The Thirty Years War and the Peace of Westphalia
1. CAUSES AND FIRST STAGES OF THE WAR--
While political ambitions aggravated and prolonged the conflict, the main cause lay in religious antagonisms. No stable and satisfactory settlement of these had been effected. The peace of Augaburg afforded but an imperfect and temporary basis of agreement. It gave no guarantees to the Reformed as distinguished from the Lutherans. Its terms were such as Lutherans could accept only under protest, for Protestantism was left thereby at a disadvantage in a large part of Germany. Its rights were restricted in the ecclesiastical territories, or the bishoprics which were held immediately of the Empire. These were numerous, and some of them were large enough to constitute important principalities. According to the clause known as the Ecclesiastical Reservation, the heads of these territories were to vacate their sees with all their temporalities if they passed over to Protestantism. Moreover, Protestant subjects in these districts had, as security for the enjoyment of their religion, simply the imperial declaration, and not a definite provision in the treaty itself. Thus circumstanced, they could not of course be anxious to perpetuate a succession of Roman Catholic prelates, who perhaps would deny them any standing room in their domains. In short, the Ecclesiastical Reservation presumed upon an impracticable fixity. When the great mass of the people in the limits of a bilshopric of the Empire had become Protestant, it was next to inevitable that the bishop would not lose his prerogatives by embracing Protestantism. Nothing but the strong arm of power could install a pronounced foe of the dominant religion; and place the church property under his direction. In fact, but moderate respect was paid to the Ecclesiastical Reservation. As Northern Germany became almost wholly Protestant, the great bishoprics there passed under Protestant control. In the interpretation of the evangelical party, this was declared not to be contrary to the spirit of the treaty. The treaty, they said, was meant for a case in which a bishop, after having been elected by a Roman Catholic chapter, turned Protestant. In that event he was to resign. But where the chapter itself had become Protestant, it was not contemplated that a Protestant bishop should be excluded. This was certainly a rational adjustment of the matter. But the opposing party could plead against it the letter of the provision in the treaty. They had a show of legality on their side, though if must be confessed that it was a legality of a Shylock type which allowed a community that had been perchance substantinlly Protestant for more than half a century to be dispossessed of church property and threatened with exclusion from all rights of worship. An attempt to blot out three quarters of a century of history, and bring back a status which existed in the time of Charles V., was essentially a violent undertaking. There was room for the suspicion that the work of restoration, when once effected, would turn out to be an introduction to a project for the complete extermination of Protestantism in Germany.
A reactionary movement on this extended scale was undertaken by the house of Hapsburg, which held the imperial dignity, sided by its Roman Catholic allies in Germany, especially Bavaria, and also by Spain. Ferdinand II., who represented the Austrian house during the more important stages of the war, was in temper a religious devotee, a prince whom the Jesuits, who conducted his entire education, found little difficulty in moulding according to their intent. He was not a man of commanding force or robust personality. On the most important measures he often shirked responsibility, and left the decision to his counsellors. But in one direction he had a decided bent. He was resolved to use his power, wherever opportunity was offered, for the suppression of heresy and the restoration of Romish supremacy. While yet a young man, during a pilgrimage in Italy, as his confessor reports, he vowed at Loretto that he would spare no pains to root out the sects from his hereditary domains. This promise he faithfully fulfilled in the provinces which were first assigned to his rule, those of Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola. If in the broader field which afterwards came under his sceptre he found more obstacles to deal with, he exhibited there still the same disposition, the same intolerant zeal.
When it is said that Ferdinand II. and the associated princes undertook a reactionary project, which aimed, under a show of legality, to cut off the acquisitions which Protestantism had made in three quarters of a century, and indeed to endanger its existence in Germany, it is not meant that this project was distinctly conceived from the first. The project was not unfolded, perhaps not planned, until aggression from the Protestant side had supplied a pretext for sweeping measures.
The order of events was on this wise. First came Roman Catholic aggression. This called out a counter aggression, though not from the whole body of Protestants. It was in fact discountenanced by a large proportion of them. In the ensuing encounter the arms of the Romish party were victorious. The advantage thus gained was used in the most intemperate manner. Later successes mere improved with as little moderation, until at length a reactionary project as broad as that mentioned was openly proclaimed.
