<^SS^'^^"P^^%s,
.K8713 1888 v. 2
J. H. 1809-1890
)
BR 145
Kurtz,
Church history
THE
FOREIGN BIBLICAL LIBRARY,
EDITED BY THE
REV. W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A.
Editor of the '^Expositor."
KURTZ'S CHURCH HISTORY.
HODDER AND STOUGHTON,
27, PATERNOSTER ROW.
MDCCCLXXXIX.
.y
> .y
CHURCH HISTORY
BY
PROFESSOR "^KURTZ.
AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION FROM LATEST REVISED
EDITION BY THE
REV. JOHN MACPHERSON, ALA.
IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. IL
f Ottboit :
HODDER AND STOUGHTON,
27, PATERNOSTER ROW.
MDCCCLXXXIX.
^Ail rights reserved.)
BUTLEH & TANNEE,
THE SELWOOD PRINTING WOKESj
rBOKE, AND LONDON.
CONTENTS.
SECOND DIVISION.— SECOND SECTION.
HISTOEY OF THE GEEMAXO-EO^IANIC CHUECH,
FEOM THE 10th TO THE 13th CEXTUEY.
A.D. 911-1294.
I. THE SPEEAD OF CHRISTIANITY.
93,
MissioKART Enterprises
(1) The Scandinavian Mission Field .
(2) Denmark
(3) Sweden
(4) Norway
(5) The North-Western Group of Islands
(6) The Slavo-Magyar Mission Field .
(7) Bohemia
(8) Hungary
(9) The Wendish Eaces
(10) Pomerania
(11) The Finns and Lithuanians, Lapland
(12) Esthonia, Livonia, and Courland .
(13) Prussia
(14) Lithuania
(15) Mongolia
(16) Mission Field of Islam .
94.
The Crusades
(1) The First Crusade, a.d. 1096 .
(2) The Second Crusade, a.d. 1147
(3) The Third Crusade, a.d. 1189
(4) The Fourth Crusade, a.d. 1217
(5) The Fifth Crusade, a.d. 1228
(6) The Sixth Crusade, a.d. 1218, and the Seventh, a.d
VOL. II. ^'
1270
b
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CONTENTS.
PAGE
§ 95. Islam and the Jews in Europe 20
(1) Islam in Sicily 21
(2) Islam in Spain 21
(.8) The Jews in Europe ....... 23
IT. THE HIERAECHY, THE CLERGY, AND THE MONKS.
§ 96. The Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire in the German
Nationalities
(1) The Romish Pornocracy and the Emperor Otto I
973
(2) The Times of Otto II., III., a.d. 973-1002
(3) Otto III., Pope Sylvester II. .
(4) From Henry 11. to the Synod at Sutri, a.d. 1002-1046
(5) Henry III. and his German Popes, a.d. 1046-1057
(6) The Papacy under .the Control of Hildebrand, a.d
1057-1078
(7, 8) Gregory VII., A.D. 1073-1085
(9) Central Idea of Gregory's Policy . . . . ,
(10) Victor III. and Urban II., a.d. 1086-1099 .
(11) Paschalis II., Gelasius II., and Cahxtus II., a.d. 1099-
1124
(12) English Investiture Controversy ....
(13) Times of Lothair HI. and Conrad III., a.d. 1125-1152
(14) Times of Frederick I. and Henry VL, a.d. 1152-llGO
(15) Pope Alexander III., a.d. 1159-1181
(16) Thomas a Becket
(17) Innocent III., a.d. 1198-1216
(18j Fourth Lateran Council
(19) Times of Frederick II. and his Successors, a.d.
1268
(20) Innocent IV. and Successors, a.d. 1243-12&8
(21) Times of the House of Anjou to Boniface VIII
1268-1294
(22) Nicholas IH. to Ccelestine V., a.d. 1277-1294
(23) Temporal Power of the Popes
§ 97. The Clergy
(1) The Roman College of Cardinals .
(2) Political Importance of the Superior Clergy
(3) The Bishops and the Cathedral Chapter
(4) Endeavours to Reform the Clergy .
(5) The Pataria of Milan ....
121.5
CONTENTS.
Vll
§ 98. Monastic Oedeks and Institutions .
(1) Offshoots of the Benedictines
(2) New Monkish Orders ....
(3) The Franciscans. [See also Appendix, p.
(4) SpHts and Offshoots of the Franciscans
(5) The Dominicans ....
(6) The other Mendicant Orders .
(7) Working Guilds of a Monkish Order
(8) Spiritual Order of Knights
(9) Bridge Brothers and Mercedarians
449:
PAGK
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G6'
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71
72
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74
75
76
III. THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND ITS CONTROVERSIES.
§ 99. Scholasticism in General ....... 77
(1) Dialectic and Mysticism ...... 78
(2) Philosophical Basis of Dialectic Scholasticism . . 79
(3) Nurseries of Scholasticism 80
(4) Epochs of Scholasticism 81
(5) The Canon Law ........ 81
(G) Historical Literature 82
§ 100. The " S.eculum OBScuEUii": the Tenth Cp:ntury . 82
(1) Classical Studies . 83
(2) Italy, France, and England 84
§ 101. Thk Ele^-enth Century 85
(1) Most Celebrated Schoolmen of this Century ... 85
(2) Berengar's Eucharist Controversy, a.d. 1050-1079 . 87
(3) Anselm's Controversies 88
§ 102. The Twelfth Century 89
(1) Contest on French Soil: (i.) The Dialectic Side of the
Gulf. Abailard . 90
(2) Abffilard 91
(3) (ii.) The Mystic Side of the Gulf. Bernard ... 92
(4) (iii.) Bridging the Gulf from the Side of Mysticism. The
St. Victors 94
(5) (iy.) Bridging the Gulf from the Side of Dialectics. Peter
the Lombard, etc. ....... 95
(6) The Controversy on German Soil 96
(7) Theologians of Biblical Tendency. Rupert of Deutz, etc. 97
(8) John of Salisbury 98
(9) Humanist Philosophers 99
§ 103. The Thirteenth Century . . . . ~ . . 99
(1) Aristotle and his Arabic Interpreters .... 100
Vlll
CONTENTS.
(2) Twofold Truth
(3) Appearance of Mendicant Orders ....
(4) Franciscan Schoolmen. Alex, of Hales, Bonaventura
(5) Dominican Schoolmen. Albert the Great
(6) Thomas Aquinas
(7) Eeformers of the Scholastic Method. Eaimund Lull
(8) Eoger Bacon
(9) Theologians of Biblical Tendency ....
(10) Precursors of German Mystics. David of Augsburg, etc
IV. THE CHUKCH AND THE PEOPLE.
§ 104. Public Worship and Art ....
(1) The Liturgy and the Sermon .
(2) Definition and Number of the Sacraments
(3) Sacrament of the Altar ....
(4) Penance .......
(5) Extreme Unction
(6) Sacrament of Marriage ....
(7) New Festivals
(8) Veneration of Saints ....
(9) St. Ursula and the 11,000 Virgins .
(10) Hymnology
(11) Church Music
(12) Ecclesiastical Architecture
(13) Free Mason Lodges ....
(14) Statuary and Painting ....
§ 10-:
National Customs and the National Literature
(1) Knighthood and the Peace of God
(2) Popular Customs
(3) Two Pioyal Saints : Elizabeth and Hedwig .
(4) Evidences of Sainthood. Stigmatization, etc.
(5) Beligious Culture of the People
{(')) National Literature
5^ lOG. Church Discipline, Indulgences, and Asceticism
(1) Ban and Interdict
(2) Indulgences ......
(3) Church Doctrine of the Hereafter .
(4) Flagellation
§ 107. Female Mystks
(1) Two Ehenish Prophetesses of the 12th Century
(2) Three Thuringian Prophetesses of the 13th Century
CONTENTS.
IX
V. HERETICAL OPPOSITION TO ECCLESIASTICAL
AUTHOEITY.
§ 108. The Pkotesters against the Church
(1, 2) The Cathari
(3) The Pasagians
(4) Pantheistic Heretics. Amah-ich, David of Dinant, Ort
libarians .
(5) Apocalyptic Heretics. Joachim of Floris
(6) Ghibelline Joachites
(7, 8) Pievolutionary Pieformers. Petrobrusians, Arnold o:
Brescia, etc .
(9) Reforming Enthusiasts. Tanchelm, Eon
(10-12) The Waldensians. [Substitute §§ 10-lG in Ap
pendix, p. -464] ....
109. The Church against the Protesters
(1) Albigensian Crusade, a.d. 1209-1229
(2) The Inquisition ....
(3) Conrad of Marburg and the Stedingers
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130
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132
133
137
137
138
138
THJRB SECTION.
HISTOEY OF THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH IN
THE 14th and 15th CENTUEIES.
A.D. 1294-1517.
I. THE HIERARCHY, CLERGY, AND MONKS.
(1) Boniface VIIL and Benedict XL, a.d. 1294-1304 .
(2) Papacy during Babylonian Exile, a.d. 1305-1377 .
(3) John XXII., A.D. 1316-1334
(4) Benedict XII. and Clement VL, a.d. 1334-1352 .
(5) Innocent VI. to Gregory XL, a.d. 1352-1378 .
(6) Papal Schism and Council of Pisa, 1378-1410
(7) Council of Constance and Martin V., a.d. 1410-1431
(8) Eugenius IV. and Council of Basel, a.d. 1431-1419
(9) Pragmatic Sanction, etc., a.d. 1438
(10) Nicholas V. to Pius 11. a.d. 1447-1464 .
(11) Paul 11. and Innocent VIL, a.d. 1464-1492 .
(12) Alexander VL, a.d. 1492-1503 ....
(13) Julius II., A.D. 1503-1513
(14) Leo X., A.D. 1513-1521
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142
143
144
145
148
147
148
149
15a
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152
153
154
CONTENTS.
(15) Papal Claims to Sovereignty
(16) The Papal Curia .
^ 111. The Clergy
(1) Moral Condition of Clergy
(2) Commendator Abbots .
§ 112. Monastic Orders and Societie
(1) Benedictine Orders
(2) Franciscans .
(3) Observants and Conventual^; ,
(4) The Dominicans .
(5) Augustinians .
(6) John von Staupitz .
(7) Overthrow of the Templars
(8) New Orders .
(9) Brothers of the Common Life
IL THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE.
§ 113. Scholasticism and its Eeformers
(1) John Duns Scotus
(2) Thomists and Scotists .
(3) Nominalists and Realists
(4) Casuistry ....
(5) Founder of Natural Theology : Eaimund of Sabun
(6) Nicholas of Cusa
(7) Biblical and Practical Theologians
^ 114. The German Mystics
(1) Meister Eckhart
(2) Mystics of Upper Germany after Eckhart. Tauler, etc
(3) Friend of God in the Uplands ...
(4) Nicholas of Basel .......
(5) Suso
(6) Henry of Nordlingen, etc. .....
(7) Mystics of Netherlands. Ruysbroek, A Kempis, etc.
III. THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE.
§ 115a. Public "Worship and the Religious Education or
People
(1) Fasts and Festivals
(2) Preaching
(3) Biblia Pmtperum .
(4) Bible in the Vernacular
(5) Catechisms and Prayer-Books
CONTENTS.
XI
(6) Dcinoe of Death
(7) Hymnology .
(8) Church Music
{9} Legendary Kelics
§ lloB. National Litekature and Ecclesl^stical Ak
(10) Italian National Literature .
(11) Gennan National Literature .
(12) The Sacred Drama ....
(13) Architecture and Painting
§ 116. Popular Movements
(1) Two National Saints : John of Nepomuk and Nic
of Fliie
(2) Maid of Orleaus, a.d. 1128-1431 .
(3) Lollards, Flagellants, and Dancers
(4) The Friends of God ....
(5) Pantheistic Libertine Societies
117
Church Discipline .
(1) Indulgences ....
(2) Inquisition ....
(3) The Bull " In Coena Domini "
(4) Prosecution of Witches .
IV. ATTEMPTS AT EEFOEMATION
§ 118. Attempted Keforms in Church Polity .
(1) Literary War between Imperialists and Curiaiists
Marsilius
(2) Literary War between Imperialists and Curialists
Occam ......
(3) Kefoiming Councils of the loth Century
(4) Friends of Keform in France in 15th Century. Peter
D'Ailly, Gerson, etc
(5) Friends of Eeform in Germany
(6) Italian Apostate from Party of Basel : ^Eneas Sylvius
(7) Eeforms in Church Policy in Spain
§ 119. Evangelical Efforts at Eeform
(1) Wiclif and Wichfites ....
(2) Precursors of the Hussite Movement .
(3-6) John Huss
(7) Calixtines and Taborites
(8) Bohemian and Moravian Brethren
(9) Wiukeiers. [Substitute § 119, 9, 9a, in Appendix, p. 475
olaus
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Xll
CONTENTS.
(10) Dutch Eeformers : John of Goch, Von Wesel, and Wessel
(11) An ItaHan Beformer : Savonarola
§ 120. The Eevival of Learning
(1) Italian Humanists
(2, 3) German Humanism .
(4) John Eeuchlin
(5) EpistolcB obscurorum virorum
(6) Erasmus of Kotterdam .
(7) Humanism in England .
(8) in France and Spain
(9) and the Eeformation of the 16th Century
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228
THIED DIVISION.
HISTORY OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHUECH
UNDER MODERN EUROPEAN FORMS OF CIVILIZATION.
S 121. Chabacter and Distribution of Modern Church History 229
FIRST SECTION.
CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
I. THE EEFOEMATION.
122. The Beginnings of the Wittenberg Eeformation
(1) Luther's Years of Preparation ....
(2) Luther's Theses of a.d. 1517
(3) Prierias, Cajetan, and Miltitz, a.d. 1518, 1519
(4) The Leipzig Disputation, a.d. 1519
(5) Philip Melauchthon
(6) George Spalatin
123. Luther's Period of Conflict, a.d. 1520, 1521
(1) Luther's Three Chief Eeformation Writings .
(2) Papal Bull of Excommunication ....
(3) Erasmus, a.d. 1520
(4) Luther's Controversy with Emser, a.d. 1519-1521
(5) Emperor Charles V
(6) Diet at Worms, a.d. 1521
(7) Luther at Wittenberg after the Diet
(8) Wartburg Exile, a.d. 1521, 1522 ....
(9) Frederick the Wise and the Eeformation
124. Deterioration and Purification of the Wittenber(
Eeformation, a.d. 1522-1525 ....
(1) Wittenberg Fanaticism, a.d. 1521, 1522
231
232
233
234
235
236
236
237
238
238
239
239
240
240
241
243
245
245
246
CONTENTS.
Xlll
PAGE
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248
249
250
250
251
252
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256
(2) Franz von Sickingen, a.d. 1522, 1523 ....
(3) Carlstadt, a.d. 1524, 1525
(4) Thomas Miinzer, a.d. 1523, 1524
(5) The Peasant War, a.d. 1524, 1525
§ 125. Feiexds and Foes of Luther's Doctrine, a.d. 1522-1526
(1) Spread of Evangelical Views
(2) " Sum of Holy Scripture " and its Author
(3) Henry VIH. and Erasmus .
(4) Thomas Murner
(5) Onus Ecclesia
§ 126. Development of the Keformation in the Empire, a.d
1522-1526
(1) Diet at Nuremberg, a.d. 1522, 1523
(2) A.D. 1524
(3) Convention at Eegensburg, a.d. 1524
(4) The Evangelical Nobles, a.d. 1524
(5) The Torgau League, a.d. 1526
(6) The Diet of Spires, a.d. 1526
§ 127. Organization of the Evangelical Provincial Churches,
A.D. 1526-1529 257
(1) In the Saxon Electorate, a.d. 1527-1529 . . . 257
(2) In Hesse, a.d. 1526-1528 257
(3) In other German Provinces, a.d. 1528-1530 . . . 258
(4) Pieformation in Cities of North Germany, a.d. 1524-1531 258
§ 128. Martyrs for Evangelical Truth, a.d. 1521-1529 . . 258
§ 129. Luther's Private and Public Life, a.d. 1523-1529 . 260
(1) Luther's Literary Works 261
(2) Dollinger's View of Luther 262
§ 130. The Reformation in German Switzerland, a.d. 1519-1531 262
(1) Ulrich Zwingli 262
(2) Reformation in Zikich, a.d. 1519-1525 .... 264
(3) Reformation in Basel, a.d. 1520-1525 .... 265
(4) Reformation in other Cantons, A.D. 1520-1525 .. . 266
(5) Anabaptist Outbreak, a.d. 1525 266
(6) Disputation at Baden, a.d. 1526 267
(7) Disputation at Bern, a.d. 1528 267
(8) Complete Victory of Reformation at Basel, St. Gall, etc. 267
(9) First Treaty of Cappel, a.d. 1529 268
(10) Second Treaty of Cappel, a.d. 1531 .... 268
XIV
CONTENTS.
131. The Sacr\mentakian Controversy, a.d. 1525-1529
PAGE
269
§ 132. The Protest and Confession of the Evangelical Nobles,
A.D. 1527-1530
(1) The Pack Incident, a.d. 1527, 1528
(2) Emperor's Attitude, a.d. 1527-1529
(3) Diet at Spires, a.d. 1529 ....
(4) Marburg Conference, a.d. 1529
(5) Convention of Schwabach and Landgrave Philip
(6) Diet of Augsburg, a.d. 1530 ....
(7) Confession of Augsburg, a.d. 1530
(8) Conclusions of Diet of Augsburg .
§ 133. Incidents of the Years a.d. 1531-1530 .
(1) Founding of the Schmalcald League
(2) Peace of Nuremberg, a.d. 1532
(3) Evangelization of Wiirttemberg, a.d. 1534, 1535
(4) Keformation in Anhalt and Pomerania, a.d. 1532-1534
(5) Keformation in Westphalia, a.d. 1532-1534 .
(6) Disturbances at Miinster, a.d. 1534, 1535
(7) Extension of Schmalcald League, a.d. 153C .
(8) Wittenberg Concordat, a.d. 1536 .
§ 134. Incidents of the Years a.d. 1537-1539 .
(1) Schmalcald Articles, a.d. 1537
(2) League of Nuremberg, a.d. 1538 .
(3) Frankfort Interim, a.d. 1539
(4) Eeformation in Albertine Saxony, a.d. 1539 .
(5) Keformation in Brandenburg, etc., a.d. 1539 .
§ 135. Union Attempts of a.d. 1540-1546 .
(1) The Double Marriage of Philip of Hesse, a.d. 1510
(2) Keligious Conference at Worms, a.d. 1540
(3) Keligious Conference at Kegensburg, a.d. 1541
(4) The Kegensburg Declaration, a.d. 1541
(5) The Naumburg Bishopric, a.d. 1541, 1542 .
(6) Keformation in Brunswick and Palatinate, a.d.
1546
(7) Keformation iu the Electorate of Cologne, a.d. 154'.;
(8) The Emperor's Difficulties, a.d. 1548, 1544 .
(9) Diet at Spires, a.d. 1544 ....
(10) Emperor and Protestant Nobles, a.d. 1545, 1540
(11) Luther's Death, a.d. 1546 ....
1542
1
14
CONTENTS.
XV
§ 136. The Schmalcald War, the Interiii, and the Council
A.D. 1516-1551
(1) Prei^arations for the Schmalcald War, a.d. 1546
(2) Campaign on the Danube, a.d. 1546
(3) Campaign on the Elbe, a.d. 1547 .
(4) Council of Trent, a.d. 1545-1547 .
(5) Augsburg Interim, a.d. 1548 .
(6) Execution of the Interim
(7) The Leipzig or Little Interim, a.d. 1549
(8) The Council again at Trent, a.d. 1551 .
§ 137a. Maurice and the Peace of Augsburg, a.d. 1550-1555
(1) State of Matters in a.d. 1550
(2) Elector Maurice, a.d. 1551 .
(3) Compact of Passau, a.d. 1552
(4) Death of Maurice, a.d. 1553 .
(5) Eeligious Peace of Augsburg, a.d. 1555 .
§ 137b. Germany after the Eeligious Peace .
(6) The Worms Consultation, a.d. 1557
(7) Second Attempt at Keformation in Electorate of
Cologne, A.D. 1582 ....
(8) The German Emperors, a.d. 1556-1612
§ 138. The Eeformation in French Switzerland
(1) Calvin's Predecessors, a.d. 1526-1535 .
(2) Calvin before his Genevan Ministry
(3) Calvin's First Ministry in Geneva .
(4) Calvin's Second Ministry in Geneva
(5) Calvin's Writings
(6) Calvin's Doctrine
(7) Victory of Calvinism over Zwiuglianism
(8) Calvin's Successor in Geneva. Beza .
§ 139. The Eeformation in Other Lands
(1) Sweden
(2) Denmark and Norway .
(3) Courland, Livonia, and Esthonia
(4) England. Henry VIII.
(.5) Edward VI. .
(6) Elizabeth .
(7) Ireland
(8) Scotland, Hamilton and Wishart
(9) John Knox .
(10) Queen Mary Stuart
291
291
292
292
293
293
294
294
295
296
296
297
297
298
298
299
300
300
300
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302
303
304
305
305
306
307
308
309
311
312
313
314
316
317
318
319
320
XVI
CONTENTS.
PAGE
(11) Scotland. Kuox and Mary 321
(12) The Netherlands 322
(13) France. Francis I. and Henry II 324
(14) Huguenots, Francis II., and Charles IX. . . 325
(15) Huguenot Persecution ...... 327
(16) Bloody Marriage. Massacre of St. Bartholomew . 328
(17) Henry III. and IV. Edict of Nantes . . . 329
(18) Poland 331
(19) Bohemia and Moravia ..... . . 333
(20) Hungary and Transylvania 335
(21) Spain 336
(22) Italy 338
(23) Aonio Paleario 339
(24) Ochino, Peter Martyr, Vergerius, etc. . . . 341
(25) Protestantizing of Waldensiaus 343
(26) Attempt at Protestantizing the Eastern Church . . 344
II. THE CHURCHES OF THE REFORMATION.
§ 140. The Distinctive Characteb of the Lutheran Church
§ 141. Doctrinal Controversies in the Lutheran Church
(1) The Antinomian Controversy, a.d. 1537-1511
(2) The Osiander Controversy, a.d. 1519-1556
(3) iEpinus' Controversy ....
(4) The Philippists and their Opponents
(5) The Adiaphorist Controversy, a.d. 1548-1555
(6) The Majorist Controversy, a.d. 1551-1562
(7) The Synergistic Controversy, a.d. 1555-1567
(8) The Flacian Controversy on Original Sin, a.d. 15G0-157
(9) Lutheran Doctrine of the Lord's Snpper
(10) Cryptocalvinism in its First Stage, a.d. 1552
(11) The Frankfort Compact, a.d. 1558 .
(12) Formula of Concord, a.d. 1577
(13) Second Stage of Cryptocalvinism, a.d. 1586-
(14) Huber Controversy, a.d. 1588-1595
(15) Hofmann Controversy, a.d. 1598 .
142. Constitution, Worship, Life, and Science in
Church ....
(1) The Ecclesiastical Constitution
(2) Public Worship and Art
(3, 4) Church Song
(5) Chorale Singing
(6) Theological Science
1574
Lutheran
344
347
347
348
350
350
351
352
352
353
354
355
357
358
360
361
361
361
363
364
3()5
367
368
CONTENTS.
XVll
PAOE
(7) German National Literature 369
(8) Missions to Heathen 370
§ 143. The Inner DEVELOPiiENT of the Eefoemed Church . 371
(1) Ecclesiastical Constitution 372
(2) Public Worship 373
(3) The English Puritans 374
(4) The Brownists, etc 375
(5) Theological Science . 377
(6) Philosophy 378
(7) Missionary Enterprise . 379
§ 144. Calvinizing of German Lutheran National Churches . 379
(1) The Palatinate, a.d. 1560 379
(2) Bremen, a.d. 1562 381
(3) Anhalt, a.d. 1597 382
III. THE DEFOEMATION.
§ 145. Character of the Deformation
§ 146. Mysticism and Pantheism
(1) Schwenkfeld and his Followers
(2) Agrippa, Paracelsus, and Weigel .
(3) Franck, Thamer, and Bruno .
(4) Pantheistic Libertine Sects of Spirituals in
(5) The Familists
Franco
147. Anabaptism
(1) The Anabaptist Movement in Genernl .
(2) Keller's View of Anabaptist History
(3) The Swiss Anabaptists ....
(4) South German Anabaptists .
(5) The Moravian Anabaptists
(6) The Venetian Anabaptists
(7) Older Apostles of Anabaptism in North- West
(8) Jan Matthys of Haarlem
(9) The Munster Catastrophe, a.d. 1534, 1535
(10) Menno Simons and the Mennonites
148. Antitrinitarians and Unitarians
(1) Anabaptist Antitrinitarians in Germany
(2) Michael Servetus
(3) Italian Antitrinitarians before Socinus .
(4) The Two Socini and the Socinians
Germany
383
385
386
387
388
389
390
390
392
394
395
397
398
400
401
403
403
405
406
406
408
410
412
XVlll
CONTENTS.
IV. THE COUNTER-REFORMATION.
§ 149. The Internal Strengthening and Revival, op the
Catholic Church ....
(1) The Popes before the Council
(2) The Popes of the Time of the Council .
(3) The Popes after the Council .
(4) Papal Infallibility
(5) Prophecy of St. Malachi
(6) Reformation of Old Monkish Orders
(7) New Orders for Home Missions
(8) Society of Jesus. Founding,'
(9) Constitution .....
(10) ■ Doctrinal and Moral System.
(11) Jesuit Influence upon Worship and Superstition
(12) Educational Methods of Jesuits
(13) Theological Controversies
(14) Theological Literature ....
(15) Art and Poetry . . . .
(16) The Spanish Mystics ....
(17) Practical Christian Life. Borromeo, etc.
(1) Missions to Heathen
(2) Japan .
(3) America
(4) Nestorians, etc.
India and China
§ i;
1. Attempted Regeneration of Roman Catholicism
(1) Attempts at Regeneration in Germany .
(2) Throughout Europe
(3) Russia and the United Greeks
414
415
417
420
422
422
423
425
426
428
430
432
433
434
434
437
438
440
441
441
442
443
444
445
446
448
448
APPENDIX.
Additions from Tenth Edition to §§ 98, 108, 119
449
NOTE BY TEANSLATOR.
While the translator was workicg from the ninth edition
of 1885, a tenth edition had appeared during 1887, to which
unfortunately his attention was not called until quite re-
cently. The principal additions and alterations aifecting
Vol. II. occur in §§ 98, 108, 119, and 147. On the section
dealing with Anabaptism, the important changes have been
made in the text, so that § 147 precisely corresponds to its
latest and most perfect form in the original. As the print-
ing of the volume was then far advanced, it was impossible
thus to deal with the earlier sections, bat students will find
references in the Table of Contents to the full translation
in the Appendix of those pas-sages where material altera-
tions have been introduced.
John Macpherson.
FiNDHORN,
MarcJi^ 1889.
SECOND SECTION.
HISTORY OF THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH,
EROM THE 10th TO THE 13th CENTURY.
A.D. 911-1294.
I.— 'The Spread of Christianity.
§ 93. Missionary Enterprises.
During this period the Christianizing of Europe was well
nigh finished. Only Lapland and Lithuania were reserved
for the following period. The method used in conversion
was still the same. Besides missionaries, warriors also
extended the faith. Monasteries and castles were the
centres of the newly founded Christianity, Political con-
siderations and Christian princesses converted pagan
princes; their subjects followed either under violent
pressure or with quiet resignation, carrying with them,
however, under the cover of a Christian profession, much
of their old heathen superstition. It was the policy of
the German emperors to make every effort to unite the
converted races under the German metropolitans, and to
establish this union. Thus the metropolitanate of Ham-
burg-Bremen was founded for the Scandinavians and those
of the Baltic provinces, that of Magdeburg for the Poles
and the Northern Slavs, that of Mainz for the Bohemians,
that of Passau and Salzburg for the Hungarians. But it
was Rome's desire to emancipate them from the German
1 I
2 THE GERMAXO- ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
clergy and the German state, and to set them up as in-
dej^endent metropolitanates of a great family of Christian
nationalities recognising the pope as their spiritual father
(§ 82, 9). The Western church did now indeed make a
beginning of missionary enterprise, which extended in its
range beyond Europe to the Mongols of Asia and the Sara-
cens of Africa, but throughout this period it remained with-
out any, or at least without any important, result.
1. The Scandinavian Mission Field. — The work of Ansgar and Ptimbert
(§ 80) had extended only to the frontier provinces of Jutland and to the
trading ports of Sweden, and even the churches founded there had in
the meantime become almost extinct. A renewal of the mission could
not be thought of, owing to the robber raids of Normans or Vikings, who
during the ninth and tenth centuries had devastated all the coasts.
But it was just those Viking raids that in another way opened a door
again for the entrance of missionaries into those lands. Many of the
home-going Vikings, who had been resident for a while abroad, had there
been converted to the Christian faith, and carried back the knowledge
of it to their homes. In France the Norwegians under Rollo founded
Normandy in a.d. 912. In the tenth century the entire northern half
of England fell into the hands of the Danes, and finally, in a.d. 1013,
the Danish King Sv/eyn conquered the whole country. Both in France
and in England the incomers adopted the profession of Christianity, and
this, owing to the close connection maintained with their earlier homes,
led to the conversion of Norway and Denmark.
2. In Denmark, Gorm the Old, the founder of the regular Danish
monarchy, makes his appearance toward the end of the ninth century
as the bitter foe of Christianity, He destroyed all Christian institutions,
drove away all the priests, and ravaged the neighbouring German coasts.
Then, in a.d. 934, the German king Henry I. undertook a war against
Denmark, and obliged Gorm to pay tribute and to grant toleration
to the Christian faith. Archbishop Unni of Bremen then immediately
began again the mission work. With a great part of his clergy he
entered Danish territory, restored the churches of Jutland, and died in
Sweden in a.d. 936. Gorra's son, Harald Blaatand, being defeated in
battle by Otto I. in a.d. 965, submitted to baptism. But his son Sweyn
Gabelbart, although he too had been baptized, headed the reactionary
heathen party. Harald fell in battle against him in a.d. 986, and
Sweyn now began his career as a bitter persecutor of the Christians.
Eric of Sweden, however, formerly a heathen and an enemy of
§ 93. MISSIONARY ENTERPRISES. 3
Christianity, drove hhn out in a.d. 980, and at the entreaty of a Germau
embassage tolerated the Christian reUgion. After Eric's death in a.d.
998, Sweyn returned. In exile his opinions had changed, and now
he as actively befriended the Christians as before he had persecuted
them. In a.d, 1013 he conquered all England, and died there in
A.D. 1014. His son Canute the Great, who died in a.d. 1036, united
both kingdoms under his sceptre, and made every effort to find in the
profession of a common Christian faith a bond of union between the
two countries over which he ruled. In place of the German mission
issuing from Bremen, he set on foot an English mission that had great
success. In a.d. 1026 by means of a pilgrimage to Rome, prompted
also by far-reaching political views, he joined the Danish church in the
closest bonds with the ecclesiastical centre of Western Christendom.
Denmark from this time onwards ranks as a thoroughly Christianized
land.
3. In Sweden, too, Archbishop Unni of Bremen resumed mission work
and died there in a.d. 936. From this time the German mission was
prosecuted uninterruptedly. It was, however, only in the beginning
of the eleventh century, when English missionaries came to Sweden
from Norway with Sigurd at their head, that real progress was made.
By them the king Olaf Skotkonung, who died in a.d. 1021, was baptized.
Olaf and his successor used every effort to further the interests of the
mission, which had made considerable progress in Gothland, while
in Swealand, with its national pagan sanctuary of Upsala, heathenism
still continued dominant. King Inge, when he refused in a.d, 1080 to
renounce Christianity, was pursued with stones by a crowd of people at
Uj)sala. His son-in-law Blot-Sweyn led the pagan reaction, and sorely
persecuted those who professed the Christian faith. After reigning for
three years, he was slain, and Inge restored Christianity in all parts.
It was, however, only under St. Eric, who died in a.d, 1160, that the
Christian faith became dominant in Upper Sweden,^
4. The Norwegians had, at a very early period, by means of the
adventurous raids of their seafaring youth, by means of Christian
prisoners, and also by means of intercourse with the Norse colonies in
England and Normandy, gained some knowledge of Christianity. The
first Christian king of Norway was Haco the Good (a.d. 934-961), who
had received a Christian education at the English court. Only after
he had won the fervent love of his people by his able government, did
he venture to ask for the legal establishment of the Christian religion.
The people, however, compelled him to take part in heathen sacrifices ;
1 Principal authorities for last two sections : Adam of Bremen, "Gesta
Hamburg eccl. Pontificum," and Saxo Grammaticus, " Hist. Danica,"
4 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
and wlien he made the sign of the cross over the sacrificial cup before
he drank of it, they were appeased only by his associating the action
with Thor's hammer. Haco could never forgive himself this weakness
and died broken-hearted, regarding himself as unworthy even of
Christian burial. Olaf Trygvesen (a.d. 995-1000), at first the ideal of
a Norse Viking, then of a Norse king, was baptized during his last visit
to England, and used all the powerful influences at his command, the
charm and fascination of his personality, flattery, favour, craft, inti-
midation and cruelty, to secure the forcible introduction of Christianity.
No foreigner was ever allowed to quit Norway without being persuaded
or compelled by him to receive baptism. Those who refused, whether
natives or foreigners, suffered severe imprisonment and in many cases
were put to death. He fell in battle with the Danes, Olaf Haraldson
the Fat, subsequently known as St. Olaf (a.d. 1014-1030), followed in
Trygvesen's steps. Without his predecessor's fascinating manners and
magnanimity, but prosecuting his ecclesiastical and political ends with
greater recklessness, severity, and cruelty, he soon forfeited the love of
his subjects. The alienated chiefs conspired with the Danish Canute ;
the whole country rose against him ; he himself fell in battle, and
Norway became a Danish province. The crushing yoke of the Danes,
however, caused a sudden rebound of public feeling in regard to Olaf.
The king, who was before universally hated, was now looked on as the
martyr of national liberty and independence. Innumerable miracles
were wrought by his bones, and even so early as a.d. 1031 the country
unanimously proclaimed him a national saint. The enthusiasm over
the veneration of the new saint increased from day to day, and with it
the enthusiasm for the emancipation of their native country. Borne
along by the mighty agitation, Olaf's son, Magnus the Good, drove out
the Danes in a.d. 1035. Olaf's canonization, though originating in
purely political schemes, had put the final stamp of Christianity upon
the land. The German national privileges, however, were insisted upon
in Norway over against the canon law down to the 13th century.^
5. In the North-Western Group of Islands, the Hebrides, the Orkneys,
Shetlands, and Faroe Isles, the sparse Celtic population professing
Christianity was, during the ninth century, expelled by the pagan Norse
Vikings, and among these Christianity was first introduced by the
two Norwegian Olafs. The first missionary attempt in Iceland was
made in a.d. 981 by the Icelander Thorwald, who having been baptized
n Saxony by a Bishop (?) Frederick, persuaded this ecclesiastic to
accompany him to Iceland, that they might there work together for the
^ Snorro Sturleson's, " Heimskringla, or Chronicle of the Kings of
Norway." Transl. from the Icelandic by Laing. 3 vols. London, 1844.
§ 93. MISSIONARY ENTERPRISES. 5
conversion of liis heathen fellow-countrymen. During a five years'
ministry several individuals were won, but by a decision of the National
Council the missionaries were forced to leave the island in a.d. 958.
Olaf Trygvesen did not readily allow an Icelander visiting Norway to
return without having been baptized, and twice he sent formal expe-
ditions for the conversion of Iceland. The first, sent out in a.d. 996,
with Stefnin, a native of Iceland, at its head, had little success. The
second, a.d. 997-999, was led by Olaf's court chaplain Dankbrand, a
Saxon. This man, at once warrior and priest, who when his sermons
failed shrank not from buckling on the sword, converted many of the
most powerful chiefs. In a.d. 1000 the Icelandic State was saved at the
last hour from a civil war between pagans and Christians which threat-
ened its very existence, by the adoption of a compromise, according to
which all Icelanders were baptized and only Christian worship was
publicly recognised, but idol worship in the homes, exposure of children,
and eating of horses' flesh was tolerated. But in a.d. 1016, as the result
of an embassage of the Norwegian king Olaf Haraldson, even these
last vestiges of paganism were wiped out. — Greenland, too, which had
been discovered by a distinguished Icelander, Eric the Red, and had then
been colonized in a.d. 985, owed its Christianity to Olaf Trygvesen, who
in a.d. 1000 sent the son of the discoverer, Leif the Fortunate, with
an expedition for its conversion. The inhabitants accepted baptism
without resistance. The church continued to flourish there uninter-
ruptedly for 400 years, and the coast districts became rich through
agriculture and trade. But when in a.d. 1408 the newly elected bishop
Andrew wished to take possession of his see, he found the country
surrounded by enormous masses of ice, and could not effect a landing.
This catastrophe, and the subsequent incursions of the Eskimos, seem
to have led to the overthrow of the colony. — Continuation, § 166, 9. —
Leif discovered on his expeditions a rich fertile land in the West, which
on account of the vines growing wild there he called Vineland, and this
region was subsequently colonized from Iceland. In the twelfth century,
in order to confirm the colonists in the faith, a Greenland bishop Eric
undertook a journey to that country. It lay on the east coast of North
America, and is probably to be identified with the present Massachusetts
and Rhode Island.
6. The Slavo-Magyar Mission-field. — Even in the previous period a
beginning had been made of the Christianizing of Bohemia (§ 79, 3).
After Wratislaw's death his heathen widow Drahomira administered the
government in the name of her younger son Boleslaw. Ludmilla, with
the help of the clergy and the Germans, wished to promote St. Wen-
zeslaw, the elder son, educated by her, but she was strangled by order of
Drahomira in a.d. 927. Wenzeslaw, too, fell by the hand of his brother.
Boleslaw now thought completely to root out Christianity, but was
6 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
obliged, in consequence of the victory of Otbo I. in a.d. 950, to agree
to the restoration of the church. His son Boleslas II., a.d. 967-999,
contributed to its establishment by founding the bishopric of Prague.
The pope seized the oi^portunity on the occasion of this founding of the
bishopric to introduce the Roman ritual (a.d. 973). ^
7. From Bohemia the Christian faith was carried to the Poles. In
A.D. 966 the Duke Micislas was persuaded by his wife Dubrawka, a
Bohemian princess, daughter of Boleslaw I., to receive baptism. His
subjects were induced to follow his example, and the bishopric of Posen
was founded. The church obtained a firm footing under his son, the
powerful Boleslaw Chrobry, a.d. 992-1025, who with the consent of
Otto III. freed the Polish church from the metropolitanate of Magdeburg,
and gave it an archiepiscopal see of its own at Gnesen (a.d. 1000). He
also separated the Poles from German imperial federation and had
himself crowned king shortly before his death in a.d. 1025. A state
of anarchy, which lasted for a year and threatened the overthrow of
Christianity in the land, was put an end to by his grandson Casimir in
a.d. 1039. Casimir's grandson Boleslaw II. gave to the Poles a national
saint by the murder in a.d. 1079 of Bishop Stanislas of Cracow, which
led to his excommunication and exile.
8. Christianity was introduced into Hungary from Constantinople.
A Hungarian prince Gylas received baptism there about a.d. 950, and
returned home with a monk Hierotheus, consecrated bishop of the
Hungarians. Connection with the Eastern church, however, was soon
broken off, and an alHance formed with the Western church. After
Henry I. in a.d. 933 defeated the Hungarians at Keuschberg, and still
more decidedly after Otto I. in a.d. 955 had completely humbled them
by the terrible slaughter at Lechfelde, German influence won the upper
hand. The missionary labours of Bishop PiHgrim of Passau, as well as
the introduction of Christian foreigners, especially Germans, soon gave
to Christianity a preponderance throughout the country over paganism.
The mission was directly favoured by the Duke Geysa, a.d. 972-997, and
his vigorous wife Sarolta, a daughter of the above-named Gylas. The
Christianizing of Hungary was completed by Geysa's son St. Stephen,
A.D. 997-1038, who upon his marriage with Gisela, the sister of the
Emperor Henry II., was baptized, a pagan reaction was put down, a
constitution and laws were given to the country, an archbishopric was
founded at Gran with ten suffragan bishops, the crown was put upon his
head in a.d. 1000 by Pope Sylvester II., and Hungary was enrolled as
an important member of the federation of European Christian States.
Under his successors indeed paganism once more rose in a formidable
^ Cosmas of Prague [f a.d. 1125^ , " Chronicon Prag."
§ 93. MISSIONARY ENTERPEISES. 7
revolt, but was finally stamped out. St. Ladislaw, a.d. 1077-1095,
rooted out its last vestiges.
9. Among the numerous Wendisli Races in Northern and North-
Eastern Germany the chief tribes were the Obotrites in what is now
Holstein and Mecklenburg, the Lutitians or Wilzians, between the Elbe
and the Oder, the Pomeranians, from the Oder to the Vistula, and
the Sorbi, farther south in Saxony and Lusatia. Henry I., a.d.
919-936, and his son Otto I., a.d. 936-973, in several campaigns
subjected them to the German yoke, and the latter founded among
them in a.d. 968 the archbishopric of Magdeburg besides several
bishoprics. The passion for national freedom, as well as the proud
contempt, illtreatment, and oppression of the German margraves,
rendered Christianity peculiarly hateful to the Wends, and it was only
after their freedom and nationality had been completely destroyed
and the Slavic population had been outnumbered by German or
Germanized colonists, that the Church obtained a firm footing in their
land. A revolt of the Obotrites under Mistewoi in a.d. 983, who with
the German yoke abjured also the Christian faith, led to the destruction
of all Christian institutions. His grandson Gottschalk, educated as a
Christian in a German monastery, but roused to fury by the murder of
his father Udo, escaped from the monastery in a.d. 1032, renounced
Christianity, and set on foot a terrible persecution of Christians and
Germans. But he soon bitterly repented this outburst of senseless rage.
Taken prisoner by the Germans, he escaped and took refuge in Den-
mark, but subsequently he returned and founded in a.d. 1045 a great
Wendish empire which extended from the North Sea to the Oder. He
now enthusiastically applied all his energy to the establishment of the
church in his land upon a national basis, for which purpose Adalbert
of Bremen sent him missionaries. He was himself frequently their
interpreter and expositor. He was eminently successful, IJut the
national party hated him as the friend of the Saxons and the church.
He fell by the sword of the assassin in a.d. 1066, and thereupon began
a terrible persecution of the Christians. His son Henry having been
set aside, the powerful Ranian chief Cruco from the island of Riigen, a
fanatical enemy of Christianity, was chosen ruler. At the instigation
of Henry he was murdered in his own house in a.d. 1115. Henry died
in A.D. 1127. A Danish prince Canute bought the Wendish crown from
Lothair duke of Saxony, but was murdered in a.d. 1131. This brought
the Wendish empire to an end. The Obotrite chief Niklot, who died in
A.D. 1161, held his ground only in the territory of the Obotrites. His
son Pribizlaw, the ancestor of the present ruling family of Mecklenburg,
by adopting Christianity in a.d. 1164, saved to himself a part of the
inheritance of his fathers as a vassal under the Saxon princes. All the
rest of the laud was divided by Henry the Lion among his German
8 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO AD. 1294.
warriors, and the depopulated districts were peopled with German
colonists. — In a.d. 1157 Albert the Bear, the founder of the Margravate
of Brandenburg, overthrew the dominion of the Lutitians after protracted
struggles and endless revolts. He, too, drafted numerous German colon-
ists into the devastated regions. — The Christianizing of the Sorbi was
an easier task. After their first defeat by Henry I. in a.d. 922 and 927,
they were never again able to regain their old freedom. Alongside of
the mission of the sword among the Wends there was always carried on,
more or less vigorously, the mission of the Cross. Among the Sorbi
bishop Benno of Meissen, who died in a.d. 1107, wrought with special
vigour, and among the Obotrites the greatest zeal was displayed by St.
Vicelinus. He died bishop of Oldenburg in a.d. 1151.
10. Pomerania submitted in a.d. 1121 to the duke of Poland,
Boleslaw III., and he compelled them solemnly to promise that they
would adopt the Christian faith. The work of conversion, however,
appeared to be so unpromising that Boleslaw found none among all
his clergy willing to undertake the task. At last in a.d. 1122, a Spanish
monk Bernard offered himself. But the Pomeranians drove him away
as a beggar who looked only to his own gain, for they thought, if the
Christians' God be really the Lord of heaven and earth He would have
sent them a servant in keeping with His glorious majesty. Boleslaw was
then convinced that only a man who had strong faith and a martyr's
spirit, united with an imposing figure, rank, and wealth, was fit for the work,
and these qualifications he found in bishop Otto of Bamberg. Otto
accepted the call, and during two missionary journeys in a.d. 1121-1128
founded the Pomeranian church. Following Bernard's advice, he went
through Pomerania on both occasions with all the pomp of episcopal
dignity, with a great retinue and abundant stores of provisions, money,
ecclesiastical ornaments, and presents of all kinds. He had unparalleled
success, yet he was repeatedly well nigh obtaining the crown of
martyrdom which he longed for. The whole Middle Ages furnishes
scarcely an equally noble, pure, and successful example of missionary
enterprise. None of all the missionaries of that age presents so
harmonious a picture of firmness without obstinacy, earnestness without
harshness, gentleness without weakness, enthusiasm without fanaticism.
And never have the German and Slavic nationalities so nobly, success-
fully, and faithfully practised mutual forbearance as did the Pomeranians
and their apostle. — The last stronghold of Wendish paganism was the
island of Eiigen. It fell when in a.d. 1168 the Danish king Waldemar
I. with the Christian Pomeranian and Obotrite chiefs conquered the
island and destroyed its heathen sanctuaries.
11. Mission Work among the Finns and Lithuanians. — St. Eric of
Sweden in a.d. 1157 introduced Christianity into Finland by conquest
and compulsion. Bishop Henry of Upsala, the apostle of the Finns
§ 93. MISSIONARY ENTERPRISES. 9
who accompanied him, suffered a martyr's death in the following year.
The Finns detested Christianity as heartily as they did the rule of the
conquering Swedes, who introduced it, and it was only after the third cam-
paign which Thorkel Canutson undertook in a.d. 1293 against Finland, that
the Swedish rule and the Christian faith were established, and under a
vigorous yet moderate and wise government the Finns were reconciled to
both.— Lapland came under the rule of Sweden in a.d. 1279, and there-
after Christianity gradually found entrance. In a.d. 1335 bishop Hem-
ming of Upsala consecrated the first church at Toruea.
12. Esthonia, Livonia, and Courland were inhabited by peoples belong-
ing to the Finnic stem. Yet even in early times people from the south
and east belonging to the Lithuanian stem had settled in Livonia and
Courland, Letts and Lettgalls in Livonia, and Semgalls and Wends
in Courland. The first attempts to introduce Christianity into these
regions were made by Swedes and Danes, and even under the Danish
king Sweyn III., Eric's son, about a.d. 1018 a church was erected in
Courland by Christian merchants, and in Esthonia the Danes not long
after built the fortress of Lindanissa. The elevation of the bishopric of
Lund into a metropolitanate in a.d. 1098 was projected with a regard to
these lands. In a.d. 1171 Pope Alexander III. sent a monk, Fulco, to
Lund to convert the heathen and to be bishop of Finland and Esthonia,
but he seems never to have entered on his duties or his dignity.
Abiding results were first won by German preaching and the German
sword. In the middle of the 12th century merchants of Bremen and
Liibeck carried on traffic with towns on the banks of the Dwina. A
pious priest from the monastery of Segeberg in Holstein, called Meinhart,
undertook in their company under the auspices of the archbishop of
Bremen, Hartwig II., a missionary journey to those regions in a.d. 1184.
He built a church at Uxkiill on the Dmna, was recognised as bishop of
the place in a.d. 1186, but died in a.d. 1196. His assistant Dietrich
carried on the work of the mission in the district from Freiden down
to Esthonia. Meinhart's successor in the bishopric was the Cistercian
abbot, Berthold of Loccum in Hanover. Having been driven away
soon after his arrival, he returned with an army of German crusaders,
and was killed in battle in a.d. 1198. His successor was a canon of
Bremen, Albert of Buxhowden. He transferred the bishop's seat to Eiga,
which was built by him in a.d. 1201, founded in a.d. 1202, for the
protection of the mission, the Order of the Brethren of the Sword
(§ 98, 8), amid constant battles with Eussians, Esthonians, Courlanders
and Lithuanians erected new bishoprics in Esthonia (Dorpat), Oesel, and
Semgallen, and effected the Christianization of nearly all these lands.
He died in a.d. 1229. After a.d. 1219 the Danes, whom Albert had
called in to his aid, vied with him in the conquest and conversion of
the Esthonians. Waldemar II. founded Eevel in a.d. 1219, made it an
10 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
episcopal see, and did all in his power to restrict the advances of the
Germans. In this he did not succeed. The Danes, indeed, were obliged
to quit Esthonia in a.d. 1257. After Albert's death, however, the
difficulties of the situation became so great that Volquin, the Master of
the Order of the Sword, could see no hope of success save in the union
of his order w^ith that of the Teutonic Knights, shortly before estab-
lished in Prussia. The union, retarded by Danish intrigues, was
not effected until a.d. 1237, when a fearful slaughter of Germans by
the Lithuanians had endangered not only the existence of the Order
of the Sword but even the church of Livonia. Then, too, for the first
time was Courland finally subdued and converted. It had, indeed, nomi-
nally adopted Christianity in a.d. 1230, but had soon after relapsed
into paganism. Finally in a.d. 1255 Riga was raised to the rank of
a metropolitanate, and Suerbeer, formerly archbishop of Armagh in
Ireland, was appointed by Innocent IV. archbishop of Prussia, Livonia,
and Esthonia, with his residence at Riga.
13. The Old Prussians and Lithuanians also belonged to the Lettish
stem. Adalbert, bishop of Prague, first brought the message of salvation
to the Prussians between the Vistula and Memel, but on the very first
entrance into Bameland in a.d. 997 he won the martyr's crown. This,
too, was the fate twelve years later of the zealous Saxon monk Bruno
and eighteen companions on the Lithuanian coast. Two hundred years
passed before another missionary was seen in Prussia. The first was the
Abbot Gothfried from the Polish monastery of Lukina ; but in his case
also an end was soon put to his hopefully begun work, as well as to that
of his companion Philip, both suffering martyrdom in a.d. 1207. More
successful and enduring was the mission work three years later of the
Cistercian monk Christian from the Pomerania nmonastery of Oliva,
in A.D. 1209, the real apostle of the Prussians. He was raised to the
rank of bishop in a.d. 1215, and died in a.d. 1245. On the model of the
Livonian Order of the Brethren of the Sword he founded in a.d. 1225
the Order of the Knights of Dobrin {Milites Christi). In the very first
year of their existence, however, they were reduced to the number of five
men. In union with Conrad, Duke of Moravia, whose land had suffered
fearfully from the inroads of the pagan Prussians, Christian then called
in the aid of the Teutonic Knights, whose order had won great renown
ill Germany. A branch of this order had settled in a.d. 1228 in Culm,
and so laid the foundation of the establishment of the order in Prussia.
With the appearance of this order began a sixty years' bloody conflict
directed to the overthrow of Prussian paganism, which can be said
to have been effected only in a.d. 1283, when the greater part of the
Prussians had been slain after innumerable conflicts with the order and
with crusaders from Germany, Poland, Bohemia, etc. Among the
crowds of preachers of the gospel, mostly Dominicans, besides Bishop
§ 93. MISSIONARY ENTERPRISES. 11
CLristian and the noble papal legate William, bishop of Modena, the
Polish Dominican Hyacinth, who died in a.d. 1257, a vigorous preacher
of faith and repentance, deserves special mention. So early as a.d. 1243,
William of Modena had sketched an ecclesiastical organization for the
country, which divided Prussia into four dioceses, which were placed in
A.D, 1255 under the metropolitanate of Riga.
14. The introduction of Christianity into Lithuania was longest
delayed. After Eingold had founded in a.d. 1230 a Grand Duchy of
Lithuania, his son Mindowe endeavoured to enlarge his dominions by
conquest. The army of the Prussian-Livonian Order, however, so
humbled him that he sued for peace and was compelled to receive
baptism in a.d. 1252. But no sooner had he in some measure regained
strength than he threw off the hypocritical mask, and in a.d. 1260
appeared as the foe of his Christian neighbours. His son Wolstinik,
who had remained true to the Christian faith, dying in a.d. 1266, reigned
too short a time to secure an influence over his people. With him every
trace of Christianity disappeared from Lithuania. Christians were
again tolerated in his territories by the Grand Duke Gedimin (a.d.
1315-1340). Eomish Dominicans and Russian priests vied with one
another under his successor Olgerd in endeavours to convert the
inhabitants. Olgerd himself was baptized according to the Greek rite,
but apostatised. His son Jagello, born of a Christian mother, and
married to the young Polish queen Hedwig, whose hand and crown
seemed not too dearly purchased by submitting to baptism and under-
taking to introduce Christianity among his people, made at last an end
to heathenism in Lithuania in a.d. 1386. His subjects, each of whom
received a woollen coat as a christening gift, flocked in crowds to receive
baptism. The bishop's residence was fixed at Wilna.
15. The Mongolian Mission Field. — From the time of Genghis Kban,
who died in a.d. 1227, the princes of the Mongols, in consistency with
their principles as deists with little trace of religion, showed themselves
equally tolerant and favourable to Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism.
The Nestorians were very numerous in this empire, but also very much
deteriorated. In a.d. 1240-1241 the Mongols, pressing westward with
irresistible force, threatened to overflow and devastate all Europe. Russia
and Poland, Silesia, Moravia, and Hungary had been already dreadfully
wasted by them, when suddenly and unexpectedly the savage hordes
withdrew. Innocent IV. sent an embassage of Dominicans under Nicolas
Ascelinus to the Commander Batschu ia Persia, and an embassage of
Franciscans under John of Piano-Carpini to the Grand Khan Oktai,
Genghis Khan's successor, to his capital Karakorum, with a view to their
conversion and to dissuade them from repeating their inroads. Both
missions were unsuccessful. Certain adventurers pretending to be bearers
of a message from Mongolia, told Louis IX. of France fabulous stories of
12 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
the readiness of the Grand Khan Gajuk and his princes to receive Chris-
tianity, and their intention to conquer the Holy Land for the Christians.
He accordingly sent out two missions to the Mongols. The first, in a.d.
12J:9 was utterly unsuccessful, for the Mougols regarded the presents
given as a regular tribute and as a symbol of voluntary submission.
The second mission in a.d. 1253, to the Grand Khan Mangu, although
under a brave and accomplished leader, William of Euysbroek, yielded
no fruit ; for Mangu, instead of allowing free entrance into the land for
the preaching of the gospel, at the close of a disputation with Moham-
medans and Buddhists sent the missionaries back to Louis with the
threatening demand to tender his submission. After Mangu's death
in A.D. 1257, the Mongolian empire was divided into Eastern and
Western, corresponding to China and Persia. The former was governed
by Kublai Khan, the latter by Hulagu Khan.— Kublai Khan, the Em-
peror of China, a genuine type of the religious mongrelism of the Mongol-
ians, showed himself very favourable to Christians, but also patronised
the Mohammedans, and in a.d. 1260 gave a hierarchical constitution and
consolidated form to Buddhism by the establishment of the first Dalai
Lama. The travels of two Venetians of the family of Polo led to the
founding of a Latin Christian mission in China. They returned from
their Mongolian travels in a.d. 1269. Gregory X. in a.d. 1272 sent two
Dominicans to Mongolia along with the two brothers, and the son of
one of them, Marco Polo, then seventeen years old. The latter won
the unreserved confidence of the Grand Khan, and was entrusted by
him with an honourable post in the government. On his return in a.d.
1295 he published an account of his travels, which made an enormous
sensation, and afforded for the first time to Western Europe a proper
conception of the condition of Eastern Asia.^ A regular Christian
missionary enterprise, however, was first undertaken by the Franciscan
Joh. de Monte-Corvino, a.d. 1291-1328, one of the noblest, most intelli-
gent, and most faithful of the missionaries of the Middle Ages. After he
had succeeded in overcoming the intrigues of the numerous Nestorians,
he won the high esteem of the Grand Khan. In the royal city of
Cembalu or Pekin he built two churches, baptized about 6,000 Mongols,
and translated the Psalter and the New Testament into Mongolian. He
wrought absolutely alone till a.d. 1303. Afterwards, however, other
brethren of his order came repeatedly to his aid. Clement V. appointed
him archbishop of Cembalu in a.d. 1307. Every year saw new churches
established. But internal disturbances, under Kublai's successor,
weakened the power of the Mongolian dynasty, so that in a.d. 1370
it was overthrown by the national Ming dynasty. By the new rulers
1 " The Book of Ser Marco Polo the Venetian," edited with Com-
mentary by Col. Yule, 2 vols., London, 1871.
§ 93. MISSIONARY ENTEEPEISES. 18
the Christian missionaries were driven out along with the Mongols, and
thus all that they had done was utterly destroyed. — The ruler of Persia,
Hulagu Khan, son of a Christian mother and married to a Christian
wife, put an end in a.d. 1258 to the khalifate of Bagdad, but was so
pressed by the sultan of Egypt, that he entered on a long series of
negotiations with the popes and the kings of France and England, who
gave him the most encouraging promises of joining their forces with his
against the Saracens. His successors, of whom several even formally
embraced Christianity, continued these negotiations, but obtained
nothing more than empty promises and protestations of friendship.
