The Roman Catholic Restoration In The Reign Of Mary (1553-1558).

The Roman Catholic Restoration In The Reign Of Mary (1553-1558).

The harm which resulted to the Protestant cause from the defective administration under Edward VI. was augmented by the plot of the Duke of Northumberland to change the succession. An unscrupulous ambition was the mainspring of the plot, though the Duke made it appear to the dying King and to others that he was consulting for the perpetuity of the noble system of faith and worship just completed. Lack of public sympathy wrecked his enterprise, and the outcome was a sad list of executions, among which was finally included that of the guileless, devout, and accomplished girl,--victim to the intemperate scheme of those who placed the crown upon her reluctant brow, --the Lady Jane Grey. To add to the disheartening effect of his futile attempt, Northumberland upon the scaffold abjectly recanted his Protestant faith, or rather declared that it had never been his except in pretence.

The accession of Mary though immediately threatening to the reforms which had been accomplished in the preceding reign, was not understood by the nation to imply a reunion with Rome. Since the death of her mother Catharine, that is, for nearly twenty years, she had professed to accept the Anglo-Catholic system devised by Henry VIII. It was felt, therefore, that she might be content to carry the nation at least no farther back than to that system. Had a different conclusion been entertained, no small amount of that friendly assistance of all parties which eased her way to the throne would have been withheld.

But the nation misjudged the mind of the Queen. While in her public acts Mary at first recognized the ecclesiastical independence of England, and bore the title which had been conferred in the Act of Supremacy, she at the same time entered into secret communication with the papal court. The national feeling found little response with her. Her heart was with Rome and Spain. By inheritance from her Spanish mother, as well as by memory of the wrongs which her mother had suffered, she was rendered in disposition and sympathy more Spanish than English. Her Spanish bent was speedily revealed in her obstinate determination, contrary to the will of Parliament and the nation at large, to accept the hand of Philip II. The marriage was consummated about a year from the beginning of her reign, the most that the opposition could effect being a careful limitation of the powers of the foreign consort. On the Spanish side the marriage was regarded as a politic step toward the universal monarchy which Charles V. was aspiring to found, and Philip II. treated it as little else than an accessory to political advantage. He remained in the country not much over a year, quite to the satisfaction of the people, but much to the anguish of the Queen, who lavished an affection upon him that he in no wise returned.

The Spanish match was rightly regarded by the discerning as a prophecy of a relentless assault against Protestantism. There was no long waiting for the fulfillment. Toward the close of the year 1554 Cardinal pole returned to England as papal legate.

1 Pole, who was related to the royal family, and in his earlier years was highly regarded by Henry VIII., had resided on the Continent since 1532. His return at an earlier date had been rendered impossible by his attempts to concert an armed invasion of England, for the purpose of bringing back the country into the unity of the Church. For a complete account of Pole's career see W. F. Hook, Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury, vol viii., or vol. iii. of the New Series.

Measures were now hastened through for subjecting the kingdom to the papacy and the Roman Catholic faith. A subservient Parliament responded to the demands of the court. The whole ecclesiastical legislation of the preceding reigns was swept away, with the exception that it was provided that the property which had been confiscated and secularized should not be restored. Full connection with Rome was resumed. The sanguinary laws against heresy were revived, and a fierce crusade was begun against the Protestants.

The character of the persecution is no subject for doubt or speculation. It was persecution for heresy, for the crime of believing contrary to the mediæval dogmas. The insurrectionary attempts which occurred may have exasperated the authorities. But those who shared in rebellion were hung for that crime. Those who were sent to the stake were condemned on the specific charge of heresy. In many eases the denial of transubstantiation and the sacrifice of the mass was the sole ground of sentence to the fire. No record and no profession of loyalty had any power to rescue. The persecution was not even in pretence anything else than a means of avenging defection from the Roman Catholic faith and of restoring that faith to supremacy.

The chief responsibility for the persecution admits of more inquiry. Some differences of opinion have been elicited. But most of the grounds needed for a probable conclusion are at hand. These grounds lead us to divide the responsibility between the Queen, her chancellor Stephen Gardiner, Cardinal Pole, and the Queen's Spanish advisers. While Bonner, Bishop of London, won peculiar infamy in the persecution, there is reason to conclude that he was rather the harsh executioner of the victims than a responsible author of their apprehension and arraignment. 1 "What made him odions was the vulgar, bullying personalities in which he indulged when the heretic, brought before him as a judge, provoked his angry passions" (Hook, Lives of the Archbishops,. vii. 311).

That the Queen took a leading part in initiating and urging on the severities cannot be questioned. No one of her subordinates excelled her in intolerant zeal or fanatical preference for the Romish Church. As she declared to Parliament, she believed that "she had been predestined and preserved by God to the succession of the crown for no other end save that He might make use of her above all else in the bringing back of the realm to the Catholic faith." In pursuing this end she identified pity with criminal weakness. Edicts issued under her authority express surprise at a relaxation of the prosecutions against heretics, and authorize extreme rigor in dealing with the guilty. 2 Burnet, Collection of Records, part ii. book ii. nos. 20, 32; Wilkins, Concilia, iv. 177. With a zeal mounting into ferocity, a few months before her death she ordered the sheriff of Hampshire immediately to execute a convicted heretic, whose recantation had caused the officer to withhold him from the flames." 3 Burnet, Reformation, ii. 568.

Gardiner's share in the persecution was probably not so great as has sometimes been represented. In restoring the severe laws against heresy he no doubt fulfilled an active part. But in this, however agreeable it may have been to his own way of thinking, he was urged on by the will of the sovereigns. 1 Ranke, History of England i. 204, 209; Massingberd, The English Reformation, p. 429. That he was really in favor of persecution is implied by the correspondence of Renard, the ambassador of Charles V. 2 Such at least is the inference from Froude's references to that correspondence (History of England, vi. 196, 197). On the other hand, we have the fact that he stood aloof after the first executions, and that his death, near the end of 1555, placed no check upon the carnival of intolerance. The conclusion seems to be that Gardiner, who was more politician than dogmatist, favored at the outset the execution of some of the influential leaders of the Protestants as a means of terrorism.

Pole has frequently been praised as an exponent of mild and tolerant principles. No doubt his position in previous years had been that of a somewhat liberal Roman Catholic, as opposed to the party of uncompromising bigotry. No doubt he preferred gentle measures when they would avail. But the fact remains that when he was the Queen's most trusted and influential adviser, the executions continued, and that men and women were burned in his own See of Canterbury. He evidently connived at the whole ungodly proceeding, and, more than that, helped it on in its later stages. 3 Wilkins, Concilia iv. 173, 174. He either did not wish to check the persecution, or else did not dare to do so, lest he should give countenance to the charge of heresy which was cast out against himself by the fanatical Pope. 1 Hook, Lives of the Archbishops, viii. 384-391.

Be respects the Spanish advisers of the Queen, two facts might appear to be in favor of their exculpation. The ambassador of Charles V., while he urged to great rigor against rebels, opposed persecution for heresy as being impolitic; and the chaplain of Philip II. publicly criticised the burning of the distinguished victims with which the crusade opened, declaring that such violent methods were contrary to the spirit of the gospel. As to the first of these facts, it may be replied that the politic ambassador could not compel the Spanish theologians who had access to the Queen to see with his eyes. Moreover, a historian of that nation has given credit to Carranza, who became the Queen's confessor, for bringing many, and among them Archbishop Cranmer, to the flames. 2 Fernandez, quoted by Massingberd, p. 436. As to the sermon of the royal chaplain in favor of tolerance, it was simply a piece of official hypocrisy to ward off odium from Philip, whose popularity at best came near a perilous deficit. The same chaplain, Alphonso de Castro, was the author of a book on the Just Punishment of Heretics, -- previously published, and published again after the sermon, -- in which the violent repression of heresy is explicitly advocated.

3 The following will serve as a specimen: "Nullum est gravins haeresi peccatum, nullum est ergo crimen, cujus odium sit Christiano viro magis incutiendum, et inde per consequens sequitur, ut nullum sit crimen pro quo justius aliquis possit occidi, quàm pro haeresi fixa at insanabili. Si Martinus Lutherus cùm primum coepit effundere venenum suum, et legitime admonitus noluit resipiscere, fuisset (ut decebat) capitis animadversione punitus, caeteri timorem habuissent, et non prorupissent tot tanque pestiferae haereticorum factiones, quales, proh dolor, hodie Germania sustinet" (De Justa Haereticorum Punitione, lib. ii, cap. xii., Antverpiae, 1568).

On the whole, it is difficult to escape the conviction that the Spanish advisers of the Queen, Philip himself included, helped to supply fuel to her intolerant zeal.

During the persecution about two hundred and eighty persons were burned at the stake, nearly a hundred, as is computed, died in prison, while many hundreds purchased safety by exile. The stamp of peculiar infamy which attaches to the reign of Mary is due not so much to the number of the victims as to the mode and the grounds of their execution. The burning of two hundred and eighty persons for heresy in the space of three and a half years stands without parallel in English history. The preceding one hundred and fifty years, during which the Lollard Statute had been in force, fails to give record of such an aggregate of victims; while the long reign of Elizabeth presents five instances of burning for heresy, and that of James I. adds two more. Other reigns were disfigured by violent persecutions; but in the unique horror of burning men alive for their religious opinions, the reign of Mary Tudor must bear forever in English annals an odious distinction.

1 Tierney, a Roman Catholic priest, whose learned notes have added much to Dodd's Church History, makes this candid acknowledgment: "As to the number and character of the sufferers, certain it is that no allowances can relieve the horror, no palliatives can remove the infamy, that must forever attach to these proceedings. The amount of real victims is too great to be affected by any partial deductions. Were the catalogue limited to a few persons, we might pause to examine the merits of each individual case; but when after the removal of every doubtful or objectionable name, a frightful list of not fewer than two hundred still remains, we can only turn with horror from the blood-stained page, and be thankful that such things have passed away" (Dodd's Church History, ii. 107).

Among the first to suffer were Rogers, Bishop Hooper, Lawrence Sanders, Bishop Ferrar, Rowland Taylor, and Bradford. It is narrated of Rogers, who was the protomartyr of this reign, that he seemed to be transported above all sense of pain, and bathed his hands in the flames as if they had been cold water. Sanders kissed the stake, and died exclaiming: "Welcome, the cross of Christ! Welcome, everlasting life!" Taylor journeyed toward the place of his execution as toward a place of pleasant fellowship and rest. Coming within two miles of Hadleigh, he cheerfully remarked: "Now I know I am almost at home. I lack not past two stiles to go over, and I am even at my Father's house!"

But the victims, who from their eminence attracted most attention, were Latimer, formerly Bishop of Worcester, Ridley, Bishop of London, and Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury. Ridley and Latimer were burned at Oxford, Oct. 16, 1555. Cranmer was burned at the same place, March 21, 1556.

