of his native town, he passed at the age
of sixteen to the University of Glasgow, where the celebrated John Mair
was then principal. It is said that he distinguished himself in philosophy
and scholastic theology, and took priest’s orders, previous to his having
attained the regular canonical age. After leaving college, he passes out of
view, and little is known of his history till we find him in the company of
Wishart, immediately before his martyrdom.15

KNOX’S CALL TO THE MINISTRY

The Reformer was no doubt warmly welcomed by the party inside the
castle, and earnestly entreated to become one of their preachers. These
solicitations he stedfastly resisted, “alleging that he could not run where
God had not sent him.” When he received a unanimous invitation from the
whole congregation, and was solemnly pressed by Mr. Rough, a preacher,
not to refuse God’s call as he would avoid His heavy displeasure, Knox
burst into tears, and withdrew himself to his chamber. He had now very
 1244
different thoughts as to the importance of the ministerial office, from what
he had entertained when invested with priest’s orders. The charge of
declaring “the whole counsel of God, keeping nothing back,” however
ungrateful it might be to his hearers, with all the consequences to which
the preachers of the Protestant doctrines were then exposed, filled his
mind with anxiety and fear. He evidently passed through much conflict of
mind on this occasion; for though he possessed great strength of character,
being naturally bold, upright, and independent, he was thoroughly honest,
conscientious, and modest. But when he felt satisfied that he had the call
of God to engage in His work, he resolved to undertake it with all its
responsibilities, and say with the apostle,
“But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear
unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the
ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the
gospel of the grace of God.” (Acts 20:24.)
He commenced his labors as a preacher with his characteristic boldness,
and was greatly blessed both to the garrison and to the inhabitants of the
town. In his first sermon in the parish church of St. Andrew’s, he
undertook to prove that the pope of Rome was the man of sin, the
Antichrist, the Babylonish harlot spoken of in scripture. He struck at the
root of popery that they might destroy the whole system. During the few
months that he preached at St. Andrew’s, a great number of the
inhabitants, besides the garrison in the castle, renounced popery, and made
profession of the Protestant faith, by partaking of the Lord’s supper after
the Reformed mode in Scotland. But his useful labors were soon
interrupted.

MARY OF GUISE AND THE FRENCH FLEET

After the death of Beaton, the queen-dowager, Mary of Guise, sister to
Henry, the cruel duke, who fought against the Huguenots and directed the
massacre on St. Bartholomew’s Eve, was openly opposed to the
Reformation; and, like her family, was entirely devoted to France and
Rome. Soon after the regent had completely failed to reduce the castle of
St. Andrew’s, a French fleet of sixteen armed galleys, commanded by Leo
Strozzi, appeared in the bay. The vessels took up their line, so as at full
 1245
tide completely to command the outworks towards the sea, while the
forces of Arran besieged it by land. A breach was soon affected; and,
within less than a week, a flag of truce was seen approaching. Thus fell the
castle of St. Andrew’s; and all in it, including Knox, were put on board
the galleys and conveyed to France. The terms of capitulation, it is said,
were violated; and at the solicitations of the pope, the Scottish queen, and
clergy, the principal gentlemen were incarcerated in Rouen, Cherbourg,
Brest, and Mont St. Michel. Knox, with a few others, was confined on
board the galleys, loaded with chains, and exposed to all the indignities
with which papists were accustomed to treat those whom they regarded as
heretics.
During their captivity, threatenings and violence were employed to induce
the prisoners to change their religion, or at least to countenance the popish
worship. But so great was their abhorrence of that system, that not a
single person of the whole company, on hind or water, could be induced in
the smallest degree to join them. Mass was frequently said within their
hearing, and on such occasions they were threatened with torture if they
did not give the usual signs of reverence; but instead of complying, they
covered their heads as soon as the service began. One day a fine painted
image of the Virgin was brought into one of the galleys, and a Scottish
prisoner — probably Knox — was desired to give it the kiss of adoration.
He refused, saying, that such idols were accursed, and he would not touch
it. “But you shall,” replied one of the officers, at the same time forcing it
towards his mouth. Upon this the prisoner seized the image, and throwing
it into the water, said, “Let oor Ledie noo save hersel; sche is licht
aneuche, let hit leirne to swyme.” The officers with some difficulty saved
their goddess from the waves; and the prisoners were not again troubled
with such importunities.16
The Lord had no doubt important lessons to teach His beloved servant and
his associates by their rigorous confinement. To escape the persecution of
Hamilton, he was obliged to conceal himself, and to remove from place to
place, to provide for his safety. Under these circumstances we need not be
surprised that he took refuge in the castle. Nevertheless, it was like casting
in his lot with the assassins of the cardinal, and with them he reaped the
consequences. He was detained nineteen months a galley-slave in French
waters. Not one of his associates suffered death!
 1246
By what means the prisoners obtained their liberty, historians are not
agreed. Dr. McCrie very reasonably concludes, “That the French court
having procured the consent of the parliament of Scotland to the marriage
of Queen Mary to the Dauphin, and obtained possession of her person,
felt no longer any inclination to avenge the quarrels of the Scottish clergy.”

KNOX REGAINS HIS LIBERTY

Upon regaining his liberty, Knox repaired to England; emaciated in
body, but vigorous and unshaken in mind. The reputation which he had
gained by his preaching, and his late sufferings, recommended him to the
English court, and he was chosen one of the chaplains to Edward VI. He
was offered the living of All-hallows in London, which he refused as he did
not agree with the English liturgy. The early death of Edward, and the
accession of Mary compelled him to flee for his life. He traveled through
France to Switzerland, and after visiting the most noted divines of the
Helvetic church, he settled in Geneva.
The celebrated John Calvin was then in the zenith of his reputation and
usefulness. Knox was affectionately received by him as a refugee from
Scotland, and an intimate friendship was soon formed between them. The
two great Reformers of that day were now together, nearly of the same
age, very similar in their sentiments as to doctrine and the government of
the church, and not unlike as to the more prominent features of their
character. “Knox was a rough, unbending, impassioned, impetuous man,
but full of humor: Calvin was calm, severe, often irritable, but never
impassioned; rising in pure intellect above all his compeers, like Mont
Blanc among the mountains, touching the very heavens, yet shrouded in
eternal snows. There is no doubt but that Calvin exercised a great influence
upon the mind of his fellow-Reformer. Knox was but beginning his work;
Calvin’s work was done; Knox was but rising into fame; Calvin was giving
laws to a large section of Christendom.”17
But no friendships, no prospect of personal safety, no sphere of
usefulness, could banish from his mind the thoughts of his persecuted
countrymen. He was constantly writing letters to encourage, and papers to
strengthen them, in the truth of God; and he was no doubt well supplied
with information as to all that was going on.
 1247
KNOX RETURNS TO SCOTLAND
In the year 1555, after an absence of eight years, Knox again visited his
native land. He was entertained by James Syme, a respectable burgess of
Edinburgh, in whose house the friends of the Reformation assembled to
talk over their prospects and plans. Up till this time many of the warm
friends of Reform had attended mass, and were not outwardly separate
from the communion of the Romish church; but the earnest
uncompromising discourses of Knox convinced them of their error, and
decided them to participate no longer in the Romish worship. Soon after
this the Lord’s supper was celebrated according to the Protestant form;
and in this united act the foundations were laid of the coming Reformed
Church of Scotland.
Among the nobles who now gathered round the Protestant standard, were
Lord Lorne, Lord Erskine, Lord James Stewart, the Earl of Marischall, the
Earl of Glencairn, John Erskine of Dun, and William Maitland of
Lithington. These were diligent in attending the sermons of Knox, and
helping him in his work. With such a body-guard the Reformer became free
and indefatigable in preaching, not only in the capital, but in the provinces.
In the winter of 1555-6 he preached in Kyle, Cunningham, Angusshire,
and other places, imparting with God’s blessing, new life to the Reform
movement, and powerfully consolidating the good work in many souls.
Rumours of all this work flew through the country, the clergy were
alarmed, his apprehension was determined upon, and Knox perceiving that
his continued presence in the country would draw down a fresh storm of
persecution on the infant community, prudently withdrew to Geneva.

THE FIRST COVENANT

From this period the progress of the Reformation in many parts of
Scotland was rapid and decisive. The brief visit of the Reformer proved to
be of immense service to the cause of Reform. Nobles, barons, burgesses,
and peasants, separated from the communion of Rome, and assembled for
the reading of the word and prayer. According to the Presbyterian form,
they could not have the sacraments administered without a duly ordained
minister; but these small meetings paved the way for the more complete
organization. The next step of the nobles was the framing of what is
 1248
known in church history as the First Covenant, and the framers are called
the “lords of the congregation.” In this covenant they promised before
“the majesty of God and His congregation, to apply their whole power,
substance, and their very lives, to maintain, set forward, and establish the
most blessed word of God and his congregation,” etc., etc. This third day
of December, 1557. God called to witness — Earls of Argyle, Glencairn,
Morton, Lord of Lorne, Erskine of Dun.
These measures alarmed the clergy. They saw that their downfall was
near, unless strong and decided means were taken to prevent it. But they
had only one weapon — the flames of martyrdom; and these were
speedily kindled. Walter Mill, a godly old man, was accused of heresy,
and burnt alive at St. Andrew’s, August 28th, 1558. As he stood at the
stake, he addressed the people in these words: “As for me, I am fourscore
and two years old, and could not live long by course of nature; but a
hundred better shall rise out of the ashes of my bones. I trust in God that I
shall be the last that shall suffer death in Scotland for this cause.” He had
been a parish priest near Montrose, but suffered as a true believer in the
Lord Jesus Christ.
The clergy were at their wits’ end. Martyrdoms only increased the number
of Protestants. The people were rapidly leaving the mass, and openly
uniting with the Reformers. It was now perfectly clear, that unless the
papists could strike a decisive blow, they must surrender. The friars
appealed to the bishops, and the bishops to the civil power. The queen
dowager, the bigoted catholic of the House of Lorraine, now openly
avowed herself on the side of Romanism. Hitherto she had been playing a
part between the bishops and the lords of the congregation. Now she
issued a proclamation prohibiting all persons from preaching or dispensing
the sacraments without authority from the bishops. The Reformed
preachers disobeyed the proclamation. They were summoned to appear
before her at Stirling, and answer to a charge of heresy and rebellion. The
Lords of the congregation interfered, and the queen, amazed at their
firmness, agreed to delay the prosecution until she had examined the affair
more seriously.
 1249
KNOX’S FINAL RETURN TO SCOTLAND
In the midst of these stirring and threatening times a powerful leader was
wanted. A deputation was sent to Geneva, to entreat Knox to return; and
on May 2nd, 1559, he arrived at Leith. The news of his arrival fell like a
thunderbolt on the papal party. A royal proclamation was immediately
issued, declaring Knox a rebel and an outlaw. But these proclamations
were now little heeded. Chancing to pass through Perth soon after, he
preached one of his vehement sermons against the idolatry of the mass,
and the worship of images. The people were ripe for such a discourse, and
greatly moved by it, but quietly dispersed when it was over. A priest,
remaining behind, to show his contempt for the doctrine which had just
been delivered, uncovered a rich altar-piece, decorated with images, began
to say mass. A boy standing near, shouted, “Idolatry!” The priest in anger
struck the boy; and he retaliated by throwing a stone, which, missing the
priest, broke one of the images. A few idle persons who were loitering in
the church, sympathized with the boy, and in the course of a few
moments, the altar, images, crucifixes, and all the church ornaments were
torn down and trampled under foot. The noise soon collected a mob; the
excitement became great, and some one shouted, “To the monasteries;” and
in a short time the monasteries of the Black and Grey Friars were in ruins.
The excited mob next bent their way to the abbey of the Charterhouse; and
soon nothing was left of that magnificent structure but the bare walls. The
magistrates of the town and the preachers hastened to the scene of the riot
as soon as they heard of it, but neither the persuasion of the one nor the
authority of the other could calm the tempest.18

POPULAR TUMULTS
The work of demolition, which was begun in a frenzy of popular rage at
Perth, rapidly extended to St. Andrew’s, Cupar, and other places in Fife;
and to Scone, Cambaskenneth, Linlithgow, Stirling, Edinburth, etc., etc. It
was upon the monasteries, chiefly, that the violence of the popular hatred
expended itself. They were in evil repute among the people, as nests of
idleness, gluttony, and wickedness. Tradition has ascribed to Knox the
party-cry — “Pull down the nests, and the rooks will flee away.” And in a
single day, those nests of impurity and hypocrisy, which had stood for
ages, were ravaged and swept away.
 1250
The queen, violently incensed at these outrages, vowed that she would
raze the city of Perty to the ground, and sow its foundations with salt, in
sign of perpetual desolation. She collected an army of considerable force,
and appeared in its neighborhood in a few days. The citizens shut the
gates, and sent letters to the queen regent, the nobility, and “to the
generation of Anti-Christ, the pestilent prelates, and their shavelings
within Scotland.” These letters proved that the lords of the congregation
were prepared to meet her. Seeing the determination and force of the
people, she was artful enough to come to terms of peace, and accomplish
what she could by dissimulation.
A war of religion now began. It is always distressing, and deeply to be
deplored, to see Reformers taking up the carnal weapons of the world in
their defense, and for the moment laying aside the sword of the Spirit. But
the cry to arms by the queen led the Reformers to utter the same cry in
self-defense; and in that age they thought that it was as lawful to follow
the example of Joshua and David as of Peter and Paul. But the Lord in
mercy interposed and removed the queen dowager by death. This took
place in the castle of Edinburth on the 10th of June 1560. Her decease was
the death-blow to French influence in Scottish affairs, and happily
resulted in the emancipation of the nation from a foreign yoke. The way
was now fully open for the establishment of the Reformation. The nation,
through the wonderful preaching of Knox during the previous fifteen
months, was ready to throw off the papal yoke, and abolish its
jurisdiction in the land.

THE PAPACY ABOLISHED BY ACT OF PARLIAMENT

Parliament was convened early in the month of August, 1560, and the
voice of the three estates assembled, was to determine the question of
religion. All men looked forward to this convention as one of the most
important that had ever been held since Scotland became a nation. We can
only give the results. The estates of the realm authoritatively decreed the
suppression of the Roman hierarchy, and the establishment of the
Protestant faith. A short confession, or summary, of christian doctrine,
had been drawn up by Knox and his associates, which was read in
audience of the whole parliament, and by the estates thereof ratified and
approved, “as wholesome and sound doctrine, grounded on the infallible
 1251
word of God.” The great victory was won. The enthusiasm of the
assembly was at the highest, and the venerable Lord Lindsay rose and
declared that he could say with Simeon of old, “Lord, now lettest thou thy
servant depart in peace... for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation.”
Immediately after the ground had been cleared for the erection of a new
ecclesiastical edifice, Knox was ready with the plan of the Reformed
church in what is known as “The First Book of Discipline.” The
constitution of the church, as set forth in this symbolic book, is strictly
Presbyterian. It recognizes four classes of ordinary and permanent office
bearers — the minister, the doctor, the elder, and the deacon.
1. Ministers, who preach to the congregation.
2. Doctors who expound scripture to students in seminaries and
universities.
3. Elders, who are associated with the ministers in ruling the
congregation.
4. Deacons, who manage money matters, and care for the poor.
Then there are four courts — the Kirk-session, the Presbytery, the
Provincial Synod, and the General Assembly.
The success of the Reform movement was now decided. Parliament had
declared Protestantism to be the national faith, and Knox was ready with
the fashion of the new church, and the creed of its members. But he
entirely over-looks — like all the other Reformers — the doctrine of the
church of God, as taught by our Lord and His apostles, and frames a
constitution according to human wisdom, though he no doubt thought it
was in accordance with the word of God. The consequences of this
mistake, as we have already seen, are set forth in the Lord’s address to the
church in Sardis. But we cannot speak too highly of those thirty-four
years of faithful testimony to the truth at an immense expense of suffering
and blood. And the Lord greatly blessed the preaching of the gospel.
Nearly the whole national mind was gained over to the new teaching during
that period, and the altars and the idols of superstition were destroyed
throughout the land amidst the acclamations of the people.19
 1252
From this time, down to the Revolution in 1688, the Presbyterians were
greatly oppressed and persecuted by the faithless and deceitful Stuaris,
who wished to establish Episcopacy instead of Presbytery in Scotland.
But the history of these stirring times falls not within our plan.
We must now briefly glance at the effects of the Reformation in England.
 1253

CHAPTER 54
ENGLAND

From the times of Wycliffe, the great English Reformer, the Lord
preserved a remnant in England, who witnessed for the truth, and who
testified against the doctrines and superstitions of Rome. We found many
of the descendants of the Lollards, or followers of Wycliffe, in the western
districts of Scotland, who were prepared to receive the new doctrines of
the continental divines. So it was in England. There were many, very
many, among the humbler classes, who still held to the doctrines taught by
their great chief; but they were compelled to hide themselves among the
humbler ranks of the people, and to hold their meetings in secret. “They
lived unknown, till persecution dragged them into the light, and chased
them up to heaven.” The least whisper of dissent from Holy Mother
Church was visited with the severest penalties. As an instance of this, six
men and a woman were brought to the stake at Coventry, in the year
1519, for teaching their children the Lord’s prayer, the ten
commandments, and the apostles’ creed in the vulgar tongue.
Such were the scenes of daily occurrence in England, shortly before the
Reformation. The priests were, as the apostle says, like “grievous wolves,
not sparing the flock.” Richard Hun, an honest tradesman in London,
though still in the Romish communion, was a diligent student of his Bible,
and a truly pious man. At the death of one of his children, the priest
required of him an exorbitant fee, which Hun refused to pay, and for which
he was summoned before the legate’s court. Animated by that public spirit
which characterizes his countrymen, he felt indignant that an Englishman
should be cited before a foreign tribunal, and lodged an accusation against
the priest under the act of Praeraunire. Such boldness — most
extraordinary at that time — exasperated the clergy beyond all bounds.
“Such boldness,” they said, “must be severely checked, or every layman
will dare to resist the priest.” Hun was accused of heresy, and thrown into
the Lollards’ tower of St. Paul’s, and left there with an iron collar round
 1254
his neck, attached to which was a heavy chain which he could scarcely
drag across his prison floor.
When brought before his judges, no proof of heresy could be brought
against him, and it was observed with astonishment “that he had his beads
in prison with him.” His persecutors were now in a great dilemma. To set
him at liberty would proclaim their own defeat; and who could stop the
Reformers, if the priests were to be so easily resisted? Three of their
agents undertook to extricate the holy fathers from their difficulties. At
midnight those men, one of them the bellringer, conducted the others with
a light to Hun’s cell. They fell upon him, strangled him, and then, putting
his own belt round his neck, they suspended the lifeless body by an iron
ring in the wall; and thus the turnkey found him in the morning. “The
priests have murdered him,” was the general cry in London, and demanded
an inquest to be held on his body. Marks of violence being found on his
person, and traces of blood in his cell, the jury concluded that he had been
murdered; besides two of the three criminals were so conscience-stricken
that they confessed their guilt. The priests were now in a greater dilemma
than ever. What was to be done? This would be a serious blow to them
unless they could somehow justify themselves. The house of Hun was
searched; a Bible was found in it; and it was Wycliffe’s translation. This
was enough; He was condemned as a heretic; his body was dug up and
burnt in Smithfield. But all this rather exposed than screened their guilt.
The case was brought before parliament; Hun’s character was vindicated;
the priests were charged with the crime of murder; and restitution of his
goods had to be made to his family. But through the influence of Wolsey
the criminals were not punished.

THE MARTYRDOM OF JOHN BROWN

Although the clergy had been unfortunate in the affair of Hun, and exposed
themselves to shame and reproach, they were by no means discouraged in
their cruel course of persecution. There were many sufferers and martyrs
about this time, according to our English martyrologist.
In the spring of 1517 — the year in which Luther nailed his theses to the
church door — John Brown of Ashford, an intelligent Christian,
happened to seat himself beside a priest in the Gravesend passage-boat.
 1255
“Dost thou know who I am?” said the priest, in the most haughty manner.
“No, sir,” said Brown. “Well then, you must know that I am a priest; you
are too near me.” “Indeed, sir! are you a parson, or vicar, or lady’s
chaplain?... No; I elm a soul-priest; I sing mass to save souls.” “Do you,
sir,” rejoined Brown, “that is well done: and can you tell me where you
find the soul when you begin the mass?... I cannot,” said the priest. “And
where do you leave it, pray, when the mass is ended?... I do not know,”
said the priest. “What!” continued Brown, “you do not know where you
find the soul or where you leave it, and yet you say that you save it!... Go
thy ways,” said the priest angrily; “thou art a heretic, and I will be even
with thee.”
As soon as the priest landed at Gravesend, he rode off to Canterbury, and
denounced Brown to the archbishop. In three days after this conversation,
as Brown sat at dinner with his family, the officers of Warham entered,
dragged the man from his house, tied him on horseback, and rode off
quickly. The heart-rending cries of his wife and children were of no avail.
The primate’s officers were too well acquainted with such tears and cries
to be moved to pity. Brown was thrown into prison, and there he lay
forty days, during which time his family knew not where he was, or what
had been done to him. At the end of that time he was brought up for trial
before the archbishop of Canterbury, and the bishop of Rochester. He was
required to retract his “blasphemy.” “Christ was once offered,” said
Brown, “to bear the sins of many, and it is by this sacrifice we are saved,
not by the repetitions of the priests.” At this reply the archbishop made a
sign to the executioners, who immediately took off the shoes and stockings
of the pious Christian, and placed his bare feet on a pan of burning coals.
This heartless cruelty was in direct violation of the English laws which
forbade torture to be inflicted on any subject of the crown, but the clergy
thought themselves above the laws. “Confess the efficacy of the mass,”
cried the two bishops to the sufferer. “If I deny my Lord upon earth,” he
replied, “He will deny me before his Father in heaven.” The flesh was
burnt off the soles of his feet even to the bones, and still John Brown
remained firm and unshaken. The bishops feeling their utter weakness in
the presence of divine strength, ordered him to be burnt alive — the last
act of human cruelty.
 1256
The martyr was led back to Ashford. The servant of the family happening
to be out when he arrived, saw him, and running back, rushed into the
house, exclaiming, “I have seen him! I have seen him!” His poor wife
hastened to see him; he was so tightly bound in the stocks, that he could
hardly move even his head, in speaking to his wife. She sat down beside
him: his features were changed by suffering; her tears and distress must
remain for ever untold. He thanked the Lord for sustaining him under the
torture, and for enabling him to confess his faith in the blessed Lord Jesus;
and exhorted his good wife Elizabeth to continue as she had begun — to
love the Lord, for He is good, and to bring up the children for Him.
The following morning, being Whitsunday, he was taken out of the stocks
and bound to the stake. His wife, his daughter Alice, and his other
children, with some friends, gathered round the faggots to receive his
farewell blessing. He sang a hymn while the flames were playing around
him, but feeling that the fire had nearly done its work, he breathed out the
prayer of his Lord and Master; “Father, into Thy hands I commend my
spirit,” adding, “Thou hast redeemed me, O God of truth.” The martyr
was now silent; but redoubled cries of anguish rent the air. His wife and
daughter seemed as if they would lose their senses. The spectators moved
with compassion, deeply sympathized with the distracted family, but
scowled with indignation on the executioners. “Come,” said Chilton, a
brutal officer, “let us cast the heretic’s children into the fire, lest they, too,
should become heretics. So saying, he rushed towards Alice, but the
maiden ran off, screaming with fright, and escaped the ruffian.”1
Such were the servants of the archbishop, and such the heart-rending
scenes in England, down to the time of Luther, and the reign of Henry
VIII., to which we must now turn.