The time of the crusades was over, and the popes, even the most
powerful of them, were not able to reawaken the crusading spirit. The
Persian khans, vacillating between Christianity and Islam, became
more and more powerless, until at last, in a.d. 1387, Tamerlane (Timur)
undertook to found on the ruins of the old government a new universal
Mongolian empire under the standard of the Crescent. But with his
death in a.d. 1405 the dominion of the Mongols in Persia was overthrown,
and fell into the hands of the Turkomans. Henceforth amid all changes
of dynasties Islam continued the dominant religion.
16. The Mission Pield of Islam.— The crusader princes and soldiers
wished only to wrest the Holy Land from the infidels, but, with the
exception perhaps of Louis IX., had no idea of bringing to them the
blessings of the gospel. And most of the crusaders, by their licentious-
ness, covetousness, cruelty, faithlessness, and dissensions among them-
selves, did much to cause the Saracens to scorn the Christian faith as
represented by their lives and example. It was not until the 13th cen-
tury that the two newly founded mendicant orders of Franciscans and
Dominicans began an energetic but fruitless mission among the Moslems
of Africa, Sicily, and Spain. St. Francis himself started this work in
A.D. 1219, when during the siege of Damietta by the crusaders he entered
the camp of the Sultan Camel and bade him kindle a fire and cause
that he himself with one of the Moslem priests should be cast into it.
When the imam present shrank away at these words, Francis offered to
go alone into the fire if the sultan would promise to accept Christianity
along with his people should he pass out of the fire uninjured. The
sultan refused to promise and sent the saint away unhurt with presents,
which, however, he returned. Afterwards several Franciscan missions
were sent to the Moslems, but resulted only in giving a crowd of
martyrs to the order. The Dominicans, too, at a very early period took
part in the mission to the Mohammedans, but were also unsuccessful.
The Dominican general Kaimund de Pennaforti, who died in a.d. 1273,
devoted himself with special zeal to this task. For the training of the
brethren of his order in the oriental languages he founded institutions
at Tunis and Murcia. The most important of all these missionary
14 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
enterprises was that of the talented Eannund Lulhis of Majorca, who
after his own conversion from a worldly life and after careful study of
the language, made three voyages to North Africa and sought in dis-
putations with the Saracen scholars . to convince them of the truth of
Christianity. But his Ars Magna (§ 103, 7), which with great ingenuity
and enormous labour he had wrought out mainly for this purpose, had
no effect. Imprisonment and ill-treatment were on all occasions his only
reward. He died in a.d. 1315 in consequence of the ill-usage to which he
had been subjected.
§ 94. The Crusades.^
The Arabian rulers had for their own interest protected
the Christian pilgrims to the Holy Sepulchre. But even
under the rule of the Fatimide dynasty, early in the 10th
century, the oppression of pilgrims began. Khalif Hakim,
in order that he might blot out the disgrace of being born
of a Christian mother, committed ruthless cruelties upon
resident Christians as well as upon the pilgrims, and pro-
hibited under severe penalties all meetings for Christian
worship. Under the barbarous Seljuk dynasty, which held
sway in Palestine from about a.d. 1070, the oppression
reached its height. The West became all the more con-
cerned about this, since during the 10th century the idea
that the end of the world was approaching had given a new
impulse to pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Pope Sylvester II.
had in a.d. 999 ex persona clevastatce Hierosolymce sum-
moned Christendom to help in this emergency. Gregory
VII. seized anew upon the idea of wresting the Holy Land
from the infidels. He had even resolved himself to lead a
Christian army, but the outbreak of contentions with Henry
^ Michaud, "History of the Crusades," transl. by Eobson, 3 vols.
London, 1852. Mill, " History of the Crusades," 2 vols., London, 1820.
" Chronicles of the Crusades: Contemporary Narratives of Richard Cceur
de Lion, by Richard of Devizes and Geoffrey de Vinsauf, and of the
Crusade of St. Louis, by Lord John de Joinville," Loudon (Bohn).
Gibbon, "History of Crusades," London, 18G9.
§ 94. THE CEUSADES. 15
IV. hindered the execution of this plan. Meanwhile com-
plaints by returning pilgrims of intolerable ill-usage in-
creased. An urgent appeal from the Byzantine Emperor
Alexius Comnenus gave the spark that lit the combustible
material that had been gathered throughout the West.
The imperial ambassadors accompanied Pope Urban II. to
the Council of Clermont in a.d. 1095, where the pope him-
self, in a spirited speech, called for a holy war under the
standard of the cross. The shout was raised as from one
mouth, " It is God's will." On that very day thousands
enlisted, with Adhemar, bishop of Puy, papal legate, at their
head, and had the red cross marked on their right shoulders.
The bishops returning home preached the crusade as they
went, and in a few weeks a glowing enthusiasm had spread
throughout France down to the provinces of the Rhine.
Then began a movement which, soon extending over all
the West, like a second migration of nations, lasted for two
centuries. The crusades cost Europe between five and six
millions of men, and yet in the end that which had been
striven after was not attained. Its consequences, how-
ever, to Europe itself were all the more important. In
all departments of life, ecclesiastical and political, moral
and intellectual, civil and industrial, new views, needs,
developments, and tendencies were introduced. Mediseval
culture now reached the highest point of its attainment,
and its failure to transcend the past opened the way for the
conditions of modern society. And while on the other hand
they afforded new and extravagantly abundant nourishment
for clerical and popular superstition, in all directions, but
specially in giving opportunity to roguish traffic in relics
(§ 104, 8 ; 115, 9), on the other hand they had no small
share in producing religious indifference and frivolous
free-thinking (§ 96, 19), as well as the terribly dangerous
growth of mediseval sects, which threatened the overthrow
16 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
of church and State, religion and morality (§ 108, 1, 4 ; IIG
5). The former was chiefly the result of the sad conclu-
sion of an undertaking of unexampled magnitude, entered
upon with the most glowing enthusiasm for Christianity
and the church ; the latter was in great measure occa-
sioned by intercourse with sectaries of a like kind in the
East (§ 71).
1. The First Crusade, A.D. 1096.— In the spring of a.d. 1096 vast
crowds of people gathered together, impatient of the delays of the
princes, and put themselves under the leadership of Walter the Penni-
less. They were soon followed by Peter of Amiens with 40,000 men.
A legend, unw^orthy of belief, credits him with the origin of the whole
movement. According to this story, the hermit returning from a pil-
grimage described to the holy father in vivid colours the sufferings
their Christian brethren, and related how that Christ Himself had
appeared to him in a dream, giving him the command for the pope to
summon all Christendom to rescue the Holy Sepulchre. The legend
proceeds to say that, by order of the pope, Peter the Hermit then went
through all Italy and France, arousing the enthusiasm of the people.
The hordes led by him, however, after committing deeds of horrid
violence on every side, while no farther than Bulgaria, were reduced to
about one half, and the remnant, after Peter had already left them be-
cause of their insubordination, was annihilated by the Turks at Nicrea.
Successive new crusades, the last of them an undisciplined mob of
200,000 men, were cut down in Hungary or on the Hungarian frontier.
In August a regular crusading army, 80,000 strong, under the leadership of
Godfrey of Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine, passing through Germany and
Hungary, reached Constantinople. There several French and Norman
princes joined the army, till its strength was increased to 600,000. After
considerable squabbling with the Byzantine government, tbey passed over
into Asia. With great labour and heavy loss Nictea, Edessa,and Antioch
were taken. At last, on 15th July, 1099, amid shouts of, It is God's will,
they stormed the walls of Jerusalem ; lighted by torches and wading
in blood, they entered with singing of psalms into the Church of the
Resurrection. Godfrey was elected king. With pious humility he
declined to wear a king's crown where Chrit-t had worn a crown of thorns.
He died a year after, and his brother Baldwin was crowned at Bethlehem.
By numerous impropriations crowds of greater and lesser vassals were
gathered about the throne. In Jerusalem itself a Latin patriarchate was
erected, and under it were placed four archbishoprics, with a corresponding
number of bishoprics. The story of these proceedings enkindled new
§ 94. THE CRUSADES. 17
enthusiasm in the "West. In a.d. 1101 three new crusades of 260,000
men were fitted out in Germany, under Welf, duke of Bavaria, and iu
Italy and in -France. Tliey marched against Bagdad, in order to strike
terror into the hearts of Moslems by the terrible onslaught ; the undisci-
plined horde, however, did not reach its destination, but found agiavein
Asia Minor.
2. The Second Crusade, A.D. 1147.— The fall of Edessa in a.d. 1116,
as the frontier fortress of the kingdom, summoned the West to a new
effort. Pope Eugenius III. called the nations to arms. Bernard of
Clau'vaux, the prophet of the age, preached the crusade, and prophesied
victory. Louis VII. of France took the sign of the cross, in order to atone
for the crime of having burnt a church filled with men ; and Conrad III.
of Germany, moved by the preaching of Bernard, with some hesitation
followed his example. But their stately army fell before the sword of
the Saracens, the malice of the Greeks, and internal disorders caused
by famine, disease, and hardships. Damascus remained unconqaered,
and the princes returned humbled with the miserable remnant of their
army.
3. The Third Crusade, A.D. 1189.— The kingdom of Jerusalem before
a century had past was in utter decay. Greeks or Syrians and Latins
had a deadly hatred for one another : the vassals intrigued against each
other and against the crown. Licentiousness, luxury, and recklessness
prevailed among the people ; the clergy and the nobles of the kingdom,
but especially the so called Pulleni,i descendants of the crusaders born
in the Holy Land itself, were a miserable, cowardly and treacherous
race. The pretenders to the crown also continued their intrigues and
cabals. Such being the corrupt condition of affairs, it was an easy
thing for the Sultan Saladin, the Moslem knight "without fear and
without reproach," who had overthrown the Fatimide dynasty in Egypt,
to bring down upon the Christian rule in Syria, after the bloody battle
of Tiberias, the same fate. Jerusalem fell into his hands in October, a.d.
1187. When this terrible piece of news reached the West, the Christian
powers were summoned by Gregory YIIL to combine their forces in
order to make one more vigorous effort, Philip Augustus of France and
Henry II. of England forgot for a moment their mutual jealousies, and
took the cross from the hands of Archbishop William of Tyre, the
historian of the crusade. Next the Emperor Frederick I. joined them,
with all the heroic valour of youth, though in years and experience an
^ Pulleni dicuntur, vel quia recentes et novi, quasi pulli respectu Suria-
nonim reputati sunt, vel quia principaliter de gente Apulice matres
habuerurit. Cum enim paucas rnulieres adduxissent nostri, qui in terras
remanserunt, de regno Apulice, eo quod propius esset aliis regionibus,
vocantes rnulieres, cum eis matrimonia contraxerunt.
18 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
old man. He entered on the underlaking with an energy, considerate-
ness, and circumspection which seemed to deserve glorious success. After
piloting his way through Byzantine intrigues and the indescribable
fatigues of a waterless desert, he led his soldiers against the well-equipped
army of the sultan at Iconium, which he utterly routed, and took the
city. But in a.d. 1190 the heroic warrior was drowned in an attempt
to ford the river Calycadnus. A great part of his army was now
scattered, and the remnant was led by his son Frederick of Swabia
against Ptolemais. At that point soon after landed Philip Augustus and
Richard Cceur de Lion of England, who after his father's death put him-
self at the head of an English crusading army and had conquered
Cyprus on the way. Ptolemais (Acre) was taken in a.d. 1191. But the
jealousies of the princes interfered with their success. Frederick had
already fallen, and Philip Augustus under pretence of sickness returned
to France ; Richard gained a brillant victory over Saladin, took Joppa
and Ascalon, and was on the eve of marching against Jerusalem when
news reached him that his brother John had assumed the throne of
England, and that Philip Augustus also was entertaining schemes of
conquest. Once again Richard won a great victory before Joppa, and
Saladin, admiring his unexampled bravery, concluded with him now,
in A.D. 1192, a three years' truce, giving most favourable terms to the
pilgrims. The strip along the coast from Jojjpa to Acre continued
under the rule of Richard's nephew, Henry of Champagne. But
Richard was seized on his return journey and cast into prison by
Leopold of Austria, whose standard he had grossly insulted before Ptole-
mais, and for two years he remained a prisoner. After his release he
was prevented from thinking of a renewal of the crusade by a war with
France, in which he met his death in a.d. 1199.^
4. The Fourth Crusade, A.D. 1217. — Innocent III. summoned Chris-
tendom anew to a holy war. The kings, engaged in their own affairs,
gave no heed to the call. But the violent penitential preacher, Fulco
of Neuilly, prevailed upon the French nobles to collect a considerable
crusading army, which, however, instead of proceeding against the Sara-
cens, was used by the Venetian Doge, Dandolo, in payment of transport,
for conquering Zaras in Dalmatia, and then by a Byzantine prince
for a campaign against Constantinople, where Baldwin of Flanders
founded a Latin Empire, a.d. 1201-1261. The pope put the doge and the
crusaders under excommunication on account of the taking of Zaras,
and the campaign against Constantinople was most decidedly disapproved.
Their unexpected success, however, turned away his auger. He boasted
that at last Israel, after destroying the golden calves at Dan and Bethel,
was again united to Judah, and in Rome bestowed the p^lium upon the
^ Stubbs, " Chronicle and Memorials of Richard I." London, 1801.
§ 94. THE CRUSADES. 19
first Latin patriarch of Constautinople. — The Children's Crusade, which in
A.D. 1212 snatched from their parents in France and Germany 30,000
boys and girls, had a most tragic end. Many died before passing from
Europe of famine and fatigue ; the rest fell into the hands of unprincipled
men, who sold them as slaves in Egypt. — King Andrew II. of Hungary, urged
by Honorius III., led a new crusading army to the Holy Land in a.d.
1217, and won some successes; but finding himself betrayed and deserted
by the Palestinian barons, he returned home in the following year.
But the Germans under Leopold VII. of Austria, who had accompanied
him remained, and, supported by a Cologne and Dutch fleet, undertook
in A.D. 1218, along with the titular king John of Jerusalem, a crusade
against Egypt. Damietta was taken, but the overflow of the Nile reser-
voirs placed them in such peril that they owed their escape in a.d. 1221
only to the generosity of the Sultan Camel.
5. The Fifth Crusade, A.D. 1228.— The Emperor Frederick II. had
promised to undertake a crusade, but continued to make so many excuses
for delay that Gregory IX. (§ 96, 19) at last thundered against him the
long threatened excommunication. Frederick now brought out a com-
paratively small crusading force. The Sultan Camel of Egypt, engaged
in war with his nephew, and fearing that Frederick might attach himself
to the enemy, freely granted him a large tract of the Holy Land. At
the Holy Sepulchre Frederick placed the crown of Jerusalem, the in-
heritance of his new wife lolanthe, with his own hands on his head,
since no bishop would perform the coronation nor even a priest read
the mass service for the excommunicated king. He then returned home
in A.D. 1229 to arrange his differences with the pope. The crusading
armies which Theobald, king of Navarre, in a.d. 1239, and Kichard Earl
of Cornwall, in a.d. 1240, led against Palestine, owing to disunion among
themselves and quarrels among the Syrian Christians, could accomplish
nothing.
6. The Sixth, A.D. 1248, and Seventh, A.D. 1270, Crusades.— The zeal
for crusading had by this time considerably cooled. St. Louis of Prance,
however, the ninth of that name, had during a serious illness in a.d.
1244, taken the cross. At this time Jerusalem had been conquered and
subjected to the most dreadful horrors at the hands of the Chowares-
mians, driven from their home by the Mongols, and now in the pay of
Egyptian sultan Ayoub. Down to a.d. 1247 the rule of the Christians
in the Holy Land was again restricted to Acre and some coast towns.
Louis could no longer think of delay. He started in a.d. 1248 with a
considerable force, wintered in Cyprus, and landed in Egypt in a.d.
1249. He soon conquered Damietta, but, after his army had been in
great part destroyed by famine, disease and slaughter, was taken
prisoner at Cairo by the sultan. After the murder of the sultan by the
Mamelukes, who overthrew Saladiu's dynasty, he fell into their hands.
20 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
The king was obliged to deliver over Damietta and to purchase his own
release by payment of 800,000 byzantines. He sailed with the remnant
of his army to Acre in a.d. 1250, whence his mother's death called him
home in a.d. 1254. But as his vow had not yet been fully paid, he sailed
in A.D. 1270 with a new crusading force to Tunis in order to carry on
operations from that centre. But the half of his army was cut off by a
pestilence, and he himself was carried away in that same year. All sub-
sequent endeavours of the popes to reawaken an interest in the crusades
were unavailing. Acre or Ptolemais, the last stronghold of the Chris-
tians in the Holy Land, fell in a.d. 1291.
§ 95. Islam and the Jews in Europe.
The Saracens (§ 81, 2) were overthrown in the 11th cen-
cnry by the Normans. The reign of Islam in Spain too
(§ 81, 1) came to an end. The frequent change of dynasties,
as well as the splitting up of the empire into small prin-
cipalities, weakened the power of the Moors ; the growth
of luxurious habits in the rich and fertile districts robbed
them of martial energy and prowess. The Christian power
also was indeed considerably split up and disturbed by many
internal feuds, but the national and religious enthusiasm
with which it was every day being more and more inspired,
made it invincible. Eodrigo Diaz, the Castilian hero, called
by the Moors the Cid, i.e. Lord, by the Christians Cam-
peador, i.e. champion, who died in a.d. 1099, was the most
perfect representative of Spanish Christian knighthood,
although he dealt with the infidels in a manner neither
Christian nor knightly. Also the Almoravides of Morocco,
whose aid was called in in a.d. 1086, and the Almohades,
who had driven out these from Barbary in a.d. 1146, were
not able to stop the progress of the Christian arms. On
the other hand, neither the unceasing persecutions of the
civil power, nor innumerable atrocities comjaitted on Jews
by infuriated mobs, nor even Christian theologians' zeal for
the instruction and conversion of the Israelites, succeeded
in destroying Judaism in Europe.
§ 95. ISLAM AND THE JEWS IN EUROPE. 21
1. Islam in Sicily.— The robber raids upon Italy perpetrated by the
Sicilian Saracens were put an end to by the Normans who settled there
in A.D. 1017. Robert Guiscard destroyed the remnant of Greek rule
in southern Italy, conquered the small Longobard duchies there, and
founded a Norman duchy of Apulia and Calabria in a.d. 1059. His
brother Roger, who died in a.d. 1101, after a thirty years' struggle drove
the Saracens completely out of Sicily, and ruled over it as a vassal of
his brother under the title of Count of Sicily. His son Roger II., who
died in a.d. 1154, united the government of Sicily and of Apulia and
Calabria, had himself crowned in a.d. 1130 king of Sicily and Italy,
and finally in a.d. 1139 conquered also Naples. In consequence of the
marriage of his daughter Constance with Henry VI. the whole kingdom
passed over in a.d. 119-4 to the Hohenstaufens, from whom it passed in
A.D. 1266 to Charles of Anjou; and from him finally, in consequence of
the Sicilian Vespers in a.d. 1282, the island of Sicily passed to Peter of
Arragon, the son-in-law of Manfred, the last king of the Hohenstaufen
line. The Normans and the Hohenstaufens granted to the subject
Saracens for the most part full religious liberty, the Emperor Frede-
rick recruiting from among them his bodyguard, and they supplied
the bravest soldiers for the Italian Ghibelline war. For this purpose
he was constantly drafting new detachments from the African coast, as
Manfred also had done. The endeavours made by monks of the men-
dicant orders for the conversion of the Saracens proved quite fruitless.
It was only under the Spanish rule that conversions were made by force,
or persecution and annihilation followed persistent refusal.
2. Islam iu Spain. — The times of Abderrhaman III., a.d. 912-961,
and Hacem II., a.d. 961-976, were the most brilliant and fortunate of the
Ommaiadean khalifate. After the death of the latter the chamberlain
Almansor, who died in a.d. 1002, reigned in the name of Khalif Hescham
II., who was little more than a puppet of the seraglio, and his rule was
glorious, powerful and wise. But interminable civil contentions were
the result of this disarrangement of government, and in a.d. 1031, in
consequence of a popular tumult, Abderrhaman IV., the last of the
Ommaiades, took to flight, and voluntarily resigned the crown. The
khalifate was now broken up into as many little iDrincipalities or emir-
ships as there had been governors before. Amid such confusions the
Christian princes continued to develop and increase their resources.
Saucho the Great, king of Navarre, a.d. 970-1035, by marriage and con-
quest united almost all Christian Spain under his rule, but this was split
up again by being partitioned among his sons. Of these Ferdinand I., who
died in a.d. 10G5, inherited Castile, and in a.d. 1037 added to it Leon by
conquest. With him begins the heroic age of Spanish knighthood. His
son Alfonso IV., who died in a.d. 1109, succeeded in a.d. 1085 in taking
from the Moors Toledo and a great part of Andalusia. The powerful
22 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
leader of the Almoravides, Jussuf from Morocco, was now called to their aid
by the Moors. On the plain of Salacca the Christians were beaten in a.d.
1086, but soon the victor turned his arms against his allies, and within
six years all Moslem Spain was under his government. His son Ali, in a
fearfully bloody battle at Ucles in a.d. 1107, cut down the flower of the
Castilian nobility; this marked the summit of power reached by the
Almoravides, and now their star began slowly to pale. Alfonso I. of
Arragon, a.d. 1105-1134, conquered Saragossa in a.d. 1118, and other
cities. Alfonso VII. of Castile, a.d. 112G-1157, whose power rose so high
that most of the Christian princes in Spain acknowledged him as sove-
reign, and that he had himself formally crowned emperor of Spain in a.d.
1135, conducted a successful campaign against Andalusia, and in a.d. 1144
forced his way down to the south coast of Granada. Alfonso I. of Portugal,
drove the Moors out of Lisbon ; Eaimard, count of Barcelona, conquered
Tortosa, etc. At the same time too the government of the Almoravides
was being undermined in Africa. In a.d. 114G Morocco fell, and with it
North-western Africa, into the hands of the Almohades under Abdelmou-
men, while his lieutenant Abu Amram at the same time conquered Moslem
Spain and Andalusia. Abdelmoumen's son Jussuf himself crossed over
into Spain with an enormous force in order to extingviish the Christian
rule there, but fell in a battle at Santarem against Alfonso I. of Portugal.
His son Jacob avenged the disaster by the bloody battle of Alarcos in
a.d. 1195, where 30,000 Castihans were left upon the field. When, not-
withstanding the overthrow, the Christians a few years later endeavoured
to retrieve their loss, Jacob's successor Mohammed descended upon
Spain with half a million fanatical followers. The critical hour for
Spain had now arrived. The Christians had won time to come to
agreement among themselves. They fought with unexampled heroism on
the plain of Tolosain a.d. 1212 under Alfonso VIII. of Castile. The battle-
field was strewn with more than 200,000 bodies of the African fanatics.
It was the death-knell of the rule of the Almohad in Spain. Notwithstand-
ing the dissensions and hostilities that immediately broke out among the
Christian princes, they conquered within twenty-five years the whole of
Andalusia. The work of conquest was carried out mostly by Ferdinand
III., the saint of Castile, a.d. 1217-1254, and Jacob I., the conqueror of
Arragon, a.d. 1213-1276. Only in the southernmost district of Spain a
remnant of the Moslem rule survived in the kingdom of Granada, founded
in A.D. 1238 by the emir Mohammed Aben Alamar. Here for a time
the glories of Arabic culture were revived in such a way as seemed like a
magical restoration of the day of the Ommaiades. In consequence of the
marriage in a.d. 1469 of Ferdinand of Arragon, who died in a.d. 1516,
with Isabella of Castile, these two most important Christian empires were
unite^l. Soon afterwards the empire of Granada came to an end. On
2nd January, a.d. 1492, after an ignominious capitulation, the last khalif,
§ 95. ISLAM AND THE JEWS IN EUROPE. 28
Abu Abdilehi Boabdil, was driven out of the fair (Granada), and a few
moments later the Castilian banner waved from the highest tower of the
proud Alhambra. The pope bestowed upon the royal pair the title of
Catholic monarchs. The Moors who refused to submit to baptism were
expelled, but even the baptized, the so-called Moriscoes, proved so dan-
gerous an element in the state that Philip III., inA.D. 1G09, ordered them
to be all banished from his realm. They sought refuge mostly in Africa,
and there went over openly again to Mohammedanism, which they had
never at heart rejected.^
3. The Jews in Europe. — By trade, money lending and usury the
Jews succeeded in obtaining almost sole possession of ready money,
which brought them often great influence with the needy princes and
nobles, but was also often the occasion of sore oppression and robbery,
as well as the cause of popular hatred and violence. Whenever a coun-
try was desolated by a plague the notion of well-poisoning by the Jews
was renewed. It was told of them that they had stolen the consecrated
sacramental bread in order to stick it through with needles, and Chris-
tian children, that they might slaughter them at their passover festival.
From time to time this popular rage exploded, and then thousands of
Jews were ruthlessly murdered. The crusaders too often began their
feats of valour on Christian soil by the slaughter of Jews. From the
13th century in almost all lands they were compelled to wear an insult-
ing badge, the so called Jews' hat, a yellow, funnel-shaped covering of the
head, and a ring of red cloth on the breast, etc. They were also compelled
to herd together in the cities in the so called Jewish quarter (Italian =
Ghetto), which was often surrounded by a special wall. St. Bernard and
several popes, Gregory VII., Alexander III., Innocent III., etc., interested
themselves in them, refused to allow them to he violently persecuted, and
pointed to their position as an incontrovertible proof of the truth of the
gospel to all times. The German emperors also took the Jews under
their special protection, for they classed them, after the exam^Dle of Ves-
pasian and Titus, among the special servants of the imperial chamber,
Servi camera nostrce speciales).^ In England and France they were treated
as the mancipium of the crown. In Spain under the Moorish rule they
had vastly increased in numbers, culture and wealth; also under the
Christian kings they enjoyed for a long time special privileges, their own
' Prescott, " History of Ferdinand and Isabella," good edition by Kirk,
in 1 vol., London, 1886; Geddes, "History of Expulsion of Moriscoes,"
in "Miscell. Tracts," vol. i., London, 1714; McCrie, "Hist, of Prop, and
Supj)r. of Eeformation in Spain," London, 1829; Ranke, "History of
Reformation," transl. by Mrs. Austin, vol. iii., London, 18-47.
" Milman, "History of the Jews." Book xxiv. 1, "The Feudal
System."
24 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
tribunals, freedom in the possession of land, etc., and obtained great
influence as ministers of finance and administration, and also as astrolo-
gers, physicians, apothecaries, etc. ; but by their usury and merciless greed
drew forth more and more the bitter hatred of the people. Hence in the
14th century in Spain also there arose times of sore oppression and per-
secution, and attempts at conversion by force. And finally, in a.d. 1492,
Ferdinand the Catholic drove more than 400,000 Jews out of Spain, and
in the following year 100,000 out of Sicily. But even the baptized Jews,
the so-called " New Christians," who were prohibited from removing, fell
under the suspicion of secret attachment to the old religion, and many
thousands of them became victims of the Inquisition. — Many apologetic
and polemical treatises were composed for the purpose of discussion with
the Jews and for their instruction, but like so many other formal dispu-
tations they did not succeed in securing any good result, for the Jewish
teachers were superior in learning, acuteness, and acquaintance with the
exposition of Old Testament ScrijDtures, upon which in this discussion
everything turned. But an interesting example of a Jew earnestly striv-
ing after a knowledge of the truth and working himself up to a full con-
viction of the divinity of Christianity and the church doctrine of that age,
somewhere about a.d. 1150, is presented by the story told by himself of
the conversion of Hermann afterwards a Premonstratensian monk in the
monastery of Kappenberg in Westphalia. ^ But on the other hand there
are also isolated examples of a passing over to Judaism as the result, it
would seem, of genuine conviction. The first known example of this
kind appears in a.d. 839, in the case of a deacon Boso, who after being
circumcised received the name Eleazar, married a Jewess, and settled in
Saracen Spain, where he manifested extraordinary zeal in making con-
verts to his new religion. A second case of this sort is met with in the
times of the Emperor Henry II., in the perversion of a priest Wecelinus.
The narrator of this story gives expression to his horror in the words,
Totus contremisco et horrejitihus pilis capitis terrore conciitior. Also the
Judaising sects of the Pasagiaus in Lombardy during the 11th century
(§ 108, 3) and the Russian Jewish sects of the 15th century (§73, 5) were
probably composed for the most part of proselytes to Judaism.^
1 " De sua conversione," in Carpzov's edit, of the "PugioFidei" of
Raimund Martini, § 103, 9.
2 Milman, "History of the Jews," 3 vols., London, 18G3; bks. xxiv.,
xxvi. Prescott, " Ferdinand aiul Isabella," Pt. I., ch. xvii.
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 25
II. — The Hierarchy, the Clergy, and the Monks.
§ 9G. The Papacy and the Holy Eoman Empire in the
Ger]Man Natioxalities.i
The history of the papacy during this period represents it
in its deepest shame and degradation. But after this state
of matters was put an end to b}^ the founding of the Holy
Roman Empire of German, nationalities, it sprang np again
from its deep debasement, and reached the highest point of
power and influence. With the German empire, to which it
owed its salvation, it now carried on a life and death con-
flict ; for it seemed that it was possible to escape enslave-
ment under the temporal power of the emperor only by puc-
ting the emperor under its spiritual power. In the conflict
with the Hohenstaufens the struggle reached its climax.
The papacy won a complete victory, but soon found that
it could as little dispense with as endure the presence of
a powerful empire. Eor as the destruction of the Caro-
lingian empire had left it at the mercy of the factions of
Italian nobles at the time when this period opens, so its
victory over the German empire brought the papacy under
the still more degrading bondage of French politics, as is
seen in the beginning of the next period. It had during
this transition time its most powerful props and advisers
in the orders of Clugny and Camaldoli (§ 98, 1). It had a
standing army in the mendicant orders, and the crusaders,
besides the enthusiasm, which greatly strengthened the
papal institution, did the further service of occupying and
engrossing the attention of the princes.
1 Bryce, " The Holy Roman Empire," London, 18G6. Q-Donogliur,
" History of Church and Court of Rome, from Constantine to Present
Time," 2 vols., London, IS-iG. Bower's " History of tLe Popes," vol. v.
26 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
1. The Romisli Pornocracy and the Emperor Otto I, f A.D. 973.— Among
the wild struggles of the Italian nobles which broke out after the
Emperor Arnulf's departure (§82-8), the party of the Margrave Adal-
bert of Tuscany gained the upperhand. His mistress Theodora, a well
born and beautiful, ambitious and voluptuous Roman, wife of a Roman
senator, as well as her like-minded daughters Marozia and Theodora,
filled for half a century the chair of St. Peter with their paramours, sons
and grandsons. These constituted the base and corrupt line of popes
known as the pornocracy. Sergins III., a.d. 904-911, Marozia's para-
mour, starts this disagraceful series. After the short pontificates of
the two immediately following popes, Theodora, because Ravenna was
inconveniently distant for the gratification of her lust, called John, the
archbishop of that place, to the papal chair under the title of John X.,
A.D. 914-928. By means of a successful crusade which he led in person,
he destroyed the remnant of Saracen robbers in Garigliano (§ 81 2), and
crowned the Lombard king Bernard I., a.d. 916-924, as emperor. But
when he attempted to break off his disgraceful relations with the woman
who had advanced him, Marozia had him cast into prison and smothered
with a pillow. The two following popes on whom she bestowed the
tiara enjoyed it only a short time, for in a.d. 931 she raised her own son
to the papal throne in the twentieth year of his age. His father was
Pope Sergius, and he assumed the name of John XI. But her other son
Alberich, who inherited the temporal kingdom from a.d. 932, restricted
this pope's jurisdiction and that of his four successors to the ecclesiastical
domain. After Alberich's death his son Octavianus, an arch-profligate
and blasphemer, though only in his sixteenth year, united the papacy
and the temporal power, and called himself by the name of John XII. a.d.
955-963 — the first instance of a change of name on assuming the papal
chair. He would sell anything for money. He made a boy of ten years
a bishop ; he consecrated a deacon in a stable ; in hunting and dice
playing he would invoke the favour of Jupiter and Venus ; in his orgies
he would drink the devil's health, etc. Meantime things had reached a
terrible pass in Germany. After the death of Louis the Child, the last of
the German Carolingians, in a.d. 911, the Frankish duke Conrad I., a.d.
911-918, was elected king of the Germans. Although vigorously sup-
ported by the superior clergy, the Synod of Hohenaltheim in a.d. 915
threatening the rebels with all the pains of hell, the struggle with the
other dukes prevented the founding of a united German empire. His
successor, the Saxon Henry I., a.d. 919-936, was the first to free himself
from the faction of the clergy, and to grant to the dukes independent
administration of internal affairs within their own domains. His greater
son. Otto I., A.D. 936-973, by limiting the power of the dukes, by fight-
ing and converting heathen Danes, Wends, Bohemians and Hungarians,
by* decided action in the French troubles, by gathering around him a
i
virtuous German clergy, who proved true to him and the empire, secured
after long continued civil wars a power and reputation such as no ruler
in the "West since Charlemagne had enjoyed. Called to the help of the
Lombard nobles and the pope John XII. against the oppression and
tyranny of Berengarius II., he conquered the kingdom of Italy, and was
at Candlemas a.d. 962 crowned emperor by the pope in St. Peter's, after
having really held this rank for thirty years. Thus was the Holy Roman
Empire of German Nationalities founded, which continued for centuries
to be the centre around which the history of the church and the world
revolved. The new emperor confirmed to the pope all donations of
previous emperors with the addition of certain cities, without detriment, .
however, to the imperial suzerainty over the patrimony of St. Peter, and
without lessening in any degree the imperial privileges maintained by
Charlemagne. The Privilegium Ottonis, still preserved in the papal
archives, and claiming to be an authentic document, was till quite re-
cently kept secret from all impartial and capable investigators, so that
the suspicion of its spuriousness had come to be regarded as almost a
certainty. Under Leo XIII., however, permission was given to a capable
Protestant scholar. Prof. Sickel of Vienna, to make a photographic fac-
simile of the document, the result of which was that he became con-
vinced that the document was not the original but a contemporary
official duplicate, a literally faithful transcript on purple parchment with
letters of gold for solemn deposition in the grave of St. Peter. Its first
part describes the donations of the emperor, the second the obligations
of the pope in accordance with the Constitutio Momana, § 82-4. — But
scarcely had Otto left Kome than the pope, breaking his oath, conspired
with his enemies, endeavoured to rouse the Byzantines and heathen
"Hungarians against him, and opened the gates of Kome to Adalbert the
son of Berengarius. Otto hastened back, deposed the pope at the synod
of Kome in a.d. 963, on charges of incest, perjury, murder, blasphemy,
etc., and made the Romans swear by the bones of Peter never again to
elect and consecrate a pope, without having the emperor's permission
and confirmation. Soon after the emperor's departure, however, the
newly elected pope Leo VIII., a.d. 963-965, had to betake himself to
flight. John XII. returned again to Rome, excommunicated his rival
pope, and took cruel vengeance upon the partisans of the emperor. On
his death soon afterwards, in a.d. 964, the Romans elected Benedict V
as his successor; but he, when the emperor conquered Kome after a
stubborn resistance, was obliged to submit to humiliating terms. Leo
VIII. had in John XIII., a.d. 965-972, a virtuous and worthy successor.
A new revolt of the Romans led soon after his election to his imprison-
ment ; but he succeeded in making his escape in a.d. 966. Otto now for
the third time crossed the Alps, passed relentlessly severe sentences
upon the guilty, and had his son, now thirteen years of age, crowned
in Rome as Otto II., a.d. 967.
28 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294,
2. The Times of Otto II., III., A.D. 973-1002.— After the death of
Otto I., since Otto II., a.d. 973-98.3, was restrained from a Roman cam-
paign in consequence of Cisalpine troubles, the nobles' faction under
Crescentius, son of Pope John X. and the younger Theodora, again won
the upperhand. This party had in a.d. 974 overthrown Pope Benedict
VI., A.D. 972-974, appointed by Otto I., and cast him into prison. But
their own anti-pope Boniface VII. could not maintain his position,
and fled with the treasures of St. Peter to Constantinople. By means
of a compromise of parties Benedict VII., a.d. 974-988, was now raised
to the papal chair and held possession in spite of manifold opposition,
till the arrival of the young emperor in Italy in a.d. 980 obtained for
him greater security. Otto II. again restored the imperial prestige in
Rome in a.d. 981, but in a.d. 982 he suffered a complete defeat at the
hand of the Saracens. He died in the following year at Rome, after
he had in John XIV., a.d. 988-984, secured the appointment of a pope
faithful to the empire. His son Otto III., three years old, was at
the council of state, held at Verona, by the princes of Germany and
Italy, there gathered together, elected king of both kingdoms. During
the German civil wars under the regency of the Queen-mother Theo-
phania, a Byzantine princess, and the able Archbishop Willigis, of
Mainz, wlio, through his firmness and penetration saved the crown for
the royal child Otto III., a.d. 988-1002, and maintained the existence
and integrity of the German empire, Rome and the papacy fell again
under the domination of the nobles, at whose head now stood the
younger Crescentius, a son of the above mentioned chief of the same
name. In a.d. 984 the anti-pope Boniface VII., who had fled to Con-
stantinople, made his appearance in Rome, won a following by Greek
gold, got possession of John XIV. and had him cast into prison, but
was himself soon afterwards murdered. The new pope John XV., a.d.
985-996, who was thoroughly venal, was an obedient topi of the
tyranny of Crescentius, which, however, soon became so intolerable to
him, that he yearned for the restoration of imperial rule under Otto III.
At this same time great danger threatened the imperial authority from
France. Hugh Capet had, after the death of the last Carolingian,
Louis v., in a.d. 987, taken possession for himself of the French crown.
He insisted upon John XV. deposing the archbishop Arnulf of Rheims,
who had opened the gates of Rheims to his uncle Charles of Lorraine,
the brother of Louis V.'s father. The pope, who was then dependent
upon German power, hesitated. Hugh then had Arnulf deposed at a
synod at Rheims in a.d. 921, and put in his place Gerbert, the greatest
scholar (§ 100, 2) and statesman of that age. The council quite openly
declared the whole French church to be free from Rome, whose bishops
for a hundred years had been steeped in the most profound moral
corruption, and had fallen into the most disgraceful servitude, and
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 29
Gerbert issued a confession of faith in wliich celibacy and fasting were
repudiated, and only the first four oecumenical councils were acknow-
ledged. But the plan was shattered, not so much through the ap-
parently fruitless opposition of the pope as through the reaction of the
high church party of Clugny and the popular esteem in which that
party was held. Gerbert could not maintain his position, and was
heartily glad when he could shake the dust of Eheims off his feet
by accepting an honourable call of the young emperor, Otto III., who
in A.D. 997 opened new paths for his ambition by inviting the celebrated
scholar to be with him as his classical tutor. Hugh's successor Robert
reinstated Arnulf in the see of Rheims. John XV. called in Otto III.
to his help against the intolerable oppression of the younger Cres-
centius, but died before his arrival in a.d. 996. Otto directed the choice
of his cousin Bruno, twenty-four years of age, the first German pope,
who assumed the name of Gregory V., a.d. 996-999, and by him he
was crowned emperor in Rome. Gregory was a man of an energetic,
almost obstinate character, thoroughly in sympathy with the views of
the monks of Clugny. The emperor ha\ing soon returned home,
Crescentius violated his oath and made himself again master of Rome.
Gregory fled to Pavia, where he held a synod in a.d. 997, which thun-
dered an anathema against the disturber of the Roman church. Mean-
while Crescentius raised to the papal throne the archbishop John of
Piacenza, formerly Greek tutor to Otto IH., under the title of John XVI.
It was not till late in autumn of that year that the emperor could
hasten to the help of his injured cousin. He then executed a fearfully
severe sentence upon the tyrant and his pope. The former was be-
headed, and his corpse dragged by the feet through the streets and
then hung upon a gallows ; the latter, whom the soldiers had cruelly
deprived of his ears, tongue, and nose, was led through the streets
seated backward on an ass, with the tail tied in his hands for reins.—
From Pavia Gregory had issued a command to Robert, the French
king, to put away his queen Bertha, who was related to him in the
fourth degree, on pain of excommunication. But he died a suspiciously
sudden death before he could bring down the pride of this king, which,
however, his successor accomplished.
3. Otto III. now raised to the papal chair his teacher Gerbert, whom
he had previously made Archbishop of Ravenna, under the title of
Sylvester II., a.d. 999-1003. Already in Ravenna had Gerbert's ecclesi-
astical policy been changed for the high church views of his former
opponents, and as pope he developed an activity which marks him out
as the worthy follower of his predecessor and the precursor of a yet
greater Gregory (VII.). He energetically contended against simony,
that special canker of the church, and by sending the ring and staff to his
former opponent, Arnulf, made the first effort to assert the papal claim
30 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
to the exclusive investiture of bishops. But he had previously, as
tutor of Otto, by flattering his vanity, inspired the imaginative, high-
spirited youth with the ideal of a restoration of the ancient glory of
Rome and its emperors exercising universal sway. And just with this
view had Otto raised him to the papal chair in order that he might
have his help. The pope did not venture openly to withdraw from
this understanding, for in the condition of Italy at that time in a
struggle with the emperor, the victory would be his in the first instance,
and that would be the destruction of the papal chair. So there was
nothing for it but by clever tacking in spite of contrary winds of imperial
policy, to make the ship of the church hold on as far as possible in the
high church course and surround the emperor by a network of craft.
The phantom of a Benovatio imperii Romaiii with the mummified form
of the Byzantine court ceremonial and the vain parade of a title was
called into being. On a pilgrimage to the grave of his saintly friend
Adalbert in Gnesen (§ 83, 13) the emperor emancipated the Polish
church from the German metropolitanate by raising its see into an arch-
bishopric. He also, in a.d. 1000, released the Polish duke Boleslaw
Chrobry (§ 98, 7), the most dangerous enemy of Germany, who schemed
the formation of a great Slavic empire, from his fealty as a vassal of
the German empire, enlisting him instead as a "friend and confederate
of the Roman people" in his new fantastic universal empire. In the
same year, however, Sylvester, in the exercise of papal sovereignty,
conferred the royal crown on Stephen the saint of Hungary (§ 93, 8),
appointed the payment by him of a yearly tribute to the papal vicar
with ecclesiastical authority over his country, and made that land
ecclesiastically independent of Passau and Salzburg by founding a
separate metropolitanate at Gran. Though Otto let himself be led in
the hierarchical leading strings by his papal friend, he yet made it abun-
dantly evident by bestowing upon his favourite pope eight counties of
the States of the Church, that he regarded these as merely a free gift
of imperial favour. He also lashed violently the extravagances as
well as the greed of the popes, and declared that the donation of Con-
stantine was a pure fabrication (§ 87, 4). The emperor, however, had
meanwhile thoroughly estranged his German subjects and the German
clergy by his un-German temperament. The German princes denounced
him as a traitor to the German empire. Soon all Italy, even the much
fondled Rome, rose in open revolt. Only an early death a.d. 1002
saved the unhappy youth of twenty-two years of age from the most
terrible humiliation. With him, too, the star of the pope's fortunes
went down. He died not long after in a.d. 1003, and left in the popu-
lar mind the reputation of a dealer in the black art, who owed his
learning and the success of his hierarchical career to a compact with
the devil.
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIEE. 31
4. From Henry II. to the Synod at Sutri, A.D. 1002-1046.— After the
death of Otto III,, Henry II., a.d. 1002-1024, previously duke of Bavaria,
a great-grandson of Henry I. and as such the last scion of the Saxon
line, obtained the German crown — a ruler who proved one of the ablest
that ever occupied that throne. A bigoted pietist and under the power of
the priests, although pious-hearted according to the spirit of the times
and strongly attached to the church, and seeking in the bishops sup-
ports of the empire against the relaxing influence of the temporal
princes, yet no other German emperor ruled over the church to the
same extent that he did, and no one ventured so far as he did to
impress strongly upon the church, by the most extensive appropriation
of ecclesiastical property, especially of rich monasteries, that this was
the shortest and surest way of bringing about a much needed refor-
mation. Meanwhile in Kome, after the death of Otto III., Joannes
Crescentius, the son of Crescentius II., who was beheaded by order of
Otto, assumed the government, and set upon the chair of Peter crea-
tures of his own, John XVII., XVIII., and Sergius IV. But as he and
his last elected pope died soon after one another in a.d, 1012, the long
subjected faction of the Tusculan counts, successors of Alberich, came
to the front again, and chose as pope a scion of one of their own
families, Benedict VIII., a,d. 1012-1024, The anti-pope Gregory, chosen
by the Crescentians, was obliged to retire from the field. He sought
protection from Henry II. But this monarch came to an understanding
with the incomparably nobler and abler Benedict, received from him
for himself and his Queen Cunigunda, subsequently canonized by
Innocent III., the imperial crown, in a.d. 1014, and continued ever
after to maintain excellent relations with him. These two, the em-
peror and the pope, were on friendly terms with the monks of Clugny.
They both acknowledged the need of a thorough reformation of the
church, and both carried it out so far as this could be done by the
influence and example of their own personal conduct, disposition, and
character. But the pope had so much to do fighting the Crescentians,
then the Greeks and Saracens in Italy, and the emperor in quelling in-
ternal troubles in his empire and repelling foreign invasions, that it was
only toward the close of their hves that they could take any very decided
action. The pope made the first move, for at the Synod of Pavia in
a.d. 1018, he excommunicated all married priests and those living in
concubinage, and sentenced their children to slavery. The emperor
entertained a yet more ambitious scheme. He wished to summon a
Western oecumenical council at Pavia, and there to engage upon the re-
formation of the whole church of the West. But the death of the pope
in A.D. 1024, which was followed in a few months by the death of the
emperor, prevented the carrying out of this plan. After the death of
the childless Henrv II., Ccnrad II., a.d. 1024-1039, the founder of the
32 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1'294.
Franconian or Salic dynasty, ascended the German throne. To him the
empire was indebted for great internal reforms and a great extension of
power, but he gave no attention to the carrying out of his predecessor's
plans of ecclesiastical reformation. Still less, however, was anything of
the kind to be looked for from the popes of that period. Benedict VIII.
was succeeded by his brother Eomanus, under the name of John XIX.,
A.D. 1024-1033, as void of character and noble sentiments (§ 67, 2) as his
predecessor had been distinguished. When he died, Count Alberich of
Tusculum was able by means of presents and promises to get the Romans
to elect his son Theophylact, who, though only twelve years old, was
already practised in the basest vice. He took the name of Benedict IX.,
A.D. 1033-1048, and disgraced the papal chair with the most shameless
profligacy. The state of matters became better under Conrad's son,
Henry III., a.d. 1039-1056, who strove after the founding of a universal
monarchy in the sense of Charlemagne, and by a powerful and able
government he came nearer reaching this end than any of the German
emperors. He was at the same time inspired with a zeal for the
reformation of the church such as none of his predecessors or successors,
with the exception of Henry II., ever showed. Benedict IX. was, in
A.D. 1044, for the second time driven out by the Romans. They now
sold the tiara to Sylvester III., who three months after was driven
out by Benedict. This pope now fell in love with his beautiful cousin,
daughter of a Tusculan count, and formed the bold resolve to marry her.
But the father of the lady refused his consent so long as he was pope.
Benedict now sold the papal chair for a thousand pounds of silver to
tbe archdeacon Joannes Gratian. This man, a pious simple individual,
in order to save the chair of St. Peter from utter overthrow, took upon
himself the disgrace of simony at the bidding of his friends of Clugny,
among whom a young Roman monk called Hildebrand, son of poor
parents of Soaua, in Tuscany, was already most conspicuous. The new
pope assumed the name of Gregory VI., a.d. 1044-1046. He wanted
the talents necessary for the hard task he had undertaken. Benedict
having failed in carrying out his matrimonial plans, again claimed
to be pope, as did also Sylvester. Thus Rome had at one and the same
time, three popes, and all three were publicly known to be simonists.
The Clugny party cast off their protege Gregory, and called in the
German emperor as saviour of the church. Henry came and had all the
the three popes deposed at the Synod at Sutri, a.d. 1046. The Romans
gave to him the right of making a new appointment. It fell upon
Suidger, bishop of Bamberg, who took the name of Clement II., and
crowned the king emj^eror on Christmas, a.d. 1040. The Romans were
so delighted at having order restored in the city, that they gave over to
the emperor with the rank of patrician the government of Rome and the
right of papal election for all time, and swore never to consecrate a
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 33
pope without the emperor's concurrence. Henry took the ex-pope
Grregory along with him, back to Germany, where he died in exile, at
Cologne. Hildebrand, his chaplain, had accompanied him thither, and
after his death retired into the monastery of Clugny.
5. Henry III. and his German Popes, A.D. 1046-1057.— With Clement
III., 1046-1047, begins a whole series of able German popes, who,
elected by Henry III., wrought under his protection powerfully and
successfully for the reform of the church. All interested in the reforma-
tion, the brethren of Clugny, as well as the disciples of Romuald and
the settlers in Vallombrosa (§ 98, 1), agreed that at the root of all the
corruption of the church of that age were simony, or obtaining spiri-
tual offices by purchase or bribery (Acts viii. 19), and Nicolaitanism
(§ 27, 8), under which name were included all fleshly lusts of the
clergy, marriage as well as concubinage and unnatural vices. These
two were, especially in Italy, so widely spread, that scarcely a priest
was to be found who had not been guilty of both. Clement II., in the
emperor's presence, at a synod in Rome in a.d. 1017, began the battle
against simony. But he died before the end of the year, probably by
poison. While Roman envoys presented themselves at the German
court about the election of a new pope, Benedict IX., supported by
the Tusculan party, again laid claim to the papal chair, and the
emperor had to utter the severest threats before the man of his choice,
Poppo, bishop of Brixen, was allowed to occupy the papal chair as
Damasus II. Twenty-three days afterwards, however, he was a corpse.
This cooled the ardour of German bishops for election to so dangerous
a position, and only after long persuasion Bishop Bruno of Toul, the
emperor's cousin and a zealous friend of Clugny, accepted the ap-
pointment, on the condition that it should have the approval of the
people and clergy of Rome, which, as was to be expected, was given
with acclamation. He ascended the papal throne as Leo IX., a.d. 1049-
1054. According to a later story conceived in the interests of Hilde-
brandism, Bruno is said not only to have made his definite acceptance
of the imperial call dependent upon the supplementary free election of
people and clergy of Rome, but also to have been prevailed upon by
Hildebrand, who by his own request accompanied him, to lay aside his
papal ornaments, to continue his journey in pilgrim garb, and to make
his entrance into the eternal city barefoot, so that the necessary
sanction of a formal canonical election might be given to the imperial
nomination. Leo found the papal treasures emptied to the last coin
and robbed of all its territorial revenues by the nobles. But Hilde-
brand was his minister of finance, and soon improved the condition of
his exchequer. Leo now displayed an unexampled activity in church
reform and the purifying of the papacy. No pope travelled about
so much as he, none held as many synods in the most distant places
3
84 THE GEBMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.B. 1294.
and various lands. The uprooting of simony was in all cases the main
point in their decrees. By bonds of gratitude and relationship, but
above all of common interests, he was attached to the German emperor.
He could not therefore think of emancipating the papacy from the
imperial suzerainty. Practically Leo succeeded in clearing the Augean
stable of the Eoman clergy, and filled vacancies with virtuous men
brought from far and near. In order to chastise the Normans, put by him
under ban because of their rapacity, he himself took the field in a.d.
1053, when the emperor refused to do so, but was taken prisoner after
his army had been annihilated, and only succeeded, after he had
removed the excommunication, in getting them to kiss his feet with
the most profound devotion. He demanded from the Greek emperor
full restitution of the donation of Constantino, so far as this was still in
the possession of the Byzantines, and his envoys at Constantinople
rendered the split between the Eastern and Western churches irreparable
(§ 67, 3). Leo died in a.d. 1051, the only pope for centuries whom the
church honours as a saint. A Roman embassy called upon the emperor
to nominate a new pope. He fixed upon Gebhardt, bishop of Eichstadt,
who now ascended the papal throne as Victor II., a.d. 1055-1057.
Here again monkish tales have transformed a single matter of fact
into a romance in the interests of their own party. The Romans wished
Hildebrand himself for their pope, but he was unwilling yet to assume
such a responsibility. He put himself, however, at the head of an
embassy which convinced the emperor of the sinfulness of his former
interferences in the papal elections, and persuaded him to set aside the
tyrannical power of his patrician's rank and to resign to the clergy and
people their old electoral rights. As candidate for this election, Hilde-
brand himself chose bishop Gebhardt, the most trusted counsellor of
the emperor. After long opposition Henry's consent was won to this
candidature, he even urged the bisho^D to accept it, who at last submitted
with the words : " Now so do I surrender myself to St. Peter, soul and
body, but only on the condition that you also yield to him what belongs
to him." The latter, however, seems not mere beating of the air, for the
emperor restored to the newly elected pope the patrimony of Peter in
the widest extent, and bestowed on him besides the governorship of all
Italy. — Henry died in a.d. 1056, after he had appointed his queen Agnes
to the regency, and had recommended her to the counsel and good
offices of the pope. But the pope's days were already numbered. He
died in a.d. 1057. Hildebrand could not boast of having dominated him,
but the position of the powerful monk of Clugny under him had become
one of great importance.
6. The Papacy under the Control of Hildebrand, A.D. 1057-1078.— After
Victor's death the cardinals without paying any regard to the imperial
right, immediately elected Cardinal Frederick of Lorraine, at that
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY KOMAN EMPIRE. 35
time abbot of Monte Cassino, and Hildebrancl travelled to Germany in
order to obtain the post factum approval of the empress. Stephen IX.,
A.D. 1057-1058, for so Frederick styled himself, died before Hildebrand's
return. The Tusculan party took advantage of his absence to put
forward as pope a partisan of their own, Benedict X., a.d. 1058. But
an embassy of Hildebrand's to the empress secured the succession to
bishop Gerhard of Florence. Benedict was obliged to withdraw, and
Gerhard ascended the papal throne as Nicholas II., a.d. 1058-1061.
With him begins the full development of Hildebrand's greatness, and
from this time, a.d. 1059, when he became archdeacon of Home, till he
himself mounted the papal chair, he was the moving spirit of the
Eomish hierarchy. By his powerful genius in spite of all hindrances
he raised the papacy and the church to a height of power and glory
never attained unto before. He thus wrought on, systematically, firmly,
and irresistibly advancing toward a complete reformation in ecclesias-
tical polity. Absolute freedom of the church from the power and in-
fluence of the state, and in order to attain this and make it sure, the
dominion of the church over the state, papal elections independent
of any sort of temporal influence, the complete uprooting of all
simoniacal practices, unrelenting strictness in dealing with the im-
morality of the clergy, invariable enforcement of the law of celibacy,
as the most powerful means of emancipating the clergy from the
world and the state, filling the sacred offices with the most vir-
tuous and capable men, were some of the noble aims and achieve-
ments of this reformation. Hildebrand sought the necessary secular
protection and aid for the carrying out of his plans among the
Normans. Nicholas II., on the basis of the donation of Constantine,
gave as a fief to their leader, Eobert Guiscard (§ 95, 1), the lordship of
Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily, out of which the Saracens had yet to be
expelled, and exacted from him the oath of a vassal, by which he bound
himself to pay a yearly tribute, to protect the papal chair against all
encroachments of its privileges, and above all to maintain the right of
papal elections by the ^^meliores cardinales.'" Yet again, Nicholas, when,
at a later period, by the help of the Normans, he had broken the power
of the Tusculan nobles, issued a decree at a Lateran synod at Eome, in
A.D. 1059, by which papal elections (§ 82, 4) were regulated anew. Of
the two extant recensions of this decree, which are distinguished as the
papal and the imperial, the former is now universally acknowledged to
be the more authentic form. According to it the election lies exclu-
sively with the Roman cardinal priests (§ 97, 1) ; to the rest of the clergy
as to the people there is left only the right of acclamation, that brought
no advantage, and to the emperor, according to Boichorst, the right of
concurrence after the election and investiture, according to Granert, the
right of veto before the election. This decree, and not less the league
36 THE GEKMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
with the NormaDS, were open slights to the imperial claims upon Italy
and the papal chair. The empress therefore convened about Easter, a.d.
1061, a council of German bishops, at which Nicholas was deposed, and
all his decisions were annulled. Soon after the pope died. The Tuscu-
lan party, now joined with the Germans under the Lombard chancellor
Wibert, asked a new pope from the emj)ress. At the Council of Basel
in A.D. 1061, bishop Cadalus of Parma was appointed. He assumed
the name of Honorius II., a.d. 1061-1072. But Hildebrand had
already five weeks earlier in concert with the Margravine Beatrice of
Canossa, wholly on his own responsibility, chosen bishop Anselm of
Lucca, and had him consecrated as Alexander II. a.d. 1061-1073.
Honorius advanced to Eome, accompanied by Wibert, and frequently in
bloody conflicts conquered the party of his opponent. Duke Godfrey
the Bearded of Lorraine, the husband of Beatrice, now appeared as
mediator. He made both popes retire to their dioceses and gave to the
empress the decision of the controversy. But meanwhile a catastrophe
occurred in Germany that led to the most important results. Arch-
bishop Anno of Cologne, standing at the head of a rising of the princes,
decoyed the young king of twelve years of age on board a ship at
Kaiserswerth on the Rhine, and took him to Cologne. The regency and
the conduct of government were now transferred to the German bishoj)s
collectively, but lay practically in the hands of Anno, who meanwhile,
however, since a.d. 1063, found himself obliged to share the power with
Archbishop Adalbert of Bremen. At a council held at Augsburg in a.d.