If he was not the most scholarly of the three, Latimer is perhaps the most interesting on account of his strongly marked individuality. As respects doctrine, it was only by slow degrees that he broke sway from the Roman Catholic system. His interest was preëminently on the side of the practical, and the staple of his sermons corresponded. In the pulpit he rarely indulged in theological subtleties, his aim being to quicken the conscience of the people, and to lead them to a devout and upright life. In pursuance of this aim he used plain language and homely illustrations, though never descending into vulgarity. The simplicity and directness of his sermons were a reflex of the man. "He was," says Demaus, "a straightforward, upright man, who meant what he said, and practised what he taught; one who never sunk the man in the mere theological polemic, in whose eyes sin was always worse than error, and a pure life of more importance than a mere orthodox creed. This love of practical religion it was Latimer's mission to infuse into the English Reformation." 1 Biography of Hugh Latimer, p. 525. With this simplicity, honesty, and love of practical piety Latimer joined an equally courageous and humorous bent. He had indeed his hour of weakness, and under the great pressure that was brought to bear upon him (1532) signed a list of articles which carried with them implications that he strongly opposed in heart. But on the whole he was a man of conspicuous courage. He reminded the highest of their duty and responsibility with the same freedom as the humblest. He did not shun to address this bold charge to Henry VIII. while urging him to remove the prohibition against the circulation of the Bible: "Wherefore, gracious King, remember yourself; have pity upon your soul; and think that the day is even at hand when you shall give account of your office, and of the blood that hath been shed with your sword." Latimer had the qualities of the true censor. The moral earnestness, directness, and fire with which he sent home his denunciations of wrong remind of the Jewish prophet. At the same time he escaped the unpleasant impression which is apt to be made by the censor's office, through his abounding humor. His humor, indeed, was a prominent element of his power, a chief means of stamping truth upon the hearts of the people or of putting opponents to rout. Among other instances we have the following: A friar, whom his brethren put forward to answer the popular preacher, had argued from the pulpit that if the people were allowed to read the Bible, they would pervert the meaning and be led utterly astray. The ploughman, reading that no man having put his hand to the plough should look back, would soon forsake his labor; the baker, reading that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump, would make nothing but insipid Bread; and simple people, following the command to pluck out the offending right eye, would soon fill England with the spectacle of blind beggars. The next Sunday Latimer undertook to reply to his critic, who was present with his friar's hood. "As for the comparisons," said. he, "drawn from the plough, the leaven, and the eye, is it necessary to justify these passages of Scripture? Must I tell you what plough, what leaven, what eye is here meant? Is not our Lord's teaching distinguished by those expressions which under a popular form conceal a spiritual and profound meaning? Do we not know that in all languages and in all speeches it is not on the image that we must fix our eyes, but on the thing which the image represents? For instance," he continued, as he looked straight at the friar, "if we see a fox painted preaching in a friar's hood, nobody imagines that a fox is meant, but that craft and hypocrisy are described, which so often are disguised in that garb." The confusion of the poor friar at this point can better be imagined than told. Latimer's humor followed him to the end. The chamber of the Tower, where be was confined, prior to his transference to Oxford, being very badly heated, he complained to the jailer, and told him that if the government intended to burn him, they ought to see to it that they did not suffer him first to freeze to death. By this time Latimer had become bowed down by age and infirmity.

Ridley was less in years and less probably in popular power, but he ranked high in scholarship and general ability. Burnet commends him as being "for learning and solid judgment the ablest man of all that advanced the Reformation." 1 History of the Reformation, ii. 496. He was comely in person, persuasive in address, courteous in manners, and exemplary in the ordering of his life. In debate he was ready and apt. His answer, during his examination, to the miserable pretence that the Church exercises no severity, was perhaps the best that has ever been given. "I thank the court," said he, "for their gentleness, being the same that Christ had of the high priest. He said that it was not lawful for him to put any man to death, but committed Christ to Pilate, yet would he not suffer him to absolve Him, though he sought by all the means he might to do so."

The undaunted spirit with which Ridley looked forward to the hour of supreme trial appears in these words written a few months before his martyrdom:
"All of us here are in good health and comfort, watching with our lamps alight, when it shall please our Master, the bridegroom, to call us to wait upon him unto the marriage feast." At the stake a sermon was preached in honor of the Romish faith. Ridley, wishing to reply, was told that he could not do so unless he would renounce his false opinions. To this he responded, that as long as the breath was in his body, he would never deny his Lord Christ and His known truth. Latimer bore himself with equal bravery, and as he saw a blazing fagot laid at Ridley's feet encouraged his companion with the memorable words: "Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man. We shall this day light such a candle, by God's grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out."

Archbishop Cranmer was a man to whom unqualified praise cannot be awarded. He exhibited, it is true, highly commendable traits. He was very ready to overlook a personal injury. He was full of kindness to the poor and the unfortunate, and assisted them liberally with his means. He opposed some of the more cruel measures of Henry VIII. with commendable courage. Some of his apparent inconsistencies may be explained as the result of the peculiarities of his position and of the times. He lived in a transition age, and his own mind was in more or less of a transition state. He was not a man like Calvin, pushing his reasonings far and wide into the field upon which he entered, and speedily and decisively grasping a new set of opinions. It was but gradually that he abandoned old opinions for new, so that with good conscience he may have countenanced at one time persecution for articles of faith which he himself finally adopted. A good degree of charity also should be extended to him for apparently acting in some instances below the standard of a courageous and straightforward man. To one so reverent of kingship what temptation more trying than that imposed by the will of a prince from whom he has received abundant favors? How easy to entertain the suggestion that it is better to hold on to one's place in spite of same unwelcome compliance to royal wishes than to give over that place to an utter enemy of the good cause? Such considerations may palliate, but cannot excuse the conduct of Cranmer. He was pliant in a very unworthy degree to the arbitrary will of Henry VIII. His final recantation, also, to save himself from the fate of Ridley and Latimer, argues against his moral heroism and steadfastness. After all that may be said about the subtle arts with which he was plied, about the diligence employed to flatter him and awaken his love of life, it still remains true that he yielded and denied the faith of his heart. No great stress needs to be laid upon the fact that his recantation was sixfold. After the first disavowal, the remaining were drawn on by natural sequence. The probable history of the affair is well expressed by Strype. "The unhappy prelate," says he, "by over-persuasion wrote one paper with his subscription set to it, which he thought to pen so favorably and dexterously for himself that he might evade both the danger of the State and the danger of his conscience too. That would not serve, but another was required as explanatory of that. And when he had complied with that, yet, either because written too briefly or too ambiguously, neither would that serve but drew on a third, fuller and more expressive than the former. Nor could he escape so; but still a fourth and fifth paper of recantation were demanded of him to be more large and particular. Nay, and lastly a sixth, which was very prolix, containing an acknowledgment of all the forsaken and detested errors and superstitions of Rome." 1 Ecclesiastical Memorials, vol, iii. pt, 1. p. 391. The text and the circumstances of the recantations are given by Hook, Lives of the Archbishops, vii. 394-407.

Notwithstanding the recantation, it was decided that Cranmer must die. The man who had taken a leading part in making null the marriage of Catharine of Aragon, and in causing the nation to Stray from Roman supremacy, could obtain no mercy under a Spanish sceptre. Never did malice and bigotry more signally defeat their own intent. In order to make the most of the degraded Primate, he was allowed to address the people prior to his execution, his judges making no question but that he would urge unqualified submission to the Roman Catholic Church. But another spirit was in Cranmer in that hour. The fear of torture and death was at length mastered, and he closed his address with declarations that astonished his judges. After making a total recall of his recantation, he added: "And forasmuch as my hand has offended in writing contrary to my heart, my hand shall first be punished; for when I come to the fire it shall be first burned." Cranmer kept his promise. As the flames leaped up about him, the offending hand was stretched forth that it might be first burned. 2 The details of the scene are given in a letter of a Roman Catholic witness, quoted in Foxe's Acts and Monuments, and also in Strype's Memorials of Cranmer.

The pathos of Cranmer's repentance was well-nigh as effectual as would have been an example of true martyrdom. Indeed, weakness atoned for and triumphed over at last in such a signal manner, probably touched the hearts of many, who stood in doubt of their own ability to endure the fiery ordeal, more deeply then would a record of unswerving steadfastness. His death helped on the invincible recoil against Romanism which the work of blood was creating in the minds of the people. It was significant of a profound reaction when a lady wrote to Bonner, "You have lost the hearts of twenty thousand, that were rank Papists, within these twelve months." "The martyrs alone," says Froude, "broke the spell of orthodoxy, and made the establishment of the Reformation possible."

Mary died Nov. 17, 1558. If her reign had been unhappy for her subjects, it was no less so for herself, and her life went out in the midst of deep shadows. Afflicted by ill health, miserably deceived in her hope of an heir, neglected by Philip whom she worshipped, humiliated by national reverses, particularly the loss of Calais, making herself hated by her subjects through a persecution which she counted her bounden duty to God and the Church, opposed and plagued at last by the Pope, compelled in self-respect to shelve the requirements of the very pontiff whom she was laboring to enthrone over the consciences of her subjects, Mary had cause enough to die broken-hearted.

Cardinal Pole survived the Queen but a few hours. The bells which notified him of her departure sounded the knell for his great enterprise. Four years before he had stretched forth his hands over the prostrate representatives of the nation in Parliament, and with quiet but deep exultation had accepted their submission and proclaimed England restored to the unity of the Church. Now he was dying, himself under the papal frown, and every day making it more manifest that the great scene of the nation's reconciliation to Rome was an empty pageant, a solemn farce.

1 The hostility of the Pope to Spain had eventuated in war in 1557. As England assisted Philip II. against France, the Pope's ally,Paul IV. gave token of his displeasure in cancelling Pole's legation. At the same time, reviving an old grudge, he cited him to Rome to prove there his soundness in the faith. "The citation of Pole to appear before the Inquisition, as a reputed heretic, was never revoked. He who in England was condemning to the stake was afraid to appear in Rome, lest the furnace he heated for others might be heated sevenfold for himself" (Hook, Lives of the Archhishops, viii 353, 354).

The Reformation In England During The Reign Of Edward VI.

The Reformation In England During The Reign Of Edward VI.

Edward VI. was only nine years old at his accession, and his death occurred before he had reached his majority as specified in the testament of the late King. The regency, left in the hands of sixteen men, soon centered in the Duke of Somerset, who was appointed Protector of the realm. His discretion did not prove adequate to the difficult position. Means of overthrow were found, and in the closing years of Edward VI. he was superseded by the Duke of Northumberland.

The brief reign which bears the name of Edward VI. marks a decisive era in the history of the English Church. The untenable scheme of Henry VIII., which could satisfy neither Papist nor Protestant, was at once modified; and before the six years of Edward's rule were concluded, England had exchanged an Anglo-Catholic system for one which, without abuse of terms, may be called Protestant. Laws, articles, and, to a large extent, formularies of worship were made to assume a Protestant cast. The statute under which heretics had been burned since the rise of the Lollards was abolished.

1 The abolition of the statute ought in all consistency to have put a stop to the barbarous practice which it sanctioned. But we have the fact that under this Protestant administration Joan Bocher was burned in 1549 for denying the proper humanity of Christ, and George van Paris met the same fate in 1551 on account of Arian views. In the absence of the statute, appeal was made to the common law in these executions. It was a most impolitic and discreditable severity; and the chief agents, especially Cranmer, soon reaped a bitter recompense. Says Burnet: "In all the books published in Queen Mary's days, justifying her severity against the Protestants, these instances were always made use of; and no part of Cranmer's life exposed him more than this did" (Reformation, ii. 177-179).