HENRY VIII
From the rival claims of York and Lancaster the succession to the English
throne had been a matter of fierce contention for many years. The struggle
of the opposing factions amongst the nobility, known in history by the
term, “The Wars of the Roses,” broke out about the time when
Gutenberg’s labors at the printing press began, and greatly hindered the
peaceful triumph of the arts and literature. The country was deeply
 1257
affected in all its interests by these civil wars. Commerce was reduced to
its lowest state; ignorance covered the land, and tnle piety had scarcely
any existence, except amongst the despised and persecuted Lollards.2
Such was the condition of things when Henry VIII. ascended the throne in
1509. Uniting in his person the claims of the rival houses of York and
Lancaster, he received the devotion of both. Everything seemed to favor
the young monarch, and give hope of a peaceful and popular reign. His
father, Henry VII., had successfully founded the Tudor dynasty, left him
with a people outwardly quiet, and an exchequer overflowing with what
would now amount to ten or twelve millions of gold. He was young —
about eighteen — said to be “majestic in. port, eminently handsome, and
rioting in health and spirits.” His manners were frank and open, and being
most accomplished in all the manly exercises of the time, he became the
idol of the nation. His marriage and coronation were followed by a
constant succession of gateties and amusements on the most expensive
plan, which rapidly reduced the treasures accumulated by his
parsimonious father.
Henry had also a taste for letters. He delighted in the society of scholars,
and lavished upon them his patronage. Having been destined by his father
for the church, and educated accordingly, his naturally vigorous mind had
been greatly improved by education, so that in mental accomplishments he
far exceeded the princes of his age. The new study of revived classical
literature had for some time been much cultivated in England. This was not
the Reformation, but it exposed the ignorance of the clergy, and prepared
the public mind for the approaching change. The priests were now as
opposed to the scholars as to the heretics. They railed against the
invention of printing, the manufacture of paper, and the introduction of
such heathenish words as nominatives and adverbs: they were all of Satan,
and sources of heresy — but, as the king favored the most illustrious of
the scholars, it was not so easy to have them murdered or burnt as poor
Hun and Brown.
But of all the learned men now in England, the one they hated most was
Erasmus. He could not endure — as we have already seen in the course of
our history — the greed, the gluttony, and the ignorance of the monks. He
had often levelled against them his keenest shafts, and his most pungent
 1258
satire. He had also indulged in some of his witty sarcasms against the
bishop of St. Asaph; and, though he was a favorite at court, he must be
banished if he cannot be burnt. The bishops set to work accordingly.
Erasmus, seeing their intentions, and true to his nature, left the country.
This event was overruled by a gracious providence in the most blessed
way. He went straight to Basle, and published his Greek and Latin New
Testament. Copies were straightway despatched to London, Oxford, and
Cambridge, where they were received with great enthusiasm. The priests
had thought to maintain the darkness by driving away the master of
letters, but his departure was the means of restoring to England the light of
eternal truth — the pure gospel of the Lor’d Jesus Christ. Before Luther
had posted up his theses, the holy scriptures were circulated in England.
Thus was the Reformation chiefly accomplished by the word of God.
There the Person and glory of Christ are revealed as the Savior of sinners;
salvation through faith in His precious blood, and oneness with Him
through the indwelling of the Holy Ghost.
“The Reformation in England,” says D’Aubigne, “perhaps to a
greater extent than that of the continent, was effected by the word
of God. Those great individualities we met with in Germany,
Switzerland, and France — men like Luther, Zwingle, and Calvin
— do not appear in England; but holy scripture is widely
circulated. What brought light into the British Isles subsequently to
the year 1517, and on a more extended scale after the year 1526,
was the word — the invisible power — of the living God. The
religion of the Anglo-Saxon race — a race called more than any
other to circulate the oracles of God throughout the world — is
particularly distinguished for its Biblical character.”3

THOMAS WOLSEY
Just as everything seemed tending to the rapid advancement of the
Reformation, a powerful priest, Thomas Wolsey, appeared on the scene,
who, for a time, hindered its progress.
This remarkable man, according to tradition, was the son of a wealthy
butcher in Ipswich, and born in the year 1471. He seems to have been
designed for the church from an early age, and was trained at Magdalen
 1259
College, Oxford. About the year 1500 he was appointed chaplain to Henry
VII. through the influence of Fox, bishop of Winchester. The diligence and
capacity for business which he displayed soon attracted the attention of
the old king, who rewarded him with the valuable deanery of Lincoln. He
was equally successful in gaining the favor of the Son, Henry VIII.
Although twenty years older than his new master, he adapted himself to
his youth and all its tendencies. He was no ascetic, though a priest; and
vice, it is said, never hung her head in his presence. He was so clever,
accommodating, and unscrupulous, that he could be gay or grave, as best
served the purpose of his ambition. He gradually gained such an influence
over the mind of Henry, that he virtually became the ruler of the realm.
Wealth, honors, offices — civil and ecclesiastical-flowed in upon him
rapidly. He was created bishop of Tournay, and raised to the sees of
Lincoln and York in the year 1514, and the following year he received a
cardinal’s hat, with the office of lord chancellor.
His enormous wealth, gathered from so many sources both at home and
abroad, enabled him to maintain his elevated position with more than
regal splendor. “Whenever he appeared in public, two priests, the tallest
and comeliest that could be found, carried before him huge silver crosses,
one to mark his dignity as archbishop, the other as papal legate.
Chamberlains, gentlemen, pages, sergeants, chaplains, choristers, clerks,
cupbearers, cooks, and other domestics — to the number of more than five
hundred — among whom were nine or ten lords, and the stateliest yeomen
of the country — filled his palace. He generally wore a dress of scarlet
velvet and silk, with hat and gloves of the same color. His shoes were
embroidered with gold and silver, inlaid with pearls and precious stones.”
But with all this pomp and grandeur, his capacity for business was great,
and seemed to enlarge with the elevation of his rank, and the increase of his
offices. He patronized learning, sympathized with the literary inclinations
of Henry, while in matters of state, he was the most profound counsellot,
in the English court, though too often swayed by his absorbing ambition.4
Thus it was permitted of the Lord, that the church of Rome, the mother of
harlots, should be illustrated in the man who ruled in church and state, and
was arrayed in all the worldly glory spoken of in Revelation 17. It was a
kind of papacy in England: he only wanted the triple crown; and the
 1260
English people were to witness the kind of glory the papacy ever valued,
before it sank and disappeared from the land.

THE REFORMATION BEGUN

The elevation of such a prince of Rome, who was now to take a share in
domestic and foreign politics, even greater than that of Henry himself,
could not be favorable to the Reformation. The priests, emboldened by
this display of papal power, determined to make a stand against the
scholars and the Reformers. But it was too late to effect much, though
heresy was still severely punished. The eve of the Reformation had
arrived. Men’s minds were disturbed; the papacy had lost its traditional
hold upon the conscience and affections of the people, and the New
Testament which Erasmus had given to England was doing a greater work
than all the teachers or doctors in the land. Names so dear to every
Christian’s heart, and so famous in English history, now come before us.
Thomas Bilney, a student at Trinity college, Cambridge, hearing some
friends speak one day of the New Testament of Erasmus, made haste to
procure a copy. It was strictly forbidden by the Catholics, but was sold
secretly. Bilney opened the book which he had been told was the source of
all heresy — his eyes caught these words: “This is a faithful saying, and
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save
sinners, of whom I am chief.” He laid down his book, and meditated on the
astonishing words. “What,” he exclaimed, “St. Paul the chief of sinners,
and yet St. Paul is sure of being saved!” The Holy Spirit shed a divine light
on the sacred page, revealed Christ and His salvation to his soul, so that he
at once began to preach Christ to others. He was the blessed instrument in
God’s hands in bringing many to the knowledge of Christ, among whom
was the celebrated Hugh Latimer.
William Tyndale, from the valley of the Severn — who afterwards
translated the Bible into English — was at this time a student at Oxford.
He had the reputation of being an extremely virtuous young man of
spotless character, and fond of sacred literature. He obtained the book
which was then attracting so much attention, and God used it to the
conversion of his soul. He began almost immediately to give public
lectures on the gospel of Christ, and the way of salvation through faith in
 1261
Him; but this being more than Oxford could yet bear, he left, and joined
the dear evangelist Bilney at Cambridge.
John Fryth, from Sevenoaks, was distinguished among the students of
King’s college for the quickness of his understanding, and the integrity of
his life. He was brought to the knowledge of Christ by means of Tyndale;
and these three young students, completely emancipated from the yoke of
Rome by the word of God alone, were amongst the earliest preachers of
the doctrines of the Reformation, and ultimately were honored of God
with the crown of martyrdom. It was especially laid on the heart of
Tyndale to translate the holy scriptures into the English tongue; but
finding no convenience for this blessed work in England, he retired to the
continent, and, settling at Antwerp, he there published a translation of the
New Testament about the year 1527.

THE WORKS OF LUTHER REACH ENGLAND

At the very time when God’s Spirit was working so manifestly in the
universities, the writings of Luther had entered the kingdom and were
being widely circulated among the people. The noble stand which the
monk had made at the Diet of Worms was much talked of, and awakened a
deep interest in his writings. There was no small stir among the clergy; the
bishops held a council to deliberate on what was to be done. The bull of
Leo against Luther was sent to England; and Wolsey also issued a bull of
his own against him. The bull of Leo which gave a description of Luther’s
perverse opinions was. nailed to the church door, while Wolsey’s was read
aloud during high mass. The cardinal issued orders at the same time to the
bishops to seize all heretical books, and books containing Martin Luther’s
errors; and to give notice in all the churches, that any person having such
books, and failing to deliver them up within fifteen days would incur the
pain of excommunication. But this was not all; the cardinal-legate, in great
pomp, proceeded to St. Paul’s and publicly burnt the arch-heretic’s book.
The principal result of these proceedings, as some say, with the
publication of Luther’s alleged errors on the doors of the cathedrals and
churches, was to advertise his works, awaken the slumbering interest of
the English people, and prepare them for the more fearless profession of
the doctrines of the Reformation. The bishops had taken counsel to arrest
 1262
the progress of the gospel; but in this, as in many other cases, the efforts
of adversaries only accelerated the speed of the great work, and the puny
wrath of men was turned to the praise of the Lord.

HENRY AND LUTHER

When the writings of Luther were commanding such general attention, the
king stood forward as the champion of the church in the character of a
polemic. Henry was at this time a bigoted enemy to the principles of the
Reformation, and greatly incensed against Luther for treating with
contempt his favorite author, Thomas Aquinas. But Luther, nothing
daunted by his royal antagonist, and in no wise convinced by his royal
logic, soon replied to him in his usual style, plainly showing that, in his
defense of the great principles of the Reformation, he was no respecter of
persons.5

THE ROYAL MARRIAGES

It is not difficult to discern, at this moment, the overruling hand of a divine
providence in the marvellous changes which were taking place, and how
little man at his best estate is to be trusted. The same gallant Henry that
showed so much zeal for the Roman See, and was rewarded with the titles,
“Most Christian King; Defender of the Faith,” etc., in a short time denies
the pope’s authority, renounces his supremacy, and withdraws his
kingdom from the obedience of the pontifical jurisdiction. And the same
double policy of the Catholics that turned the mind of Henry, caused the
downfall of Wolsey. Rome lost both — Henry and Wolsey — and the
Reformation, indirectly, greatly gained. But the events which led to these
results have been so minutely related by all our historians, that we may
fairly suppose the reader to be acquainted with them.
The quarrel between the king and the pope first arose on the subject of the
royal marriages. Arthur, the eldest son of Henry VII., was married to
Catherine, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, and died without issue six
months afterwards. The shrewd money-loving father-in-law, that he might
preserve the advantages of the Spanish alliance, and retain her dowry of
two hundred thousand ducats, proposed her marriage with Henry, his
second son, now Prince of Wales. Some of the bishops were opposed to
 1263
the union, as contrary to the laws of God, others favored it; but to settle
the question, a bull was obtained from Julius II. to sanction it, and the
marriage took place soon after Henry’s accession to the throne. For
seventeen years no question appears to have arisen as to the validity of
this union. Of five children — three sons and two daughters — only Mary
survived the period of infancy.
One of the many reasons suggested for the king’s doubts as to the
lawfulness of his marriage was the loss of his children. He began to think
that it was the judgment of God for marrying his brother’s widow. But it
is more generally believed that the origin of his doubts was the passion he
had formed for Anne Boleyn. The great question of “the divorce” was
first mooted about the year 1527, and it soon became the source of the
most important results in both church and state, and to the nation at large.
The pope was appealed to for a bull pronouncing the marriage of Henry
and Catherine to be unlawful, and a dispensation for king Henry to marry
again. The pope was now in a great perplexity. If he declared the marriage
of the royal pair to be unlawful, he would thereby affirm to all
Christendom that his infallible predecessor, Julius II., had made a mistake
in declaring it to be lawful. Still, the artful pope, who was most anxious to
oblige the king of England, would have had little difficulty in making that
straight; but the armies of the powerful Charles — nephew to Catherine
— were then in Italy, and he was indignant at the repudiation of his aunt.
This complication of interests led to the most shameful artifices and
intrigues on the part of the papal court, in which the double dealing of
Wolsey — who had been promised the tiara by Charles if he threw
difficulties in the way of the divorce — being discovered by the king, led
to his disgrace and his ignominious end. For seven long years the pope, by
his diplomatic strategy, kept the impetuous Henry waiting, which shows,
on the other side, the immense hold which the word of a pope had upon
the mind of an absolute monarch. Driven to extremities, Henry resolved to
take the law into his own hands, and entirely abolish the pope’s power
in England. “In 1534 an act of parliament was passed, with very little
opposition, which put an end to the papal authority, as well as to the
various payments of whatever kind which had hitherto been made by the
laity or clergy to the see of Rome.”6
 1264
THE PERSECUTION BEGINS
The king, very prudently, demanded and obtained the sanction of the
higher clergy to the great changes he was introducing into the ecclesiastical
constitution of England. The bishops were greatly embarrassed. “If we
recognize the king as supreme head of the church in England,” said they,
“we overthrow the pope.” But they were obliged to submit to all his
enactments, or fall under his displeasure. To atone for their cowardly
submission to Henry, and sacrificing the pope, they resolved on kindling
afresh the fires of persecution, which had been languishing during the latter
years of Wolsey’s reign. The evangelical preachers were becoming more
numerous, Lutheranism was rapidly gaining ground, the leaders must be
burnt.
“Your highness,” said the bishops to the king, “one time defended
the church with your pen, when you were only a member of it;
now that you are its supreme head, your majesty should crush its
enemies, and so shall your merits exceed all praise.” Before giving
Henry’s reply to this insidious flattery, it is necessary to state
that, although the alterations of the king had done much for the
overthrow of the papal power in England, they had done nothing
as yet for the deliverance of the persecuted Reformers. Henry had
no intention at this time of proceeding further with the
Reformation, though the steps which he had taken were overruled
by God for the advancement of that great movement. The act
which acknowledged the king’s supremacy declared that, “they did
not hereby intend to vary from Christ’s church about the articles
of the Catholic faith of Christendom, or in any other things,
declared by the scriptures and the word of God to be necessary for
their salvation.”
As Henry had now broken with the pope, and the fidelity of the clergy
was not much to be trusted, he felt the necessity of uniting more closely
with them; and as he greatly delighted in his title “Defender of the Faith,”
he consented to hand over the disciples of the heretic Luther to the priests.
Thus an agreement was made between the king and the clergy of the
most infamous character that ever darkened the pages of history. The king
gave them authority to imprison and burn the Reformers, provided they
 1265
would assist him in resuming the power usurped by the pope. This was
enough; the priests would agree to anything, swear to anything, if only
authority were given them to burn the heretics. The bishops immediately
began to hunt down the friends of the gospel — the holy men of God.
We regret being unable, from want of space, to give details of the martyrs
of this period, but they are to be found in many histories,7 and sure we are
their record is on high; and if the reader is a believer in the gospel, which
was then called heresy, he will meet them on the morning of the first
resurrection. This is the sure and certain hope of all true believers.
“For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout,
with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the
dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain
shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the
Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” (1
Thessalonians 4:16, 17.)
Nothing can be plainer than these words of eternal truth. The church,
which is His body, is complete, the Lord Himself comes for her; she hears
His voice, whether in the caverns of the grave or alive upon the earth, and
ascends in her chariot of clouds; He meets her in the air, and conducts her
to the house of many mansions — the home of love which He has
prepared for the bride of His heart. Brightly, amidst the myriad hosts of
heaven, will shine on that day, the noble army of martyrs. But all will be
perfect, absolutely perfect, as Christ Himself is perfect, and the joy of one
will be the common joy of all; for all will be like Christ, the perfect
reflection of His glory.
The prisons, the stakes, the faggots, as well as the tedious sick chamber,
will all be forgotten on that day, save to speak of the grace which enabled
us in some measure to glorify Him. Neither will it be an undistinguishable
mass, for we shall know each other, and the links which had been formed
on earth by the Holy Ghost shall remain unbroken for ever. Such is the
bright and blessed future for which we wait, we long, we pray; but we
know He is too faithful to come before the right time. And this is the
future of all who believe in Jesus — the feeblest as well as the strongest.
All who come to Jesus now are received: He rejects none. His mournful
complaint is,
 1266
“Ye will not come to Me, that ye might have life.”… “Him that
cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.” (John 5:40; 6:37.)
The names of Bilney, Byfield, Tewkesbury, Barnes, Bainham, Fryth, and
many others, who suffered martyrdom about this time, have become
familiar as the first Reformers in England. But it was difficult for any
honest man to escape persecution at this period of our history. The
Reformers suffered as heretics, and many of the papists as traitors. Those
who refused to take the oath of supremacy were condemned as guilty of
high treason. The aged Dr. Fisher, bishop of Rochester, nearly eighty, and
Sr. Thomas More, late Lord Chancellor, styled the Erasmus of England,
were condemned and executed in 1534, for refusing to acknowledge Henry
as supreme head of the church. Neither age, service, learning, nor virtue
were respected by the cruel and vindictive tyrant. Just about this time,
when scaffolds, blocks, and stakes were rapidly multiplying in the land,
one of queen Anne’s maids of honor attracted the attention, and excited
the guilty passion of the king. But as there was no ground for pleading a
divorce in the case of Anne Boleyn, he resolved to clear his way, as one
has said, by the axe, to a new marriage with Jane Seymour. Pretending to
suspect her fidelity, the monster threw her into the Tower. She was denied
even the help of counsel on her trial, and found guilty by judges who were
bound to bend before the tyranny of their master. The beautiful, and, as
many say, the virtuous, Anne Boleyn, was beheaded on May 19th, 1536,
and Henry and Jane Seymour were married on the day following.

THE SUPPRESSION OF MONASTERIES

Henry had been excommunicated by the pope; his subjects absolved from
their allegiance; Charles V. might invade his kingdom, and avenge the cause
of his royal aunt, Catherine: and should there be a popish rebellion, the
whole fraternity of monks would flock to the standard of revolt. The king
was no doubt moved, by such considerations and fears to make an end of
the monasteries, and appropriate their wealth before the danger arose. His
prime minister, Sir Thomas Cromwell, a favorer of the Reformation, and
an energetic man, was authorized by his master to appoint a commission
to visit the abbeys, monasteries, nunneries, and universities of the
kingdom, and report the condition of these foundations. The result was
overwhelming. In place of obedience, poverty, and charity, which these
 1267
religious houses were established to exemplify, they had raised themselves
above the laws of the land, besides rolling in wealth; and, as to their
practices, we leave them in the original histories. Bishop Burner says, “I
have seen an extract of a part of this report, concerning one hundred and
forty-four houses, that contains abominations in it equal to any that were
in Sodom.”8
The king and the parliament, on hearing the report of the commissioners,
resolved on their suppression. The lesser and greater monasteries
amounted in number to six hundred and forty-five, while their possessions
were valued at one-fifty of the kingdom — “at least one-fifty of the soil of
England was in the hands of the monks.” Besides the enormous wealth
which fell to the crown, from the abolition of the religious houses, the king
seized the rich shrine of Thomas a Becket at Canterbury, and his name as a
saint was ordered to be erased from the calendar. The monks and nuns
were turned adrift to shift for themselves, which caused great confusion
and distress throughout the land. Cranmer and Latimer pleaded the part
of the confiscated property should be devoted to the founding of hospitals
for the sick and the poor, and institutions for the cultivation of learning;
but the king and his courtiers had little to spare for such purposes. As
Tyndale quaintly says, “The counsels were taken not of a pure heart and
love of the truth, but to avenge themselves, and to eat the harlot’s flesh,
and suck the marrow of her bones.”

THE SIX ARTICLES

But, notwithstanding this apparent Reformation, Henry was a thorough
Romanist at heart. He maintained the doctrines of Rome, while he
abolished the authority of the Roman pontiff in his kingdom. Under the
influence of Gardiner and Bonner, two bigoted papists, six articles were
enacted by the king and his parliament, usually termed the “Bloody
statute.” It condemned to death all who opposed the doctrine of
transubstantiation, auricular confession, vows of chastity, and private
masses; and all who supported the marriage of the clergy, and the giving of
the cup to the laity. This creed was thoroughly Roman. Cranmer used all
his influence, and even risked the king’s displeasure, to prevent its
passing, but all in vain. The Romish party was still powerful, and the
king’s temper became more violent than ever. Latimer, now bishop of
 1268
Worcester, was thrown into prison, and hundreds soon followed him. The
prisons of London were crowded with all sorts of persons suspected of
heresy. Papists were hung for denying the supremacy, and men and
women were burnt in great numbers for denying transubstantiation.
Commissioners were appointed to carry out the act, and who could
escape? If a man was an honest papist, he denied the king’s supremacy,
and if he was an honest Protestant, he denied the real presence. The
number that died by the hand of the executioner, during the reign of Henry
VIII., could not be credited in our day. Some say seventy-two thousand.9

THE TRUE SOURCE OF THE REFORMATION

There are writers, we know, who ascribe the Reformation in England to
the enactments of the king; but we think this a great mistake. That mighty
movement flowed from a purer source than the murderous heart of Henry.
Besides, he was a Romanist to the end of his days; and bequeathed large
sums to be spent in saying masses for the repose of his soul. The work
throughout was evidently of God, and by means of evangelists and His
own holy word.
We have already seen the learned men of England in possession of the
New Testament in Greek and Latin; but the common people — unless
they had Wycliffe’s translation — must receive the knowledge of the truth
through preachers — such as Bilney, Latimer, and others. William
Tyndale, a man chosen of God, translated the Greek into English at
Antwerp, and sent thousands of his New Testaments to England,
concealed in vessels coming to our ports. Sometimes they were seized and
burned, but many escaped detection, and were widely circulated. The
whole Bible in the English of that day, translated by Tyndale, with the
assistance of Miles Coverdale, appeared in 1535, dedicated to the king,
being the first edition of the scriptures published by royal authority.
Probably through the influence of Cranmer, Henry ordered the free sale of
the Bible, and a copy in Latin and English to be provided for every parish
church in the realm, and chained to a pillar or a desk in the choir, that any
man might have access to it, and read it. “I rejoice,” wrote Cranmer to
Cromwell, “to see this day of Reformation now risen in England, since the
light of God’s word doth shine over it without a cloud.”
 1269
England had now thrown off the tyranny of Rome, abolished the whole
monastic system, and re-established the authority of scripture. Still, the
Reformation made no great progress during the remainder of Henry’s life.
The fabric of Roman traditions had fallen, and the foundation of a new
edifice was laid in restoring the Bible to the people; but much patience,
toil, and suffering had to be endured before the building could be
completed.