1062, Alexander was acknowledged as the true pope, but Honorius by
no means resigned his claims. With a small army he advanced upon
Rome in a.d. 1064, seized fort Leo, which had been built and fortified
by Leo IV. for defence against the Saracens, entrenched himself in the
castle of St. Angelo, and repeatedly routed his opponent's forces. But
Hildebrand reminded the Normans of their oath of fealty. At a council
held at Mantua in a.d. 1064 (or 1067 ?) Alexander was once again
acknowledged, and Honorius, whose party the council sought in vain
to break up by force of arms, was again deposed. The proud, ambitious
and self-seeking priest of Cologne had meanwhile been obliged to trans-
fer to his northern colleague, Adalbert of Bremen, the further education
and training of the young king, who, though only fifteen years old was
now proclaimed of age in a.d. 106.5, as Henry IV., a.d. 1056-1106. If
the bishop of Cologne injured the disposition of the royal youth by
his excessive harshness and severity, the bishop of Bremen did him
irreparable damage by allowing him unrestrained indulgence in his evil
passions.
7. Gregory VII., A.D. 1073-1085.— Hildebrand had at last brought the
papacy to such a height of power that he was able now to put the finish-
ing stroke to his own work in his own name, and so now he mounted
96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIRE. 37
the chair of the chief of the apostles, as Gregory VII., elected and
enthroned by a disorderly mob. The Lombard and German bishops
appealed to the emperor to have the election declared invalid. But he
being on all sides threatened with wars and revolution, thought it
advisable to forego the assertion of his rights and to win the favour
of the pope by a letter full of devotion and humility. At the Roman
Fast Synod of a.d. 1074, Gregory renewed the old law of celibacy and
rendered it more strict, deposed all married priests or those who got
office through simony, and pronounced their priestly acts invaUd. The
lower clergy, who were generally married, violently opposed the measure,
but Gregory's stronger will prevailed. Papal legates visited all lands,
and, supported by the people, insisted upon the strict observance of the
papal decree. At the next fast synod in a.d. 1075, the pope began the
contest against the usual investiture of the higher clergy by the temporal
princes, with ring and staff as symbols of episcopal office. Whoever
should accept ecclesiastical office from the hand of a layman was to be
deposed, and any potentate who should give investiture should be put
under the ban of the church. Here too he thundered his anathema
against the counsellors of Henry who should meanwhile prove guilty of
the sale of ecclesiastical offices. Henry, whose hands were fully occu-
pied with the rebellious Saxons, at first dismissed his counsellors, but
after the close of the wars he reinstated them, and quite ignored the
papal prohibition of investiture. Gregory had for a while quite enough
to do in Italy. Cencius, the head of the nobles opposed to reform, fell
upon him on Christmas, a.d. 1075, during Divine service, and made him
prisoner, but the Piomans rescued him, and Cencius had to take to
flight. On New Year's Day, a.d. 1076, there appeared at the royal resi-
dence at Goslar a papal embassy which threatened the king with
excommunication and deposition should he not immediately break off
all relations with the counsellors under the ban, and reform his own
infamous life. The king burst out in furious rage. He heaped in-
sults upon the legates, and at the Synod of Worms, on 24th January,
had the pope formally deposed as a perjured usurper of the papal chair,
a tyrant, an adulterer and a sorcerer. The Lombard bishops, too, gave
their consent to this decree (§ 97, 5). At the next Roman Fast Synod
on 22nd February, the pope placed all bishops who had taken part
in thesC' proceedings under ban, and at the same time solemnly excom-
municated and deposed the king, and released all his subjects from the
obligation of their oaths of allegiance. Moreover he had the king's
ambassadors, whose life he had preserved from the fury of those present
at the meeting of synod by his personal interference, cast into prison,
and then in the most contemptuous manner led through the streets.
The papal ban made a deep impression upon the German people and
princes. One bishop after another gave in, the Saxons raised a new
38 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
revolt, and at the princes' conference at Tribur, in October, a.d. 1076, the
pope was invited to come personally to Augsburg on 2nd February, to
meet and confer with the princes about the affairs of the king. It was
resolved that if Henry did not succeed by 22nd February, the first
anniversary of the ban, to get it removed, he should for ever forfeit the
crown, but that meanwhile he should reside at Spires and continue in
the exercise of all royal prerogatives.
8. It was for the pope's advantage to have the business settled upon
German soil with the greatest possible publicity. Therefore he scorn-
fully refused the humble petition of the king to send him absolution
from Eome, and hastened his preparations for travelling to Augsburg.
But Henry went forth to meet him on the way. Shortly before Christ-
mas he escaped from Spires with his wife and child, and in spite of a
severe winter crossed Mount Cenis. The Lombards protected him in
defying the pretensions of the pope. But Henry's whole attention was
now directed to overturning the machinations of the hostile German
princes. So he suddenly appeared at Canossa, where Gregory was
staying with the Margravine Matilda, daughter of Beatrice, a princess
enthusiastically attached to him and his ideal. This meeting was un-
expected and undesired by the pope. There during the cold winter days,
from 25th to 27th January, a.d. 1077, stood the son of Henry III. bare-
foot in the courtyard of the castle of Canossa, wearing a sackcloth shirt,
fasting all day and supplicating access to the proud monk. With inflexi-
ble severity the pope refused, until at last the tears, entreaties, and
reproaches of the margravine overcame his obduracy. Henry promised
to submit himself to the future judgment of the pope in regard to his
reconciliation with the German princes, and was absolved. Neverthe-
less the princes at the Assembly at Forcheim in March, with the con-
currence of the papal legate, elected a new king in the person of
Rudolph of Swabia, Henry's brother-in-law. Roused to fury, Henry
now hastened back to Germany, where soon he gathered round him a
great army. Notwithstanding all pressure brought to bear upon him,
Gregory maintained for three years a position of neutrality, but at last,
in A.D. 1080, at the Roman Fast Synod, where the envoys of the contend-
ing kings presented their complaints, he renewed the excommunication
and deposition of Henry. Then the bishops of Henry's party immedi-
ately met at Brixen, and hurled the anathema and pronounced sentence
of deposition against Gregory, and elected as anti-pope Wibert, formerly
chancellor, then archbishop of Ravenna, who assumed the title of
Clement III., a.d. 1080-1100. After the death of Rudolph in battle,
at Merseburg, in a.d. 1080, Henry marched across the Alps and appeared
at Pentecost before the gates of Rome, which were opened to him after
a three years' siege. Clement III. then at Easter, a.d. 1084, set upon
him and his queen the in^perial crown. Gregory had withdrawn to
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLT ROMAN EMPIRE. 39
the Castle of St. Angelo. Henry, however, was compelled by the
appearance of a new rival for the crown, Henry, Count of Luxemburg,
to return to Germany, and Robert Guiscard, the Norman duke, hastened
from the south to deliver the pope, which he accomplished only after
Rome had been fearfully devastated. Gregory died in the following year,
A.D. 1085, at Salerno. Gregory VII. also took the field against the
dissolute and prodigal king of France, Philip I., and threatened him,
because of simony, with interdict and deposition. His success here,
however, was comparatively small. Philip avowedly submitted to the
papal decree, but did not in the least alter his conduct, and Gregory
felt that it was not prudent to push matters to an extremity. He
showed himself more indulgent toward the powerful William the Con-
queror of England, although this prince ruled the church of his dominions
with an iron hand, pronounced all church property to be freehold, and
was scarcely less guilty of simony than the kings of Germany and
France. Yet the pope himself, who hoped to secure the aid of his arms
against Henry IV., and sought therefore to dazzle him with the prospect
of the imperial throne, winked at his delinqueucies, and loaded him
with expressions of his good-will. The primate of England, too, the
powerful Conqueror's right-hand supporter, Lanfranc of Canterbury,
who bore a grudge against Gregory because of his patronage of the
heretic Berengarius (§ 101, 2), showed no special zeal for the reforms
advocated by the pope. At a synod held at Winchester in a.d. 1076, the
law of celibacy was enforced, with this limitation, however, that those
of the secular clergy who were already married should not be required to
put away their wives, but no further marriages among them were to be
permitted.^
9. The Central Idea in Gregory's Policy was the establishment of a uni-
versal theocracy, with the pope as its one visible head, the representative
of Christ upon earth, who as such stands over the powers of the world.
Alongside of it, indeed, the royal authority was to stand independently
as one ordained of God, but it was to confine itself strictly to temporal
affairs, and to be directed by the pope in regard to whatever might be
partly within and partly without these lines. All states bearing the
Christian name were to be bound together as members of one body in
the great papal theocracy which had superior to it only God and His
law. The princes must receive consecration and Divine sanction from
the spiritual power ; they are " by the grace of God," not immediately,
however, but only mediately, the church as the middle term stands
between them and God. The pope is their arbiter and highest liege
lord, whose decisions they are under obligation unconditionally to obey.
^ For Lanfranc, see Hook, " Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury," vol,
ji. London, ISGl.
40 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
Royalty stands related to the papacy as the moon to the suu, from which
she receives her light and warmth. The church, which lends to the power
of the world her Divine authority, can also withdraw it again when it
is being misused. When this is done, the obligation of subjects to obey
also ceases. Gregory began this gigantic work, not so much to raise
himself personally to the utmost pinnacle of power, but rather to save
the church from destruction. He certainly was not free from ambition
and the lust of ruling, but with him higher than all personal interests
was the idea of the high vocation of the church, and to the realizing of it
he enthusiastically devoted all the energies of his life. On the other
hand, he cannot escape the reproach of having striven with carnal
weapons for what he called a spiritual victory, of having meted out
unequal measures, where his interests demanded it, in the exercise of
his assumed function as judge of kings and princes, and of having
occupied bimself more with political schemes and intrigues than with
the ministry of the church of Christ. His whole career shows him to
have been a man of great self-reliance, yet, on the other hand, he was
able to preserve the consciousness of the poor sinner who seeks and
finds salvation only in the mercy of Christ. The strict morality of his
life has been admitted even by his bitterest foes. Not infrequently too
did he show himself in advance of his time in humanity and liberality
of sentiment, as e.g. in the Berengarian controversy (§ 101, 2), and in
his decided disapproval of the prosecution of witches and sorcerers.^
10. Victor III. and Urban II., A.D. 1086-1099.— Gregory VII. was
succeeded by the talented abbot of Monte Cassino, Desiderius, under the
title of Victor III., a.d. 1086-1087. Only after great pressure was brought
to bear upon him did he consent to leave the cloister, which under his
rule had flourished in a remarkable manner ; but now aged and sickly,
he only enjoyed the pontificate for sixteen months. His successor was
bishop Odo, of Ostia, a Frenchman by birth, and a member of the
Clugny brotherhood, who took the name of Urban II., a.d. 1088-1099.
For a long time he was obliged to give up Rome to the party of the
imperial anti-pope. But the enthusiasm with which the idea of res-
cuing the Holy Sepulchre was taken up, which he proposed to Western
Christendom at the Council of Clermont, in a.d. 1095 (§ 94), secured for
him the highest position in his time, and made him strong enough
to withstand the opposition of Philip I., king of France, whom he had
put under ban at Clermont, on account of his aduiterous connection
^ Bowden, " Life and Pontificate of Gregory VII.," 2 vols,, London,
1840. Villemain, "Life of Gregory VII.," transl. by Brockley, 2 vols.
London, 1874. Stephen, " Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography," 2 vols.
London, 1850. Hallam, "Middle Ages," vol. i. London, 1840. Mil-
man, " Latin Christianity," vol. iii., London, 1854.
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 41
with Bertrada. Returning to Italy from his victorious campaign
through France, he was able to celebrate Christmas once again in the
Lateran at Rome in a.d. 1096. His main sujpporters in the conflict
against the emperor were the powerful Margravine Matilda, and the
emperor's most dangerous opponent in Germany, duke Welf of Bavaria,
whose son of the same name, then in his seventeenth year, was married
by the pope to the widowed Matilda, who was now forty years of age,
whence arose the first of the anti- imperial and strongly papistical Welf
or Guelph party in Germany and Italy. On the other side the margra-
vine succeeded in stirring up Conrad, the son of Henry IV,, to rebel
against his father, and had him crowned king in a.d. 1087. At Cremona
this prince held the pope's stirrup, and took the oath of obedience to
him. The emperor had him deposed in a.d. 1098, and had his second
son elected and crowned as Henry V. Urban, who received on his
death-bed the news of the destruction of Jerusalem, died in a.d. 1099,
and his anti-pope Clement III., who had withdrawn to Ravenna, died in
the following year.
11. Paschalis II., Gelasius II., and Calixtus II., A.D. 1099-1124.— Urban's
successor, Paschalis II., a.d. 1099-1118, also a member of the Clugny
brotherhood, at once stirred up the fire of rebellion against the excom-
municated emperor, and favoured a conspiracy of the princes. The
young king, at the head of the insurgents, took his father prisoner, and
obliged him to abdicate in a.d. 1106. Six months afterwards the emperor
died. The church's curse pursued even his corpse. Twice interred in
holy ground, first in the cathedral of Liege, then in the cathedral of
Spires, his bones were exhumed and thrown into unconsecrated ground,
until at last, in a.d. 1111, his son obtained the withdrawal of the ban.
At the Council of Guastalla in a.d. 1106, Paschalis renewed the pro-
hibition of Investiture. But Henry V., a.d. 1106-1125, concerned him-
self as little about this prohibition as his father had done. No sooner had
he seated himself upon the throne in Germany than he crossed the
Alps to compel the pope to crown him emperor and concede to him the
right of investiture. The pope, who was wilhng that the church should
be poor if only she retained her freedom, being now without counsel
or help (for Matilda was old and her warlike spirit was broken, and
from the Normans no assistance could be looked for), was driven in a.d.
1111, in his perplexity to offer a compromise, whereby the emperor should
surrender investiture to the church, but on the other hand the clergy
should return to him all landed property and privileges given them by
the state since the times of Charlemagne, while the Patrimony of Peter
should continue the property of the pope himself. On the basis of this
agreement the coronation of the emperor was to be celebrated in St.
Peter's on 12th Feb., a.d. 1111. But when after the celebration had
begun the document which set forth the compact was read, the prelates
42 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
present in the cathedral raised loud cries of dissent and demanded that
it should immediately be cancelled. The coronation was not proceeded
with, the pope and his cardinals were thrown into prison, and a revolt
of the Romans was suppressed. The pope was then compelled to rescind
the synodal decrees and formally to grant to the king the right of in-
vestiture ; he had also, after solemnly promising never again to put the
emperor under ban, to proceed with the coronation. But Hildebrand's
party called the pope to account for this betrayal of the church. A synod
at Rome in a.d. 1112 declared the concessions wrung from him invalid,
and pronounced the ban against the emperor. The pope, however,
remembering his oaths, refused to confirm it, but it was nevertheless
proclaimed by his legate in the French and German synods. Matilda's
death in a.d. 1115 called the emperor again to Italy. She had even in
the time of Gregory VII. made over all her goods and possessions to the
Roman Church ; but she had the right of free disposal only in regard
to allodial property, not in regard to her feudal territories. Henry, how-
ever, now laid claim to all her belongings. At the Fast Synod of a.d.
1116 Paschalis asked pardon of God and man for his sin of weakness,
renewed and made more strict the prohibition of investiture, but still
stoutly refused to confirm the ban of the emperor. In consequence of
a rebellion of the Romans he was obliged to take to flight, and he died
in exile in a.d. 1118. The high church party now chose Gelasius II., a.d.
1118-1119, but immediately after the election he was seized by a second
Ceucius (see No. 7) on account of a private grudge, fearfully maltreated
and confined in chains within his castle. The Romans indeed rescued
him, but the emperor's sudden arrival in Rome led him, in order to avoid
making inconvenient terms of peace, to seek his own and the church's
safety in flight. The people and nobles in concert with the emperor set
up Gregory VIII. as anti-pope. So soon as the emperor left Rome,
Gelasius returned. But Cencius fell upon him during Divine service,
and only with difficulty he escaped further maltreatment by flight into
France, where he died in the monastery of Clugny after a pontificate
of scarcely twelve months. The few cardinals present at Clugny elected
archbishop Guido of Vienne. He assumed the title of Calixtus II. , a d.
1119-1121. Pope and emperor met together expressing desires for peace.
But the auspiciously begun negotiations never got beyond the statement
of the terms of contract, and ended in the pope renewing at the Council of
Rheims, in a.d. 1119, the anathema against the emperor and anti-pope.
Next year Calixtus crossed the Alps. He received a hearty greeting in
Rome. He laid siege to the anti-pope in Sutri, took him prisoner, and
after the most contumelious treatment before the Roman mob, cast him
into a monastic prison. The investiture question, now better understood
through learned discussions on civil and ecclesiastical law, was at last
definitely settled m the Worms Concordat, as the result of mutual con-
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 43
cessions made at the National Assembly at Worms, a.d. 1122. The
arrangement come to was this : canonical election of bishops and abbots
of the empire by the diocesan clergy and the secular nobles should be
restored, and under imperial inspection made free from all coercion, but
in disputed elections decisions should be given in accordance with the
judgment of the metropolitan and the rest of the bishops, the investing
of the elected with the sceptre in Germany before, in other parts of the
empire after, consecration, should belong to the emperor, and investiture
with ring and staff at the consecration should belong to the pope. This
agreement was solemnly ratified at the First (Ecumeaical Lateran Synod
in A.D. 1123.
12. The contemporary English Investiture Controversy was brought
earlier to a conclusion. William the Conqueror had unopposed put
Norman prelates in the place of the English bishops, and had homage
rendered him by them, while they received from him investiture with the
ring and the staff. William Rufus, the Conqueror's son and successor,
A.D. 10S7-1100, a domineering and greedy prince, after Lanfranc's death
in A.D. 1089 (§ 101, 1) allowed the archbishopric of Canterbury to remain
vacant for four years, in order that he might himself enjoy the undis-
turbed possession of the revenues. It was not till a.d. 1093, during a
severe illness and under fear of death, that he agreed to bestow it upon
Anselm, the celebrated Abbot of Bee (§ 101, 1, 3), with the promise
to abstain ever afterwards from simony. No sooner had he recovered
than he repented him of his promise. He resumed his old practices, and
even demanded of Anselm a large sum for his appointment. For peace
sake Anselm gave him a voluntary present of money, but it did not satisfy
the king. When, in a.d. 1097, the archbishop asked permission to
make a journey to Rome in order to have the conflict settled there, the
king banished him. In Rome Anselm was honourably received and his
conduct was highly approved ; but neither Urban II. nor Paschalis II.
could venture upon a complete breach with the king. William the Con-
queror's third son, Henry I. Beauclerk, a.d. 1100-1135, who, having also
snatched Normandy from his eldest brother Robert, needed the support
of the clergy to secure his position, agreed to the return of the exiled
primate, and promised to put a stop to every kind of simony ; but he
demanded the maintenance of investiture and the oath of fealty which
Anselm now, in consequence of the decrees of a Roman synod which he
had himself agreed to, felt obliged to refuse. Thus again the conflict
was renewed. The king now confiscated the goods and revenues of the
see, and the archbishop was on the point of issuing an excommunication
against him, when at last an understanding was come to in a.d. 1106,
through the mediation of the pope, according to which the crown gave up
the investiture with ring and staff, and the archbishop agreed to take the
oath of fealty. — In France, too, from the end of the 11th century, owing
44 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
to the pressure used by the high church reforming party, the secular
power was satisfied with securing the oath of fealty from the higher
clergy, without making further claim to investiture. ^
13. The Times of Lothair III. and Conrad III., A.D. 1125-1152.— After
the death of Henry V. without issue, the Saxon lothair, a.d. 1125-1137,
was elected, and the Hohenstaufen grandson of Henry IV. descended in
the female line was passed over. Honorius II., a.d. 1124-1130, successor
of Calixtus II. , hastened to confer the papal sanction upon the newly elected
emperor, who already upon his election had, by accepting spiritual in-
vestiture before temporal investiture, and a minimising of the oath of
fealty by ecclesiastical reservations, showed himself ready to support the
claims of the clergy. But neither ban nor the preaching of a crusade
against Count Roger II. of Sicily (§ 95, 1) could prevent him from building
up a powerful kingdom comprehending all Southern Italy. The next
election of the cardinals gives us two popes : Innocent II., a.d. 1130-1143,
and Anacletus II., a.d. 1130-1138. The latter, although not the pope of
the majority, secured a powerful support in the friendship of Roger II.,
whom he had crowned king by his legate at Palermo. Innocent, on the
other hand, fled to France. There the two oracles of the age, the abbot
Peter of Clugny and Bernard of Clairvaux, took his side and won for him
the favour of all Cisalpine Europe. Both popes fished for Lothair's
favour with the bait of the promise of imperial coronation. A second
edition of the Synod of Sutri would probably have enabled a more
powerful king to attain the elevation of Henry III. But Lothair was not
the man to seize the opportunity. He decided in favour of the protege
of Bernard, led him back in a.d. 1133 to the eternal city, had himself
crowned emperor by him in the Lateran and invested with Matilda's
inheritance, which was declared by the curialists a fief of the empire.
But Lothair's repeated demands, that what had been acquired by the
Concordat of Worms should be renounced, were set aside, through the
opposition not so much of the pope as of St. Bernard and St. Norbert
(§ 98, 2). At the prayer of the pope, who immediately after Lothair's
departure had been driven out by Roger, and moved by the prophetic
exhortations of Bernard, the emperor prepared for a second Roman
campaign in a.d. 1136. Leaving the conquest of Rome to the eloquence
of the prophet of Clairvaux, he advanced from one victory to another
until he brought all Southern Italy under the imperial sway, and died
on his return homeward in an Alpine hut in the Tyrol. Fuming with
rage Roger now crossed over from Sicily and in a short time he recon-
quered his southern provinces of Italy. The appointment, however, of
1 Church, "St. Anselm," London, 1870. Rule, "Life and Times of
St. Anselm," 2 vols. London, 1883. Hook, " Lives of Archb. of Canter-
bury," vol. ii., London, 1879, pp. 109-276.
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 45
a new pope after the death of Anacletus miscarried, and Innocent was
able at the Second (Ecumenical Lateran Synod in a.d. 1139 to declare the
schism at an end. The pope then renewed the excommunication of
Roger and pronounced an anathema against the teachings of Arnold of
Brescia (§ 108, 7), a young enthusiastic priest of the school of Abaelard,
who traced all ecclesiastical corruption back to the wealth of the church
and the secular power of the clergy. He next prepared himself for war
with Roger. That prince, however, waylaid him and had him brought
into his tent, where he and his sons cast themselves at the holy father's
feet and begged for mercy and peace. The pope could do nothing else
than play the role of the magnanimous given him in this comedy. He
had therefore to confirm the hated Norman in the possession of the con-
quered provinces as a hereditarymonarchy with the ecclesiastical privilege
of a native legate, and, as some set off to comfort himself with, the prince
was to regard the territory as a fief of the papal see. But still greater
calamities befell this pope. The republican freedom, which the cities of
Tuscany and Lombardy won during the 12th century, awakened also
among the Romans a love of liberty. They refused to render obedience
in temporal matters to the pope and established in the Capitol a popular
senate, which undertook the civil government in the name of the Roman
Commune. Innocent died during the revolution. His successor Coeles-
tine II. held the pontificate for only five months, and Lucius II., after
vainly opposing the Commune for seven months, was killed by a stone
thrown in a tumult. Eugenius III., a.d. 1145-1153, a scholar and friend
of St. Bernard, was obliged immediately after his election to seek safety
in flight. An agreement, however, was come to in that same year : the
pope acknowledged the government of the Commune as legitimate, while
it recognised his superiority and granted to him the investiture of the
senators. Yet, though taken back three times to Rome, he could never
remain there for more than a few months. He visited France and
Germany (Treves) in a.d. 1147. In France he heard of the fall of Edessa.
Supported by the fiery zeal of Bernard, the summons to a second
crusade (§ 94, 2) aroused a burning enthusiasm throughout all the West.
But in Rome he was unable to offer any effectual resistance to the dema-
gogical preaching by which Arnold of Brescia from a.d. 1146 had inflamed
the people and the inferior clergy with an ardent enthusiasm for his ideal
constitution of an apostolic church and a democratic state. Since this
change of feeling had taken place in Rome, both parties, that of the
Capitol as well as that of the Lateran, had repeatedly endeavoured to
win to their side the first Hohenstaufen on the German throne, Conrad
III.. A.D. 1138-1152, by promise of bestowing the imperial crown. But
Conrad, meanwhile otherwise occupied, refrained from all intermeddling,
and when at last he actually started upon a journey to Rome death over-
took him on the way.
46 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
14. The Times of Frederick I. and Henry VI., A.D. 1152-1190.— The
nephew and successor of Conrad III., Frederick I. Barbarossa, a.d. 1152-
1190, began his reign with the firm determination to realize fully the
ideas of Charlemagne (§ 82-3) by his pope Paschalis III., whom at a later
period, in a.d. 1165, he had canonized. With profound contempt at
heart for the Roman democracy of his time, he concluded a compact in
A.D. 1153 with the papal see, which confirmed him in the possession of
the imperial crown and gave to the pope the Dominium temporale in the
Church States. After the death of Eugenius which soon followed, the
aged Anastasius IV. occupied the papal chair for a year and a half, a
time of peace and progress. He was succeeded by the powerful Hadrian
IV., A.D. 1151-1159. He was an Englishman, Nicholas Breakspear, son of
a poor English priest, the first and, down to the present time, the only
one of that nation who attained the papal dignity. He pronounced an
interdict upon the Romans who had refused him entrance into the inner
part of the city and had treacherously slain a cardinal. Rome endured
this spiritual famine only for a few weeks, and then purchased deliver-
ance by the expulsion of Arnold of Brescia, who soon thereafter fell into
the hands of a cardinal. He was indeed again rescued by force, but
Frederick I., who had meanwhile in a.d. 1154 begun his first journey
to Rome, and on his way thither had humbled the proud Lombard cities
struggling for freedom, urged by the pope, insisted that he should be
surrendered up again, and subsequently gave him over to the Roman city
prefect, who, in a.d. 1155, without trial or show of justice condemned
him to be burnt and had his ashes strewn upon the Tiber. In the camp
at Sutri the pope personally greeted the king who, after refusing for
several days, at length agreed to show him the customary honour of
holding his stirrup, doing it however with a very ^bad grace. Soon too
the senatorial ambassadors of the Roman people, who indulged in bom- •
bastic, turgid declamation, presented themselves professing their readi-
ness on consideration of a solemn undertaking to protect the Roman
republic, and on payment of five thousand pounds, to proclaim the Ger-
man king from the Capitol Roman emperor and ruler of the world. With
a furious burst of anger Frederick silenced them, and with scathing words
showed them how the witness of history pointed the contrast between
their miserable condition and the glory and dignity of the German name.
Yet on the day of the coronation, which they were not able to prevent, the
Romans took revenge for the insults he had heaped upon them by an
attack upon the papal residence in the castle of Leo, and upon the im-
perial camp in front of the city, but were repelled with sore loss. Soon
thereafter, in a.d. 1155, the emperor made preparations for returning
home, leaving everything else to the pope. The relations between the
two became more and more strained from day to day. The Lombards,
too, once again rebelled. Frederick therefore in a,d. 1158 made his
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 47
second expedition to Rome. On the Roncalian plains lie held a great
assembly wliicli laid down to the Lombards as well as to the pope the
imperial prerogatives. Hadrian would have given utterance to his wrath
by thundering an anathema, but he was restrained by the hand of
death.
15. The cardinals of the hierarchical party elected Alexander III.,
A.D. 1159-1181, those of the imperial party, Victor IV. A synod con-
vened by the emperor at Pavia in a.d. 1160 decided in favour of Victor,
who was now formally recognised. Meanwhile Milan threw off the yoke
that had been laid upon her. After an almost two years' siege the emperor
took the city in a.d. 1162 and razed it to the ground. From France whither
he had fled, Alexander, in a.d. 1163, launched his anathema against the
emperor and his pope. The latter died in a.d. 1164, and Frederick had
Paschalis III. (f a.d. 1168) chosen his successor ; but in a.d. 1165, Alex-
ander returning from France, pressed on in advance of him and was
acknowledged by the Roman senate. Now for the third time in a.d.
1166, Frederick crossed the Alps. A small detachment of troops that
had been sent in advance to accompany the imperial pope to Rome
under the leadership of the archbishops of Cologne and Mainz, in a
bloody battle at Monte Porzio in a.d. 1167 utterly destroyed a Roman
army of twenty times its size. Frederick then himself hasted forward.
After an eight days' furious assault the fortress of Leo surrendered, and
Paschahs was able to perform the Te Deum in St. Peter's. The Trans-
tiberines, too, after Alexander had sought safety in flight, soon took the
oath of fealty to the emperor upon a guarantee of imperial protection of
their republic. But at the very climax of his success " the fate of Sen-
nacherib "befell him. The Roman malaria during the hot August became
a deadly fever plague, thinned the lines of his army and forced him to with-
draw. So weakened was he that he could not even assert his authority
in Lombardy, but had to return to Germany in a.d. 1168. The emperor's
disaster told also unfavourably upon the fortunes of his pope, whose
successor Calixtus III. was quite disregarded. In a.d. 117-1 Frederick
again went down into Italy and engaged upon a decisive battle with the
confederate cities of Lombardy, but in a.d. 1176 at Legnano he suffered
a complete defeat, in consequence of which he agreed at the Congress of
Venice, in a.d. 1177, to acknowledge the freedom of the Lombard cities,
abandoned the imperial claims upon Rome, and recognised Alexander
III., who was also present there, as the rightful pope, kissing his feet and
holding his stirrup according to custom. Rome, which he had not seen
for nearly eleven years, would no longer shut her gates against the pope.
Welcomed by senate and people, he made his pubhc entrance into the
Lateran in March a.d. 1178, where in the following year he gathered
together 300 bishops in the Third Lateran Council (the 11th oecumenical),
in order by their advice to heal the wounds which the schism of the
48 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
church had made. Here also, in order to prevent double elections in
time to come, it was resolved that for a valid papal election two-thirds
of the whole college of cardinals must be agreed. The right of concur-
rence assigned by the decree of Nicholas II. in a.d. 1059 to the people and
emperor was treated as antiquated and forgotten, and was not even
alluded to.
16. Even before his victory over the powerful Hohenstaufen, Alexander
III. during his exile won a yet more brilliant success in England. King
Henry II., a.d. 1154-1189, wished to establish again the supremacy of the
state over church and clergy, and thought that he would have a pliant
tool in carrying out his plans in Thomas a Becket, whom he made arch-
bishop of Canterbury, in a.d. 1162. But as primate of the English
church, Thomas proved a vigorous upholder of hierarchical principles.
Instead of the accommodating courtier, the king found the archbishop
immediately upon his consecration the bold asserter of the claims of the
church. The jovial man of the world became at once the saintly ascetic.
At a council at Tours in a.d. 1163, he returned into the pope's own
hand the pallium with which an English prince had invested him in
name of the king, resigning also his archiepiscopal dignity, that he might
receive these directly as a papal gift. Straightway began the conflict be-
tween the king and his former favourite. Henry summoned a diet at
Clarendon, where he obtained the approval of the superior clergy for his
anti-hierarchical propositions; Thomas also for a time withstood, promis-
ing at last, when urged on all sides, to assent to the constitutions, but
refusing to sign the document when it was placed before him. The
king now ordered a process of deposition to be executed against him,
and Thomas then fled to France, where the pope was at that time
residing. The pope released him from his promise, condemned the Con-
stitutions of Clarendon, and threatened the king with anathema and
interdict. At last, after protracted negotiations, in a.d. 1170 by means
of a personal interview on the frontiers of Normandy, a reconciliation was
effected ; by which, however, neither the king nor the archbishop re-
nounced their claims. Thomas now returned to England and threatened
with excommunication all bishops w^ho should agree to the Constitutions
of Clarendon. Four knights seized upon an unguarded word of the king
which he had uttered in passion, and murdered the archbishop at the
altar in a.u. 1170. Alexander canonized the martyr to Hildebrandism,
and the king was so sorely pressed by the pope, his own people and his
rebellious sons, that he consented to do penance humbly at the tomb of
his deadly sainted foe, and submitted to be scourged by the monks.
Becket's bones, for which a special chapel was reared at Canterbury,
were visited by crowds of pilgrims until Henry VIII., when he had broken
with Eome (§ 139, 4), formally arraigned the saint as a traitor, had his
96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIRE. 49
name struck out of the calendar and bis ashes scattered to the winds. ^
Thus by a.d. 1178 Alexander III. bad risen to the summit of ecclesias-
tical power; but in Rome itself as well as in the Church States, he
remained as powerless politically as before. Soon, therefore, after the
great council be again quitted the city for a voluntary exile, and never
saw it more. His three immediate successors, too, Lucius III. ( f a.d.
1185), Urban III. (f a.d. 1187), and Gregory VIII. (f a.d. 1187), were
elected, consecrated and buried outside of Rome. Clement III. (f a.d.
1191) was the first to enter the Laterau again in a.d. 1188, on the basis
of a compromise which acknowledged the republican constitution under
the papal superiority. Meanwhile Frederick I., without regarding the
protest of the pope as liege lord of the Sicilian crown, had in a.d. 1186
consummated the fateful marriage of his son Henry with Constance, the
posthumous daughter of king Roger, and aunt of his childless grandson
William II. (f a.d. 1191), and thus the heiress of the great Norman king-
dom of Italy. From the crusade which he then undertook in a.d. 1189
Frederick never returned (§ 91, 3). His successor, Henry VI., a.d. 1190-
1197, compelled the new pope Coelestine III., a.d. 1191-1198, to crown
him emperor in a.d. 1191, conquered the inheritance of his wife, pushed
back the boundaries of the Church States to the very gates of Rome, and
asserted his imperial rights even over the city of Rome itself. He
pressed on to the realizing of the scheme for making the German crown
together with the imperial dignity for ever hereditary in his house.
The princes of the empire in a.d. 1196 elected his son Frederick II., when
scarcely two years old, as king of the Romans. He then thought under
the pretext of a crusade to conquer Greece, to which he had laid ground-
less claims of succession, but while upon the way his plans were over-
hrown by his sudden death at Messina.
17. Innocent III., A.D. 1198-1216.— After the death of Alexander III.
the power and reputation of the Holy See had fallen into the lowest degra-
dation. Then the cardinal deacon, Lothair Count of Segni in Anagni,
succeeded in a.d. 1198 in his 37th year, under the name of Innocent III.,
and raised the papacy again to a height of power and glory never reached
before. In point of intellect and j)ower of will he was not a whit behind
Gregory VII., while in culture (§ 102, 9), scholarship, subtlety and adroit-
ness he far excelled him. His piety, too, his moral earnestness, his en-
^ "Vita et Epistolae Thoma Cantuari," edited by Giles. 4 vols.
London, 1816. Morris, "Life and Martyrdom of Thomas a Becket."
London, 1859. Robertson, " Thomas a Becket, Archbishop of Canter-
bury." London, 1859. "Materials for Life of Thomas a Becket." 2 vols.
London, 1875. Hook, " Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury," vol. ii.
London, 1879, pp. 354-507. Stanley, "Memorials of Canterbury."
London, 1855. Freeman, " Historical Essays." First Series, Essay IV.
4
50 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
tbusiasm and devotion to the church and the theocratical interest of the
chair of St. Peter, were at least as powerful and decidedly purer, deeper
and more spiritual than Gregory's. And in addition to all these great
endowments he enjoyed an invariable good fortune which never forsook
him. His first task was the restoration of the Church States and his
political prestige in Eome. In* both these directions he was favoured by
the sudden death of Henry VI. and the internal disorders of the Capi-
toline government of that time. On the very day of his enthronement
the imperial prefect tendered him the oath of fealty and the Capitol did
homage to him as the suj)erior. And also before the second year had
passed the Church States in their fullest extent were restored by the ex-
pulsion of the greater and smaller feudal lords who had been settled there
by Henry VI. Eome was indeed once more the scene of wild party conflicts
which forced the pope in a.d. 1203 to fly to Anagni. He was able, however,
to return in a.d. 1204 and to conclude a definite and decisive peace with
the Commune in a.d. 1205, according to the terms of which the many-
headed senate resigned, and a single senator or podesta nominated by
the pope was entrusted with the executive authority. Meanwhile Inno-
cent had been gaining brilliant successes beyond the limits of the States
of the Church. These were won first of all in Sicily. The widow of
Henry VI. had her son Frederick of four years old, after his father's
death, crowned king in Palermo. Unadvised and helpless, pressed upon
all sides, she sought protection from Innocent, which he granted upon
her renouncing the ecclesiastical privileges previously claimed by the
king and making acknowledgment of the papal suzerainty. Dying in
A.D. 1198, Constance transferred to him the guardianship of her son, and
the pope justified the confidence placed in him by the excellent and
liberal education which he secured for his ward, as well as by the zeal
and success with which he restored rest and peace to the land. In Ger-
many, Philip of Swabia, Frederick's uncle, was appointed to carry on the
government in the name of his Sicilian nephew during his minority.
The condition of Germany, however, demanded the direct control of a
firm and vigorous ruler. The princes, therefore, insisted upon a new
election, for which Phihp also now appeared as candidate. The votes
were split between two rivals; the Ghibellines voting for Philip, a.d.
1198-1208, and the Guelph party for Otto IV. of Brunswick, a.d. 1198-
1218. The party of the latter referred the decision to the pope. For
three years he delayed giving judgment, then he decided in favour of
the Guelph, who paid for the preference by granting all the demands
of the pope, and calling himself king by the grace of God and the pope.
The States of the Church were thus represented as including the Duchy
of Spoleto, and in the election of bishops the church was freed from the
influence of the state. By a.d. 1204, however, Philip's power and repute
had risen to such a pitch that even the pope found himself obliged to
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIRE. 51
take into account the altered position of matters. A papal court of arbi-
tration at Rome to which both claimants had agreed to submit, was on
the point of giving its decision unequivocally in favour of the Hoheu-
staufen, when the murder of Philip by Otto of Wittelsbach, in a.d. 1208,
rendered it void. Otto IV. was now acknowledged by all, and in a.d. 1209
he was crowned by the pope after new concessions had been made. But
as Roman emperor he either would not or could not perform what he
had promised before and at his coronation. He took to himself the
possessions of Matilda as well as other parts of the States of the Church,
and was not prevented from pursuing his victorious campaign in Southern
Italy by the anathema which Innocent thundered against him in a.d.
1210. Then Innocent called to mind the old rights of his former pupil
to the German crown, and insisted that they should be given effect to.
In A.D. 1212, Frederick II., now in his eighteenth year, accepted the call,
was received in Germany with open arms, and was crowned in a.d. 1215
at Aachen. Otto could not maintain his position against him, and so
withdrew to his hereditary possessions, and died in ad. 1218.
18. King Philip Augustus II. of France, had in a.d. 1193 married the
Danish princess Ingeborg, but divorced her in a.d. 1196, and married the
beautiful Duchess Agnes of Meran. Innocent compelled him in a.d.
1200 to put her away by issuing against him an interdict, but it was only
in A.D. 1218 that he again took back Ingeborg as his legitimate wife. —
From far off Spain the young king Peter of Arragon went in a.d. 1201 to
Rome, laid down his crown as a sacred gift upon the tomb of the chief
of the apostles, and voluntarily undertook the payment of a yearly
tribute to the Holy See. In the same year a crusading army, by founding
a Latin empire in Constantinople, brought the schismatical East to the
feet of the pope (§ 94, 4). In England, when the archbishopric of
Canterbury became vacant, the chapter filled it by electing their own
superior Reginald. This choice they had soon cause to rue. They
therefore annulled their election, and at the wish of the usurping king John
Lackland made choice of John, bishop of Norwich. Innocent refused to
confirm their action, and persuaded certain members of the chapter stay-
ing in Rome to choose the cardinal priest Stephen Langton, whose elec-
tion he immediately confirmed.^ When the king refused to recognise this
appointment, and on an interdict being threatened swore that he would
drive all priests who should obey it out of the country, the pope issued it
in A.D.1208 against all England, excommunicated the king, and finally, in
1 On Stephen Langton see Pearson, "History of England during Early
and Middle Ages," vol. ii. Milman, " History of Latin Christianity,"
vol. iv. Loudon, 1854. Hook, •' Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury,"
vol. ii., 4th edition. London, 1879, pp. 657-761. Maurice, " Lives of
English Popular Leaders, 1, Stephen Langton," London.
52 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
A.D. 1212, released all his subjects from their oath of allegiance and de-
posed the monarch, while he commissioned Philip Augustus of France to
carry the sentence into effect. John, now as cringing and terrified as
before he had been proud and despotic, humbled himself in the dust, and
at Dover, in a.d. 1213, placed kingdom and crown at the feet of the papal
legate Pandulf , and received it from his hands as a papal fief, undertaking
to pay twice a year the tribute imposed. But in a.d. 1214 the English
nobles extorted from their cowardly tyrant as a safeguard against lordly
wilfulness and despotism the famous Magna Charta, against which the
pope protested, threatening excommunication and promising legitimate
redress of their grievances, though in consequence of confusion caused
by the breaking out again of the civil wars he was unable to enforce his
protest. And now his days were drawing to an end. At the famous
Fourth Lateran Council of A.D. 1215, more than 1,500 prelates from all
the countries of Christendom, along with the ambassadors of almost all
Christian kings, princes and free cities, gave him homage as the repre-
sentative of God on earth, as visible Head of the Church, and supreme
lord and judge of all princes and peoples. A few months later he died. —
As in Italy and Germany, in France and England, he had also in all
other states of the Christian world, in Spain and Portugal, in Poland,
Livonia and Sweden, in Constantinople and Bulgaria, shown himself
capable of controlling political as well as ecclesiastical movements,
arranging and smoothing down differences, organizing and putting into
shape what was tending to disorder. Some conception of his activit}'
may be formed from the 5,316 extant decretals of the eighteen years of
his pontificate.
19. The Times of Frederick II. and his Successors, A.D. 1215-1268.—
Frederick II, ^ a.d. 1215-1250, contrary to the Hohenstaufen custom, had
not only agreed to the partition of Sicily from the empire in favour
of his son Henry, but also renewed the agreements previously entered
into with the pope by Otto IV. He even increased the papal possessions
by ceding Ancona, and still further at his coronation at Aachen he
showed his goodwill by undertaking a crusade. He also allowed this
same Henry who became king of Sicily as a vassal of the pope, to be
elected king of the Romans in a.d. 1220, and then began his journey to
Rome to receive imperial coronation. The new pope Honoriiis III., a.d.
1216-1227, formerly Frederick's tutor and even still entertaining for him
a fatherly affection, exacted from him a solemn renewal of his earlier
promises. But instead of returning to Germany, Frederick started for
Sicily in order to make it the basis of operations for the future carrying
out of the ideas of his father and grandfather. The peace-loving pope
^ Kingston, " History of Frederick II., King of the Romans." London,
1862.
§ 96. THE PAPACl' AND THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIEE. 58
constantly urged bim to fulfil his promise of fitting out a crusade. But
it was only after his successor Gregory IX., a.d. 1227-1241, a high church-
man of the stami? of Gregory VII. and Innocent III., urged the matter
with greater determination, that Frederick actually embarked. He
turned back, hoAvever, as soon as an epidemic broke out in the ships,
but he did not himself escape the contagion, and died three days after.
In A.D. 1227 the pope had in a senseless passion hurled an anathema
against him, and, in an encyclical to all the bishops, painted the
emperor's ingratitude and breach of faith in the darkest colours. The
emperor on his part, in a manifesto justifying himself addressed to the
princes and people of Europe, had quite as unsparingly lashed the world-
liness of the church, the corruption, presumption and self-seeking of the
papacy, and then in a.d. 1228 he again undertook the postponed crusade
(§ 94, 5). The pope's curse followed " the pirate " to the very threshold
of the Holy Sepulchre, and a papal crusading force made a raid upon
Southern Italy. Frederick therefore hastened his return, landed in a.d.
1229 in Apulia, and entered into negotiations for peace, to which, how-
ever, the pope agreed only in a.d. 1230, when the emperor's victoriously
advancing troops threatened him with the loss of the States of the
Church. In consequence of the pope's continued difficulties with his
Komans, who drove him three times out of the city, Frederick had
frequent opportunities of showing himself serviceable to the pope by
giving direct aid or mediating in his favour. Nevertheless he continu-
ally conspired with the rebellious Lombards, and in a.d. 1239 renewed
the ban against the emperor. The pope who had hitherto only charged
Frederick with a tendency to freethinking, as well as an incUnation to
favour the Saracens (§ 95, 1), and to maintain friendly intercourse with
the Syrian sultans, now accused him of flippant infidelity. The em-
peror, it was said, had among other things declared that the birth of
the Saviour by a virgm was a fable, and that Jesus, Moses and Moham-
med were the three greatest impostors the world had ever seen, — a form
of unbehef which spread very widely in consequence of the, crusades.
Manifestoes and counter-manifestoes sought to outdo one another in
their violence. And while the wild hordes of the Mongols were over-
spreading unopposed the whole of Eastern Europe, the emperor's troops
were victoriously pressing forward to the gates of Eome, and his ships
were preventing the meeting of the council summoned against him by
catching the prelates who in spite of .his prohibition were hastening to
it. The pope died in a.d. 1211, and was followed in seventeen days by
his successor Coelestine IV.
20. For almost two years the papal chair remained vacant. Then this
position was won by Innocent IV., a.d. 1243-1254, who as cardinal had
been friendly to the emperor, but as pope was a most bitter enemy to
him and to his house. The negotiations about the removal of the ban
54 THE CxEEMANO-ROMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
were broken off, and Innocent escaped to France, where at the First
Lyonese or lath (Ecumenical Council of A.D. 1245, attended by scarcely
any but Frenchmen and Spaniards, he renewed the excommunication of
the emperor, and declared him as a blasphemer and robber of the church
deprived of his throne. Once again with the most abject humility
Frederick sued for reconciliation with the church. The pope, however,
wished not for reconcihatiou, but the destruction of the whole " viper
brood " of the Hohenstaufens. But the rival king, Henry Easpe of
Thuringia, set up by the papal party in Germany, and William of
Holland, who was put forward after his death in a.d. 1247, could not
maintain their position against Frederick's son, Conrad IV., who as
early as a.d. 1235 had been elected in jjlace of his rebel brother Henry as
king of the Eomaus. Even in Italy the fortune of war favoured at first
the imperial arms. At the siege of Parma, which was disloyal, the tide
began to turn. The sorely pressed citizens made a sally in a.d. 1248,
while Frederick was away at a hunt, and roused to courage by despair,
put his army to flight. His brave son, Enzio, king of Sardinia and
governor of Northern Italy, fell in a.d. 1249 into the hands of the
Bolognese, and was subjected to a life4ong imprisonment. Frederick
himself in a.d. 1250 closed his active life in the south in the arms of his
son Manfred. The pope then returned to Italy, in order to take posses-
sion of the Sicilian kingdom, which he claimed as a papal fief. But
in A.D. 1251 Conrad IV., summoned by Manfred, hasted thither from
Germany, subdued Apulia, conquered Naples, and was resolved to lay
hands on the person of the pope himself, who had also excommunicated
him, when his career was stopped by death in a.d. 1254, in his twenty-
sixth year. On behalf of Conrad's two-year-old son, Conradin, who had
been born in Germany after his father's departure, Manfred undertook the
regency in Southern Italy, but found himself obliged to acknowledge the
pope's suzerainty. Nevertheless the pope was determined to have him
also overthrown. Manfred, however, escaped in time to the Saracenic
colony of Luceria, and with its help utterly defeated the papal troops sent
out against him. Five days after Innocent IV. died. Alexander IV.,
A.D. 1254-1261, although without his predecessor's ability, sought still
to continue his work. He could not, however, either by ban or by war
prevent Manfred, who on the report of Conradin's death had had himself
crowned, from extending the power and prestige of his kingdom farther
and farther into the north. Urban IV., a.d. 12G1-1264, a Frenchman
by birth, son of a shoemaker of Troyes, took up with all his heart the
heritage of hate against the Hohenstaufens, and in a.d. 1263 invited
Charles of Anjou, the youngest brother of Louis IX. of France, to win
by conquest the Sicilian crown. While the prince was preparing for the
campaign Urban died. His successor, Clement IV., a.d. 1205-1268, also
a Frenchman, could not but carry out what his predecessor had begun.
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. 55
Charles, whom the Eomans without the knowledge of the pope had
elected their senator, proceeded in a.d. 1265 into Italy, took the vassal
oath of fealty, and was crowned as Charles I., a.d. 1265-1285, king of the
two Sicilies. Treachery opened up his way into Naples. Manfred fell in
A.D. 1266 in the battle of Benevento ; and Conradin, whom the Ghibel-
lines had called in as a deliverer of Italy, after the disastrous battle of
Tagliacozzo in a.d. 1268, died on the scaffold in his sixteenth year.
21. The Times of the House of Anjou down to Boniface VIII., A.D. 1268-
1294. — The papacy had emerged triumphantly from its hundred years'
struggle with the Hohenstaufens, and by the overthrow of this powerful
house Germany was thrown into the utmost confusion and anarchy.
But Italy, too, was now in a condition of extreme disorder, and the
unconscionable tyrants of Naples subjected it to a much more intoler-
able bondage than those had done from whom they pretended to have
delivered it. After the death of Clement IV. the Holy See remained vacant
for three years. The cardinals would not elect such a pope as would
be agreeable to Charles I. During this papal vacancy Louis IX. of
France, a.d. 1226-1270, fitted out the seventh and last crusade (§ 91, 6),
from which he was not to return. As previously he had reformed the
administration of justice, he now before his departure introduced drastic
reforms in the ecclesiastical institutions of his kingdom, which laid the
first foundations of the celebrated " Galilean Liberties." Clement IV.
gave occasion for such procedure on the part of the monarch who was a
model of piety after the standard of those times, by claiming in a.d. 1266
for the papal chair the plenaria dispositio of all prebends and benefices.
In opposition to this assumption the king secured by a Pragmatic
Sanction of a.d. 1269 to all churches and monasteries of his realm un-
conditional freedom of all elections and presentations according to old
existing rights, confirmed to them anew all privileges and immunities
previously granted them, forbade every form of simony as a heinous
crime, and prohibited all extraordinary taxation of church property on
the part of the Roman curia. — At last the cardinals took courage and
elected Gregory X., a.d. 1271-1276, an Italian of the noble house of
Visconti. The desolating interregnum in Germany was also put an end
to by the election of Count Rudolf of Hapsburg, a.d. 1273-1291, as king of
the Germans. At the Second Lyonese or 14th (Ecumenical Council of A.D.
1274, the worthy pope continued his endeavours without avail to rouse
the flagging enthusiasm of the princes so as to get them to undertake
another crusade. The union with the Greek church did not prove of an
enduring kind (§ 67,4). The constitution, too, sanctioned at the council,
which provided, in order to prevent prolonged vacancies in the papal
see, that the election of pope should not only be proceeded with in
immured conclaves in the place where the deceased pope last resided
with the curia, but also (though this was again abrogated in a.d. 1351
56 THE GERMANO-RO^IANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1^94.
by a decree of Clement VI.) should be expedited by limiting the supply of
food after three days to one dish, after other five days to water, wine, and
bread. Yet this completely failed to secure the object desired. More
successful, however, were the negotiations carried on at Lyons with the
ambassadors of the new German king. Rudolf, in entering upon his
government, renewed all the concessions made by Otto IV. and Frederick
II., renounced all imperial claims upon Rome and the States of the
Church, with the exception of the possessions of Matilda, and abandoned
all pretension to Sicily. The pope on his part acknowledged him as king
of the Romans and undertook to crown him emperor in Rome, where
this agreement was to be formally ratified and signed. But Gregory died
before arrangements had been completed.
22. The three following popes. Innocent V., Hadrian V., and John
XXI., died soon after one another. The last named, previously known
as Petrus Hispauus, had distinguished himself by his medical and
philosophical writings. He was properly the twentieth Pope John, hut
as there was a slight element of uncertainty (§ 82, G) he designated
himself the twenty-first. After a six months' vacancy Nicholas III.,
A.D. 1277-1280, mounted the papal throne. By diplomacy he secured
the ratification of the still undecided concordat with the German king-
dom, and Rudolf, who had enough to do in Germany, immediately
withdrew from Italian affairs, even abandoning his claims to imperial
coronation. The powerful pope, whose pontificate was marked by
rapacity and nepotism, and who is therefore put by Dante in hell, did
not live long enough to carry out his plans for the overthrow of the
French yoke in Italy. But he obliged Charles I. to resign his Roman
senatorship, and secretly encouraged a conspiracy of the Sicilians, which
under his successor Martin IV., a.d. 1281-1285, a Frenchman and a
pliable tool of Charles, broke out in the terrible " Sicilian Vespers " of
A.D. 1282. The island of Sicily was thereby rent from the French rule
and papal vassalage, and in a roundabout way the Hohenstaufens by the
female line regained the government of this part of their old inheri-
tance (§ 95, 1). Rome now again in a.d. 1284 shook off the senatorial rule
which Charles I. had meanwhile again assumed, and after his death and
that of Martin, which speedily followed, they transferred this dignity to
the new pope Houorius IV., a.d. 1285-1287, whose short but vigorous
reign was followed by a vacancy of eleven months. The Franciscan
general then mounted the pap^al throne as Nicholas IV., a.d. 1288-1292.
He filled up the period of his pontificate with vain endeavours to
revive the spirit of the crusades and secure the suppression of heresy.
Violent party feuds of cardinals of the Orsini and Colonna factions
delayed the election of a pope after his death for two years. They
united at last in electing the most unfit conceivable, Peter of Mur-
rone (§ 98, 2), wlio, as Coelestine V. changed the monk's cowl for the
§ 96. THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY EOMAN EMPIRE. 57
papal tiara, but was persuaded after four months by the sly and ambi-
tious Cardinal Cajetan to resign. Cajetan now himself succeeded in a.d.
129J: as Boniface VIII. The poor monk was confined by him in a tower,
where he died. He was afterwards canonized by Pope John XXII.
23. Temporal Power of the Popes. — During the 12th and 13th centuries,
when the spiritual power of the papacy had reached its highest point,
the pope came to be regarded as the absolute head of the church.
Gregory VII. arrogated the right of confirming all episcopal elections.
The papal recommendations to vacant sees {Preces, whence those so
recommended were called Precistce) were from the time of Innocent III,
transformed into mandates [Mandata), and Clement IV. claimed for the
papal chair the right of sl plenario dispositio of all ecclesiastical benefices.
Even in the 12th century the theory was put forth as in accordance with
the canon law that all ecclesiastical possessions were the property not of
the particular churches concerned but of God or Christ, and so of the
pope as His representative, who in administering them was responsible to
Him alone. Hence the popes, in special cases when the ordinary revenues
of the curia were insufficient, had no hesitation in exercising the right
of levying a tax upon ecclesiastical property. They heard appeals from
all tribunals and could give dispensations from existing church laws. The
right of canonization (§ 104, 8), which was previously in the power of
each bishop with application simply to his own diocese, was for the first
time exercised with a claim for recognition over the whole church by
Jolm XV., in a.d. 993, without, however, any word of withdrawing their
privilege from the bishops. Alexander III. was the first to declare in
A.D. 1170 that canonization was exclusively the right of the papal chair.
The system of Gregory VII. made no claim of doctrinal infallibility for
the Holy See, though his ignorance of history led him to suppose that
no heretic had ever presided over the Eoman church, and his under-
standing of Luke xxii. 32 made him confidently expect that none ever
would. Innocent III., indeed, publicly acknowledged that even the
pope might err in matters of faith, and then, but only then, become
amenable to the judgment of the church. And Innocent IV., fifty years
later, taught that the pope might err. It is therefore wrong to say,
"I believe what the pope believes "; for one should believe only what
the church teaches. Thomas Aquinas was the first who expressly main-
tained the doctrine of papal infallibility. He says that the pope alone
can decide finally upon matters of faith, and that even the decrees of
councils only become valid and authoritative when confirmed by him.
Thomas, however, never went the length of maintaining that the pope
can by himself affirm any dogma without the advice and previous
deliberations of a council. — Kissing the feet sprang from an Italian
custom, and even an emperor like Frederick Barbarossa humbled
himself to hold the pope's stirrup. According to the Bonation of Con-
58 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
stautine document (^ 87, i), Constantine the Great liad himself per-
formed this office of equerry to Pope Sylvester. When the coronation
of the pope was introduced is still a disputed point. Nicholas I. was,
according to the Libei- pontijicalis, formally crowned on his accession.