A portent of the darkened sky which was to shadow Germany appeared in a little cloud which arose in 1607. We refer to the affair of the free city Donauwerth in Southern Germany. Romanism had become a mere remnant in this place, when one of its representatives affronted the Protestant sentiment of the people by sending out a pompous procession. This led to some rudeness from the other side, though not to any destructive riot. The city, nevertheless, was put under the ban, robbed of its political privileges, placed ecclesiastically under Roman Catholic domination, and annexed to Bavaria. Such arbitrary action was naturally awakening. The next year a number of the Protestant princes, as a measure of defence against new enoroachments, formed the Evangelical Union. Christian of Anhalt was a leading spirit in the organization. He is credited with some bold and resolute opinions as to the need of curtailing the threatening power of Austria. But the Union did not embark upon any radical enterprise and appeared for the time being simply as a precautionary alliance. In 1609, the opposite party provided an offset in a Roman Catholic League.
The more direct occasion of the prolonged struggle great out of affairs in Bohemia. This country by the opening of the seventeenth century had in large part accepted the Reformation. So strong was the Protestant element that Rudolph, who was at once German Emperor and King of Bohemia, felt constrained in 1609 to give distinct recognition of its rights. In the Letter of Majesty, or Royal Charter, which was issued at that time, liberty of conscience was guaranteed to all.who should keep within the limits of certain creeds. As to the building and use of churches, that was left to the estates; in other words, the nobles and the towns had jurisdiction within their respective territories. In the special domains of the King, on the other hand, all tolerated parties could have their churches, or freedom of public worship, as well as liberty of conscience. The charter was given grudgingly. Rudolph showed forthwith an inclination to evade its provisions. Matthias, who became King of Bohemia in 1611, and Emperor the next year, soon manifested the same disposition. After 1617, when Ferdinand was crowned King of Bohemia, the causes of complaint were aggravated. Protestants on the royal domains were denied the rights of conscience, which had been assured to them. One of their churches was closed, and another was torn down. At length, in 1618, some of the high-spirited nobles resolved to take advantage of popular feeling, and to sever the connection between Bohemia and the Austrian crown. The revolution was started by an act of miscalculating outrage, and was not conducted with a discretion adequate to the emergency. The next year after the outbreak, Ferdinand was strengthened by an election to the imperial dignity. The Bohemians, who had taken their crown from Ferdinand and awarded it fo Frederic of the Palatinate, received far less sympathy from the German Protestants than they had expected. Frederic did not prove to be an efficient leader. The battle of White Hill, in November, 1620, proclaimed the uprising a failure.
The defeated now lay at the mercy of the conqueror. They were treated as though mercy had no place in the Christian vocabulary. Wholesale confiscations brought them down by the hundred thousand to the verge of beggary. "The woe under which the land groaned can be likened in compass and depth only to that which, in the time of the barbaric invasions, came upon the inhabitants of Gaul and Upper Italy through the conquering Franks .and Lombards." 1 Religion was spared still less than property. The Protestant ministers were banished. Their flocks fared no better after a brief respite. In 1627, commissioners went; through the country, with troops at their backs, offering to the worried and impoverished people choice between return to the Romish Church and exile. Moravia, which made common cause with Bohemia, was treated in like manner. Meanwhile the sword descended upon the Palatinate. The electoral dignity 1 Anton Gindeley, Geschichte des dreissigjährigen Kriegs, i, 257, Leipzig, 1882. was taken away from Frederic, and bestowed upon Maximilian of Bavaria. Much of the territory of the Palatinate was also given to Maximilian, and its Protestant inhabitants were subjected to the usual expedients for restoring Roman Catholic ascendency. From the Palatinate the course of the war was into the Lower Saxon circle, or the districts of Northern Germany. The movements in this quarter brought a new combatant into the lists, since Christian IV. of Denmark felt that the integrity of his own kingdom was being threatened. His active participation in the war was not, however, of long continuance. In l629, he availed himself of the peace of Lübeck to retire from the struggle.