THE REIGN OF EDWARD VI

On the death of Henry, in 1547, the English Reformation assumed an
entirely different aspect. Edward VI., the child of Henry’s third wife, Jane
Seymour, was acknowledged king of England, January 28, 1547, when
only nine years old. His coronation took place in February, when the
friends of the gospel were released from prison, the statutes of the “six
articles” were abolished; many returned from exile, and the ranks of the
Reformers were greatly recruited. When the procession was about to move
from the abbey of Westminster to the palace, three swords were brought
to be carried before the newly crowned king, emblematic of his three
kingdoms. Seeing this, the king observed, “There lacks yet one.” On his
nobles inquiring what it was, he answered, “The Bible;” adding, “that book
is the sword of the Spirit, and is to be preferred before those. It ought in
all right to govern us; without it we are nothing. He that rules without it is
not to be called God’s minister, or a king.” The Bible was brought, and
carried reverently in the procession.
The natural gifts of Edward, it is said, were such as to raise him far above
the ordinary conditions of childhood. His father had wisely provided him
with pious teachers, who were also friends of the gospel. Numerous letters
written by the precocious prince in Latin and French, before he was ten
years old, are still extant. Catherine Parr, the sixth wife of his father,
said to be a lady of great virtue and intelligence, carefully watched over his
training.
During the brief reign of Edward, every encouragement was given to the
diffusion of the English Bible. Though his reign extended to little more
than seven years, no fewer than eleven editions of the Bible, and six of the
New Testament were published. Various improvements were also
 1270
introduced in the mode of conducting divine service. Images were ordered
to be removed from the churches, prayers were no longer to be offered for
the dead, auricular confession and transubstantiation were declared to be
unscriptural, the clergy were permitted to marry, and the service was
ordered to be, performed in English in place of Latin. Articles of religion
were also agreed upon in convocation; they were forty-two in number. In
the reign of Elizabeth, they were reduced to thirty-nine, which continue, as
then revised, to be the standard of the English church. The liturgy was
revised, and re-revised, chiefly by Cranmer and Ridley — after consulting
Bucer and Martyr — known as the “First and Second Book of Edward
VI.,” and was duly ratified by the king and the parliament, and came into
use in 1552. It was substantially the Book of Common Prayer now in use.
While these works of Reform were being carried on with great vigor, the
pious King Edward died, in his sixteenth year, July 6th, 1553; and with his
premature death a night of terrible darkness surrounded the Reformation in
England. His last prayer was, “O my Lord God, bless my people, and
save Thine inheritance; O Lord God, save Thy chosen people of England;
O Lord God, defend this realm from popery, and maintain Thy true
religion, that I and my people may praise Thy holy name, for Jesus Christ
His sake.” During this short reign, we may say, the Reformation was
established, and Protestantism had assumed, in all essential points, the
form in which we find it today. “When Henry VIII. descended into the
tomb in 1547, England was little better than a field of ruins; the colossal
fragments of that ancient fabric, which the terrible blows of the king had
shivered to pieces, lay all about; and before these obstructions could be
removed — time-honored maxims exploded, inveterate prejudices rooted
up, the dense ignorance of all classes dispelled — and the building of the
new edifice begun, a generation, it would have been said, must pass
away.”10 Yet in six short years the work proceeded with such rapidity,
that the ancient faith, which for a thousand years had stood firm and been
held sacred, had passed away for ever.

THE REIGN OF MARY

The Princess Mary ascended the throne in July, 1553. She inherited from
her mother, Catherine of Arragon, a determined hatred of the Protestant
religion, and a strong attachment to the Roman Catholic faith. Her first
 1271
acts were to repeal the laws of her father and brother in favor of Reform
and against the pope and popish worship. Gardiner and Bonner were
released from the Tower, and the leaders of the Reformation — Cranmer,
Hooper, Coverdale, Rogers, and others — were sent to occupy their
vacant prisons. Meanwhile cardinal Pole arrived from Italy, with full
powers from the pope to receive the kingdom of England into the Roman
pale. Persecution commenced, and all men apprehended a terrible storm.
“A thousand of the Reformers,” says Marsden, “including five bishops,
many noblemen, fifty dignitaries of the church, and others whose position
in society might render them obnoxious, hurried their departure, and fled
abroad — chiefly to Geneva, Basle, and Zurich, where the Reformed
religion was now established.” The year 1555 has been termed the one of
burning and blood.
Rogers, vicar of St. Sepulchre’s who had been the associate of Tyndale
and Coverdale in the translation of the scriptures, was the first to suffer.
As he was being led to Smithfield, he saw his wife in the crowd waiting to
see him. She had an infant in her arms, and ten children around her. He
could only bid them all farewell with a look of faith and love. A pardon
was offered him when he reached the faggots if he would recant. “That
which I have preached,” he said firmly, “will I seal with my blood.” “Thou
art a heretic,” said the sheriff. “That shall be known at the last day,”
responded the martyr. The torch was applied, the flames rose around him,
and with hands raised to heaven he bore with perfect calmness the torture
until they dropped into the fire. So died John Rogers, the protomartyr of
the Marian persecution.
Hooper, late bishop of Gloucester, was burnt alive in front of his own
cathedral. It was a market day, and a crowd of not less than seven
thousand had assembled to witness the last moments of one so greatly
beloved. His enemies, fearing the power of his eloquence, forbade him to
speak, and threatened if he did to cut out his tongue. But it is said that the
meekness, the more than usual serenity of his countenance, and the
courage with which he endured his prolonged and awful sufferings, bore
nobler testimony to his cause than any words he could have uttered. He
was much in prayer, and probably the greater part of the seven thousand
were in tears. “To say nothing of his piety,” says another historian, “and
the cause for which he suffered, he was a noble specimen of the true
 1272
English character; a man of transparent honesty, of dauntless courage, of
unshaken constancy, and of warm affections and a loving heart.” His last
words were, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Within a few days after
Hooper’s death, Saunders was burnt at Coventry; Dr. Taylor at Hadleigh,
in Suffolk; Ferrar, bishop of St. David’s, at Carmarthen, Wales. All these
were clergymen.
Fires were thus kindled in all parts of England in order to strike a wider
terror into the hearts of the people, and deter them by these terrible
examples from siding with the Reformers. But they had just the opposite
effect. Men could easily contrast the mild treatment of the papists under
the reign of Edward, and the cruelties practiced on innocent men under the
reign of Mary. Barbarous as the nation then was, and educationally
Catholic, it was shocked beyond measure with the severities of the court
of Mary; especially when the council issued an order to the sheriffs of the
different counties to exact a promise from the martyrs to make no
speeches at the stake — otherwise to cut out their tongues. Thus were
kindred and friends deprived of the last and sacred words of the dying.
Even the most rigid papists pretended to be ashamed of these savage
proceedings when they saw their effect upon the nation. Undying hatred
of the church which encouraged such atrocities took the place of
superstitious reverence. The hearts of the people by thousands and tens of
thousands were moved by sympathy to take part with the oppressed. In
the summer of this year of horrors, Bradford, prebendary of St. Paul’s,
was burnt at Smithfield, together with an apprentice, a lad of nineteen; and
many others whom we cannot name. But we must briefly notice three
familiar and honored names in the martyrology of England.

RIDLEY, LATIMER, AND CRANMER

Having been examined by the queen’s commissioners at Oxford on the
charge of heresy, they were condemned to be burnt as obstinate heretics.
They were old, learned, and greatly esteemed as ministers of Christ;
Latimer was eighty-four, and had been one of the most eloquent
preachers in England. They were sent back to prison, where they were
detained nearly twelve months, the sentence of death hanging over them.
In October 1555, an order was issued for the execution of Ridley and
Latimer. They were led to the city ditch, over against Balliol college. After
 1273
spending a few moments in prayer, they were fastened to the stake. The
torch was first applied to the faggots around Ridley. The dear old Latimer
addressed his companion in words still fresh, after three centuries, as on
the day on which they were uttered: “BE OF GOOD COMFORT , M ASTER
RIDLEY , AND PLAY T HE M AN ; WE SHALL T HIS DAY LIGHT SUCH A
CANDLE , BY GOD ’S GRACE , IN ENGLAND , AS I T RUST SHALL NEVER BE
PUT OUT.” They both leaned forward as if to embrace the flames — the
chariot of fire that was to carry them to heaven — their happy souls soon
departed to be for ever with the Lord. Quietly have they been reposing on
that heart of eternal love these three hundred years, and there they will
rest until the morning of the first resurrection, when the sleeping dust of
God’s redeemed shall be raised, and their bodies fashioned like unto
Christ’s body of glory,
“according to the working whereby He is able even to
subdue all things unto Himself.” (Philippians 3:21.)
Cranmer was still in prison. Having acted so prominent a part under two
monarchs, Henry and Edward, and in both church and state, he must be
made to drink the bitterest dregs of humiliation; besides he had voted for
the divorce, the unpardonable sin in Mary’s eyes. He was visited by the
most accomplished of the Romish party, and treated with courtesy. They
professed a sincere desire to prolong his life for future service, and hinted
that he might have a quiet sphere in the country. His gentle spirit, his age,
his failing courage, caused him to give way, and he fell into a disgraceful
dissimulation by the arts of his seducers, and signed the submission
required of him. The Catholics gloated over the humiliation of their victim,
and hoped thereby to inflict a deadly wound on the Reformation. But
Mary and Cardinal Pole had no thought of pardoning him. Instructions
were secretly sent down to Oxford to prepare for his execution. On the
morning of the 21st of March, 1556, the venerable archbishop, meanly
habited, was led in solemn procession to St. Mary’s church. Meanwhile
grace had wrought deeply in the heart of Cranmer. He was truly penitent,
his soul was restored, and fully prepared to make a bold confession of his
faith. He was placed on a raised platform in front of the pulpit; Dr. Cole
preached a sermon, as usual on such occasions. “He,” says Foxe, “that
was late archbishop, metropolitan and primate of England, and the king’s
privy counsellor, being now in a bare and ragged gown, and ill-favoredly
 1274
clothed, with an old and square cap, exposed to the contempt of all men,
did admonish men, not only of his own calamity, but also of their state
and fortune. More than twenty several times the tears did gush out
abundantly, dropping down marvellously from his fatherly face.”

MARTYRDOM OF CRANMER
Sermon being ended, Dr. Cole asked him to clear himself of all suspicion of
heresy, by making a public confession. “I will do so,” said Cranmer, “and
that with a good will.” He rose up, and addressed the vast concourse,
declaring his abhorrence of the Romish doctrines, and expressing his
stedfast adherence to the Protestant faith. “And now,” he said, “I come to
the great thing that is troubling my conscience, more than anything that I
ever did or said in my whole life. And forasmuch, as my hand offended,
writing contrary to my heart, my hand shall therefore first be punished;
for, may I come to the fire, it shall be first burned.” Hardly had he uttered
the words, when the priests, filled with fury at hearing a confession
contrary to what they expected, dragged him tumultuously to the stake. It
was already set up on the spot where Latimer and Ridley had suffered. As
soon as the flames approached him, holding his right hand in the hottest of
the fire, he exclaimed, “That unworthy right hand!” and there he kept it till
it was consumed, repeatedly exclaiming, “That unworthy right hand!” His
constancy amazed his persecutors. He stood in the midst of the flames
unmoved as the stake to which he was bound. His last words were those
familiar to so many martyrs, and first uttered by the noblest of all martyrs
— “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And in a few moments, his happy
soul, released from all its cares and troubles, joined his companions in the
paradise of God.
“Absent from the body, present with the Lord.” (2 Corinthians 5:8.)
Within three years (from 1555 to 1558) according to the historians of the
time, two hundred and eighty-four martyrs suffered by fire, while
many perished in prison from hunger and ill-usage. “Over all England,”
says one, “from the eastern counties to Wales on the west, and from the
midland shires to the shores of the English Channel, blazed those baleful
fires. Both sexes, and all ages and conditions, the boy of eight and the man
of eighty, were dragged to the stake and burnt, sometimes singly, at other
 1275
times in dozens. Just two days before the death of the queen, five martyrs
were burnt in one fire at Canterbury.’” The news of her death filled the
country with rejoicings. It is said that bonfires were lighted, that the
people setting tables in the street, and bringing forth bread and wine, “did
eat, drink, and rejoice.” Thus was fulfilled the saying of the wise king,
“When it goeth well with the righteous, the city rejoiceth: and when the wicked
perish, there is shouting. By the blessing of the upright the city is exalted: but it
is overthrown by the mouth of the wicked.” (Proverbs 11:10, 11.)
The world, notwithstanding the native enmity of the heart, bears its
testimony to consistent godliness, both in princes and people; and what a
testimony against wickedness when the death of a wicked ruler is matter
of national exultation! So it was on the death of Mary; there was the shout
of joy throughout the whole land. And such was the joy of Rome on the
death of Nero; and of France on the death of Robespierre. And such shall
it be at last when God shall judge the harlot, and avenge the blood of His
saints at her hand. Then heaven shall rejoice, and shout its loud Alleluia!
Alleluia! (Revelation 18:20.)
On the same day that Mary breathed her last — November 17th, 1558 —
died Cardinal Pole, her guilty counsellor. The system of Jezebel, reared
at the cost of so much blood, fell with these two, never to be restored.
Mary’s zeal for Rome had been fired into fanaticism by her marriage with
Philip II. of Spain; and her three advisers — the bigoted Gardiner, the
brutal Bonner, and the sanguinary Pole — led her to believe that in burning
her Protestant subjects she was doing the will of God. When mourning the
cold-heartedness of Philip, who rarely carne to see her, Pole assured her
that the estrangement of her husband was God’s displeasure for her
leniency towards the Amalekites: then a few more were sacrificed to bring
over the gloomy bigot; but Philip cared not to come, which, with other
things, in the great mercy of God to this afflicted nation, hastened her to
the grave in the forty-third year of her age, and in the sixth of her reign.11
 1276

CHAPTER 55
THE REIGN OF ELIZABETH

In 1558 the princess Elizabeth, daughter of Anne Boleyn, ascended the

throne in the twenty-fifth year of her age. Her accession changed
everything. The terrible gloom which the reign of the “bloody Mary” had
spread over the land instantly passed away. Every steeple in town and
country sent forth its merry peal; the prison doors were opened, and men
whom Mary had left to be burnt were set at liberty. All the laws which
had been passed in the reign of Mary for the restoration of popery were
repealed, and the English service was again introduced. Her conduct in
relation to the Reformation-the great question of the age — was such as to
preclude all hope of the restoration of popery, though she had a strong
leaning to Romish ceremonies herself, and her public measures fell short of
that complete removal of abuses, which many desired to see effected. The
Puritan party strongly objected to the habits and vestments commanded to
be worn, nor did they think the prayer book itself free from superstition.
This led to a great schism in the church, and occasioned a painful
controversy, which lasted from the early days of Elizabeth to the
restoration of Charles II. But we can only briefly refer to its
commencement.

THE PURITANS
“Among the first,” says Marsden, “who introduced into England the
controversy which soon afterwards ripened into Puritanism, was the
martyr, bishop Hooper. He had lived some time abroad, and was the
friend of Bullinger and Gualter — the two leaders of the Protestant cause
in Germany and Switzerland. Returning from his exile in the days of
Edward VI., his piety and talents were at once appreciated, and he was
nominated to the see of Gloucester. But his conscience was embarrassed;
and in his person a contest began, which has never since been stilled. He
demurred to the robes in which the episcopal investiture usually took
place.” Hooper, with many of the exiles, had contracted a love for the
 1277
severely simple style of worship which existed in the Reformed churches
on the Continent, and led them to complain that the Reformation in
England was left in an imperfect state: many abuses, both in worship and
discipline, being still retained.
Hooper begged to decline the bishopric, or be admitted without the usual
ceremonials. Through the influence of Peter Martyr and Bucer, then
professors of divinity at Oxford and Cambridge, he at length consented to
use the vestments at his consecration, and to preach in them, once at least,
before the court. It is not certain that he ever wore them afterwards. But
the controversy was now begun; the elevated position of Hooper and his
popular eloquence kept it alive. Some of the greatest names in the church
of England of that day became friendly to the Reform pleaded for by the
Puritans. Many refused to be consecrated in robes worn by the bishops of
the church of Rome, and which they regarded as the badge of Antichrist.
Elizabeth, though opposed to popery, was resolved, notwithstanding, to
retain as much show and pomp in religious matters as might be possible.
From this time the court party and the Puritan party became more
decidedly opposed to each other. An order was issued by the queen, that
exact uniformity should be maintained in all external rites and ceremonies.
This was followed by another, requiring immediate uniformity in the
vestments on pain of prohibition from preaching and deprivation from
office. Matters were now brought to a crisis; multitudes of godly ministers
were ejected from their churches, and forbidden to preach anywhere else.
All hopes of further reform in the church being now at an end, the
suspended ministers formed themselves into a body distinct from the
church of England, which they regarded as only half reformed. Elizabeth
was enraged, and threatened them with her royal displeasure; but in the
face of persecution the Puritans, or Nonconformists, as they were now
sometimes called, rapidly increased. The famous Thomas Cartwright, with
three hundred more, threw off their surplices in one day within the walls
of one college.1
During the reign of the House of Stuart, the tide of persecution ran high
and strong, and the Puritans, deprived of all hopes of redress, fled in great
numbers to the Continent. After the accession of Charles I. fresh
ceremonies were introduced by Laud and additional cruelties were inflicted
on the Nonconformists. Emigration now seemed their only hope. A body
 1278
of Puritans embarked as exiles, landed on the western shores of the
Atlantic, and formed a settlement in New England. This colony of the
“Pilgrim Fathers” soon received vast accessions; and the desire for
emigration became so great, and the numbers leaving so many, that the
government became alarmed, and stopped by royal warrant eight vessels
when they were on the point of sailing from the Thames with emigrants to
New England. On board were ejected ministers of high standing, and men
of influence and rank, among whom were Oliver Cromwell, Hampden,
Hesselrig, Lord Brook, and Lord Saye. The circumstances which followed
this disembarkation are so remarkable, that we are compelled to pause and
wonder. The overruling providence of God is very manifest. There is only
One who knows the end from the beginning, and blessed are all they that
put their trust in Him. Man knows not the future, and can neither make
provision for his need nor against approaching danger. In 1642 — five
years after the vessels were arrested — through the oppression of Charles
and his popish ways the sword was drawn, and the war began, which
ended in the subversion of his throne, his tragical execution, and the
establishment of the Commonwealth under the protectorate of Cromwell.
Puritanism, properly so-called, became extinct under the Commonwealth.
The vestments being generally laid aside, the ground of contention was
removed. But the later Puritans went farther than the Hoopers and
Cartwrights, and contended not only against the forms and vestments, but
against the constitution of the Church of England; and these immediately
became two great parties — PRESBYTERIANS AND INDEPENDENTS .

CHARLES II. AND JAMES II

After the restoration of Charles II. prelacy was restored with all its popish
ceremonials. On May 19, 1662, the following act was passed: “That all
who had not received episcopal ordination should be re-ordained by
bishops. That every minister should, on or before the 24th of August
following, declare his unfeigned assent and consent to everything contained
in the Book of Common Prayer, on pain of being deprived of his benefice,”
etc. “The dreaded day arrived. Great anxiety was felt as to whether the
Reformation was to stand or fall in England. But the grace of God
triumphed, and the enemy was defeated. Two thousand ministers, rather
than submit to the act of uniformity, surrendered their livings, and left
 1279
their parsonages. Thus were the most faithful and able ministers of the
church of England east out, ignominiously reduced to great poverty, and
provoked by spiteful usage.” — Burnet.
Charles II. died in 1685, and his brother, the Duke of York, ascended the
throne as James II. Although suspected of being a papist, he was allowed
to take possession of the crown in peace and quietness. But his true
character and intentions soon appeared. Being surrounded with Jesuits as
his advisers, edict followed edict, the tendency of which was the
overthrow of the laws and institutions of the realm, and to restore popery
in all its power and completeness. One of these edicts, which was ordered
to be read during divine service in all the churches, hastened the final
struggle. Several of the bishops, and a vast number of the clergy refused to
read it. Seven bishops were summoned before the ecclesiastical
commission, and sent to the Tower by the notorious Judge Jeffreys. But
the heart of the nation was too soundly Protestant to submit long to such
tyranny. The bishops were tried at Westminster, and acquitted. The hall
rang with shouts of joy, and the crowd rushing to the streets, crying, “Not
guilty! Not guilty!” All London soon caught the flying joy; but James,
agitated and troubled, heard in these sounds the mutterings of the coming
storm.
The disgraceful conduct of Charles and James, and the atrocious cruelties
of Jeffreys in England, and of Claver-house in Scotland, most thoroughly
convinced all parties that, if the slightest vestige of liberty was to be
preserved, decisive measures must be adopted. A majority of the nobility
favored the intervention of William, Prince of Orange, son-in-law to James,
and the next heir to the throne. Invitations were sent to the Hague,
messengers were despatched, all entreating him to come over and mediate
between the king and his subjects, and if necessary, to employ more
stringest measures. Having duly considered the various aspects of this
great enterprize, and prepared for it, he sailed under the English banner,
with the motto, “For the Protestant Religion and Liberties of England,”
and landed at Brixham, in Torbay, on the 5th of November, 1688. In the
meantime James fled, being fully aware of the universal feeling of
disaffection existing amongst his subjects. He scarcely made any show of
opposition.
 1280
THE REVOLUTION OF 1688
A national convention was summoned, the throne was declared vacant by
the abdication of James, and the crown was settled on the Prince and
Princess of Orange. “This was the triumph,” says Wylie, “not of English
Protestantism only; it was the triumph of the Protestantism of all
Christendom... It was the revival, not less of the Scotch Covenanters,
whose torn and blood-stained flag, upheld at the latter end of their struggle
by only a few laymen, was soon to be crowned with victory.”2
Thus was the great revolution of 1688 accomplished without tumult or
bloodshed. The ignominious flight of James and his queen to France,
relieved the ruling powers from all perplexities, and facilitated the
arrangement of affairs connected with the act of settlement. Bills were
speedily passed for the relief of the Protestants, and for securing the civil
and religious liberties of the English people. William, who had been
brought up a Calvinist, was strongly inclined to favor dissenters; but
several of the bishops and many of the clergy contending for the divine
right of kings, refused to take the required oaths to the new government,
and became a troublesome faction, afterwards known by the term —
Nonjurors. In Catholic Ireland, and among the popish clans of the
Highlands of Scotland, there were strong factions who favored the house
of Stuart.
In Ireland Tyrconnel raised an army of Catholics, and was joined by James
from France with a fleet of fourteen vessels, and well supplied by Louis
with men, money, and arms. Several battles were fought before the
country was subdued. The siege of Derry is one of the most memorable
in history; but the famous battle of the Boyne, fought on July 1st, 1690,
closed the dispute. James, finding all was lost, escaped once more to
France, where he solaced himself with a devotion almost monastic, and
which made even his Catholic friends laugh at him, as a man who had
thrown away three kingdoms for a mass.
In Scotland Viscount Dundee, the notorious Claverhouse, succeeded in
raising a considerable body of Highlanders in favor of their dethroned
monarch. The English army, under the command of General Mackay, met
Dundee and the clans at the pass of Killiecrankie, where a serious
engagement took place. The battle went against the army of William, but
 1281
the cause of James suffered an irreparable loss in the death of Claverhouse.
He was killed when on tip-toe in his stirrups urging on his men to the
charge. The rallying power was now gone, and the popish clans laid down
their arms, and gradually submitted to the authority of William.