Previously the successors of the apostles were satisfied with a simple
episcopal mitre (§ 8i, 1), which on the head of the crowned pope was
developed into the tiara (§ 100, 15). At the Lateran Council of a.d. 1059
Hildebrand is said to have set upon the head of the new pope Nicholas
II. a double crown to indicate the council's recognition of his temporal
and spiritual sovereignty. The papal granting of a golden rose con-
secrated by prayer, inceuse, balsam and holy water to princes of exem-
plary piety or even to prominent monasteries, churches, or cities,
conveying an obligation to make acknowledgment by a large money gift,
dates as far back as the 12th century. So far as is known, Louis VII.
was the first to receive it from Alexander III. in a.d. 1163. — The popes
appointed legates to represent them abroad, as they had done even
earlier at the synods held in the East. Afterwards, when the institu-
tion came to be more fully elaborated, a distinction was made between
Legati missi or nuntios and Legati nciti. The former were appointed
as required for diplomatic negotiations, visitation and organization of
churches, as well as for the holding of provincial synods, at which they
presided. They were called Legati a latere, if the special importance of
the business demanded a representation from among the nearest and most
trusted councillors of the pope, i.e. one of the cardinals, as Pontijices
collaterales. The rank of born legate, Legatus natus, on the other hand,
was a prelatic dignity of the highest order conferred once for all by papal
privilege, sometimes even upon temporal princes, who had specially
served the Holy See, as for example the king of Hungary and the
Norman princes of Italy (Nos. 3, 13), which made them permanently
representatives of the pope invested with certain ecclesiastical preroga-
tives.— Among the numerous literary and documentary fictions and
forgeries with which the Gregorian papal system sought to support its
ever-advancing pretensions to authority over the whole church, is one
which may be regarded as the contemporary supplement to the work of
the Pseudo-Isidore. It is the production of a Latin theologian residing in
the East, otherwise unknown, who, at the time of the controversies waged
at the Lyonese Council of a.d. 1271 between the Greeks and Latins
(§ 67, 4), brought forth what professed to be an unbroken chain of tradi-
tions from alleged decrees and canons of the most famous Greek Coun-
cils, e.g. Nicfea, Chalcedon, etc., and church fathers, most frequently from
Cyril of Alexandria, the so-called Pseudo-Cyril, in which the controverted
questions were settled in favour of the Roman pretensions, and especially
the most extreme claims to the primacy of the pope were asserted. It
was presented in a.d. 1261 to Urban IV., who immediately guaranteed
§ 97. THE CLEiRGt. 59
s genuineness in a letter to the emperor Michael PaUeologus. On its
doption by Thomas Aquinas, who diligently employed its contents in
is controversies against the Greeks as well as in his dogmatic works, it
on respect and authority throughout all the countries of the West.
§ 97. The Clergy.
By tithes, legacies, donations, impropriations, and the
rising value of landed estates, the wealth of churches and
monasteries grew from year to year. In this way benefit
was secured not only to the clergy and the monks, but also
in many ways to the poor and needy. The law of celibacy
strictly enforced by Gregory VII. saved the church from
the impoverishment Avdth which it was beginning to be
threatened by the dividing or squandering of the property
of the church upon the children of the clergy. But
while an absolute stop was put to the marriage of the
clergy, it tended greatly to foster concubinage, and yet
more shameful vices. Yet notwithstanding all the cor-
ruption that prevailed among the clerical order it cannot
be denied that the superior as well as the inferior clergy
embraced a great number of worthy and strictly moral
men, and that the sacerdotal office which the people could
quite well distinguish from the individuals occup3dng it,
still continued to be highly respected in spite of the
immoral lives of many priests. Even more hurtful to the
exercise of their pastoral work than the immorality of indi-
vidual clergymen was the widespread illiteracy and gross
ignorance of Christian truth of those who should have been
teachers.
1. The Roman College of Cardinals.— All the clergy attached to one
particular church were called Clerici cardinales down to the 11th
century. But after Leo IX. had reformed and re-organized the Roman
clergy, and especially after Nicholas II. in a.d. 1059 had transferred the
right of papal election to the Komau cardinals, i.e. the seven bishops of
the Roman metropolitan dioceses and to the presbyters and deacons of
the principal churches of Rome, the title of cardinal was given to them
at first by way of eminence and very soon exclusively. It was not till
60 THE GERMANO-BOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
the 13th century that it became usual to give to foreign prelates the
rank of Roman cardinal priests as a mark of distinction. Under the
name of the holy college the cardinals, as the spiritual dignitaries most
nearly associated with the pope, formed his ecclesiastical and civil council,
and were also as such entrusted with the highest offices of state in the
papal domains. Innocent IV. at Lyons in a.d. 1245 gave to them as a
distinction the red hat ; Boniface VIII. in a.d. 1297 gave them the purple
mantle that indicated princely rank. To these Paul II. in a.d. 1464
added the right of riding the white palfrey with red cloth and golden
bridle ; and finally, Urban VIII. in a.d. 1630 gave them the title
" Eminence." Sixtus V. in a.d. 1586 fixed their number at seventy, after
the pattern of the elders of Israel, Exod. xxiv. 1, and the seventy disciples
of Jesus, Luke x. 1. The popes, however, took care to keep a greater or
less number of places vacant, so that they might have opportunities of
showing favour and bestowing gifts when necessary. The cardinals were
chosen in accordance with the arbitrary will of the individual pope, who
nominated them by presenting them with the red hat, and installed
them into their high position by the ceremony of closing and opening
the mantle. From the time of Eugenius IV., a.d. 1431, the college of
cardinals put every newly elected pope under a solemn oath to maintain
the rights and iDrivileges of the cardinals and not to come to any serious
and important resolution without their advice and approval.
2. The Political Importance of the Superior Clergy (§ 84) reached its
highest point during this period. This was carried furthest in Germany,
especially under the Saxon imperial dynasty. On more than one
occasion did the wise and firm policy of the German clergy, splendidly
organized under the leadership of the primate of Mainz, save the
German nation from overthrow or dismemberment threatened by
ambitious princes. This power consisted not merely in influence over
men's minds, but also in their position as members of the states of the
empire and territorial lords. "Whether or not a warlike expedition was to
be undertaken depended often only on the consent or refusal of the
league of lords spiritual. It was the policy of the clergy to secure a
united, strong, well-organized Germany. The surrounding countries
wished to be included in the German league of churches and states ; not,
however, as the emperor wished, as crown lands, but as portions of the
empire. Agaiust expeditions to Rome, which took the attention of Ger-
man princes away from German affairs and ruined Germany, the German
clergy protested in the most decided manner. They wished the chair of
St. Peter to be free and independent as a European, not a German, in-
stitution, with the emperor as its supporter not its oppressor, but they
manfully resisted all the assumptions and encroachments of the popes.
One of the most celebrated of the German dignitaries of any age was
Bruno the Great, brother of the Emperor Otto I., equally distinguished
§ 97. THE CLERGY. 61
as a statesman and as a reformer of the church, and the unwearied pro-
moter of liberal studies. Chaucellor under his imperial brother from
A.D. 9iO, he was his most trusted counsellor, and was appointed by him
in A.D. 953 Archbishop of Cologne, and was soon after made Duke of
Lon-aiue. He died in a d. 965. Another example of a German prelate
of the true sort is seen in Willigis of Mainz, who died in a.d. 1011,
under the two last Ottos and Henry II., whom he raised to the throne.
The good understanding that was brought about between this monarch
and the clergy of Germany was in great measure owing to the wise
policy of this prelate. Under Henry IV. the German clergy got split up
into three parties, — the papal party of Clugny under Gebhard of Salz-
burg, including almost all the Saxon bishops ; an imperial party under
Adalbert of Bremen, who endeavoured with the emperor's help to found
a northern patriarchate, which undoubtedly tended to become a northern
papacy ; and an independent German party under St. Anno II. of
Cologne (§ 96, 6), in which notwithstanding much violence, ambition,
and self-seeking, there still survived much of the spirit that had character-
ized the policy of the old German bishops. Henry V., too, as well as
the first Hohenstauf ens, had sturdy supporters in the German clergy;
but Frederick II. by his ill treatment of the bishops alienated their
clergy from the interest of the crown. The rise of the imperial digni-
taries after the time of Otto I., and the tran'sference to them under
Otto IV. of the election of emperor raised the archbishops of Mainz,
Treves, and Cologne to the rank of spiritual electoral princes as arch-
chaplains or archchancellors. The Golden Bull of Charles IV., in a.d.
1356 (§ 110, 4), confirmed and tabulated their rights and duties.
3. The Bishops and the Cathedral Chapter. — The bishops exercised juris-
diction over all the clergy of their diocese, and punished by deprivation
of office and imprisonment in monasteries. Especially questions of
marriage, wills, oaths, were brought before their tribunal. The German
synodal judicatures soon gave way before the Eoman judiciary system.
The archdeacons emancipated themselves more and more from episcopal
authority and abused their power in so arbitrary a way that in the 12th
century the entire institution was set aside. For the discharge of busi-
ness episcopal officials and vicars were then introduced. The Cliorepi-
scopi {§ 84) had passed out of view^in the 10th century. But during the
crusades many Catholic bishoprics had been founded in the East. The
occupants of these when driven away clung to their titles in hojaes of
better times, and found employment as assistants or suffragans of Western
bishops. Thus arose the order of Episcopi in partibus (sc. infidelium)
which has continued to this day, as a witness of inalienable rights,
and as affording a constant opportunity to the popes of showing favour
and giving rewards. For the exercise of the archepiscopal office, the
Fourth Lateran Council of a.d. 1215 made the receiving from the pope the
62 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
pallium (§ 5'J, 7) au absolutely essential condition, and those elected were
obliged to pay to the curia an arbitrary tax of a large amount called the
pallium fee. The canonical life (§ 84, 4) from the 10th century began
more and more to lose its moral weight and importance. Out of attempts
at reform in the 11th century arose the distinction of Canonici seculares
and regulares. The latter lived in cloisters according to monkish rules,
and were zealous for the good old discipline and order, but sooner or later
gave way to worldliness. The rich revenues of cathedral chapters made
the reversion of prebendal stalls the almost exclusive privilege of the
higher nobility, notwithstanding the earnest opposition of the popes.
In the course of the 13th century the cathedral clergy, with the help of
the popes, arrogated to themselves the sole right of episcopal elections,
ignoring altogether the claims of the diocesan clergy and the people or
nobles. The cathedral clergy also made themselves independent of
episcopal control. They lived mostly outside of the cathedral diocese,
and had their canonical duties performed by vicars. The chapter filled
up vacancies by co-optation.
4. Endeavours to Reform the Clergy. — As a reformer of the English
clergy, who had sunk very low in ignorance, rudeness and immorality, the
most conspicuous figure during the 10th century was St. Dunstan. He
became Archbishop of Canterbury in a.d. 959 and died in a.d. 988. He
sought at once to advance the standard of education among the clergy
and to inspire the Church with a higher moral and religious spirit. For
these ends he laboured on with an energy and force of will and an
inflexible consistency and strictness in the pursuit of his hierarchical
ideals, which mark him out as a Hildebraud before Hildebrand. Even
as abbot of the monastery of Glastonbury he had given a forecast of his
life work by restoring and making more severe the rule of St. Benedict,
and forming a brotherhood thoroughly disciplined in science and in
ascetical exercises, from the membership of which, after he had become
bishop of Worcester, then of London, and finally primate of England and
the most influential councillor of four successive kings, he could fill the
places of the secular priests and canons whom he expelled from their
cures. As the primary condition of all clerical reformation he insisted
upon -the unrelentingly consistent putting down of marriage and con-
cubinage among the priests.^ — In the 11th century St. Peter Damiani
distinguished himself as a zealous supporter of the reform party of
Clugny in the struggle against simony, clerical immorality, and the
marriage of priests. This obtained for him not only his position as
cardinal-bishop of Ostia, but also his frequent employment, as papal
1 Stubbs, " Memorials of St. Dunstan. Collection of six Biographies."
London, 1875. Soames, " Anglo-Saxon Church." London, 1835. Hook,
" Lives of Archb. of Canterbury." Vol. i., pp. 382-426. London, 1860.
§ 97. THE CLEEGY. 63
legate in serious negotiations. In a.d. 1061 he resigned his bishopric
and retired into a monastery, where he died in a.d. 1072. His friend
Hildebrand, who repeatedly called him forth from his retreat to occupy a
conspicuous place among the contenders for his hierarchical ideal, was
therefore called by him his " holy Satan." He had indeed little interest
in pressing hierarchical and political claims, and was inclined rather
to urge moral reforms within the church itself. In his Libei' Gomor-
rliianus he drew a fearful picture of the clerical depravity of his times,
and that with a nakedness of detail which gave to Pope Alexander II. a
colourable excuse for the suppression of the book. For himself, how-
ever, Damiani sought no other pleasure than that of scourging himself
till the blood flowed in his lonely cell (§ 106, 4). His collected works,
consisting of epistles, addresses, tracts and monkish biographies, were
published at Eome in a.d. 1602 in 4 vols, by Cardinal Cajetau, — In the
12th century St. Hildegard (§ 107, 1) and the abbot Joachim of Floris,
(§ 108, 5) raised their voices against the moral degradation of the clergy,
and among the men who contributed largely to the restoring of clerical
discipline, the noble provost Geroch of Eeichersberg in Bavaria, who died
in A.D. 1169 (§ 102, 5) and the canon Norbert, subsequently archbishop
of Magdeburg (§ 98, 2), are deserving of special mention. — In the 13th
century in England Robert Grosseteste distinguished himself as a prelate
of great nobility and force of character. After being chancellor of Oxford
he became bishop of Lincoln, energetically reforming many abuses in his
diocese, and persistently contending against any form of papal encroach-
ment. He died in a.d. 1253.^
5. The Pataria of Milan. — Nowhere during the 11th century were
simony, concubinage and priests' marriages more general than among
the Lombard clergy, and in no other place was such determined opposition
offered to Hildebrand's reforms. At the head of this opposition stood
Guido, archbishop of Milan, whom Henry III. deposed in a.d. 1046.
Against the papal demands, he pressed the old claims of his chair to
autonomy (§ 46, 1) and renounced allegiance to Eome. The nobles and
the clergy supported Guido. But two deacons, Ariald and Laudulf, about
A.D. 1057 formed a consjiiracy among the common people, against " the
Nicolaitan sect" (§ 27, 8). To this party its opponents gave the oppro-
brious name of Pataria, Paterini, from ijatalia, meaning rabble, riffraff,
or from Pattarea, a back street of ill fame in Milan, the quarter of the
rabble, where the Arialdists held their secret meetings. They took the
name given in reproach as a title of honour, and after receiving military
organization from Erlembald, Landulf's brother, they opened a campaign
against the married priests. For thirty years this struggle continued to
deluge city and country with blood.
^ Luard, " Eoberti Grosseteste, Episcopi quondam Lincolniensis Epi-
stolfe." Loudon, 18B2.
64 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
§ 98. Monastic Orders and Institutions.
In spite of the great and constantly increasing corrup-
tion the monastic idea during this period had a wonderfully
rapid development, and more persistently and siiccessfully
than ever before or since the monks urged their claims
to be regarded as " the knighthood of asceticism." A
vast number of monkish orders arose, taking the place
for the most part of existing orders which had relaxed
their rules. These were partly reformed off-shoots of the
Benedictine order, partly new organizations reared on an
independent basis. New monasteries were being built
almost every day, often even within the cities. The re-
formed Benedictine monasteries clustered in a group
around the parent monastery whose reformed rule they
adopted, forming an organized society with a common
centre. These groups were therefore called Congregations.
The oldest and, for two centuries, the most important, of
these congregations was that of the Brethren of Clugny,
whose ardent zeal for reform in the hierarchical direction
was mainly instrumental in raising again the church and
the papacy out of that degradation and corruption into
which they had fallen during the 10th and 11th centuries.
The otherwise less important order of the Camaldolites
was also a vigorous promoter of these movements. But
Clugny had in Clairvaux a rival which shared with it on
almost equal terms the respect and reverence of that age.
The unreformed monasteries of the Benedictines, on the
other hand, still continued their easy, luxurious style of
living. They were commonly called the Black Monks to
distinguish them from the Cistercians who were known
as the White Monks. In order to prevent a constant
splitting up of the monkish fraternities, Innocent III. at
the Lateran Council of a.d. 1215 forbade the founding
§ 98. MONASTIC ORDERS AND INSTITUTIONS. 65
of new orders. Yet he himself took part in the formatiou
of the two great mendicant orders, and also the following-
popes issued no prohibition. — The papacy had in the
monkish orders its standing army. It was to them, in a
special manner, that Gregory's sj^stem owed its success.
But they were also by far the most important promoters
and fosterers ol learning, science, and art. The pope in
various ways favoured the emancipation of the monasteries
from episcopal control, their so-called Exemption ; and con-
ferred upon the abbots of famous monasteries what was
practically episcopal rank, with liberty to wear the bishop's
mitre, so that they were called Mitred Abbots (§ 84, 1).
The princes too classed the abbots in respect of dignity
and order next to the bishops ; and the people, wdio saw
the popular idea of the church more and more represented
in the monasteries, honoured them with unmeasured reve-
rence. From the 10th century the monks came to be
considered a distinct religious order {Orclo religiosorum).
Lay brethren, Fvatres conversi, were now taken in to dis-
charge the worldly business of the monastery. They were
designated Fratres^ while the others who received clerical
ordination were addressed as Pcitres. The monks rarely
lived on good terms with the secular clergy; for the
former as confessors and mass priests often seriously
interfered with the rights and revenues of the latter. —
Besides the many monkish orders, with their strict seclu-
sion, perpetual vows and ecclesiastically sanctioned rule,
we meet with organizations of a freer type such as the
Humiliati of Milan, consisting of whole families. Of a
similar type were the Beguines and Beghards of the
Netherlands, the former composed of women, the latter of
men. These people abandoned their handicraft and their
domestic and civic duties for a monastic-like mode of life
retired from the world. The crusading enthusiasm also
5
(36 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
occasioned a combination of the monastic idea witli that
of knighthood, and led to the formation of the so-called
Orders of Knights, which with a Grandmaster and several
Commanders, were divided into Knights, Priests, and Serv-
ing Brethren. — Continuation, § 112,
1. Offshoots of the Benedictines.— (1) Tlio Brethren of Clugny. Among
the Benedictines, since their reformation by the second Benedict
(§ 85, 2) many serious abuses had crept in. After the Burgundian Count
Berno, who died in a.d. 'J27, had done useful service by restoring dis-
cipline and order in two monasteries of which he was abbot, the Duke
"William of Aquitaine founded for him a new institution. Thus arose in
A.D. 910 the celebrated monastery of Clugny, Cluniacum, in Burgundy,
which the founder placed under immediate papal control. Berno's suc-
cessor Odo, who died in a.d. 942, abandoning the life of a courtier on his
recovery from a severe illness, made it the head and heart of a separate
Clugny-Congregation as a branch of the Benedictine order. Strict
asceticism, a beautiful and artistic service, zealous prosecution of science
and the education of the young, with yet greater energy in the pro-
motion of a hierarchical reform of the church as a whole, as well as an
entire series of able abbots, among whom Odilo (f a.d. 1048), the friend
of Hildebrand, and Peter the Venerable (f a.d. 1156) are specially pro-
minent, gave to this congregation, which in the 12th century had 2,000
monasteries in France, an influence quite unparalleled in this whole
period. The abbot of Clugny stood at the head, and appointed the priors
for all the other monasteries. Under the licentious Abbot Pontius, who
on account of his base conduct was deposed in a.d. 1122, the order fell
into decay, but rose again under Peter the Venerable. Continuation,
§ 164, 2. — (2) The Congregation of the Cainaldolites was founded in a.d.
1018 by the Benedictine Romuald, descended from the Duke of Ravenna,
at Camaldoli {Campus MaldoU), a wild district in the Apennines. In a.d.
1086 a nunnery was placed alongside of the monastery. The president
of the parent monastery at Camaldoli stood at the head of the whole
order as Major. The order carried out enthusiastically the high church
ideal of Clugny, and won great influence in its time, although it by no
means attained the importance of the French order. — (3) Twenty years
later, in a.d. 1038, the Florentine Gualbertus founded the Order of Val-
lombrosa, in a romantically situated shady valley of the Apeimines {Valli.i
umhrosa), according to the rule of Benedict. This was the first of all
the orders to appoint lay brethren for the management of worldly busi-
ness, in order that the monks might observe their vow of silence and
strict seclusion. The parent monastery attained to great wealth and
reputaticm, but it never had a great number of alliliatcd institutions.^
§ 98. MONASTIC ORDERS AND INSTITUTIONS. 67
(4) The Cisterciaus. In a.d. 1098 the Benedictine abbot Robert founded the
monastery of Citeaux {Cistercium) near Dijon, which as the parent mona-
stery of the Congregation of the Cistercians became the most formidable
rival of Clugny. The Cistercians were distinguished from the Brethren
of Clugny by voluntary submission to the jurisdiction of the bishops,
avoidance of all interference with the pastorates of others, and the
banishing of all ornaments from their churches and monasteries. The
order continued obscure for a while, till St. Bernard (§ 102, 3), from a.d.
1115 abbot of the monastery of Clairvaux (Claravallis), an offshoot of
Citeaux, by his ability and spirituality raised it far above all other orders
in the esteem of the age. In honour of him the French Cistercians took
the name of Beruardines. The hostility between them and the Brethren
of Clugny was overcome by the personal friendship of Bernard and
Peter the Venerable. By the statutory constitution, the so-called Cliarta
charitatis, drawn up in a.d. 1119, the administration of all the affairs of
the order was assigned to a general of the order, appointed by the
abbot of Citeaux, the abbots of the four chief affiliated monasteries, and
twenty other elected representatives forming a high council. This
council, however, was answerable to the general assembly of all the
abbots and priors, which met at first yearly, but afterwards every third
year. The affiliated monasteries had a yearly visitation of the abbot of
Citeaux, but Citeaux itself was to be visited by the four abbots just referred
to. In the 13th century this order had 2,000 monasteries and 6,000 nun-
neries.— (5) The Congregation of Scottish Monasteries in Germany owed
its origin to the persistent love of travel on the part of Irish and Scottish
monks, which during the 10th century received a new impulse from the
Danish invasions (§ 93, 1). The first monastery erected in Germany for
the reception exclusively of Irish monks was that of St. Martin at
Cologne, built in the 10th century. Much more important, however, was
the Scottish monastery of St. James at Regensburg, founded in a.d. 1067
by Marianus Scotus and two companions. It was the parent mona-
stery of eleven other Scottish cloisters in South Germany. Old Celtic
sympathies (§ 77, 8), which may have originally bound them together,
could not assert themselves in the new home during this period as they
did in earlier days ; and when Innocent III., at the Laterau Council of
A.D. 1215, sanctioned them as a separate congregation bound by the
Benedictine rule, there certainly remained no longer any trace of Celtic
peculiarities. They were distinguished at first for strict asceticism,
severe discipline and scientific activity, but subsequently they fell lower
than all the rest in immorality and self-indulgence {§ 112).
2. New Monkish Orders. — Reserving the great mendicant orders, the
following are the most celebrated among the vast array of new orders,
not bound by the Benedictine rule : (1) The Order of Grammout in
France, founded by Stephen of Ligerno in a.d. 1070. It took simply the
68 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
gospel as its rule, cultivated a quiet, humble and peaceable temper, and
so by the 12th century it had its very life crushed out of it by the bold
assumptions of its lay brethren.— (2) The Order of St. Anthony, founded in
A.D. 1095 by a French nobleman of Dauphiny, called Guaston, in grati-
tude for the recovery of his son Guerin from the so-called St. Anthony's
fire on his invoking St. Anthony. He expended his whole property upon
the restoring of a hospital beside the church of St. Didier la Mothe, in a
chapel of which it was supposed the bones of Anthony lay, and devoted
himself, together with his son and some other companions, to the nursing
of the sick. At first merely a lay fraternity, the members took in a.d. 1218
the monk's vow. Boniface VIII. made them canons under the rule of
St. Augustine (§ 45, 1). They were now called Antonians, and devoted
themselves to contemplation. The order spread greatly, especially in
France. They wore a black cloak with a T-formed cross of blue upon
the breast (Ezek. ix. 9) and a little bell round the neck while engaged
in collecting alms. — (3) The Order of Fontevraux was founded in a.d. 1094
by Robert of Arbrissel in Fontevraux {Fons Ehraldi) in Poitou. Preach-
ing repentance, he went through the country, and founded convents for
virgins, widows and fallen women. Their abbesses, as representatives of
the Mother of God, to whom the order was dedicated, were set over the
priests who did their bidding. — (4) The Order of the Gilbertines had its
name from its founder Gilbert, an English priest of noble birth. Here
too the women formed the main stem of the order. They were the
owners of the cloister property, and the men were only its administrators.
The monasteries of this order were mostly both for men and women.
It did not spread much beyond England, and had at the time of the
suppression of the monasteries twenty-one well endowed convents, with
orphanages and houses for the poor and sick. — (5) The Carthusian Order was
founded in a.d. 1086 by Bruno of Cologne, rector of the High School at
liheims. Disgusted with the immoral conduct of Archbishop Manasseh,
he retired with several companions into a wild mountain gorge near Gre-
noble, called Chartreuse. He enjoined upon his monks strict asceticism,
rigid silence, earnest study, prayer, and a contemplative life, clothed them
in a great coarse cowl, and allowed them for their support only vegetables
and bran bread. Written statutes, Consuetudines Gartusice, which soon
spread over several houses of the Carthusians, were first given them in
A.D. 1134 by Guido, the fifth prior of the parent monastery. A steward
had management of the affairs of the convent. Each ate in his own
cell; only on feast days had they a common meal. At least once a
week they fasted on salt, water and bread. Breaking silence, permitted
only on high festivals, and for two hours on Thursdays, was punished
with severe flagellation. Even the lay brethren were treated with great
severity, and were not allowed either to sit or to cover their heads in
the presence of the brothers of the order. Carthusian nuns were added
§ 98. MONASTIC OEDEKS AND INSTITUTIONS. 69
to the order in the 13th century with a modifiecl rule. —(G) The Premon-
stratensian Order was founded in a.d. 1121 by Norbert, the only German
founder of orders besides and after Bruno. A rich, worldly-minded
canon of Xanthen in the diocese of Cologne, he was brought to another
mind by the fall of a thunderbolt beside him. He retired along with
several other like-minded companions into the rough valley of Premontre
in the bishopric of Laon [Prcemonstratum, because pointed out to him in
a vision). In his rule he joined together the canonical duties with an
extremely strict monastic life. He appeared in a.d. 1126 as a preacher
of repentance at the Diet of Spires, was there elected archbishop of
Magdeburg, and made a most impressive entrance into his metropolis
dressed in his mendicant garb. His order spread and estabhsbed many
convents both for monks and for nuns. — (7) The Trinitarian Order, ordo s.
Trinitatis de redemptione captivorum, was called into existence by Innocent
III., and had for its work the redemption of Christian captives. — (8) The
Ccelestine Order was founded by Peter of Murrone, afterwards Pojdc Coeles-
tine V. (§ 90, 22). Living in a cave of Mount Murrone in Apulia, under
strict penitential discipline and engaged in mystic contemplation, the
fame of his sanctity attracted to him many companions, with whom in
A.D. 1254 he established a monastery on Mount Majella. Gregory X., in
whose presence Peter, according to his biographer, hung up his monkish
cowl in empty space, upon a sunbeam which he took for a cord stretch-
ing across, instituted the order as Brethren of the Holy Spirit. But
when in a.d. 1294 their founder ascended the papal throne, they took
his papal name. This order, which gave itself up entirely to extravagant
mystic contemplation, spread over Italy, France and the Netherlands.
3. The Franciscans.— The mendicant orders had their origin in the
endeavours to carry out as exactly as possible the vow of poverty.
They would live solely on charitable gifts, which, as voluntary alms, were
partly paid into their cloisters, partly gathered outside of the cloister at
set times by monks sent out for the purpose {Terminants)A The author
of this idea was St. Francis, born in a.d. 1182, the son of a wealthy
merchant, at Assisi in Umbria. His proper name was Giovanni Ber-
nardone. The name Francis was given him on account of his early
proficiency in the French language. As a rich merchant's son he gave
himself up to the enjoyments of the world, from which he was first
estranged by means of a dream, in which he saw a vast number of
weapons marked with the sign of the cross, which were meant for him
and his warriors. He wished now to enter on military service. But
a new vision taught him that he was called to build up the house of
God that had fallen down. He understood this to refer to the decayed
^ Trench, " The Mendicant Orders," in " Lectures on Medieval Church
History." London, 1878.
70 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
fjhapel of St. Damiani at Assisi, and began to expend on the building
of the chapel the proceeds got from the sale of valuable webs of cloth
from his father's warehouse. Disowned by his father in consequence
of such proceedings, he lived for several years as a recluse until the
reading in the church one day of the gospel passage about the sending
out of the disciples without gold and silver, without staff or purse
(Matt. X.), shot like a flash of lightning into his soul. Kenouncing all
property, begging for the necessaries of life, from about a.d. 1208, he
began to go through all countries in the East and West, preaching re-
pentance, taken by the people sometimes for a crazy, harebrained
enthusiast, sometimes for a most venerable saint (§ 93, 16). In the un-
exampled thoroughness of his self-denial and renunciation of the world,
in the purity and simplicity of his heart, in the enthusiasm of his
love for God and man, in the sacred riches of his poverty, St. Francis
appeared a heavenly stranger in a selfish world He had wonderful depths
of tender feeling for nature. With the birds of the forest, with the beasts
of the field, he maintained a childlike intercourse as with brothers and
sisters {§ 104, 10), exhorting them to praise their Creator. The para-
disaical relation of man to the lower animals seemed in this saint to
have been restored. When attempting to deliver carefully studied
speeches before the pope and the cardinals he failed ; but his unpre-
meditated speeches were poured forth from the depth of his heart in
an uninterrupted as well as powerful and irresistible torrent of elo-
quence. Innocent III., struck with his simplicity and humility, gave
his approval to this remarkable saint. According to an old legend he is
said to have sent him at first to the swine, and the saint obeyed the
command. Innocent's successor Honorius III. formally instituted in
A.D. 1223 the company of like-minded men which had gathered around
Francis as the order of Fratres minores, Minorites or Franciscans, and
gave them the right of preaching and discharging pastoral duties in
any place wheresoever they might go. It was, however, the founder's
intention that the order should signalise itself by acts of self-denial
rather than by preaching. A brown frock with a capouch, and instead
of a girdle a rope round the body, constituted the badge of the order.
They were also the first Barefooted monks, Discalceati ; for they either
wore no covering on the feet, or on long journeys put on merely sandals
to protect the soles of the feet (Matt. x. 10 ; Mark vi. 9). The holy p)ride
of contempt for the world, the genuine humility, the enthusiasm and
completeness of their self-denying love made a powerful imiiression, and
won for the pious brethren the honourable designation of the Seraphic
order. A like-minded virgin, St. Clara of Assisi, founded in a.d. 1212
the order of the Nuns of St. Clara, to whom as a second order St.
Francis gave a rule in a.d. 1224. The fraternity of the Tertiaries {Ter-
this ordo de •jjoenitentia), to whom he also gave a rule, allowed their
§ 98. MONASTIC OEDERS AND INSTITUTIONS. 71
members to continue in the world, and secured a broad basis for the
Franciscan order among the people. The central seat of the order was
the church of Portiuncula in Assisi, dedicated to Mary, which the pope
endowed with the plenary power of bestowing indulgences. The founder
himself died in a.d. 1226, stretched out naked on the floor of the Porti-
unciilar church. Gregory IX. canonized him in a.d. 1288 ; and in a.d.
1264 his order numbered 8,000 cloisters, containing 200,000 monks. In
A.D. 1399 the chief authorities of the Franciscans at Assisi authorized
the Liher conformitatum of Bartholomew of Pisa, which enumerated forty
resemblances between Christ and St. Francis, in which generally the
saint was made to transcend the Saviour. On the legend of the
stigmatization of St. Francis, see § 105, 4. His life embellished by the
record of many miracles was written in a.d. 1229 by Thomas of Celano,
an edition enlarged by the Tres Socii was published in a.d. 1216 ; and
another appeared in a.d. 1261, by Bonaventura.^
4. Splits and Offshoots of the Franciscans.— During the lifetime of
St. Francis, Elias of Cortona, to whom the founder during a journey
to the East had entrusted the command of the order, sought to modify
the severity of its rules. Francis set aside these proposed changes with
disapproval. But when Elias was appointed general in a.d. 1233 he
successfully renewed his attempt. The stricter party, however, adhered
to Authony of Padua (born in a.d. 1195, at Lisbon ; died in a.d. 1231,
at Padua), who lived and wrought quite in the spirit of the founder.
When men refused to listen to his teaching, he preached with success
to the fishes, and wrought many other miracles. Gregory IX. canonized
bim in a.d. 1232. Violent contondings soon arose within the order.
Twice was Elias thrust out from the generalship. Then he attached
himself to Frederick II., was excommunicated along with him, but died
at peace with the church in a.d. 1253. The more lax party, Fratres cle
Comvmnitate, endeavoured to reconcile the possession of rich monastic
property with the founder's fundamental principle of poverty by affirm-
ing that these goods were placed by the donors in their hands only in
usufruct, or that they were given not really to the order but to the
Eomau church, though with the intention of supporting the order.
Nicholas III. in a.d. 1279 sanctioned this view, deciding by the bull
Exiit qui seminal that the disciples of St. Francis were allowed the
usufruct but not the possession of earthly goods, as permitted by the
example of Christ and the Apostles. But now a new controversy arose
over the form and measure of the usufruct. . A distinction was made
between Usus inoderatus and a Usus tenuis or pauper. The latter
1 Milman, "History of Latin Christianity," vol. v. Wadding, " An-
nales Minorum Fratrum." 8 vols. Lugd., 1625. Stephen, " St. Francis
of Assisi," in "Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography." London, 1860.
72 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
allowed of no provision be^'ond what was evidently necessary for the
indispensable support of life. The rigorists, Zelatores, wdth Oliva and
Casale at their head, took np a position of open and fanatical antagon-
ism to the papacy, which they identified with antichrist (§ 108, 5).
One portion of them, that took offence at the views of the lax party
about dress reform as well as about the use of property, got permission
from Ccelestine V. in a.d. 129i to separate from the main body of the
order, and under the designation of Ccelestine Eremites they formed an
independent community with a general of their own. They settled for
the most part in Greece and on the islands of the Archipelago. Boniface
VIII. in A.D. 1302 ordered them to return to the West, and to the parent
order. But as he soon afterwards died, they still maintained their
separate existence and their distinguishing garb.
5. The Dominicans. — The founder of this order was Dominic, born
A.D. 1170 of a noble Italian family, a priest at Osma, a man of ardent
temperament and liberal culture. His burning zeal for the salvation of
men led him with his fellow workers to proceed to the south of France
in A.D. 1200, to labour there with great self-denial and in a condition of
apostolic poverty for the conversion of the Albigenses (§ 109, 1). In
A.D. 1215 he went in company with the bishop of Toulouse to the great
Lateran Council at Rome. He was at first refused permission to found
a new order. Innocent III., however, at last gave ear to his persistent
entreaties, and Honorius III., in a.d. 1216, authorized the rule which
Dominic had drawn up. The Dominicans or i)reaching order, 0/Y?o/ra -
tnnn pnedicatorum, thus obtained the right of preaching and hearing con-
fession everywhere, with the special task of restoring heretics by means of
their preaching and teaching to the church in which alone salvation is to
be found. It was not till a.d. 1220 that Dominic and his order pronounced
themselves mendicants like the Franciscans. He died in a.d. 1233.' —
An olYshoot of this order composed of converted Albigensian women
attached itself in later times to the Tertiaries, Fratres et sorore>t de
militia CJiristi.— Both orders, Franciscans as well as Dominicans, called
forth by the needy circumstances of the age, as mendicant orders
requiring no endowments and invested with privileges by the pope,
spread rapidly over the whole West. Each of them had a general at
its head in Rpme, a provincial presiding over the convents of each
country, and among the Franciscans a guardian, among the Dominicans
a prior, over each separate cloister. Among the Dominicans, owing
to the disposition of their founder and their endeavours to convert the
heretics, liberal studies were encouraged and prosecuted. At a later
period they displayed a great zeal for missions. But most important of
all was the energy with which they secured the occupancy of academical
^ " Aimales Ordinis Pnedicatorum," vol. i. Home. 174G.
§ 98. MONASTIC ORDERS AND INSTITUTIONS. 73
chairs. Sometimes the Franciscans, too, inspired by the example of the
Dominicans, sought after Uberal culture and influence in the universities,
and were scarcely behind their rivals in zeal for missions to the
heathens and the Mohammedans. The veneration of the people, who pre-
ferred to confide their secret confessions to itinerant begging monks,
roused the jealousy of the secular clergy against both orders, and their
preponderating influence at the universities awakened the animosity of
the learned. The University of Paris most vigorously withstood their
aggression (§ 103, 3). But when this struggle had ended in victory for
the monks, bitter jealousies and rivalries arose between the two
orders and led to the establishment of two opposing philosophical schools
{§ 113, 2). The Dominicans won a great increase of power from
their being entrusted by Gregory IX. with the exclusive management of
the inquisition of heretics (§ 109, 2). The Franciscans, on the other
band, were more beloved by the common people than the more courtly
and haughty Dominicans. — Continuation, § 112, 4.
6. The other Mendicant Orders. — The brilliant success of the Francis-
cans and Dominicans led other societies, either previously existing, or
only now called into being, to adopt the character of mendicants. Only
three of them succeeded, though in a much less degree than their
models, in gaining position, name and extension throughout the West.
The first of these was the Carmelite Order. It owed its origin to the
crusader Berthold, Count of Limoges, who in a.d. ]156 founded a mona-
stery at the brook of Elias on Mount Carmel, to which in a.d. 1209 the
patriarch of Jerusalem prescribed the rule of St. Basil (§ 44, 3). Hard
pressed by the Saracens, the Carmelites emigrated in a.d. 1238 to the
West, where as a mendicant order, under the name of Prates Maria de
Monte Carmelo, with unexampled hardihood they repudiated their founder
Berthold, and maintained that the prophet EHas had been himself their
founder, and that the Virgin Mary had been a sister of their order. What
they most prided themselves on was tbe sacred scapular which the
Mother of God herself had bestowed upon Simon Stock, the general of
the order in a.d. 1251, with the promise that whosoever should die wear-
ing it should be sure of eternal blessedness. Seventy years later, accord-
ing to tie legends of the order, the Virgin appeared to Pope John XXII.
and told him she descended every Saturday into purgatory, in order to
take such souls to herself into heaven. In the 17th century, when violent
controversies on this point had arisen, Paul V. authenticated the miracu-
lous qualities of this scapular, always supposing that the prescribed fasts
and prayers were not neglected. Among the Carmelites, just as among
the Franciscans, laxer principles soon became current, causing con-
troversies and splits which continued down to the 16th century (§ 149, 6).
—The Order of Angustinians arose out of the combination of several
Italian monkish societies. Innocent IV. in a.d. 1243 prescribed to them
74 THE (xERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 129-4.
tlie rule of St. Augustine {§ 45, 1) as the directory of their commou hfe.
It was only under Alexander IV. in a.d. 1256 that they were welded
together into one order as Ordo Fmtrum Eremitarum S. Aucjusthii, with
the duties and privileges of mendicant monks. Their order spread over
the whole West, and enjoyed the special favour of the papal chair,
which conferred upon its memhers the permanent distinction of the office
of sacristan to the papal chapel and of chaplain to the Holy Father
(Continuation, § 192, 5). — Finally, as the fifth in the series of mendicant
orders, we meet with the Order of Servites, Servi b. Virg., devoted to
the Virgin, and founded in a.d. 1233 by seven pious Florentines. It
was, however, first recognised as a mendicant order by Martin V., and
had equal rank with the four others granted it only in a.d. 1567 by
Pius V.
7. Working Guilds of a Monkish Order.— (1) During the 11th century,
midway between the strictly monastic and secular modes of life, a
number of pious artisan families in Milan, mostly weavers, under the
name of Humiliati, adopted a communal life with spiritual exercises,
and community of handicraft and of goods. Whatever profit came
from their work was devoted to the poor. The married continued their
marriage relations after entering the community. In the 12th centary,
however, a party arose among them who bound themselves by vows of
celibacy, and to them were afterwards attached a congregation of priests.
Their society was first acknowledged by Innocent III. in a.d. 1021.
But meanwhile many of them had come under the influence of Arnold
(§ 108, 6), and so had become estranged from the Catholic church. At
a later period these formed a connection with the French Waldensians,
the Pauperes de Lugduno, adopted their characteristic views, and for the
sake of distinction took the name of Pauperes Italici (§ 108, 12). — Re-
lated in every respect to the Lombard Humiliati, but distinguished from
them by the separation of the sexes and a universal obligation of celi-
bacy, were the communities of the Beguines and Beghards. Priority of
origin belongs to the Beguines. They took the three monkish vows, but
only for so long as they belonged to the society. Hence they could
at any time withdraw, and enter upon marriage and other relations of
social life. They lived under the direction of a lady superior and
a priest in a so-called Beguine-house, Curtis Bcguinarum, which gene-
rally consisted of a number of small houses connected together by one
surrounding wall. Each had her own household, although on entrance
she had surrendered her goods over to the community and on with-
drawing she received them back. They busied themselves with handiwork
and the education of girls, the spiritual training of females, and sewing,
washing and nursing the poor in the houses of the city. The surplus
income over expenditure was applied to works of benevolence. Every
Beguiue house had its own costume and colour. These institutions soon
§ 9ft. MONASTIC ORDEES AND INSTITUTIONS. 75
spread over all Belgium, Germany, and France. The first Beguine house
known to us was founded about 1180 at Liege, by the famous priest and
popular preacher, Lambert la Beghe, i.e. the Stammerer. Kallmann
thinks that the name of the society may have been derived from that of
the preacher. Earlier writers, without anything to support them but a
vague similarity of sound, were wont to derive it from Begga, daughter
of Pepin of Landen in the 7th century. Most likely of all, however,
is Mosheim's derivation of it from " beggan," which means not to pray,
"beten," a praying sister, but to beg, as the modern English, and so
proves that the institute originally consisted of a collection of poor
helpless women. We may compare with this the designation " Lollards,"
§ 116, 3. — After the pattern of the Beguine communities there soon
arose communities of men, Beghards, with similar tendencies. They
supported themselves by handicraft, mostly by weaving. But even in the
13th century corruption and immorality made their appearance in both.
Brothers and sisters of the New (§ 108, 4) and of the Free Spirit
(§ 116, 5), Fratricelli (§ 112, 2) and other heretics, persecuted by the
church, took refuge in their unions and infected them with their heresies.
The Inquisition (§ 109, 2) kept a sharp eye on them, and many were
executed, especially in France. The 15th General Council at Vienna, in
A.D. 1312, condemned eight of their positions as heretical. There was
now a multitude of Beguine and Beghard houses overthrown. Others
maintained their existence only by passing over to the Tertiaries of the
Franciscans. Later popes took the communities that were free from
suspicion under their protection. But even among those many forms
of immorality broke out, concubinage between Beguines and Beghards,
and worldliness, thus obliging the civil and ecclesiastical authorities again
to step in. The unions still remaining in the time of the Eeformation
were mostly secularized. Only in Belgium have a few Beguine houses
continued to exist to the present day as institutions for the maintenance
of unmarried women of the citizen class. ^
8. The Spiritual Order of Knights.— The peculiarity of the Order of
Knights consists in the combination of the three monkish vows of
poverty, chastity, and obedience with the vow to maintain a constant
struggle with the infidels. The most important of these orders were
the following. (1) The Templars, founded in a.d. 1118 by Hugo de
Payens and Godfrey de St. Omer for the protection of pilgrims in the
Holy Land. The costume of the order was a white mantle with a red
cross. Its rule was drawn up by St. Bernard, whose warm interest in
the order secured for it papal patronage and the unanimous appro-
bation of the whole West. When Acre fell in a.d. 1291 the Templars
1 Gieseler, " Ecclesiastical History," § 72, Edin., 1853. Vol. iii., pp.
268-276,
76 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
settled in Cyprus, but soon most of them returned to the West, making
France their headquarters. They had their name probably from a
palace built on the site of Solomon's temple, which king Baldwin II.
of Jerusalem assigned them as their first residence.^ — Continuation,
§ 112, 7.— (2) The Knights of St. John or Hospitallers, founded by
merchants from Amalfi as early as the middle of the 11th century,
residing at first in a cloister at the Holy Sepulchre, were engaged in
showing, hospitality to the pilgrims and nursing the sick. The head
of the order Raimund du Puy, who occupied this position from a.d.
1118, added to these duties, in imitation of the Templars, that of fight-
ing against the infidels. They carried a white cross on their breast,
and a red cross on their standard. Driven out by the Saracens, they
settled in Rhodes in a.d. 1310, and in a.d. 1530 took possession of
Malta.-— (3) The Order of Teutonic Knights had its origin from a hospital
founded by citizens of Bremen and Liibeck during the siege of Acre
in A.D. 1120. The costume of the knights was a white mantle with a
black cross. Subsequently the order settled in Prussia (§ 93, 13), and
in A.D. 1237 united with the order of the Brothers of the Sword, which
had been founded in Livonia in a.d. 1202 (93, 12). Under its fourth
Grandmaster, the prudent as well as vigorous Hermann v. Salza, a.d.
1210-1239, it reached the summit of its power and influence. — (4) The
Knights of the Cross arose originally in Palestine under the name of
the Order of Bethlehem, but at a later period settled in Austria,
Bohemia, Moravia and Poland. There they adopted the life of regular
canons (§ 97, 5) and devoted themselves to hospital work and pastoral
duties. They are still to be found in Bohemia as holders of valuable
livings, with the badge of a cross of red satin. — In Spain, too, various
orders of spiritual knights arose under vows to fight with the Moors
(§ 95, 2). The two most important were the Order of Calatrava, founded
in A.D. 1158 by the Cistercian monk Velasquez for the defence of the
frontier city Calatrava, and the Order of Alcantara, founded in a.d. 115G
for a similar purpose. Both orders were confirmed by Alexander III.
and gained great fame and still greater wealth in the wars against the
Moors. Under Ferdinand the Catholic the rank of Grandmaster of
both orders passed over to the crown. Paul III. in a.d. 1540 released
the knights from the vow of celibacy, but obliged them to become
champions of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin. Both orders
still exist, but only as military orders of merit.
9. Bridge-Brothers and Mercedarians.— The name of Bridge Brothers,
Freres Fontifex, Fratres Fontifices, was given to a union founded under
Clement III., in Southern France, in a.d. 1189, for the building of hos-
^ Addison, " History of the Knights Templars," etc. London, 1842.
2 Taafe, " Order of St. John of Jerusalem." 4 vols, London, 1852.
§ 99. SCHOLASTICISM IN GENEKAL. 77
pices and bridges at points where pilgrims crossed the large rivers, or for
the ferrying of pilgrims over the streams. As a badge they wore a pick
upon their breast. Their constitution was modelled upon that of the
Knights of St. John, and upon their gradual dissolution in the 13th
century most of their number went over to that order. — Petrus Kolescens,
born in Languedoc, of noble parents and military tutor of a Spanish
prince, moved by what he had seen of the sufferings of Christian slaves
at the hand of their Moorish masters, and strengthened in his resolve by
an appearance of the Queen of Heaven, founded in a.d. 1228 the knightly
order of the Mercedarians, Marice Virg. de mercede pro redemptione Capti-
vorum. They devoted all their property to the purchase of Christian
captives, and where such a one was in danger of apostatising to Islam
and the money for redemption was not procurable, they would even give
themselves into slavery in his place. When in a.d. 1317 the Grand Com-
mandership passed over into the hands of the priests, the order was
gradually transformed into a monkish order. After a.d. 1600, in con-
sequence of a reform after the pattern of the rule of the Barefoots, it
became a mendicant order, receiving the privileges of other begging
fraternities from Benedict XIII. in a.d. 1725. The order proved a useful
institution of its time in Spain, France and Italy, and at a later period
also in Spanish America.
III.— Theological Science and its Controversies.
§ 99. Scholasticism in General.^
The scientific activity of the Middle Ages received the
name of Scholasticism from the cathedral and cloister
schools in which it originated (§ 90, 8). The Schoolmen,
with their enthusiasm and devotion, their fidelity and per-
severance, their courage and love of combat, may be called
the knights of theology. Instead of sword and spear they
used logic, dialectic and speculation ; and profound scliolar-
ship was their breastplate and helmet. Ecclesiastical
orthodoxy was their glory and pride. Aristotle, and also
to some extent Plato, afforded them their philosophical basis
and method. The Fathers in their utterances, scntcntkej
1 Ueberweg, " History of Philosophy," vol. i., pp. 355-377. Hamp-
den, " The Scholastic Philosophy considered in its relation to Christian
Theology." Oxford, 1832. Maurice, " Mediaeval Philosophy." London,
1870. Harper, " The Metaphysics of the School." Loudon, 1880 f.
78 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
the Councils in their dogmas and canons, the popes in their
decretals, yielded to this Dialectic Scholasticism theologicf 1
material which it could use for the systematising, demon-
strating, and illustrating of the Church doctrine. If we
follow another intellectual current, we find the Mystical
Scholasticism taking up, as the highest task of theology, the
investigating and describing of the hidden life of the pious
thinker in and with God according to its nature, course, and
results by means of spiritual contemplation on the basis of
one's individual experience. Dogmatics (including Ethics)
and the Canon Law constituted the peculiar field of the
Dialectic Theology of the Schoolmen. The standard of dog-
matic theology during the 12th century was the Book of the
Sentences of the Lombard (§ 102, 5) ; that of the Canon Law
the Decree of Gratian. Biblical Exegesis as an independent
department of scientific study stood, indeed, far behind these
two, but was diligently prosecuted by the leading represen-
tatives of Scholasticism. The examination of the simple
literal sense, however, was always regarded as a secondary
consideration; while it was esteemed of primary impor-
tance to determine the allegorical, tropological, and ana-
gogical signification of the text (§ 90, 9).
1. Dialectic and Mysticism.— With the exception of the speculative
Scotus Erigena, the Schoohnen of the Carlovingian Age were of a
practical turn. This was changed on the introduction of Dialectic in
the 11th century. Practical interests gave way to pure love of science,
and it was now the aim of scholars to give scientific shape and perfect
logical form to the doctrines of the church. The method of this Dialectic
Scholasticism consisted in resolving all church doctrines into their
elementary ideas, in the arranging and demonstrating of them under all
possible categories and in the repelling of all possible objections of the
sceptical reason. The end aimed at was the proof of the reasonableness
of the doctrine. This Dialectic, therefore, was not concerned with exo-
getical investigations or Scripture proof, but rather with rational demon-
stration. Generally speaking, theological Dialectic attached itself to. the
ecclesiastical system of the day as positivism or dogmatism ; for, appro-
priating Augustine's Credo ut inteliujam, it made faith tliu priucii)al
§ 99. SCHOLASTICISM IN GENEKAL. 79
starting point of its theological thinking and the raising of faith to know-
ledge the end toward which it laboured. On the other hand, however,
so .pticism often made its appearance, taking not faith but doubt as the
starting point for its inquiries, with the avowed intention, indeed, of
raising faith to knowledge, but only acknowledging as worthy of belief
what survived the purifying fire of doubt. — Alongside of this double-
edged Dialectic, sometimes in conflict, sometimes in alliance with it, we
meet with the Mystical Scholasticism, which appealed not to the reason
but to the heart, and sought by spiritual contemplation rather than by
Dialectic to advance at once theological science and the Christian life.
Its object is not Dogmatics as such, not the development of Fides qua
creditur, but life in fellowship with God, the development of Fides qua
creditur. By contemplative absorption of the soul into the depth of the
Divine life it seeks an immediate vision, experience and enjoyment of the
Divine, and as an indispensable condition thereto requires purity of heart,
the love of God in the soul and thorough abnegation of self. What is
gained by contemplation is made the subject of scientific statement, and
thus it rises to speculative mysticism. Both contemplation and specula-
tive mysticism in so far as their scientific procedure is concerned are em-
braced under the name of scholastic mysticism. The practical endeavour,
however, after a deepening and enhancing of the Christian life in the
direction of a real and personal fellowship with God was found more
important and soon out-distanced the scientific attempt at tabulating and
formulating the facts of inner experience. Practical mysticism thus
gained the ascendency during the 12th, 13th and 14th centuries, and
formed the favourite pursuit of the numerous inmates of the nunneries
(§ 107).
2. The Philosophical Basis of Dialectic Scholasticism was obtained
mainly from the Aristotelian philosophy, which, down to the end of the
12th century, was known at first only from Latin renderings of Arabic
and even Hebrew translations, and afterwards from Latin renderings of
the Greek originals (§ 103, 1). Besides Aristotle, however, Plato also had
his enthusiastic admirers during the Middle Ages. The study of the
writings of Augustine and the Areopagite (§ 90, 7) led back again to him,
and the speculative mystics vigorously opposed the supremacy of
Aristotle. — At the outset of the philosophical career of scholasticism in
the 11th century we meet with the controversy of Anselm and Roscei-
linus about the relations of thinking and being or of the idea and the
substance of things (§ 101, 3). The Nominalists, following the principles
of the Stoics, maintained that General Notions, Universalia, are mere
abstractions of the understanding, Noniijia, which as such have no
reality outside the human mind, Universalia post res. The Realists, on
the contrary, affirmed the reality of General Notions, regarding them as
objective existences before and apart from human thinking. But there
80 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
were two kinds of realism. The one, based on the Platonic doctrine
of ideas, taught that General Notions are really existent before the origin
oi the several things as archetypes in the Divine reason, and then also
in the human mind before the contemplation of the things empirically
given, Universalia ante res. The other, resting on Aristotle's doctrine,
considered them as lying in the things themselves and as first getting
entrance into the human mind through experience, Universalia in rebus.
The Platonic Realism thought to reach a knowledge of things by pure
tfiought from the ideas latent in the human mind ; the Aristotelian, on
the other hand, thought to gain a knowledge of things only through
experience and thinking upon the things themselves. — Continuation,
§ 103, 1.
3. The Nurseries of Scholasticism. — The work previously done in
cathedrals and cloister schools was, from about the 12th century, taken up
in a more comprehensive and thorough way by the Universities. They
were, as to their origin, independent of church and state, emperor and
pope. Here and there famous teachers arose in the larger cities or
in connection with some celebrated cloister or cathedral school.
Youths from all countries gathered around them. Around the teacher
who first attracted attention others gradually grouped themselves.
Teachers and scholars organized themselves into a corporation, and thus
arose the University. By this, however, we are to understand nothing
less than a JJniversitas litteranim, where attention was given to the
whole circle of the sciences. For a long time there was no thought of a
distribution into faculties. When the multitude of teachers and students
demanded a distribution into several corporations, this was done accord-
ing to nations. The name signifies the Uiiiversitas viagistromm et
scholar iuin rather than an articulated whole. The study here pursued
was called Studium gencrale or universale, because the entrance thereto
stood open to every one. At first each university pursued exclusively
and in later times chiefly some special department of science. Thus,
e.g. theology was prosecuted in Paris and Oxford and subseciuently also
in Cologne, jurisprudence in Bologna, Medicine in Salerno. The first
university that expressly made provision for teaching all sciences was
founded at Naples in a.d. 1224 with imperial munificence by Frederick II.
The earliest attempt at a distribution of the sciences among distinct
faculties was occasioned by the struggle between the university of
Paris and the mendicant monks (§ 103, 1), who separated themselves
from the other theological teachers and as members of a guild formed
themselves in a.d. 1259 into a theological faculty. The number of the
students, among whom were many of ripe years, was immensely great,
and in some of the most celebrated universities reached often to ten or
even twenty thousand. There was a ten years' course prescribed for
the training of the monks of Clugiiy : two years' T.ogicalia, three years
§ 99. SCHOLASTICISM IN GENERAL. 81
Literce naturales et philosophiccc, and tive yeai's' Theology. The Council
at Tours in a.d. 1236 insisted that every priest should have passed
through a five years' course of study.^
4. The Epochs of Scholasticism. — The intellectual work of the theo-
logians of the Middle Ages during our period ran its course in four
epochs, the boundaries of which nearly coincide with the boundaries
of the four centuries which make up that period. (1) From the 10th
century, almost completely destitute of any scientific movement, the so-
called Sccculum obacurum, there sprang forth the first buds of scholar-
ship, without, however, any distinct impress upon them of scholasticism.
(2) In the 11th century scholasticism began to show itself, and that in
the form of dialectic, both sceptical and dogmatic. (3) In the 12th
century mysticism assumed an independent place alongside of dialectic,
carried on a war of extermination against the sceptical dialectic, and
finally appeared in a more peaceful aspect, contributing material to
the positive dogmatic dialectic. (4) In the 13th century dialectic scho-
lasticism gained the complete ascendency, and reached its highest glory
in the form of dogmatism in league with mysticism, and never, in the
persons of its greatest representatives, in opposition to it.
5. The Canon Law. — After the Pseudo-Isidore (§ 87, 2) many collec-
tions of church laws appeared. They sought to render the material
more complete, intentionally or unintentionally enlarging the forgeries
and massing together the most contradictory statements without any
attempt at comparison or sifting. The most celebrated of these
were the collections of bishops Burchard of Worms about a.d. 1020,
Anselm of Lucca, who died in a.d. 1086, nephew of the pope of the
same name, Alexander II., and Ivo of Chartres, who died in a.d. 1116.
Then the Camaldolite monk Gratian of Bologna undertook not only to
gather together the material in a more complete form than had hitherto
been done, but also to reconcile contradictory statements by scholastic
argumentation. His work appeared about a.d. 1150 under the title
Goncordantia discordantium canonum, and is commonly called Decretum
Gratiani. A great impulse was given to the study of canon law by
means of this work, especially at Bologna and Paris. Besides the
Legists, who taught the Koman law, there now arose numerous
Decretists teaching the canon law and writing commentaries on
Gratian's work. Gregory IX. had a new collection of Decrees of Councils
and Decretals in five books, the so-called Liber extra Decretum, or shortly
Extra or Decretum Gregorii, drawn up by his confessor and Grand-
Penitentiary, the learned Dominican Eaimundus de Pennaforti, and sent
^ Kirkpatrick, "The Historically Received Conception of a University."