The images were ordered to be removed from the churches. Communion in both kinds was enjoined. Marriage was made lawful for the clergy. Readiness and desire for fellowship with the Protestant brotherhood on the Continent were expressed in invitations to distinguished foreign divines to favor England with their presence. Such representatives of the Reformed Church as Peter Martyr and Martin Bucer received much honor, the one being installed at Oxford and the other at Cambridge, in 1549.

Under the new conditions the need of a new service-book naturally received early and emphatic recognition. In the latter part of the reign of Henry VIII. some progress had been made toward revising the old forms of worship. This work was now carried forward with alacrity; and before the middle of the year 1549 the venerated product of English piety and scholarship, the Book of Common Prayer, was brought into use. It was largely the work of Cranmer, and reflects his inclination to a mediatorial position between the old and the new, his reverent love of the past and at the same time his consciousness of the need of change. It reflects also his felicitous mastery of the English language. "As the translation of the Bible," says Froude, "hears upon it the impress of Tyndale, so, while the Church of England remains, the image of Cranmer will be seen reflected on the calm surface of the Liturgy. The most beautiful portions of it are translations from the Breviary; yet the same prayers translated by others would not be those which chime like church-bells in the ears of the English child. The translations and the addresses, which are original, have the same silvery melody of language, and breathe the same simplicity of spirit." 1 History of England, v. 391,

The progress of opinion soon raised a demand that some of the traces of mediæval thought and custom, which had been retained in the Prayer Book, should be corrected. The influence of the foreign divines no doubt helped to strengthen this demand, but there were native theologians who were anxious to cast out the remaining vestiges of mediævalism. Among these was Hooper, to whom a special notoriety attaches as a forerunner of the Puritans in his opposition to the clerical vestments. The learned Ridley was also in favor of such emendations as should make the Prayer Book a more unequivocal exponent of Protestant sentiments. These recommendations succeeded the more easily as Cranmer himself shared in the advance of opinion. Quite early in the reign of Edward VI. his mind seems to have been disabused of the doctrine of the real presence, and he was carried along by the current into enlarging sympathy with the ordinary Reformed type. Accordingly a revision was made, and a somewhat more Protestant cast was given to the Prayer Book, much to the grief of Nonjurors and Ritualists in later times.

1 One of the principal changes effected by the revision of the Prayer Book was in the communion service. The invocation of the Holy Ghost upon the elements was omitted, the prayer of oblation was converted into a thanksgiving, and the words used in the delivery of the elements were so modified as to avoid any implication of a real bodily presence. We may also include among the more noticeable items the discontinuance of exorcism and other usages connected with baptism and the visitation of the sick (Hardwicke, Reformation, pp. 224-229).

The distinguishing characteristic, however, which it bore at its first compilation, was not eliminated. In preserving many elements of the ancestral worship, it continued to serve as a bond of connection with the past. The revived edition was authoritatively published in 1552.

The Articles of Religion, forty-two in number, prepared chiefly by Cranmer and Ridley, served as the basis of the Thirty-Nine Articles which have so long been in force in the Church of England. Being drawn up at the close of Edward's reign, they constitute, as might be expected, a thoroughly Protestant creed. Indeed the Articles, whether in their original or their final form, bear only in slight measure the character of a compromise document. In the Liturgy a mind reverent of the mediæval system can find that which may be interpreted in harmony with its preferences. But the Articles are no mean between Anglo-Catholicism and Protestantism. They constitute a robust Protestant creed, such as a Calvin or a Knox would have found little occasion to criticise.

1 Baur says of the Articles: "The dogmatic decisions contained in them were rather Melanchthonian than Lutheran or Calvinian" (Kirchengeschichte der Neueren Zeit, p. 385). Perhaps moderate Calvinism is as accurate a description of the creed as can be made in a single phrase.

While Protestantism was being enthroned in the minds of theologians and established by act of government, it was not equally successful in winning the firm and intelligent acceptance of the nation at large. Religious reconstruction in the hearts of the people did not keep pace with the formation of prayer books and creeds. While there were able preachers here and there, the demand for the indoctrination of the masses was far from being adequately met. Not a few had gone far enough to lose confidence in the old faith, but had not yet come close enough to the new to feel its virtue. They were thus left practically destitute of the restraints of religion. Many of the nobles were mere policy Christians, and in their view the best policy was that which would yield the largest spoil. The indeterminate form of the government entailed by the minority of the sovereign hindered a vigilant oversight of affairs and the repression of abuses. The consequence was that there was much plundering of ecclesiastical property, much exhibition of irreverence and irreligion. Such conditions were evidently favorable to a Romish reaction. A strong government, allied with a vigorous system of education and evangelism, might have barred out the reaction and secured the structure already reared. But the early death of Edward prevented the application of needed remedies. At the accession of Mary grave causes of dissatisfaction were ready to assist her in the design of a Roman Catholic restoration.

The Reformation In England Under Henry VIII.

The Reformation In England Under Henry VIII.

THE history of the Reformation in England is not the history of a rapid transition to a new order of religious beliefs. The revolt from Rome, however suddenly accomplished in legislative decrees, was but slowly achieved in fact. England, as regards the feelings and established principles of the great body of her people, could hardly be pronounced a Protestant country before the middle of Elizabeth's reign. It is true an essentially Protestant scheme was introduced in the reign of Edward VI.; but the ease with which it was swept away on the accession of Mary shows that it had not taken root in the hearts of more than a fraction of the nation.

That the reform did not proceed more rapidly and radically, was due to several causes. A large element of conservatism was inwoven with the national temper. No theologian of commanding ability and energy, such as a Luther, a Zwingli, or a Calvin, appeared upon the field of agitation. Their disposition, as well as their circumstances, inclined the leaders to depend very largely upon governmental action, instead of making a direct and powerful appeal to the people. The political factor had, therefore, an ample scope. The throne, in fact, exercised a dominant influence over the English reformation. It was not the author of that reformation. The movement was started in the face of its prohibition. But it vigorously asserted its influence in directing, limiting, and organizing the movement.

The great English sovereigns of the sixteenth century were no friends of radical Protestantism. Even Elizabeth, while her sovereignty served as a bulwark of the Protestant cause in Europe, was averse to a sweeping change from the old system, and would have consented to Rome with quite as little reluctance as to Geneva. As for Henry VIII., it is only by an abuse of terms that he can be called a Protestant. With nearly as much propriety one might call the Hohenstaufen sovereigns Protestants, on account of their quarrels with the Popes. Henry VIII. is properly defined as a refractory Roman Catholic. While he cut loose to some extent from mediæval fetishism, and made concessions to the circulation of the Bible, he still undertook to sustain well-nigh: the whole system of the scholastic dogmas. He never placed foot upon the evangelical basis of Protestantism; and the principal change which he aimed to effect was to substitute his own authority, within English domains, for that of the Pope.

The attempt of the crown to manage religious affairs according to its own behests was greatly assisted by the relative lack of independence which characterized the English people under the Tudors. Before the reign of Henry VIII. had reached its meridian, loyalty had degenerated into servility. The explanation of this pliant attitude is found partly in the preceding history and partly in the personality of the sovereign. The ruinous wars between the houses of York and Lancaster had created an extreme dread of civil commotion. Men thought of civil strife as a worse evil than tyranny. While thus disposed by a consideration of interest to endure a vast stretch of royal prerogative, they were impelled in the same direction by feelings of esteem and admiration. For in the earlier part of his reign Henry VIII. seemed to Englishmen the very pattern of royalty. His personal appearance was noble. He is described by a foreign resident at his court as by far the handsomest sovereign in Europe. 1 Venetian ambassador Giustiniani, Despatches, ii. 312. With courtliness and magnificence he combined an easy and friendly style of intercourse with the people. The faults of his government being charged upon his ministers interfered but little with his popularity. Thus it came about that when his remorseless selfishness began to break through the smooth exterior, few checks were interposed against his arbitrary will. The scheme of Hobbes was practically anticipated. A great Leviathan - lord of men's consciences as well as of their conduct-was on the throne. The will of the sovereign became the standard for the profession and practice of the people. The national trait, upon which the Venetian ambassador commented with so much severity in the time of Queen Mary, had been well exemplified under Henry VIII. "The example and authority of the sovereign," he wrote, "are everything with the people of this country in matters of faith. As he believes, they believe; Judaism or Mohammedanism,-it is all one with them. They conform themselves easily to his will, at least so far as the outward show is concerned, and most easily of all where it concurs with their own pleasure or profit." 1 Giovanni Micheli, quoted by Prescott, Philip II., i. 70. This is, of course, an exaggerated statement. Conviction had its impregnable entrenchments in the hearts of Englishmen, as is well attested by a noble line of martyrs. The remark of the ambassador, however, has its significance as indicating how large a measure of subserviency to royal authority was exhibited, and how gradually the minds of the people became actually possessed by the truths of the Reformation.

It is to be observed that while the conservative spirit, as represented by the crown and some of its more distinguished agents, gave to the English Church a more hierarchical and ritualistic cast than appeared in any other reformed country, a tendency exactly contrary to this was at the same time generated. By a natural reaction, as the hierarchical and ritualistic scheme was enforced, the opposing tendency gathered increasing intensity. Premonitions of the great conflict which convulsed the nation in the seventeenth century reach back almost to the foundation of the established Church.

No single abuse, like the sale of indulgences, started the Reformation in England. But the movement, doubtless, received no small incentive from the prevalence of corruption and malpractice among ecclesiastics. Profitable superstitions, though receiving the scorn of the more advanced spirits, were cherished with shameless tenacity. Pride, arrogance, and avarice were displayed to a degree which provoked the disgust of many a layman. The opening of the sixteenth century was indeed a palmy time with the higher ecclesiastics in England. The influence which the nobility had lost by the Wars of the Roses seemed to have accrued in large measure to the prelates. They held a chief place in the State as well as in the Church. By an enormous abuse of the practice of pluralities they massed great revenues into their hands, and were foremost among examples of showy and luxurious living.

At the head of the ecclesiastical dignitaries stood Wolsey. Brought to notice in the closing years of the reign of Henry VII., he advanced rapidly to the first place in the control of affairs. Offices and emoluments were literally heaped upon him. He had all at once the position of chancellor of the realm, the bishopric of Winchester, the rich abbey of St. Albans, and the archbishopric of York. 1 Jeremy Collier, Ecclesiastical History of Great Britain, iv. 125, ed. 1840; Gilbert Burnet, History of the Reformation of the Church of England, i. 12, 13, ed. 1843. He was also made cardinal, and was vested with an authority, as legate, which scarcely fell short of a practical supremacy over the Church of England. To this official elevation Wolsey undoubtedly brought more than common abilities. The Venetian ambassador speaks with admiration of his industry and extraordinary capacity for work, representing him as discharging in person all the varied functions which in Venice were devolved upon the different magistracies and councils. 2 Giustiniani, Despatches ii. 314. His character, too, was not without its favorable side. He was free from the bitterness of dogmatism. Though in his dying message he urged upon the King the necessity of depressing the "new sect of Lutherans," 1 Cavendish, Life of Wolsey, p. 389. he was not, during the period of his authority, directly accessory to any act of bloody intolerance. He cherished also liberal schemes of education and designs of ecclesiastical reform. Some have supposed that if he had reached the goal of his ambition and ascended the papal throne, he would have done much to check the advancing revolution by removing the causes of offense. This is, however, a baseless supposition. Even if Wolsey had possessed the right disposition, the prerogatives of the papacy in his hand would have been no effectual guarantee of reform. To renovate the old Church, vastly more was needed than a well-disposed Pope. But Wolsey did not have the right disposition. This worldly prelate, whose best energies were absorbed in European politics, who never indicated that he was half awake to the crisis which had overtaken Latin Christendom, who made the service of God secondary to the service of the Kings and to his own advancement, was not the man to arrest religious revolution by lifting the Church to a higher plane. In the chair of Peter he would probably have performed a part scarcely more illustrious than that of Leo X.