THE PROTESTANT SUCCESSION

The reign of William is especially worthy of our notice, because he placed
the throne of the United Kingdom on a thoroughly Protestant foundation.
It was provided in the Bill of Rights, “not only that every person in
communion with the church of Rome, or marrying a papist, shall for ever
be incapable of the crown, but also that in case of any British sovereign’s
apostasy to popery, the people shall be absolved from their allegiance, and
the next heir shall immediately succeed, if a Protestant, just as if the royal
personage reconciled to the church of Rome, or marrying a papist, he
actually died.” This famous bill immediately followed the Act of
Settlement in 1689.
The English church, we may say, is the same now as it was in the time of
William. The Episcopalians are the reigning party, and number among their
adherents the royal family, the principal part of the nobility, and the
greatest part of the people. The foundation of the Presbyterian
establishment in Scotland was also firmly laid about the same time, by an
act of the Scottish Parliament which ratified the “Westminster
Confession of Faith,” as the creed of that church.3
The unbounded liberty which the British subject enjoys of publishing his
opinions without restraint, and of worshipping God according to the
dictates of his own conscience, enlightened by the truth as it is in Jesus,
naturally causes various sects to arise, and controversies respecting things
pertaining to religion to be perpetuated. Many of these may be most
interesting to the student of ecclesiastical history; but we have already
exceeded our limits, and can do little more than notice the names of the
leading seceders whose followers now form large sections of the professing
church, with whom we are familiar.
 1282
EBENEZER ERSKINE
The church of Scotland in her early days allowed no latitude of belief
within her pale. We speak of what she was, not alas! of what has
disturbed her communion of late years. Her creed descends to the minutest
particulars, and the slightest deviation from it was immediately canvassed
and strictly dealt with according to that creed. The following remarks of
Cunningham the historian, and one of her ministers, we fully accept as to
what she has been, but not as to what she is at the present time. “All her
ministers speak precisely the same things. The mind of each one presents
a perfect impression of the Westminster divines. Notwithstanding the
independence of the Scotch intellect, it has seldom been exercised upon
forms of faith. Notwithstanding the free scope of its metaphysics, the
region of theology has been carefully avoided. Notwithstanding the
schisms which have taken place, heresy has never been able to lift up her
head... But notwithstanding this marvellous uniformity of faith, the church
judicatories have required, in a few instances, to deal with heresy.”
In the year 1732, a controversy arose about the settlement of ministers in
vacant parishes. The assembly passed an act to the effect that, if the
planting of a parish devolved upon the Presbytery, from the patron not
availing himself of his right, the call was to proceed from the heritors and
elders. Ebenezer Erskine, a grave and spiritual man, but energetic and
always on the popular side of public questions, strongly opposed the act.
He advocated the free choice and election of the minister by the members.
“What difference,” he exclaimed in the debate, “does a piece of land make
between man and man in the affairs of Chrisifs kingdom which is not of
this world? We must have the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ without
respect of persons.” Many of the most spiritual sympathized with him,
and several joined him in his protest. The case was carried from court to
court; but the assembly would not yield, and the protestors would not
yield, and so the secession took place. But the Lord overruled it for the
revival of religion, the spread of the truth, and the blessing of precious
souls.
These few seceders, four or five in number, immediately constituted
themselves into a Presbytery, and commenced publishing and preaching in
separation from the Established Church. This was the small beginning of
 1283
the secession church, now United Presbyterian, which estimates its
adherents at half a million.4

JOHN WESLEY
In England, things were in a very low condition in the establishment, as
they were in Scotland. There had been a great reaction since the time of the
Puritans. The people had thrown off the restraints of Puritanism, or,
rather, of Christianity, and returned to their games and pleasures. They
soon sank into their former ignorance and worldliness. But the Lord in
great mercy, just about this time, was preparing His chosen servants for
the revival of His work, for the spread of the truth, and for the preaching
of His gospel, which would reach the hearts and consciences of men in
every sphere of life.
Samuel Wesley, the father of the celebrated John and Charles Wesley,
was of Puritanical descent, and, marrying a daughter of Dr. Annesley —
one of the ejected ministers — the mother came from an eminent
Nonconformist family. When the revolution was effected, Mr. Wesley
was the first who wrote in favor of that great national change, and
dedicated his work to Queen Mary, who rewarded him with the rectory of
Epworth, in Lincolnshire. Here, John, their second son, the founder of the
Methodists, was born in June, 1703. After receiving an early education at
Charterhouse school, he proceeded to Christchurch, Oxford, where his
brother Charles, who was several years younger, joined him in 1727. From
reading such books as Thomas a Kempis’ “Imitation of Christ,” and
Jeremy Taylor’s “Rules of Holy Living and Dying,” they became
extremely troubled about the salvation of their souls; but were dark as
midnight as to the simple gospel — the way of salvation through faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ. Having been baptized, and received the sacrament,
they thought, as they had been taught, and as almost every one else
believed at that time, that they could only hope to be saved by persisting
in good works to the end of their days. This they tried, as Luther and
Calvin had done before them; but, so far from being satisfied, they became
every day more and more miserable. The God of all grace had touched their
hearts, and created a void which nothing could fill but the knowledge of
Christ in His Person and finished work.
 1284
In this troubled state of soul the Wesleys, with two or three others, held
private meetings during the week for the promotion of personal piety, and
rigidly observed all the rules prescribed by the University statutes. The
strictness of their lives, and the regularity of their habits, brought down
upon them the contempt and scorn of their godless fellow-students, who
called them “Bible moths,” “methodists,” and “the holy club.”

GEORGE WHITEFIELD
Just about this time, a young man from Gloucester — as earnest and
sincere as themselves, joined the little community-George Whitefield. He
was descended from a respectable family; but his father, who was a wine
merchant, ultimately kept the Bell Inn at Gloucester. There the future
great preacher was born in 1714. For some time before meeting with the
Wesleys, he had been the subject of much anxiety on matters of religion,
and, like the Wesleys, he had been greatly perplexed by Thomas a
Kempis, and also by Law’s “Serious Call.” But as we cannot pursue in
detail the deep exercises through which they passed, and their subsequent
course, we would only add that, ere long, they were led, by God’s Holy
Spirit and the plain truths of scripture, to know the gospel for their own
peace and joy, and to preach it to others.
Being clergymen of the church of England, they were privileged to preach
in the churches this new gospel — immediate pardon and salvation
through faith in Christ, without works of human merit. But this was too
simple and too scriptural to be tolerated; and in a short time almost every
pulpit in England was closed against them. Thus driven outside, they were
compelled to preach in the open air, and thereby inaugurated open-air
preaching which has since become so common. In Moorfields, on
Kennington Common, and such like places they preached in town and
country to audiences numbering from ten to twenty thousand. By the
grace of God these “twin apostles” of England — Wesley and Whitefield
— continued faithful and devoted to the end of their career.
They were used of God to rescue the English people from the depths of
moral darkness, leading thousands, both in this country and in America, to
the feet of Jesus. Men of all ranks acknowledged the force of their appeals
— colliers and carpenters, ploughmen and philosophers; and many of the
 1285
nobility yielded their hearts to the power of the truth. But their record is
on high, and there the fruits of their labors shall abide throughout eternity.
Whitefield died in America in 1770; and Wesley in London in 1791, in the
eighty-eighth year of his age.5

REVIVAL AT CAMBUSLANG
The eighteenth century was the period of great awakenings and great
revivals in different countries and of a different character in each place. In
the spring of 1742 strange symptoms of a religious revival began to appear
to Cambus-lang, in Lanarkshire, Scotland. Mr. McCulloch, the parish
minister, is spoken of as a godly man, but nothing remarkable as a
preacher. Some of his parishioners began to call upon him at the manse, in
deep concern about the state of their souls. This was something entirely
new and unexpected. But there was evidently a growing desire for the
word of God, which resulted in a number of the parishioners signing a
request for a weekly lecture in addition to the usual sabbath-day services.
One evening in the month of February, he happened to exclaim, “Who
hath believed our report, and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?”
upon which, some persons in the meeting cried aloud in great distress
because of their sins. From this evening such scenes became common. And
now the people desired to have preaching every evening. Other ministers
came to assist, and crowds gathered round the preachers on every
occasion. Men and women were violently agitated; clasping their hands,
smiting their breasts in great agony of mind. Others, as in a transport of
joy, shouting, “He is come! I have got Him, and will not let Him go!” And
there were others who seemed to be so full of the Spirit, and so supremely
happy, that they exclaimed, “Now, Lord, let Thy servant depart in peace,
for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation.”
As on all such marvellous visitations of the Holy Spirit, multitudes from
all parts crowded to see the Lord’s great work. During the month of
August when the sacrament of the supper was dispensed, about thirty
thousand people were gathered together, and fourteen ministers were
engaged in preaching on the green, and in dispensing the elements to one
company after another inside the church. George Whitefield was one of the
ministers, and appointed to preach in the evening. The tent stood on the
margin of a little stream; in front of this rose a green bank in the form of an
 1286
amphitheatre. About ten o’clock at night Whitefield rose to give the last
address for the day. It was indeed nature’s temple, as the preacher
observed, built by God Himself for so great a concourse to worship in. As
his deep voice in impassioned eloquence rolled over the vast multitude, it
was answered by sighs and sobs, and soon the tens of thousands were
melted in tears.
The minister, Mr. McCulloch, in speaking of this gracious visitation nine
years afterwards, had to lament many back-sliders; but still he spoke of
hundreds who had been truly converted.
At Kilsyth and other places the work of God’s Spirit was very similar.
We can only give one short extract of a letter under date May 16th, 1742.
“The Lord has shot His arrows very thick into the hearts of His enemies
this day, not for their destruction, but that they might fall under Him.
There was a great cry of awakened sinners this day; there have been seven
and twenty awakened; all of them under so great agonies as we conceive
those mentioned in Acts 2; besides others who were carried away by their
friends whose names I have not got; I have dealt with them all this evening,
as also Mr. Oughterson for a while, having sent for him. O praise the Lord,
and pray much for us, and tell everybody to praise Him for His mercy to
us, and that He will stay a long time with us after this sort.”6

SUNDAY SCHOOLS
It is generally known that the vast operations of the Sunday-school
system, which have been so beneficial in their results for nearly a hundred
years, commenced with a young man in Gloucester. Robert Raikes, the
founder of Sunday schools, was born in 1735. His father was a printer,
and conductor of the Gloucester Journal, who, after giving his son a liberal
education, brought him up to his own business, in which after a time he
succeeded his father. The events of his life present nothing beyond those
of an industrious tradesman in general; and but for his benevolent pity for
the prisoners in Gloucester jail, and for the ignorant and neglected children
of his native city, his name and memory might have sunk into the grave
with himself.
He was struck with the number of wretched children whom he found in
the suburbs and in the streets, especially on Sunday, and determined to
 1287
make an effort at some improvement. He first found three or four decent
women in the neighborhood, who were capable of teaching children to
read, to each of whom he agreed to give a shilling for the day’s
employment, and then induced the children to come to the school. The
success was great; many of the children were not only eager to learn to
read, but, on being presented with New Testaments, they began of their
own accord to frequent places of worship. At first he found many of the
children were unwilling to come on account of their clothes not being good
enough; but he assured such that “clean hands, clean faces, and combed
hair,” were all that was required at school. The good effects of this new
work were so evident, that in a short time Sunday schools were
established in all directions; and each succeeding generation has developed
more fully the wide extent and the blessed results of the Sunday-school
system.
Most probably, the. thoughts of Mr. Raikes, in the good work he was
doing, did not extend beyond the immediate objects of his benevolence.
But great results in the things of God depend not upon our plans or human
display. The man of faith reckons upon God, and he can afford to be
unobtrusive, unostentatious, and quiet in his work, leaving consequences
with Him. Mr. Raikes is a happy illustration of what may be done by
personal influence, and by taking up the work which the Master may have
placed before our eyes, instead of waiting for the sanction of others, or a
formal introduction to what others are doing. Individual responsibility is
the true principle of Christ’s servant, and he must watch against every
arrangement, or co-operation, that would take him off the ground of faith.
Mr. Raikes had the satisfaction before his death on April 5th, 1811, of
seeing his first humble endeavors become the most efficient means of
educating the children of the poor throughout the kingdom.7

FOREIGN MISSIONS
At the Reformation in the sixteenth century, as we have already seen, the
light of the gospel spread rapidly among the nations of Europe; and many
at that time, fired with a holy zeal for the wider spread of the truth, sent
missionaries to foreign parts. Among the first of these were the Swiss, the
 1288
Swedes, the Dutch, and the Moravians. Many of them were exposed to
great sufferings, and, in some instances, were very unsuccessful.
The Baptist Missionary Society seems to have taken the lead in the
missionary enterprize in this country, and no doubt, by its example,
aroused other churches to their responsibility in reference to the benighted
heathen. In October, 1792, a few Baptist ministers assembled at Kettering,
in Northamptonshire, united in constituting a Society for the Propagation
of the Gospel among the Heathen. William Carey, then a Baptist
minister in Leicestershire, was the chief mover in this new society. He
afterwards went to India as a missionary and became famous for the
acquisition of Eastern languages. Soon after the publication of the New
Testament in the Bengali language, translated by Mr. Carey, he was
appointed by the Marquis of Wellesley, the British Governor-general,
teacher of the Bengali and Sanskrit languages in the new college of Fort-
William. The labors of Messrs. Carey, Marshman, and Ward, in India,
have been often written, and are generally known. To Dr. Carey, it is said,
belongs the honor of having awakened the zeal of the church in the
important work of foreign missions.
In 1795 the London Missionary Society was formed. This Institution for
the Propagation of the Gospel among the Heathen, was composed of
Christians of various denominations. The spread of the truth, irrespective
of all denominational distinctions, was its motto. The institution of this
society on so broad a scale was everywhere hailed as a new era in the
christian church. Its attention was immediately turned to the islands of the
South Seas.
In 1799 the Church Missionary Society was formed, consisting of
members of the church of England. It sent a mission to the Susoo country,
in the neighborhood of Sierra Leone.
In 1796 the Scottish Missionary Society was formed in Edinburgh, and
commenced its operations by a mission to the Foulah country, in the
neighborhood of Sierra Leone.
In 1812 the familiar names of Judson, Newell, Hull, and others, sailed
under the auspices of “The American Board for Foreign Missions,” for
Calcutta. They labored in many parts of the eastern world.
 1289
In 1786 several Wesleyan ministers sailed as missionaries from England
for Nova Scotia; but, after encountering a succession of storms, the captain
directed his course for the West Indies. Having reached Antigua, and
finding the inhabitants favorable, they resolved to attempt the
establishment of a mission in the West Indies. Such were the
circumstances, under the overruling providence of God, which led the
Methodists to turn their attention to the heathen, and to adopt measures
for the diffusion of Christianity among them.8
Surely we can thank God with full hearts for these societies,
notwithstanding their many defects. For a number of years they have been
scattering the blessings of Christianity among many tribes and tongues,
where darkness reigned. The light and life of the gospel have been carried
to millions who were sitting in the region and shadow of death. The rise
and fall of empires, the achievement of great victories, the discovery and
civilization of new countries, the improvements of the arts and sciences,
are but as nothing compared with the diffusion of the gospel throughout
the world, which brings “glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good
will toward men.” (Luke 2:14.)
May the Lord greatly bless both our home and foreign missions, and give
good success to the arduous labors of the Sunday school, that His name
may be glorified, and multitudes of precious souls eternally saved.
We have now reached, by the good providence of God, the nineteenth
century. But before speaking of the fresh and distinct work of God’s
Spirit in the early part of it, we must refer to the last two churches —
Philadelphia and Laodicea — which give us the Lord’s mind as to the
condition of the professing church before it is finally and for ever rejected
by Him.
 1290

CHAPTER 56
PHILADELPHIA

In looking over the general course of the churches we find in Ephesus,

declension; in Smyrna, persecution; in Pergamos, worldliness; in Thyatira,
corruption; in Sardis, deadness; in Philadelphia we find the blessed Lord
comforting a faithful remnant without characterizing their works, though
well He knew them. He speaks not here, as in His address to the church in
Sardis, of His authority in government, or of the plenitude of the Spirit in
blessing, but of Himself in His moral glory. “These things saith He that is
holy, He that is true.” This is the grand feature of this epistle — personal
communion with the Lord Himself, as the Holy One and the True. He thus
reveals Himself to the feeble few who are witnessing for Him. He speaks
not of what He has, but of what He is. Although they had but “a little
strength,” they were in close connection, in intimate communion with
Himself.
Seeing the outward ruin of the church all around, and feeling that it is now
a hopeless thing to expect its restoration to the principles of the word of
God, they cleave to Him alone who changes not. Thankful, indeed, for the
fellowship of saints who are walking in the truth, but all dogmas, theories,
and mere prudential arrangements, are cold and heartless things to a true
Philadelphian. Christ in the word, Christ in the glory — a written Christ
and a living Christ — is alone appreciated by him. But would not this
narrow his mind and his service? some may inquire. Just the opposite; we
believe that it would separate him from the world and the world’s religion.
The great apostle of the Gentiles writes his life and service in one word —
Christ. “For me to live is Christ.” To have Christ as our object, our
motive, and power, would be to extend our sphere of service by prayer
and testimony to the wide circle of the Holy Spirit’s action. John also, in
his first epistle, when speaking to the “little children” in the family of
God, says, “But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all
things.” And again, “We are in Him that is True, even in His Son Jesus
Christ. This is the true God and eternal life. Little children, keep
 1291
yourselves from idols.” If the Christian has not Christ before him as his
all-governing object, he has an idol. Christ, in His moral glory, is the true
object for our affections, and the only standard for service, fellowship, and
discipline. Christ is “He that is holy, He that is true.”
It is natural to many of us to shrink from the painful work of discipline,
and to allow things to pass easily if we are not personally offended, or the
respectability of the community not touched. But this is falling short of
our standard. The question is not, as to church fellowship, what suits us,
but what suits Christ. Is it holy? is it true? Holiness and truth should be
the two great pillars of the church’s practical ways. The question must
always be — Will this suit Christ, according to the character in which He
presents Himself? Christ is “He that is holy, He that is true.”
There can be no doubt that the condition of the church in Philadelphia was
entirely different from that of Sardis. The one was negative, the other
positive. “I know thy works,” says Christ speaking to Sardis, “that thou
hast a name that thou livest, and art dead. Be watchful and strengthen the
things which remain:. . for I have not found thy works perfect before
God.” There was a fair outward appearance, but nothing was perfect, or
complete. Their works fell short of the divine word; nothing was in full
accordance with scripture. That which characterized the church in
Philadelphia was keeping the word of Christ’s patience, and not denying
His name. And this is what characterizes a true Philadelphian, wherever he
is found, from that day even until now. It is not a question of power, or of
anything outwardly great, but of close, intimate, personal communion with
Christ Himself, through the written word by the power of the Holy Spirit.
All around may be going wrong, or going on with rites and ceremonies, and
worldly show. He walks with Christ through it all, and, like the few names
in Sardis, his garments are not defiled.
We further see here the grace of the Lord Jesus meeting the faithfulness of
the Philadelphians with many privileges and blessings. “These things saith
he that... hath the key of David; he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and
shutteth, and no man openeth. I know thy works: behold, I have set before
thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength,
and hast kept My word, and hast not denied My name.” Christ not only
reveals Himself in His Personal glory to these faithful ones, but also in His
 1292
divine power and authority, because of their “little strength.” He has the
key of David, according to the ancient prophecy —
“And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder;
so he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none
shall open.” (Isaiah 22:22.)
Thus all the treasures of knowledge, all the riches of grace, all the power of
the Spirit, all the resources of the royal house of David, are under His hand
and at His disposal.
Should the preaching of the gospel be forbidden in any place, except
according to canonical law, the preacher has only to wait on the Lord in
the faith of a true Philadelphian. The key, he knows, is in the Master’s
hand. He must not seek to force the door open; the Lord’s time may not
be come. Paul was forbidden to speak in Asia at one time, but the door
was afterwards opened to him, and he labored there for years. It is said of
the blessed Lord Himself, in John 10, “To him the porter openeth,” and
the scribes and Pharisees could not hinder the lost sheep of the house of
Israel from hearing the voice of the Good Shepherd. The waiting one is in
the sympathy of Jesus, and can count on His promise, “Behold, I have set
before thee an open door, and no man can shut it.”
Three things are here said of the Philadelphians, which are particularly to
be noticed. “Thou hast a little strength, and hast kept My word, and hast
not denied My name.” Their condition was not marked by any outward
display of power; they were of little note in the sight of the world. There
was no assumption of strength. They had not the “sign-gifts” of Corinth,
which were a testimony to the unbelieving world, and we gather from the
Lord’s words that they were despised by Sardis — “Behold, I will make
them to come and worship before Thy feet, and to know that I have loved
thee.” Weakness characterized them, but they were without reproach from
the Lord. And this very weakness, when mixed with faith, is strength.
“When I am weak, then am I strong.” If outwardly weak, they were
inwardly strong. The needed grace and inward power of life, which flows
from the exalted Head in glory, for the nourishment of His members on
earth, can never fail. And mark the emphasis on the word “My.” It is
personal association with Christ in the sweetest way. “And hast kept My
word, and hast not denied My name.” — “My word,” and “My name.”
 1293
The written word is Christ’s own word, and is our only security and
authority at all times, and is the means of direct communion with Himself.
The name of the Lord means the revelation of what He is. We know Him
as the Savior, on whom the soul rests for salvation, and as the center
around whom we gather as the assembly of God by the power of the
presence of the Holy Ghost.
“Where two or three are gathered together in My name,
there am I in the midst of them.” (Matthew 18:20.)
The Lord, in verse 10, evidently looks forward to a period of seductive
power, from which He will deliver His own. “Because thou hast kept the
word of My patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation,
which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the
earth.” “Evil men and seducers,” says the apostle, “shall wax worse and
worse.” The promise is, not that He will keep them when they pass
through the tribulation — like Noah through the waters — but from it, like
Enoch, who had been translated to heaven before the flood came. We are to
hold fast the word of His patience, which is the hope of His return, and
when He comes, He meets us with a crown. “Behold, I come quickly: hold
that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown.” This is very
different from His coming as represented to Sardis — as a thief in the
night.
Then come the promises. “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the
temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him
the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is New
Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God; and I will
write upon him my new name. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit saith unto the churches.” Here the promises are all connected with
the glory, the New Jerusalem, the home, the rest, the dwelling-place — not
only of the true Philadelphian, but of every true believer in Christ Jesus.
Still, there appears to be an answer in the glory to what we were here.
Those who have taken the place of weakness in themselves, but of holy
firmness against evil, shall be made pillars there. And because they denied
not His name here, He will write His own new name upon them there.
The blessed thought of association with Christ Himself is still kept up.
And being associated with Him who is the object of the Father’s infinite
 1294
delight, we have this place of blessed nearness to Him in the temple, where
He is worshipped in the beauty of holiness. Then these precious “Mys,”
which indicate the wondrous place we have in the temple — ‘ ‘My name,”
“My word,” “My patience,” “My God,” and “My new name.” Oh! what
wondrous, marvelous, inconceivable, indescribable blessedness! To be
pillars in the temple of God, and to go no more out! To have the name of
God, the name of the city of God — the new Jerusalem — and the new
name of Christ as the exalted Man in the glory, written upon us! A few
moments’ meditation of this scene of unmingled, unending, blessedness
arrests the activity of our thoughts. We can only praise, wonder, adore,
and long to be there.
“Lord of the worlds above,
How pleasant and how fair,
The dwellings of Thy love,
The heavenly mansions are!
To Thine abode our hearts aspire,
With warm desire, to see our God.”