London, 1857. Hagenbach, " Encyclopaedia of Theology," transl. by
Crooks and Hurst. New York, 1884, § 18, pp. 50, 51.
82 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
it in A.D. 12.^ 1 to the University of Bologna. Boniface VIII. in a.d. 1298
added to this collection in five parts his -Liber Sextiis, and Clement V.
in A.D. 1314 added what are called after him the Clementines, From
that time down to a.d. 1483 the decretals of later popes were added as
an appendix under the name Extravog antes, and with these the Corpus
juris canonici was concluded. An official edition was begun in a.d. 1566
by the so-called Correctores Roman i, which in a.d. 1580 received papal
sanction as authoritative for all time to come.^
6. The Schoolmen as such contributed nothing to Historical Literature.
Histories were written not in the halls of the universities but in the
cells of the monasteries. Of these there were three kinds as we have
already seen in § 90, 9. For workers in the department of Biblical
History, see § 105, 5 ; and of Legends of the Saints, § 104, 8. For
ancient Church History Rufinus and Cassiodorus were the authorities
and the common text books {^ 5, 1). An interesting example of the
manner in which universal history was treated when mediaeval culture
had reached its highest point, is afforded by the Speculum magnum s.
quadruplex of the Dominican Vincent of Beauvais [Uellovacensis). This
treatise was composed about the middle of the 13th century at the com-
mand of Louis IX. of France as a hand-book for the instruction of the
royal princes. It forms an encyclojpaedic exposition of all the sciences
of that day in four parts. Speculum historiale, naturale, doctrinale, and
morale. The Speculum doctrinale breaks off just at the point where it
should have passed over to theology proper, and the Speculum morale is
a later compilation by an unknown hand.-
§ 100. The S/ECULum Obscurum: the 10th Century.^
In contrast to the brilliant theological scholarship and
the activity of religions life in the 9th centnry, as well as
to the remarkable cnltnre and scientific attainments of the
Spanish Moors with their world-renowned school at Cordova,
the darkness of the 10th centnry seems all the more con-
spicnous, especially its first half, when the papacy reached
its lowest depths, the clergy gave way to unblushing world-
1 Cunningham, "Historical Theology." Edinburgh, 1870. Vol. i.,
ch. XV., " The Canon Law," pp. 426-438.
- Kiibiger, " Theological Encyclopaedia." Vol. i., p. 28. Edin., 1884.
^ Maitland, "The Dark Ages: a Series of Essays, to Illustrate the
State of Rehgion and Literature in the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, and
Twelfth Centuries." London, 1844.
§ 100. THE Sx5:culu:m obscurum. 83
liness and the cliurcli was consumed by the foulest corrup-
tion. During this age, indeed, there were gleams of light
even in Italy, but only like a will o' the wisp rising from
swampy meadows, a fanatical outburst on behalf of ancient
classic paganism. The literature of this period stood in
direct and avowed antagonism to Christian theolog}^ and
the Christian church, and commended a godless frivolity
and the most undisguised sensual it}'. A grammarian Wil-
gard of Ravenna taught openly that Virgil, Horace, and
Juvenal were better and nobler than Paul, Peter, and John.
The church had still so much authority as to secure his
death as a heretic, but in almost all the towns of Italy he
had sympathisers, and that among the clergy as well as
among laymen. It was only by the influence of the monks
of Clugny, the reformatory ascetic efforts of Romuald
(§ 98, 1) and St. Nilus the Younger, a very famous Greek
recluse of Gaeta, who died in a.d. 1M05, aided by the refor-
matory measures for the purification of the church taken by
the Saxon emperors, that this unclean spirit was gradu-
alty driven out. The famous endeavours of Alfred the
Great and their temporary success were borne to the grave
along with himself. Prom a.d. 950 however, Dunstan's
reformation awakened anesv in England appreciation of a
desire for theological and national culture. The connection
of the imperial house of Otto with Byzantium also aroused
outside of Italy a longing after old classical learning. The
imperial chapel founded by the brother of Otto I., Bruno
the Great (§ 97, 2), became the training school of a High-
German clergy, who Avere there carefully trained as far as
the means at the disposal of that age permitted, not only in
politics, but also in theological and classical studies.
1. The degree to which Classical Stadias were pursued in Germany
during the pciiod of the Saxon imperial house is shown by the works
of the learned nun Eoswitha of Gandersheim, north of Gottingen, who
died about a d. •.•34. The first edition of her works, which comprise six
84 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
dramas on biblical and ecclesiastical themes in the style of Terence, in
prose interspersed with rhymes, also eight legends, a history of Otto I ,
and a history of the founding of her cloister in leonine hexameters, was
issued by the humanist Conrad Celtes, with woodcuts by Diirer in a.d.
1501. — Notker Labeo, president of the cloister school of St. Gall, who
died in a.d. 1022, enriched the old German literature by translations of
the Psalms, of Aristotle's Organon, the MoralUi of Gregory the Great,
and various writings of Boethius. — In England the educational eliforts of
St. Dunstan (§ 97, 4) were powerfully supported by Bishop Ethelwold of
Winchester, who quite in the spirit of Alfred the Great (§ 90, 10) wrought
incessantly with his pupils for the extension and enrichment of the
Anglo-Saxon literature. Of his scholars by far the most famous was
Aelfric, surnamed Grammaticus, who flourished about a.d. 990. He
wrote an Anglo-Saxon Grammar, prepared a collection of homilies for
all the Sundays and festivals and a free translation from sermons of the
Latin Fathers, translated also the Old Testament heptateuch, and wrote
treatises on other portions of Scripture and on biblical questions.^
2. Italy produced during the second half of the century many theo-
logians eminent and important in their day, Atto, bishop of Vercelli,
who died about a.d. 960, distinguished himself by his exegetical com-
pilations on Paul's epistles, and as a homilist and a vigorous opponent
of the oppressors of the church during these rough times. Still more
important was his younger contemporary Ratherius, bishop of Verona,
afterwards of Liege, but repeatedly driven away from both, who died
a.d. 974. A strict and zealous reformer of clerical morals, he insisted
upon careful study of the Bible, and wrought earnestly against the un-
blushing paganism of the Italian scholars of his age as well as against
all kinds of hypocrisy, superstition, and ecclesiastical corruptions. This,
and also his attachment to the jDolitical interests of the German court,
exposed him to much persecution. Among his writings may be named
De contemptu canonum, Meditationes cordis, Apoloijia sxd ipsius, De
discordia inter ipsum et clericos. — In France we meet with Odo of Clugny,
who died in a.d. 942, famed as a hymn writer and homilist, and, in his
CoUatiomim LI. Hi., as a zealous reprover of the corrupt morals of his
age. In England and France, Abbo of Fleury taught toward the end of
1 The Aelfric Society founded in 1842 has edited his Anglo-Saxon
writings and those of others. The Homilies were edited by Thorpe in
2 vols., in 1843 and 184G. " Select Monuments of Doctrine and Worship
of Catholic Church in England before the Norman Conquest, consisting
of Aelfric's Paschal Homily," etc. London, 1875. On Aelfric and Ethel-
wold see an admirable sketch, with full references to and appropriate
quotations from early chronicles, in Hook's *' Lives of the Archbishops
of Canterbury," vol. i., pp. 4,34-455,
§ 101. THE ELEVENTH CENTURY. 85
the century. From England, where he had been induced to go by St.
Dunstau, he returned after some years to his own cloister of Fleury, and
by his academic gifts raised its school to great renown. He wrote on
astronomy, mathematics, philosophy, and history. He also composed
a treatise on dialectics, in which he makes his appearance as the first
and most eminent precursor of the Schoolmen. Chosen abbot of his
monastery and exercising strict discipline over his monks, he suffered a
martyr's death by the hand of a murderer in a.d. 1001. — Gerbert of
Rheims, afterwards Pope Sylvester II. (§ 96, 3, 4), during his active
career lived partly in France, iiartly in Italy. Distinguished both for
classical and Arabic scholarship, he shone in the firmament of this dark
century as it was passing away (f a.d. 1003) like a star of the first
magnitude in theology, mathematics, astronomy, and natural science,
while by the common people he was regarded as a magician. Under him
the school of Kheims reached the summit of its fame.
§ 101. The Eleventh Century,
During the 11th century, with the moral and spiritual
elevation of the church, eager attention was again given to
theological science. It was at first mainly prosecuted in the
monasteries of the Cistercians and among the monks of
C] ugny, but afterwards at the seminaries which arose toward
the end of the century. The dialectic method won more and
more the upper hand in theology, and in the Eucharist con-
troversy between Lanfranc and Berengar, as well as in the
controversy between Anselm and Gaunilo about the existence
of God, and between Anselm and Roscelin about the Trinity,
Dogmatism obtained its first victory over Scepticism.
1. The Most Celebrated Schoolmen of this Century.— (1) Fulbert opens
the list, a pupil of Gerbert, and from a.d. 1007 Bishop of Cliartres.
Before entering on his episcopate he had founded at Chartres a theo-
logical seminar}'. His fame spread over all the West, so that pupils
poured in upon him from every side. — (2) The most important of these
was Berengar of Tours, afterwards a canon and teacher of the cathedral
school of his native city, and then again archdeacon at Angers. He died
in A.D, 1088. The school of Tours rose to great eminence under him.—
(3) Lanfranc, the celebrated opponent of the last-named, was abbot of
the monastery of Bee in Normandy, and from a.d. 1070 Archbishop of
Canterbury (§ 9G, 8). He died in a.d. 1089. He wrote against Berengar
86 THE GrERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. l'29-4:.
Liber de corpore et samjulne Domini. — (4) Bishop Hildebert of Tours, who
died in a.d. 1134, famous as a writer of spiritual songs, was a pupil of
Berengar. But he avoided the sceptical tendencies of his teacher, and,
warned of the danger of dialectic and following the mystical hent of
his mind, he applied himself to the cultivation of a life of faith, so that
St. Bernard praised him as tantam columnam ecclesics. — (5) The monastic
school of Bee, which Lanfranc had rendered celebrated, reached the
summit of its fame under his pupil Anselm of Canterbury, who far
excelled his teacher in genius as well as in importance for theological
science. He was born in a.d. 1033 at Aosta in Italy, educated in the
monastery of Bee, became teacher and abbot there, was raised in a.d.
1093 to the archiepiscopal chair of Canterbury, and died in a.d. 1109. As
a churchman he courageously defended the independence of the church
according to the principles of Hildebrand (§ 96, 12). As a theologian
he may be ranked in respect of acuteness and profoundity, speculative
talent and Christian earnestness, as a second Augustine, and on the
theological positions of that Father he based his own. Though carrying
dialectic even into his own private devotions, there was yet present in him
a vein of religious mysticism. According to him faith is the condition of
true knowledge, Fides prrscedit intellectum ; but it is also with him a sacred
duty to raise faith to knowledge. Credo ut intellifjam. Only he who in
respect of endowment and culture is not capable of this intellectual
activity should content himself with simple Veneratio. His Monologium
contains discussions on the nature of God, his Proslogium proves the
being of God ; his three books, De fide Trinitatis et de incarnatione Verbi,
develop and elaborate the doctrine of the Trinity and Christology ; while
the three dialogues De veritate, De libero arbitrio, and De casu diaboli
treat of the object, and the tract Cur Dens homo 1 treats of the subject, of
soteriology. The most able, profound, and impressive of all his writings
is the last-named, which proves the necessity of the incarnation of God
in Christ for the reconciliation of man with God. It was an epoch-
making treatise in the historical development of the church doctrine
of satisfaction on Pauline foundations.^ Anselm took part in the
controversy of the Greeks by his work De processioue Spiritiiti (§ 67, 4).
He discussed the question of predestination in a moderate Augustinian
form in the book, De concordia prcescioiticc et prcedest. et (/ratice Dei cum,
libero arbitrio. In his Meditationes and Orationes he gives expression
to the ardent piety of his soul, as also in the voluminous collection
(426) of his letters.- — (6) Anselm of Laon, surnamed Scholasticus, was
^ Macpherson on " Anselm's Theory of the Atonement ; its Place in
History" ; in Brit, and For. Evanrj. Review for 1878, pp. 207-232.
- Church, " St. Anselm." London, 1870. Rule, " Life and Times of
St. Anselm." 2 vols. London, 1883.
§ 101. THE ELEVENTH CENTURY. 87
the pupil of Anselm of Cauterbury. From a.d. 1076 be taught with
brilliant success at Paris, and thus laid the first foundation of its uni-
versity. Subsequently he returned to his native city Laon, was made
there archdeacon and Scholasticus, and founded in that place a famous
theological school. He died in a.d. 1117. He composed the Glossa
interlinear^, a short exposition of the Vulgate between the lines, which
with Walafrid's Glossa orcUnaria (§ 90, 4), became the favourite exe-
getical handbook of the Middle Ages. — (7) William of Champeaux, the
proper founder of the University of Paris, had already taught rhetoric
and dialectic for some time with great success in the cathedral school,
when the fame of the theological school of Laon led him to the feet of
Anselm. Li a.d. 1108 he returned to Paris, and had immense crowds
listening to his theological lectures. Chagrined on account of a defeat
in argument at the hand of Abfelard, one of his own pupils, he retired
from public life into the old chapel of St. Victor near Paris, and there
founded a monastery under the same name for canons of the rule of St.
Augustine. He died in a.d, 1121 as Bishop of Chalons. — (8) The abbot
Guibert of Nogent, in the diocese of Laon, who died about a.d. 1124, a
scholar of Anselm at Bee, was a voluminous writer and, with all his own
love of the marvellous, a vigorous opponent of all the grosser absurdities
of relic and saint worship. He Avrote a useful history of the first crusade,
and a work important in its day- entitled, Lihcr quo online sermo fieri
debeat. His great work was one in four books, De piijnoribus Sanctorum,
against the abuses of saint and relic worship, the exhibition of pretended
parts of the Saviour's body, e.g. teeth, pieces of the foreskin, navel cord,
etc., against the translation or distribution of the bodies of saints, against
the fraud of introducing new saints, relics, and legends.
2. Berengar's Eucharist Controversy, A.D. 1050-1079. — Berengar of
Tours elaborated a theory of the eucharist which is directly antago-
nistic to the now generally prevalent theory of Kadbert (§ 91, 3). He
taught that while the elements are changed and Christ's body is really
present, neither the change nor the presence is substantial. The
presence of His body is rather the existence of His power in the ele-
ments, and the change of the bread is the actual manifestation of this
power in the form of bread. The condition however of this power-
presence is not merely the consecration but also the faith of the receiver.
Without this faith the bread is an empty and impotent sign. Such views
were publicly expressed by him and his numerous followers for a long
while without causing any offence. But when he formally stated them
in a letter to his friend Lanfranc of Bee, this churchman became
Berengar's accuser at the Synod of Kome in a.d. 1050. The synod
condemned him unheard. A second synod of the same year held at
Vercelli, before which Berengar was to have appeared but could not
because he ha. I meanwhile been imprisoned in France, in an outburst of
88 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
fanatical fury had the treatise of Eatramnus on the eucharist, wrongly
ascribed to Erigena, torn up and burnt, while Berengar's doctrine was
again condemned. Meanwhile Berengar was by the intervention of
influential friends set at liberty and made the acquaintance of the power-
ful papal legate Hildebrand, who, holding by the simple Scripture doc-
trine that the bread and wine of the sacrament was the body and blood
of Christ, occupied probably a position intermediate between Eadbert's
grossly material and Berengar's dynamic hypothesis. Disinclined to
favour the fanaticism of Berengar's opponents, Hildebrand contented
himself with exacting from him at the Synod of Tours in a.d. 1054 a
solemn declaration that be did not deny the presence of Christ in the
Supper, but regarded the consecrated elements as the body and blood of
Christ. Emboldened by this decision and still always persecuted by his
opponents as a heretic, Berengar undertook in a.d. 1050 a journey to
Eome, in order, as he hoped, by Hildebrand's influence to secure a dis-
tinct papal verdict in his favour. But there he found a powerful opposi-
tion headed by the passionate and pugnacious Cardinal Humbert (§ G7,
3). This party at the Lateran Council in Eome in a.d. 1059, compelled
Berengar, who was really very deficient in strength of character, to cast
his writings into the fire and to swear to a confession composed by Hum-
bert which went beyond even Eadbert's theory in the gross corporeality
of its expressions. But in France he immediately again repudiated this
confession with bitter invectives against Eome, and vindicated anew
against Lanfranc and others his earlier views. The bitterness of the
controversy now reached its height. Hildebrand had meanwhile, in a.d.
1073, himself become pope. He vainly endeavoured to bring the con-
troversy to an end by getting Berengar to accept a confession couched in
moderate terms admitting the real presence of the body and blood in the
vS upper. The opposite party did not shrink from casting suspicion on
the pope's own orthodoxy, and so Hildebrand was obliged, in order to
avoid the loss of his great life work in a mass of minor controversies, to
insist at a second synod in Eome in a.d. 1079 upon an unequivocal and
decided confession of the substantial change of the bread. Berengar was
indiscreet enough to refer to his private conversations with the jjope ;
but now Gregory commanded him at once to acknowledge and abjure his
error. With fear and trembling Berengar obeyed, and the pope dis-
missed him with a safe conduct, distinctly prohibiting all further disputa-
tion. Bowed down under age and calamities, Berengar withdrew to the
island of St. Come, near Tours, where he lived as a solitary penitent in
the practice of strict asceticism, and died at a great age in peace with
the church in a.d. 1088. His chief work is De Coma S. adv. Lanfr. —
Continuation, § 102, 5.
3. Anselm's Controversies.— I. On the basis of his Platonic realism,
Anselm of Canterbury constructed the ontological proof of the being of
§ 102. THE TWELFTH CENTURY. 89
God, that there is given in man's reason the idea of the most perfect
being to whose perfection existence also belongs. When he laid this
proof before the learned world in his Monologiiun and Pioslogium, the
monk Gaimilo of Marmoutiers, wlio was a supporter of Aristotelian
realism, opposed him, and acutely pointed out the defects of this proof
in his Liber pro insipiente. He so named it in reference to a remark of
Anselm, who had said that even the insipiens who, according to Psalm xiv.
1, declares in his heart that there is no God, affords thereby a witness for
the existence of the idea, and consequently also for the existence of God.
Anselm replied in his Apologeticus c. Gaunilonem. And there the con-
troversy ended without any definite result. — II. Of more importance was
Anselm's controversy with Roscelin, the Nominalist, canon of Compi^gne.
He in a purely nominalistic fashion understood the idea of the Godhead
as a mere abstraction, and thought that the three persons of the Godhead
could not be luia res, ovaia, as then they must all at once have been
incarnate in Christ. A synod at Soissons in a.d. 1092 condemned him
as a tritheist. He retracted, but afterwards reiterated his earlier views.
Anselm then, in his tract De fide Trinitatis et de incarnatione Verbi
contra blaspliemias Rucelini, proved that the drift of his argumentation
tended toward tritheism, and vindicated the trinitarian doctrine of the
church. For more than two centuries Nominalism was branded with a
suspicion of heterodoxy, until in the 14th century a reaction set in
(§ 113, 3), which restored it again to honour.
§ 102. The Twelfth Century.
In the 12tli century dialectic and mysticism are seen con-
tending for the mastery in the department of theology. On
the one side stands Abselard, in whom the sceptical dialectic
had its most eminent representative. Over against him
stands St. Bernard as his most resolute opponent. Theo-
logical dialectic afterwards assumed a pre-eminently dogmatic
and ecclesiastical character, entering into close relationship
with mysticism. While this movement was mainly carried
on in France, where the University of Paris attracted teachers
and scholars from all lands, it passed over from thence into
Grermany, where Provost Oerhoch and his brother Arno gave
it their active support in opposition to that destructive sort
of dialectic that was then spreading around them. Although
the combination of dogmatic dialectic and mysticism had for
90 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
a long time no formal recognition, it ultimately secured the
approval of the highest ecclesiastical authorities.
1. The Contest on French Soil :— I. The Dialectic Side of the Gulf.—
Peter Abselard, superior to all liis contemporaries iu acuteness, learning,
dialectic power, and boldfreethiuking, but proud and disputatious, was born
at Palais in Brittany in a.d, 1079. His first teacher in philosophy was
Roscelin. Afterwards he entered the school of William of Champeaux
at Paris, the most celebrated dialectician of his times. Having defeated
his master in a public disputation, he founded a school at Melun near
Paris, where thousands of pupils flocked to him. In order to be nearer
Paris, he moved his school to Corbeil ; then to the very walls of Paris
on Mount St. Genoveva ; and ceased not to overwhelm William with
humiliations, until his old teacher retreated from the field. In order to
secure still more brilliant success, he began to study theology under the
Schoolman Anselm of Laon. But very soon the ambitious scholar
thought himself superior also to this master. Relying upon his dia-
lectical endowments, he took a bet without further preparation to ex-
pound the difficult prophet Ezekiel. He did it indeed to the satisfaction
of scholars, but Anselm refused to allow him to continue his lectures.
Abffilard now returned to Paris, where he gathered around him a great
number of enthusiastic pupils. Canon Fulbert appointed him teacher
of his beautiful and talented niece Heloise. He won her love, and they
were secretly married. She then denied the marriage in order that he
might not be debarred from the highest offices of the church. Persisting
in this denial, her relatives dealt severely with her, and Abffilard had
her placed in the nunnery of Argenteuil. Fulbert in his fury had Abte-
lard seized during the night and emasculated, so that he might be dis-
qualified for ecclesiastical preferment. Overwhelmed with shame, he fled
to the monastery of St. Denys, and there in a.d. 1119 took the monastic
vow. Heloise took the veil at Argenteuil. But even at St. Denys Abte-
lard was obliged by the eager entreaties of former scholars to resume his
lectures. His free and easy treatment of the church doctrine and his
haughty spirit aroused many enemies against him, who at the Synod of
Soissons in a.d. 1121 compelled him before the papal legate to cast into
the fire his treatise De Unitate ct Tr'uiitate diviiia, and had him com-
mitted to a monastic prison. By the intercession of some friends he was
soon again set free, and returned to St. Denys. But when he made the
discovery that Dionysius at Paris was not the Areopagite the persecution
of the monks drove him into a forest near Troyes. There too his scholars
followed him and made him resume his lectures. His colony grew up
under his hands into the famous abbey of the Paraclete. Finding even
there no rest, he made over the abbey of the Paraclete to Heloise, who had
not been able to come to terms with her insubordinate nuns at Argenteuil
§ 102. THE TWELFTH CENTURY. 91
He himself now became abbot of the monastery of St. Gildasius at Ruys
iu Brittany, and, after in vain endeavouring for eight years to restore the
monastic discipline, he again in a.d. 1136 resumed his office of teacher
and lectured at St. Geuoveva near Paris with great success. He wrote an
ethical treatise, " Scito te iiysnm,'' issued a new and enlarged edition of
his Theologia Christiana, now extant as the incomplete Introductio ad
theologiam in three books, and composed a Dialogns inter Philosophum,
Judcciini et Chriatianum, in which the heathen philosophers and poets of
antiquity are ranked almost as high as the prophets and apostles. In
Sic et Non, " Yes and No," a collection of extracts from the Fathers
under the various heads of doctrine contradictory of one another, the
traditional theology was held up to contempt.
2. Abselard maintained, in opposition to the Augustinian-Anselmian
theory, that faith preceded knowledge, that only what we comprehend is
to be believed. He did indeed intend that his dialectic should be used
not for the overthrow but for the establishment of the church doctrine.
He proceeded, however, from doubt as the principle of all knowledge,
regarding all church dogmas as problems which must be proved before
they can be believed : Dubitando enim ad inqmxitionem venimus, inqui-
rendo veritatem percipimus. He thus reduced faith to a mere probability
and measured the content of faith by the rule of subjective reason. This
was most glaring in the case of the trinitarian doctrine, which with him
approached Sabellian modalism. God as omnipotent is to be called
Father, as all wise the Son, as loving and gracious the Spirit ; and so the
incarnation becomes a merely temporal and dynamic immanence of the
Logos in the man Jesus. The significance of the ethical element in
Christianity quite pvershadowed that of the dogmatic. He taught that
all fundamental truths of Christianity had been previously proclaimed
by i)hilosophers and poets of Greece and Eome, who were scarcely less
inspired than the prophets and apostles, the special service of the latter
consisting in giving currency to these truths among the uncultured. He
turns with satisfaction from the theology of the Fathers to that of the
apostles, and from that again to the religion of Jesus, whom he represents
rather as a reformer introducing a pure morality than as a founder of a re-
ligious system. Setting aside Anselm's theory of satisfaction, he regards
the redemption and reconciliation of man as consisting in the awakening
iu sinful man, by means of the infinite love displayed by Christ's teaching
and example, by His life, sufferings and death upon the cross, a respond-
ing love of such fulness and power, that he is thereby freed from the
dominion of sin and brought into the glorious liberty of the children
of God.'— Abffilard's fame and following grew in a wonderful manner
1 On Anselm's and Abailard's theories of atonement, see Ritschl,
"History of Christian Doctrine of Justification and Eeconcilation,"
pp. 22-40. Elin , ls7-'.
92 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
from day to day ; but also powerful oi^ponents dragged his heresies into
light and vigorously combated them. The most important of these were
the Cistercian monk William of Thierry and St. Bernard, who called
attention to the dangerous tendency of his teaching. St. Bernard dealt
personally with the heretic, but when he failed in converting him, he
appeared in a.d. 1141 at the Synod of Sens as his accuser. The synod
condemned as heretical a series of statements culled from his writings by
Bernard. Abtelard appealed to the pope, but even his friends at Eome,
among whom was Card. Guido de Castella, afterwards Pope Coelestine 11.,
could not close their eyes to his manifest heterodoxies. His friendship
for Arnold of Brescia also told against him at Eome (§ 108, 7). Innocent
II. therefore excommunicated Abrelard and his supporters, condemned
his writings to be burnt and himself to be confined in a monastery.
Aba^lard found an asylum with the abbot Peter the Venerable of Clugny,
who not only effected his reconcilation with Bernard, but also, on the
ground of his Apologia s. Confessio fidei, in which he submitted to the
judgment of the church, obtained permission from the pope to pass his
last days in peace at Clugny. During this time he composed his Hist,
cahimitatam Abcelardi, an epistolary autobiography, which, though not
free from vanity and bitterness, is yet worthy to be ranked with Augustine's
" Confessions " for its unreserved self-accusation and for the depth of self-
knowledge which it reveals. He died in a.d. 1142, in the monastery of St.
Mareellus at Chalons, where he had gone in quest of health. He was buried
in the abbey of the Paraclete, where Heloise laid on his coffin the letter of
absolution of Peter of Clugny. Twenty-two years later Heloise herself
was laid in the same quiet resting place. ^
3. — II. The Mystic Side of the Gulf. — Ab^elard's most famous opponent
was St. Bernard of Clairvaux (§ 98, 1), born in a.d. 1091 at Fontaines
near Dijon in Burgundy, died in a.d. 1153, a man of such extraordinary
influence on his generation as the world seldom sees. Venerated as a
miracle worker, gifted with an eloquence that carried everything before
it {doctor melUfluus), he was the protector and reprover of the Vicar of
God, the peacemaker among the jirinces, the avenger of every wrong. His
genuine humility made him refuse all high places. His enthusiasm for
the hierarchy did not hinder him from severely lashing clerical abuses.
It was his word that roused the hearts of men throughout all Europe to
undertake the second crusade, and that won many heretics and schis-
matics back to the bosom of the church. Having his conversation in
heaven, leading a life of study, meditation, prayer, and ecstatic contem-
plation, he had also dominion over the earth, and by counsel, exhortation,
^ Berington, " History of the Lives of Abaslard and Heloise." London,
1787. Ueberweg, " History of Philosophy," vol. i., pp. 38G-397. Lon-
don, 1872.
§ 102. THE TWELFTH CENTUKY. 93
and exercise of discipline exerted a quickening and healtliful influence on
all the relations of life. His theological tendency was in the direction
of contemplative mysticism, with hearty submission to the doctrine of
the church. Like Abselard, bat from the opposite side, he came into con-
flict with the theory of Auselm ; for the ideal of theology with him was
not the development of faith into knowledge by means of thought, but
rather the enlightenment of faith in the way of holiness. Bernard was
not at all an enemy of science, but he rather saw in the dialectical hair-
splitting of Abaelard, which grudged not to cut down the main props of
saving truth for the glorification of its own art, the overthrow of all true
theology and the destruction of all the saving eflticacy of faith. Heart
theology founded on heart piety, nourished and strengthened by prayer,
meditation, spiritual illumination and holiness, was for him the only true
theology. Tantinn Deus cognoscitur, quantum diligitur. Orando facilius
qucun disputando et dignius Deus quceritur et invenitur. The Bible was
his favourite reading, and in the recesses of the forest he spent much
time in prayer and study of the Scriptures. But in ecstasy (excessus)
which consists in withdrawal from sensible phenomena and becoming
temporarily dead to all earthly relations, the soul of the pious Christian
is able to rise into the immediate presence of God, so that " more ange-
lorum'' it reaches a blessed vision and enjoyment of the Divine glory and
that perfect love which loves itself and all creatures only in God. Yet
even he confesses that this highest stage of abstraction was only attained
unto by him occasionally and partially through God's special grace. Ber-
nard's mysticism is most fully set forth in his eighty-six Sermons on
the first two chapters of the Song of Solomon and in the tract Be diligendo
Deo. In his controversy with Abtelard he wrote his Tractatus de errori-
bus Petri Ahcelardi. To the department of dogmatics belongs De gratia
et libera arhitrio ; and to that of history, the biography of his friend Mala-
chias (§ 149, 5). The most important of his works is De Consideratione,
in 5 bks, , in which with the affection of a friend, the earnestness of a
teacher, and the authority of a prophet, he sets before Pope Eugenius IH.
the duties and dangers of his high position. He was also one of the
most brilliant hymn writers of the Middle Ages. Alexander HI. canonized
him in a.d. 1173, and Pius VHI. in a.d. 1830 enrolled him among the
doctores ecclesice (§ 47, 22 c). — Soon after the controversy with Abtelard
had been brought to a close by the condemnation of the church, Bernard
was again called upon to resist the pretensions of dialectic. Gilbert de
la Porree (Porretauus), teacher of theology at Paris, who became Bishop
of Poitiers in a.d. 1142 and died in a.d. 1154, in his commentary on the
theological writings of Boethius (§ 47, 23) ascribed reality to the uni-
versal term " God" in such a way that instead of a Trinity we seemed
to have a Quaternity. At the Synod of Eheims, a.d. 1148, under the
presidency of Pope Eugenius III., Bernard appeared as accuser of Porre-
94 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
tanus. Gilljei't's doctrine was condemned, but he himself ^Yas left
unmolested.*
4. III. Bridging the Gulf from the Side of Mysticism.— At the school of
the monastery of St. Victor in Paris, founded by William of Champeaux
after his defeat at the hands of Abrelard, an attempt was made during the
first half of the 12th century to combine mysticism and dialectic in the
treatment of theology. The peaceable heads of this school would indeed
have nothing to do with the speculations of Abaslard and his followers
which tended to overthrow the mysteries of the faith. But the mystics
of St. Victor made an impoitant concession to the dialecticians by en-
tering with as much energy upon the scientific study and construction
of dogmatics as they did ujjon the devout examination of Scripture and
mystical theology. They exhibited a speculative j)ower and a profundity
of thought that won the hearty admiration of the subtlest of the dialec-
ticians. By far the most celebrated of this school was Hugo of St. Victor.
Descended from the family of the Count of Halberstadt, born in a.d.
1097, nearly related to St. Bernard, honoured by his contemporaries as
Altei- Aupustinifi or Lriufiia Aufjustini, Hugo was one of the most pro-
found thinkers of the Middle Ages. Having enjoyed a remarkably com-
plete course of training, he was enthusiastically devoted to the pursuit
of science, and, endowed with rich and deep spirituality, he exerted a
most healthful and powerful infiuence upon his own and succeeding ages,
although church and science had to mourn their loss by his early death
ill A.D. 1141. In his Eruditio clidascalica we have in 8 bks. an ency-
clopaedic sketch of all human knowledge as a preparation to the study of
theology, and in other 3 bks. an introduction to the Bible and church
history.2 His Siuiima sententiurnm is an exposition of dogmatics on
patristic lines, an ecclesiastical counterpart of Abffilard's Sic et Non.
The ripest and most influential of all his works, and the most inde-
pendent, is his Dp sacramentis cJirist. fidei, in 2 bks., in which he treats
of the whole contents of dogmatics from the point of view of the Sacra-
ments (§ 104, 2). His exegetical works are less important and less
original. His mysticism is set forth ex 2>i'ofesso in his Soliloquium de arrha
(uiiiiice and in the series of three tracts, De area morali, De area mystica,
and De vanitate. miunli. He makes Noah's ark the symbol of the church as
well as of the individual soul which journeys over the billows of the world
to God, and, by the successive stages of leetio, cofjitatio, meditatio, uratio,
and operatio reaches to covtcmplatio or the vision of God. — Hugo's pupil,
and from a.d. 1162 the prior of his convent, was the Scotchman Richard
St. Victor, who died in a.d. 1173. With less of the dialectic faculty than
1 Neander, " St. Bernard and his Times." London, 1843. Morison,
' Life and Times of St. Bernard." London, 1803.
2 Riibiper " Theological Encyclopajdia," vol, i., p. 27. Edin. 1884.
§ 102. THE TWELFTH CENTURY. 95
Lis master— though this too is shown in his 6 bks. Be trinitatc., a
scholastic exposition of the Cogiiitio or Fides quce credltur — he mainly
devoted his energies to the development on the mystico-contemplative
side of the " Affectus " or Fides qua creditur, which aims at the vision
and enjoyment of God. This he represents as reached by the three
stages of contemplation, distinguished as mentis dilatatio, sublevatio, and
alienatio. Among his mystical tracts, mostly mystical expositions of
Scripture passages, the most important are, De praparationc animce ad
contemplationem, s. de xii. patriarchis, and the 4 bks. De f/ratia con-
tem2)lationis s. de area mystica. These are also known as Benjamin minor
and B. major. In Eichard there appears the first indications of a mis-
understanding with the dialecticians which, among the late Victorines,
and especially in the case of Walter of St. Victor, took the form of
vehement hostility.
5. IV. Bridging the Gulf from the Side of Dialectics. — After Abie-
lard's condemnation theological dialectics came more and more to be
associated with the church doctrine and to approach more or less nearly
to a friendly alliance with mysticism. Hugo's writings did much to
bring this about. The following are the most important Schoolmen of
this tendency. (1) The Englishman Robert Pulleyn, teacher at Oxford
and Paris, afterwards cardinal and papal chancellor at Rome, who died
about A.D. 1150. His chief work is Sentcntiarum LI, VIII. Though
very famous in its day, it was soon cast into the shade by the Lombard's
work. — (2) Petrus Lombardus, born at Novara in Lombardy, a scholar of
Abaslard, but powerfully infiaenced by St. Bernard and Hugo St. Victor,
was Bishop of Paris from a.d. 1159 till his death in a. d. -1161:. He pub-
lished a dogmatic treatise under the title of Sententiarum LI. IV ; of
which Bk. 1 treated of God, Bk. 2 of Creatures, Bk. 3 of Redemption,
Bk. 4 of the Sacraments and the Last Things. For centuries this was
the textbook in theological seminaries and won for its author the desig-
nation of AJagister Sententiarum. He himself compared this gift laid
on the altar of the church to the widow's mite, but the book attained a
place of supreme importance in mediaeval theology, had innumerable
commentaries written on it and was officially authorized as the theo-
logical textbook by the Lateran Council of a.d. 1215. It is indeed a well
arranged collection of the doctrinal deliverances of the Fathers, in which
apparent contradictions are dialectically resolved, with great skill, and
wrought up together into an articulate system, but from want of indepen-
dence and occasional indecision or withholding of any definite opinion,
it falls behind Hugo's Summa and Robert's Sentences. It had this advan-
tage, however, that it gave freer scope to scholars and teachers, and so
was more stimulating as a textbook for academic use. The Lombard's
works include a commentary on the Psalms and Catena; on the Pauline
Epistles. — (3) The Frenchman Petpr of Poitiers {Piclaviensis), one of
96 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
the ablest followers of the Lombard, was chancellor of the University of
Paris toward the end of the century. He wrote 5 bks. of Sentences or
Distinctions, which in form and matter are closely modelled on the
work of his master. — (4) The most gifted of all the Summists of the 12th
century was the German Alanus ab Insnlis, born at Lille or Ryssel, lat.
liisulce. After teaching long at Paris, he entered the Cistercian order,
and died at an advanced age at Clairvaux in a.d. 1203. A man of exten-
sive erudition and a voluminous writer, he was called Doctor universalis.
He wrote an allegorical poem Anticlaudlanus, which describes how reason
and faith in union with all the virtues restore human nature to perfection.
His RegulcB de s. theologia give a short outline of theology and morals in
125 paradoxical sentences which are tersely expounded. A short but able
summary of the Christian faith is given in the 5 bks. De arte catholiccs
iidei. This work is characterized by the use of a mathematical style of
demonstration, like that of the later school of Wolf, and an avoidance of
references to patristic authorities, which would have little weight with
Mohammedans and heretics. He is thus rather an opponent than a
representative of dialectic scholasticism. The Summa quadripartita c.
Hcereticos siii temporis ascribed to him was written by another Alanus.
6. The Controversy on German Soil. — The provost Gerhoch and his
brother, the dean Arno of Reichersberg in Bavaria, were representatives of
the school of St. Victor as mediators between dialectics and mysticism.
In A.D. 1150 Gerhoch addressed a memorial to Eugenius III., De corrupto
ecclesicB statu, and afterwards he published De investigatione Antichristi.
He found the antichrist in the papal schisms of his times, in the ambi-
tion and covetousness of popes, in the corruptibility of the curia, in the
manifold corruptions of the church, and especially in the spread of a dia-
lectic destructive of all the mysteries of the faith. The controversy in
which both of these brothers took most interest was that occasioned by
the revival of Adoptionism in consequence of the teaching of French
dialecticians, especially Abaslard and Gilbert. It led to the formulating
of the Christological doctrine in such a form as prepared the way for
the later Lutheran theories of the Communicatio idiomatum and the
Ubiquitas corporis Christi (§ 141, 9). — In South Germany, conspicuously
in the schools of Bamberg, Freisingen, and Salzburg, the dialectic of
Abaelard, Gilbert, and the Lombard was predominant. Its chief repre-
sentatives were Folmar of Triefenstein in Franconia and Bishop Eberhard
of Bamberg, The controversy arose over the doctrine of the eucharist.
Folmar had maintained like Berengar that not the actually glorified body
of Christ is present in the sacrament, but only the spiritual substance of
His flesh and blood, without muscles, sinews and bones. Against this
gross Capernaitic view (John vi. 52, 59) Gerhoch maintained that the
eucharistic body is the very resurrection body of Cln-ist, the substance of
which is a glorified corporeity without fiesh and blood in a carnal sense
§ 102. THE TWELFTH CENTUEY. 97
without sinews and bones. The bishop of Bamberg took offence at his
friend's bold rejection of the doctrine approved by the church, and so
Folmar modified his position to the extent of admitting that there was
on the altar not only the true, but also the whole body in the perfection
of its human substance, under the form of bread and wine. But never-
theless both he and Abaelard adhered to their radical error, a dialectical
dismemberment of the two natures of Christ, according to which the
divinity and humanity, the Son of God and the Son of man, were two
strictly separate existences. Christ, they taught, is according to His
humanity Son of God in no other way than a pious man is, i.e. by
adoption; but according to His Divine nature He is like the Father
omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient. In respect of His human
nature it must still be said by Him, " My Father is greater than I." He
dwells, however, bodily in heaven, and is shut in by and confined to it.
Only His Divine nature can claim Latria or adoratio, worship. Only
Dulia, cultus, reverence, such as is due to saints, images, and relics,
should be given to His body and blood upon the altar. Gerhoch's
doctrine of the Supper, on the other hand, is summed up in the pro-
position : He who receives the flesh of the Logos {Caro Verhi) receives
also therewith the Logos in His flesh {Verbwn carnis). Folmar and
Eberhard denounced this as Eutychian heresy. A conference at Bam-
berg in A.D. 1158, where Gerhoch stood alone as representative of his
views, ended by his opponents declaring that he had been convicted of
heresy. In a.d. 1162 a Council at Friesach in Carinthia, under the
presidency of Archbishop Eberhard of Salzburg, reached the same con-
elusion.
7. Theologians of a Pre-eminently Bibhcal and Ecclesiastico- Practical Ten-
dency.—(1) Alger of Liege, teacher of the cathedral school there, was one
of the most important German theologians in the beginning of the 12th
century. He resigned his appointment in a.d. 1121, to spend his last
years in the monastery of Clugny, in order to enjoy the company and
friendship of its abbot, Peter the Venerable ; and there he died about
A.D. 1130. The school of Liege, in which he had himself been trained up
in the high church Cluniac doctrine there prevalent, flourished greatly
during his rule of twenty years. His chief works are De Sacramentis
corjyoris et sanguiiiis Domini in 3 bks., distinguished by acuteness and
lucidity, and a controversial tract on the Hues of Eadbert against
Berengar's doctrine condemned by the church. In his De misericordia et
jxistitia he treats of church discipline with circumspection, clearness, and
decision. — (2) Rupert of Deutz, more than any mediasval scholar before
or after, created an enthusiasm for the study of Scripture as the people's
book for all times, the field in which the precious treasure is hid, to
be found by any one whose eyes are made sharp by faith. He was a
contemporary and fellow countryman of Alger, and died in a.d. 1135.
7
98 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
Though he refers to the Hebrew and Greek texts, he cares less for the
literal than for the speculative-dogmatic and mystical sense discovered
by allegorical exegesis. In his principal work, De trinitate et operibus
ejus, he sets forth in 3 bks. the creation work of the Father, in 30
bks. the revealing and redeeming work of the Son, from the fall to the
death of Christ, and in the remaining 9 books the sanctifying work
of the Holy Spirit, from the resurrection of Christ to the general resur-
rection. He maintains in opposition to Anselm (who was afterwards
followed by Thomas Aquinas) that Christ would have become incarnate
even if men had not sinned (a view which appears in Ireuaus, and
afterwards in Alexander Hales, Duns Scotus, John Wessel, and others).
In regard to the Lord's Supper he maintained the doctrine of consub-
stantiation, and he taught like pope Gelasius (§ 58, 2) that the relation of
the heavenly and earthly in the eucharist is quite analogous to that of
the two natures in Christ.^— (3) The Benedictine Hervseus in the cloister
of Bourg-Dieu, who died about a.d. 1150, was distinguished for deep
piety and zealous study of Scripture and the fathers. He wrote commen-
taries on Isaiah and on the Pauline Epistles, the latter of which was
ascribed to Anselm and so published among his works.
8. — (4) John of Salisbury, Johannes Parvus Sarisheriensis, was a
theologian of a thoroughly practical tendency, though a diligent student
of Abffilard and an able classical scholar, specially familiar with the
writings of Cicero. As the trusted friend of Hadrian IV. he was often
sent from England on embassies to the pope. In Becket's struggle
against the encroachments of the Crown upon the rights of the church
(§ 96, 16) he stood by the primate's side as his faithful counsellor and
fellow soldier, wrote an account of his life and martyrdom, and laboured
diligently to secure his canonization. He was made Bishop of Chartres
in A.D. 1176, and died there in a.d. 1180. His works, distinguished by
singularly wide reading and a pleasing style, are pre-eminently practical.
In his Policraticits s. de nugis Curialium et vestigiis Philosophorum he
combats the niigce of the hangers on at court with theological and philo-
sophical weapons in a well balanced system of ecclesiastico-political and
philosophico-theological ethics. His Metalogicus in 4 bks. is a pole-
mic against the prostitution of science by the empty formalism of the
schoolmen. His 329 Epistles are of immense importance for the literary
and scientific history of his times.— (5) Walter of St. Victor, Eichard's suc-
cessor as prior of that monastery, makes his appearance about a.d. 1130,
as the author of a vigorous polemic against dialectic scholasticism, in
which he combats especially Christological heresies and spares the ido-
■ Westcott, "Epistles of St. John," Loudon, 1883. Dissertation on
" The Gospel of Creation," pp. 277-280. Bruce, " Humiliation of Christ."
Ed in, 1876, pp. 354 ff., 487 f.
§ 103. THE THIRTEENTH CENTUEY. 99
lized Lombard just as little as the condemned Abaslard.^ He combats
with special eagerness a new heresy springing from Abaslard and developed
by the Lombard which he styles " Nihilism," because by denying the
independence of the human nature of Christ it teaches that Christ in so
far as He is man is not an Aliquid, i.e. an individual. — (6) Innocent III.
is deserving of a place here both on account of his rich theological learning
and on account of the earnestness and depth of the moral and religious
view of life which he presents in his writings. The most celebrated of
these are Be contemtu mundi and 6 bks. Hysteria evang. legis ac sacra-
menti Eucharistice, and during his pontificate, his epistles and sermons.
9. Humanist Philosophers.— While Abalard was striving to prove
Christianity the religion of reason, and for this was condemned by the
church, his contemporary Bernard Sylvester, teacher of the school of
Chartres, a famous nursery of classical studies, was seeking to shake
himself free of any reference to theology and the church. Satisfied with
Platonism as a genuinely spiritual religion, and feeling therefore no per-
sonal need of the church and its consolations, he carefully avoided any
allusion to its dogmas, and so remained in high repute as a teacher and
writer. His treatise, Be mundi universitates. Megacosmus et Microcosrnus,
in dialogue form discussing in a dilettante, philosophizing style natural
phenomena, half poetry, half prose, was highly popular in its day. It
fared very differently with his accomplished and like-minded scholar
William of Conches. The vehemence with which he declared himself a
Catholic Christian and not a heathen Academic aroused suspicion.
Though in his Philosophia mundi, sometimes erroneously attributed to
Honorius of Autun, he studiously sought to avoid any contradiction
of the biblical and ecclesiastical theory of the world, he could not help
in his discussion of the origin of man characterizing the literal inter-
pretation of the Scripture history of creation as peasant faith. The book
fell into the hands of the abbot William of Thierry, who accused its
author to St. Bernard. The opposition soon attained to such dimensions
that he was obliged to publish a formal recantation and in a new edition
to remove everything objectionable.
§ 103. The Thirteenth Century.
Scholasticism took a new departure in tlie beginning ot
the 13th century, and by the middle of the century it
reached its climax. Material for its development was found
^ This work is entitled Contra quatuor labyrinthos Francice, Sen contra
novas hcereses, quas Ahcelardus, Loinbardus, Petrus Pictaviensis,et Gilber-
tus Porretanus lihris sententiarum acuunt limant, rohorant LI. IV.
100 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
in the works of Aristotle and his Moslem expositors, and
this Avas skilfully used by highly gifted members of the
Franciscan and Dominican orders so that all opposition to
the scholastic philosophy was successfully overborne. The
Franciscans Alexander of Hales and Bonaventura stand side
by side with the brilliant Dominican teachers Albert the
Great and Thomas Aquinas. As reformers of the scholastic
philosophy from different points of view we meet with
Kaimund Lull and Roger Bacon. There were also numerous
representatives of this simple biblical and practical tendency
devoted to Scripture study and the pursuit of the Christian
life ; and during this period we find the first developments
of German mysticism properly so called.
1. The Writings of Aristotle and his Arabic Interpreters. — Till the end
of the 12th century Aristotle was known in the Christian West only
through Porphyry and Boethius. This philosophy, however, from the 9th
century was diligently studied in Arabic translations of the original text
(§ 72) by Moslem scholars of Badgad and Cordova, who wrote expositions
and made original contributions to science. The most distinguished of
these, besides the logicians Alldndi in the 9th, and Alfarabi in the 10th
century, were the supernaturalistic Avicenna of Bokhara, fA.D. 1037
Algazel of Bagdad, inclined to mysticism or sufism, fA.D. 1111, and
the pantheistic-naturalistic Averroes of Cordova, fA.D. 1198. The Moors
and Spanish Jews were also devoted students of the peripatetic philo-
sophy. The most famous of these was Maimonides, f a.d. 1204, who
wrote the rationalistic work 3Iore Nebochim. On the decay of Arabic
philosophy in Spain, Spanish Jews introduced the study of Aristotle into
France. Dissatisfied with Latin translations from the Arabic, they began
in A.D, 1220 to make translations directly from the Greek. Suspicions
were now aroused against the new gospel of philosophy. At a Synod
in Paris a.d. 1209 (§ 108, 4) the physical writings of Aristotle were
condemned and lecturing on them forbidden. This prohibition was
renewed in a.d. 1215 by the papal legate and the metaphysics included.
But no prohibition of the church could arrest the scientific ardour of
that age. In a.d. 1231 the definitive prohibition was reduced to a
measure determining the time to be devoted to such studies, and in
A.D. 1254 we find the university prescribing the number of hours dur-
ing which Aristotle's physics and metaphysics should be taught. Some
decades later the church itself declared that no one should obtain the
§ 103. THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY. 101
degree of master who was not familiar with Aristotle, " thz precursor
of Christ in natural things a? John Baptist was in the things of grace.'"
This change was brought about by the belief that not Aristotle but
Erigena was the author of all the pantheistic heresies of the age (§ § 90,
7 ; 108, 4), and also by the need felt by the Franciscans and Domini-
cans for using Aristotelian methods of proof in defence of the doctrine
of the church. Philosophy, however, was now regarded by all theolo-
gians as only the handmaid of theology. Even in the 11th century
Petrus Damiani had indicated the mutual relation of the sciences thus :
Debet velut ancilla domince quodam famulatus obseqido subservire, ne si
prcecedit, oherret.^
2. On account of their characteristic tendencies Avicenna was most
popular with the Schoolmen and after him Algazel, while Averroes, though
carefully studied and secretly followed by some, was generally regarded
with suspicion and aversion. Among his secret admirers was Simon of
Tournay, about a.d. 1200, who boasted of being able with equal ease to
prove the falseness and the truth of the church doctrines, and declared
that Moses, Christ, and Mohammed were the three greatest deceivers the
world had ever seen. The Parisian scholars ascribed to Averroes the
Theory of a twofold Truth. A positive religion was required to meet the
religious needs of the multitude, but the philosopher might reach and
maintain the truth independently of any revealed religion. In the
Christian West he put this doctrine in a less offensive form by saying
that one and the same affirmation might be theologically true and
philosophically false, and vice versa. Behind this, philosophical scepticism
as well as theological unbelief sought shelter. Its chief opponents were
Thomas Aquinas and Raimund Lull, while at a later time Duns Scotus
and the Scotists were inclined more or less to favour it.
3. The Appearance of the Mendicant Orders. — The Dominican and
Franciscan orders competed with one another in a show of zeal for the
maintenance of the orthodox doctrine, and each endeavoured to secure
the theological chairs in the University of Paris, the principal seat of
learning in those days. They were \dgorously opposed by the university
corporation, and especially by the Parisian doctor William of St. Amour,
who characterized them in his tract De periculis novissimorum temporum
of A.D. 1255 as the precursors of antichrist. But he was answered by
learned members of the orders, Albert the Great, Aquinas, and Bonaven-
tura, and finally, in a.d. 1257, all opposition on the part of the university
1 Ueberweg, " History of Philosophy," London, 1872. Vol. i., pp. 405-
428. Ginsburg, " The Kabbalah, its doctrines, development, and litera-
ture," London, 1865. Palmer, " Oriental Mysticism," a treatise on the
Suffistic and Unitarian Theosophy of the Persians, compiled from native
sources, London, 1867.
102 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
was checked by papal authority and royal command. The Augustinians,
too, won a seat in the University of Paris in a.d. 1261. — The learned
monks gave themselves with enthusiasm to the new science and applied
all their scientific gains to polemical and apolegetical purposes. They
diligently conserved all that the earlier Fathers down to Gregory the
Great had written in exposition of the doctrine and all that the later
Fathers down to Hugo St. Victor and Peter the Lombard had written
in its defence. But what had been simply expressed before was now
arranged -under elaborate scientific categories. The Summists of the
previous century supplied abundant material for the work. Their
Siimmcc sententiarum, especially that of the Lombard, became the theme
of innumerable commentaries, but besides these, comprehensive original
works were written. These were no longer to be described as Summce
sententiarum, but assumed with right the title of Summce theologice or
tlieologic(e.
4. Distinguished Franciscan Schoolmen.— Alexander of Hales, trained in
the English cloister of Hales, doctor irrcfrafiabilis, was the most famous
teacher of theology in Paris, where in a.d. 1222 he entered the Seraphic
Order. He died in a.d. 1245. As the first church theologian who,
without the excessive hair-splitting of later scholastics, applied the forms
of the peripatetic philosophy to the scientific elaboration of the
doctrinal system of the church, he was honoured by his grateful order
with the title of Monarcha theologorum, and is still regarded as the first
scholastic in the strict sense of the word. His Summa theologica, pub-
lished at Nuremberg in a.d. 1482 in 4 folio vols, was accepted by his
successors as the model of scientific method and arrangement. The
first two vols, treat of God and His Work, the Creature ; the third, of the
Redeemer and His Work ; the fourth, of the Sacraments of the 0. and
N.T. The conclusion, which is not extant, treated of Pramia salutis
per futuram gloriam. Each of these divisions was subdivided into a great
number of Qmestiones, these again into Membra, and these often into
ArtlcuU. The question at the head of the section was followed by
several answers affirmative and negative, some of which were entitled
Aactoritates (quotations from Scripture, the Fathers, and the teachers of
the church), some Rationes (dictates of the Greek, Arabian, and Jewish
philosophers), and finally, his own conclusion. Among the authorities
of later times, Hugo's dogmatic works (§ 102, 4) occupy with him the
highest place, but he seems to have had no appreciation of his mystical
speculations. — His most celebrated discij^le John Fidanza, better known
as Bonaventura, had a strong tendency to mysticism. Born at Bagnarea
in the district of Florence in a.d. 1221, he became teacher of theology in
Paris in a.d. 1253, general of his order in a.d. 1257, was made Cardinal-
bishop of Ostia by Gregory X. in a.d. 1273, and in the following year
was a member of the Lyons Council, at which the question of the
§ 103. THE THIETEENTH CENTUEY. lOS
reunion of the churches was discussed (§ 67, 4), He took an active
part in the proceedings of that council, but died before its close in a.d.
1274. His aged teacher Alexander had named him a Verus Israelita,
in quo Adam non peccasse videtur. Later Franciscans regarded him as
the noblest embodiment of the idea of the Seraphic Order next to its
founder, and celebrated the angeUc purity of his personality by the
title doctor seraphicus. Sixtus IV. canonized him in a.d. 1482, and
Sixtus v., edited his works in 8 fol. vols, in a.d. 1588, and gave him in
A.D. 1587 the sixth place in the rank of Doctores ecclesice as the greatest
church teacher of the West. Like Hugo, he combined the mystical and
doctrinal sides of theology, but Hke Eichard St. Victor inclined more to
the mystical. His greatest dogmatic work is his commentary in 2 vols.
fol. on the Lombard. His able treatise, De reductione artium ad
theologiam, shows how theology holds the highest place among all the
sciences. In his Breviloquium he seeks briefly but with great expendi-
ture of learning to prove that the church doctrine is in accordance with
the teachings of reason. In the Centiloquium, consisting of 100 sections,
he treats summarily of the doctrines of Sin, Grace, and Salvation. In
the Pharetra he gives a collection of the chief authorities for the
conclusions reached in the two previously named works. The most
celebrated of his mystical treatises are the DiceUc salutis, describing the
nine days' journey (diatce) in which the soul passes from the abyss of
sin to the blessedness of heaven, and the Itinerarium mentis in Deum,
in which he describes as a threefold way to the knowledge of God a
theologia symholica { = extra nos), propria {^ intra nos) and mystica
{ = supra nos), the last and highest of which alone leads to the beatific
vision of God.
5. Distmguished Dominican Schoolmen.— (1) Albert the Great, the oldest ^
son of a knight of Bollstadt, born in a.d. 1193, at Laningen in Swabia,
sent in a.d. 1212, because too weak for a military career, to the Univer-
sity of Padua, where he devoted himself for ten years to the diligent
study of Aristotle, entered then the Dominican order, and at Bologna
pursued with equal diligence the study of theology in a six years' course.