2 Some members of the Angle-Catholic school have given a much more favorable picture of Wolsey than even their mediæval standpoint will warrant. In opposition to their intemperate praise the following sober estimate of a Roman Catholic historian is pertinent: "We may pronounce Wolsey a minister of consummate address and commanding abilities; greedy of wealth and power, and glory; anxious to exalt the throne on which his own greatness was built and the church of which he was so distinguished a member; but capable, in the pursuit of these different objects, of stooping to expedients which sincerity and Justice would disavow, and of adopting, through indulgence to the caprice and passions of the King, measures which often involved him in contradictions and difficulties and ultimately occasioned his ruin" (Lingard, History of England, vi. 42, ed. 1851).

In considering the beginnings of the English Reformation we may notice three factors: (1) Remnants of the Wycliffite party, or Lollards, still found among the poor in the realm; (2) The learned; (3) The Government.

Respecting the Lollards in the early part of the sixteenth century little information is afforded, except the record of the prosecutions to which they were subjected. Six were condemned to the stake in 1509, and at intervals between this date and 1519 like sentence was passed upon others. C. Geikie, The English Reformation. A considerable number were constrained to recant, and were required to wear during life the fagot badge. The measure of influence exerted by this class was probably not very large. Indeed, it is a question whether the direct inheritance which had come down from the Wycliffite movement was an advantage to the Reformation in England. The Lollards represented a cause which had already been condemned and covered with odium, The resemblance, therefore, of their tenets to the leading doctrines of the new reformers was the reverse of a recommendation to the latter, especially with the middle and higher classes. On the other hand, the Lollards supplied to the Reformation a means of entrance into the humbler ranks; and if their numbers were considerable this was not a small advantage.

Among the learned a special incentive was derived from the Greek Testament of Erasmus, with its accompaniment of a new Latin translation and free-spirited annotations. In no country, in fact, does the work of Erasmus appear to have been more directly fruitful than in England. A specially hearty welcome was accorded to it by a number of young men in the universities. Their earnest perusal of its pages bore its legitimate fruit in a quickened religious life and a more enlightened faith. At Cambridge, Thomas Bilney, a man of mild and devout temper, was among the first to be awakened to a new sense of evangelical truth. About 1524 Hugh Latimer, who had been noted for his attachment to the Romish system, and on receiving the degree of Bachelor of Divinity had used the occasion to attack Melanchthon, was converted by the influence of Bilney. John Fryth, Robert Barnes, and others were also included in the reforming group at Cambridge. Meanwhile the divergence of these men from the old doctrinal system was not of the most radical sort. They retained some of the Romish dogmas, though bringing to them a spirit which would naturally urge erelong to a wider departure.

The movement was transferred from Cambridge to Oxford, and that by the act of Wolsey himself in selecting some of the more promising of the young men in the former university to help fi11 up the college which he had just founded. The conjecture has been made that Wolsey selected them with the full knowledge of their liberal tendencies, and expected that the soothing effect of patronage would bring them to a quiescent state. But it is more probable that respect for their talents led to their choice. In any case, the Cardinal was chagrined over the result. It was soon rumored that the college which he expected to be a bulwark of the Church and a glory to his name was infected with heresy. Arrests were forthwith made (1526). Clark, one of the foremost in the list, died in prison, and others were taken with mortal sickness. This was a more serious issue than Wolsey desired, and he accordingly gave orders for the release of the imprisoned students.

The evangelical group at Cambridge was likewise assailed. Barnes was apprehended. Threats and persuasions deluded him for the time being into a recantation. The same was true of Bilney; but both at a later date nobly atoned for their weakness. Latimer was also called to account, but was able to satisfy Wolsey without suffering restriction of his liberty. 1 R. Demaus, Biography of Hugh Latimer, pp. 56-58.

Among these early reformers from the universities, the first place as respects breadth and permanence of influence is to be assigned to William Tyndale, the one man among all Englishmen who has left any marked impress of his individuality upon our English Bible. Very soon after leaving the University of Cambridge (which may have occurred at the close of 1521), Tyndale became convinced that the Bible in the language of the people must serve as the great instrument of reform. "I perceived by experience," he says, "how that it was impossible to establish the lay people in any truth, except the Scriptures were plainly laid before their eyes in their mother-tongue, that they might see the process, order, and meaning of the text." 2 Ibid., William Tyndale, p. 71, ed. 1886. To turn the saving light of the Bible upon England became now his absorbing ambition. "If God spare my life," he said to a learned man who urged appeal to the Pope rather than to Scripture, "ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more of the Scripture than thou doest." Completely foiled in his endeavor to obtain aid for his project from the Bishop of London, and discovering that not so much as tolerance for it was to be expected in England, he crossed over to the Continent (1524). Even there he was subjected to repeated dangers and embarrassments, and was obliged to shift his residence from one city to another. Messengers from England were sent to hunt him out, and, if possible, to destroy both him and his enterprise. The former design was ultimately accomplished. Tyndale suffered martyrdom in the Netherlands in 1536. But his enterprise had already been a great success, and was forthwith to be crowned with new victories. As early as 1526 the New Testament was published, six thousand copies being printed at Worms. 1 A warning that the incendiary literature would soon be in England was sent by Edward Lee, afterwards Archbishop of York, who was then on his way to Spain. His letter to Henry VIII. is a significant specimen of the dread of an open Bible which was entertained by zealous adherents of Rome. "I need not advertise your Grace what infection and danger may ensue hereby if it be not withstood. This is the next way to fill your realm with Lutherans. For all Luther's perverse opinions me grounded on the bare words of Scripture not well taken or understood, which your Grace hath opened in sundry places of your royal book. All our forefathers, governors of the Church of England, have with all diligence forbid and eschewed the publication of English Bibles, as appears in provincial constitutions of the Church of England" (Ellis, Original Letters, CL.). These were rapidly distributed, the "Society of Christian Brothers," which bad been formed in London, probably helping to expedite the matter. Reprints immediately followed from the presses of the Dutch printers. Attempts of English bishops to check the circulation by buying up all accessible copies only supplied funds for new editions. Tyndale was able to send forth the Pentateuch in 1530, and it is understood that at the time of his death he had carried the translation to the end of the Books of Chronicles. All this labor was destined to permanent recognition in the English-speaking world. The translations of Tyndale, in very large part, lay at the basis of the editions which were permitted or authorized under Henry VIII., and no later revisions have served to conceal the handwriting of the great translator. Coverdale's translation, which was issued in 1535, was based in part on that of Tyndale. Luther's version and some others were also consulted. Matthew's (or more properly Roger's) Bible embraced all of Tyndale's work, and used Coverdale's version in completing the Old Testament. This was authorized by the Government in 1537-1538. The "Great Bible," published in 1539 under government auspices and the editorship of Coverdale, was a revised edition of Matthew's Bible. Tavener's version, which also appeared in 1539, was largely indebted to Matthew's.

The English Bible was Tyndale's peculiar legacy to his countrymen. But he had a still further relation to the religious revolution in England. He was a pioneer as respects the introduction of the Reformed theology. Several treatises which came from his pen received much attention. They indicate a man of force and thoughtfulness, though the bitter polemic in which he sometimes indulges stands quite in contrast with the calm majesty of the transistor. The importance which opponents attached to his writings is seen in the fact that Sir Thomas More, in his attempted refutations, filled nearly a thousand folio pages.

Thus the Reformation was begun in England by scholars and common people acting in entire independence of the Government, and in the face of its violent opposition. It was not till after the movement had progressed to a very noticeable degree that Henry VIII. rebelled against the Pope; and then self-will and considerations of personal pleasure dictated his course rather than any sympathy with the Protestant theology. As we have seen, he assumed at one time the rôle of the theologian against Luther, and exulted in the title of Defender of the Faith conferred upon him by the Pope. As late as 1527, he was counted a chief supporter of the papacy, and appeared anxious to avenge the imprisonment which his Holiness suffered in that year at the hands of the troops of Charles V. But about this very time a subject was broached destined to result in a rupture with the papal court. This was the famous question of divorce. Arthur, an older brother of Henry VIII., had died soon after marrying Catharine of Aragon, an aunt of Charles V. Reasons of State caused Henry to be married to his brother's widow, a union which required a papal dispensation. After about seventeen years of married life, Henry began to express doubts as to the propriety of his union with Catharine. It is certain that conscience was not the only motive power which urged him to seek a divorce. Still it is not wholly incredible that he may have felt some conscientious scruples on the subject. Of several children by Catharine, all had died in infancy with the exception of one daughter. Being exceedingly anxious for a male heir, Henry might very naturally be led to the suspicion that the death of his children was a visitation from Heaven upon an unrighteous marriage. Whatever the real strength of the King's scruples, they were so reinforced by other influences as to lend to decisive action. According to the belief of Catharine, and a very general opinion of the time, Wolsey's ambition served as an effective spur to Henry's doubts. Having reached the highest summit of power which the realm afforded, the Cardinal aspired to complete the list of honors by ascending the papal throne. Charles V. promised to second his aspirations, but bitterly disappointed him. The enraged cardinal thought it would be nothing more than a fitting recompense to forward the divorce from Catharine and marry Henry to a French princess, thus allying him with the great enemy of Charles. It is certain, as is assumed in this theory, that Wolsey desired to make a firm alliance with France; but the proof that he first suggested the divorce is not so decisive. Probably more effective than conscientious scruples or ministerial advice was the passionate attachment which the King had formed for Anne Boleyn. As this lady refused to be his mistress, he determined to make her his queen. This was a choice to which Wolsey was utterly averse, but Henry was too determined to brook any opposition on this score even from the powerful minister.