Thus far the advantage had been decidedly on the side of the Roman Catholic forces. With the exception of the failure to take Stralsund (1628), they had received little check. Two considerations explain their relative success. They dealt with a divided foe. The relations between the Lutherans and the Reformed were far from being cordial. The evangelical princes were slow to unite upon any general policy. Some of them were conspicuously selfish and cautious. In planning and in executing, not one of them was the equal of Maximilian of Bavaria. Moreover, the ablest generals were in the service of the Emperor and the League. Tilly and Wallenstein were both notable commanders, though very widely contrasted. The former is easily classified. He was devout, conscientiously devoted to the will of his superiors, zealous for the interests of the Romish Church, in tactics a general of the old Spanish school. Wallenstein, on the other hand, defies classification. He stands by himself, one of the most singular figures which has crossed the political or military horizon of Europe. Without the glory of great victories to emblazon his fame, he still produced a profound impression as to his military capacity, and easily found recruits to join his standard whenever it was raised. With Oriental magnificence and enormous regard for his own interests he combined marks of a prudent statesmanship. Far from sharing in the spirit of intolerant propagandism which governed the imperial counsels, he looked upon it with ill-concealed dislike. A strong central government ruling on the basis of religious freedom was regarded by him as the great need of Germany. As to his personal creed, it can only be said that it was a mixture of Romanism, astrology, and egoism. He believed in God, in the Virgin, in the stars, in himself.
Emboldened by the successes of these great captains, Ferdinand II. at length, in March, 1629, ventured on the sweeping measure known as the Edict of Restitution. This was in effect a notification that all bishoprics held immediately of the Empire, which had passed into the possession of the Protestants since the year 1552 must be placed in the hands of Roman Catholic incumbents. Nor was this the whole meaning of the edict. The declaration of Ferdinand I., that the subjects of ecclesiastical rulers should have religious freedom, was left unnoticed. The plain inference therefore was, that hand in hand with the installation of Roman Catholic bishops would proceed the suppression of the opposing religion. The Edict of Restitution meant in fact that a large part of Germany should undergo the fate of Bohemia, being stripped bare by wholesale confiscations, and then scourged with whips, cutting into the very conscience and religious life of the people.
The manifesto of the Emperor, though gloried in by the zealots of his party, was far from being a stroke of practical wisdom. While if had its aspect of terror, it had also its aspect of encouragement. Far-seeing opponents readily understood that it was well adapted to call out the latent power of resistance in German Protestantism. For the time being, however, there was too little of union and confidence to summon forth the fitting defiance. The hand that was to grasp the Edict of Restitution and crumple it into a worthless and discarded parchment was the hand of a stronger hero than had been nurtured on German soil in that era.
2. THE PART OF GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS IN THE WAR.-- From the beginning of the struggle, the Swedish King, Gustavus Adolphus, had been a thoroughly alert spectator. At one time (1624, 1625) he had conferred with James I. of England and Christian IV. of Denmark in behalf of a combined movement against the Emperor and the League. But as those princes were not ready to contribute men and means on such a scale as he deemed necessary to success, he declined all connection with the enterprise. Meanwhile he kept his eye upon the field, and waited for his opportunity. Having secured his own realm by effecting a truce with Poland, and finding himself well supported by the national sentiment, he concluded, when the Edict of Restitution was issued, that the time to strike had come. He embarked depending upon his own resources. Negotiations with France had indeed been commenced, but had not yet been brought to a successful issue.
In the middle of the summer of 1630 Gustavus landed with thirteen thousand men upon an island at the mouth of the Oder. Three motives may be supposed to have urged him forward in this daring enterprise: (1) sympathy with his oppressed co-religionists; (2) a sense of the danger which would threaten his own kingdom, if the political and religious liberties of Northern Germany were extinguished; (3) a desire to secure for his country a more prominent place in European affairs. An unfriendly judgment would lay the chief stress upon the last motive. No doubt Gustavus was ready to secure as much political advantage from his enterprise as might fairly accrue to him; but there is no just cause for denying that he was profoundly moved by religious considerations. The morality and sobriety which he enforced in his army, and the whole bearing of the man, indicate that he possessed in a marked degree the elements of Christian zeal and heroism. He wrought under the impression of a great providential mission, and with a devotion which is well indicated by his words to the Swedish Senate: " I expect you to persevere in this great work, of which you and your children will see the happy issue, such as God, I hope, will accord to your prayers. For myself, I look henceforth for no more tranquillity before entering into eternal felicity." 1 John L. Stevens, History of Gustavus Adolphus, p. 263.