He afterwards taught the regular curriculum of the liberal arts at Cologne
and in the cloisters of his order in other German cities ; and after taking
his doctor's degree at Paris, he taught theology at Cologne with such
success that the Cologne school, owing to the crowds attracted to his
lectures, grew to the dimensions of a university. In a.d. 1254 he became
provincial of his order in Germany, was compelled in a.d. 1260 by papal
command to accept the bishopric of Eegensburg, but returned to Cologne
in A.D. 1262 to resume teaching, and died there in a.d. 1280, in his 87th
year. His amazing acquirements in philosophical, theological, cabaUstic,
and natural science won for him the surname of the Great, and the title
of doctor universalis. Since the time of Aristotle and Theophrastus there
104 THE GERMANO-iaOMANlC CHUHCtt TO A.D. 1294.
had been no investigator in natural science like him. Traces of mysticism
may be discovered in his treatise Paradisus animce, and in his commen-
tary on the Areopagite. Indeed from his school proceeded the greatest
master of speculative mysticism (§ 114, 1). His chief work in natural
science is the Summa de Creaturis, the fantastic and superstitious charac-
ter of which may be seen from the titles of its several books : De virtuti-
bm herharum, lapidum, et auimalium, De mirabilibus mundi, and De secretis
mulierum. He wrote three books of commentaries on the Lombard, and
two books of an independent system of dogmatics, the Summa tJieo-
logica. The latter treatise, which closely follows the work of Alexander
of Hales, is incomplete.^
6. The greatest and most influential of all the Schoolmen was the
Doctor angelicus, Thomas Aquinas. Born in a.d. 1227, son of a count
of Aquino, at his father's castle of Roccasicca, in Calabria, he entered
against his parents' will as a novice into the Dominican monastery at
Naples. Eemoved for safety to France, he was followed by his brothers
and taken back, but two years later he effected his escape with the aid of
the order, and was placed under Albert at Cologne. Afterwards he taught
for two years at Cologne, and was then sent to win his doctor's degree at
Paris in a.d. 1252. There he began along with his intimate friend Bona-
ventura his brilliant career. It was not until a.d. 1257, after the oppo-
sition of the university to the mendicant orders had been overcome, that
the two friends obtained the degree of doctor. Urban IV. recalled him
to Italy in a.d. 1261, where he taught successively in Eome, Bologna,
Pisa, and Naples. Ordered by Gregory to take part in the discussions
on union at the Lyons Council, he died suddenly in a.d. 1274, soon after
his return to Naples, probably from poison at the hand of his country-
man Charles of Anjou, in order that he might not appear at the council
to accuse him of tyranny. John XXII. canonized him in a.d. 1323, and
Pius V. gave him the fifth place among the Latin doctores ecclesicc. — •
Thomas was probably the most profound thinker of the century, and
was at the same time admired as a popular preacher. He had an intense
veneration for Augustine, an enthusiastic appreciation of the church
doctrine and the philosophy which are approved and enjoined by this great
Father. He had also a vein of genuine mysticism, and was distinguished
for warm and deep piety. He was the first to give the papal hierarchical
system of Gregory and Innocent a regular place in dogmatics. His
Sumilia 2)hilosophi(e contra Gentiles, is a Christian philosophy of religion,
of which the first three books treat of those religious truths which human
reason of itself may recognise, while the fourth book treats of those
which, because transcending reason though not contrary to it, i.e. doc-
1 Sighart, " Albert the Great : his Life and Scholastic Labours.'
Translated from the French by T. A. Dixon. London, 1870.
§ 103. THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY. lO
ti'ines of the incarnation and the trinity, can be known only by Divine
revelation. He wrote two books of commentaries on the Lombard. By
far the most important work of the Middle Ages is his Summa theologica,
in three vols. , in which he gives ample space to ethical questions. His
polemic against the Greeks is found in the section in which he defines
and proves the primacy of the pope, basing his arguments on ancient
and modern fictions and forgeries (§ 96, 23), which he, ignorant of Greek
and deriving his knowledge of antiquity wholly from Gratian's decree,
accepted bona fide as genuine. His chief exegetical work is the Catena
aurea on the Gospels and Pauline Epistles, translated into English by
Dr. Pusey, in 8 vols., Oxf., 1841, ff. In commenting on Aristotle Thomas,
unlike Albert, neglected the treatises on natural science in favour of those
on politics. — The Dominican order, proud of having in it the greatest
philosopher and theologian of the age, made the doctrine of Thomas in
respect of form and matter the authorized standard among all its mem-
bers (§ 113, 2), and branded every departm-e from it as a betrayal not
only of the order but also of the church and Christianity. The other
monkish orders, too, especially the Augustinians, Cistercians, and Car-
melites, recognised the authority of the Angelical doctor. Only the
Franciscans, moved by envy and jealousy, ignored him and kept to Alex-
ander and Bonaventura, until the close of the century, when, in Duns
Scotus (^ 113, 1), they obtained a brilliant teacher within their own
ranks, whom they proudly thought would prove a fair rival in fame to
the great Dominican teacher. ^
7. Reformers of the Scholastic Method. — Eaimund Lull, a Catalonian
nobleman of Majorca, born in a.d. 1234, roused from a worldly life by
visions, gave himself to fight for Christ against the infidels with the
weapons of the Spirit. Learning Arabic from a Saracen slave, he passed
through a full course of scholastic training in theology and entered the
Franciscan order. Constrained in the prosecution of his mission to
seek a simpler method of proof than that afforded by scholasticism, he
succeeded by the help of visions in discovering one by which as he and
his followers, the Lullists,, thought, the deepest truths of all human
sciences could be made plain to the untutored human reason. He called
it the Ars Magna, and devoted his whole life to its elaboration in theory
and practice. Representing fundamental ideas and their relations to
the objects of thought by letters and figures, he drew conclusions from
' Hampden, "Life of Thomas Aquinas : a Dissertation of the Scholastic
Philosophy of the Middle Ages." London, 1848. Cicognani, " Life of
Thomas Aquinas." London, 1882. Townsend, " Great Schoolmen of
the Middle Ages." London, 1882. Vaughan, " Life and Labours of St.
Thomas of Aquino." 2 vols. London, 1870.
106 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
their various combinations. In his missionary travels in North Africa
(§ 93, 16) he used his art in his disputations with the Saracen scholars,
and died in a.d. 1315 in consequence of ill treatment received there, in
his 81st year. Of his writings in Latin, Catalonian, and Arabic,
numbering it is said more than a thousand, 282 were known in a.d.
1721 to Salzinger of Mainz, but only -45 were included in his edition of
the collected works.
8. Eoger Bacon, an EngUsh monk, contemporary with Lull, worked
out his reform in a sounder manner by going back to the original
sources and thus obtaining deliverance from the accumulated errors of
later times. He appealed on matters of natural science not to corrupt
translations but to the original works of Aristotle, and on matters of
theology, not to the Lombard but to the Greek New Testament. He
prosecuted his studies laboriously in mathematics and the. Greek
language. Roger was called by his friends Doctor mlrabilis or profun-
dus. He was a prodigy of learning for his age, more in the department
of physics than in those of philosophy and theology. He was regarded,
however, by his own order as a heretic, and imprisoned as a trafficker
in the black arts. Born in a.d. 1214 at Ilchester, he took his degree of
doctor of theology at Paris, entered the Franciscan order, and became a
resident at Oxford. Besides diligent study of languages, which secured
him perfect command of Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic, he busied
himself with researches and experiments in physics (especially optics),
chemistry, and astronomy. He made several important discoveries,
e.g. the principle of refraction, magnifying glasses, the defects of the
calendar, etc., while he also succeeded in making a combustible material
which may be regarded as the precursor of gunpowder. He main-
tained the possibility of ships and land vehicles being propelled most
rapidly without sails, and without the labour of men or animals. Yet
he was a child of his age, and believed in the philosopher's stone, in
astrology, and alchemy. Thoroughly convinced of the defects of
scholasticism, he spoke of Albert the Great and Aquinas as boys who
taught before they learnt, and especially reproached them with their
ignorance of Greek. With an amount of brag that smacks of the
empiric he professed to be able to teach Hebrew in three days and Greek
in the same time, and to give a full course of geometry in seven days.
With fearless severity he lashed the corruptions of the clergy and the
monks. Only one among his companions seems to have regarded Roger,
notwithstanding all his faults, as a truly great man. That was Clement
IV. who, as papal legate in England, had made his acquaintance, and
as pope liberated him from prison. To him Roger dedicated his
Opus majus s. de emendandis scieutiis. At a later period the general
of the Franciscan order, with the approval of Nicholas IV., had him
again cast into prison, and only after that pope's death was he libe-
/
§ 103. THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY. 107
rated through the intercession of his friends. He died soon after in
A.D. 1291.1
9. Theologians of a Biblical and Practical Tendency.— (1) Csesarius of
Heisterbach near Bonn was a monk, then prior and master of the
novices of the Cistercian monastery there. He died in a.d. 1230. His
Dialogus magmis visionum et miraculorum in 12 bks., one of the best
specimens of the finest culture and learning of the Middle Ages, in the
form of conversation with the novices, gives an admirable and complete
sketch of the morals and manners of the times illustrated from the
history and legends of the monks, clergy, and people. — (2) His younger
contemporary the Dominican William Peraldus (Perault), in his Summd
virtutum and Summa vitionim, presents a summary of ethics with illus-
trations from life in France. He died about a.d. 1250, as bishop of
Lyons. — (3) Hugo of St. Caro (St. Cher, a suburb of Vienne), a Domini-
can and cardinal who died in a.d. 1263, gives evidence of careful Bible
study in his PostiUa in uiiiv. Biblia juxta quadrupl. sensum (a commen-
tary accompanying the text) and his Concordantice Bibliorum (on the
Vulgate). To him we are indebted for our division of the Scriptures into
chapters. At the request of his order he undertook a correction of the y
Vulgate from the old MSS. — (4) Robert of Sorbon in Champagne, who
died in a.d. 1274, was confessor of St. Louis and teacher of theology at
Paris. He urged upon his pupils the duty of careful study of the Bible.
Li A.D. 1250 he founded the Sorbonne at Paris, originally a seminary
for the education and support of the poorer clergy who aspired to the
highest attainments in theology. Its fame became so great that it rose
to the rank of a full theological faculty, and down to its overthrow in the
French Revolution it continued to be the highest tribunal in France for
all matters pertaining to religion and the church. — (5) Raimund Martmi,
Dominican at Barcelona, who died after a.d. 1284, was unweariedly
engaged in the conversion of Jews and Mohammedans. He spoke
Hebrew and Arabic as fluently as Latin, and wrote Pugio jldei contra
Mauros et Judcsos."
10. Precursors of the German Speculative Mystics. — David of Augsburg,
teacher of theology and master of the novices in the Franciscan monas-
tery at 'Augsburg, deserves to be named first, as one who largely antici-
pated the style of speculative mysticism that flourished in the following
1 " Monumenta Franciscana," in " Chronicles and Memorials of Great
Britain and Ireland," edited for the "Master of the Rolls Series" by
Brewer, London, 1858. In addition to the Opus Majus referred to above,
Brewer has edited Fr. Eogeri Bacon Opera quadam inedita, vol. i., con-
taining Opus Tertium, Opus Minus, and Compendium Philosophic.
' Neubauer, "Jewish Controversy and the ' Pugio Fidei,' " in Expositor
for February and March, 1888.
108 TH£: GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.t>. 1294.
century (§ Hi). His writings, partly in Latin, partly in German, are
merely ascetic directories and treatises of a contemplative mystical order,
distingaislied by deep spirituality and earnest, humble piety. The Ger-
man works especially are models of a beautiful rhythmical style, worthy
of ranking with the finest creations of any century. He is author of the
important tract, De hceresl paiqjerum de Lugduno, in which the pious
mystic shows himself in the less pleasing guise of a relentless inquisitor
and heresy hunter.— A brilliant and skilful allegory. The Daughter of
Zion, the human soul, who, having become a daughter of Babylon, went
forth to see the heavenly King, and under the guidance of the virgins
Faith, Hope, Love, Wisdom, and Prayer attained unto this end, was first
written in Latin prose ; but afterwards towards the close of the 13th cen-
tury a free rendering of it in more than 4,000 verses was published by the
Franciscan Lamprecht of Eegensburg. Its mysticism is like that of St.
Bernard and Hugo St. Victor. — In speculative power and originality the
Dominican Theodorich of Freiburg, Meister Dietrich, a pupil of Albert the
Great, far excelled all the mystics of this century. About a.d. 1280 he
was reader at Treves, afterwards prior at Wiirzburg, took his master's
degree and taught at Paris, a.d. 1285-1289. About a.d, 1320, however,
along with Meister Eckhart (§ 114, 1), he fell under suspicion of heresy,
and nothing further is known of him. Among his still unpublished writ-
ings, mostly on natural and religious philosophy, the most important is
the book De heatijica visione Dei per essentiam, which marks him out as
a precursor of the Eckhart speculation.— On Female Mystics, see § 107.
IV.— The Church and the People.
§ 104. Public Worship and Art.
Public worship had for a long time been popularly re-
garded as a performance fraught with magical power. The
ignorant character of the priests led to frequent setting
aside of preaching as something unessential, so that the
service became purely liturgical. But now popes and
synods urged the importance of rearing a race of learned
priestSj and the carefully prepared and eloquent sermons of
Franciscans and Dominicans found great acceptance with
the people. The Schoolmen gave to the doctrine of the
sacraments its scientific form. The veneration of saints,
relics, and images became more and more the central point
of worship. Besides ecclesiastical architecture, which
5 104. PUBLIC WORSHIP AND ART. 109
reached its highest development in the 13th centiirVj the
other arts began to be laid under contribution to beautify
the ceremonial, the dresses of the celebrants, and the inner
parts of the buildings.
1. The Liturgy and the Sermon. — The Roman Liturgy was universally
adopted except in Spain. When it was proposed at the Synod of Toledo
in A.D. 1088 to set aside the old Mozarabic liturgy (§ 88, 1), the people
rose against the proposal, and the ordeals of combat and fire decided in
favour of retaining the old service. From that time both liturgies were
used side by side. The Slavic ritual was abandoned in Moravia and
Bohemia in the 10th century. The language of the church services
everywhere was and continued to be the Latin. The quickening of
the monkish orders in the 11th century, especially the Cluniacs and
Cistercians, but more particularly the rise of the Franciscans and
Dominicans in the 13th century, gave a great impulse to preaching.
Almost all the great monks and schoolmen were popular preachers.
The crowds that flocked around them as they preached in the vernacular
were enormous. Even in the regular services the preaching was gene-
rally in the language of the people, but quotations from Scripture and
the Fathers, as a mark of respect, were made in Latin and then trans-
lated. Sermons addressed to the clergy and before academic audiences
were always in Latin. — As a preacher of repentance and of the crusades,
Fulco of Neuilly, f a.d. 1202, regarded by the people as a saint and a
miracle worker, had a wonderful reputation (§ 94, 4). Of all mediaeval
preachers, however, none can be compared for depth, spirituality, and
popular eloquence with the Franciscan Berthold of Eegensburg, pupil
and friend of David of Augsburg (§ 103, 10), one of the most powerful
preachers in the German tongue that ever lived. He died in a.d. 1272.
He wandered from town to town preaching to crowds, often numbering
100,000 men, of the grace of God in Christ, against the abuse of indul-
gences and false trust in saints, and the idea of the meritoriousness
of pilgrimages, etc. His sermons are of great value as illustrations of
the strength and richness of the old German language. Roger Bacon
too (§ 103, 8), usually so chary of praise, eulogises Frater Bertholdus
Alemannus as a preacher worth more than the two mendicant orders
together.
2. Definition and Number of the Sacraments (§§ 58; 70, 2). — Radbert
acknowledged only two : Baptism including confirmation, and the Lord's
Supper. Rabanus Maurus by separately enumerating the bread and the
cup, and counting confirmation as well as baptism, made four. Hugo
St. Victor again held them to be an indefinite number. But he dis-
tinguished three kinds : those on which salvation depends. Baptism, Con-
-\J
110 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
firmation, and the Supper ; those not necessary and formmg important
aids to salvation, sprinkling with holy water, confession, extreme
unction, marriage, etc. ; those necessary for particular callings, the
ordination of priests, sacred vestments. Yet he prepared the way for
the final ecclesiastical conception of the sacraments, by placing its
Elementa Corporalia under the threefold category as divinam gratiam
ex similitiidine reprcBsentantia, ex institutione sigiiijicantia, and ex con-
secratione continentia. Peter the Lombard took practically the same
view, but fixed the number of the Sacraments at seven : Baptism, Con-
firmation (§ 35, 4), the Supper, Penance, Extreme Unction, Marriage,
and Ordination (§ 45, 1). This number was first officially sanctioned by
the Florentine Council of a.d. 1439 (§ 67, 6). Alexander of Hales gave
a special rank to Baptism and the Supper, as alone instituted by Christ,
while Aquinas gave this rank to all the seven. All the ecclesiastical
consecrations and benedictions were distinguished from the sacraments
as Sacramentalia. — The Schoolmen distinguished the sacraments of
the O.T., as ex opera operante, i.e. efficacious only through faith in a
coming Redeemer, from the sacraments of the N.T. as ex opera operato,
i.e. as efficacious by mere receiving without the exercise of positive
faith on the part of all who had not committed a mortal sin. Against
old sectaries (§ § 41, 3 ; 63, 1) and new (§ § 108, 7, 12) the scholastic
divines maintained that even unworthy and unbelieving priests could
validly dispense the sacraments, if only there was the intentio to ad-
minister it in the form prescribed by the church.'
3. The Sacrament of the Altar. — At the fourth Lateran Council of a.d,
1215 the doctrine of Trausubstantiation was finally accepted (§ 101, 2).
The fear lest any of the blood of the Lord should be spilt led to the
withholding from the 12th century of the cup from the laity, and its being
given only to the priests. If not the cause, then the consequence, of
this was that the priests were regarded as the only full and perfect
partakers of the Lord's table. Kings at their coronation and at the
approach of death were sometimes by special favour allowed to partake
of the cup. The withdrawal of the cup from the laity was dogmatically
justified, specially by Alex, of Hales, by the doctrine of concomitanUa,
i.e. that in the body the blood was contained. Fear of losing any
fragment also led to the substitution of wafers, the host, for the bread
that should be broken. — A consecrated host is kept in the Tahernaculum,
a niche in the wall on the right of the high altar, in the so-called lihu-
rium or Sanctisslvium, i.e. a gold or silver casket, often ornamented with
rich jewels. It is taken forth, touched only by the priests, and exhibited
to the kneeling people during the service and in solemn processions.
4. Penance.— Gratian's decree (§ 99, 5) left it to the individual believer's
' Hodge, "Systematic Theology," vol. iii., pp. 492-497.
§ 104. PUBLIC WOESHIP AND ART. Ill
decision whether the sinner could be reconciled to God by heart penitence
without confession. But in accordance also with the teaching of the
Lombard, confession of mortal sins (Gal. v. 19 ff. and Cor. v. 9 f.), or, in
case that could not be, the desire at heart to make it, was declared
indispensable. The forgiveness of sins was still, however, regarded
as God's exclusive prerogative, and the priest could bind and loose
only in regard to the fellowship of the church and the enjoyment of
the sacraments. Before him, however, Hugo St. Victor had begun to
transcend these limits ; for he, distinguishing between the guilt and the
punishment of the sinner, ascribed indeed to God alone the absolu-
tion from the guilt of sin on the ground of sincere repentance, but ascribed
to the exercise of the priestly function, the absolution from the punish-
ment of eternal death, in accordance with Matthew xviii. 18 and John
XX. 23. Richard St. Victor held that the punishment of eternal death,
which all mortal sins as well as venial sins entail, can be commuted
into temporal punishment by priestly absolution, atoned for by penances
imposed by the priests, e.g. prayers, fastings, alms, etc.; whereas with-
out such satisfaction they can be atoned for only by the pains of purga-
tory (§ 61, 14). Innocent III., at the fourth Lateran Council of a.d. 1215,
had the obligation of confession of all sins raised into a dogma, and
obliged all believers under threat of excommunication to make confession
at least once a year, as preparation for the Easter communion. The
Provincial Synod at Toulouse in a.d, 1229 (§ 109, 2) insisted on compul-
sory confession and communion three times a year, at Christmas, Easter,
and Pentecost. The three penitential requirements, enforced first by
Hildebert of Tours, and adopted by the Lombard, Contritio cordis, Con-
fessio oris, and Satiafactio operis continued henceforth in force. But
Hugo's and Richard's theory of absolution displaced not only that of the
Lombard, but, by an extension of the sacerdotal idea to the absolution of
the sinner from guilt, led to the introduction of a full-blown theory of
indulgence (§ 106, 2). As the ground of the scientific construction given
it by the Schoolmen of the 13th century, especially by Aquinas, the
Catholic Church doctrine of penance received its final shape at the
Council of Florence in a.d. 1439. Penance as the fourth sacrament con-
sists of hearty repentance, auricular confession, and satisfaction ; it takes
form in the words of absolution. Ego te absolvo ; and it is efficacious for
the forgiveness of sins. Any breach of the secrecy of the confessional
was visited by the fourth Lateran Council with excommunication, depo-
sition, and lifelong confinement in a monastery. The exaction of a
confessional fee, especially at the Easter confession, appears as an
increment of the priest's income in many mediaeval documents. Its
prohibition by several councils was caused by its simoniacal abuse.
By the introduction of confessors, separate from the local clergy, the
custom fell more and more into disuse.
112 THE CtEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1'294.
o. Extreme Unction. — Although as early as a.d. 416 Innocent I. had
described anointing of the sick with holy oil (Mark vi. 13 ; Jas. v. 14)
as a Genus Sacramenti (§ 61, 3), extreme unction as a sacrament made
little progress till the 9th century. The Synod of Chalons in a.d. 813
calls it quite generally a means of grace for the weak of soul and body.
The Lombard was the first to give it the fifth place among the seven
sacraments as Unctio extrema and Sacramentwn exeuntium, ascribing to
it Peccatoritm remissio et corporalis infirmitatio alleviatus. Original sin
being atoned for by baptism, and actual sins by penance, Albert the
Great and Aquinas describe it as the purifying from the Reliquice
lieccatorum which even after baptism and penance hinder the soul from
entering into its perfect rest. Bodily healing is only a secondary aim,
and is given only if thereby the primary end of spiritual healing is not
hindered. It was long debated whether, in case of recovery, it should
be repeated when death were found approaching, and it was at last
declared to be admissible. The Council of Trent defines Extreme Unc-
tion as Sacr. 2^oenitenti(e totiiis vita consummativum. The form of
its administration was finally determined to be the anointing of eyes,
ears, nose, mouth, and hands, as well as (except in women) the feet and
loins, with holy oil, consecrated by the bishop on Maundy Thursday.
Confession and communion precede anointing. The three together con-
stitute the Viaticum of the soul in its last journey. After receiving
extreme unction recipients are forbidden again to touch the ground with
their bare feet or to have marital intercourse.
6. The Sacrament of Marriage (§ 89, 4). — When marriage came gene-
rally to be regarded as a sacrament in the proper sense, the laws of
marriage were reconstructed and the administration of them committed
to the church. It had long been insisted upon by the church with ever-
increasing decidedness, that the priestly benediction must precede the
marriage ceremonial, and that bridal communion must accompany the
civil action. Hence marriage had to be performed in the immediate
vicinity of a church, ante ostium ecclesice. As another than the father
often gave away the bride, this position of sponsor was claimed by the
church for the priest. Marriage thus lost its civil character, and the
priest came to be regarded as performing it in his ofiicial capacity not
in name of the family, but in name of the church. Christian marriage
in the early times required only mutual consent of parties (§ 39, 1), but
the Council of Trent demanded a solemn agreement between bride and
bridegroom before the ofiiciating priest and two or three witnesses. In
order to determine more exactly hindrances to marriage (§ 61, 2) it was
made a law at the second Lateran Council in a.d. 1139, and confirmed
at the fourth in a.d. 1215, that the parties proposing to marry should
be proclaimed in church. To each part of the sacrament the character
indelihilis is ascribed, and so divorce was absolutely forbidden, even in
§ 104. PUBLIC WORSHIP AND ART. 113
the case of adultery (in spite of Matt. v. 32 andxix. 9j, though separatio
a mensa et toro was allowed. Innocent III. in a.d. 1215 reduced the
prohibited degrees from the seventh to the fourth in the line of blood
relationship (61, 2).
7. New Festivals. — The worship of Mary (§ 57, 2) received an im-
pulse from the institution of the Feast of the Birth of Mary on 8th of
September. To this was added in the south of France in the 12th
century, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception on the 8th December.
Radbert (^ 91, 4) by his doctrine of Sanctijicatio in utero gave basis to
the theory of the Virgin's freedom from original sin in her conception
and bearing. Anselm of Canterbury, however, taught in Car Dens
Homo I ii. 16, that Mary was conceived and born in sin, and that she
like all others had sinned in Adam. Certain canons of Lyons, in a.d.
1140, revived Eadbert's theory, but raised the Saiictif. in utero into the
Immaculata coiiceptio. St. Bernard protested against the doctrine and
the festival ; sinless conception is a prerogative of the Redeemer alone.
Mary like us all was conceived in sin, but was sanctified before the
birth by Divine power, so that her whole life was faultless ; if one
imagines that Mary's sinless conception of her Son had her own sinless
conception as a necessary presupposition, this would need to be carried
back ad infinitum^ and to festivals of Immaculate Concei)tions there
would be no end. This view of a Sanctijicatio in utero, with repu-
diation of the Conceptio immaculata, was also maintained by Alex, of
Hales, Bonaventura, Albert the Great, and Aquinas. The feast of the
Conception, with the predicate "immaculate " dropped, gradually came
to be universally observed. The Franciscans adopted it in this limited
sense at Pisa, in a.d. 1263, but when, beginning with Duns Scotus (§§ 113,
112), the doctrine of the immaculate conception came to be regarded
as a distinctive dogma of the order, the Dominicans felt called upon to
offer it their most strenuous opposition.^ (Continuation, § 112, 4.) — To
the feast of All Saints, on 1st November, the Cluniacs added in a.d. 998,
the feast of All Souls on 2nd November, for intercession of believers
on behalf of the salvation of souls in purgatory. In the 12th century the
Feast of the Trinity was introduced on the Sunday after Pentecost. Out
of the transubstantiation doctrine arose the Corpus Christi Festival, on
the Thursday after Trinity. A pious nun of Liege, Juliana, in a.d. 1261,
saw in a vision the full moon with a halo around it, and an inward
revelation interpreted this phenomenon to indicate that the festal cycle
of the church still wanted a festival in honour of the eucharist. Urban
IV. gave effect to this suggestion in a.d. 1264, avowedly in consequence
of the miracle of the mass of Bolsena. A priest of Bolsena celebrating
^ Preuss, " The Romish Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception
traced from its Source." Edinburgh, 1867.
114 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
mass spilt a drop of consecrated wiue, which left a blood-red stain on
the corporal or pall (§ 60, 5), in the form of a host. The festival did
not come into favour till Clement V. renewed its institution at the
Council of Vienne, in a.d. 1311. The church, by order of John XXIII.
in A.D. 1316, celebrated it by a magnificent procession, in which the
liburium was carried with all pomp.
8. The Veneration of Saints (§ 88, 4.)— The numerous Canonizations, from
the 12th century exclusively in the hands of the popes, gave an impulse
to saint worship. It was the duty of Advocatus diaboli to try to dis-
prove the reports of virtues and miracles attributed to candidates. The
proofs of holiness adduced were generally derived from thoroughly
fabulous sources. The introduction of the name of accepted candidates
into the canon of the mass gave rise to the term canonization. Beati-
fication was a lower degree of honour, often a preliminary to canoni-
zation at a later period. It carried with it the veneration not of the
whole church, but of particular churches or districts. The Dominican
Jacobus a Voragine, who died in a.d. 1298, in his Legenda aurea
afforded a pattern for numerous late legends of the saints. A Parisian
theologian who styled it Legenda ferrea, was publicly expelled from his
office. The Veneration of Mary, to whom were rendered Hyperdoulia
in contradistinction from the Doiilia of the saints, not only among the
people, but with the most cultured theologians, publicly and privately,
literally and figuratively, in prose and poetry, was almost equal to the
worship rendered to God, and indeed often overshadowed it. The
angel's salutation (Luke i. 28) was in every prayer. Its frequent repe-
tition led to the use of the Rosary, a rose wreath for the most blessed
of women. The great rosary attributed to St. Dominic has fifteen
decades, or 150 smaller pearls of Mary, each of which represents an
Ave Maria, and after every ten there is a greater Paternoster pearl.
The small or common rosary has only five decades of beads of Mary
with a Paternoster bead for each decade. Thrice repeated it forms the
so-called Psalter of Mary. The first appearance of the rosary in
devotion was with the monk Macarius in the 4th century, who took 300
stones in his lap, and after every Paternoster threw one away. The
rosary devotion is also practised by Moslems and Buddhists. In
cloisters, Saturday was usually dedicated to the Mother of God, and
was begun by a special Officium S. Marice. May was called the
month of Mary. — In the 11th century no further trace is found of the
Frankish opposition to Image Worship (§ 92, 1). But this in no way
hindered the growth of Relic Worship. Returning crusaders showered
on the West innumerable relics, which notwithstanding many sceptics
were received generally with superstitious reverence. Castles and
estates were often bartered for pretended relics of a distinguished saint,
and such treasures were frequently stolen at the risk of life. No story
§ 104. PUBLIC WOESHIP AND AET. 115
of a trafficker in relics was too absurd to be believed. — Pilgrimages,
especially to Eome and Palestine, were no less in esteem among the
Western Christians of the 10th century during the Eoman pornocracy
(§ 96, 1) or the tyranny of the Seljuk dynasty in Palestine (§ 94). The
expectation of the approaching end of the world, rather gave them an
impulse during this century, which reached its fullest expression in
the crusades. — Continuation, § 115, 9.
9. The earliest trace of a commemoration of St. Ursula and lier
11,000 Virgins is met with in the 10th century. Excavations in the
Agei' Ursulanus near Cologne in a.d. 1155 led to the discovery of some
thousand skeletons, several of them being those of males, with inscribed
tablets, one of the fictitious inscriptions referring to an otherwise un-
known pope Cyrifeus. St. Elizabeth of Schonau (§ 107, 1) at the same
time had visions in which the Virgin gave her authentic account of
their lives. Ursula, the fair daughter of a British king of the 3rd
century, was to have married a pagan prince ; she craved three years'
reprieve and got from her father eleven ships, each with an equipment
of a thousand virgins, with which she sailed up the Ehine to Basel,
and thence with her companions travelled on foot a pilgrimage to Eome.
On her return, in accordance with the Divine instruction, Pope Cyriffius
accompanied her, whose name was on this account struck out of the
list by the offended cardinals ; for as Martinus Polonus says, Credehant
plerique eum non propter devotionem sed propter obtectamenta virginum
papatum dimississe. Near Cologne they met the army of the Huns, by
whom they were all massacred, at last even Ursula herself on her per-
sistent refusal to marry the barbaric chief. — In the absence of any his-
torical foundations for this legend, an explanation has been attempted
by identifying Ursula with a goddess of the German mythology. An
older suggestion is that perhaps an ancient inscription may have given
rise to the legend.^
10. Hymnology. — The Augustan age of scholasticism was that also of
the composition of Latin hymns and sequences (§ 88, 2). The most
distinguished sacred poets were Odo of Clugny, king Eobert of France
{Veni, sancte Spiritus, et emitte), Damiani, Abaelard, Hildebert of
Tours, St. Bernard, Adam of St. Victor,^ Bonaventura, Aquinas, the
^ Maccall, " Christian Legends of Middle Ages, from German of von
Bulow," London. Cox and Jones, " Popular Eomances of the Middle
Ages," London. Baring Gould, " Curious Myths of tbe Middle Ages,"
London, 1884. " The Legend of St. Ursula and the Virgin Martyrs of
Cologne," London, 1860.
- "Liturgical Poetry of Adam of St. Victor," with trausl. into English,
and notes, by Wraugham, 3 vols., London, 1881. Bird, " The Latin
Hymns of the Church," in the Sunday Magazine for 1865, pp. 530 ff.,
679 ff., 776 ff. Trench, " Sacred Latin Poetry," London, 1849. Neale,
" Mediaeval Hymns."
116 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
Franciscan Thomas of Celano, a.d. 1260 {Dies ine), and Jacopone da
Todi, t A.D. 1306 {Stabat mater dolorosa). The latter, an eccentric
enthusiast and miracle-working saint, called himself " Stultus 'propter
Christum.'' Originally a wealthy advocate, living a Hfe of revel and riot,
he was led by the sudden death of his young wife to forsake the world.
He courted the world's scorn in the most Uteral manner, appearing
in the pubHc market bridled like a beast of burden and creeping on
all fours, and at another time appearing naked, tarred and feathered
at the marriage of a niece. But he glowed with fervent love for the
Crucified aud a fanatical veneration for the blessed Virgin. He also
fearlessly raised his voice against the corruption of the clergy and the
papacy, and vigorously denounced the ambition of Boniface VIII. For
this he was imprisoned and fed on bread and water. When tauntingly
asked, " When wilt thou come out ? " he answered in words that were
soon fulfilled, " So soon as thou shalt come down." Sacred Poetry in the
vernacular was used only in extra-ecclesiastical devotions. The oldest
German Easter hymn belongs to the 12th century.^ The Minnesingers
of the 13th century composed popular songs of a religious character,
especially in praise of Mary ; there were also sacred songs for travellers,
sailors, soldiers, etc. Heretics separated from the church and its
services spread their views by means of hymns. St. Francis wrote
Italian hymns, and among his disciples Fra Pacifico, Bonaventura,
Thomas of Celano, and Jacopone followed worthily in his footsteps.
11. Church Music (§ 88, 2).— The Gregorian Cantus firmus soon fell
mto disfavour and disuetude. The rarity, costliness, and corruption of
the antiphonaries, the difticulty of their notation and of their musical
system, and the want of accurately trained singers, combined to bring
this about. Singers too had often made arbitrary alterations. Hence
alongside of the Cantus firmus there gradually grew up a Discantus or
Cantus figuratus, and instead of singing in unison, singing in har-
mony was introduced. Rules of harmony, concord, and intervals
were now elaborated by the monk Hucbald of Rheims about a.d. 900,
while the German monk Reginus about a.d. 920 and the abbot
Opo of Clugny did much for the theory and practice of music. In
place of the intricate Gregorian notation the Tuscan Benedictine
Guido of Arezzo, a.d. 1000-1050, introduced the notation that is still
used, which made it possible to write the harmony along with the
melody, counterpoint, i.e. punctum contra punctum. The discoverer of
the measure of the notes was Franco of Cologne about a.d. 1200. The
organ was commonly used in churches. The Germans were the greatest
masters in its construction and in the playing of it.— Continuation,
^ 115, 8.
Christus ist erstaudeu vou der Marter Banden.
5 104. PUBLIC WOESHI? AND ART. 117
12. Ecclesiastical Architecture. — Churcli building, which the barbarism
of the 10th century, and the widespread expectation of the coming
end of the world had restrained, flourished during the 11th century
in an extraordinary manner. The endeavour to infuse the German
spirit into the ancient style of architecture gave rise to the Romance
Style of Architecture, which prevailed during the 12th century. It was
based upon the structure of the old basilicas, the most important
innovation being the introduction of the vaulted in place of the flat
wooden roof, which made the interior lighter and heightened the perspec-
tive effect. The symbolical and fanciful ornamentation was also richly
developed by figures from the plants and animals of Germany, from
native legends. Towers were also added as fingers pointing upward,
sometimes over the entrance to the middle aisle or at both sides
of the entrance, sometimes over the point where the nave and tran-
septs intersected one another, or on both sides of the choir. The
finest specimens of this style were the cathedrals of Spires, Mainz,
and Worms. But alongside of this appeared the beginnings of the
so-called Gothic Architecture, which reached its height in the 13th and
14th centuries. Here the German ideas shook themselves free from the
bondage of the old basilica style. Retaming the early ground plan, its
pointed arch admitted of development in breadth and height to any
extent. The pointed arch was first learnt from the Saracens, but its
application to the Gothic architecture was quite original, because it
was not as with the Saracens decorative, but constructive. The blank
walls were changed into supporting pillars, and became a magnificent
framework for the display of ingenious window architecture. A rich
stone structure rose upon the cruciform ground plan, and the powerful
arches towered up into airj' heights. Tall tapering pillars symbolized
the heavenward strivings of the soul. The rose window over the portal
as the symbol of silence teaches that nothing worldly has a voice there.
The gigantic peaked windows send through their beautifully painted
glass a richly coloured light full on the vast area. Everything in the
structure points upward, and this symbolism is finally expressed in the
lofty towers, which lose themselves in giddy heights. The victory over
the kingdom of darkness is depicted in the repulsive reptiles, demonic
forms, and dragon shapes which are made to bear up the pillars and
posts, and to serve as water carriers. The wit of artists has made
even bishops and popes perform these menial offices, just as Dante
condemned many popes to the infernal regions.^
1 Eastlake, " History of the Gothic Revival," London, 1872. Norton,
" Historical Studies of Church Building in the Middle Ages," New York,
1880. Didron, " History of Christian Art in the Middle Ages," London,
1851.
118 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
13. The most famous architects were Benedictines. The master
builder along with the scholars trained by him formed independent
corporations, free from any other jurisdiction. They therefore called
themselves "Free Masons," and erected " Lodges," where they met for
consultation and discussion. From the 13th century these lodges
fell more and more into the hands of the laity, and became training
schools of architecture. To them we are largely indebted for the
development of the Gothic style. Their most celebrated works are the
Cologne cathedral and the Strassburg minster. The foundation of the
former was laid under Archbishop Conrad of Hochsteden in a.d. 1248 ;
the choir was completed and consecrated in a.d. 1322 (§ 173, 9). Erwin
of Steinbach began the building of the Strassburg minster in a.d. 1275.
14. Statuary and Painting. — Under the Hohenstaufens statuary, which
had been disallowed by the ancient church, rose into favour. Its first
great master in Italy was Nicola Pisano, who died in a.d. 1274.
Earlier indeed a statuary school had been formed in Saxony, of which
no names but great works have come down to us. The goldsmith's
craft and metallurgy were brought into the service of the church by the
German artists, and show not only wonderful technical skill, but also high
attainment in ideal art. In Painting the Byzantines taught the Italians,
and these again the Germans. At the beginning of the 13th century
there was a school of painting at Pisa and Siena, claiming St. Luke
as its patron, and seeking to impart more life and warmth to the stiff
figures of the Byzantines. Their greatest masters were Guido of
Siena and Giunta of Pisa, and the Florentine Cimabue, t a.d. 1300.
Mosaic painting mostly on a golden ground was in favour in Italy.
Painting on glass is first met with in the beginning of the 11th century
in the monastery of Tegernsee in Bavaria, and soon spread over Germany
and all over Europe.^ — Continuation, § 115, 13.
§ 105. National* Customs and the National
Literature.
It was an age full of the most wonderful contradictions
and anomalies in the life of the people, but every pheno-
menon bore the character of unquestionable power, and the
church applied the artificer's chisel to the unhewn marble
block. In club law the most brutal violence prevailed, but
bowed itself willingly or unwillingly before the might of an
^ Kligler, "Handbook of Painting: Italian Schools," translated by
Eastlake, London, 1855. Warrington, " History of Stained Glass,"
London, 1850.
§ 105. NATIONAL CUSTOMS AND LITERATURE. 119
idea. The basest sensuality existed alongside of the most
simple self-denial and renunciation of the world, the most
wonderful displays of self-forgetting love. The most sacred
solemnities were parodied, and then men turned in awful
earnest to manifest the profoundest anxiety for their soul's
salvation. Alongside of unmeasured superstition we meet
with the boldest freethinking, and out of the midst of
widespread ignorance and want of culture there radiated
forth great thoughts, profound conceptions, and suggestive
anticipations.
1. Knighthood and the Peace of God. — Notwithstanding its rude violence
there was a deep religious undertone in knighthood, which came out in
Spain in the war with the Saracens, and throughout Europe in the
crusades. What princes could not do to check savagery was to some
extent accomplished by the church by means of the injunction of the
Peace of God. In a.d. 103i the severity of famine in France led to acts
of cannibalism and murder, which the bishops and synods severely
punished. In a.d. 1041 the bishops of Southern France enjoined the
Peace of God, according to which under threat of anathema all
feuds were to be suspended from Wednesday evening to Monday morn-
ing, as the days of the ascension, death, burial,' and resurrection of
Christ. At a ater council at Narbonne in a.d. 1054, Advent to
Epiphany, Lent to eight days after Easter, from the Sunday before
Ascension to the end of the week of Pentecost, as well as the ember
days and the festivals of Mary and the Apostles, were added. Even on
other days, churches, cloisters, hospitals, and churchyards, as well as
priests, monks, pilgrims, merchants, and agriculturists, in short, all
unarmed men, and, by the Council of Clermont, a.d. 1095, even all cru-
saders, were included in the peace of God. Its healthful influence was
felt even outside of France, and at the 3rd Lateran Council in a.d. 1179
Alexander III. raised it to the rank of a universally applicable law of
the church.
2. Popular Customs. — Superstition resting on old paganism introduced
a Christian mythology. In almost all the popular legends the devil bore
a leading part, and he was generally represented as a dupe who was
cheated out of his bargain in the end. The most sacred things were
made the subjects of blasphemous parodies. On Fool's Festival on New
Year's day in France, mock popes, bishops, and abbots were introduced
and all the holy actions mimicked in a blasphemous manner. Of a
similar nature was the Festum innocentum (§ 57, 1) enacted by school-
boys at Christmas. Also at Christmas time the so-called Feast of Asses
120 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
was celebrated. At Rouen dramatic representation of the prophecies of
Christ's birth were given; at Beauvais, the flight into Egypt. This
relic of pagan license was opposed by the bishops, but encouraged by
the lower clergy. After bishops and councils succeeded in banishing
these fooleries from consecrated places they soon ceased to be celebrated.
Under the name of Calends, because their gatherings were on the
Calends of each month, brotherhoods composed of clerical and lay
members sprang up in the beginning of the 13th century throughout
Germany and France, devoting themselves to prayer and saying masses
for living and deceased members and relatives. This pious purpose was
indeed soon forgotten, and the meetings degenerated into riotous
carousings.
3. Two Koyal Saints. — St. Elizabeth, daughter of Andrew II. of Hun-
gary, married in her 14th year to St. Louis IV., Landgrave of Thuringia,
was made a widow^ in her 20th year by the death of her husband in the
crusade of Frederick II. in a.d. 1227, and thereafter suffered many priva-
tions at the hand of her brother-in-law. Her father confessor inspired
her with a fanatical spirit of self denial. She assumed in Marburg the
garb of the Franciscan nuns, took the three vows, and retired into a
house of mercy, where she submitted to be scourged by her confessor.
There she died in her 24th year in a.]). 1231. Her remains are credited
with the performance of many miracles. She was canonized by Gregory
IX., in A.I). 1235, and in the 14th century the order of Elizabethan nuns
was instituted for ministering to the poor and sick.^ — St. Hedwig, aunt
of Elizabeth, married Henry duke of Silesia, in her 12th year. After
discharging her duties of wife, mother, and princess faithfully, she
took along with her husband the vow of chastity, and out of the sale of
her bridal ornaments built a nunnery at Trebnitz, where she died in
A.I). 1243 in her 69th year. Canonized in a.d. 1268, her remains were
deposited in the convent church, which became on that account a favou-
rite resort of pilgrims.
4. Evidences of Sainthood. — (1) Stigmatization, Soon after St. Francis'
death in a.d. 1226, the legend spread that two years before, during a forty
days' fast in the Apennines, a six-winged seraph imprinted on his body
the nail prints of the wounded Saviour. The saint's humility, it was
said, prevented him speaking of the miracle except to those in closest
terms of intimacy. The papal bull canonizing the saint, however, issued
in A.D. 1228, knows nothing of this wonderful occurrence. What was then
told of the great saint was subsequently ascribed to about 100 other asce-
tics, male and female. Some sceptical critics attributed the phenomenon
to an impressionable temperament, others again accounted for all such
1 Kingsley, "The Saint's Tragedy," London, 1848. A dramatic poem
founded on the story of St. Elizabeth's life.
§ 105. NATIONAL CUSTOMS AND LITERATURE. 121
stories by assuming that they were purely fabulous, or that the marks
had been deceitfully made with human hands. Undoubtedly St, Francis
had made those wounds upon his own body. That pain should have
been felt on certain occasions in the wounds may be accounted for,
especially in the case of females, who constituted the great majority of
stigmatized individuals, on pathological grounds. — (2) Bilocation. The
Catholic Church Lexicon, published in a.d. 1882 (II. 840), maintains
that it is a fact universally believed that saints often appeared at the
same time at places widely removed from one another. Examples are
given from the lives of Anthony of Padua, Francis Xavier, Liguori, etc.
This is explained by the supposition that either God gives this power to
the saint or sends angels to assume his form in different places.
5. Religious Cultare of the People. — Unsuccessful attempts were made by
the Hohenstaufens to institute a public school system aud compulsory
education. Waldeusians and such Hke (§ 108) obtained favour by spread-
ing instruction through vernacular preaching, reading, and singing. The
Dominicans took a hint from this. The Council of Toulouse, a.d. 1229
(§ 109, 2), forbade laymen to read the Scriptures, even the Psalter and
Breviary, in the vulgar tongue. Summaries of the Scripture history were
allowed. Of this sort was the Rhyming Bible in Dutch by Jacob of
Maerlant, f a.d. 1291, which gives in rhyme the O.T. history, the Life
of Jesus, and the history of the Jews to the destruction of Jerusalem.
In the 13th century Rhyming Legends gave in the vernacular the sub-
stance of the Latin Martyrologies. The oldest German example in 3
bks. by an unknown author contains 100,000 rhyming lines, on Christ
and Mary, the Apostles and the saints in the order of the church year.
Still more effectively was information spread among the people during
the 11th and subsequent centuries by the performance of Sacred Plays.
From simple responsive songs they were developed into regular dramas
adapted to the different festivals. Besides historical plays which were
called Mysteries = minister ia as representations of the MinlstrieccL, there
were allegorical and moral plays called Moralities, in which moral truths
were personified under the names of the virtues and vices. The nume-
rous pictures, mosaics, and reliefs upon the walls helped greatly to spread
instruction among the people.^
G. The National Literature {§ 89, Z).~Walter v. d. Vor/elweide, f a.p.
1230, sang the praises of the Lord, the Virgin, and the church, and lashed
the clerical vices and hierarchical pretensions of his age. The 12th
century editor of the pagan Nibdungenlied gave it a slightly Christian
gloss. Wolfram of Eschenbach, however, a Christian poet in the highest
^ On Hilarius, an English monk, author of several plays, see Morley's
Writers before Chaucer," London, 1864, pp. 542-552.
122 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
sense, gave to the pagan legend of Parcival a thoroughly Christian
character in the story of the Holy Grail and the Knights of the Round
Table of King Arthur. His antipodes as a purely secular poet was
Godfrey of Strassburg, whose Tristan and Isolt sets forth a thoroughly
sensual picture of carnal love; yet as the sequel of this we have a
strongly etherealized rhapsody on Divine love conceived quite in the spirit
of St. Francis. — The sprightly songs of the Troubadours of Southern
France were often the vehicle of heretical sentiments and gave expres-
sion to bitter hatred of the Romish Babylon. ^
§ 106. Church Discipline, Indulgences, and Asceticism.
The ban, directed against notorious individual sinners and
foes of the church, and the interdict, directed against a
whole country, were formidable weapons which rarely failed
in accomplishing their purpose. Their foolishly frequent
use for political ends by the popes of the 13th century was
the first thing that weakened their influence. The peni-
tential discipline of the church, too (§ 104, 4), began to lose
its power, when outward works, such as alms, pilgrimages,
and especially money fines in the form of indulgences were
prescribed as substitutes for it. Various protests against
prevailing laxity and formality were made by the Bene-
dictines and by new orders instituted during the 11th
century. Strict asceticism with self-laceration and morti-
fication was imposed in many cloisters, and many hermits won
high repute for holiness. The example and preaching of
earnest monks and recluses did much to produce a revival
of religion and awaken a penitential enthusiasm. Not satis-
fied with mortifying the body by prolonging fasts and
watchings, they wounded themselves with severe scourg-
ings and the wearing of sackcloth next the skin, and some-
times also brazen coats of mail, heavy iron chains, girdles
with pricks, etc.
^ Delepierre, " History of Flemish Literature from the 12th Century,'
London, 1860.
§ 106. CHUECH DISCIPLINE AND ASCETICISM. 123
1. Ban and Interdict. — From the 9th century a distinction was made
between Excommiinicatio major and minor. The latter, inflicted upon
less serious offences against the canon law, merely excluded from partici-
pation in the sacrament. The former, called Anathema, directed against
hardened sinners with solemn denunciation and the church's curse,
involved exclusion from all ecclesiastical communion and even refusal of
Christian burial. Zealots who slew such excommunicated persons were
declared by Urban II. not to be murderers. Innocent III., at the 4th
Lateran Council a.d. 1215, had all civil rights withdrawn from excom-
municates and their goods confiscated. Kulers under the ban were
deposed and their subjects released from their oath of allegiance.
Bishops exercised the right of putting under ban within their dioceses,
and the popes over the whole church. — The Interdict was first recog-
nised as a church institution at the Synod of Limoges in a.d. 1031.
While it was in force against any country all bells were silenced, litur-
gical services were held only with closed doors, penance and the eucharist
administered only to the dying, none but priests, mendicant friars,
strangers, and children under two years of age received Christian burial,
and no one could be married. Earely could the people endure this long.
It was therefore a terrible weapon in the hands of the popes, who not
infrequently exercised it effectually in their struggles with the princes
of the 12th and 13th centuries.
2. Indulgences. — The old German principle of composition (§ 89, 5),
and the Gregorian doctrine of purgatory (§ 61, 4), formed the bases on
which was reared the ordinance of indulgences. The theory of the
monks of St. Victor of the 12th century regarding penitential satisfac-
tion (§ 104, 4), gave an impetus to the development of this institution of
the church. It copestone was laid in the 13th century by the formulat-
ing of the doctrine of the superabundant merit of Christ and the saints
[Thesaurus super erogationis Christi et perfectorum) by Alexander of Hales,
Albert the Great, and Aquinas. The members of the body of Christ could
suffer and serve one for another, and thus Aquinas thought the merits of
one might lessen the purgatorial pains of another. Innocent III., in a.d.
1215, allowed to bishops the right of limiting the pains of purgatory to
forty days, but claimed for the pope exclusively the right of giving full
indulgence {Indulgentia plenaria). Clement VI. declared that the pope
as entrusted with the keys was alone the dispenser of the Thesaurus
supererogationis. Strictly indulgence was allowed only to the truly peni-
tent, as an aid to imperfect not a substitute for non-existent satisfaction.
This was generally ignored by preachers of indulgences. This was
specially the case in the times of the crusaders. Popes also frequently
gave indulgences to those who simply visited certain shrines.
3. The Church Doctrine of the Hereafter. — All who had perfectly ob-
served every requirement of the penances and sacraments of the church
124 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1294.
to the close of their lives had the gates of Heaven opened to them. All
others passed into the Lower "World to suffer either positively = se?is»s,
inexpressible pains of fire, or negatively = damnum, loss of the vision of
God. There are four degrees corresponding to four places of punish-
ment. Hell, situated in the midst of the earth, ahyssiis (Rev. xx. 1), is
place and state of eternal punishment for all infidels, apostates, excom-
municates, and all who died in mortal sin. The next circle is the puri-
fying fire of Purgatory, or a place of temporary punishment positive or
negative for all believing Christians who did not in life fully satisfy the
three requirements of the sacrament of penance {§ lOi, 4). The Limbus
infantum is a side chamber of purgatory, where all unbaptized infants
are kept for ever, only deprived of blessedness in consequence of original
sin. Then above this is the Limbus Patrum, "Abraham's bosom," where
the saints of the Old Covenant await the second coming of Christ.
4. Flagellation. — From the 8th century discipline was often exercised
by means of scourging, administered by the confessor who prescribed it.
In the 11th century voluntary Self-Flagellation was frequently practised not
only as punishment for one's own sin, but, after the pattern of Christ and
the martyrs, as atonement for sins of others. It originated in Italy, had
its great patron in Damiani (§ 97, 4), and was earnestly commended by
Bernard, Norbert, Francis, Dominic, etc. It is reported of St. Dominic
that he scourged himself thrice every night, first for himself, and then
for his living companions, and then for the departed in purgatory. The
zealous Franciscan preachers were mainly instrumental in exerting an
enthusiasm for self-mortification among the people (§ 98, 4). About
A.D. 1225, Anthony of Padua attracted crowds who went about publicly
lashing themselves while singing psalms. Followers of Joachim of Floris
(§ 108, 5) as Flagellants rushed through all Northern Italy in great num-
bers during a.d. 1260, preaching the immediate approach of the end of
the world. 1
§ 107. Female Mystics.
Practical mj^sticism which concerned itself only with the
salvation of the soul, had many representatives among the
women of the 12th and 13th centuries. Among them it was
specially characterized by the prevalence of ecstatic visions,
often deteriorating into manifestations of nervous affections
which superstitious people regarded as exhibitions of mira-
culous power. Examples are found in all countries, but
especially in the Netherlands, and the Rhine provinces, in
^ Cooper, " Flagellation and the Flagellants." London, 1873.
§ 107. FEMALE MYSTICS. 125
France, Alsace and Switzerland, in Saxony and Thuringia.
Those whose visions pointed to the inauguration of reforms
are of particular interest to us, as they often had a consider-
able influence on the subsequent history of the church.
1. Two Ehenish Prophetesses of tlie 12th Century. — St. Hildegard was
founder and abbess of a cloister near Bingen on the Rhine, where she
died in a.d. 1178 in her 74th year. Grieving over clerical and papal
corruptions, she had apocalyptic visions of the antichrist, and travelled
far and engaged in an extensive correspondence in appealing for radical
reforms. St. Bernard and pope Eugenius III. who yisited Treves in a.l».
1117 acknowledged her prophetic vocation, and the people ascribed to her
wonderful healing power. — Hiklegard's younger contemporary was the
like-minded St. Elizabeth of Schonau, abbess of the neighbouring convent
of Schonau, who died in a.d. 1165. Her prophecies were mostly of the
apocalyptic-visionary order, and in them with still greater severity she
lashed the corruptions of the clergy. She also gave currency to the
legend of St. Ursula (§ 101, 9).
2. Three Thuringian Prophetesses of the 13th Century. — Mechthild of
Magdeburg, after thirty years of Beguine life, wrote in a beautiful rhyth-
mical style in German her "Light of Deity," setting forth the sweet-
ness of God's love, the blessedness of glorified saints, the pains of
purgatory and hell, and denouncing with great moral earnestness the
corruptions of the clergy and the church, and depicting with a poet's or
prophet's power the coming of the last day. Influenced by the apoca-
lyptic views of Joachim of Floris (§ 108, 5), she also gives expression to
a genuinely German patriotism. With her it is a new preaching order
that leads to victory against antichrist, and the founder of this order, who
meets a martyr's death in the conflict, is a son of the Roman king. In
contrast with Joachim, she thus makes the German empire not a foe but
the ally of the church. Mechthild's prophecies largely influenced Dante,
and even her name appears in that of his guide Matilda. — Mechthild of
Hackeborn, who died in a.d. 1310, in her Speculum spiritualis gratia
published her visions of a reformatory and eschatological prophetic
order, more subjective and personal than those of the former. — Gertrude
the Great, who died in a.d. 1311, is more decidedly a reformer than either
of the Mechthilds or any other woman of the Middle Ages. A diligent
inquirer into the depths of Scripture, she renounced the veneration
usually shown to Mary, the saints, and relics, repudiated all the ideas of
her age regarding merits, ceremonial exercises, and indulgences, and in
the exercise of simple faith trusted only to the grace of God in Christ.
She seems to belong to the 16th rather than to the 13th century. Her
visions, too, are more of a spiritual kind.
126 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
v.— Heretical Opposition to Ecclesiastical Authority.
§ 108. The Protesters against the Church.
Mediaeval endeavours after reform, partly proceeded from
within the church itself in attempts to restore apostolic
purity and simplicity, partly from without on the part of
those who despaired of any good coming out of the church,
and who therefore warred bitterly against it. Such attempts
were often lost amid the vagaries of fanaticism and heresy,
which soon threatened the foundation of the social fabric,
and often came into collision with the State. Most widely
spread and most radical were the numerous dualistic sects
of the Cathari. Montanist fanaticism was revived in apo-
calyptic prophesyings. There were also pantheistic sects,
and among the Pasagians a sort of Ebionism reappeared.
Another group of sects originated through reformatory
endeavours of individual men, who perceiving the utter
corruption of the church of their day, sought salvation in
a revolutionary overthrow of all ecclesiastical institutions
and repudiated often the truth with the error which was
the object ot their hate. The only protesting church of a
thoroughly sensible evangelical sort was that of the Wal-
densians.
1. The Cathari. — Opposition to hierarchical pretensions led to the
spread of sects, especially in Northern Italy and France, from the 11th
century. Hidden remnants of Old Manichsean sects got new courage
and ventured into the light during the period of the crusades. In
France they were called Tisserands, because mostly composed of weavers.
In Italy they were called Patareni or Paterini, either from the original
meaning of the word, rabble, riff-raff (§ 97, 5), or because they so far
adopted the attitude of the Pasaria of Milan, as to offer lay opposition
to the local clergy, or because of the frequent use of the Paternoster. Of
later origin are the names Publicani and Bulgriri, given as opprobrious de-
signations to the Paulicians. The most widely current name of Cathari,
from early times a favourite title assumed by rigorist sects (§ 41, 3),
had it^ origin in the East. In France they were called Albigensians,
§ 108. THE PEOTESTERS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 127
from the province of Albigeois, which was their chief seat in Southern
France. — Of the Writings of the Cathari we possess from the end of the
13th century a Provencal translation of the N.T., free from all falsifica-
tion in favour of their sectarian views. Their tenets are to be learnt
only from the polemical writings of their opponents, Alanus ab Insulis
(§102, 5), the Dominican Joh. Moneta, about a.d. 1240, and Eainerius,
Sacchoni, Dominican and inquisitor, about a.d. 1250.
2. Besides their opposition to the hierarchy, all these sects had in
common a dualistic basis to their theological systems. They held in a
more or less extreme form the following doctrines : The good God who
is proclaimed in the N.T. created in the beginning the heavenly and
invisible world, and peopled it with souls clothed in ethereal bodies.