The contradictory items in the famous question of divorce may be seen in the following summary of the main points: (1) As stated above, contemporary opinion, to a noticeable extent, made Wolsey the prime mover in the divorce suit. (2) The King, before the legatine court of Wolsey and Campeggio, expressly asserted that the Cardinal did not first suggest the divorce, but rather opposed it at the start. (3) The King affirmed that his scruples were excited by the fact that the Bishop of Tarbes, the French ambassador, while negotiating respecting the marriage of the Princess Mary to the Duke of Orleans, had raised some question about the legitimacy of the princess. (4) The negotiation with the Bishop of Tarbes occurred in the early part of the year 1527. But in 1531 the King told Simon Grynæus that for seven years he had abstained from the bed of Catharine, evidently wishing to convey the impression that his scruples reached as far back as 1524. (5) According to some of the most thorough investigators, there is evidence that secret action in the direction of the divorce was taken in 1526, and accordingly before the conference with the Bishop of Tarbes. (6) Knight, the King's ambassador to the Pope in 1527, was instructed to inquire whether the King might not contract a new marriage, that with Catharine still standing. From this it would appear that desire for a new marriage, rather than a sore conscience over the old, was the impelling motive in the royal mind. This inference gains double weight it one gives credit to the evidence that the relation of Henry VIII. to Mary Boleyn was such as legally to debar a marriage with her sister Anne. See, on the whole subject, J. S. Brewer, Reign of Henry VIII. from his accession to the Death of Wolsey, vol. ii

The Pope, being plied for a divorce, found himself in a great dilemma. If he should grant the divorce, he would earn the mortal hatred of Charles V.; if he withheld it, he would be visited with equal displeasure from Henry VIII. He adopted, therefore, a policy of delay. The wearisome length to which the negotiations were drawn out, and their unpromising look in the end proved fatal to Wolsey. Failure in a minister to accomplish the royal pleasure was in the eyes of Henry VIII. a capital crime. Wolsey was degraded from the chancellorship in 1529, and died on his way to the Tower in 1530. "On his deathbed his thoughts still clung to the prince whom he had served. 'Had I but served God as diligently as I have served the King,' murmured the dying man, 'He mould not have given me over in my gray hairs. But this is my due reward for my pains and study, not regarding my service to God, but only my duty to my prince.' No words could paint with so terrible a truthfulness the spirit of the new despotism which Wolsey had done more than any of those who went before him to build up. From tempers like his, all sense of loyalty to England, to its freedom, to its institutions, had utterly passed away, and the one duty which the statesman owed was a duty to his 'prince.' " 1 J. R. Green, History of the English People, ii. 150.

The fall of Wolsey was the fall of his order. Churchmen sank at once to a plane of lessened authority. The charge against Wolsey of having accepted and fulfilled the functions of papal legate contrary to the laws against foreign appointments, was at the same time a charge against the ecclesiastics who had become his accomplices by accepting his legatine jurisdiction. The charge in either case was founded in malice rather than in equity; but it had a show of legality, and could be utilized for bending the clergy in general to the royal will. Wolsey, in fact, was a principal author of the ecclesiastical supremacy of the crown. He concentrated in himself the ecclesiastical sovereignty of the realm; being an obsequious servant of the crown, while he was ruler of the Church, he helped to bridge over the interval between the temporal and the spiritual ; he compromised the position of those under him so that his forfeit could be made theirs also. Accordingly, when he fell the ecclesiastical supremacy was within easy reach of the King.

The patience of Henry VIII. having become exhausted by the tedious manœuvres of Clement VII., he determined at length to settle his "great matter" without recourse to Rome. By the advice of Cranmer, the universities, and numerous individuals who were reputed learned in the canon law, were consulted on the validity of the marriage with Catharine. A fair proportion of these reported in the King's favor. The favorable verdict, however, was in some cases the result of bribery or a shameless use of royal authority. In January, 1583, the King celebrated in private his marriage with Anne Boleyn. Later in the same year Cranmer, who had been created Archbishop of Canterbury, passed sentence against the marriage with Catharine as unlawful and invalid, and ratified the marriage with Anne Boleyn, who was publicly crowned queen. To seal emphatically the separation from the papacy, Parliament passed, in 1534, the Act of Supremacy, by which it was ordered that the King "shall be taken, accepted, and reputed the only supreme head on earth of the Church of England, and shall have and enjoy, annexed and united to the Imperial Crown of this realm, as well the title and state thereof as all the honors, jurisdictions, authorities, immunities, profits, and commodities to the said dignity belonging; and that our said sovereign lord, his heirs and successors, kings of this realm, shall have full power to visit, repress, redress, reform, and amend all such errors, heresies, abuses, contempts, and enormities, which by any manner of spiritual authority or jurisdiction might or may lawfully be reformed." Three years before Convocation had conceded to Henry the title of "supreme lord and head of the Church and Clergy of England," but had blunted its force by the addition of the ambiguous clause, "so far as the law of Christ will allow." Even in the mind of the King, the title, as then employed, did not seem to mean a positive renouncing of papal authority, for negotiations were still kept up with Rome. The definite abrogation of the papal headship over the English Church is most properly located at the year 1534. 1 For a list of the successive steps by which the papal jurisdiction was abolished, see J.H. Blunt, The Reformation of the Church of England, i. 277, 278. This work is written from an Anglo-Catholic or anti-Protestant standpoint.

The steps taken by the government toward a rupture with Rome were accompanied by no great show of favor toward the Protestants. Indeed, a persecution was inaugurated which was more searching than any which had occurred up to that time. Thomas More succeeded Wolsey in the chancellorship. Contrary to what might have been expected from the free-spirited humanist and layman, he proved a more diligent persecutor than the Cardinal had been, more zealous to suppress both heretics and their writings. Some exaggerated statements may have been made respecting his severities. But it is certain that he considered burning a fit punishment for heretics; that during his administration several were sent to the stake, and that he pursued the memory of some of these after their death with most unfeeling slurs. His acts and his writings combine to convey the impression that his zeal so far got the better of his amiability as to pass over into a species of fanaticism. His controversial tracts against Luther and Tyndale are among the most fertile in scurrility and invective which that intemperate age produced.

More held his office but a short time. Seeing the unconquerable tendency of the King to revolt against Rome, he pleaded ill health and retired in 1532. Three years later his refusal to give the desired acknowledgment to the King's supremacy brought him to the scaffold (July 6, 1535). A fortnight before, Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, whom the Pope had made a cardinal while he was in prison, had been executed on the same ground. The sacrifice of these two men, whom all parties allow to have been distinguished for their integrity, was justly regarded as a piece of tyranny; for there is no indication that they were disposed to offer anything more than a passive resistance to the new régime. Among the more humble victims to the royal supremacy the monks of the Charterhouse in London won an honorable name by their constancy.

From this point the conduct of Henry VIII. may be described as a somewhat wavering opposition both to the Protestant and the strict Roman Catholic systems. His ideal was evidently an Anglo-Catholic Church; that is, a church conformed in the main to the mediæval model as respects constitution and doctrine, but having an English sovereign for its supreme head in place of the Pope. His measures, however, were tinged not a little by the spirit of the counselors who happened to be in the ascendant. At one time Archbishop Cranmer, for whom the King had a special esteem, succeeded in influencing him in the interest of the Reformation. In this he was seconded by the powerful and despotic minister Thomas Cromwell, who aimed at a political alliance with Protestantism and zealously fostered some of its features, whatever may have been the measure of his sympathy with the Protestant theology. At another time advisers like Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, gained the ear of the King, and decrees extremely hostile to Protestant teaching were issued.

Among the more important measures which signalized the headship of Henry VIII. over the Church of England, the following deserve special mention: (1) The promulgation of the Ten Articles and kindred expositions of doctrine; (2) The dissolution of the monasteries; (3) The enacting of the Six Articles; (4) Provision for the distribution of the Bible in English.

The Ten Articles, signed by members of the Convocation and published in 1536, present the old creed in such a moderate form as might conciliate the party of reform. While they inculcate the doctrine of the real bodily presence in the Eucharist, the full sacrament of penance, with auricular confession included, the veneration of saints, and prayer for souls in purgatory, they do not necessitate the acceptance of transubstantiation, mention only three sacraments, warn against making too much of the saints, dissuade from refinements upon purgatory, and disallow the value of papal pardons and of masses as means of helping the souls of the departed. The Ten Articles were followed the next year by the "Bishops' Book," of the "Institution of a Christian Man." This differed little in tone from the Ten Articles, and its contents were mainly an expansion of the same. Froude has pronounced it, in point of language, "beyond question the most beautiful composition which had as yet appeared in English prose." 1 History of England, iii. 245.

"The Necessary Erudition of a Christian Men," authoritatively published in 1543, bears some traces of the reactionary movement which had been started shortly before.

Cardinal Wolsey, acting under the authority of the Pope, had given an example, on a moderate scale, of suppressing monasteries; a score having been sacrificed for the founding of his colleges at Ipswich and Oxford. After the separation from Rome a further suppression naturally followed, from the conviction that these institutions were alien to the new order of things and formed a dangerous bond of connection with the papacy, as well as from an avaricious appetite for their enormous wealth. Nearly four hundred were dissolved in 1536, and the still larger remainder experienced a like fate in the years immediately following. Some of the monasteries no doubt deserved their downfall, in consideration of the iniquities which they had harbored. But the suddenness with which a large multitude of people were thrown out of their accustomed mode of life bears an appearance of harshness, while the manner in which the crown and its favorites appropriated the greater share of the proceeds can hardly be characterized as anything else than shameless spoliation. In general, it may be said, the dissolution of the monasteries was justified on the score of religious and State policy, but the manner in which the dissolution was effected was cause for national grief and shame. An unbiased historical judgment will subscribe to the following words of Hallam: "If Henry had been content with prohibiting the profession of religious persons for the future, and had gradually diverted their revenues instead of violently confiscating them, no Protestant could have found it easy to censure his policy." Constitutional History of England, chap, ii.

In 1537-1539 the English Bible was published under sanction of the government, and allowed to be freely distributed. This may be counted the greatest indulgence which Henry VIII. awarded to Protestant principles. And even this concession was in part withdrawn. After the execution of Cromwell, in 1540, the anti-Protestant element found opportunity to vent its dislike of the unrestricted reading of the Bible; and in 1543 a decree was issued prohibiting the public reading of the Scriptures except in the authorized services, and the private reading of the same on the part of the humbler classes.

The Six Articles present in a most undisguised manner the mediæval theology which was still entrenched in the mind of Henry VIII., after his revolt against the papacy. One of their designs seems to have been to notify the world that the King had not become infected with Protestantism. They assert transubstantiation, the adequacy of communion in one kind, the celibacy of priests, the perpetual obligation of rows of chastity, the utility of private masses, and the necessity of auricular confession. These Articles were given the force of law by Act of Parliament in 1539, and barbarous penalties were denounced against those who should contradict them. Any denial of the first was to be punished with death by burning. A first offense against the others entailed confiscation of property; a second offense was punishable with death.

The ascendancy of the reactionary party prophesied a gloomy time for the friends of reform. And in truth victims were not wanting, though the onslaught was less extensive than might have been expected from the tenor of the Six Articles. Barnes, Garret, and Jerome were burned in 1540; Testwood, Peerson, and Filmer in 1543. Anne Ascue, a woman of eminent station and talents, was tortured and burned in 1546, for denying the doctrine of the real presence. Three companions perished with her. Latimer was confined in the Tower. Papists and Protestants both suffered, and sometimes were carried on the same hurdles to execution. A stranger in England at the time had occasion to remark that "those who were against the Pope were burned, and those who were for him were hanged." The death of Henry VIII. in 1547 caused a cessation of this anomalous and double persecution.