LAODICEA
It is not without a measure of reluctance that we turn away from a picture
so beautiful to look on one so painful. Laodicea is a perfect contrast to
Philadelphia. In the latter, the Lord is seen as waiting on His feeble but
faithful ones with the key of David, to supply their need, and reveal
Himself to them as the object of their affections. This is perfectly
beautiful, and perfectly blessed. But the former are threatened with utter
rejection because of their unfaithfulness. There was no heart for Christ
Himself as the Holy One and the True. “And unto the angel of the church
of the Laodiceans write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true
witness, the beginning of the creation of God; I know thy works, that thou
art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because
thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of My
mouth.”
The unfaithfulness of the church of the Laodiceans to its heavenly calling,
and as a witness for Christ at the right hand of God, had become so open
and unblushing that it could no longer be borne with. And this alas! is a
true picture of the sad condition which the professing church will have
reached when the judgment here pronounced shall be executed, “I will spue
 1295
thee out of my mouth.” The church still subsists in form, we know, and
the judgment lingers, but it is certain. When this is accomplished, Christ
will take His place as the “faithful and true witness,” the “Amen,” the
Verifier of all God’s promises, and in relationship with the new
creation. What the church should have done as a witness for God on the
earth, Christ here presents Himself as doing, and secures every promise
when all else had failed. “For all the promises of God in Him are yea, and
in Him, Amen, unto the glow of God by us.”
The failure, as we have seen, commenced in Ephesus; “thou hast left thy
first love;” and Laodicea, the last of the seven, presents what Christendom
will be when fully ripe for judgment. But, like the Amorites, her iniquity
is not yet full. Grace still lingers; warnings are still given; the door still
stands open; and whosoever will may enter in through faith in Christ
Jesus, and find a refuge from the approaching judgments. Before a seal is
broken, or a trumpet blown, or a vial poured out, the true church will have
been caught up to heaven and will be peacefully worshipping in the temple
of God.
What we have said of the successional character of these churches from the
commencement of our history, seems fully proved by the Lord’s own
declaration to Laodicea of unconditional rejection. Though the professing
church has not yet reached that state of entire failure, it is fast hastening
towards it. It certainly grows worse and worse every year. There is not
only a very general return to ritualism, and a refined character of
rationalism almost everywhere, but an open, an unblushing infidelity, even
in our seats of learning and among the instructors of the young. And if the
fountain be so corrupt, what must the streams soon be! Holding fast
Christ’s word, and not denying Christ’s name, and looking for His return,
or the Philadelphian state, forms a small part of Christendom in the
present day.
Indifference to the truth, and to the glory of the Person of Christ;, is the
sin of Laodicea — lukewarmness or latitudinarianism. It is not ignorance
that produces such a state of things, but cold indifference. The church
says, “I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing.”
There was great pretension to spiritual riches in the church itself, mark, “I
am rich;” but this was the sure sign of their poverty, because spiritual
 1296
riches can only be found in Christ. Hence the Lord adds, “And knowest
not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.”
Such is Christ’s estimate of the church which carries its head so high and
boasts so loudly of riches within itself. It was without divine life, spiritual
discernment, and destitute of the riches of Christ and the righteousness of
God.
The application of the Laodicean state to the present time we think plain
and easy. It is to be feared that there are many churches going on with no
small show of spiritual riches, who care but little for the word and the
name of the Lord Jesus. Where is the absolute authority of the word
owned, and the name of Christ as the alone center and power of the
assembly? We speak not of individuals, but of churches so-called. And are
there not many pulpits which go the length of calling in question the
plenary inspiration of holy scripture? Where this is the case, there can be
nothing for the hearers but human speculations, notwithstanding the great
appearance of intelligence and of spiritual wealth that may be displayed.
But we must leave the reader to make his own application of both
Philadelphia and Laodicea in the present time; they go on with Thyatira
and Sardis, until the Lord return. Let the children of God, however, watch
against luke-warmness as to the state of things around them, and rather
seek to imitate the example of Christ who still pleads with deceived souls;
He does not give them up yet.
“I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be
rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of
thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eye-salve, that
thou mayest see.” The church was not looking to the Lord for these things,
but boasting of riches within herself, as if she had been the vessel of grace
instead of Christ. “I am rich, and increased in goods, and have need of
nothing.” But the gracious Lord knew her need, and counselled her to buy
of Him without money and without price.
Gold is the symbol of divine righteousness — the righteousness of God
which every Christian is made in Christ; hence it characterizes the standing
and foundation of the saints. “The white raiment” is practical
righteousness, the works of the saints, or first-fruits of the Spirit; such as
“love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness,
 1297
temperance.” Where do we see such fruits of the Spirit in the professing
church? At the present moment we cannot say that she holds a place
above the world around her. Then there is the eye-salve; for they were in
the blindness of nature as to the things of God, notwithstanding all their
pretensions to spiritual light. It could not be said of the Laodiceans, “Ye
have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things.” Of whom
could it be said in the present day? “Be zealous, therefore, and repent;”
says the Lord. What grace, what patience, and what a needed word for
today, and for all! His love lingers about the door; but alas! He is outside.
“Behold, I stand at the door and knock!” Solemn position! Outside the
door of His own house. But it is all individual here; the church is given up;
still He perseveres. At length the knock is heard; the slumbering one
awakes; the sheep know His voice; He gathers them out; the number of
His people is accomplished; the body is complete, and caught up to His
throne. And now, the end has come: the long threatened judgment is
executed; the corrupt mass of Christendom is cast off for ever. Then
follow the awful judgments of the earth, of apostate Christendom, and the
day of Jacob’s trouble; but the true church, the holy elect bride of Christ is
with Himself in the Father’s house of many mansions.
We hear no more of churches on the earth. All church history ends here.
We have the first page of her wondrous history in Acts 2, and the last in
Revelation 3. A door is opened in heaven: John is invited to come up
hither, and see the things that follow the rapture of the saints. In chapter 1
he says, “And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being
turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks.” In chapter 4, he is invited not to
turn, but to ascend to heaven’s open door, and see what was passing
within. And we, too, may look in and see, in vision, the living ones, and
the four and twenty elders crowned, enthroned, and worshipping.
Thunderings, lightnings, and voices proceed from the rainbow throne, but
the saints are in a state of perfect, blessed, and eternal repose. Chapter 4
celebrates the glow of God in creation; chapter 5, in redemption: the
proper action of the book, strictly speaking, begins with chapter 6.
May the Lord enable both reader and writer to keep the word of His
patience, not to deny His name, and to hold fast that which we have, that
no man take our crown.
 1298
If the exposition we have given of the epistle to Philadelphia and to
Laodicea be correct, we may expect to find in the nineteenth centuw an
entirely fresh work of God’s Spirit; and chiefly in recovering many truths
which have been long overlooked by the professing church; probably since
the days of the apostles. Philadelphia is the only church that is without
reproach from the Lord; and He commends them for holding fast His
word, for not denying His name, and for keeping the word of His patience,
which means the constant expectation of His coming. These characteristics
of an assembly we have not yet met with in the histow of the church.
Almost immediately after the days of the apostles, human inventions were
substituted for the word of Christ, and human arrangements for the
authority of His name. And little, if anything, seems to have been said or
written on the subject; of the Lord’s return for the church as His bride,
down to the present century. Doubtless there may have been at different
periods, some loving hearts that sighed and longed for His c. oming; but it
was no part of the truth taught, either during the middle ages, or at the
Reformation. The doctrines of the unity of the church of God, of the
coming of the Lord as the proper hope of the church, and of the Holy
Spirit’s presence on earth, while Christ is seated at the right hand of God,
were almost entirely overlooked by the Reformers.

PROPHETIC TRUTH
The study of prophetic truth was greatly revived in the early part of this
century. In the year 1821 a short treatise, entitled “The Latter Rain,” by
the Revelation Lewis Way, made its appearance. The main object of the
writer is to prove from scripture the restoration of Israel, and the
consequent glory in the land. His poem entitled, “Palingenesia,” or “The
World to Come,” appeared in 1824. Thoughts on the “Scriptural
Expectations of the Church,” by Basilicus, followed it in 1826. The author
takes a wider range in this book than in the former, though the kingdom of
Israel occupies a prominent place. In 1827 the Revelation Edward Irving
endeavored to arouse the professing church, but especially his brethren in
the ministry, to a sense of their responsibility as to the truth of prophecy.
He translated the work of Ben Ezra, a converted Jew, on “The Coming of
Messiah in Glory and Majesty,” with a long preliminary discourse. This
 1299
book was originally written: in Spanish, and first published in Spain in the
year 1812.
The circulation of these books, with some others that appeared about this
time, and fresh articles constantly appearing in the magazines, awakened a
deep interest in the prophetic scriptures, which became at that time an
entirely new study, and led to the establishment of what were called “The
Prophetic Meetings,” in Great Britain and Ireland — they were held
chiefly at Albury Park in England, and at Powerscourt in Ireland.
Clergymen and private gentlemen attended those meetings for some time;
but, in their reading, it does not appear that they saw much beyond the
restoration of Israel, and the glory of the milennial kingdom. The relations
of Christ to the church, as distinct from the destiny of Israel and the earth,
were not then clearly seen.

CHURCH TRUTH
Just about this time the Spirit of God was evidently working in many
minds, and in different parts of the country, and awakening many of His
children to the importance, not only of prophetic truth, but of what He
has revealed in His word respecting the church as the body of Christ,
formed and energized by the Holy Spirit. This was especially the case at
that moment in Dublin. A few earnest christian men became deeply
exercised in heart and conscience, as to the low condition of things in the
several sections of professing Christendom, and as to the great contrast
between the church of God, viewed in the light of His word, and that
which man calls the church. These convictions resulted — though with
deep searchings of heart, and many painful feelings — in a positive
secession from the existing religious systems with which they had been
severally connected.
This was a new thing in the history of the church. The best of the
Reformers in all ages had no wish to leave the communion of the church of
Rome, had she consented to the reform of abuses. Nearly all of them were
excommunicated. Even the Puritans, and Wesley and Whitefield, were
forced out of the establishment. But as many are still alive, of those who
took this place of separation in the early part of this century, we shall do
little more than state the origin of this community, and give a brief outline
 1300
of its progress. We could not bring down the history of the church to the
present time without giving it a place. But of that which has appeared in
print, and been written by themselves, we may freely speak. Their
writings, in tracts, books, and periodicals, are abundant and widely spread
over the face of Christendom, so that they are well fitted to speak for
themselves.

“THE BRETHREN”
In the winter of 1827-8, four christian men who had for some time been
exercised as to the condition of the entire professing church, agreed to
come together on Lord’s day mornings, for worship and communion in the
breaking of bread, according to the word of the Lord; namely, Mr. Darby,
Mr. [afterwards Dr.] Cronin, Mr. Bellett, and Mr. Hutchinson. Their
first meeting was held in the house of Mr. Hutchinson, 9, Fitz-William
Square, Dublin. They had for a considerable time been studying the
scriptures — along with others who attended their reading meetings — and
comparing what they found in the word of God with the existing state of
things around them, they could find no expression of the nature and
character of the church of God, either in the national establishment, or in
the various dissenting bodies. This brought them into the place of
separation from all these ecclesiastical systems, and led them to come
together in the name of the Lord Jesus, owning the presence and sovereign
action of the Holy Spirit in their midst, and thus endeavor-ing, according
to their light, “to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”
(Matthew 18:20; Ephesians 4:3, 4.) The brethren continued to meet for
some time in Fitz-William Square, and others were gradually added to their
number.

THE BRETHREN’S FIRST PAMPHLET

Here we have something most definite and positive as to their principles
and starting-point: something more to be relied upon than general report or
personal recollections.
In the year 1828 Mr. Darby published his first pamphlet, entitled, “The
Nature and Unity of the Church of Christ.” We may consider this tract
as a statement of what the young community believed and practiced,
 1301
though not in the form of a confession, and further, as presenting the
divine ground on which they acted. It may also be considered to contain
nearly all the elements of those distinctive truths which have been held and
unfolded by Brethren from that day even until now. Not that the writer
thought anything of this at the time; he was simply making known for the
help of others what he had learnt from the word of God for himself. But
who could question the guidance of the Holy Spirit in such a production?
Surely He was leading His chosen instruments by a way which they knew
not, that the blessing which followed might be seen to be of His own grace
and truth.1
As this paper was the first public testimony of a movement which was so
rapidly to produce such great and blessed results in liberating souls, we
will here give for the convenience of the reader a few extracts, chiefly as to
the unity of the church.
“We know that it was the purpose of God in Christ to gather
together in one all things in heaven and on earth; reconciled unto
Himself in Him; and that the church should be, though necessarily
imperfect in His absence, yet by the energy of the Spirit the
witness of this on earth, by gathering the children of God which
were scattered abroad. Believers know that all who are born of the
Spirit have substantial unity of mind, so as to know each other,
and love each other, as brethren. But this is not all, even if it were
fulfilled in practice, which it is not; for they were so to be all one,
as that the world might know that Jesus was sent of God. In this
we must all confess our sad failure. I shall not attempt so much to
propose measures here for the children of God, as to establish
healthful principles; for it is manifest to me, that it must flow from
the growing influence of the Spirit of God and His unseen teaching:
but we may observe what are positive hindrances, and in what that
union consists...
“In the first place, it is not a formal union of the outward
professing bodies that is desirable; indeed it is surprising that
reflecting Protestants should desire it: far from doing good, I
conceive it would be impossible that such a body could be at all
recognized as the church of God. It would be a counterpart to
 1302
Romish unity; we should have the life of the church and the power
of the word lost, and the unity of spiritual life utterly excluded.
Whatever plans may be in the order of Providence, we can only act
upon the principles of grace; and true unity is the unity of the
Spirit, and it must be wrought by the operation of the Spirit... If
the view that we have taken of the state of the church be correct,
we may adjudge that he is an enemy to the work of the Spirit of
God who seeks the interests of any particular denomination; and
that those who believe in ‘the power and coming of the Lord Jesus
Christ ought carefully to keep from such a spirit; for it is drawing
back the church to a state occasioned by ignorance and non-
subjection to the word, and making a duty of its worst and most
anti-christian results. This is a most subtle and prevailing mental
disease, ‘he followeth not us;’ even when men are really
Christians...
“Christians are little aware how this prevails in their minds; how
they seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ; and how it
dries up the springs of grace and spiritual communion; how it
precludes that order to which blessing is attached — the gathering
together in the Lord’s name. No meeting, which is not framed to
embrace all the children of God in the full basis of the kingdom of
the Son, can find the fullness of blessing, because it does not
contemplate it — because its faith does not embrace it...
“Accordingly, the outward symbol and instrument of unity is the
partaking of the Lord’s supper, ‘for we being many are., one body,
for we are all partakers of that one bread.’ And what does St. Paul
declare to be the true intent and testimony of that rite? That
whensoever ‘we eat of that bread and drink of that cup, we do
show the Lord’s death till He come.’ Here then are found the
character and life of the church — that into which it is called —
that in which the truth of its existence subsists, and in which alone
is true unity..
“Am I desiring believers to correct the churches? I am beseeching
them to correct themselves by living up, in some measure, to the
hope of their calling. I beseech them to show their faith in the death
 1303
of the Lord Jesus, and their boast in the glorious assurance which
they have obtained by it, by conformity to it — to show their faith
in His coming, and practically to look for it, by a life suitable to
desires fixed upon it. Let them testify against the seculartry and
blindness of the church; but let them be consistent in their own
conduct. ‘Let their moderation be known unto all men.’ While the
spirit of the world prevails, spiritual union cannot subsist. Few
believers are at all aware how the spirit which gradually opened the
door to the dominion of apostasy, still sheds its wasting and
baneful influence in the professing church... I do believe that God is
working, by means and in ways little thought of in ‘preparing the
way, and making His paths straight’ — doing by a mixture of
providence and testimony the work of Elias. I am persuaded that
He will put men to shame exactly in the things in which they have
boasted. I am persuaded that He will stain the pride of human
glory, ‘and the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the
haughtiness of man shall be brought low, and the Lord alone shall
be exalted in that day.’...
“But there is a practical part for believers to act. They can lay
their hands upon many things in themselves practically inconsistent
with the power of that day — things which show that their hope is
not in it — conformity to the world, which shows that the cross has
not its proper glory in their eyes... Further, unity is the glow of the
church; but unity to secure and promote our own interests is not
the unity of the church, but confederacy and denial of the nature
and hope of the church. Unity, that is of the church, is the unity of
the Spirit, and can only be in the things of the Spirit, and therefore
can only be perfected in spiritual persons... But what are the
people of the Lord to do? Let them wait upon the Lord, and wait
according to the teaching of His Spirit, and in conformity to the
image, by the life of the Spirit, of His Son...
“But if any will say, If you see these things, what are you doing
yourself? I can only deeply acknowledge the strange and infinite
shortcomings, and sorrow and mourn over them; I acknowledge the
weakness of my faith, but I earnestly seek for direction. And let
me add, when so many who ought to guide go their own way,
 1304
those who would have gladly followed are made slow and feeble,
lest they should in any wise err from the straight path, and hinder
their service, though their souls may be safe. But I would earnestly
repeat what I said before:the unity of the church cannot possibly
be found till the common object of those who are members of it, is
the glory of the Lord, who is the Author and Finisher of its faith
— a glory which is to be made known in its brightness at His
appearing, when the fashion of this world shall pass away... The
Lord Himself says,
‘That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, art in Me and I in
Thee, that they also may be one in Us; that the world may believe
that Thou hast sent Me. And the glory which Thou gavest Me I
have given them, that they may be one, even as We are one; I in
them, and Thou in Me, that they may be made perfect in one; and
that the world may know that Thou hast sent Me, and hast loved
them, as Thou hast loved Me.’ (John 17.)
“Oh, that the church would weigh this word, and see if their
present state does not preclude necessarily their shining in the
glory of the Lord, or of fulfilling that purpose for which they were
called. And I ask them, Do they at all look for or desire this? Or are
they content to sit down and say that His promise is come utterly
to an end for evermore? Surely if we cannot say, ‘Arise, shine, for
Thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is’, risen upon thee,’
we should say, ‘Awake, awake, put on Thy strength, arm of the
Lord; awake, as in the ancient days, as in the generations of old.’ ·.
. Will He give His glory to one division or another? Or where will
He find a place for it to rest upon amongst us?...
“I have gone beyond my original intention in this paper. If I have
in anything gone beyond the measure of the Spirit of Jesus Christ,
I shall thankfully accept reproof, and pray God to make it
forgotten.”

THE BRETHREN’S FIRST PUBLIC ROOM

The effect of these statements — so plain and scriptural — was immediate
and great. They found an echo in many a heart· Earnest Christians, feeling
 1305
and mourning over the low condition of the churches, welcomed the truth
thus brought before them. Many left their respective denominations, and
joined the new movement. The numbers so increased that in little more
than a year, the house of Mr. Hutchinson was found to be unsuitable for
their meetings· Mr. Parnell (afterwards Lord Congleton), who appears to
have united with the Brethren in 1829, hired a large auction room in
Aungier Street, for the use of the Brethren on the Lord’s day. His idea
was, that the Lord’s table should be a public witness of their position.
This was the Brethren’s first public room. There they commenced
breaking bread in the spring of 1830; and it may be taken as a sample of
the rooms which Brethren have generally occupied in all parts of the
country ever since. In order to make room for the Lord’s day morning,
three or four of the brothers were in the habit of moving the furniture aside
on Saturday evening. Many, on their first visit, felt the place to be very
strange, having been accustomed to all the propriety of churches and
chapels. But the truths they heard were new in those days; such as, the
efficacy of redemption, the knowledge of pardon and acceptance, the
oneness of the body of Christ, the presence of the Holy Ghost in the
assembly, and the Lord’s second coming.
“There is some difficulty,” says Mr. Marsden,2 “in laying before
the reader, in a simple form, the principles of this body. It puts
forth no standards of faith, nor publishes any forms of worship or
discipline. It professes to practice Christianity as Christianity was
taught by our Lord and the apostles in the New Testament... The
Brethren equally object to the national church and to all forms of
dissent. Of national churches, one and all of them, they say, ‘that
the opelling of the door to receive into the most solemn acts of
worship and christian fellowship the whole population of a
country, is a latitudinarian error.’ Dissenters, on the other hand,
‘are sectarians, because they close the door on real Christians, who
cannot utter the shibboleth of their party.’... The one system
makes the church wider, the other narrower, than God’s limits.
Thus in either way, the proper scriptural idea of the church is
practically destroyed — dissent virtually affirming that it is not
one body, but many, while nationalism virtually denies that this
one body is the body of Christ. That which constitutes a church is
 1306
the presence of the Holy Ghost in the assembly. ‘It is the owning
of the Holy Ghost as the really present, sole, and sufficient
sovereign in the church during our Lord’s absence.’ This is the
leading feature in the testimony of Brethren.”
Mr. Marsden further observes on the subject of ministry, quoting from
their writings: “So far from supposing there is no such thing as ministry,
Brethren hold, and have always held, from Ephesians 4:12, 13, that Christ
cannot fail to maintain and perpetuate a ministry so long as His body is
here below. Their printed books and tracts, their teachings in private and
in public affirm this as a certain settled truth; insomuch that it is as absurd
to charge them with denying the permanent and divine place of ministry in
the church on earth, as it would be to charge Charles I. with denying the
divine right of kings. Wherever it has pleased God to raise up pastors after
His own heart, they gladly, thankfully own His grace, and esteem them
very highly in love for their work’s sake.”
In a paper lately written by Mr. Darby about the Brethren at the request
of a French journalist, we have not only the facts, but the thoughts and
feelings connected with their beginning. “We were only four men,” he
says, “who came together for the breaking of bread and prayer, on the
authority of that word,
‘Where two or three are gathered together in My name,
there am I in the midst of them’ (Matthew 18:20);
and not, I hope, in a spirit of pride and presumption; but deeply humbled
at the state of things around us; and praying for all Christians, and
recognizing all those in whom the Spirit of God was found as true
Christians, members of the body of Christ, wherever they were
ecclesiastically. We thought of nothing else but satisfying the need of the
soul according to the word of God; nor did we think of it going any farther.
We proved the promised presence of the Lord; and others, feeling the same
need, followed in the same path, and the work spread in a way we never
thought of in the least.”
It is very apparent from this extract, that the Brethren had no thought of
constructing a fresh system, or of reconstituting the church as God had
constituted it at first — of restoring it to its Pentecostal glory. This was
 1307
the snare into which Satan wiled that otherwise noble soul — Edward
Irving. But the Brethren seemed to have had no plan, no system, no
organization. They held the common faith of all orthodox Christians with
regard to foundation truths; but, having received light from God’s word as
to what the calling, position, and hopes of the church are, they could no
longer remain in what man and the world called “the church.” These
thoughts and searchings of heart issued, as we have seen, in the secession
of many individuals from the various bodies of professing Christians, and
in their coming together for ‘worship and communion on the ground of the
“one body,” as formed and directed by the “One Spirit.”

THE SPREAD OF THE TRUTH

Mr. Darby, who seems from the first to have had a love for travelling, or
rather for carrying the truth from place to place, soon after the formation
of the meeting in Fitz-William Square, set out on his mission; and in a
truly apostolic spirit he has steadily gone on for fifty years, and never
more so than during the last ten or fifteen. Limerick was the first place he
visited. He held reading meetings, to which some of the gentry and clergy
came. Thomas Maunsell, who lived there, worked with him, and was the
active laborer for a long time. Mr. Darby went on to Clare, which led to
the Lord’s work at Ennis, where Thomas Mahon went on with it. He then
went over to Paris, saw some Christians there, and had readings in the
same quiet way. On his return to Ellgland, he visited Cambridge and
Oxford, and then went down to Plymouth at the request of Mr. Newton,
where he met with Captain Hall, who was then preaching in the villages.
Reading meetings were held, and ere long, a few began to break bread. This
was about the year 1831.

THE ORIGIN OF THE TITLE — “PLYMOUTH BRETHREN”

Their first public meeting-place in Plymouth was called “Providence
Chapel,” and, as they refused to give themselves any name, they were
only known as “Providence people.” But when the brothers began to go
outside the town and preach the gospel in the villages — then a rare thing
— they were spoken of as “Brethren from Plymouth,” which naturally
resulted in the designation, “The Plymouth Brethren.” This new title
rapidly spread over England and elsewhere. As the numbers increased, the
 1308
little chapel was bought and enlarged considerably. The effect of the truth
on the hearts and consciences of the Brethren was soon manifest. There
was great freshness, simplicity, devotedness, and separation from the
world. Such features of spirituality have always a great attraction for
certain minds; and many, no doubt, who left their respective
denominations and united with the Brethren had very undefined thoughts
as to the nature of the step they were taking. But all was new: they
flocked together, and gave themselves to the study of the word of God,
and soon experienced the sweetness of christian communion, and found
the Bible — as they said — to be a new book. It was, no doubt, in those
days of virgin freshness a most distinct and blessed work of God’s Spirit,
the influence of which was felt not only throughout this country, but on
the continent, and in distant lands.
It was no uncommon thing at this time to find valuable jewelry in the
collection boxes, which was soon turned into money, and given to the
deacons for the poor. But the bloom of this new movement was soon to be
blighted by the subtlety of Satan. Mr. Newton, though one of the earliest
laborers in Plymouth, seems never to have entered into the truth of the
position occupied by Brethren, but, almost from the first, to have pursued
a course distinct from the others. The tendency of his teaching, though for
a time most speciously disguised, was to undermine and neutralize those
distinctive truths which the Lord was bringing out by the ministry of the
Brethren, and to set up afresh, though in another form, all that had been
renounced. His aim was clerical position and authority; and thus
practically denying the first principles of the church of God, he fell into
the snare of Satan. Several of the Brethren who had labored much in
Plymouth, not feeling happy with Mr. Newton’s course, left to work
elsewhere. Mr. Darby went abroad, Captain Hall to Hereford, Mr. Wigram
to London; and Mr. Bellerr, at this time, was ministering with great
acceptance in Dublin.