The attributes of a great commander are clearly discernible in Gustavus Adolphus. In a remarkable degree he blended self-restraint with energy and daring. He made important contributions to the art of war, substituting largely skill and rapidity of movement for mere weight and pressure of the mass. The first Napoleon assigned him a place among the eight greatest generals the world has seen. Few leaders have accomplished more, in so brief an interval, than was accomplished by him in his career of little more than two years in Germany. At the outset, however, he had great difficulties to contend with. If was a cold welcome which he received from some of the Protestant princes. Men of such influential and representative position as the Duke of Brandenburg and the Elector of Saxony stood aloof. Not till after the fall of Magdeburg, before the soldiers of Tilly, could these princes be constrained to give up their neutrality and render any hearty aid to the Swede. Even then they needed to be spurred on, the one by the stern threats of Gustavus, and the other by the spectacle of his own territories being overrun and pillaged, though the fate of Magdeburg by itself might have been sufficiently awakening. Fearful indeed was the ordeal which came upon the ill-fated city. Nothing was sacred to the infuriated soldiers as they rushed through the streets. Womanhood, age, and infancy appealed in vain for mercy. To increase the horror, a conflagration broke out which reduced nearly the whole city to ashes. Tilly himself declared that the downfall of Magdeburg could be likened to nothing else than the destruction of Troy and Jerusalem.
The invasion of Saxony followed close upon the fall of Magdeburg. Tilly established himself at Leipzig. Here he was confronted by the combined army of the Swedes and the Saxons (September, 1631). The result of the ensuing engagement was a complete breaking of the spell of imperial success. On the battle-field of Leipzig, or Breitenfeld, the generalship of Gustavus and the valor of the Swedes secured a glorious victory. Following up his success with great vigor, Gustavus pressed through Franconia and the Palatinate, capturing many cities for his Protestant allies. Tilly was mortally wounded while attempting to check his advance. Bavaria was invaded, and some of its chief cities passed into the hands of the victorious Swede. The "Snow King" did not melt away so suddenly under the southern sun as had been contemptuously prophesied at Vienna. Meanwhile, the Elector of Saxony invaded Bohemia.
The hard-pressed Imperialists saw now no hope save in restoring the command to Wallenstein. Shortly before the Swedish invasion, the princes of the League, taking offence at his exorbitant demands, and fearing that their own dignity would be abased before a military despotism if he were allowed to carry out his ambitious designs, had forced him to lay down the command. Assured that his star would again be in the ascendant, the proud general had retired to his estates in Bohemia to await the turn of events. The victories of Gustavua had been to him no cause of regret, but rather of rejoicing. He saw in them omens of good for himself. Being at last requested to resume his place at the head of the imperial forces, he put on a show of reluctance. He was determined to make of his restoration a great triumph. He haughtily refused any associate in command, blasphemously declaring, if report may be trusted, that he would not accept God Himself as a colleague. The powers which he claimed were really those of an irresponsible dictator. Nor was he unmindful of territorial aggrandizement. He must have a confirmed title to the duchy of Mecklenburg, or to some equivalent principality. Enormous as were the demands, the Emperor agreed to them.
After the imperial arms had gained some minor successes under the lead of Wallenstein, the opposing forces met in the bloody and hard-fought battle of Lützen (November; 1632). The Swedes were left in possession of the field; but the battle was virtually lost to them in that they lost their heroic commander. Gustavus Adolphus fell in the heat of the conflict.
3. CLOSING STAGES AND EFFECTS OF THE WAR.-- Notwithstanding the death of her King, Sweden was resolved to continue the war. But it was soon plain that the master spirit of the conflict was gone. The war progressed through wearisome alternations of fortune. Neither side could now claim generals of such prestige and reputation as had disputed the field during the campaigns of Gustavus. Wallenstein had but a brief career after the battle of Lützen. A growing cloud of suspicion gathered against him, till at length in its thick shadow his deposition was ordained and his assassination effected (February, 1634). He was accused of treasonable designs, and not without grounds. For he was ill-affected toward the policy of the Emperor, and though he may have formed no positive conclusion to enter the field against him, he was in all probability resolved so to do unless he could constrain him to terminate the conflict by a reasonable peace.1 Compare Ranke, Geschichte Wallensteins, pp. 421, 423; Gindeley, Geschichte des dreissigjährigen Kriegs, iii. 8-13; S. R. Gardiner, The Thirty Years' War,pp. 172-178.
During the further prosecution of the war French influence performed an important part. Of course the interest of France in the struggle was purely political. Richelieu and those who inherited his plans wished to limit the power of Austria and Spain and to acquire new territory for France.