The character of this monarch has received but little eulogy from the great majority of historians. Mr. Froude, however, while he finds many things in his rule to condemn or to apologize for, makes him out, on the whole, a sovereign quite superior in character as well as in ability. As has been well suggested, Mr. Froude seems to lay too much stress upon contemporary verdicts, and does not make sufficient allowance for the subservient spirit toward the throne which characterized the King's associates and a large proportion of the people in that era. When Parliaments were ready at the royal nod to declare the King released from his debts, and Convocation undertook to dissolve a marriage, without the least show of legal ground, simply because it was distasteful to the monarch,-- when thus the highest powers in State and Church were enslaved, the fact that this or that party helped to give a specious appearance to various deeds of the King does not go far toward his justification. It was understood to be no safe matter to bring in a different verdict from that which was desired. There might be courage to resist an exorbitant tax, for the universal opposition to it relieved each individual from serious responsibility. But where less support could be counted on, conduct was too apt to be determined by dread of the royal displeasure.

No doubt Henry VIII. had some of the qualities of an efficient ruler. To strong resolution he added a degree of compliance with the demands of the times. He knew the value of popularity. He had the discretion not to push any particular policy beyond the bounds of national endurance. But the restraint which he acknowledged lay in policy rather than in any conscientious moderation. His essential temper was that of an Oriental despot. Not to mention other features of his rule, the heartlessness with which he sacrificed the feelings and the lives of his queens, and sent to the scaffold the ministers who had served him with signal devotion, gives an unavoidable impression of devouring egotism and unfeeling tyranny. "In Henry VIII.," says Ranke, "we remark no free self-abandonment and no inward enthusiasm, no real sympathy with any living man; men are to him only instruments which he uses and then breaks to pieces." 1 History of England, i. 169, English edition.

Protestantism In The Netherlands

Protestantism In The Netherlands

The renunciation of the sceptre by Charles V., in 1555, brought the government of the Netherlands into the hands of his son Philip II. The Netherlands embraced at that time seventeen provinces, covering nearly the same territory which at present is included in Holland and Belgium. These provinces were anciently independent states. In the first half of the fifteenth century they were united under the Duke of Burgundy; and, toward the end of the same century, they passed under the sovereignty of the house of Austria. They continued, however, to enjoy considerable privileges of local self-rule, which they were disposed very zealously to maintain. They were densely populated. The country is said to have contained three hundred and fifty cities, and six thousand three hundred towns of smaller size. De Thou, Lib. XL. Brussels had seventy-five thousand inhabitants, and Antwerp one hundred thousand, at a time when London contained but one hundred and fifty thousand.

As respects industrial prosperity, the Netherlands constituted, at the middle of the sixteenth century, the richest and most thriving district of Europe. Agriculture and manufactures flourished, and a commerce rivalling that of Venice was developed. Learning found large patronage, and intelligence was uncommonly diffused through the different classes.

Among a people of such intelligence and broad commercial relations, the doctrines of the Reformation naturally found an early and an earnest canvassing. The land of Gerhard Groot, Thomas à Kempis, and Erasmus, could not be expected to remain blindly and stubbornly attached to Romish authority. As matter of fact, Lutheran teachings speedily won in the Netherlands a very considerable following. Charles V. found occasion to issue a severe edict against the new heresy as early as 1521. The fruits of martyrdom were not long delayed. Two Augustinian monks, Henry Boes and John Esch, were burned at the stake, in Brussels, in 1523. They met the ordeal in a manner eminently suitable to serve as an example to the long list of their brethren in the faith, who were to follow in the same pathway of fiery trial. 1 Gerard Brandt, History of the Reformation in the Low Countries, Book II. pp. 45, 46, in the old English translation. A hymn of Luther has justly celebrated their heroism, and the power of their martyrdom. One of the stanzas is as follows:--

"Quiet their ashes will not lie;
But scattered far and near,
Stream, dungeon, bolt, and grave defy,
Their foeman's shame and fear.
Those whom alive the tyrant's wrongs
To silence could subdue,
He must, when dead, let sing the songs
Which in all languages and tongues
Resound the wide world through."

In the Netherlands, Charles V. was much more free to use a policy of repression than in Germany. As, therefore, his first measures were unavailing, others and more severe followed. The edicts of 1529 and 1535 mere genuine specimens of Spanish despotism; and that of 1550, which in a manner summed up all the preceding, put the climax upon legislative barbarity. It required that all convicted of heresy should be burned alive, buried alive, or beheaded. All were to be counted liable to these penalties who had any thing to do with heretical books, who held or attended conventicles, who disputed on the Scriptures in public or in private, who preached or defended doctrines of reform. Informers were to be liberally rewarded from the confiscated estates of the condemned. No mitigation of the prescribed penalties was to be allowed, and friends who asked for any mitigation were to be counted as guilty of a penal offense. In the execution of these barbarous decrees, Charles expected much from the Inquisition, and no doubt that instrument of spiritual despotism did much of its characteristic work in the Netherlands; still the free spirit of the people compelled a limitation of its prerogatives, and prevented it from becoming such a formidable power as it was in Spain. As to the number sacrificed in the Netherlands under Charles V., no exact statement can be made. The estimates given, namely, from fifty to one hundred thousand, seem incredible, and provoke inquiry as to bow the people of the Netherlands could have been induced tamely to endure such horrible butchery. 1 Prescott concludes that fifty thousand is a grossly exaggerated estimate of the victims under Charles V. in the Netherlands( Philip II., i. 346-348). Motley, on the other hand, says, "The number ol Netherlanders who were burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive, in obedience to his edicts, and for the offenses of reading the Scriptures, of looking askance at a graven image, or of ridiculing the actual presence of the body and blood of Christ in a wafer, have been placed as high as one hundred thousand by distinguished authorities, and have never been put at a lower mark than fifty thousand. The Venetian envoy, Navigero, placed the number of victims in the provinces of Holland and Friesland alone, at thirty thousand; and this in 1546, ten years before the abdication, and five before the promulgation of the hideous edict of 1550" (Rise of the Dutch Republic, i. 114, 115).

As one reads of the merciless policy sanctioned by the father, he is inclined to a measure of charity toward the son who received such an inheritance. Indeed, Philip did little more than to execute what his father had outlined. In theory, Charles V. was well-nigh as extreme as Philip II. The chief difference was that Charles had more heart, and more leaning to political expediency, to deter him from steady and remorseless persecution. In his last days, however, these checks mere enfeebled. The counsels which issued from his retreat in the convent of Yuste were such as Inquisitor Valdés or Pope Plus V. might have applauded. 1 For the tenor of his instructions to Philip, see Sepulveda, De Rebus Gestis Caroli V., vol. iii., Lib. XXX., cap, xli.-xliii.

Philip II., on his accession, made it very evident that the people of the Netherlands could not expect any leniency or increase of privileges in any direction at his hands. His management tended to alienate Roman Catholics as well as Protestants. Margaret of Parma, an illegitimate daughter of Charles V., was made regent. Margaret, though not the choice of the nobles, was not decidedly obnoxious; but the Bishop of Arras, the artful, talented, and ambitious Granvelle, in his position of chief counselor of the Regent, caused much suspicion and uneasiness. The slow and unwilling abandonment of an attempt to quarter Spanish troops upon the country increased the discontent. A like result attended the provision for the erection of a large number of new bishoprics; the measure being regarded by the native nobility as prejudicial to their dignity, and by the Protestants as a means for more rigorous persecution. Still further, the national spirit, apart from religious preferences, was averse to the tyrannical measures of the Inquisition, which the government seemed determined to employ in the true Spanish fashion.

Among the more distinguished representatives of the national spirit were William, Prince of Orange, and the Counts Egmont and Horn. All of these, in the early part of Philip's reign, were adherents of the Roman Catholic Church: but the Prince of Orange cherished no ardent attachment to that Church; his natural disposition, as well as the memory of his Protestant parents, made it impossible for him to be a bigot. Egmont and Horn were much more zealous for the Romish religion. Both of them were men of high spirit, patriotic impulses, and martial reputation. Egmont, in particular, was distinguished by his brilliant achievements, popular gifts, and aspiring temper. But in real ability and power of insight, the Prince of Orange claimed by far the precedence. This was early perceived by Granvelle. In a letter to Philip he described Egmont as firm in the faith, loyally disposed, and easy to be won by flatteries and favors. The Prince of Orange, on the other hand, he portrayed as a man of profound views, dangerous ability, and tenacious purpose, whom it was difficult or impossible to control.

William of Orange was not altogether superior to the vices of his age. A trace of Machiavellian tactics may here and there be observed in his dealings with his opponents. His resort to such arts, however, indicates not so much that they were agreeable to his mind, as that he did not know how else to foil the serpentine policy and deadly aims of the Spanish despot. Noble and heroic qualities had the chief place in his character. He was willing to endure any sacrifice in behalf of the liberties of his country. No amount of adverse fortune could check his determination and efforts in this holy work. As respects religious tolerance, he was broad-minded and consistent almost beyond example in that age. In prosperity as well as adversity he advocated, and, as far as was feasible, enforced, the claims of religious freedom; provoking on this account, in more than one instance, the criticism of his patriotic allies. In his intercourse with men, he was far from, an appearance of moroseness or cold reserve. The name of "The Silent," which he bore, indicates not so much a general habit of taciturnity as the unapproachable secrecy with which he kept, even from those in close relations with himself, such counsels as it was impolitic to divulge. "But, while masking his own designs, no man was more sagacious in penetrating those of others. He carried on an extensive correspondence in foreign countries, and employed every means for getting information. Thus, while he had it in his power to outwit others, it was very rare that he became their dupe. Though on ordinary occasions frugal of words, when he did speak it was with effect. His eloquence was of the most persuasive kind; and as toward his inferiors he was affable, and exceedingly considerate of their feelings, he acquired an unbounded ascendency over his countrymen." 1 Prescott, Philip II., i. 449.

Possessing, as he did, a profound insight into the nature of Philip, the Prince of Orange saw from the outset that a crisis was being prepared for his country. Moreover, he was forewarned in good season, by the inconsiderate avowal of Henry II. of France, that he and the Spanish King were preparing for the complete extirpation of heresy in their respective dominions. But he determined to proceed with moderation and caution. The watchword which he adopted, sœvis tranquillus in undis, is a good index both of his policy and his disposition.

The efforts of the discontented nobles effected the resignation of Granvelle in 1564. But his departure did not materially improve the condition of the country. The Inquisition continued its odious work. In 1566, a league was formed whose express object was to rid the country of the Inquisition. The league soon numbered several hundred nobles besides many burghers; the most distinguished of the nobility, however, such as Orange, Egmont, and Horn, stood aloof. The appellation Gueux or beggars, originally applied in sarcasm to the members of the league, was voluntarily adopted with corresponding ensigns. This was not a Protestant, but rather a political or national league. Indeed, the terms of its agreement distinctly affirmed that nothing was intended against the Roman Catholic Church. The extent of the combination gave the matter a serious aspect, and led Philip to profess himself willing to make certain concessions. However, there is good evidence that his professions were dictated by the most treacherous designs. Preserved documents show that he had no serious intention to exempt the country from the rigors of the Inquisition, or to grant the smallest indulgence to a single heretic.