FALSE DOCTRINE DETECTED

Soon after the year 1845, when the numbers at Plymouth, Devonport, and
Stonehouse had reached about a thousand souls, troubles arose which
caused the first breach among the Brethren; but it was not: until 1848 that
what had been strongly suspected by some came to the light and brought
 1309
matters to a crisis at Plymouth. It was discovered by Mr. Harris —
through copious notes of Mr. Newton’s lectures accidentally falling into
his hands — that he had been diligently and systematically teaching, not
only that which is ecclesiastically, but that which is fundamentally
heretical as to Christ. When this became known, Brethren in all parts were
deeply affected by the sad tidings, and numerous meetings were held in
different parts of the country to investigate the charges. Nearly all were
agreed, after much prayer and confession, that the doctrines which Mr.
Newton had been teaching were not only false, but utterly subversive of
all that is essential to Christianity.
But though they were thus agreed as to the character of the heresy, they
were divided in their judgment as to the principle of separation from it.
One part thought that the poison of the doctrines — which had been
insidiously taught for some years — might have infected more than were
yet manifested; and, therefore, they could have no fellowship with any
who sympathized with the doctrines, or had fellowship with their author
at the breaking of bread. Others thought these terms of communion were
too strict; that each one applying for fellowship should be examined, and if
it were found that they neither understood nor had imbibed the false
doctrines, they should be received, even though they came from Mr.
Newton’s meeting; that every true Christian should be received on the
ground of his individual soundness in the faith, no matter from what
meeting he came. But many strongly objected to this way of dealing with
so grave a matter. They maintained that the glory of Christ was in
question, as well as the purity of His assembly; that, on this principle, the
door was left open for the heresy to come in, and that it was giving up the
unity of the church of God, as the ground of action, and going back to
independency.

THE DIVISION
On this point the Brethren divided. The one part maintained, that, on the
principle of the one body, a person coming from a meeting where false
doctrine was known to be held, is tainted, though personally sound; and
that in receiving one member of the community all are received. This they
sought to prove by the divine principle which the apostle applies to the
assemblies at Corinth and Galatia: “Know ye not that a little leaven
 1310
leaveneth the whole lump?” The other part adhering to the open ground
which they had adopted, the breach widened, and reconciliation became
hopeless.
Thus the Brethren have stood from that day until now. Their history is
well known. Only one thing further need be noticed. From this time, the
term, “The Brethren,” as found in statistics, or controversial and other
writings, applies almost exclusively to those who adhered to the original
principles of Brethren. In the census of 1851, three years after the
division, the writer concludes his article by stating that, “The number of
places of worship which the census officers in England and Wales returned
as frequented by the Brethren was 132; but probably this number is below
the truth, in consequence of the objection which they entertain to
acknowledge any sectarian appellation.” In a list of meetings which they
publish annually for the convenience of Brethren who may be travelling,
they give the addresses of 523 in England, 48 in Ireland, and 75 in
Scotland. There are also a goodly number on the Continent of Europe, in
Australia and New Zealand, in the West Indies, in Canada, and in the
United States. And indeed almost everywhere, if we may believe the
testimony of The Southern Review, which says:
“The Society, or order of christian men, usually styled, ‘The
Plymouth Brethren,’ has already, and almost without
observation, spread over the face of the civilized world. It seems,
in fact, to have stolen a march on Christendom, and must now —
whether for good or for evil — be acknowledged as a power in the
present awful crisis in the world’s history, or tremendous conflict
between the powers of light and darkness. That it is felt to be such
a power, is evident, from the fact of the controversy about
Plymouth Brethren coming up all over the Protestant world, just
now, and by the innumerable articles, pamphlets, and volumes,
which this widespread controversy has called forth. We have
placed, at the head of this article, only three references to the
literature connected with this controversy; but, if we had so
chosen, we might easily have embraced in our list the titles of more
than a hundred volumes of the same literature.”3
 1311
The above article is written with great vigor, extends to seventy-nine
pages, and discusses the question of “Plymouth Brethrenism” more fully
than any of the “hundred volumes” referred to that have come under our
notice. The writer, being a Methodist, of course does not agree with all
their doctrines, but he admires their zeal in spreading the work, admits that
he has profited by their writings, and heartily rebukes their unfair critics.

THE FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND

This large and influential section of the Scottish church was organized into
a religious denomination, distinct from the Establishment, in the year
1843. The conflict between the “Evangelicals” and the “Moderates,”
which at length terminated in this great division, was chiefly on the long
vexed question of patronage.
From the days of Ebenezer and Ralph Erskine — whose secession from
the Established church we have already noticed — the evangelical party
had been opposed to the interference of patrons with the religious rights of
congregations. But under the powerful ministry of Dr. Chalmers in
Glasgow, and Dr. Thomson in Edinburgh, the tide of popular feeling was
decidedly turned in favor of the and-patronage movement. In the General
Assembly of 1834, the evangelical party introduced the celebrated Veto
Act, which was passed by a: majority of forty-six. By this act, it was
declared to be a fundamental law of the church, that no minister should be
intruded on any congregation contrary to the will of the christian people;
and the better to effect this, it enacted, that if a majority of male heads of
families, being communicants, should object to any presentee, the
presbytery, on that ground alone without inquiry into the reasons, should
also reject him. The objectors, however, were required, if called upon, to
declare solemnly before the presbytery that they were actuated by no
malicious motives, but solely by a conscientious regard to their own
spiritual interests, or those of the congregation. The legality, or rather the
illegaltry of this act, which directly interfered with the civil rights of
patrons, was soon put to the test.
In the course of a few months after the Veto Act had passed into
ecclesiastical law, the Earl of Kinnoul presented Mr. Robert Young to the
parish church of Auchterarder; but the presentee, not meeting with the
 1312
approval of the congregation, was rejected, and the presbytery refused to
ordain him. The earl, not willing to be deprived of his rights as a patron,
appealed to the civil tribunals; long law-suits followed, and the whole
question was raised as to the terms of the connection between church and
state.
The decision of the Court of Session not only went against the church
party, but proceeded to enforce compliance with its decisions by
pecuniary penalties, and awarding damages to the persons deprived of
their churches, by the presbytery refusing to induct them. The protesters
were now a large, popular, and influential body; they would admit of no
compromise; they took the ground of martyrs, and maintained that they
were contending for the “CROWN RIGHTS OF T HE LORD JESUS CHRIST, T HE
ALONE KING AND HEAD OF T HE CHURCH.” Public meetings were held in
all parts of the country, and addressed by ministers in the most exciting
style, until Scotland was in a state of religious agitation and ferment from
one end to the other. Lay patronage was denounced, as contrary to the
spirit, principles, and constitution of the Presbyterian church of Scotland,
and the Veto Act treated as of divine appointment. In place of submitting
to the law as declared by the Court of Session, the assembly of that year
— 1842 — declared by a large majority, that lay patronage ought to be
abolished; they also issued a “‘Claim of Rights” against the encroachments
of the civil courts. A memorial to this effect was presented to the
government, but with no favorable effect; and on the 9th of August, the
House of Lords gave judgment against the majority of the presbytery of
Auchterarder, finding them liable in damages to Mr. Young and the Earl of
Kinnoul.

THE DISRUPTION
All hope of a pacific arrangement on the part of the government being now
at an end, the momentous event, which many had for some time been
dreading, seemed unavoidable. From the high and independent position
which Dr. Chalmers and his followers had taken, they could not in honor
draw back; therefore they nobly resolved to separate from the Established
church. At the General Assembly which met in May, 1843, Dr. Welsh, the
moderator, laid a protest on the table to this effect, and withdrew,
followed by those who adhered to the protest, and proceeded in solemn
 1313
silence to Tanfield Hall, Canonmills — a large building situated at the
northern extremity of the city of Edinburgh. There they constituted
themselves into the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland,
choosing Dr. Chalmers as their first moderator.
“On Tuesday, the 23rd of May, the ministers and professors, to
the number of four hundred and seventy-four, solemnly subscribed
the Deed of Demission, formally renouncing all claim to the
benefices which they had held in connection with the
establishment, declaring them to be vacant, and consenting to their
being dealt with as such. Thus, by a regular legal instrument, the
ministers completed their separation from the establishment, and
the Free church of Scotland assumed the position of a distinct
ecclesiastical denomination, holding the same doctrines, and
observing the same forms of worship as had been received and
observed in the National church.”
Thus, in one day, these ordained ministers of the Scottish establishment
gave up their manses, their churches, their benefices, and state support.
Their wives and children had to leave their comfortable parsonages with
their glebes and gardens. To many of these the new position wore a
gloomy aspect, and they were ready to blame the leaders for having gone
too far. But the zeal and sympathy of the people soon placed their
ministers in finer buildings as churches than they had left, and abundantly
met all their need. In a few years about eight hundred new churches were
built by the liberality of the people, which must have cost nearly a million
of money. Dr. Chalmers, foreseeing what must take place, had made
arrangements some months before the disruption, for establishing
associations throughout the country, with the view of collecting funds for
the support of the ministry; and so successful was his plan that, before
the day of trial came, six hundred and eighty-seven separate associations
had been formed in all parts of the country, and at the close of the first
year of the history of the Free Church, her income amounted to the
munificent sum of three hundred and sixty thousand, seven hundred and
nineteen pounds, fourteen shillings, and threepence.
Such was the sympathy felt with this movement in Scotland, that all
contributed liberally to the various funds connected with the Free church.
 1314
And even to this day, after the lapse of more than thirty years, the source
of her supply, we are told, shows not the slightest symptoms of
exhaustion.4

THE AWAKENING IN 1859

The great awakening in 1859, which filled so many lands with the blessed
fruits of salvation, being still fresh in many minds, we need do little more
than notice its humble beginnings. It has been a point of special interest to
us all through our history to know the beginning of things. When the Spirit
of God works; and means to accomplish something great, either in
individuals or in nations, He usually commences without observation: man
sounds a trumpet before him.

THE ORIGIN OF NOON-DAY PRAYER-MEETINGS

In September, 1857, a city missionary in New York, observing that
masons and other workmen had some time for rest during their dinner
hour, proposed to speak to them about the things of the Lord. The men
being agreeable, they gathered around the missionary for about fifteen or
twenty minutes. The interest increased, and as the winter drew near, the
missionary applied for the loan of a schoolroom, connected with a chapel
in Fulton Street, where the men were working. This being granted, the men
assembled for their brief service. But the Lord had a great work to do
there. Others were attracted to the little noon-day meeting; the unction of
the Holy Spirit was felt; divine blessing was manifested, and it soon
became a large meeting. Similar meetings sprang up in different places, and
were commended and sanctioned by the presence of ministers, men of
business, the gentry, and all classes. In a short time, noon-day prayer-
meetings spread over the United States, a great Revival followed, and
thousands of precious souls were said to be converted.

THE NORTH OF IRELAND

In the same month of the same year, as if by concert, four young men, near
Connor, county Antrim, were led by the same blessed Spirit to commence
what was termed “The Believers’ Fellowship Meeting.” One main
object of these young men, in connection with this meeting, was to pray to
 1315
God that He would bless their labors, as Sunday-school teachers, and that
He would revive by His Holy Spirit the churches around them, which they
felt to be in a dull dead condition. This humble beginning, like the one on
the other side of the Atlantic, was greatly blessed of God; numbers rapidly
increased. The power of prayer was soon felt throughout the whole
neighborhood. Souls were converted in the prayer-meeting, the Spirit of
God was working mightily, and the spirit of prayer so prevailed, that in
the following year — 1858 — prayer-meetings were almost innumerable.
There were known to be in one district, about sixteen meetings for prayer
every night in the week. These facts we learnt from living witnesses on the
spot at the time.5
Thus were the foundations of the great Revival in the north of Ireland
strengthening and deepening for about eighteen months before it burst
forth to public view, and rose to such a glorious height in 1859.
Conversion at that time was frequently accompanied with utter physical
prostration for several hours. A similarly unpretending agency was
employed in beginning the work of Revival in Greenock, Glasgow, and
other parts of Scotland.

THE WEEK OF PRAYER

Just about this time, a request was sent out by some missionaries in
Lodiana, calling upon all Christendom to set apart the second week in
January, 1860, as a week of prayer. The call was much talked of, and
when the time came, it was most heartily responded to by all classes of
Christians. It was a week of real, earnest prayer to God, that He would
revive His own work, and bless the preaching of the gospel to the
conversion of many, many, souls. This cry arose from every quarter of the
globe, and was continued in many places far beyond the one week.
We can testify, as partakers of that marvellously gracious visitation of the
Spirit, to the power of prayer which then prevailed, and to the abundant
showers of blessing which fell on the church and on numberless precious
souls. Meetings for prayer were held in the early morning, at noonday, and
in the evening, so that all classes might be suited; and a spirit for gospel
preaching, altogether unknown before, was then awakened. Preachers
sprang up from the very lowest condition of society, as if by a miracle,
 1316
and were possessed of such gifts as to attract thousands night after night.
The grandees of the land, too, turned preachers of the gospel, and the
poorest were privileged to hear the glad tidings from the lips of noble
lords, and then to be shaken by the hand, and entreated in the most kindly
loving way, to give their hearts to Jesus, and to be decided for Him. The
great work of the gospel seemed to have passed entirely into the hands of
laymen; but it was no time to find fault with that which was uncanonical.
God was working, who is above the routine of traditional order; and
thousands of souls were converted, from the poorest to the richest, with
numbers of little children.
But this gracious visitation of the Spirit in special power was not of long
continuance. In a few years man’s bustling importance became more
manifest than the Spirit’s power. The meetings were kept up, and certain
forms were introduced, to make them outwardly more orderly, but the
vital power rapidly declined. It is one thing to accept the Spirit’s order,
and pray Him to work in His own way; it is quite another to set up our
order, and then pray Him to work according to our arrangement. Still, the
effects of the great Revival remain amongst us, even to this day. These, we
think, may be summed up under three heads:
1, the great increase in the number of prayer meetings;
2, the growing activity in gospel work from that time, both in
preaching and the circulation of tracts;
3, a more general interest in the Lord’s second coming. The midnight
cry —
“Behold the Bridegroom cometh” — has spread over the face of
Christendom since 1859. We have no doubt that the cry was raised in the
early part of this century, but the Revival gave it eagles’ wings.
Everything has been moving with great rapidity, both in the church and the
world, since that period, as if to hasten the conling of the Lord. This has
been the century of invention, and of the display of man’s energy, as if he
were approaching the highest pinnacle of human fame before his final
overthrow. (Isaiah 2.) There is also great activity in every section of the
professing church. We are in that period spoken of by the Lord in the
parable (Matthew 25.) — “Then ALL those virgins arose, and trimmed
 1317
their lamps.” None are asleep now. The foolish are professedly trimming
their lamps as well as the wise. Hence the activity of evil in the church
along with that which is unquestionably good. Ritualism, Rationalism, and
open infidelity, have made rapid strides of late years, and all so mixed up
with science and the world.

CONCLUSION
Such alas! is the condition of what man and the world call the church at the
close of our history. “The falling away” has commenced; “the strong
delusion” may have set in; the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. The
Christian, in these last and closing days, is only safe in keeping the Lord
Himself constantly before him, and daily looking for His return. He must
not trust or follow entirely any community of Christians; there are none of
one heart and one mind in the Lord. But this need not prevent him from
breaking bread with those who are gathered to His name. We only mean
that his Christianity must be intensely personal, intensely individual. He
must maintain a holy walk with the Lord, and uninterrupted communion
with Himself, in separation from the swelling tide of evil which is rising on
every side. When the darkness thickens, and troubles arise, the soul’s only
refuge is in the secret of His presence. Nations may be quarrelling, the cry
of war may be coming from all quarters, calamities of the most
overwhelming character may be happening daily in our midst, the
professing church may be passing through the several stages of departure,
as “the way of Cain... the error of Balaam... the gainsaying of Core;” but
the soul’s hiding-place from the strife of nations and the divisions of
Christendom is the unchanging and unchangeable love of the ever-blessed
and all-adorable Lord.
We must leave the reader to apply the principles of Philadelphia and
Laodicea to the professing church of the present day, according to his
spiritual judgment. The Philadelphian period has not passed away, but we
must be on our guard against the spirit of Laodiceanism which is spreading
rapidly among all classes of professing Christians.
May the good Lord keep both reader and writer near Himself until we see
His face, hear His voice, and be for ever in the full enjoyment of His love
and His glory. Amen.
 1318

FOOTNOTES
INTRODUCTION

1
The title “Pope” was first adopted by Hyginus in 139; and Pope
Boniface III induced Phocas, Emperor of the East, to confine it to the
prelates of Rome in 606. By the connivance of Phocas also the pope’s
supremacy over the christian church was established — Haydn’s
Dictionary of Dates.

CHAPTER 1

1
The terms “church,” “a kingdom of heaven,” and “great house,” are
scriptural, and somewhat different in their meaning as used by the
Lord and His apostles. The term “my church,” as used by the Lord,
can only embrace true and living members. The primary thought in the
expression “kingdom of heaven,” surely refers to the authority of the
ascended Lord. And all who profess subjection to Him are owned as in
the kingdom. In the “great house” we see the evil, which had crept into
the professing body through the failure of man, in activity, so that in
result it is co-extensive with the kingdom of heaven and the professing
church. But there is another term in constant use which is not found in
scripture — Christendom. It is an ecclesiastical term, and originally
meant all who were christened, or those portions of the world in which
Christianity prevails, in distinction from heathen or Mahometan lands.
But now it is used synonymously with the other three terms already
considered. In a general way the four terms are used interchangeably,
though originally different in their meaning and application. But where
is it that there is not confusion?
2
Lectures on the Gospel of Matthew. By W. Kelly.
3
“Delivering to Satan is an act of power — putting out a wicked person, a
duty attached to the faithfulness of the assembly. No doubt, exclusion
from the assembly of God is a very serious thing and leaves us
 1319
exposed to sorrow and just trouble of heart, and that from the enemy:
but direct delivery to Satan is an act of positive power. It was done in
Job’s case for his good. It was done by Paul in 1 Corinthians 5, though
acting in the gathered assembly, and for the destruction of the flesh;
and again, without reference to the assembly, in 1 Timothy 1, as to
Hymanaeus and Alexander, that they might learn not to blaspheme. All
discipline is for the correction of the individual, though to maintain
withal the holiness of the house of God, and clear the consciences of
the saints themselves.” — Present Testimony, vol. 1, p. 392, New
Series

CHAPTER 2

1
Synopsis of the Books of the Bible, vol. 4, p. 8.
2
The Church and the World, page 178 — 188.
3
The following brief statements from the fathers of the fourth century, on
the subject of baptism, will show our readers the sources, or the
authorities, of much that is said and done in the present day by the
ritualists. The authority of scripture is entirely set aside. “At Easter,
and at Pentecost, and in some places at the Epiphany, the rite of
baptism was administered publicly — that is, in the presence of the
faithful — to all the converts of the year, excepting those few
instances in which it had been expedient to perform the ceremony
without delay, or where the timid Christian put it off till the close of
life, after the example of Constantine: a practice for a long time
condemned in vain by the clergy. But the fact of the delay shows how
deeply the importance and efficacy of the rite were rooted in the
christian mind. It was a complete lustration [purifying] of the soul.
The Neophyte [new convert] emerged from the waters of baptism in a
state of perfect innocence. The dove — the Holy Spirit — was
constantly hovering over the font, and sanctifying the waters to the
mysterious ablution of all the sins of the past life. If the soul suffered
no subsequent taint, it passed at once to the realms of purity and bliss;
that is, the heart was purified; the understanding illuminated; the spirit
was clothed with immortality.
 1320
“Robed in white, emblematic of spotless purity, the candidate
approached the baptistery — in the larger churches a separate building.
There he uttered the solemn vows which pledged him to his religion.
The symbolizing genius of the East added some significant ceremonies.
The Catechumen [one in the first stages of christian instruction] turned
to the West, the realm of Satan, and thrice renounced his power; he
turned to the East, to adore the Sun of Righteousness, and to proclaim
his compact with the Lord of life. The mystic trinal number prevailed
throughout; the vow was threefold, and thrice pronounced. The
baptism was usually by immersion; the stripping off the clothes was
emblematic of ‘putting off the old man;’ but baptism by sprinkling
was allowed, according to the exigency of the case. The water itself,
became, in the vivid language of the church, the blood of Christ: it was
compared, by a fanciful analogy, to the Red Sea: the daring metaphors
of some of the fathers might seem to assert a transmutation of its
color.
“Almost all the fathers of this age, Basil, the two Gregories,
Ambrose, etc., etc., have treatises on baptism; and vie, as it were, with
each other in their praises of its importance and efficacy. Gregory of
Nazianzen almost exhausts the copiousness of the Greek language in
speaking of baptism.” — Milman’s History of Christianity, vol. 3.

CHAPTER 3

1
Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible.
2
See Lecture 6 on Acts 2, 8, 10, 19. Lectures on the New Testament
Doctrine of the Holy Spirit. By W. Kelly.
3
See fuller details on this subject, by J.G.B., Christian Witness, vol. 4,
page 221; and by W.K., Lectures on Galatians, chap. 1.

CHAPTER 4

1
See Cave’s Lives of the Apostles; Burton’s Ecclesiastical History;
Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible.
2
See Cave’s Life of St. James the Great.
 1321
3
See Horne’s Introduction to the New Testament.

CHAPTER 5

1
See Chapter 3 The Conversion of Saul of Tarsus, The Apostleship of
Paul.
2
See Porter’s Five Years in Damascus, for the latest and best account of
the city and its environs.
3
Synopsis of the Books of the Bible, vol. 4, page 53, 54. [Second Edition,
January 1950]
4
See Smith’s Student’s New Testament History.
5
Synopsis of the Books of the Bible, vol. 4.
6
See Notes on the Book of Daniel, by W. K.
7
The action of the Spirit as to the family seems to have obtained
remarkably among the Gentiles; among the Jews, as far as I know, we
do not hear of it. We have found, already, districts among the Jews, as
also among the Samaritans, which were powerfully impressed (to say
the least) by the gospel: but among the Gentiles, families seem
particularly visited by divine grace, as recorded by the Spirit. Take for
example Cornelius, the jailor, Stephanus; indeed you find it over and
over again. This is exceedingly encouraging — especially to us. —
Introductory Lectures to the Acts of the Apostles, etc., by W.K.
8
See evangelistic papers on the leading characters of this chapter, Things
New and Old, vol. 12, page 29 — 97.
9
For full and minute geographical details, see The Life and Epistles of St.
Paul, by Conybeare and Howson. We may also state here, that we
follow them chiefly as to dates. It is the latest, the most
comprehensive, and probably the best history of the great Apostle.
10
As some have made too much of this passage, and others too little, it
may be well to note what we believe to be its true meaning. The
apostle’s resolution not to be burdensome to the saints, as here so
strongly expressed, applies chiefly, if not exclusively, to the
Corinthian church. An important principle was involved, but it was a
special, not a general principle with the apostle. He acknowledges
 1322
communications from other churches in the most grateful manner
possible. (Philippians 4.) And in writing to the Corinthians afterwards,
he says, “I robbed other churches, taking wages of them to do you
service. And when I was present with you, and wanted, I was
chargeable to no man: for that which was lacking to me the brethren
which came from Macedonia supplied.”
The apostle, no doubt, had the best of reasons for thus refusing
fellowship with the church at Corinth. We know there were “false
apostles” and many enemies there; and that many grave and serious
disorders had been allowed amongst them, which he strongly rebuked
and sought to correct. Under these circumstances, lest his motives
might be misconstrued, the apostle would rather work with his hands
than receive support from the church at Corinth. And, “Wherefore?”
he asks, “Because I love you not? God knoweth. But what I do, that I
will do, that I may cut off occasion from them that desire occasion.” 2
Corinthians 9:1-15.

CHAPTER 6

1
The Present Testimony, vol. 8, p. 405-407.
2
Synopsis of the Books of the Bible, vol. 4, 90 — 101.
3
The wise and humane BURRUS was prefect of the pretorian guard when
Julius arrived with his prisoners. He was a virtuous Roman and ever
treated Paul with the greatest consideration and kindness. — Dr.
Smith’s Dictionary of Biography.
4
See Introductory Lectures to the Acts, by W. Kelly.
5
For particulars of the persecution referred to, see Josephus, Ant. 20,9, 1.

CHAPTER 7

1
See Dean Milman’s History of the Jews, vol. 2, book 16, page 380.
2
See Roman History, Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. 19, page 406.
3
See Mosheim’s Ecclesiastical History, vol. 1, page 67. Cave’s Primitive
Christianity; early chapters.
 1323
4
Neander’s Church History, vol. 1, p. 95.
5
Cave’s Primitive Christianity, p. 20.
6
See The Genuine Epistles of Clement, Polycarp, Ignatius, and Barnabas,
by Ab. Wake, 6th ed. Bagster.
7
Lectures on the Revelation, by W.K.
8
Neander’s Ecclesiastical History, vol. 1, p. 142.
9
For full details, see Milner’s Church History, vol. 1, p. 194.