The earthly world, on the other hand, is the work of an evil spirit, who
is held up as object of worship in the O.T. Entering the heavenly
world he succeeded in seducing some of its inhabitants, whom he, when
defeated by the archangel Michael, took with him to earth, and there im-
prisoned in earthly bodies, so as to make return to their heavenly home
impossible. Yet they are capable of redemption, and may, on repent-
ance and submission to purificatory ordinances, be again freed from their
earthly bonds and brought home again to heaven. For this redemption
the good God sent "the heavenly man" Jesus (1 Cor. xv. 47) to earth
in the appearance of man to teach men their heavenly origin and the
means of restoration. The Cathari rejected the O.T., but accepted the
N.T., which they read in the vernacular. Marriage they regarded as a
hindrance to Christian perfection. They treated with contempt water
baptism, the Supper, and ordination, as well as all veneration of saints
and relics, and tolerated no images, crosses, or altars. Prayer, absti-
nence, and baptism of the Spirit were regarded as the only means of
salvation. Preaching was next to prayer most prominent in their public
services. They also laid great stress upon fasting, genuflection, and repe-
titions of stated formulas, especially the Lord's Prayer. Their members
were divided into Cregentz {credentes or catechumens) and Bos homes or Bos
crcsiias {boni homines, boni Christiam=perfecti or electi). A lower order
of the catechumens were the Auditores. These were received as Credentes
after a longer period of training amid various ceremonies and repetition of
the Lord's prayer, etc. The order of the Perfecti was entered by spiritual
baptism, the Cousolamentum or communication of the Holy Spirit as the
promised Comforter, without which no one can enjoy eternal life. Even
opponents such as St. Bernard admit that there was great moral earnest-
ness shown by some of them, and many met a martyr's death with true
Christian heroism. Symptoms of decay appeared in the spread among
them of antinomian practices. This moral deterioration showed itself as
a radical part of this system in the so-called Luciferians or devil wor-
shippers, whose duahsm, hke that of the Euchites and Bogomils (§ 71), led
128 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
to tbe adoption of two Sons of God. Lucifer the elder, wrongly driven
from heaven, is the creator and lord of this earthly world, and hence
alone worshipped in it. His expulsion (Isa. xiv. 12) is carried out by the
younger son, Michael, who will, however, on this account, whenever
Lucifer regains heaven, be sent with all his company into eternal punish-
ment. Of an incarnation of God, even of a docetic kind, they know
nothing. They regarded Jesus as a false prophet who was crucified on
account of the evil he had done. — Catharist sects suspected of Mani-
chffian tendencies were discovered here and there during the 11th century.
In the following century their number had increased enormously, and
they spread over Lombardy and Southern France, but were also found
in Southern Italy, in Germany, Belgium, Spain, and even in England.
They had a pope residing in Bulgaria, twelve magistri and seventy-two
bishops, each with a Filius major and minor at his side. In a.d. 1167
they were able to muster an oecumenical Catharist Council at Toulouse.
Neither clemency nor severity could put them down. St. Bernard pre-
vailed most by the power of his love, and subsequently learned Domi-
nicans had more effect with their preaching and disputations. They
found abundant opportunity of displaying their hatred of the papacy
during the struggles of the Guelphs and GhibeUines. In spite of ter-
rible persecution, which reached its height in the beginning of the
13th century in the Albigensian crusade (§ 109, 1), remnants of them
were found down into the 14th century.
3. The small sect of the Pasagians in Lombardy during the 12th
century, protesting against the Manichsean depreciation of the O.T. of
the Catharists, adopted views of a somewhat Ebionite character. With
the exception of sacrifice, they enforced all tlie old ceremonial obser-
vances, even circumcision, and held an Arian or Ebionite theory of the
Person of Christ. Their name meaning "passage," seems to refer to
pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and possibly from this a clue to their
origin may be obtained.
4. Pantheistic Heretics.— (1) Amalrich of Bena taught first philosophy,
then theology, at Paris in the end of the 12th century. In a.d. 1204
Innocent III. called him to account for his proposition. Christian in
sound, but probably pantheistically intended, that no one could be saved
who is not a member in Christ's body, and obliged him to retract. His
death occurred soon after, and some years later we find traces of a pan-
theistic sect founded on the alleged doctrines of Amalrich vigorously
propagated by his disciple William the goldsmith. God had previously
appeared as Father incarnate in Abraham, and as Son in Christ, and
now henceforth as the Holy Spirit in every believer, who therefore in the
same sense as Christ is God. As such, too, he is without sin, and what
to others would be sin is not so to him. In the age of the Son the
Mosaic law lost its validity, and in that of the Sj)irit, the sacraments and
§ 108. THE PKOTESTEKS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 129
services of the new covenant. God has always been all in all. We
find him in Ovid as well as in Augustine, and the body of Christ is in
common bread as well as in the consecrated wafer on the altar. Saint
worship is idolatry. There is no resurrection; heaven and hell exist
only in the imagination of men. Eome is Babylon, and the pope is
antichrist ; but to the king of France, after the overthrow of antichrist,
shall the kingdoms of the earth be subject, etc. A synod at Paris iu
A.D. 1209 condemned William and nine priests to be burnt, and four
other priests to imprisonment for life, and ordered that Amalrich's bones
should be exhumed and scattered over an open field. Regarding the
physical works of Aristotle as the source of this heresy, the council
also prohibited all lectures upon these (§ 103, 1). This was seen to be a
mistake, and so in a.d. 1225 Honorius III. fixed on the true culprit and
condemned the De divisione natures of Erigena (§ 90, 6). The penalties
inflicted did not by any means lead to the rooting out of the sect. Dur-
ing the whole 13th century it continued to spread from Paris over all
eastern France as far as Alsace, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, and
in the 14th century reached its highest development in the pantheistic-
libertine doctrines of the Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit (§ 116, 5).
We never again meet with the name of Amalrich, and the sects were
never called after him. — (2) David of Dinant at the same time with Amal-
rich taught philosophy and theology in the University of Paris. He also
lived for a long while at the papal court in Rome, high in favour with
Innocent III. as a subtle dialectician. The Synod of Paris of a.d. 1209,
which passed judgment on the Amalricians, pronounced David a heretic
and ordered his works to be burnt. He avoided personal punishment by
flight. The central point of his system was the assumption of a single
eternal substance without distinctions, from which God, sjjirit (pous),
and matter (vXr)) sprang as- the three principles of all later forms of
existences {corpora, animce, and ^iCbstantUe cetermc). God is regarded as
the primiim ejjicieiis, matter as the priuiuin susciplens, and spirit as the
medium between the two. David's scholars never formed a sect and
never had any connection apparently with the followers of Amalrich. —
(3) The Ortlibarians were a sect condemned by Innocent III., followers of
a certain Ortlieb of Strassburg about a.d. 1212. They held the world to
be without beginning. They looked upon Jesus as the son of Joseph
and Mary, sinless like all other children, but raised to be son of God
only through illumination from the doctrines of their srect, which had
existed from the earliest times. They admitted the gospel story of
Christ's life, sufferings, and resurrection, not, however, in a literal but
only in a moral and mystical acceptation. The consecrated host was but
common bread, and in it was the body of the Lord. A Jew entering their
sect needed not to be bcaptized, and fellowship with them was suffi-
cient to secure salvation. There is no resurrection of the flesh : man's
130 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
spirit alone is immortal. After the last judgment, which will come
when pope and emperor are converted to their views and all opposition
is overcome, the world will last for ever, and men will be born and die
just as now. They professed a strictly ascetic life, and many of them
fasted every second day.
5. Apocalyptic Heretics. — The Cistercian abbot Joachim of Floris,
who died in a.d. 1202, with his notions of the so called " Everlasting
Goftpcl,'^ as a reformer and as one inclined to apocalyptic prophecy,
followed in the footsteps of Hildegard of Bingen and Elizabeth of
Schonau (§ 107, 1). His prophetic views spread among the Franciscans
and were long unchallenged. In a.d. 1254 the University of Paris,
warning against the begging monks (§ 103, 3), got Alexander IV. to
condemn these views as set forth in commentaries on Isaiah and
Jeremiah ascribed to Joachim, but now found to be spurious. Preger
doubts but, Eeuter maintains the genuineness of the three tracts grouped
under the title of the EvangeUum ceternum. The main points in his
theory seem to have been these : There are three ages, that of the Father
in the O.T., of the Son in the N.T., and of the Holy Spirit in the
approaching fulness of the kingdom of God on earth. Of the apostles,
Peter is representative of the first age, Paul of the second, and John of
the third. They may also be characterized as the age of the laity, the
clergy, and the monks, and compared in respect of light with the stars,
the moon, and the sun. The first six periods of the N.T. age are divided
(after the pattern of the forty-two generations of Matt. i. and the forty-
two months or 1260 days of Rev. xi. 2, 3) into forty-two shorter periods
of thirty years each, so that the sixth period closes with a.d. 1260, and
then shall dawn the Sabbath period of the New Covenant as the age of
the Holy Spirit. This will be preceded by a short reign of antichrist as
a punishment for the corruptions of the church and clergy. By the
labours of the monks, however, the church is at last purified and
brought forth triumphant, and tbe life of holy contemplation becomes
universal. The germs of antichrist were evidently supposed to lie in the
Hohenstaufen empire of Frederick I, and Henry VI. The commentaries
on Isaiah and Jeremiah went so far as to point to the person of Frederick
II. as that of the antichrist.
6. Ghibelline Joachites in Italy, mostly recruited from the Franciscans,
sided with the emperor against the pope and adopted apocalyptic views
to suit their politics, and regarded the papacy as the precursor of anti-
christ. One of their chiefs, Oliva, who died in a.d. 1297, wrote a Fostilla
super Apoc, in which he denounced the Roman church of his day as the
Great Whore of Babylon, and his scholar Ubertino of Casale saw in the
beast that rose out of the sea (Rev. xiii.) a prophetic picture of the papacy.
— In Germany these views spread among tbe Dominicans during the 13th
century, especially in Swabia. The movement was headed by one Arnold.
§ 108. THE PKOTESTERS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 131
who wrote an Epistola de correctione ecciesice about a.d. 1216. He finds
in Innocent IV. the antichrist and in Frederick II. the executioner of
the Divine judgment and the inauguration of the reformation. Frede-
rick's death, which followed soon after in a.d. 1250, and the catastrophe
of A.D. 1268 (§ 96, 20), must have put an end to the whole movement.
7. Revohitionary Reformers. — (1) The Petrobrusians, whose founder,
Peter of Bruys, was a pupil of Ab^elard and a priest in 'the south of
France, repudiated the outward or visible church and sought the true
or invisible church in the hearts of believers. He insisted on the de-
struction of churches and sanctuaries because God could be worshi23ped
in a stable or tavern, burnt crucifixes in the cooking stove, eagerly
opposed celibacy, mass, and infant baptism, and after a twenty years'
career perished at the stake about a.d. 1126 at the hands of a raging
mob. One of Peter's companions, Henry of Lausanne, whose fiery elo-
quence had been influential in inciting to reform, succeeded to the
leadership of the Petrobrusians, who from him were called Henricians.
St. Bernard succeeded in winning many of them back. Henry was
condemned to imprisonment for life, and died in a.d. 1149. — (2) Arnold of
Brescia, who died in a.d. 1155, a preacher of great moral and religious ear-
nestness, addressed himself to attack the worldliness of the church and
the papacy. Except in maintaining that sacraments dispensed by unworthy
priests have no efficacy, he does not seem to have deviated from the
church doctrine. Officiating as reader in his native town, his bishop
complained of him as a heretic to the second Lateran Council of a.d.
1139. His views were coudemned, and he himself was banished and
enjoined to observe perpetual silence. He now went to his teacher
Abaslard in France. Here St. Bernard accused him at the synod con-
vened against Abaelard at Sens in a.d. 1141 (§ 102, 2) as "the armour-
bearer " of this " Goliath-heretic," and obtained the condemnation of
both. He was then excommunicated by Innocent II. and imprisoned in
a cloister. Arnold, however, escaped to Switzerland, where he lived and
taught undisturbed in Ziirich for some years, till Bishop Hermann of
Constance, at the instigation of the Saint of Clairvaux, threatened him
with imprisonment or exile. He was now taken under the protection of
Guido de Castella, Abselard's friend and patron, and accompanied him
to Bohemia and Moravia. On Guido's elevation as Coelestine II. to the
papal chair in a.d. 1143, Arnold returned to his native land. From a.d.
1146 we find him in Eome at the head of the agitation for political and
ecclesiastical freedom. For further details of his history, see § 96, 13,
14. A party of so-called Arnoldists occupied itself long after his death
with the carrying out of his ecclesiastico-political ideal.
8. — (3) The so called Pastorelles were roused to revolution by the mise-
ries following the crusades. An impulse was given to the sect by the
news of the imprisonment of St. Louis (§ 94, 6). A Cistercian Magister
132 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
Jacob from Hungary appeared in a.b. 1251 with the announcement that
he had seen the Mother of God, who gave him a letter calling upon the
pastors to rescue the Holy Sepulchre. Those who have heard the
Christmas message are called of God to undertake the great work which
neither the corrupt hierarchy nor the proud, ambitious nobles were able
to perform ; but before them, the poor shepherds, the sea will open a way,
so that they may hasten with dry feet to the release of king Louis. His
fanatical harangues soon gathered immense crowds of common people
around him, estimated at about 100,000 men. But instead of going to
the Holy Land, they first gave vent to their wrath against the clergy,
monks, and Jews at home by murdering, plundering, and ill treating them
in all manner of ways. The queen-mother Blanca, favourable at first,
now used all her power against them. Jacob was slain at Bourges, his
troops scattered, and their leaders executed. — (4) In the Apostolic Brothers
we have a blending of Arnoldist and Joachist tendencies. Their founder,
Gerhard Segarelli, an artisan of Parma, was moved about a.d. 1260 by
the sight of a picture of the apostles in their poverty to go about preach-
ing repentance and calling on the church to return to apostolic sim-
plicity. He did not question the doctrine of the church. Only when
Honorius in a.d. 1286 and Nicholas IV. in a.d. 1290 took measures against
them did they openly oppose the papacy and denounce the Roman church
as the apocalyptic Babylon. Segarelli was seized in a.d. 1294 and perished
in the flames with many of his followers in a.d. 1300. Fra Dolcino, a
younger priest, now took the leadership, and roused great enthusiasm by
his preaching against the Roman antichrist. He bravely held his ground
with 2,000 followers for two years in the recesses of the mountains, but
was reduced at last in a.d. 1307 by hunger, and died hke his predecessor
at the stake. He distinguished four stages in the historical development
of the kingdom of God on earth. The first two are those of the Father
and the Son in the O.T. and the N.T. The third begins with Con-
Stan tine's establishment of the Christian empire, advanced by the
Benedictine rule and the reforms of the Franciscans and Dominicans,
but afterwards falhug into decay. The fourth era of complete restora-
tion of the apostolic life is inaugurated by SegarelH and Dolcino. A new
chief sent of God will rule the church in peace, and the Holy Spirit will
never leave the restored communion of His saints. Remnants of the sect
were long in existence in France and Germany, where they united with
the Fraticelli and Beghards. Even in a.d. 1374 we find a synod at
Narbonne threatening them with the severest punishments.
9. Reforming Enthusiasts.— (1) A ccitain Tanchelm about a.d. 1115
preached in the Netherlands against the corruptions of the church. He
claimed like honour with Christ as being assisted by the same Spirit, is
said to have betrothed himself to the Virgin Mary, and to have been
killed at last in a.d. 1124 by a priest.— (2) A Frenchman, Eon de Stella
§ 108. THE PROTESTERS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 183
of Brittany, hearing in a churcli the words ''per Eum qui ventums est
judicare vivos et mortuos,'' and understanding it of his own name, went
through the country preaching, prophesying, and working miracles. He
secured many followers, and when persecuted, fled to the woods. He
denied the Divine institution of the hierarchy, denounced the Roman
church as false because of the wicked lives of the priests, rejected the
doctrine of a resurrection of the body, denied that marriage was a sacra-
ment, and regarded the communication of the Spirit by imposition of
hands the only true baptism. In a.d. 1148 troops were sent against him,
and he and many of his followers were taken prisoners. His adherents
were burnt, but Eon was brought before a synod at Rheims, where he
answered the question of the pope Eugenius III., " Who art thou? " by
saying Is qui venturus est, etc. He was then pronounced deranged and
delivered over to the custody of the archbishop.
10. The Waldensians. — A rich citizen of Lyons called Waldus had first
the gospels, then other books of the 0. and N.T., and finally a selection
from the works of the fathers, translated by two priests for his own in-
struction into the Romance dialect. Moved by the careful study of these
writings and impressed by the sudden death of a friend, about a.d. 1170
he distributed his goods to the poor and founded a society for preaching
the gospel among the people. They went forth like the seventy disciples
two and two, without staff or scrip, with wooden sandals or sabots on
their feet, a pattern of apostolic poverty and simplicity, preaching and
teaching through the land and calling upon the people to return to
apostolic purity of life and to study the Scriptures for themselves. They
were called Pauperes de Lugduno, Leonista, as coming from Lyons ;
and Sabatati as wearing sabots. The Arcbbishop of Lyons forbade their
preaching ; but they referred to Acts v. 29 and appealed to the third Late-
ran Council of a.d. 1179 under Alexander III. They were there, how-
ever, treated with contempt. As they still persisted in preaching, Lucius
III. in A.D. 1184 put them under the ban. They had not hitherto shown
any opposition to the doctrine, worship, or constitution of the Catholic
church. Even the ecclesiastical authorities had made no objection to
the substance of their preaching, but only to their exercising that func-
tion without a legitimate call. Innocent III. acknowledged the injudi-
ciousness of his predecessor, and agreed in a.d. 1209 to the plan of a
Spanish Waldensian, Durandus of Osca, or Huesca, to have the society of
Pauperes de Lugduno organized as an order of lay monks of Pauperes
Catholici, who should preach, expound Scripture, and give practical
instruction under episcopal supervision. But this came too late. The
church itself had severed the ties which had hitherto bound them to the
traditional doctrines of Catholicism, and the Leonists were now too far
advanced on the path of evangelical freedom to be thus induced to re-
turn. Innocent now renewed the ban against them at the fourth Laterau
134 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
Council of A.D. 1215. Of the later life and activity of the founder only
this is known with certainty, that he made extensive journeys for the
advancement of his cause. Even during his lifetime his followers had
spread greatly over all the south of France, the east of Spain, the north of
Italy, the south of Germany ; they were even found in the Netherlands
and as far as England. Although they had a great abhorrence of the
Catharists and denounced their proceedings as demoniacal, they were
often confounded with them, and were with equal eagerness persecuted
by the Spanish Inquisition, which sent thousands of them to the stake.
— The remnants of the German Waldensians got mixed up during the
15th century with the Bohemian and Moravian Brethren {§ 119, 8, 9) ;
those of France and Italy retired into the remote valleys of the western
and eastern spurs of the Cottian] Alps, into Dauphine, Provence, and
Piedmont. From a.d. 1310 they sent forth from Piedmont, with the
connivance of the local government, thriving colonies into Calabria and
Apulia. The French Waldensians in Provence and Dauphine succumbed
in A.D. 1545 to the violent persecutions to which they were subjected,
and those of Southern Italy were routed out some sixteen years later
(§ 139, 25). But the Piedmontese, in spite of the most severe and per-
sistent persecution, continue to the present day (§ 201, 4). The per-
secutions began at the beginning of the 15th century, when their country
came under the rule of the house of Savoy, and continued till a.d. 1477,
when Innocent VIII. organized an exterminating crusade from Savoy and
France which slaughtered 18,000 men. They had now rest for a long
while, until their Protestant sympathies in the 16th century roused per-
secution anew (^§ 139, 25; 153, 5).
11. The most important Sources of Information for the early history of
the Waldensians, besides the Acts of Synod and the Inquisition, are the
Catholic controversalists. Of these the most important are the following :
Bernard, abbot of Fonscalidus, Alanus (§ 102, 5), Walter Mapes, arch-
deacon of Oxford {Dc secta Waldens.), Stephen de Borbone about a.d.
1250, the Dominicans Moneta and Rainerius, and David of Augsburg,
who wrote De hccresi imuperum de Lugduno (§ 103, 10). False views in
contradiction to the description given in these works prevailed among
historians till the present generation. Dieckhoff, Herzog, Todd, and
Preger have thoroughly sifted this Waldensian mythology. It had been
maintained that long before Waldus of Lyons Waldensian communities
existed in the valleys of Piedmont, the " Israel of the Alps," preserving
the gospel in its purity, and owing their origin to Claudius of Turin
(§ 92, 2) or even to the Apostle Paul, who on his journey to Spain had
visited these recesses. From them Peter of Lyons had got his religious
quickening and the surname of Waldus, the Waldensian. For proof of
this assertion they referred to the Waldensian Manuscripts, preserved in
Geneva, Dublin, Cambridge, Ziirich, Grenoble, and Paris, composed in a
§ 108. THE PKOTESTERS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 135
peculiar Romance dialect. But wheu these were examined they were
found to belong to three different periods. In the tracts belonging to
the first period, which cannot be placed earlier than the 14th century,
the complete separation of the Waldensian doctrine and practice from
those of the Catholic church is not yet maintained. Complaint is made
of the corruptions of the church, but the meritoriousuess of fasts and
almsgiving, clerical celibacy, the mass, and auricular confession are
still insisted upon. They occupy the position described by the Catholic
controversialists, and like them know nothing of Waldeusians before
VValdus. The writings of the second period were composed under Hussite
influence, but such views they do not seek to ascribe to an old Walden-
sian source. In the documents of the third period, however, that of the
Protestantising Waldensians of the 16th century (§ 139, 25), Rome is
identified with Babylon, the pope is antichrist, worship of saints is
idolatry, enforced celibacy is repudiated, monkery is denounced, the
doctrine of merits and indulgences, purgatory, the mass, auricular con-
fession, etc., are condemned. They do not shrink from barefaced forgery
as well by means of interpolation, excision, and alteration in earlier works
as by means of new writings, in order to vindicate a venerable antiquity
for the evangelical purity of their community. These documents were
industriously and successfully used by their historians, Perrin, Leger,
Mustou, Monastier, etc. In the "Noble Lesson," belonging to the former
class of writings, a didactic religious poem, where the statement occurs
that 1,400 years had passed since the composition of the N. T. Scriptures,
the figure 4 was erased, to show that Waldensian communities existed
in A.D. 1100, seventy years before the appearance of Waldus of Lyons.
But when in a.d. 18(52 the Morland MS 3., lost for 200 years, were discovered
again at Cambridge (§ 153, 5), a text of the "Noble Lesson " was found
in which before the word "c<?»f." an erasure had been made, in which,
however, the loop of the Arabic figure 4 was still discernible, while in
another passage the statement referred to was quoted as " 3111 c CGCC
anz.^^ The Hussite writings were introduced among the Waldensians by
the Bohemians as genuine works of the earlier centuries. To the Con-
fession of Faith of the Waldensians was assigned the date a.d. 1120, but
from Morel's account of his negotiations with (Ecolampadius and Bucer
(§ 139, 25) it appears that the Protestant tone of the formulary is largely
the work of these reformers.^
1 Perrin, " History of the Vaudois," London, 1624. Muston, "Israel
of the Alps," 2 vols., Glasgow, 1858. Monastier, " History of the
Vaudois Church from its Origin," New York, 1849. Peyran, "Historical
Defence of the Waldenses or Vaudois," London, 1826. Todd, " The
Waldensian Manuscripts," London, 1865. Wylie, "History of the Wal-
densians," Loudon, 1880, Comba, "History of the Waldenses," Loa-
don, 1888,
136 THE CtErmano-romanic church to a.d. 1294.
12. The Poor Men of Italy or Lombardy, and their Relation to the Walden-
sians. — These were called Pauperes Spiritu and HamiUati, as having
their origin probably from the workmen's guilds of the 12th century
(§ 98, 7). Adopting Arnoldist views they became estranged from the
Catholic church and were brought into friendly relations with the French
Waldensians. They were distinguished from the Waldensians, however,
by these two characteristics : (1) They maintained that the efficacy of
the means of grace depended on the worthiness of the officiating priest,
and (2) they had workmen's leagues (Congregationes lahorantium) . The
former associates them with the Arnoldists ; the latter, with the Humili-
ates. In common with the Waldensians they acknowledged the Scriptures
as the only source of religious knowledge and spiritual priesthood as the
right of all baptized believers, and claimed for all Christians the privilege
of studying the word of God. Their clergy wrought with their hands
for their own support, to which the Waldensians took exception, founding
upon Luke x. 7, 8. More serious was the difference of view as to the
effect of a priest's unworthiness on the dispensation of the sacrament.
Regarding all Catholic priests as unworthy, they were obliged to have a
priesthood of their own, whom they designated not Sacerdoten but Minii^tri,
with a Prcspositus corresponding to a bishop at their head. The Wal-
densians, on the other hand, had recourse to their own Ministri only
where they could not have the sacrament from Catholic priests. Their
pastors they named Barhe>i, i.e. Uncle ; and the institution was regarded
as temporary, and the appointments were at first only for a year, but
subsequently for life. Among both the spiritual priesthood of believers
was strongly insisted upon. The pastors had stricter obligations laid
upon them in the enforcement of celibacy and absolute poverty. This
distinction between the clergy and the laity was soon dropped by the
Italians, but retained by the Waldensians till they became Protestantised
during the 16th century. The Italians seem also to have been in advance
of the Waldensians in the rejection of compulsory confession and fast-
ing, worship of saints, the doctrine of purgatory, and probably also in
the refusal of canonical authority to the apocryphal books of the O.T.
About A.D. 1260 they had forty-two congregations in the diocese of
Passau, with a bishop at their head. From this centre they spread out
over the neighbouring countries as far as Northern Germany. In spite
of constant persecution, which repeatedly brought hundreds of them to
the stake, they maintained a footing in Austria, Bohemia, and Moravia
down to the 15th century, when the remnants went over into the ranks
of the Bohemian Brethren.
§ 109. THE CHURCH AGAINST THE PROTESTERS. 137
§ 109. The Church against the Protesters.
The church was by no means indifferent to the spread of
those heresies of the 11th and 12th centuries, which called
in question its own very existence. Even in the 11th cen-
tury she called in the aid of the stake as a type of the fire
of hell that would consume the heretics, and against this only
one voice, that of Bishop Wazo of Liege (f a.d. 1048), was
raised. In the 12th century protesting voices were more
numerous : Peter the Venerable (§ 98, 1), E^upert of Deutz,
St. Hildegard, St. Bernard, declared sword and fire no fit
weapons for conversion. St. Bernard showed by his own
example how by loving entreaty and friendly instruction
more might be done than by awakening a fanatical enthusi-
asm for martyrdom. But hangmen and stakes were more
easily produced than St. Bernards, of whom the 12th and
13th centuries had by no means a superabundance. By-and-
by Dominic sent out his disciples to teach and convert here-
tics by preaching and disputation ; as long as they confined
themselves to these methods they were not without success.
But even they soon found it more congenial or more effec-
tive to fight the heretics with tortures and the stake
rather than with discussion and discourse. The Albigensian
crusade and the tribunal of the Inquisition erected in con-
nection therewith at last overpowered the protesters and
drove the remnants of their sects into hiding. In the
administration of punishment the church made no distinction
between the various sects ; all were alike who were at war
with the church.
1. The Albigensian Crusade, A.D. 1209-1229.— Toward the end of the
12th century sects abounded in the south of France. Innocent III.
regarded them as worse than the Saracens, and in a.d. 1203 sent a
legate, Peter of Castelnau, with full powers to secure their extermina-
tion. But Peter was murdered in a.d. 1208, and suspicion fell on
Raymond IV., Count of Toulouse. A crusade under Simon de Montfort
was now summoned a.qainst the sectaries, who as mainly inhabiting the
138 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1294.
district of Albigeois were now called Albigensians. A twenty years' war
was carried on with mad fanaticism and cruelty on both sides, in which
guilty and innocent, men, women, and children were ruthlessly slain.
At the sack of Beziers with 20,000 inhabitants the papal legate cried,
" Slay all, the Lord will know how to seek out and save His own." ^
2. The Inquisition. — Every one screening a heretic forfeiteil lands,
goods, and office ; a house in which such a one was discovered was
levelled to the ground ; all citizens had to communicate thrice a year,
and every second year to renew their oath of attachment to the church,
and to refuse all help in sickness to those suspected of heresy, etc. The
bishops not showing themselves zealous enough in enforcing these laws,
Gregory IX. in a.d. 1232 founded the Tribunal of the Inquisition, and
placed it in the hands of the Dominicans. These as Bomini canes subjected
to the most cruel tortures all on whom the suspicion of heresy fell, and
all the resolute were handed over to the civil authorities, who readily
undertook their execution,^ — Continuation 117, § 2.
3. Conrad of Marburg and the Stedingers. — The first Inquisitor of
Germany, the Dominican Conrad of Marburg, also known as the severe
confessor of St. Elizabeth (§ 105, 3), after a three years' career of cruelty
was put to death by certain of the nobles in a.d. 1233. Et sic, say the
Annals of Worms, divino auxilio Uberata est Teutonia ah isto judicio
enormi et inaudito. He was enrolled by Gregory IX. among the martyrs.
Perhaps wrongly he has been blamed for Gregory's crusade of a.d. 1284
against the Stedingers. These were Frisians of Oldenburg who revolted
against the oppression of nobles and priests, refused socage and tithes,
and screened Albigensian heretics. The first crusade failed ; the second
succeeded and plundered, murdered, and burned on every hand. Thou-
sands of the unhappy peasants were slain, neither women nor children
were spared, and all prisoners were sent to the stake as heretics.
^ Sismondi, "History of Crusades against the Albigenses of the 13th
Century." London, 1826.
- Limborch, "History of the Inquisition." 2 vols. London, 1731.
Lea, " History of the Inquisition." 3 vols. Philad. and London, 1888.
Baker, " History of Inquisition in Portugal, Spain, Italy," etc. London,
1703. Prescott, " History of Ferdinand and Isabella," pt. i., ch. vii.
Llorente, " Histoire critique de I'lnquisition d'Espagne." Paris, 1818.
Rule, " History of Inquisition." 2 vols. London, 1874.
THIRD SECTION.
HISTOEY or THE GERMANO-HOMANIC CHURCH IN
THE 14th and 15th CENTURIES (a.d 1294-1517).
I. The Hierarchy, Clergy, and Monks.
§ 110. The Papacy.i
From the time of Gelasius 11. (§ 9G, 11) it had been the
custom of the popes whenever Italy became too hot for them
to fly to Erance, and from France they had obtained help to
deliver Italy from the tyranny of the latest representatives
of the Hohenstaiifens. But when Boniface YIIL dared boldly
to assert the universal sovereignty of the papacy even over
France itself, this presumption wrought its own overthrow.
The consequence was a seventy years' exile of the papal chair
to the banks of the Rhone, with complete subjugation under
French authority. Under the protection of the French
court, however, the popes found Avignon a safe asylum, and
from thence they issued the most extravagant hierarchical
claims, especially upon Germany. The return of the papal
court to Rome was the occasion of a forty years' schism,
during which two popes, for a time even three, are seen
hurling anathemas at one another. The reforming Councils
of Pisa, Constance, and Basel sought to put an end to this
scandal and bring about a reformation in the head and
the members. The fathers in these councils, however, in
accordance with the prevalent views of the age, maintained
the need of one visible head for the government of the
^ Creighton, •' History of the Papacy during the Eeformation." Vols,
i.-iv., A.D. 1378-1518. London, 1882 ff. Gosselin, "The Power of the
Popes during the Middle Ages." 2 vols. London, 1853. Keichel, " See
of Eome in the Middle Ages." London, 1870.
139
140 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
church, such as was afforded by the papacy. But the corrup-
tions of the papal chair led them to adopt the old theory
that the highest ecclesiastical authority is not the pope
but the voice of the universal church expressed in the
oecumenical councils, which had jurisdiction over even the
popes. The successful carrying out of this view was
possible only if the several national churches which had
come now more decidedly than ever to regard themselves as
independent branches of the great ecclesiastical organism,
should heartily combine against the corrupt papacy. But
this they did not do. They were contented with making
separate attacks, in accordance with their several selfish
interests. Hence papal craft found little difficulty in ren-
dering the strong remonstrances of these councils fruitless
and without result. The papacy came forth triumphant, and
during the 1 5th century, the age of the Renaissance, reached
a degree of corruption and moral turpitude which it had not
approached since the 10th century. The vicars of God now
used their spiritual rank only to further their ambitious
worldly schemes, and by the most scandalous nepotism (the so-
called nephews being often bastards of the popes, who were
put into the highest and most lucrative offices) as well as by
their own voluptuousness, luxury, revelry, and love of war,
brought ruin upon the church and the States of the Church.
1. Boniface VIII. and Benedict XI., A.D. 1294-1304.— Boniface VIII., a.d.
1294-1303 (§ 96, 22), was not inferior to his great predecessor in political
talents ^nd strength of will, but was destitute of all spiritual qualities
and without any appreciation of the spiritual functions of the papal
chair, while passionately maintaining the most extravagant claims of the
hierarchy. The opposition to the pope was headed by two cardinals oi
the powerful Colonna family, who maintained that the abdication of
Ccfilestine V. was invalid. In a.d. 1297 Boniface stripped them of all
their dignities, and then they appealed to an cecumenical council as a
court of higher jurisdiction. The pope now threatened them and their
supporters with the ban, fitted out a crusade against them, and destroyed
their castles. At last after a sore struggle Palaestrina, the old residence
of their family, capitulated. Also the Colonnas themselves submitted.
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 141
Nevertheless in a.d. 1299 he had the famous old city and all its churches
and palaces levelled to the ground, and refused to restore to the outlawed
family its confiscated estates. Then again the Colonnas took up arms,
but were defeated and obliged to fly the country, while the pope forbade
under threat of the ban any city or realm to give refuge or shelter to the
fugitives. But neither his anathema nor his army was able to keep the
rebellious Sicilians under papal dominion. Even in his first contest
with the French king, Philip IV. the Fair, a.d. 1285-1314, he had the
worst of it. The pope had vainly sought to mediate between Philip and
Edward I. of England, when both were using church property in carry-
ing on war with one another, and in a.d. 1295 he issued the bull Clericis
laicos, releasing subjects from their allegiance and anathematizing all
laymen who should appropriate ecclesiastical revenues and all priests
who should put them to uses not sanctioned by the pope. Philip then
forbade all payment of church dues, and the pope finding his revenues
from France withheld, made important concessions in a.d. 1297 and
canonized Philip's grandfather, Louis IX. His hierarchical assumptions
in Germany gave promise of greater success. After the first Hapsburger's
death in a.d. 1291, his son Albert was set aside, and Adolf, Count of
Nassau, elected king; but he again was overthrown and Albert I. crowned
in A.D. 1298. Boniface summoned Albert to his tribunal as a traitor and
murderer of the king, and released the German princes from their oaths
of allegiance to him. Meanwhile, during a.d. 1301, Boniface and Philip
were quarrelling over vacant benefices in France. The king haughtily
repudiated the pretensions of the papal legate and imprisoned him as
a traitor. Boniface demanded his immediate liberation, summoned the
French bishops to a council at Eome, and in the bull Amculta fill showed
the king how foolish, sinful, and heretical it was for him not to be subject
to the pope. The bull torn from the messenger's hands was publicly burnt,
and a version of it probably falsified published throughout the kingdom
along with the king's reply. All France rose in revolt against the papal
pretensions, and a parliament at Notre Dame in Paris a.d. 1302, at which
the king assembled the three estates of the empire, the nobles, the
clergy, and (for the first time) the citizens, it was unanimously resolved
to support Philip and to write in that spirit to Eome, the bishops under-
taking to pacify the pope, the nobles and citizens making their complaint
to the cardinals. The king expressly forbade his clergy taking any part
in the council that had been summoned, which, however, met in the
Lateran, in Nov., 1302. From it Boniface issued the famous bull Unam
Sanctarn, in which, after the example of Innocent III. and Gregory IX.,
he set forth the doctrine of the two swords, the spiritual wielded by
the church and the temporal for the church, by kings and warriors
indeed, but only according to the will and by the permission of the
spiritual ruler. That the temporal power is independent was pronounced
142 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
Manichfean heresy ; and finally it was declared that no human being
could be saved unless he were subject to the Roman pontiff. King and
parliament now accused the pope of heresy, simony, blasphemy, sorcery,
tyranny, immorality, etc., and insisted that he should answer these
charges before an cecumenical council. Meanwhile, in a.d. 1303,
Boniface was negotiating with king Albert, and got him not only to break
his league with Philip, but also to acknowledge himself a vassal of the
papal see. The pope had all his plans laid for launching his anathema
against Philip, but their execution was anticipated by the king's assassins.
His chancellor Nogaret and Sciarra, one of the exiled Colonnas, who,
with the help of French gold, had hatched a conspiracy among the
barons, attacked the papal palace and took the pope prisoner while he
sat in full state upon his throne. The people indeed rescued him, but
he died some weeks after in a raging fever in his 80th year. Dante assigns
him a place in hell. In the mouth of his predecessor Coclestine V. have
been put the prophetic words, Ascendisti ut viilpes, regnatis iit leo, viorieris
ut canis.^ His successor Benedict XI., a.d. 1303, 1301, would have will-
ingly avenged the wrongs of Boniface, but weak and unsupported as he
was he soon found himself obliged, not only to withdraw all imputations
against Philip, who always maintained his innocence, but also to absolve
those of the Colonnas who were less seriously implicated.
2. The Papacy during the Babylonian Exile, A.D. 1305-1377. — After a
year's vacancy the papal chair was filled by Bertrand de Got, Archbishop
of Bordeaux, a determined supporter of Boniface, who took the name of
Clement V., a.d. 1305-1314. He refused to go to be enthroned at Rome,
and forced the cardinals to come to Lyons, and finally, in a.d. 1309,
formally removed the papal court to Avignon, which then belonged to the
king of Naples as Count of Provence. At this time, too, Clement so far
yielded to Philip's wish to have Boniface condemned and struck out of
the list of popes, as to appoint two commissions to consider charges
against Bonifaca, one in France and the other in Italy. Most credible
witnesses accused the deceased pope of heresies, crimes, and immorahties
committed in word and deed mostly in their presence, while the rebutting
evidence was singularly weak. A compromise was effected by Clement
surrendering the Templars to the greedy and revengeful king. In the
bull Rex gloricB of a.d. 1311 he expressly declares that Philip's proceed-
ing against Boniface was bona fide, occasioned by zeal for church and
country, cancels all Boniface's decrees and censures upon the French king
and his servants, and orders them to be erased from the archives. The
15th oecumenical Council of Vienue in A.D. 1311 was mainly occupied with
the affairs of the Templars, and also with the consideration of the contro-
^ On Boniface VIII. see a paper in Wiseman's •* Essays on Various
Subjects." Londou, 1888.
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 143
versies in the Franciscan order (§ 112, 27). — Henry VII. of Luxemburg
was raised to the German throne on Albert's death in a.d. 1203 in opposi-
tion to Philip's brother Charles. Clement supported him and crowned
him emperor, hoping to be protected by him from Philip's tyranny. At
Milan in a.d. 1311 Henry received the iron crown of Lombardy ; but at
Kome the imperial coronation was effected in a.d. 1312, not in St. Peter's,
the inner city being held by Kobert of Naples, papal vassal and govejnor
of Italy, but only in the Lateran at the hands of the cardinals com-
missioned to do so. The emperor now, in spite of all papal threats,
pronounced the ban of the empire against Kobert, and in concert with
Frederick of Sicily entered on a campaign against Naples, but his
sudden death in a.d. 1313 (according to an unsupported legend caused
by a poisoned host) put an end to the expedition. Clement also died
in the following year ; and to him likewise has Dante assigned a place
in hell.
3. Alter two years' murderous strife between the Italian and French
cardinals, the French were again victorious, and elected at Lyons John
XXII., A.D. 1316-1334, son of a shoemaker of Cahors in Gascony, who
was already seventy-two years old. He is said to have sworn to the
Italians never to use a horse or mule but to ride to Kome, and then to
have taken ship on the Khone for Avignon, where during his eighteen
years' pontificate he never went out of his palace except to go into the
neighbouring cathedral. Working far into the night, this seemingly weak
old man was wont to devote all his time to his studies and his business.
The weight of his official duties will be seen from the fact that 60,000
minutes, filling 59 vols, in the papal archives, belong to his reign. — In
Germany, after the death of Henry VII. there were ^two rivals for the
throne, Louis IV. the Bavarian, a.d. 1314-1347, and Frederick III. of
Austria. The pope, maintaining the closest relations with Kobert of
Anjou, his feudatory as king of Naples and his protector as Count of
Provence, and esteeming his wish as a command, refused to acknowledge
either, declared the German throne still vacant, and assumed to himself
the administration of the realm during the vacancy. At Miihldorf in a.d.
1322 Louis conquered his opponent and took him prisoner. He sent
a detachment of Ghibellines over the Alps, while he made himself master
of Milan and put an end to the papal administration in Northern Italy.
The pope in a.d. 1323 ordered him within three months to cease dis-
charging all functions of government till his election as German king
should be acknowledged and confirmed by the papal chair. Louis first
endeavoured to come to an understanding with the pope, but soon em-
ployed the sharp pens of the Minorites, who in May, 1324, drew up a
solemn protest in which the king, basing his claims to royalty solely on
the election of the princes and treating the pope as one who had forfeited
his chair in consequence of his heresies (§ 112, 2), appealed from this
144 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
false pope to an oecumenical council and a future legitimate pope.
John now thundered an anathema against him, declared that he was
deprived of all his dignities, freed his subjects from their allegiance, for-
bade them, under jjain of anathema, to obey him, and summoned all Euro-
pean potentates to war against the excommunicated monarch. Louis
now sought Frederick's favour, and in a.d. 1325 shared with him the
royal dignity. In Milan in a.1). 1327 he was crowned king of Lombardy,
and in a.d. 1328 in Eome he received the imperial crown from the Eoman
democracy. Two bishops of the Ghibelline party gave him consecration,
and the crown was laid on his head by Sciarra Colonna in the name o
the Koman people. In vain did the pope pronounce all these proceedings
null and void. The king began a process against the pope, deposed him
as a heretic and antichrist, and finally condemned him to death as guilty
of high treason, while the mob carried out this sentence by burning the
pope in ettigy upon the streets. The people and clergy of Eome, in accord-
ance with an old canon, elected a new pope in the person of a pious
Minorite of the sect of the Spirituales (§ 112, 2), who took the name of
Nicholas V. Louis with his own hand placed the tiara on his head, and
was then himself crowned by him. All this glory, however, was but
short lived. An unsuccessful and inglorious war against Eobert of Naples
and a consequent revolt in Eome caused the emperor in a.d. 1328, with
his army and his pope, amid the stonethrowing of the mob, to quit the
eternal city, which immediately became subject to the curia. He did
not fare much better in Tuscany or Lombardy; and thus the Eoman
expedition ended in failure. Returning to Munich, Louis endeavoured
in vain amid many humiliations to move the determined old man at
Avignon. But Nicholas V., the most wretched of all the anti-popes, went
to Avignon with a rope about his neck in a.d. 1328, cast himself at the
pope's feet, was absolved, and died a prisoner in the papal palace in
A.D. 1333. Next year John died. Notwithstanding the expensive Italian
wars 25,000,000 gold guldens was found in the papal treasury at his
death. — Eoused by his opposition to the stricter party among the Fran-
ciscans (§ 112, 2), its leaders lent all their influence to the Bavarian and
supported the charge of heresy against the pope. Against John's favour-
ite doctrine that the souls of departed saints attain to the vision of God
only after the last judgment, these zealots cited the opinions of the
learned world (§ 113, 3), with the University of Paris at its head. Philip
VI. of France was also in the controversy one of his bitterest opponents,
and even threatened him with the stake. Pressed on all sides the pope
at last in a.d. 1333 convened a commission of scholars to decide the ques-
tion, but died before its judgment was given. His successor hasted to
still the tumult by issuing the story of a deathbed recantation, and gave
ecclesiastical sanction to the opposing view.
4. Benedict XII., a.d. 1334-1342, would probably have yielded to the
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 145
urgent entreaties of the Romans to return to Rome bad not his cardinals
been so keenly opposed. He then built a palace at Avignon of imposing
magnitude, as though the papacy were to have an eternal residence
there. Louis the Bavarian retracted his heretical sentiments in order to
get the ban removed and to obtain an orderly coronation. The first diet
of the electoral union was held at Rhense near Mainz, in a. d. 1338, where
it was declared that the election of a G-erman king and emperor was, by
God's appointment, the sole privilege of the elector-princes, and needed
not the confirmation or approval of the pope. This encouraged Louis
to assert anew his imperial pretensions. Benedict's successor Clement
VI., A.D. 1342-1352, added by purchase in a.d. 1348 the city of Avignon to
the county of Venaissin, which Philip III. had gifted to the papal chair in
A D. 1273. Both continued in the possession of the Roman court till a.d.
1791 (§ 164, 13). Louis, now at feud with some of the powerful German
nobles, sought to make terms of peace with the new pope. But Clement
was not conciliatory, and made the unheard of demand that Louis should
not only annul all his previous ordinances, but also should in future issue
no enactment in the empire without permission of the papal see ; and on
Maunday Thursday, a.d. 1346, he pronounced him without title or dig-
nity and called upon the electors to make a new choice, which, if they
failed to do, he would proceed to do himself. As fittest candidate he
recommended Charles of Bohemia, who was actually chosen by the five
electors who answered the summons, under the title of Charles IV., a.d.
1346-1378, and had his election confirmed by the pope. The new
emperor solemnly promised never to set foot on the domains of the
Roman church without express papal permission, and to remain in Rome
only so long as was required for his coronation. Louis died before
he was able to engage in war with his rival, and when, six months later,
the next choice of Louis' party also died, Charles was acknowledged with-
out a dissentient voice. He was crowned emperor in Rome by a cardinal
appointed by Innocent YL, in a.d. 1355. Without doing anything to
restore the imperial prestige in Italy, Charles went back like a fugitive
to Germany, despised by Guelphs and Ghibellines. But in the following
year, at the Diet of Nuremberg, he passed a new imperial law in the
so called Golden Bull of a.d. 1356, according to which the election of
emperor was to be made at Frankfort, by three clerical electors (Mainz;,
Cologne, and Treves) and four temporal princes (Bohemia, the Palatine
of the Rhine, Saxony, and Brandenburg), and he appeased the pope's
wrath by various concessions to the curia and the clergy.
5. The famous Rienzi was made apostolic notary by Clement VI. in
A.D. 1343, and as tribune of the people headed the revolt against the
barons in a.d. 1347. Losing his popularity through his own extrava-
gances he was obliged to flee, and being taken prisoner by Charles at
Prague, he was sent to Avignon in a.d. 1 J50. lustead of the stake with
lO
146 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
wliich Clement had threatened him, Innocent VI., a.d. 1352-1362, be-
stowed senatorial rank upon him, and sent him to Kome, hoping that
his demagogical talent would succeed in furthering the interests of the
papacy. He now once more, amid loud acclamations, entered the eternal
city, but after two months, hated and cursed as a tyrant, he was
murdered in a.d. 1354, while attempting flight. — By a.d. 1367 things
had so improved in Rome that, notwithstanding the opposition of king aud
court and the objections of luxurious cardinals unwilling to quit Avignon,
Urban V., a.d. 1362-1370, in October of that year made a triumphal
entrance into Rome amid the jubilations of the Romans. Charles'
Italian expedition of the following year was inglorious and without
result. The disquiet and party strifes prevailing through the country
made the position of the pope so uncomfortable, that notwithstanding
the earnest entreaty of St. Bridget (§112, 8), who threatened him with
the Divine judgment of an early death in France, he returned in a.d.
1370 to Avignon, where in ten weeks the words of the northern pro-
phetess were fulfilled. His successor was Gregory XI., a.d. 1370-1378.
Rome and the States of the Church had now again become the scene of
the wildest anarchy, which Gregory could only hope to quell by his
personal presence. The exhortations of the two prophetesses of the
age, St. Bridget and St. Catherine (§112, 4), had a powerful influence
upon him, but what finally determined him was the threat of the ex-
asperated Romans to elect an anti-pope. And so in spite of the
renewed opposition of the cardinals and the French court, the curia
again returned to Rome in a.d. 1377 ; but though the rejoicing at the
event throughout the city was great, the results were by no means what
had been expected. Sick and disheartened, the pope was already begin-
ning to speak of going back to Avignon, when his death in a.d. 1378 put
an end to his cares and sufferings.
6. The Papal Schism and the Council of Pisa. — Under pressure from the
people the cardinals present in Rome almost unanimously chose the
Neapolitan archbishop of Bari, who took the name of Urban VI., a.d.
1378-1389. His energies were mainly directed to the emancipating of the
papal chair from French interference and checking the abuses intro-
duced into the papal court during the Avignon residence ; but the
impatience and bitterness which he showed in dealing with the greed,
pomp, and luxury of the cardinals roused them to choose another pope.
After four months, they met at Fundi, declared that the choice of
Urban had been made under compulsion, and was therefore invalid. In
his place they elected a Frenchman, Robert, cardinal of Geneva, who
was enthroned under the name of Clement VII., a.d. 1378-1391. The
three Italians present protested against this proceeding and demanded,
but in vain, the decision of a council. Thus began the greatest and
most mischievous papal scliism, a.d. 1378-1417. France, Naples, and
^ 110. THE PAPACY. 147
Savoy at once, and Spain and Scotland somewhat later, declared in
favour of Clement ; while the rest of Western Europe acknowledged
Urban. The two most famous saints of the age, St. Catherine and St.
Vincent Ferrer (§ 115, 2), though both disciples of Dominic, took dif-
ferent sides, the former as an Italian favouring Urban, the latter as
a Spaniard favouring Clement. Failing to secure a footing in Italy,
Clement took possession of the papal castle at Avignon in ad. 1379.
The schism lasted for forty years, during which time Boniface IX., a.d.
1389-1104, Innocent VII., A.D. 1401-1106, and Gregory XII., a.d. 1406-
1415, elected by the cardinals in Kome, held sway there in succession,
while at Avignon on Clement's death his place was taken by the
Spanish cardinal Pedro de Luna as Benedict XIII., a.d. 1394-1424.
The Council of Paris of a.d, 1395 recommended the withdrawal of both
popes and a new election, but Benedict insisted upon a decision by a
two-thirds majority in favour of one or other of the two rivals. An
oecamenical council at Pisi in a.d. 1409, dominated mainly by the
influence of Gerson (§118, 4), who maintained that the authority of the
councils is superior to that of the pope, made short work with both
contesting poj)es, whom it pronounced contumacious and deposed.
After the cardinals present had bound themselves by an oath that
whosoever of them might be chosen should not dissolve the council
until a reform of the church in its head and members should be carried
out, they elected a Greek of Caudia in his seventieth year, Cardinal
Philangi, who was consecrated as Alexander V., a.d. 1409-1410, and for
three years the council continued to sit without effecting any consider-
able reforms. The consequence was that the world had the edifying
spectacle of three contemporary popes anathematizing one another.
7. The Council of Constance and Martin V. — Alexander V. died after
a reign of ten months by poison administered, as was supposed, by
Balthasar Cossa, resident cardinal legate and absolute military despotj
suspected of having been in youth engaged in piracy. Cossa succeeded,
as John XXIII., a.d. 1410-1415. He was acknowledged by the new
Roman king, Sigismund, a.d. 1411-1437, 'and soon afterwards, in a.d. 1412,
by Ladislas of Naples, so that Gregory XII. was thus deprived of his last
support. The University of Paris continued to demand the holding of a
council to effect reforms. Sigismund, supported by the princes, insisted
on its being held in a German city. Meanwhile Ladislas had quarrelled
with the pope, and had overrun the States of the Church and plundered
Rome in a.d. 1413, and John was obliged to submit to Sigismund's de-
mands. He now summoned the loth oecumenical Council of Constance, a.d.
1414-1418 (§ 119, 5). It was the most brilliant and the most numerously
attended council ever held. More than 18,000 priests and vast numbers
of princes, counts, and knights, with an immense following ; in all about
100,000 strangers, including thousands of harlots from all countries, and
148 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
hordes of merchants, artisans, showmen, and players of every sort.
Gerson and D'Ailly, the one representing European learning, the other
the claims of the Galilean church (§ 118, 4), were the principal advisers
of the council. The decision to vote not individually but by nations
(Italian, German, French, and English) destroyed the predominance of
the Italian prelates, who as John's creatures were present in great num-
bers. Terrified by an anonymous accusation, which charged the pope
with the most heinous crimes, he declared himself ready to withdraw if the
other two popes would also resign, but took advantage of the excitement
of a tournament to make his escape disguised as an ostler. Sigismund
could with dilficulty keep the now popeless council together. John,
however, was captured, seventy-two serious charges formulated against
him, and on 26th July, a.d. 1415, he was deposed and condemned to im-
prisonment for life. He was given up to the Count Palatine Louis of
Baden, who kept him prisoner in Mannheim, and afterwards in Heidel-
berg. Meanwhile the leader of an Italian band making use of the name
of Martin V. purchased his release with 3,000 ducats. He now sub-
mitted himself to that pope, and was appointed by him cardinal-bishop of
Tuscoli, and dean of the sacred college, but soon afterwards died in Flor-
ence, in A.D. 1419. Gregory XII. also submitted in a.d. 1415, and was made
cardinal-bishop of Porto. Benedict, however, retired to Spain and refused
to come to terms, but even the Spanish princes withdrew their allegiance
from him as pope. The cardinals in conclave elected the crafty Oddo
Colonna, who was consecrated as Martin V., a.d, 1417-1431. There was no
more word of reformation. With great pomp the council was closed, and
indulgence granted to its members. As the whole West now recognised
Martin as the true pope the schism may be said to end with his acces-
sion, though Benedict continued to thunder anathemas from his strong
Spanish castle till his death in a.d, 1424, and three of his four cardinals
elected as his successor Clement VIII. and the fourth another Benedict
XIV. Of the latter no notice was taken, but Clement submitted in a,d.
1429, and received the bishopric of Majorca. — Martin V. on entering
Eome in a,d. 1420 found everything in confusion and desolate. By his
able administration a change was soon effected, and the Rome of the
Renaissanee rose on the ruins of the mediaeval city.^
8. Eu^enius IV. and the Council of Basel. — Martin V. commissioned
Cardinal Julian Cesarini to look after the Hussite controversy in the
Basel Council, a.d,'1431-1449. His successor Eugenius IV., a.d. 1431-1447,
confirmed this appointment. After thirteen months he ordered the
council to meet at Bologna, finding the heretical element too strong in
Germany. The members, Ihowever, unanimously refused to obey. Sigis-
^ Lenfant, " History of the Council of Constance." 2 vols. London,
1730.
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 149
mund, too, protested, and the council claimed to be superior to the pope.
The withdrawal of the bull within sixty days was insisted upon. As a
compromise, the pope offered to call a new council, not at Bologna, but
at Basel. This was declined and the pope threatened with deposition.
A rebellion, too, broke out in the States of the Church ; and in a.d. 1433
Eugenius was completely humbled and obliged to acquiesce in the demands
of the council. One danger was thus averted, but he was still threatened
by another. In a.d. 1434 Kome proclaimed itself a republic and the pope
fled to Florence. The success of the democracy, however, was now again
of but ohort duration. In five months Eome was once more under the
dominion of the pope. Negotiations for union with the Greeks were
begun by the pope at Ferrara a.d. 1433. A small number of Italians
under the presidency of the pope here assumed the offices of an oecu-
menical council, those at Basel being ordered to join them, the Basel
Council being suspended, and the continuance of that council being
pronounced schismatical. Julian, now styled ^^ JuUamis Apostata II.,'"
with almost all the cardinals, betook himself to Ferrara. Under the
able cardinal Louis d'Alemau (§ 118, 4), archbishop of Aries, some
still continued the proceedings of the council at Basel, but in con-
sequence of a pestilence they moved, in a.d. 1439, to Florence. A union
with the Greeks was here effected, at least upon paper. The Basel
Council banned by the pope, deposed him, and in a.d. 1439 elected a new
pope in the person of Duke Amadeus of Savoy, who on his wife's death
had resigned his crown to his son and entered a monkish order. He
called himself Felix V. Princes and people, however, were tired of riVal
papacies. Felix got little support, and the council itself soon lost all its
power. Its ablest members one after another passed over to the party
of Eugenius. In a.d. 1449 Felix resigned, and died in the odour of
sanctity two years afterwards.^
9. Only Charles VII. of France took advantage of the reforming de-
cree of Basel for the benefit of his country. He assembled the most
distinguished churchmen and scholars of his kingdom at Bourges, and
with their concurrence published, in a.d. 1438, twenty-three of the con-
clusions of Basel that bore on the Galilean liberties under the name of
the Pragmatic Sanction, and made it a law of his realm. For the rest
he maintained an attitude of neutrality towards both popes, as also
shortly before the electors convened at Frankfort had done. Those
assembled at the Diet of Mainz in a.d. 1439 recognised the reforming
edicts of Basel as applying to Germany. Frederick IV., a.d. 1439-1493,
^ Jenkins, "The Last Crusader; or. The Life and Times of Cardinal
Julian of the House of Cesarini." London, 1861. Creighton, " History
of the Papacy," vol. ii., " The Council of Basel : the Papal Restoration,
a.d. 1418-1464."
150 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
who as emperor is known as Frederick III., under the influence of the
cunning Itahan ^neas Sylvius Piccolomini (§ 118, 6), though at first
in the opposition, went over to the side of Eugenius IV. in a.d. 1446
upon receiving 100,000 guldens for the expenses of an expedition to
Rome and certain ecclesiastical privileges for his Austrian subjects.