The miseries caused by the protracted struggle were indescribable. No bounds were set to pillage. An evil example was early provided on the Protestant side by the unpaid marauding troops of Mansfeld and Christian of Brunswick, who undertook to uphold the cause of Frederic in the Palatinate. During the larger part of the conflict no regular governmental pay was afforded to the armies of either party. Even the Swedes, who had seemed at first like men of another world an account of their moderation and continence, yielded in the closing stages of the war to the corrupting example of other combatants. The country was so wasted that multitudes were made to feel the pangs of want, or even of starvation. Some districts were wellnigh depopulated. In a group of nineteen villages in Thuringia four fifths of the people had disappeared. The inhabitants of Augsburg were reduced from eighty thousand to eighteen thousand. The population of Bohemia sank from two millions to seven hundred thousand. Half of the houses in the Bohemian cities were left unoccupied, and half the fields in the country uncultivated. In Germany at large the percentage of waste rose near to this awful maximum. Half of the people and two thirds of the movable goods were swept sway. No man's threshold was secure from the shadow of violence or want. We can read the history of scarcely one of the eminent theologians of the time without discovering that he was burnt out of house and home, perhaps more than once. Naturally, the spoliation reached beyond mere estate to mind and morals. Education was interrupted. Many schools were attenuated into miserable remnants, or even into non-existence. The University of Heidelberg numbered but two students in 1626, and at Helmstedt the faculty was reduced at one time to a single professor.1 Karl Biedermann, Deutschlands trübste Zeit, p. 181. Where there was a better attendance the fruits of scholastic training were largely prevented by the wildness and insubordination of the students, who seemed to have imbibed a genius for barbarity from the example of ill-disciplined and plundering troops. In general, there was a loosening of moral bonds and a depression of national spirit. The extent to which their cause was taken into the hands of strangers tended to rob the German people of that confidence and self-reliance which are essential to national vigor and healthy growth.
4. THE PEACE OF WESTPHALIA.-- Though some of the interested parties may have felt that their claims were not duly regarded, it was with no small satisfaction that the news was received, in October, 1648, that terms of peace had been ratified. These terms were favorable to the Protestants, at least more favorable than any which had previously been accorded. The Reformed were included in the stipulations on an equal footing with the Lutherans. A security was given for the just settlement of disputes, in that the Imperial Court in a case between Protestantism and Romanism was to be composed of an equal number of representatives of either side. As respects the disposition of property, the first day of the year 1624 was fixed upon as the deciding date. Whatever of church property was in the hands of Protestants at that time was to be accounted theirs. States which had granted the free use of religion in that year were to grant it still. Other states were not required to grant this privilege, and if was left to the prince to decide whether in them an asylum should be conceded to those of dissenting faith. This left room still for intolerance and despotic caprice, but the age was not ready for a broader policy. In its political aspects the more important features of the treaty were the confirmation of the electoral dignity to the Duke of Bavaria, the erection of the Lower Palatinate into an eighth electorate for the son of the dispossessed Frederic, the cession of Alsace to France, and the transfer of Western Pomerania, together with the bishoprics of Bremen and Verdun, to Sweden. In virtue of her acquisitions, Sweden obtained a voice in the German Diet.
The condemnation of the treaty by Innocent X. was an unimportant episode. States which had no scruple about driving Protestants by fire and sword into subjection to the papal headship were as ready as others to treat the papal instructions with blank indifference when they were not acceptable.
At the Peace of Westphalia we reach the close of the first great era in the history of Protestantism. That peace had the force of a definite proclamation that the religious revolution of the sixteenth century was to hold its ground. As ability to maintain itself is one of the justifications of attempted revolution, it may be said that Europe subscribed here a justification of Protestantism .
Other considerations must; of course enter into an adequate justification. These we cannot consider at length, since we are writing history rather than apology. We simply note a few of the cardinal points which cannot be ignored in any fair survey of the subject.