CHAPTER 8

1
See Journey and Martyrdom of Ignatius, p. 246.
2
The above extracts are taken from Blake’s Translation. See also “A Full
and Faithful Analysis of the Writings of Ignatius, Clement, Polycarp,
and Hermas.” The Inquirer, vol. 2, p. 317.
3
Irenaeus against Heresies. Clarke, Edinburgh.
4
One of the highest authorities as to episcopal order is of opinion that the
distinction between the clergy and the laity is derived from the Old
Testament: that as the high priest had his office assigned him, and the
priests also their proper station, and the Levites their peculiar service;
so laymen in like manner were under the obligations proper to laymen.
He also states that the common priesthood of all believers is taught in
the New Testament, but that the Fathers from the earliest times
formed the church on the Jewish system. — Bingham on the Antiquity
of the Christian Church, vol. 1, p. 42.
5
For full details, see Neander, vol. l, p. 259; Mosheim, vol. 1, p. 91;
Bingham, vol. 1.

CHAPTER 9

1
See Neander, vol. 1, p. 177; Mosheim, vol. 1, p. 217; Milner, vol. 1, p.
332.
 1324
2
For minute details of the different sects, see Dictionary of Christian
Churches and Sects, by Marsden. Robertson, vol. 1. 94. Neander, vol.
2, 387. Milman, vol. 2, 80. Mosheim, vol. 1, 117.
3
Milman, vol. 2. 261.
4
It may interest the reader to know that no MSS of the New Testament
are extant older than the middle of the fourth century. One fact which
accounts for this in great measure is the destruction of the christian
writings, the scriptures especially, in the reign of Diocletian during the
earlier part of that century. Under Constantine it is known that special
efforts were made to have correct copies made, of which the celebrated
critic Tischendorf believes the Sinai MS to be one
5
For the names and particulars of many of the sufferers, see Milner, vol.
1, pp. 473-506.

CHAPTER 10

1
(Christos), Christ.
2
The letters usually employed to represent the Savior’s name are, I.H.S.,
which mean Jesu Hominum Salvator — Jesus the Savior of men.
3
History of Christianity, vol. 2, p. 283-308. Neander, vol. 3, p. 41. Life of
Constantine, by Eusebius.
4
Eusebius’s Life of Constantine, p. 147.
5
“A name of infamy given to those who, to save their lives in the
persecution, had delivered the scriptures or goods of the church to the
persecuting powers.” Milner, vol. 1, p. 513.
6
Neander, vol. 3, p. 244; Robertson, vol. 1, p. 175; Milman, vol. 2, p.
364.
7
The blasphemous doctrine of Arius was an offshoot of Gnosticism,
perhaps the least offensive in appearance, but directly and inevitably
destructive of the personal glory of the Son as God, and hence
overthrowing the basis of redemption. Modern Unitarianism denies the
Lord Jesus to be more than man, and thus even His supernatural birth
of the Virgin Mary; though Socinus asserted the singular modification
of such an exaltation after His resurrection as constituted Him an
 1325
adequate object of divine worship. Arius seemed to approach the truth
on the side of His pre-existence before He came into the world, owned
that He, the Son of God, made the universe, but manifested that He
was Himself created, though the very first and highest of creatures. It
was not the Sabellian denial of distinct personality, but the refusal to
the Son, and of course to the Spirit, of true, proper, essential, and
eternal Deity.
Not only is Arianism fundamentally inconsistent with the place
given to the Son from first to last throughout scripture, as well as with
the infinite work of reconciliation and new creation, for which the old
creation furnished but the occasion, but it is distinctly refuted
beforehand by many passages of holy writ. A few of these it may be
well here to cite. Him who, when born of woman, was named Jesus,
the Spirit of God declares (John 1:1-3) to be in the beginning the Word
who was with God and was God. “All things were made by Him; and
without Him was not anything made that was made.” Impossible to
conceive a stronger testimony to His uncreated subsistence, to His
distinct personality when He was with God before creation, and to His
divine nature. He is here spoken of as the Word, the correlate of which
is not the Father, but God (and thus leaving room for the Holy Spirit);
but, lest His own consubstantiality should be overlooked, He is
carefully and at once declared to be God.{The absence of the article
here is necessarily due to the fact that meos is the predicate of o
Aoyos, in no way to an inferior sense of His Godhead, which would
contradict the context itself. Indeed, if the article had been inserted, it
would be the grossest heterodoxy, because its effect would be to deny
that the Father and the Spirit are God by excluding all but the Word
from Godhead.} Go back beyond time and the creature, as far as one
may in thought, “in the beginning was the Word.” The language is most
precise; He was in the beginning with God, not eyevero, “He was” in
the sense of coming into being or caused to be, but nv, “He was” in His
own absolute being. All things eyevero, “came into being,” through
Him. He was the Creator so completely that St. John adds, “and
without Him not one thing came into being which is come into being.”
On the other hand, when the incarnation is stated in verse 14, the
language is, The Word was made flesh, not nv but eyevero. Further,
when come among men, He is described as “the only-begotten Son
 1326
‘who is’ [o wv, not merely who was] in the bosom of the Father” —
language unintelligible and misleading, unless to show that His
manhood in no way detracted from His Deity, and that the infinite
nearness of the Son with the Father ever subsists.
Again, Romans 9:5 is a rich and precise expression of Christ’s
underivative and supreme Godhead, equally with the Father and the
Spirit. Christ came, “who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen.”
The efforts of heterodox critics bear witness’to the all-importance of
the truth, which they vainly essay to shake by unnatural efforts which
betray the dissatisfaction of their authors. There is no such emphatic
predication of supreme Deity in the Bible: not, of course, that the
Father and the Holy Spirit are not co-equal, but because the
humiliation of the Son is incarnation and the death of the cross made it
fitting that the fullest assertion of divine supremacy should be used of
Him.
Next, the apostle says of Christ, “who is the image of the invisible
God, the first-born of every creature; for by Him were all things
created, that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible,
whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all
things were created by Him and for Him; and He is before all things,
and By Him all things consist [subsist].” (Colossians 1:15-17.) The
reveries of the Gnostics are here anticipatively cut off; for Christ is
shown to have been chief of all creation, because He was Creator, and
this of the highest invisiblebeings as well as of the visible: allthings are
said to have been created for Him as well as by Him; and as He is
before all, so all subsist together in virtue of Him.
The only other passage I need now refer to is Hebrews 1, where
the apostle illustrates the fullness of Christ’s Person among other Old
Testament scriptures by Psalms 45 and 102. In the former He is
addressed as God and anointed as man; in the latter He is owned as
Jehovah, the Creator, after He is heard pouring out His affliction as the
rejected Messiah to Jehovah.
It is impossible then to accept the Bible without rejecting Arianism
as a heinous libel against Christ and the truth; for it is not more certain
that He became a man than that He was God before creation, Himself
the Creator, the Son, and Jehovah.-From unpublished MSS of W.K.
 1327
8
See the Letter in Eusebius’s Life of Constantine, 2.64-72.

CHAPTER 11

1
The Eastern churches from an early period observed the festival of Easter
in commemoration of the crucifixion of Christ, which answered to the
Jewish Passover, on the fourteenth day of the month. This may have
arisen from the fact that in the East there were many Jewish converts.
The Western churches observed the festival in commemoration of the
resurrection. This difference as to the day gave rise to a long and fierce
controversy. But after much contention between the Eastern and
Western churches, it was ordained by the council of Nice to be
observed in commemoration of the resurrection throughout the whole
of Christendom. Thus, Easter-day is the Sunday following the
fourteenth day of the paschal moon which happens upon or next after
the 21st of March: so that, if the said fourteenth day be a Sunday, it is
not that Sunday but the next. It may be any Sunday of the five weeks
which commence with March 22nd and end with April 25th.
2
The term Catholic Church, as given by Constantine, simply means the
established church.
3
History of Christianity, vol. 2. p. 540.
4
See Robertson’s Church History, vol. 1, p. 199; Cave’s Lives of the
Fathers, vol. 2, p. 145.
5
Milman’s History of Christianity, vol. 3, p. 140; Robertson’s History of
the Church, vol. 1, p. 242; Milner’s Church History, vol 2, p. 28.

CHAPTER 12

1
The Inquirer, 1839, p. 232.
2
See Dr. Wall’s History of Infant Baptism. We quote from his translation
of the Fathers. Having received the thanks of the clergy of the lower
house of Convocation, and the honor of D.D. from the University of
Oxford, for his great work in defense of infant baptism, we may rely
on his quotations as, in the main, correct, and as the most favorable to
his object.
 1328
3
Hooker’s Ecclesiastical Polity, book 5. 59, 60. Burner on the Articles,
Art. 27.
4
Then, by the Reformers, and afterwards by the Puritans, an effort was
made to find scripture for what the church of Rome had held as
tradition; the Protestants went to the Bible for everything, the
Catholics to the Fathers.
5
Gale’s Reflections on Wall’s History, vol. 3, p. 84.
6
General Church History, vol. 3, p. 310. See also History of the Church
by James Craigie Robertson, vol. 1, p. 295.
7
Robertson, vol. 1, p. 296; Neander, vol. 3, p. 317; Gardner’s Faiths of the
World, vol. 2, p. 473.
8
Waddington, vol. 2, p. 252.
9
Gardner’s Faiths of the World.
10
Encyclop. Brit. vol. 19, p. 420. White’s Eighteen Christian Centuries, p.
94.
11
See The Church and the World, 1866.
12
Eccles. Hist. vol. 1, p. 366, Murdock and Soames. Robertson, vol. 1, p.
316.
13
“The fundamental error of the monk Pelagius was the denial of our total
corruption by sin derived from Adam, and met only by the death and
resurrection of the second Man, the last Adam. Hence he asserted
liberty as now true of all men, not merely in the sense of exemption
from external restraint, but of freedom within the nature as to good and
evil, denying thus in the race internal bondage to sin. So he appears to
have seen little more in grace, even in its christian application, than
pardon for this or that offense, not the impartation to the believer of a
new nature, in virtue of which he does not practice sin, because he is
born of God. Thus no room was left in the Pelagian scheme for man
being lost now on the one side, or for the believer being saved now on
the other. In fact the race was conceived to be in an innocence like the
primeval state of Adam till each sinned and thus fell under guilt and its
consequences. The Pelagians denied the imputation of Adam’s sin,
seeing no more than the influence of a bad example. As the moral ruin
of man was thus enfeebled and the relation of the head lost, so on the
 1329
other hand under grace were reckoned all the natural endowments of
the human family, as well as the supernatural. Hence conscience, law,
and gospel were regarded as different methods as well as advancing
stages of righteousness, in every case the means and operations of
grace being effectual only according to the measure of the tendencies of
the will. Again, the redemption of Christ became thus, if not an
amelioration, certainly an exaltation and transfiguration of humanity.
Christ Himself was but the highest pattern of righteousness, some
before Him having perfectly kept the moral law, and others since being
stimulated by His work, love, and example to the evangelical counsels
of moral perfection beyond law.” — W.K.
14
For details see Notes on the Book of Genesis, p. 81.
15
See Gardner’s Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 531.
16
Landon’s Manual of Councils, p. 225; Neander, vol. 4, p. 141;
Mosheim, vol. 1, p. 468.

CHAPTER 13

1
Greenwood’s Cathedra Petri, vol. 1, p. 348.
2
Milman, vol. 1, p. 350; J.C. Robertson, vol. 1, p. 473; Milner, vol. 2, p.
336.
3
The Lombards were a German tribe from Brandenburg. according to the
popular belief, they had been invited into Italy by Justinian to serve
against the Goths. Their chief, Alboin, established a kingdom which
lasted from 568 to 774. The last king, Desiderius, was dethroned by
Charlemagne. As we shall meet them again in connection with our
history, we give this notice of their origin,-Haydn's Dictionary of
Dates.
4
Latin Christianity, vol. 1, p. 434.
5
For details, see Life of Paul by Conybeare and Howson, and English
Monasticism by Travers Hill.
6
J.C. Robertson, vol. 1, p. 450.
 1330
7
See English Monasticism by Travers Hill, p. 141; the works of Gildas;
The Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation by Bede; The
Ecclesiastical History of Great Britain by Jeremy Collier, vol. 1.
8
Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. 5, p. 301.
9
Cathedra Petri, book 3, p. 215.
10
Gardner, vol. 1, p. 391.
11
J.C. Robertson, vol. 2, p. 4.

CHAPTER 14

1
D'Aubigne, vol. 5, p. 25.
2
For interesting details, see "The Church History of Scotland from the
commencement of the Christian era to the present time," by the Rev.
John Cunningham, minister of Crieff. A. and C. Black, Edinburgh.
1859.
3
Gardner's Faiths of the World, vol. 1, p. 150.
4
Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 52.
5
J.C. Robertson, vol. 2, p. 62.
6
D'Aubigne, vol. 5, p. 77. Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 90.
7
Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 94.
8
For particulars see Hardwicke's Middle Ages; J.C. Robertson, vol. 2, p.
95.
9
Mosheim, vol. 2, p. 29.
10
See especially Greenwood's Cathedra Petri.
11
For an able description of this important period, see Milman's Latin
Christianity, vol. 2, p. 243.
12
See Milman, vol. 2. Greenwood, vol. 2.

CHAPTER 15

1
See Milman's Latin Christianity, vol. 2, p. 4-52; James White's Eighteen
Christian Centuries, p. 143.
 1331
2
For full details of the different sects, see Marsden's Dictionary of
Christian Churches and Sects, and Gardner's Faiths of the World.
3
Greenwood's Cathedra Petri, vol. 3, p. 474.
4
J. C. Robertson, vol. 2, p. 83; Milman, vol. 2, p. 156.
5
Milman's Latin Christianity, vol. 2, p. 160.
6
See Greenwood's Cathedra Petri, vol. 3.
7
Greenwood, vol. 3, p. 476.
8
Cathedra Petri, vol. 3, p. 480.

CHAPTER 16

1
See E.B. Elliott's Hora Apocalyptica, vol. 2, p. 219.
2
See Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 527; J.C. Robertson, vol. 2, p. 163.
3
Latin Christianity, vol. 2, p. 202.
4
We do not mean to affirm that all who were slain by Theodora as
Paulicians were true Christians. We cannot judge the heart; but they
professed to be and willingly died as martyrs.
5
Milner, vol. 2, p. 498.
6
For a careful inquiry and details, see Hora Apoc., vol. 2, 249-344, 5th
edition.
7
Latin Christianity, vol. 2, p. 286.
8
Milman, vol. 2, p. 375; Greenwood, book 6, chap. 3, p. 82.
9
Mosheim's History, vol. 3, p. 184 & 272.

CHAPTER 17

1
Robertson, vol. 2, p. 131.
2
For details, see Milman's Latin Christianity, vol. 2.
3
As given by Du Pin, vol. 2, p. 156.
4
Robertson, vol. 2, p. 360.
 1332

CHAPTER 18

1
James White's Eighteen Christian Centuries.
2
Neander, vol. 5, p. 197.
3
Waddington's History, vol. 2, p. 44.
4
Cunningham's Church History of Scotland, vol. 1, p. 97; Milner, vol. 2,
p. 566; Robertson, vol. 2, p. 441.

CHAPTER 19

1
Sir James Stephen, Ecclesiastical Biography, vol. 1, p. 2; Milman, vol. 3,
p. 103; Robertson, vol. 2, p. 515.
2
Robertson, vol. 2, p. 567.
3
Greenwood, Cathedra Petri, vol. 4, p. 331.
4
Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 105.
5
History of the Church, vol. 2, p. 70.
6
Cathedra Petri, vol. 4, p. 274.
7
Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 121.
8
Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 168.
9
Robertson, vol. 2. p. 594.
10
History of Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 197
11
Cathedra Petri, book 11, p. 606.
12
Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 277.

CHAPTER 20

1
White's Eighteen Christian Centuries, p. 246.
2
Waddington, vol. 2, p. 102.
3
Robertson, vol. 2, p. 630; Milman, vol. 3, p. 233; Waddington, vol. 2, p.
77.
 1333
4
Robertson's Church History, vol. 2, p. 641. White's Eighteen Christian
Centuries.
5
Robertson, vol. 3, p. 341.
6
Milman, Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 242.
7
Haydn's Dictionary of Dates.

CHAPTER 21

1
Milman, vol. 3, p. 320; Greenwood, book ll, p. 673.
2
These accounts are chiefly taken from The Life and Times of St. Bernard
by James Carter Morrison, M.A.
3
Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 330.
4
Literature of Europe in the Middle Ages, vol. 1, p. 4.
5
Life and Times of Bernard, Morrison, p. 290; Eighteen Christian
Centuries, White, p. 266.
6
Latin Christianity, vol. 3, p. 333.

CHAPTER 22

1
Milman, vol. 3, p. 450.
2
Cathedra Petri, book 12, vol. 5, p. 219. See also a full account of the
whole contest in Milman's History of Latin Christianity, vol. 3, pp.
434 — 528. The former may be considered the constitutional, the
latter the historical, view of the long quarrel
3
White's Eighteen Christian Centuries, p. 275.

CHAPTER 23

1
See J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, pp. 259 — 272.
2
Gardner's Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 905. See also an able essay on
this subject, Edgar's Variations of Popery, pp. 347 — 388.
 1334
3
For details see "Mariolatry," Gardner's Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p.
372. Butler's Lives of the Saints, October 1 — the great Roman
Catholic book on this subject.
4
Paul's Council of Trent, p. 750. See also, for details, Milner's End of
Controversy, Letter 43.
5
Edgar's Variations of Popery, p. 455.
6
Gardner's Faiths of the WorId, p. 721. Milman, vol. 6, p. 428.
7
Gardner's Faiths of the World, vol. 1, p. 582. Milman, vol. 6, p. 361.
8
Milner, vol. 3, p. 439.
9
For full details by Catholic writers on the sacraments, see Paul's Council
of Trent, Donovan's Catechism of the Council of Trent, Milner's End of
Controversy; and for rather sharp criticisms on these doctrines, see
Edgar's Variations of Popery; as also the general histories.

CHAPTER 24

1
Edgar's Variations of Popery, p. 157.
2
For full details see Lectures on the Apocalypse by W.K.
3
Cathedra Petri, book 13, p. 363.
4
Waddington, vol, 2, p. 158.
5
Cathedra Petri, book 13, chapter 1, p. 339.
6
Milman, vol. 4, p. 19.
7
J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 292.
8
Latin Christianity, vol 4, p. 33.
9
J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 297. Milman, vol. 4, p. 51. Neander, vol. 7, p.
236.
10
See Latin Christianity, vol. 4, p. 67.
11
For details, see the civil and general church histories. We have followed
chiefly names already and frequently quoted
12
Greenwood's Cathedra Petri, book 13, p. 582; Milman's Latin
Christianity, vol. 4, p. 90; Waddington's History of the Church, vol. 2,
p. 167.
 1335
13
An old Scotch silver coin, worth about 13s. 6d. This was to be paid
yearly, besides Peter's pence.
14
Cathedra Petri, book 13, p. 588.
15
Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. 8, p. 721; D'Aubigne, vol. 5, p. 98; James
White, Eighteen Christian Centuries, p. 290.

CHAPTER 25

1
See Chapter 16, The Paulicians in Europe.
2
In the first edition of Short Papers, the following sentence occurs: — "It
also appears very certain that the Albigenses of the southern provinces
of France owe their origin to the Paulicians." Most of the general
histories are calculated to give this impression; but after consulting the
special histories and laborious researches of Peter Allix, D.D., W.S.
Gilly, M.A., W. Beattie, M.D., and others, we are fully persuaded of
their great antiquity, the purity of their faith, and their Alpine locality
— that they existed as a distinct christian people long before the
Paulicians, or even the papacy.
3
See Marsden's Dictionary, "Albigenses." Milner, vol. 3, p. 92. Bartlett"s
Scenery of the Waldenses, Introduction.
4
J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, pp. 179 — 202. Waddington, vol. 2, p. 187. Sir. J.
Stephen's History of France, vol. l, p. 218.
5
Greenwood, book 13, chap. 7, p. 546; Milman, vol. 4, p. 218; Sir James
Stephen's Lectures, vol. 1, p. 225.
6
J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 351.
7
Latin Christianity, vol. 4, p. 223; Gardner's Faiths of the World,
"Albigenses."
8
For fuller details both as to the papal and the Albigensian side of this
bloody warfare, see Du Pin, thirteenth century; Sir J. Stephen's
Lectures, vol. 1, pp. 214 — 242; Milman, vol. 4, pp. 167 — 238; J.
White. pp. 282 — 289; J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, pp. 340 — 433;
Milner, vol. 3, pp. 92 — 155; Gardner's Faiths of the World,
"Albigenses."
9
See Milner and Gardner, as quoted above.
 1336

CHAPTER 26

1
See Encyclopedia Britannica, "Inquisition," vol. 12~ p. 283. Llorente's
History of the Inquisition. Gardner's Faiths of the World. Milman, vol.
5, p. 16.
2
See Chapter 12. See also Chapter 21.
3
Latin Christianity, vol. 1, p. 426. Hill's English Monasticism p. 71.
Gardner's Faiths of the World, vol. 1, p. 318. Neander, vol. 3, p. 351.
4
Marsden's Dictionary of Christian Churches and Sects, p. 635.
5
For a list of the names and countries of these converts, with many
particulars, see English Monasticism, by O'Dell Travers Hill, p. 101.
See also Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. 4, p. 562. The numbers do not
quite agree in both, but, as English Monasticism was published as late
as 1867, we accept the figures given there.
6
Marsden's Christian Sects.
7
Dean Milman, vol. 4, p. 243. J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 363.
8
See "Reflections on the Principles of Asceticism," Short Papers, Vol. 1,
p. 434.
9
Johnston's Gazetteer.
10
Milman, vol. 4, p. 276; Mosheim, vol. 2, p. 523.

CHAPTER 27

1
See Chapter 14.
2
See Froude's History of Ireland; Gardner's Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p.
150; Edgar's Variations of Popery, p. 153 & 192.
3
See "Short Papers," p. 310 and 311.
4
For carefully collected details, see Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 106.
5
Cunningham, vol. 1, chap. 5.
6
See a graphic description of the state of religion in Scotland before the
Reformation, in Dr. McCrie's Life of John Knox, pp. 7 — 13,
 1337
7
The corpse-present was the vicar’s perquisite in the case of death. In
country parishes it consisted of the best cow which belonged to the
deceased, and the uppermost covering of his bed, or the finest of his
body-clothes. And this demand, which was exacted with great rigour in
Scotland and in other places, was distinct from the ordinary dues
exacted for the interment of the body, and the deliverance of the soul
from purgatory.
“And als the vicar, as I trow, He will nocht fail to tak ane kow,
And upmaist claith, thocht babis hae nane, From ane pure deid
husbandman.”
8
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 358; Mosheim, vol. 2, p. 592.
9
Milman, vol. 4, p. 168; Waddington, vol. 2, p. 270.

CHAPTER 28

1
J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 383.
2
Waddington, vol. 2, p. 281.
3
See a long letter to Henry III. of England, by the Emperor, in which hel
justly and severely reproaches the Roman church. Waddington’s
History, vol. 2, p. 281.
4
J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 393.
5
See Dean Milman, vol. 5, p. 143; Dean Waddington, vol. 2, p. 319;
Greenwood, vol. 6, p. 277.

CHAPTER 29

1
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 363.
2
Milner, vol. 3, p. 188. J.C. Robertson, vol. 3, p. 43l. D’Aubigne, vol. 1,
p. 99.
3
Mosheim, cent. 4, chap. 3.
4
J.C. Robertson, vol. 4, p. 77. For lengthy accounts of such men and their
writings, see Knight’s Biographical Dictionary.
5
Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. 21, p. 543.
 1338
6
Scenery of the Waldenses, William Beattie, M.D. See also a lengthy
account of the Waldenses in Milner’s Church History, vol. 3.