The league was by no means a perfect instrument for the accomplishment of its patriotic designs. While it embraced clear-headed men, such as Sainte Aldegonde and Count Louis of Nassau, it numbered too many of those rude and disorderly spirits which are apt to be cast up in times of revolution. What it might have achieved, however, under fair conditions, was not to be known. One of those violent outbursts, which in several instances prejudiced the cause of the Reformation, put an end to all negotiations with Philip. About the middle of August, 1566, a mob destroyed the images in several churches in the province of Flanders. This became the signal for a general storm of iconoclasm. Churches, chapels, and convents were everywhere despoiled. It was horrible and inexcusable vandalism. Still the motive was not of the worst order. Mere wantonness may have been the ruling impulse with some; but a majority of the frenzied image-breakers considered that they were wreaking deserved vengeance upon contaminating idols. Moreover, the deeds of the iconoclasts were the deeds of a mob from the dregs of the people; a paltry contingent, whose violent doings were discountenanced generally by the Protestant clergy and the greater part of those who looked to them as their teachers. 1 Brandt, Book VII., pp. 191-194. "A hundred persons, belonging to the lowest order of society, sufficed for the desecration of the Antwerp churches. It was, said Orange, 'a mere handful of rabble,' who did the deed." 2 Motley, i. 569, 570. The disturbance might easily have been quelled, only that Protestants and Romanists alike seemed to be paralyzed by the suddenness of the outburst. One feature of relief should be noticed. The iconoclasts, with all their fury and fanaticism, confined their violence to the images. They shed no blood, and made it plain, for the most part, that their aim was not plunder.

Though order was soon restored, the iconoclastic outbreak was a sufficient occasion in the eyes of Philip for the most unsparing vengeance. Indeed, the preceding agitation in behalf of the liberties of the provinces was offense enough, in his view, to call for the exterminating sword. That sword was now unsheathed. In 1567 the Duke of Alva was sent into the Netherlands at the head of an army, and with a commission which virtually superseded the Regent Margaret, and compelled her, in self-respect, to resign. Both in military ability and in temper, Alva was a fit instrument for the work to be done. His appearance and character are thus described: "A long, thin, bony figure, with a high and brazen forehead, black bristling hair, and flowing beard; hollow, dull voice; stubborn, revengeful, and cruel, recognizing no virtue except Blind obedience, no means but terror, no merit but his own or that of his subordinates; as thoroughly a Spaniard as Publicola and Brutus were Romans; as pliant toward great minds as he was oppressive and cruel towards inferior ones." 1 Hormayr, quoted by William Bradford, Correspondence of Charles V. and his Ambassadors, p. 410. "He did not combine," says Motley, "a great variety of vices; but those which he had were colossal, and he possessed no virtues. He was neither lustful nor intemperate; but his professed eulogists admitted his enormous avarice, while the world has agreed that such an amount of stealth and ferocity, of patient vindictiveness and universal bloodthirstiness, were never found in a savage beast of the forest, and but rarely in a human bosom." 1 Rise of the Dutch Republic, ii. 107. By principle and disposition, Alva was a merciless persecutor. He believed that it was useless to reason either with rebels or heretics, that with such the edge of the sword is the most effective argument. In this he was a man after Philip's own heart; and the most that can be said in exculpation of his atrocities is, that he in no wise exceeded the orders or the wishes of his royal master.

Alva, like the inquisitors of the era, placed a high estimate upon blows against persons of eminence, as a means of terrorism. His first care, therefore, was to seize the most distinguished nobles who in any degree had made themselves obnoxious by opposition to the policy of the King. Egmont and Horn were treacherously decoyed into the snare which had been laid, and were cast into prison. The Prince of Orange had the discretion to keep aloof. Granvelle understood sufficiently the character of Orange to know how to weigh the importance of this escape. As he heard in Rome of the imprisonment of the two counts, he asked, "Have they the Silent one?" A negative answer being returned, "Then," said Granvelle, "if he is not in the net, the Duke has caught nothing." 2 Strada, De Bello Belgico, Decad. I., Lib. VI.

This bold beginning, on the part of Alva, naturally increased the tide of emigration, which dread of the Spanish dictator had already set in motion. Twenty thousand are said to have left the country in the course of a few weeks. 1 Brandt, Book IX., p. 260. Alva, seemingly unwilling that the number of his victims should be lessened by flight, issued an order threatening death and confiscation of property against those who should attempt to escape from the country. Meanwhile, the work of blood began. A special tribunal consisting of twelve men, named the Council of Tumults, but known in history as the Council of Blood, was constituted. The authority of this tribunal was based upon no royal charter, upon no written constitution or decree from any source: it was based simply upon the verbal fiat of Alva. But in spite of this flimsy sanction, it assumed to supersede every other tribunal in the country. "It defined and it punished the crime of treason. The definitions, coached in eighteen articles, declared it to be treason to have delivered or signed any petition against the new bishops, the Inquisition, or the edicts; to have omitted resistance to image-breaking, to the field preaching, or to the presentation of the request by the nobles, and, 'either through sympathy or surprise,' to have asserted that the King did not possess the right to deprive all the provinces of their liberties, or to have maintained that this present tribunal was bound to respect in any manner any laws or any charters." 2 Motley, ii. 136. Under such definitions, there could be no difficulty in finding victims. The only trouble for Alva's tribunal was to carry through the mock trials and to pass sentence with sufficient speed. Some of the twelve councilors had the decency to retire in disgust. Two or three carried forward the bloody work with a zeal only equalled by that of Alva. Hessels and Juan de Vargas made themselves especially notorious. It is said of Hessels, that he frequently fell asleep during the trial of a prisoner; but his verdict was so much at his tongue's end, that, on being waked up, he uniformly cried out, half asleep, and rubbing his eyes, "Ad patibulum! Ad patibulum!" "To the gallows! To the gallows!" 1 Brandt, Book IX. p. 277. Vargas was a man who had made himself a criminal in Spain before he became a butcher in the Netherlands. "He executed Alva's bloody work with an industry which was almost superhuman, and with a merriment that would have shamed a demon." 2 Motley, ii. 140. On one occasion, making light of the scruples of a fellow-councilor, who was troubled because a certain innocent person was rescued from execution only by the merest accident, he exclaimed, "Why do you worry yourself? It is all the better for the soul of the person sentenced to death, if he is only innocent." 3 Brandt, Book IX., p. 277. Every day witnessed the repetition of judicial murders. In a few months, eighteen hundred persons were sent to the scaffold, some of them on the most frivolous charges. 4 Ibid., ix. 261.

According to some of the most eminent historians of the time, the authorities in Spain took pains to provide the Council of Blood with an ample basis for their barbarous proceedings. In the early part of the year l568, as De Thou 5 Lib. XLIII. and Meteren 6 Historien der Nederlanden, fol. 49. report, the Inquisition at Madrid passed a sentence which involved, with insignificant exceptions, the whole population of the Netherlands in the crime of treason against God and the King. A few days later Philip II. added his sanction to the decree of the Inquisition, and forwarded it to the Duke of Alva as a rule for his administration. 1 The Dutch historians, Bor and Hooft, younger contemporaries of De Thou and Meteren, also make mention of the Sentence (Brandt, Book IX. p. 266).

To speak of mercy under this regime was counted a crime, as appeared when the magistrates of Antwerp asked that some who had offended only lightly might be released. Alva replied, "that he was amazed that there should still be any magistrates of their city, that could be so bold and so impudent as to dare to speak in favor of heretics; that they had best take care how they did so for the future, otherwise he would hang them all for an example to others; and that his Majesty had rather see all his territories deserted and uncultivated, than to suffer one heretic or Lutheran to remain in them." 2 Brandt, Book IX, p. 265.

Meanwhile, the Prince of Orange, who had taken refuge in Germany, did not content himself with securing his personal safety, but used his utmost endeavor to assemble an army for the relief of his oppressed country. Hitherto he had remained in the Romish Church, but he began now to show open preference for the Protestant faith. Alva, finding it necessary to meet the forces of Orange in person, hurried through the execution of Egmont and Horn, and took the field. He was in general victorious, and inflicted terrible vengeance on the cities which fell into his hands.

Notwithstanding confiscations and enormous exactions, Alva by no means realized his expectations in obtaining a great revenue. The golden stream which he had promised did not flow into Spain. He found that subordinates engaged in the plundering trade were likely to enrich themselves at the expense of the public chest. The fundamental principle of economics, that an exorbitant tax on repressed and ruined industries is less productive than a low tax on industries highly flourishing, was abundantly illustrated. Moreover, Alva could not escape the consciousness, that by his exactions and cruelties he had made himself universally hated. At length he became weary of his task, and asked and received a recall (1573). He left, boasting that during his six years administration, he had caused upwards of eighteen thousand men to be executed; "a number," remarks Raumer, "too large if one speaks of executions proper, too small if all who were destroyed or made outcasts are reckoned." Geschichte Europas, iii. 101. The number of executions is evidently no proper measure of the sufferings that were caused. Destruction of business by fines and confiscations, and the devastations of armies, spread misery through all ranks of society. Add to this the fear and insecurity which were everywhere felt. The savage wish expressed by Alva, that every man as lie lay down at night, or as he rose in the morning, "might feel that his house, at any hour, might fall and crush him," was not far from being realized.

The task which surpassed the abilities of Alva was not to be lightly accomplished by his successors, three of whom, Requescens, Don John of Austria, and Alexander of Parma, followed before the death of the Prince of Orange. The outraged provinces were in no haste to make terms with the perfidious despotism of Spain. A number of the cities, notably that of Leyden, signalized themselves by the most heroic resistance. Adequate means, however, were wanting for the attainment of a complete emancipation of the Netherlands. During the course of the war, the southern provinces were disengaged from their allies. The untimely fall of the great leader in the revolt prevented any successful effort for their recovery. These provinces, accordingly, were reconciled to Spain; the Jesuits were plentifully introduced, and means were taken to make a territory, which was no unfavorable soil for the Reformation, one of the most Romish districts in Europe. On the other hand, the seven northern provinces,--of which Holland was by far the largest,--fought out for themselves an independent status. A bond of federation was supplied to these provinces by the Union of Utrecht in 1579; and in 1581 they forswore all allegiance to Philip. The Prince of Orange had been for years the real sovereign of this territory, and might now have taken the title. But he considered that the country must have powerful allies for its defence, and, to insure connection with France, urged the acknowledgment of the Duke of Anjou as sovereign. The Duke was installed over some of the provinces. He appeared, however, only as a passing figure, and played a beggarly part in the affairs of the Netherlands. Holland and Zealand insisted upon the personal headship of William; and in 1582 he was vested with the sovereignty in perpetuity, though the formality for its transference was never fully consummated. Two years before this, PhilipII. had declared him an enemy of the human race, and had offered the most liberal rewards for his assassination. Various attempts upon the life of the great patriot followed. At length, in 1584, the fanatic Gerard accomplished the infernal deed. William of Orange fell, uttering as his last words, "God have compassion on me and on this poor people!" The murder was hailed in the circles of Romish bigotry with an applause second only to the insane chorus which celebrated the assassination of Henry III. The Jesuits, with whose foreknowledge the deed had taken place, reckoned Gerard among the holy martyrs of the Church; and Philip II. bestowed estates and patents of nobility upon his family.

The young republic could ill afford the loss of its illustrious head. But it still found means to maintain its independence. Maurice, the son of the fallen prince, possessed great military talents, and sustained the fortunes of the commonwealth.