To justify the Reformation it is in no wise necessary to prove that it was free from faults and excrescences. As already remarked, no one but a romancer would look for an unblemished ideal in a work of such profound upheaval and extensive reconstruction. The justification of the Reformation is found in two facts: (I.) It inaugurated an all-important emancipation. A bogus infallibility claiming jurisdiction over belief, conscience, and conduct is an intolerable fraud. If carried out according to the letter of its assumptions, it becomes a dwarfing despotism. If practically discarded, while formally acknowledged, it strikes at the roots of sincerity, and tends to reduce religion to the low rank of fashion and conventionalism. In any case, it is a menace to all the higher interests of mankind. The Reformation must accordingly be credited with an immortal service, in that it loosed so large a portion of Europe from the trammels of Rome's pretended infallibility. (2.) In its work of reconstruction, the Reformation accomplished a beneficent task. It cast out, or greatly reduced, the elements of paganism and priestcraft which vitiated the old system, cleared the way for a direct dependence upon the source of grace, gave back to revelation its right of immediate impact upon the souls of men, and strongly asserted the most quickening truths of the apostolic teaching.
Service of this serf was so fundamental and invaluable that the freest exposure of defects in the reconstructive work of the Reformation leaves to it still an essential glory. It must be allowed that there was some one-sidedness and inconsistency in theory, and that practice too often followed the worse side of theory. In this way the more central principles and tendencies were in a measure temporarily obscured. No small amount of intolerance, for example, was exhibited on the side of the Reformation. In some cases the Reformafion seemed also to add directly to the royal prerogatives, and to increase the despotism of the crown. Such, it can hardly be denied, was the result, to some extent, in Germany. The abolition of papal control gave a wider sweep to princely control, that is, where the princes themselves espoused the Reformation; in Bavaria, Austria, and Bohemia, where the sovereigns were Roman Catholic, the Protestant movement, while it was in force, tended to limit the central power. Theoretically, the great doctrinal leaders of the German Reformation, as has been indicated, were not altogether in favor of this increase of prerogatives in the temporal prince. They would gladly have secured to the reconstructed Church a larger share in the management of its own affairs, had not the undisciplined condition of the people seemed to make the supervision of the civil government a necessity. As it was, the prince ruled to a large extent in the Church as well as in the State. In England, the increase of prerogatives accruing to the crown from the Reformation was, if possible, still more noticeable. Let all this be granted, and it still remains true that Protestantism is in its nature the friend of freedom, legitimate freedom of any kind, religious or political. It is logically the friend of religious freedom, since it denies the existence of any infallible human tribunal in matters of religion; and what but an infallible tribunal is authorized to set up a system of faith to which all men must assent ? It is logically, also, the friend of civil freedom, since the enjoyment of religious liberty naturally fosters the spirit in the citizen, the sense of manhood and independence, which will insist upon civil freedom. It lies in the reason of the case, that, as respects wellgrounded confidence and self-governing ability, a company of men trained by the free use of the Bible and the exercise of their own faculties must have an advantage over a community treated perpetually as children or miners in their religion, and trained to passive acquiescence in the prescriptions of a hierarchy. And what the logic of the system thus requires, Protestantism in recent times has almost universally asserted and illustrated. It only needed a sufficiently extended opportunity to work out the demonstration that it is the friend both of religious and civil liberty.
The charge of intellectual license, or immoderate freethinking, which has been urged against Protestantism, has doubtless some foundation in the facts of its early, as also of its later history. In a system of liberty some overstepping of normal bounds is inevitable. But what is the cure ? It certainly is not despotism or usurped authority. A double failure follows in the wake of despotism. While it may procure formal assent, it cannot generate real faith. Suppose that what it enforces is genuine orthodoxy, and not mere superstition. Even then there is no reason for glorying. An enforced orthodoxy is just about on a par with the motions of a dead body enforced by a galvanic battery. Moreover, except under very special conditions, despotic repression tends to provoke reaction to the opposite extreme. The Dragonnade is the natural forerunner of a French Revolution. A discredited claim to infallible authority is fuel for infidelity. Those who mail over the results of intellectual freedom, and ask for the reign of sheer authority, mistake the nature of the human mind. This Samson cannot be bound with their wisp of straw. Protestantism may not have been free from an undue spirit of schism, independence, and insubordination. It may not have been entirely successful in working out that most difficult of all problems, the reconciliation of legitimate freedom with legitimate authority. But it cannot assist the solution of the problem by forsaking its principles. On the contrary, in a wise fidelity to its principles lies the best contribution which it can make to religious order and unity. Freedom and intelligence mutually promoting each other, as it is their nature to do, will lead men toward a healthy and common faith as far as human nature permits.