CHAPTER 30

1
Sir James Stephen’s History of France, vol. 1, p. 240.
2
Milman, vol. 6, p. 100.
3
Latin Christianity, vol. 6, p. 103.
4
J.C. Robertson, vol. 4, p. 201.
5
J.C. Robertson, vol. 4, p. 203; Latin Christianity, vol. 4, p. 94;
Encyclopedia Britannica, article, WYCLIFFE.
6
Milner, vol. 3, p. 251.
7
For full details of the earliest English translations, see preface to
Wycliffe’s Bible, edited by the Revelation Josiah Forshall and Sir
Frederick Madden, both of the British Museum. It is a noble book,
four volumes folio, printed at the University Press, Oxford, and a
noble monument of christian zeal and devotedness, under the sheltering
hand of God. See also preface to Bagster’s English Hexapla.
8
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 175.
9
See Encyclopedia Britannica, vol. 21, p. 949; D’Aubigne, vol. 5, p. 137.
10
D’Aubigne, vol. 5, p. 147; Milner, vol. 3, p. 242; Milman, vol. 6, p.
154; Fox’s Acts and Monuments.

CHAPTER 31

1
Landon’s Manual of Councils.
2
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 175.
3
See Marsden’s Dictionary of Sects, “Moravians;” Waddington, vol. 3, p.
196; Latin Christianity, vol. 6, p. 200; Milner, vol. 3, p. 336; J.C.
Robertson, vol. 3, p. 284; Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 17; Edgar’s Variations
of Popery, pp. 202, 533.
 1339

CHAPTER 32

1
Literature of Europe, vol. 1, p. 153.
2
History of the Huguenots, by Samuel Smiles, pp. 1-23.
3
J.C. Robertson, vol. 4, p. 548. Waddington, vol. 3, p. 383. Universal
History, Bagster and Sons, London, vol. 6, p. 173.
4
Milner, vol. 3, p. 421.
5
Although the Greek New Testament of Erasmus, published at Basle in
1516, was the first edition in which the original text of the Holy
Scriptures was given to the learned world, it was not the first either as
to design or printing. The Complutensian New Testament was finished
in January 1514; but as it awaited the completion of the Bible and the
license of the pope, it was not published until 1522. Thus it was that
the edition of Erasmus appeared six years earlier than the
Complutensian, though printed two years later.
This was the first Polyglott Bible, and since known as the Com-
plutensian; Paris and London Polyglotts followed. This great work
appears to have been the original conception of the celebrated Cardinal
Ximenes, of Toledo, and executed at his expense. With a view to this
he collected manuscripts, employed a number of scholars as editors,
and imported type-cutters from Germany. The outlay is stated to have
exceeded twenty-three thousand pounds — a vast sum in those days
— but the yearly income of the Primate was four times that amount.
The Complutensian Polyglott, in six volumes folio, was completed
at Alcala, in Spain, in 1517, but the preparations were begun as early
as 1502. These six noble volumes contain the Old Testament in
Hebrew, Latin and Greek; and the New Testament in Greek and Latin,
with a Hebrew dictionary, and other supplementary matter.
John Froben, an enterprising publisher at Basle, having heard of
this forthcoming Bible, and eager to forestall it, urged Erasmus to
undertake immediately an edition of the New Testament. The first was
very faulty, as Froben’s haste gave him little leisure to do his work. It
passed through three editions in six years: on the fourth and fifth
editions Erasmus bestowed more pains, having seen the
 1340
Complutensian in 1522. — See an able and useful book, entitled, “A
Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament,” by Dr.
Scrivener: George Bell and Sons, London. See also some interesting
particulars in J.C. Robertson’s Church History, vol. 4, p. 664.
6
J.C. Robertson, vol. 4, p. 673.
7
D’Aubigne, vol 1, p. 166.

CHAPTER 33

1
Milman’s Survey, Latin Christianity, vol. 6, p. 357; Greenwood’s
Summary, book 14, chap. 1.
2
Waddington’s Reformation, vol. 1, p. 31; D’Aubigne’s Reformation, vol.
1, p. 195.
3
Waddington, vol. 1, p. 34.
4
See The Present Testimony, vol. 1, p. 52.
5
Waddington, vol. 1, p. 47.
6
D’Aubigne, vol. 1. Froude’s Short Studies, vol. 1. Waddington’s
Reformation, vol. 1. Universal History, vol. 6, Bagster and Sons.

CHAPTER 34

1
Gardner’s Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 252.
2
See D’Aubigne, vol. 1, p. B22. Froude’s Short Studies, vol. 1, p. 96.
3
Vol. 2, p. 109. See also Froude’s Short Studies on Great Subjects, vol. 1.
Universal History, Bagster, vol. 8. Waddington’s Reformation, vol. 1.
Mosheim, vol. 3.
4
James White’s Eighteen Christian Centuries, p. 381.
5
Short Studies on Great Subjects.
6
Universal History, Bagster, vol. 7, p. 18. Waddington, vol. 1, p. 364.
D’Aubigne, vol. 2, p. 347. For lengthy details, see Milner, vol. 4.
 1341

CHAPTER 35

1
Dean Waddington, vol. 2, pp. 43 — 45.

CHAPTER 36

1
Lectures on the addresses to the Seven Churches. J.N.D.
2
See “Short Papers,” vol. 1, p. 255.
3
Lectures on the Revelation — Sardis, by W.K.
4
See this subject fully handled in two lectures on Corinthians 12 and 14,
by W.K.
5
Vol. 4, pp. 26-47.
6
Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 122.
7
See Chapter 35 The Protest.
8
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 83.

CHAPTER 37

1
For the authority of this incredible blasphemy, see Edgar’s Variations of
Popery, p. 384.
2
Waddington, vol. 2, pp. 346 — 370.
3
For a fuller opening up of this subject, see Bible Treasury, vol. 10, p.
357; and Synopsis, vol. 3, p. 432.
4
D’Aubigne’s History of the Reformation, vol. 4, pp. 88 — 126;
Cunningham’s Lectures on the Reformation, p. 218.
5
Dean Waddington, vol. 2, p. 401.

CHAPTER 38

1
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 39.
2
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 161.
 1342
3
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 48.
4
See a full account in D’Aubigne, vol. 4.
5
History of the Church, by John Scott, M.A., vol. 1, p. 6.
6
Scott’s Continuation of Milner, vol. 1, p. 30; Dean Waddington, vol. 3, p.
57; D’Aubigne, vol. 4; Faiths of the World, vol. 1, p. 258. For a
Summary of the Whole Confession, see Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 139.
7
Robertson’s Charles the Fifth, vol. 2, p. 383.
8
Church History, vol. 3, p. 72.

CHAPTER 39

1
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 277. John Scott, vol. 1, p. 53.
2
Ranke’s History of the Popes, vol. 1, p. 76.
3
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 84.
4
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, pp. 132 — 340; Waddington, vol. 3, pp. 43 — 113;
Scott’s Continuation, vol. 1, pp. 1 — 90; Du Pin, vol. 3, p. 206.
5
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 160. John Scott, vol. 1, p. 112. Robertson’s Reign
of Charles V., vol. 5, p. 391.

CHAPTER 40

1
Vol. 2, p. 382.
2
See Short Papers, vol. 1, p. 499.
3
Abraham Ruchat, of Lausanne, as quoted by Scott, vol. 2, p. 328;
Gardner’s Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 19.
4
D’Aubigne, vol. 2, p. 399; Waddington, vol. 2, p. 268; The Faiths of the
World, vol. 2, p. 20.
5
Scott, vol. 2, p. 344. D’Aubigne, vol. 2, p. 426.
6
Scott, vol. 2, p. 348. D’Aubigne, vol. 2, p. 428.
7
See D’Aubigne, vol. 2, p. 450. Scott, vol. 2, p. 355. Universal History,
vol. 7, p. 73.
 1343

CHAPTER 41

1
The dates and facts of the foregoing sketches have been taken chiefly
from Scott’s History where the reader will find many details which we
have omitted. Vol. 2, pp. 366 384.
2
Preface, Life of Zwingle, by J.G. Hess. Translated by Lucy Aikin.
3
D’Aubigne, vol. 2, p. 502.
4
Hess, pp. 130 — 138.
5
Scott’s quotations from Gerdes, or Gerdesius, professor of divinity at
Groningen, and from A. Ruchat, vol. 2, p. 406.
6
Hess, p. 148.
7
Waddington, vol. 2, p. 284.

CHAPTER 42

1
Hess, p. 168.
2
D’Aubigne, vol. 3, pp. 356 — 359.
3
For more lengthy details, see Life of Zwingle, by Hess, 178 — 194.
D’Aubigne, vol. 2, chap. 5. Scott, vol. 2, pp. 494 — 501.

CHAPTER 43

1
Du Pin, folio ed. vol. 3, p. 201; Hess, pp. 240 — 250.
2
Waddington, vol. 2, pp. 327 — 336. Scott, vol. 3, pp. 1 — 25.
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, pp. 361 — 385. Hess, pp. 250 — 258.
3
For lengthy details of the great crisis, see Scott, vol. 3. He quotes from
Bucer’s account of the meeting, and from Munster’s. He also quotes
from Gerdes, Ruchat, and others. Du Pin, in apologizing for the
absence of the four bishops, says, “that disputes about matters of
faith ought not to be determined by scripture alone, because everyone
would explain it according to his own humor... that the law of God had
provided another way to decide all doubts in religion, which is, to
apply themselves to the pope, and acquiesce in his determination.”
 1344
Such is the blindness of Rome’s most reasonable, learned, and devout
members.
4
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 70.
5
Wylie’s History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 75.
6
Scott, vol. 3, p. 40; Waddington, vol. 2, p. 321; D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p.
416.
7
See details, pp. 781-790.

CHAPTER 44

1
Wylie’s History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 76.
2
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 477.
3
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 480. Wylie, vol. 2, p. 82.
4
Wylie, vol. 2, p. 86.
5
History of the Reformation, vol. 3, p. 236.
6
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 536.
7
History of Potestantism, vol 2, p. 93; see also D’Aubigne, vol. 4, p. 568.
8
History of the Reformation, vol. 3, p. 242.
9
D’Aubigne, vol. 4, pp. 465 — 621. John Scott, vol. 3, pp. 104 — 120,
with quotations from Ruchat, Life of Zwingle, by J,G. Hess.
Waddington, vol. 3, pp. 236 — -252. Wylie, vol. 2, pp. 77 — 95.

CHAPTER 45

1
Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 220. Wylie, vol. 1, p. 620.
2
Robertson’s History of Charles V., p. 244.
3
Scott, vol. 1, p. 129; Waddington, vol. 3, p. 164.
4
Guicciardini and Fra Paolo, quoted by Waddington, vol. 3, p. 183.
5
History of the Church by the Reverend John Fry, p. 324.
 1345
6
From the account given by Justus Jonas to the Elector of Saxony, by the
hand of Count Albert’s secretary. See Scott’s History, vol. 1, pp. 464
— 477.
7
For Extracts of Melancthon’s Oration, see Waddington, vol. 3, pp. 353
— 356.
8
The truer ground would have been personal responsibility to God who
has spoken to man.
9
Blackwood’s Magazine — slightly altered December 1835.
10
D’Aubigne, vol. 3, p. 309.
11
Waddington, vol. 2, p. 121.
12
As our space forbids indulging in extracts from Luther’s letters to his
children, his wife, his friends, and his many encounters with the
invisible as well as with the visible world — such as the scenes in the
castle of Wartburg; we would recommend our readers, who care to
understand the personal character of Martin Luther, to study
Michelet’s Life of Luther, translated by Hazlitt, which may be bought
second-hand for 2s.
13
Robertson’s History of Charles V., vol. 6, p. 71-76.
14
Waddington’s History of the Reformation, vol. 3, p. 362.

CHAPTER 46

1
For details, see Landon’s Manual of Councils, Father Paul’s History of
the Council of Trent. Scott’s Church History, vol. 2, pp. 256 — 324.
Dr. Robertson’s History of Charles V., vol. 6.
2
See F. Paul, Teckendorf, Sleidan, Abbe Millot, quoted by Dr. Robertson,
and Wylie’s History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 113.
3
For details of this interesting period see the History of Charles V., in vol.
4 of Dr. Robertson’s Collected Writings.
4
Dr. Robertson, vol. 6, p. 22.
5
Dr. Robertson’s History, book 8.
6
Robertson, book 9, p. 178.
 1346

CHAPTER 47

1
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 118. See also Robertson’s History,
vol. 6, book 9.
2
See Mosheim’s History of the Lutheran Church on the Controversies,
vol. 3; also Scott’s continuation of Milner on Melancthon’s
submission, vol. 2.
3
Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 157. Wylie, vol. 2, p. 122. Scott, vol. 2, p. 83.
4
History of the Reformation in Spain, by Dr. McCrie, p. 119.
5
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 121.
6
Universal History, vol. 6, p. 87; Wylie, vol. 2, p. 122.
7
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 384.
8
For a thorough exposure of the iniquity of the moral code of the Jesuits,
see the Provincial Letters of Pascal, a Jansenist. For details of their
organization, training, operations, see History of Protestantism, vol. 2;
Faiths of the world — Jesuits; Universal History, Bagster, vol. 6, p.
82; Hardwick’s History of the Reformation, p. 329.

CHAPTER 48

1
History of the Church, by the Reverend John Fry, p. 333. Dr. Robert-
son’s Works, vol. 6, p. 497.
2
Vol. 2, p. 6.
3
For minute and lengthy details of the progress of the Reformation in
Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Iceland, see History of Protestantism
by the Reverend J.A. Wylie — Cassell & Co.
4
History of the Reformation in Italy.
5
History of the Reformation in Italy, p. 29.
6
For full details see Dr. McCrie’s History; Miss Young’s Life and Times
of Paleario, 2 vols.; D’Aubigne’s History of the Reformation in
Europe. vol. 4; Hardwick’s Church History, p. 105.
 1347
7
See Brief Account of the Inquisition, “Short Papers,” vol. 2, pp. 291 —
303. Llorente’s History of the Inquisition. McCrie’s History of the
Reformation in Spain.
8
See an account of the auto-de-fe, p. 573.
9
McCrie, p. 130.
10
See Dr. McCrie’s history — Blackwood, Edinburgh.
11
Hardwick’s Middle Ages, p. 372.
12
See the noble work of Gerard Brandt, on the Reformation in the
Netherlands, in four vols. folio. There the reader has almost the daily
occurrences of these most interesting and tragical times.
See also The Rise of the Dutch Republic, by Mr. Motley, three
vols. 8vo; also his book on The United Netherlands. Both embrace the
political as well as the ecclesiastical history of these times.
13
For particulars, see Annals of the English Bible by Christopher
Anderson; also the biographical notice, prefixed to his writings,
published by the Parker Society.
14
Universal History, vol. 6, p. 197.
15
Motley, vol. 2, p. 155. Brandt, vol. 1, p. 266.
16
Brandt, vol. 1, p. 270; Motley, vol. 2, p. 142; Universal History, vol. 6,
p. 199.
17
For the civil history of the new state, see Motley’s History of the
United Netherlands, and for the ecclesiastical, see Faiths of the World;
also Mosheim, vol. 3.
18
Universal History, vol. 6, p. 202; Wylie’s vol. 3, which we have just
seen, gives a long and detailed account of the struggles and triumphs in
the Netherlands.

CHAPTER 49

1
Felice, p. 18.
2
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 248.
3
D’Aubigne, vol. 3, p. 496. Scott, vol. 3, p. 70. Wylie, vol. 2, p. 247.
 1348
4
Wylie, vol. 2, p. 256.
5
For lengthy details, see D’Aubigne’s History of the Reformation in
Europe, vols. 1 and 2.
6
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 275. Wylie. vol. 2, p. 273.
7
Waddington, vol. 3, p. 278.
8
D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 1, chap. 7, 8. D’Aubigne’s Luther, vol. 3, p.
501.
9
Dr. McCrie gives many interesting details of this amiable and
accomplished princess in his History of the Reformation in Itaty.
10
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 303.
11
Scott’s History, vol. 3, p. 200. D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 6, chaps. 15-
17. Wylie’s Protestantism, vol. 2, chap. 14.
12
See the original records of the trial of Servetus before the “Little Council
of Geneva,” discovered by M. Albert Rilliet, and published in 1844,
with a short treatise on the subject, translated from the French, by Dr.
Tweedie. The production of these records, though at this late hour,
will go far to soften public opinion as to Calvin’s share in the death of
Servetus.
13
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 346.
14
Vol. 3, chap. 26.
15
Beza’s narrative, quoted by Scott, vol. 3, p. 485.

CHAPTER 50

1
Freer’s History of Margaret, vol. 1, p. 98; D’Aubigne, vol. 3, p 509;
Smiles’ History of the Huguenots, p. 18.
2
Freer’s History of Margaret, vol. 1, p. 97.
3
D’Aubigne, vol. 3, p. 532; Freer, vol. 1, p. 98.
4
Quoted by D’Aubigne, vol. 3, p. 544.
5
Freer, vol. 1, p. 70.
 1349
6
For a brief but graphic description of this memorable engagement, which
Wylie truly calls the “Flodden of France,” see Freer’s History of
Margaret, vol. 1, p. 153.
7
Wylie’s Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 141. D’Aubigne, vol. 3, chap. 7. Freer’s
History of Margaret, vol. 1, p. 134. Fry’s History, p. 356.
8
D’Aubigne, vol. 3, p. 582.
9
Felice, p. 26.
10
Wylie, vol. 2, p. 162; D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 2, p. 56; Felice, p. 27.
11
Wylie, vol. 2; D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 3; Felice, p. 35; Freer, vol. 2, p.
138.
12
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 212.

CHAPTER 51

1
Felice, p. 52; Wylie, vol. 2, p. 522.
2
For minute details of this ecclesiastical constitution, see Felice, Wylie, or
Faiths of the World.
3
The above account of the massacre is chiefly drawn from the French
historian, Felice, who is more inclined to abridge than to exaggerate the
details of his nation’s dishonor.
See also, Wylie’s History of Protestantism; Smiles’ History of the
Huguenots; White’s History of France.
4
See Chapter 46, The Opening of the Council of Trent.
5
Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 894; Scott, vol. 3, p. 256.
The great authority as to our knowledge of the proceedings of this
assembly is Father Paul’s History. “He has described its
deliberations,” says Dr. Robertson, “and explained its decrees, with
such perspicuity and depth of thought, with such various erudition,
and such force of reason, as have justly entitled his work to be placed
among the most admired historical compositions.
 1350

CHAPTER 52

1
See Chapter 29, The Dark Year of 1560.
2
History of the Waldenses, and Graphic Descriptions of the Protestant
Valleys of Piedmont, by Wm. Beattie, M.D.
3
Quoted by Wylie, vol. 2, p. 482.
4
History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 486.
5
History of the Vaudois, by Hugh Dyke Acland, p. 69.
6
Acland, p. 71.
7
For details and illustrations, see Dr. Beattie’s Waldenses. Wylie’s
History of Protestantism — Waldenses.
8
Dr. Beattie, p. 211.
9
See a most interesting book entitled, The Glorious Recovery by the
Vaudois of their Native Valleys, by Henry Arnaud, their Commander
and Pastor, with a Compendious History of that People by Hugh
Dyke Acland. The march lasted thirty-one days, and there the reader
will find the particulars of each day. Our space forbids even a sketch
of these interesting days.
10
Encycl. Brit., vol. 11, p. 543. History of Protestantism, vol. 2, p. 511.
For details of the creeds, confessions, catechisms, etc., of the
Waldenses, see Gilly’s First and Second Visits to the Valleys of
Piedmont.

CHAPTER 53

1
See Chapter 27.
2
For minute and most reliable details, see Dr. Phelan’s History of the
Policy of the Church of Rome in Ireland
3
Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 153; Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 491.
4
Mosheim, vol. 3, p. 496.
5
Dr. Phelan’s History, p. 332; Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 158. For
lengthy and minute details see Froude’s History of Ireland.
 1351
6
See Chapter 13; Chapter 27.
7
D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 6, p. 7; Wylie, vol. 3, p. 468.
8
History of Protestantism, vol. 3, p. 169.
9
See Dr. McCrie’s Life of Knox, p. 14; D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 6;
History of Protestantism, vol. 3.
10
Cunningham’s Church History of Scotland, vol. 1, p. 237; McCrie’s Life
of Knox, p. 17; D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 6, p. 168; Wylie’s
Protestantism, vol. 3, p. 479.
11
D’Aubigne’s Calvin, vol. 6, p. 194; Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 242;
McCrie, p. 20.
12
See Knox’s History of the Reformation, folio ed, p. 49.
13
McCrie, p. 21. Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 248.
14
See Encyclo. Brit., vol. 19, p. 731. Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 251. Tytler’s
History of Scotland, vol. 4, p. 372.
15
McCrie’s Life of Knox. Tytler’s History of Scotland, vol. 4, p. 374.
16
Knox’s History, folio, p. 83; McCrie, p. 34.
17
Cunningham, vol. 1, p. 308.
18
McCrie, p. 127. Wylie, vol. 3, p. 491.
19
For many interesting details of this period, see Dr. Lorimer’s History of
the Scottish Reformation; Spottiswood’s History, 3 vols.; Wylie’s
Protestantism; McCrie’s Life of Knox; Knox’s Original History.

CHAPTER 54

1
For details, see Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, vol. 2, folio ed. pp. 7-14.
2
Universal History, vol. 6, p. 27.
3
History of the Reformation, vol. 5, p. 199.
4
D’Aubigne, vol. 5, p. 184; Wylie, vol. 3, p. 355; Universal History, vol.
6, p. 32.
5
See vol. 2, p. 570.
6
Marsden’s Dict. of Churches, p. 213; Miss Strickland’s Queens of
England, vol. 4.; Fuller’s Church History of Britain, vol. 2.; Universal
 1352
History, vol. 6, chap. 4; Burnet’s History of the Reformation, vol. 1,
part 1.
7
See Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, vol. 2, folio ed.; Strype’s Memorials of the
Reformation; D’Aubigne’s Luther, vol. 5; Calvin, vol. 4.
8
History of the Reformation, part 1, book 3, p. 334.
9
Wylie’s History of Protestantism, vol. 3, p. 401.
10
History of Protestantism, vol. 3, p. 418; Faiths of the World, vol. 1, p.
825; Marsden’s Churches, p. 227.
11
For minute details of the persecutions, see Foxe’s Book ol Martyrs;
Froude’s History of England; Fuller’s Church History; Burnet’s
History of the Reformation; Wylie’s History of Protestantism.

CHAPTER 55

1
Faiths of the World, vol. 2, p. 725.
2
History of Protestantism, vol. 3, p. 624; Universal History, vol. 6, p.
288.
3
Mosheim, vol. 4, pp. 297 — 378; Cunningham, vol. 2, p. 285; Universal
History, vol. 6, p. 294.
4
Cunningham, vol. 2, p. 383; Thomson’s History of the Secession Church;
Fraser’s Life of Ebenezer Erskine.
5
See, for details, The Story of John Wesley, by Frances Bevan, Holness,
21, Paternoster Row; Life and Labours of George Whitefield, Partridge
and Co., 9, Paternoster Row.
6
The above sketch of the work at Cambuslang is taken from
Cunningham’s History of the Scotch Church, vol. 2, p. 460. For
lengthy and minute details, see Historical Recollections of Revivals,
etc., by Dr. Gillies. This book gives an account of the remarkable
periods of the success of the gospel from the first to the nineteenth
century.
7
Knight’s Dictionary of Biography.
 1353
8
For minute particulars and details of the formation and history of
Missionary Societies, from the Reformation to the present time, see
Dr. Brown’s History, 3 vols. octavo.

CHAPTER 56

1
See a Reprint of the Original in the Collected Writings of J.N. Darby,
Ecclesiastical, vol. 1, G. Morrish, 20, Paternoster Square; also in the
Christian Witness, vol. 1. and as a separate tract published by W.H.
Broom, 25, Paternoster Square.
2
See Dictionary of Christian Churches.
3
See The Southern Review for April, 1877, published under the auspices
of the Methodist Episcopalian church. South Baltimore: Bledsoe, and
Herrick. London, Trubner.
4
For full particulars as to this opulent church, see Appendix to the Scots’
Worthies, Blackie, Glasgow; also Faiths of the World.
5
For particulars of the awakening, and the work of God in Ireland, see
vols. 2 and 3 of Things New and Old.