It would seem from the preceding narrative that the people of the Netherlands had had a sufficient lesson respecting the woeful consequences of intolerance. But the case was otherwise. As charity is the divinest of gifts, so it is the last to be enthroned in human hearts. Egoism, impatient of contradiction, is ever ready to seize the weapons of brute force, instead of trusting to reason and holy living. Hence those who have suffered grievously for their faith have often been found willing to make others suffer for their honest convictions. That the Protestants of the Netherlands were not superior to this weakness and vice, was signally illustrated shortly after the death of William of Orange. The maxim was indeed very fairly established among them, that no inquisition should be made into private belief so long as it was treated simply and strictly as a private matter. But that a large proportion of them were not ready to allow any sort of public advocacy, even of a moderate and rational dissent from the current creed,was unmistakably shown in the Arminian controversy.

James Arminius, who gave name to the most fruitful re-action against the rigors of Calvinism, was born in 1560. Having enjoyed excellent opportunities for education in Leyden, Basle, and Geneva, and won high distinction as a preacher at Amsterdam, he was called in 1603 to the chair of theology in the university of Leyden. Some years before this, as a result of personal investigation, he had become convinced that the Calvinian dogmas of unconditional election and irresistible grace are untenable. As occasion required, he gave expression to his views, in fulfillment of the duties of his department of instruction. His creed was moderate. He made no further departure from the Calvinian system than was necessarily involved in his rejection of the ultra-tenets just mentioned. He was far from exhibiting any affinity with Pelagianism, except on a definition of that term, which would convict all the Church fathers before Augustine, without a single exception, of having been Pelagians. His manner of advocating his views was also characterized by moderation. He was a man of exemplary spirit, and did not forget the claims of Christian courtesy in the heat of discussion. By principle as well as by disposition, he stood above the rage and vindictiveness of intolerant dogmatism. We find him writing in 1605: "There does not appear any greater evil in the disputes concerning matters of religion, than the persuading ourselves that our salvation or God's glory are lost or impaired by every little difference. As for me, I exhort my scholars, not only to distinguish between the true and the false according to Scripture, but also between the more and less necessary articles, by the same Scripture. 1 Brandt, Book XVIII. p. 37. "In a like vein he addressed the States of Holland three years later, declaring that a creed designed for general use ought to be brief, confined to the most necessary articles, and expressed as nearly as possible in Scriptural language. 2 Works, vol. i. pp. 269, 272.

There were those in the Netherlands who appreciated the liberal sentiments of Arminius, as there were those who had been inclined, even before his public appearance, to the theological views which he advocated. But the majority of the clergy were as far from fellowship with his spirit, as from acceptance of his tenets. While some of them did not follow his most conspicuous antagonist, Gomarus, in the extreme doctrine, that even the decree for creation was subordinate to the decree for eternal damnation, they were disposed to repel any criticism of unconditional predestination as a profane assault upon the ark of the covenant.

The controversy, instead of subsiding after the death of Arminius, in 1609, proceeded with increased virulence. A fresh incentive was supplied by the action of the class of Alkmaar in insisting upon strict subscription, depriving five ministers who refused thus to sign, and resisting the requirement of the States of Holland, that the deposed ministers should be allowed to continue in their places while their appeal was pending. Emboldened by their example, the upholders of rigid orthodoxy in other quarters began to press the demand for unqualified subscription, and the pulpits resounded with invectives against the disciples of Arminius. The latter, in explanation of their position, issued in 1610 a declaration under the title of Remonstrance. This document, which was of the nature of a temperate protest against unconditional predestination, limited atonement and irresistible grace, and spoke of the doctrine of certain perseverance as open to inquiry, fastened the name of Remonstrants upon the party.

With the progress of the agitation, political complications became conspicuous. The magistrates of the provinces, including the foremost statesmen, were largely on the side of the Remonstrants, and favored a settlement on the basis of mutual tolerance. This being the general attitude of the civil power, the Remonstrants naturally regarded it as breakwater against the uncompromising zeal of the Calvinistic clergy, and so gave prominence to its prerogatives in ecclesiastical affairs. The Calvinistic or contra-Remonstrant party, on the other hand, placed a relative emphasis upon the independent authority of the Church; though, as the sequel proved, when the civil power espoused their cause, they were very willing that it should go to any length in suppressing their opponents, and accused them of treasonable insubordination for any refusal of conformity to its decrees.

The change in the attitude of the civil power was brought about by a revolutionary stroke on the part of Maurice, who held the position of Stadtholder. Being a man of great military aptitudes, Maurice found his chance of distinction much abridged by the truce with Spain, which, counter to his wish, was established in 1609. The truce itself was, to some extent, an occasion of a grudge against a prime agent in its adoption, the statesman Barneveldt, 1 So the name is commonly written in English, though Oldenbarneveldt is the proper form. who, in the official position of Advocate of Holland, had exercised a commanding and salutary guidance of the affairs of the Netherlands. The grudge of the soldier was much increased by observing, that, in actual influence, be was hardly a rival of the statesman. It was also sharpened by the consideration, that Barneveldt, interpreting the rights of the provinces, not as a theorist, but as a constitutional lawyer mindful of the legal facts in the case, found little place for the centralized authority which Maurice was ambitious to possess. The Stadtholder, therefore, had begun to look upon the Advocate as an enemy, when the theological controversy supplied an effectual weapon against him. At first Maurice took a neutral position; indeed, he continued in attendance upon the ministry of Uytenbogart, who drew up the Remonstrance, to within a year or two of the final crisis. But, at length, seeing a means of ascendency in the zeal of the clergy, and the greater part of the common people, he deposed the magistrates in the several provinces, and replaced them with men of his own party. Every thing was now at his command. Barneveldt, the patriot and statesman, who had served his country in a degree second only to that of William of Orange, was loaded with such slanderous accusations as the combined industry of political and theological hate could devise, imprisoned, subjected to a mock trial, and beheaded. Hugo Grotius, the associate of Barneveldt, and the sharer of his views, the most gifted scholar of his age, -- poet, historian, apologist, exegete, theologian, and jurist, --was sentenced to life-long imprisonment, from which, however, after two years of durance, a happy device secured his escape. The arrest of the statesmen occurred in 1618, just before the assembling of the synod of Dort; and sentence was executed against them directly after its close, as a general synod. For the political side of the Arminian controversy, see Motley's Life and Death of John of Barneveld. A mass of details relating to the ecclesiastical side of the movement may be found in Brandt's Reformation in the Low Countries, vols. ii.-iv. For a brief and lucid account, see C. M. Davies' History of Holland and the Dutch Nation, vol. ii.

The work of the synod of Dort was the ecclesiastical counterpart to the doings of Maurice in the state. For though it contained some representatives from England, and from several Continental states, in respect of sentiment it was a synod of contra-Remonstrants pure and simple. The relation of the Remonstrants to it was none other than that of prisoners at the bar. The partial hearing which was accorded to Episcopius and the other cited theologians was only a form, a decent preliminary to the sentence which was predetermined by the composition of the assembly. The Remonstrants were condemned in terms which bear a singular resemblance to the language of pontifical bulls and Romish synods against heretics. As an effectual bulwark against the five points of the Arminians, a creed, sufficiently detailed in its specifications, was subscribed. This creed is not an unworthy specimen of Calvinistic workmanship. It shows a very fair degree of skill in the wording. Still, it fails to cover up the infinite dissonance between responsibility and opportunity, which characterizes all high Calvinism, and leaves no escape from the conclusion, that a portion of the race are condemned to eternal perdition, on the score of a probation which was accomplished, and the issue of which was irretrievably determined, before they were born. This is an unavoidable inference from the teachings of the Dort canons, that no one can extricate himself from the state of nature without the regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit; and that this grace, bringing a salvation which is never forfeited, is given only to the elect. On this basis the non-elect must be regarded as having had in Adam all the probation that they have at all, so far as the alternatives of eternal life and eternal death are concerned. Whether the views held by the theologians of Dort, respecting the divine decree which extended over the fall of Adam, would not involve a still further narrowing of probation, it is hardly worth while to consider here. A man who is born under sentence of damnation, could not be consoled much by the conclusion that the sentence was not most strictly and absolutely from eternity.

For refusing to subscribe to this creed, some two hundred ministers were deprived of their positions, and about eighty were banished from the country. Several, as continuing their ministrations after the decree of banishment, were sentenced to life-long imprisonment. Heavy fines were imposed for attendance upon Remonstrant conventicles. In numerous cases the forbidden assemblies were exposed to gross abuse at the hands of the troops, and in some instances were subjected to murderous violence. Subscription to the canons of Dort was exacted from schoolmasters as well as from ministers. In some districts the requisition was extended even to the organists, one of whom, offering to compromise the matter, said that he would readily play the Calvinistic formulas if any one would set them to music.

A sad chapter, surely, in the history of the Netherlands, is this which records the crusade against the Arminians! The statesman who was unexcelled by any man of his generation, who, perhaps more than any other, was alive to the crisis which was being prepared for European Protestantism, and was already stealing upon it,--the horrors of the Thirty Years' War,--is arrested in the midst of his efforts to provide against the advancing storm, and is sent to the scaffold. At a time when the people of the newly founded republic ought to have arrayed their whole strength against the common foe, they appear with disunited ranks, one party proscribing, banishing, and repressing the other, in behalf of the supremacy of articles which are no part of Catholic Christianity. With the mutterings of war already in the air, in face of the fact that lack of unison between the Lutherans and the Reformed was perilous to the very life of Protestantism, a teaching which essentially agreed with Lutheranism is formally denounced, and its upholders declared utterly beyond the pale of toleration. 1 The interpretation which Lutherans might, and did, put upon the action of the contra-Remonstrants, is seen in a publication issued by the Wittenberg professors in l621. Referring to offers of fraternity from the side of the Reformed, the authors remark: "What good there is to be expected from such brethren, may easily be gathered from the synod of Dort and their proceedings. The Calvinists had several disputes with the Armenians, particularly about the article of grace, or election, in which the latter defended our opinion, and the former that of Calvin. In this controversy the Calvinists at length showed so much heat, that, by a hasty decree of that synod, they condemned the Arminians and their doctrines, without allowing them to make any defence, depriving them of the exercise of their religion, and banishing their most eminent ministers from their country forever. Was not that a very brotherly proceeding? If they thus treated such who differed from them in little more than one article, namely, that of predestination, what must we expect who differ from them in so many?" (Brandt, Book LVI. p. 330.) This is not forced reasoning, and it is difficult to see how the Calvinistic doctors in the Netherlands could have answered it, unless they were willing to allow that partisan malice had more to do with the proscription of the Arminians than any doctrinal interest. To be sure, there was a measure of provocation. In the early stages of the agitation several intemperate Calvinists who refused communion with the Arminians, or assailed them in scurrilous terms, were treated rather severely by the magistrates. But the provocation was of small account compared with the sweeping prosecution which followed against the Arminians.

To the credit of the people of the Netherlands, the era of infatuated intolerance was not of long continuance. After the death of Maurice, in 1625, persecution against the Remonstrants began to subside; and by 1631 they were allowed to establish congregations in the country. As respects subsequent fortunes, the Arminian movement, if it did not fully realize in the Netherlands the promise of its earlier years, was crowned with an abundant harvest in other and much broader fields.