Some weeks later the electors of Frankfort took the same steps, stipu-
lating that Eugenius should recognise the decrees of the Council of
Constance and the reforming decrees of Basel, and should promise to
convene a new free council in a German city to bring the schism to an
end, which if he failed to do they would quit him in favour of Basel.
But at the diet, held in September of that year at Frankfort, the
legates of the pope and of the king succeeded by diplomatic arts in
coming to an understanding with the electors met at Mainz. Thus
it happened that in the so-called Frankfort Concordat of the Princes a
compromise was effected, which Eugenius confirmed in a.d. 1447, with
a careful explanation to the effect that none of these concessions in
any way infringed upon the rights and privileges of the Holy See. In
the following year Frederick in name of the German nation concluded
with Eugenius' successor, Nicholas V., the Concordat of Vienna, a.d. 1448.
The advantages gained by the German church were quite insignificant.
Frederick received imperial rank as reward for the betrayal of his
country, and was crowned in Rome, in a.d. 1452, as the last German
emperor.
10. Nicholas V., Calixtus III., and Pius II., A.D. 1447-1464.— With
Nicholas V., a.d. 1447-1455, a miracle of classical scholarship and founder
of the Vatican Library, the Roman see for the first time became the
patron of humanistic studies, and under this mild and liberal pope the
secular government of Rome was greatly improved. The conquest of
Constantinople by the Turks, in a.d. 1453, produced excitement through-
out the whole of Europe. The eloquence of the pope roused the cru-
sading spirit of Christendom, and oratorical appeals were thundered
from the pulpits of all churches and cathedrals. But the princes re-
mained cold and indifferent. After Nicholas, a Spaniard, the cardinal
Alphonso Borgia, then in his seventy- seventh year, was raised to the papal
chair as Calixtus III., a.d. 1455-1458. Hatred of Turks and love of
nephews were the two characteristics of the man. Yet he could not
rouse the princes against the Turks, and the fleet fitted out at his own
cost only plundered a few islands in the Archipelago. Calixtus' successor
was iEneas Sylvius Piccolomini, the able and accomplished apostate
from the Basel reform party, who styled himself, with intended allu-
sion to Virgil's "plus Mneas,'' Pius II., a.d. 1458-1464. The pope's
Ciceronian eloquence failed to secure the attendance of princes at the
Mantuan Congress, summoned in a.d. 1459 to take steps for the equip-
ment of a crusade. A war against the Turks was indeed to have been
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 151
undertaken by emperor Frederick III., and a tax was to have been levied
on Christians and Jews for its cost ; but neither tax nor crusade was
forthcoming. Pius demanded of the French ambassadors a formal repu-
diation of the Pl'agmatic Sanction of Bourges, and when they threat-
ened the calling of an oecumenical council, he issued the bull Exe-
crabilis, which pronounced " the execrable and previously unheard of "
enormity of an appeal to a council to be heresy and treason. In a.d.
1461 the pope, by a long epistle, attempted the conversion of Mohammed
II., the powerful conqueror of Constantinople. As the discovery of the
great alum deposit at Kome in a.d. 1462 was attributed to miraculous
direction, the pope was led to devote its rich resources to the fitting out
of a crusade against the Turks. He wished himself to lead the army in
person, in order to secure victory by uplifted hands, like Moses in the
war with Amalek. But here again the jDrinces left him in the lurch.
Coming to Ancona in a.d. 1464 to take ship there upon his great under-
taking, only his own two galleys were waiting him. After long weary
waiting, twelve Venetian ships arrived, just in time to see the pope
prostrated with fever and excitement.
11. PaulII., Sixtus IV. and Innocent VII., A.D. 1464-1492.— Among the
popes of the last forty years of the 15th century Paul II., a.d. 1464-1471,
was the best, though vain, sensual, greedy,' fond of show, and extrava-
gant. He was impartial in the administration of justice, free from
nepotism, and always ready to succour the needy. His successor, Sixtus
IV., A.D. 1471-1484, formerly Franciscan general, was one of the most
wicked of the occupants of the chair of Peter. His appeal for an ex-
pedition against the Turks finding no response outside of Italy, his love
of strife found gratification in fomenting internal animosities among
the Italian states. In favour of a nephew he sought the overthrow in
A.D. 1478 of the famous Medici family in Florence. Julian was mur-
dered, but Lorenzo escaped, and the archbishop, as abettor of the crime,
was hanged in his official robes. The pope placed the city under ban
and interdict. It was only the conquest of Otranto in a.d. 1480, and
the terror caused by the landing of the Turks in Italy, that moved him
to make terms with Florence. His nepotism was most shamelessly
practised, and he increased his revenues by taxing the brothels of Eome.
His powerful government did something towards the improvement of
the administration of justice in the Church States and his love of art
beautified the city. In a.d. 1482 Andrew, archbishop of Crain, a Slav
by birth and of the Dominican order, halted at Basel on his return from
Rome, where he had been as ambassador for Frederick, and, with the
support of the Italian league and the emperor, issued violent invectives
against the pope, and summoned an oecumenical council for the re-
form of the church in its head and members. The pope ordered his
arrest and extradition, but this the municipal authorities refused. After
152 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHUKCH TO A.D. 1517.
a volley of bulls and briefs, charges and appeals, and after innumerable
embassies and negotiations between Basel, Vienna, lunsbriick, Florence,
and Eome, in wbich the emperor abandoned the archbishop and the
papal legates dangled an interdict over Basel, the authorities decided
to imprison the objectionable prelate, but refused to deliver him up.
After eleven months' imprisonment, however, he was found hanged in
his cell in a.d. 1484. Sixtus had died three months before and Basel
was absolved by his successor Innocent VIII., a.d. 1484-1492. In char-
acter and ability he was far inferior to his predecessor. The number
of illegitimate children brought by him to the Vatican gave occasion
to the popular witticism : " Octo Nocens rjenuit pueros totidemque puellas,
Hunc merito poterit dicere Roma patremy The mighty conqueror of
half the world, Mohammed II., had died in a.d. 1481. His two sons
contested for the throne, and Bajazet joroving successful committed the
guardianship of his brother to the Knights of St. John in Khodes. The
Grandmaster transferred his prisoner, in a.d. 1489, to the pope. Inno-
cent rewarded him with a cardinalate, and Bajazet promised the pope not
only continual peace, but a yearly tribute of 40,000 ducats. He also
voluntarily presented his holiness with the spear which pierced the
Saviour's side. All this, however, did not prevent the pope from re-
peatedly but ineffectually seeking to rouse Christendom to a crusade
against the Turks. To this pope also belongs the odium of familiarizing
Europe with witch prosecutions (§ 117, 4).i
12. Alexander VI., A.D. 1492-1503.— The Spanish cardinal Koderick
Borgia, sister's son of Calixtus III., purchased the tiara by bribing his
colleagues. In him as Alexander VI. we have a pope whose government
presents a scene of unparalleled infamy, riotous immorality, and un-
mentionable crimes, of cruel despotism, fraud, faithlessness, and murder,
and a barefaced nepotism, such as even the city of the popes had
never witnessed before. He had already before his election five children
by a concubine, Uosa Vanossa, four sons and one daughter, Lucretia,
and bis one care was for their advancement. His favourite son was
Giovanni, for whom wbile cardinal he had purchased the rank of a
Spanish grandee, with the title Duke of Gaudia, and when pope he
bestowed on him, in a.d. 1497, the hereditary dukedom of Benevento.
But eight days after his corpse with dagger wounds upon it was taken
out of the Tiber. The pope exclaimed, " I know the murderer." Sus-
picion fell first upon Giovanni Sforsa of Pesaro, Lucretia's husband,
who had charged the murdered man with committing incest with his
sister, but afterwards upon Cardinal Ca}sar Borgia, the pope's second
son, who was jealous of his brother because of the favour shown him
^ Creighton, "History of the Papacy," vols. iii. and iv., " The Italian
Princes, a.d. 1464-1518."
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 153
by Lucretia and by her father. Alexander's grief knew no bounds, but
sought escape from it by redoubled love to the suspected son. In
A.D. 1498 the papal bastard resigned the cardiualate as an intolerable
burden, married a French princess, and was made hereditary duke of
Romagna. Suddenly at the same time, and in the same manner, in a.d.
1503, father and son took ill. The father died after a few days,
but the vigour of youth aided the son's recovery. Cffisar Borgia was
at a later period cast into prison by Julius II., and fell in a.d. 1507
in the service of his brother-in-law, the king of Navarre. It was
generally believed that Alexander died of poisoned wine prepared by
his son to secure the removal of a rich cardinal. The father as well as
the two brothers were suspected of incest with Lucretia. This pope,
too, did not hesitate to intrigue with the Turkish sultan against Charles
VIII. of France. With unexampled assumption, during the contention
of Portugal and Spain about the American discoveries, he presented
Ferdinand and Isabella in a.d. 1493 with all islands and continents that
had been discovered or might yet be discovered lying beyond a line
of demarcation drawn from the North to the South Pole. Once only,
when grieving over the death of his favourite son, had this pope a
twinge of conscience. He had resolved, he said, to devote himself to
his spiritual calling and secure a reform in church disciphne. But
when the commission appointed for this purpose presented its first
reform proposals the momentary emotion had already passed away.
Nothing was further from his thought than the calling of an oecu-
menical council, which not only the king of France, but also the Floren-
tine reformer Savonarola demanded (§119, 11).
13. Julius II., A.D. 1503-1513.— Alexander's successor, Pius III., son of
a sister of Pius II., died after a twenty-six days' pontificate. He was fol-
lowed by a nephew of Sixtus IV., a bitter enemy of the Borgias, who took
the name of Julius 11. He was essentially a warrior, with nothing of
the priest about him. He was also a lover of art, and carried on the
works which his uncle had begun. His youthful excesses had seriously
impaired his health. As pope, he was not free from nepotism and
simony, in controversy passionate, and in policy intriguing and faithless.
He transformed the States of the Church into a temporal despotic mon-
archy, and was himself incessantly engaged in war. When he broke
with France, which held Milan from a.d. 1499 with Alexander's con-
sent, Louis XII., a.d. 1498-1515, convened a French national council
at Tours in a.d. 1510. This council renewed the Pragmatic Sanction,
which in a weak hour Louis XL, in a.d. 1462, had abrogated, and had in
consequence obtained, in a.d. 1469, the title Rex Christiaiiissiinus, and
refused to obey the pope. Also Maximilian I., a.d. 1493-1519, who even
without papal coronation called himself " elected Eoman emperor,"
directed the learned humanist Wimpfeling of Heidelberg to collect the
154 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.B. 1517.
gravamina of the Germans against the Eoman curia, and to sketch out
a Pragmatic Sanction for Germany. France and Germany, with five
revolting cardinals, convoked an oecumenical council at Pisa, in a.d.
1511. Half in sport, half in earnest, Maximilian spoke of placing on
his own head the tiara, as well as the imperial crown. The pope put
Pisa, where only a few French prelates ventured, under an interdict,
and anathematized the king of France, who then had medals cast,
with the inscription. Per dam Babylonis nomen. In a murderous battle
at Eavenna, in a.d. 1512, the army of the papal league was. all but
annihilated. But two months later, the French, by the revolt of the
Milanese and the successes of the Swiss, were driven to their homes
ingloriously, and the schismatic council, which had been shifted from
Pisa to Milan, had to withdraw to Lyons, where it was dissolved by the
pope " on account of its many crimes." Meanwhile the pope had sum-
moned a council to meet at Eome, the fifth oecumenical Lateran Council,
A.D. 1512-1517, at which however only fifty-three Italian bishops were
present. There the ban upon the king of France was renewed, but a
concordat was concluded with Maximilian, redressing the more serious
grievances of which he had complained. The pope succeeded in freeing
Northern Italy from French oppression, and only his early death pre-
vented him from delivering Southern Italy from the Spanish yoke.
14. Leo X., A.D. 1513-1521. — John, son of Lorenzo Medici, who was
cardinal in a.d. 1488, in his eighteenth year, when thirty-eight years of
age ascended the papal throne as Leo X. ; a great patron of the
Eenaissance, but luxurious and pleasure-loving, extravagant and frivolous,
without a spark of religion (§ 120, 1), and a zealous promoter of the
fortunes of his own family. The attempt of Louis XII., with the help
of Venice, to regain Milan failed, and being hard pressed in his own
country by Henry VIII. of England, the French king decided at last, in
Dec, 1513, to end the schism and recognise the Lateran Council. His
successor, Francis I., a.d. 1515-1547, was more fortunate. In the battle
of Marignano he gained a brilliant victory over the brave Swiss, in con-
sequence of which the duchy of Milan fell again into the hands of
France. At Bologna, in a.d. 1516, the pope in person now greeted the
king, who proferred him obedience, and concluded a political league and
an ecclesiastical concordat with his holiness, abrogating the Pragmatic
Sanction of Charles VII., but maintaining the king's right to nominate
all bishops and abbots of his realm, with reservation of the anuats for
the papal treasury. The Lateran Council, though attended only by
Italian bishops, was pronounced oecumenical. During its five years'
sittings it had issued concordats for Germany and France, the papal
bull Pastor cEtenius was solemnly ratified, which renewed the bull Unam
sanctam and by various forgeries proved the power of the pope to be
superior to the authority of councils, quieted the bishops' objections to
§ 110. THE PAPACY. 155
the privileges of the begging friars by a compromise, and as a protection
against heresy gave the right of the censorship of the press to bishops,
while explicitly asserting the immateriality, individuality, and immor-
tality of the human soul.^
15. Papal Claims to Sovereignty.— From a.d. 1319 the popes secured
large revenues from the Annats, revenues for a full year of all vacan-
cies ; the' Keservations, the holding of rich benefices and bestowing them
upon payment of large sums ; the Expectances, naming for payment a
successor to an incumbent still living ; the Offices held i7i commendam,
provisionally on payment of a part of the incomes ; the Jus sjjoliarum, the
Holy See being the legitimate heir of all property gained by Churchmen
from their offices ; the Taxing of Church property ^for particularly press-
ing calls ; innumerable Indulgences, Absolutions, Dispensations, etc. The
happy thought occurred to Paul II., in a.d. 1469, to extend the law of
Annats to such ecclesiastical institutions as belonged to corporations.
He reckoned the lifetime of a prelate at fifteen years, and so claimed his
tax of such institutions every fifteenth year. The doctrine of the papal
infallibility in matters of faith, under the influence of the reforming
councils of the loth century, was rather less in favour than before.
The rigid Franciscans opposed the papal doctrine of poverty (§§ 98, 4 ; 112,
2) ; and John XXII. was almost unanimously charged by his contem-
poraries with heresy, because of his views about the vision of God.
Even the most zealous curialists of the loth century did not venture
to ascribe to the pope absolute infallibility. A distinction was made
between the infallibility of the office, which is absolute, and that of the
person, which is only relative ; a pope who falls into error and heresy
thereby ceases to be pope and infallible. This was the opinion of the
Dominican Torquemada (§ 112, 4), whom Eugenius IV. rewarded at the
Basel Council with a cardinalate and the title of Defensor fulei, as the
most zealous defender of papal absolutism. From the 14th century the
popes have worn the triple crown. The three tiers of the tiara, richly
ornamented with precious stones, indicated the power of the pope over
heaven by his canonizing, over purgatory by his granting of indulgences,
and over the earth by his pronouncing anathemas. Until the papal
court retired to Avignon the Lateran was the usual residence of the
popes, and after the ending of the schism, the Vatican."
16. The Papal Curia.— The chief courts of the papal government are
spoken of collectively as the curia, their members being taken from the
higher clergy. The following are the most important : the Gancellaria
Romana, to which belonged the administration of affairs pertaining to the
^ Koscoe, " Life and Pontificate of Leo X." 4 vols. Liverpool, 1805.
= Salmon, " The InfaUibility of the Church." London, 1888.
156 THE GEKMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
pope and the college of cardinals ; the Dataria Eoviaiia, which had to
do with matters of grace not kept secret, such as absolutions, dispen-
sations, etc. ; while the Poenitentiaria liomana dealt with matters which
were kept secret ; the Camera Romana, which administered the papal
finances ; and the Rota Romana, which was the supreme court of justice.
Important decrees issued by the pope himself with the approval of the
cardinals are called hulls. They are written on parchment in the
Gothic character in Latin, stamped with the great seal of the Koman
church, and secured in a metal case. The word bull was originally
applied to the case, then to the seal, and at last to the document itself.
Less important decrees, for which the advice of the cardinals had not
been asked, are called briefs. The brief is usually written on parch-
ment, in the ordinary Koman characters, and sealed in red wax with the
pope's private seal, the fisherman's ring.
§ 111. The Clergy.
Provincial synods had now lost almost all their impor-
tance, and were rarely held, and then for the most part under
the presidency of a papal legate. The cathedral chapters
afforded welcome provision for the younger sons of the
nobles, who were nothing behind their elder brothers in
worldliness of life and conversation. For their own selfish
interests they limited the number of members of the chap-
ter, and demanded as a qualification evidence of at least
sixteen ancestors. The political significance of the prelates
was in France very small, and as champions of the Grallican
liberties they were less enthusiastic than the University
of Paris and the Parliament. In England they formed an
influential order in the State, with carefully defined rights ;
and in Grermany, as princes of the empire, especially the
clerical elector princes, their political importance was very
great. In Spain, on the other hand, at the end of the 15th
century, by the ecclesiastico-political reformation endea-
vours of Ferdinand '' the Catholic " and Isabella (§ 118, 7),
the higher clergy were made completely dependent upon
the Crown.
§ 112. MONASTIC ORDERS AND SOCIETIES. 157
1. The Moral Condition of the Clergy was in general very low. The
bishops mostly lived in open concubinage. The lower secular clergy
followed their example, and had toleration granted by paying a yearly
tax to the bishop. The people, distinguishing office and person, made
no objection, but rather looked on it as a sort of protection to their
wives and daughters from the dangers of the confessional. Especially
in Italy, unnatural vice was widely spread among the clergy. At Con-
stance and Basel it was thought to cure such evils by giving permission
to priests to marry ; but it was feared that the ecclesiastical revenues
would be made heritable, and the clergy brought too much under tbe
State. — The mendicant orders were allowed to hear confession every-
where, and when John de Polliaco, a Prussian doctor, maintained that
the local clergy only should be taken as confessors, John XXII., in a.d.
1322, pronounced his views heretical.
2. The French concordat of a.d. 1516 (§ 110, 14), which gave the
king the right of appointing commendator abbots (§ 85, 5), to almost
all the cloisters, induced many of the younger sons of old noble families
to take orders, so as to obtain rich sinecures or offices, which they could
hold in cominendam. They bore a semi-clerical character, and had the
title of abbe, which gradually came to be given to all the secular clergy
of higher culture and social position. In Italy too it became customary
to give the title abbate to the younger clergy of high rank, before receiv-
ing ordination.
§ 112. Monastic Orders axd Societies.
The corruption of monastic life was becoming more evi-
dent from day to day. Immorality, sloth, and unnatural
vice ouly too often found a nursery behind the cloister
walls. Monks and nuns of neighbouring convents lived
in open sin with one another, so that the author of the book
Dc ruina ecclesia (§ 118, 4, c) thinks that Virginem velare
is the same as Vlnjlnem ad scortandum cxponcre. In the
Benedictine order the corruption was most complete. The
rich cloisters, after the example of their founder, divided
their revenues among their several members {propriefarii).
Science was disregarded, and they cared only for good liv-
ing. The celebrated Scottish cloister (§ 98, 1) of St. James,
at Regensburg, in the 14th century, had a regular tavern
within its walls, and there was a current saying, Uxor
158 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
amissa in monasfcvio Scoforiim quwrl debet. The men-
dicants represented even yet relatively the better side of
monasticism, and maintained their character as exponents
of theological learning. Only the Carthusians, however,
still held fast to the ancient strict discipline of their order.
1. The Benedictine Orders. — For the reorganization of this order, which
had abandoned itself to good hving and luxury, Clement V., at the
Council of Vienna, a.d. 1311, issued a set of ordinances which aimed
principally at the restoration of monastic discipline and the revival of
learning among the monks. But they were of little or no avail. Bene-
dict XII. therefore found it necessary, in a.d. 1336, with the co-opera-
tion of distinguished French abbots, to draw up a new constitution for
the Benedictines, which after him was called the Beuedictina. The
houses of Black Friars were to be divided into thirty-six provinces, and
each of them was to hold every third year a provincial chapter for con-
ference and determination of cases. In each abbey there should be a
daily penitential chapter for maintaining discipline, and an annual chap-
ter for giving a reckoning of accounts. In order to reawaken interest in
scientific studies, it was enjoined that from every cloister a number of
the abler monks should be maintained at a university, at the cost of the
cloister, to study theology and canon law. But the disciplinary pre-
scriptions of the Benedictina were powerless before the attractions of
good living, and the proposals for organization were repugnant to the
proud independence of monks and abbots. The enactments in favour
of scientific pursuits led to better results. The first really successful
attempt at reforming the cloisters was made, in a.d, 1135, by the general
chapter of the Brothers of the Common Life, who not only dealt with
their own institutions, but also with all the Benedictine monasteries
throughout the whole of the West. The soul of this movement was
Joh. Busch, monk in Windesheim, then prior in various monasteries,
and finally provost of Suite, near Hildesheim, a.d. 1158-1179. The so
called Bursfeld Union or Congregation resulted from his intercourse with
the abbot of the Benedictine monastery at Bursfeld, on the Weser, John
of Hagen (ab Andagine). Notwithstanding the bitter hostility of corrupt
monks and nuns, there were in a short time seventy-five monasteries
under this Bursfeld rule, where the original strictness of the monastic
life was enforced. The rule was confirmed by the council of a.d. 1410,
and subsequently by Pius II. Most of the cloisters under this rule
joined the Lutheran reformation of the IGth century, and Bursfeld itself
is at this day the seat of a titular Lutheran abbot. — A new branch of the
Bonedictine order, the Olivetans, was founded by Bernard Tolomiei.
Blindness iiaviug obliged hiui to abandon his teaching of philosophy at
^ 112. MONASTIC OKDEES AND SOCIETIES. 159
Siena, the blessed Virgin restored him his sight ; and then, in a.d. 1313,
he forsook the world, and withdrew with certain companions into almost
inaccessible mountain recesses, ten miles from Siena. Disciples gathered
around him from all sides. He built a cloister on a hill, which he called
the Mount of Olives, and founded under the Benedictine rule a congre-
gation of the Most Blessed Virgin of the Mount of Olives, which obtained
the sanction of John XXII. Tolomaei became its first general, in a.d.
1322, and held the office till his death, caused by infection caught while
attending the plague stricken in a.d. 1318. There were new elections
of abbots every third year. The Olivetans were zealous w^orshippers of
Mary, and strict ascetics. In several of their cloisters, which numbered
as many as one hundred, the study of theology and philosophy was dili-
gently prosecuted. They embraced also an order of nuns, founded by
St. Francisca Eomana.
2. The Franciscans. — At the Council of Vienna, in a.d. 1312, Clement
V. renewed the decree of Nicholas III., and by the constitution Exivi de
paradiso decided in favour of the stricter view (§ 98, 4), but ordered all
rigorists to submit to their order. But neither this nor the solemn
ratification of his predecessor's decisions by John XXII. in a.d. 1317 put
an end to tbe division. The contention was now of a twofold kind.
The Spirituals confined their opposition to a rigoristic interpretation of
the vow of poverty. The Fraticelli carried their opposition into many
other departments. They exaggerated the demand of poverty to the
utmost, but also repudiated the primacy of the pope, the jurisdiction of
bishops, the admissibility of oaths, etc. In the south of France within
a few years 115 of them had perished at the stake ; and the Spirituals
also suffered severely. — The Dominicans were the cause of a new split
in the Seraphic order. The Inquisition at Narbonne had, in a.d. 1321,
condemned to the stake a Beghard who had affirmed, what to the
Dominicans seemed a heretical proposition, that Christ and the apostles
had neither personal nor common property. The Franciscans, who, on
the plea of a pretended transference of their property to the pope,
claimed to be without possessions, pronounced that proposition ortho-
dox, and the Dominicans complained to John XXII. He pronounced
in favour of the Dominicans, and declared the Franciscans' transfe-
rence of property illusory ; and finding this decision contrary to decrees
of previous popes, he asserted the right of any pontiff to reverse the
findings of his predecessors. The Franciscans were driven more and
more into open revolt against the pope. They made common cause
with the persecuted Spirituals, and like them sought support from the
Italian Ghibellines and the emperor, Louis the Bavarian (§ 110, 3).
The pope summoned their general, Michael of Cesena, to Avignon ;
and while detaining him there sought unsuccessfully to obtain his de-
position by tbe general synod of the order. Michael, with two like-
160 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
minded brothers, William Occam (§ 113, 3) and Bonagratia of Bergamo,
escaped to Pisa in a ship of war, which the emperor sent for them in
A.D. 1328. There, in the name of his order, he appealed to an oecu-
menical council to have the papal excommunication and deposition
annulled which had now been issued against him. After the disastrous
Italian campaign in a.d. 1330, the excommunicated churchmen accom-
panied the emperor to Munich, where they conducted a literary defence
of their rights and privileges, and charged the pope with a multitude of
heresies. Michael died at Munich, in a.d. 1342. — After the overthrow
of the schismatic Minorite pope, Nicholas V. (§ 110, 3), the opposition
soon gave in its submission. But to the end of his life John XXII.
was a bloody persecutor of all schismatical Franciscans, who showed a
fanatical love of martyrdom, rather than abate one iota of their oppo-
sition to the possession of property.
3. The strict and lax tendencies were brought to light in connection
with successive attempts at reformation. In a.d. 1368 Paolucci of Foligni
founded the fraternity of Sandal- wearers, which embraced the remnants
of the Coelestine eremites (§ 98, 4). This strict rule was soon modified
so to admit of the possession of immovable property and living together
in conventual establishments. Those who adhered rigidly to the original
requirements as to seclusion, asceticism, and dress were now called
Observants and the more lax Conventuals, Crossing the Alps in a.d.
1388, they spread through Europe, converting heretics and heathens.
Both sections received papal encouragement. Their leader for forty
years was John of Capistrano, born a.d. 1386, died a.d. 1456, who
inspired all their movements, and as a preacher gathered hundreds of
thousands around him. His predecessor in office, Bernardino of Siena,
who died in a.d. 1444, was canonized after a hard fight in a.d. 1450.
John was deputed by the pope in that same year to proceed to Austria
and Germany to convert the Hussites and preach a crusade against
the Turks. His greatest feat was the repulse, in a.d. 1456, of the Turks,
under Mohammad II., before Belgrade, ascribed to him and his crusade,
which delivered Hungary, Germany, and indeed the whole West, from
threatened subjection to the Moslem yoke. Capistrano died three
months afterwards. Notwithstanding all the efforts of his followers, his
beatification was not secured till a.d. 1690, and the decree of canoni-
zation was not obtained till a.d. 1724.— Continuation § 149, 6.
4. The Dominicans.— The Dominicans, as they interpreted the vow of
poverty only of personal and not of com»mon property, soon lost the
character of a mendicant order. — One of their most distinguished mem-
bers was St. Catharine of Siena, who died in a.d. 1380, in her thirty-third
year. Having taken the vow of chastity as a child, living only on bread
and herbs, for a time only on the eucharistic elements, she was in vision
affianced toChrist as His bride, and received His heart instead of her own.
§ 112. MONASTIC ORDERS AND SOCIETIES. 161
She felt the pains of Christ's wounds, and, like St. Dominic, lashed her-
self thrice a day with an iron chain. She gained unexampled fame, and
along with St. Bridget procured the return of the pope from Avignon to
Rome. — The controversy of the Dominicans with the Franciscans over
the immaculata conceptio (§ 104, 7) was conducted in the most pas-
sionate manner. The visions of St. Catherine favoured the Dominican,
those of St. Bridget the Franciscan views ; during the schism the French
popes favoured the former, the Roman popes the latter. The Francis-
can view gained for the time the ascendency. The University of Paris
sustained it in a.d. 1387, and made its confession a condition of receiv-
ing academic rank. The Dominican Torquemada combated this doctrine,
in A.D. 1437, in his able Tractatus de veritate Conceptionis D. V. In a.d.
1439, the Council of Basel, which was then regarded as schismatical,
sanctioned the Franciscan doctrine. Sixtus IV., ,who had previously,
as general of the Franciscans, supported the views of his order in a
special treatise, authorized the celebration of the festival referred to, but
in A.D. 1483 forbade controversy on either side. A comedy with a very
tragical conclusion was enacted at Bern, in connection with this matter
in A.D. 1509. The Dominicans there deceived a simple tailor called Jetzer,
who joined them as a novice, with pretended visions and revelation of
the Virgin, and burned upon him with a hot iron the wound prints of the
Saviour, and caused an image of the mother of God to weep tears of blood
over the godless doctrine of the Franciscans. When the base trick was
discovered, the prior and three monks had to atone for their conduct by
death at the stake. (Continuation § 149, 13.) A new controversy between
the two orders broke out in a.d. 14G2, at Brescia. There, on Easter Day
of that year, the Franciscan Jacob of Marchia in his preaching said that
the blood of Christ shed upon the cross, until its reassumption by the
resurrection, was outside of the hypostatic union with the Logos, and
therefore as such was not the subject of adoration. The grand-inqui-
sitor, Jacob of Brescia, pronounced this heretical, and at Christmas, a.d.
14G3, a three days' disputation was held between three Dominicans and
as many Minorites before pope and cardinals, which yielded no result.
Pius II. reserved judgment, and never gave his decision.
5. The Augustinians.— In a.d. 1432, Zolter, at the call of the general of
the Augustinians, reorganized the order, and in a.d. 1438 Pius II. gave
a constitution to the Observants. The " Union of the Five Convents "
founded by him in Saxony and Franconia, with Magdeburg as its centre,
formed the nucleus of regular Augustinian Observants, which had
Andrew Proles of Dresden as their vicar-general for a second time in
a.d. 1473. Notwithstanding bitter opposition, the union spread through
all Germany, even to the Netherlands. In a.d. 1475 the general of the
order at Rome took offence at Proles for looking directly to the apostolic
see, and not to him, for his authority. He therefore abolished the insti-
ll
162 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
tution of vicars, insisted that all Observants should return to their alle-
giance to the provincials, and make full restitution of all the cloisters
which they had appropriated, and empowered the provincial of Saxony
to imprison and excommunicate Proles and his party, in case of their
refusal. Proles did not submit, and when the ban was issued appealed
directly to the pope. A papal commission in a.d. 1477 decided that all
Observant cloisters placed by the duke under the pope's protection should
so continue, confirmed all their privileges, and annulled all mandates and
anathemas issued against Proles and his followers. With redoubled
energy and zeal Proles now wrought for the extension and consolida-
tion of the congregation until a.d. 1503, when he resigned office in his
74th year, and soon after died. He was one of the worthiest and most
pious men in the German Church of his time ; but Flacius is quite mis-
taken when he describes him as a precursor of Luther, an evangelical
martyr and witness for the truth in the sense of the Reformation of
the 16th century. Energetic and devoted as he was in prosecuting his
reformation, he gave himself purely to the correcting of the morals of
the monks and restoring discipline ; but in zeal for the doctrine of merits,
the institution of indulgences, mariolatry, saint and image worship, and
in devotion to the papacy, he and his congregation were by no means
in advance of the age.
6. As his successor in the vicariate the chapter, in accordance with
the wish of Proles, elected John von Staupitz. He had been prior of
the Augustinian cloister at Tiibingen, aad became professor of theology
in the University of Wittenberg, in a.d. 1502. Like his predecessor, he
devoted himself to the interests of the congregation, and by the union which
he effected between it and the Lombard Observant congregation, he
greatly increased its importance. In carrying out a plan for uniting the
Saxon Conventuals with the German Observants by combining in his
own hand the Saxon provincial priorate with the German vicariate, he
encountered such difficulties that he was obliged to abandon the attempt ;
but he succeeded thus far, that from that time the Conventuals and
Observants of Germany dwelt in peace side by side. He directed the
troubled spirit of Luther to the crucified Saviour (§ 122, 1), and thus
became the spiritual father of the great reformer. The new constitutions
for the German congregations, proffered by him and accepted by the
chapter at Nuremberg, a.d. 1504, are characterized by earnest recommen-
dations of Scripture study. But of a deep and comprehensive evangelical
and reformatory ai^plication of them we find no traces as yet, even in
Staupitz ; neither do we see any zealous study of Augustine's writings,
and consequent appreciation of his theological principles, such as is
shown by the mystics of the 13lh and 14th centuries. All this appears
later in his little treatise " On the Imitation of the Willingly Dying
Christ" of A.D. 1515. A discourse on predestination in a.d. 1517 moves
§ 112. MONASTIC ORDERS AND SOCIETIES. 163
distinctly on Augustinian lines, and the mysticism of St. Bernard may
be traced in the book " On the Love of God " of that same year. True
as he was to Luther as a counsellor and helper during the first eventful
year of struggle, the reformer's protest soon became too violent for him,
and in A.D. 1520 he resigned his office, withdrew to the Benedictine
cloister at Salzburg, and died as its abbot in a.d. 1524. His continued
attachment to the positive tendencies of the Reformation is proved by
his "Fast Sermons," delivered in a.d. 1523. — His successor Link, Luther's
fellow student at Magdeburg, was and continued to be an attached
friend of the reformer. Unsuccessful in his endeavours to remove
abuses, he resigned office in a.d. 1523, and became evangelical pastor in
Altenburg, and married. The very small opposition chose in place of
him Joh. Spangenberg, who, unable to withstand the movement among
the German Conventuals, as well as among the Observants, resigned in
a.d. 1529.
7. Overthrow of the Templars. — The order of Knights Templar, whose
chief seat was now in Paris and the south of France, by rich presents,
exactions, and robberies in the island of Cyprus, vast commercial specu-
lations and extensive money-lending and banking transactions with cru-
saders and pilgrims and needy princes, had acquired immense wealth
in money and landed property in the East and the West. They had
in consequence become proud, greedy, and vicious. Their independence of
the State had long been a thorn in the eye of Philip the Fair of France,
and their policy was often at variance with his. But above all their
great wealth excited his cupidity. In a letter to a visitor of the order
Innocent III. had in a.d. 1208 bitterly complained of their unspirituality,
worldliness, avarice, drunkenness, and study of the black art, saying that
he refrained from remarking upon yet more shameful offences with which
they were charged. Stories also were current of apostasy to Mohamma-
danism, sorcery, unnatural vice, etc. It was said that they worshipped an
idol Baphomet ; that a black cat appeared in their assemblies ; that at ini-
tiation they abjured Christ, spat on the cross, and trampled it under foot.
A Templar expelled for certain offences gave evidence in support of these
charges. Thereupon in a.d. 1307 Philip had all Templars in his realm
suddenly apprehended. Many admitted their guUt amid the tortures of
the rack ; others voluntarily did so in order to escape such treatment.
A Parliament assembled at Tours in a.d. 1308 heartily endorsed the
king's opinion, and the pope, Clement V., was powerless to resist
(§ 110, 2). While the pope's commissioners were prosecuting inquiries in
all countries, Philip without more ado in a.d. 1310 brought to the stake
one hundred Templars who had retracted their confession. The oecu-
menical council at Vienne in A.D. 1311, summoned for the final settlement
of the matter, refused to give judgment without hearing the defence of
the accused. But Philip threatened the pope till a decree was passed
164 THE GEEMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
disbanding the order because of the suspicion and ill repute into which
it had fallen. Its property was to go to the Knights of St. John. But
a great part had already been seized by the princes, especially by Philip.
Final decision in regard to individuals was committed by the pope to
the provincial synods of the several countries. Judgment on the grand-
master, James Molay, and the then chief dignitaries of the order, he
reserved to himself. Philip paid no attention to this, but, when they re-
fused to adhere to their confession of guilt, had them burnt in a slow fire
at Paris in a.d. 1314. Most of the other knights turned to secular employ-
ments, many entered the ranks of the Knights of St. John, while others
ended their days in monastic prisons. — Scholars are to this day divided
in opinion as to the degree of guilt or innocence which may be ascribed
to the Templars in regard to the serious charges brought against them.i
8. New Orders. — In a.d. 1317 the king of Portugal, for the protection
of his frontier from the Moors, instituted the Order of Christ, composed of
knights and clergy, and to it John XXII. in a.d. 1319 gave the privileges of
the order of Calatrava ( § 98, 8). Alexander VI. released them from the
vow of poverty and allowed them to marry. The king of Portugal was
grand-master, and at the beginning of the 16th century it had 450 com-
panies and an annual revenue of one and a half million livres. In a.d.
1797 it was converted into a secular order. — Among the new monkish
orders the following are the most important : (1) Hieronymites, founded
in A.D. 1370 by the Portuguese Basco and the Spaniard Pecha as an order
of canons regular under the rule of Augustine, and confirmed by
Gregory XI. in a.d. 1373. Devoted to study, they took Jerome as their
patron, and obtained great reputation in Spain and Italy. — (2) Jesuates,
founded by Colombini of Siena, who, excited by reading legends of the
saints, combined with several companions in forming this society for
self-mortification and care of the sick, for which Urban V. prescribed the
Augustinian rule in a.d. 1367. They greeted all they met with the
name of Jesus : hence their designation. — (3) Minimi, an extreme sect of
Minorites (§ 98, 3), founded by Francis de Paula in Calabria in a.d. 1436.
Their rule was extremely strict, and forbade them all use of fiesh, milk,
butter, eggs, etc., so that their mode of life was described as vita quad-
ragesimalis. — (4) Nuns of St. Bridget. To the Swedish princess visions of
the wounded and bleeding Saviour had come in her childhood. Com-
pelled by her parents to marry, she became mother of eight children ; but
at her husband's death, in a.d. 1344, she adopted a rigidly ascetic life,
and in a.d. 1363 founded a cloister at Wedstena for sixty nuns in honour
of the blessed Virgin, with thirteen priests, four deacons, and eight lay
brothers in a separate establishment. All were under the control of
the abbess. She also founded at Kome a hospice for Swedish pilgrims
1 Iliiye, " Persecution of the Knights Templars." Edin., 1865.
§ 112. MONASTIC ORDERS AND SOCIETIES. 165
and students, made a pilgrimage from Rome to Jerusalem, and died at
Rome in a.d. 1373. The Revelationes S. Brigitta ascribed to her were in
high repute during the Middle Ages. They are full of bitter invectives
against the corrupt jDapacy ; call the pope worse than Lucifer, a mur-
derer of the souls committed to him, who condemns the guUtless and
sells believers for filthy lucre. There were seventy-four cloisters of the
order spread over all Europe. Her successor as abbess of the parent
abbey was her daughter, St. Catherine of Sweden, who died in a.d.
1381. — (5) The French Annunciate Order was founded in a.d. 1501 by
Joanna of Valois, the divorced wife of Louis XII., and when abolished
by the French Revolution it numbered forty-five nunneries.
9. The Brothers of the Common Life, a society of pious priests, gave
themselves to the devotional study of Scripture, the exercise of contem-
plative mysticism, and practical imitation of the lowly life of Christ with
voluntary observance of the three monkish vows, and residing, without
any lifelong obhgation, in unions where things were administered in com-
mon. Pious laymen were not excluded from their association, and in-
stitutions for sisters were soon reared alongside of those for the brothers.
The founder of this organization was Gerhard Groot, Geranhis viagnus,
of Deventer in the Netherlands, a favourite pupil of the mystic John
of Ruysbroek (§ 114, 7). Dying a victim to his benevolence during a
season of pestilence in a.d. 1384, a year or two after the founding of the
first union institute, he was succeeded by his able pupil and assistant
Florentius Radewins, who zealously carried on the work he had begun.
The house of the brothers at Deventer soon became the centre of
numerous other houses from the Scheld to the Wesel. Florentius added
a cloister for regular canons at Windesheim, from which went forth the
famous cloister reformer Burch. The most important of the later found-
ations of this kind was the cloister built on Mount St. Agnes near
Zwoll. The famous Thomas a Kempis (§ 114, 7) was trained here, and
wrote the life of Groot and his fellow labourers. Each house was pre-
sided over by a rector, each sister house by a matron, who was called
Martha. The brothers supported themselves by transcribing spiritual
books, the lay brothers by some handicraft ; the sisters by sewing, spin-
ning, and weaving. Begging was strictly forbidden. Besides caring for
their own souls' salvation, the brothers sought to benefit the people by
preaching, pastoral visitation, and instracting the youth. They had as
many as 1,200 scholars under their care. Hated by the mendicant friars,
they were accused by a Dominican to the Bishop of Utrecht. This dig-
nitary favoured the brothers, and when the Dominican appealed to the
pope, he applied to the Constance Council of a.d. 1418, where Gerson
and d'Ailly vigorously supported them. Their accuser was compelled
to retract, and Martin V. confirmed the brotherhood. Though heartily
attached to the doctrines of the Catholic Church, their biblical and evan-
166 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
gelical tendencies formed an unconscious preparation for tlie Reforma-
tion (§ 119, 10). A great number of the brothers joined the party of the
reformers. In the 17th century the last remnant of them disappeared.^
II. — Theological Science.
§ 113. Scholasticism and its Eeformers.
The University of Paris took the lead, in accordance with
the liberal tendencies of the Galilean Church, in the oppo-
sition to hierarchical pretensions, and was followed by the
universities of Oxford, Prague, and Cologne, in all of which
the mendicant friars were the teachers. Most distin-
guished among the schoolmen of this age was John Duns
Scotus, whose works formed the doctrinal standard for the
Franciscans, as those of Aquinas did for the Dominicans.
After realism had enjoyed for a long time an uncontested
sway, William Occam, amid passionate battles, successfully
introduced nominalism. But the creative power of scholas-
ticism was well nigh extinct. Even Duns Scotus is rather
an acute critic of the old than an original creator of new
ideas. Miserable quarrels between the schools and a spirit-
less formalism now widely prevailed in the lecture halls, as
well as in the treatises of the learned. Moral theology
degenerated into fruitless casuistry and abstruse discussion
on subtlely devised cases where there- appeared a collision
of duties. But from all sides there arose complaint and
contradiction. On the one side were some who made a
general complaint without striking at the roots of the evil.
They suggested the adoption of a better method, or the
infusion of new life by the study of Scripture and the
Fathers, and a return to mysticism. To this class belonged
the Brothers of the Common Life (§ 112, 9) and d'Ailly and
Gerson, the supporters of the Constance reforms (§ 118, 4).
1 Kettlewell, " Thomas a Kempis and the Brothers of the Common
Life." 2 vols. London, 1882.
§ 113. SCHOLASTICISM AND ITS EEFORMERS. 167
Here too we may place the talented father of natural theo-
logy, E-aimund of Sabunde, and the brilliant Nicholas of
Cusa, in whom all the nobler aspirations of mediaeval
ecclesiastical science were concentrated. But on the other
side was the radical opposition, consisting of the German
mystics (§ 114), the English and Bohemian reformers (§ 119),
and the Humanists (§ 120).
1. John Duns Scotus.— The date of birth, whether a.d. 1274 or a.d. 1266,
and the place of birth, whether in Scotland, Ireland, or England, of this
Franciscan hero, honoured with the title doctor subtilis, are uncertain ;
even the place and manner of his training are unknown. After lectur-
ing with great success at Oxford, he went in a.d. 1304 to Paris, where
he obtained the degree of doctor, and successfully vindicated the imma-
culata conceptio B. V. (§ 104, 7) against the Thomists. Summoned to
Cologne in a.d. 1308 to engage in controversy with the Beghards, he
displayed great skill in dialectics, but died during that same year. His
chief work, a commentary on the Lombard, was composed at Oxford.
His answers to the questions proposed for his doctor's degree were after-
wards wrought up into the work entitled Qiicestiones quodlibetales. The
opponent and rival of Thomas, he controverted his doctrine at every
point, as well as the doctrines of Alexander and Bonaventura of his own
order, and other shining stars of the 13th century. In subtlety of thought
and dialectic power he excelled them all, but in depth of feeling, pro-
fundity of mind, and ardour of faith he was far behind them. Proofs
of doctrines interested him more than the doctrines themselves. To
philosophy he assigns a purely theoretical, to theology a pre-eminently
practical character, and protests against the Thomist commingling of
the two. He accepts the doctrine of a twofold truth (§ 103, 3), basing it
on the fall. Granting that the Bible is the only foundation of religious
knowledge, but contending that the Church under the Spirit's guidance
has advanced ever more and more in the development of it, he readily
admits that many a point in constitution, doctrine, and worship cannot
be established from the Bible; e.g. immaculate conception, clerical celi-
bacy, etc. He has no hesitation in contradicting even Augustine and
St. Bernard from the standpoint of a more highly developed doctrine of
the Church.
2. Thomists and Scotists. — The Dominicans and Franciscans were
opposed as followers respectively of Thomas and of Scotus. Thomas
regarded individuality, i.e. the fact that everything is an individual, every
res is a hcec, as a limitation and defect ; while Duns saw in this hcecitas
a mark of perfection and the true end of creation. Thomas also preferred
168 THE (iERMANO-EOMANiC CHURCH TO A.B. 1517.
the Pktonic, and Duns the Aristotelian realism. In theology Duns was
opposed to Thomas in maintaining an unlimited arbitrary will in God,
according to which God does not choose a thing because it is good, but
the thing chosen is good because He chooses it. Thomas therefore was
a determinist, and in his doctrine of sin and grace adopted a moderate
Augustinianism (§ 53, 5), while Duns was a semipelagian. The atonement
was viewed by Thomas more in accordance with the theory of Anselm,
for he assigned to the merits of Christ as the God-Man infinite worth,
satisfactio siiperahimdans , which is in itself more than sufficient for
redemption ; but Duns held that the merits of Christ were sufficient only
as accepted by the free will of God, acceptatio gratuita. The Scotists
also most resolutely contended for the doctrine of the immaculate con-
ception of the Virgin, while the Thomists as passionately opposed it.
— Among the immediate disciples of Duns the most celebrated was
Francis Mayron, teacher at the Sorbonne, who died in a.d. 1325 and was
dignified with the title doctor illuminatus or acutus. The most notable of
the Thomists was Hervseus Natalis, who died in a.d. 1323 as general of
the Dominicans. Of the later Thomists the most eminent was Thomas
Bradwardine, doctor profundus, a man of deep religious earnestness, who
accused his age of Pelagianism, and vindicated the truth in opposition
to this error in his De causa Dei c. Pelagunn. He began teaching at
Oxford, afterwards accompanied Edward HI. as his confessor and chap-
lain on his expeditions in France, and died in a.d. 1349 a few weeks
after his appointment to the archbishopric of Canterbury. ^
3. Nominalists and Realists.— After nominalism (§ 99, 2) in the person
of Rosceliu had been condemned by the Church (§ 101, 3) realism held
sway for more than two centuries. Both Thomas and Duns supported
it. By sundering philosophy and theology Duns opened the way to freer
discussion, so that by-and-by nominalism won the ascendency, and at last
scarcely any but the precursors of the Reformation (§ 119) were to be
found in the ranks of the realists. The pioneer of the movement was
the Englishman William Occam, a Franciscan and pupil of Duns, who
as teacher of philosophy in Paris obtained the title doctor singularis et
invincibilisy and was called by later nominalists venerabilis inceptor. He
supported the Spirituals (§ 112, 2) in the controversies within his order.
He accompanied his general, Michael of Cevena, to Avignon, and escap-
ing with him in a.d. 1328 from threatened imprisonment, lived at
Munich till his death in a.d. 1349. There, protected by Louis the
Bavarian, he vindicated imperial rights against papal pretensions, and
charged various heresies against the pope (§ 118, 2). In philosophy and
theology he was mainly influenced by Scotus. In accordance with his
nominalistic principles he assumed the position in theology that our
Hook," Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury," vol. iv., "Bradwardine.
§ 113. SCHOLASTICISM AND ITS REFORMERS. 169
ideas derived from experience cannot reach to a knowledge of the super-
natural; and thus he may be called a precursor of Kant (§ 170, 10).
The universalia are mere fictiones (§ 99, 2), things that do not corre-
spond to our notions ; the world of ideas agrees not with that of pheno-
mena, and so the unity of faith and knowledge, of theological and
philosophical truth, asserted by realists, cannot be maintained (§ 103, 2).
Faith rests on the authority of Scripture and the decisions of the Church ;
criticism applied to the doctrines of the Church reduces them to a series
of antinomies. — In a.d. 1339 the University of Paris forbade the read-
ing of Occam's works, and soon after formally condemned nominalism.
Thomists and Scotists forgot their own differences to combine against
Occam ; but all in vain, for the Occamists were recruited from all the
orders. The Constance reform party too supported him {§ 118, 4).i
Of the Thomists who succeeded to Occam the most distinguished was
William Durand of St. Pour(^ain, doct. resolntissimus, who died in a.d. 1322
as Bishop of Meaux. Muertius of Inghen, one of the founders of the Uni-
versity of Heidelberg in a.d. 1386 and its first rector, was also a zealous
nominalist. The last notable schoolman of the period was Gabriel Biel
of Spires, teacher of theology at Tiibingen, who died a.d. 1495, a nomi-
nalist and an admirer of Occam. He was a vigorous supporter of the
doctrine of the immaculate conception, and delivered public discourses
on the "Ethics " of Aristotle.
4. Casuistry, or that part of moral theology which seeks to provide a
complete guide to the solution of difficult cases of conscience, especially
where there is collision of duties, moral or ecclesiastical, makes its first
appearance in the penitentials (§ 89, 6), and had a great impetus given it
in the compulsory injunction of auricular confession (§ 104, 4). It was
also favoured by the hair-splitting character of scholastic dialectics. The
first who elaborated it as a distinct science was Raimundus de Pennaforte,
who besides his works on canon law (§ 99, 5), wrote about a.d. 1238 a
summa de casibiis pxnitentiallhus. This was followed by the Franciscan
Antcsana, the Dominican Pisana, and the Angelica of the Genoese
Angelus of a.d. 1482, which Luther in a.d. 1520 burned along with the
papal bull and decretals. The views of the different casuists greatly
vary, and confuse rather than assist the conscience. Out of them grew
the doctrine of probabilism (§ 149, 10).
5. The Founder of Natural Theology.— The Spaniard Raimund of Sabunde
settled as a physician in Toulouse in a.d. 1430, but afterwards turned his
attention to theology. Seeing the need of infusing new life into the cor-
rupt scholasticism, he sought to rescue it from utter formalism and fruit-
less casuistry by a return to simple, clear, and rational thinking. Anselm
of Canterbury was his model of a clear and profound thinker and believing
^ Ueberweg, " History of Philosophy," vol. i., pp. 460-464.
170 THE GEEMANO'ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
theologian (§ 101, 1). He also turned for stimulus and instruction to
the book of nature. The result of his studies is seen in his Theologia
naturalis s. lihcr creaturanim, published in a.d. 1436. God's book of
nature, in which every creature is as it were a letter, is the first and
simplest source of knowledge accessible to the unlearned layman, and the
surest, because free from all falsifications of heretics. But the fall and
God's plan of salvation have made an addition to it necessary, and this
we have in the Scripture revelation. The two books coming from the
one author cannot be contradictory, but only extend, confirm, and ex-
plain one another. The facts of revelation are the necessary presup-
position or consequences of the book of nature. From the latter all
rehgious knowledge is derivable by ascending through the four degrees
of creation, esse, vivcre, sentire, and intelligere, to the knowledge of man,
and thence to the knowledge of the Creator as the highest and absolute
unity, and by arguing that the acknowledgment of human sinfulness
involved an admission of the need of redemption, which the book of re-
velation shows to be a fact. In carrying out this idea Kaimund attaches
himself closely to Anselm in his scientific reconciling of the natural
and revealed idea of God and redemption. Although he never expressly
contradicted any of the Church doctrines, the Council of Trent put the
prologue of his book into the Index prohihitorum.
6. Nicholas of Cusa was born in a.d. 1401 at Cues, near Treves, and
was originally called Krebs. Trained first by the Brothers at Deventer
(§ 112, 9), he afterwards studied law at Padua. The failure of his first
case led him to begin the study of theology. As archdeacon of Liege he
attended the Basel Council, and there by mouth and pen supported the
view that the council is superior to the pope, but in a.d. 1440 he passed
over to the papal party. On account of his learning, address, and
eloquence he was often employed by Eugenius IV. and Nicholas V. in
difficult negotiations. He was made cardinal in a.d, 1448, an unheard of
honour for a German prelate. In a.d. 1450 he was made bishop of
Brixen, but owing to a dispute with Sigismund, Archduke of Austria, he
suffered several years' hard imprisonment. He died in a.d. 1464 at Todi
in Umbria. His principal work is De clocta ignorantia, which shows,
in opposition to jjroud scholasticism, that the absolute truth about
God in the world is not attainable by men. His theological speculation
approaches that of Eckhart, and like it is not free from pantheistic
elements. God is for him the absolute maximum, but is also the abso-
lute minimum, since He cannot be greater or less than He is. He begets
of Himself His likeness, i.e. the Son, and He again turns back as Holy
Spirit into unity. The world again is the aggregated maximum. His
Dialogus de pace, occasioned by the fall of Constantinople in a.d. 1453,
represents Christianity as the most perfect of all religions, but recognises
in all others, even in Islam, essential elements of eternal truth. Like
§ 113. SCHOLASTICISM AND ITS IlEFORMERS. 171
Eoger Bacon (§ 103, 8), he assigns a prominent place to mathematics
and astronomy, and in his De separatione Calendarii of a.d. 1436 he
recommended reforms in the calendar which were only effected in
A.D. 1582 by Gregory XIII. (§ 149, 3). He detected the pseudo-Isidore
(§ 87, 2) and the Donation of Coustantine (§ 87, 4) frauds.
7. Biblical and Practical Theologians. — (1) The Franciscan Nicholas of
Lyra, doctor planus et iitilis, a Jewish convert from Normandy, and teacher
of theology at Paris, did good service as a grammatico-historical exegete
and an earnest expositor of Scripture. Luther gratefully acknowledges the
help he got in his Bible translation from the postils of Lyra.^ He died
in A.D. 1340. — (2) Antonine of Florence played a prominent part at the
Florentine Council of a.d. 1430, and was threatened by Eugenius IV.
with the loss of his archbishopric. He discharged his duties with great
zeal, especially during a plague and famine in a.d. 1448, and during the
earthquake which destroyed half of the city in a.d. 1457. As an earnest
preacher, an unwearied pastor, and upright churchman he was universally
admired, and was canonized by Hadrian VI. in a.d. 1523. He had a high
reputation as a writer. His Summa liistorialis is a chronicle of universal
history reaching down to his own time ; and his Swnma ihcologica is a
popular outline of the Thomist doctrine. — (3) The learned and famous
abbot John Trithemius, born in a.d. 14G2, after studying at Treves and
Heidelberg, entered in a.d. 1487 the Benedictine cloister of Sponheim,
became its abbot in tbe following year, resigned office in a.d. 1505 owing
to a rebellion among his monks, and died in a.d. 151G as abbot of the
Scottish cloister of St. James at Wiirzburg. Influenced by Wessel's
reforming movement (§ 119, 10), he urged the duty of Scripture study
and prayer, but still practised and commended the most extravagant
adoration of Mary and Ann. Though he was keenly alive to the absur-
dity of certain forms of superstition, he was himself firmly bound within
its coils. He lashed unsparingly the vices of the monks, but regarded
the monastic life as the highest Christian ideal. He pictured in dark
colours the deep and widespread corrui^tion of the Church, and was yet the
most abject slave of the hierarchy which fostered that corruption.
* Luther's Catholic opponents said, -Si Lyra non lyra&set, Lutherus
non mltasset. This saying had an earlier form : " Si Lyra non lyrasset,
nemo Doctorum in Biblia saltasset " ; "Si Lyra non lyrasset, totus mundus
delirasset.''^
172 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
§ 114. The German Mystics.^
The schoolmen of the 13th century, with the exception
of Bonaventura, had little sympathy with mysticism, and
gave their whole attention to the development of doctrine
(§ 99, 1). The 14th century was the Augustan age of
mysticism. Germany, which had already in the previous
period given Hugo of St. Victor and the two divines of
Heichersburg (§ 102, 4, 6), was its proper home. Its most
distinguished representatives belonged to the preaching
orders, and its recognised grand-master was the Dominican
Meister Eckhart. This specifically German mysticism cast
away completely the scholastic modes of thought and ex-
pression, and sought to arrive at Christian truth by entirely
new paths. It appealed, not to the understanding and
cultured reason of the learned, but to the hearts and spirits
of the people, in order to point them the surest way to
union with God. The mystics therefore wrote neither
commentaries on the Lombard nor gigantic siwimcc of their
own composition, but wrought by word and writing to meet
immediate pressing needs. They preached lively sermons
and wrote short treatises, not in Latin, but in the homely
mother tongue. This popular form however did not pre-
vent them from conveying to their readers and hearers
profound thoughts, the result of keen speculation ; but that
in this they did not go over the heads of the people is
shown by the crowds that flocked to their preaching. The
"Friends of God" proved a spiritual power over many lands
(§ 116, 4). From the practical prophetic mysticism of the
12th and 13th centuries (§§ 107 ; 108, 5) it was distinguished
by avoiding the visionary apocalyptic and magnetic somnam-
^ Dalgairns, "The German Mystics in the 1-ith Century." London,
1850. Vaughan, " Hours with the Mystics," 3rd ed., 2 vols. London,
1888.
§ 114. THE GERMAN MYSTICS. 173
bulistic elements through a better appreciation of science ;
and from the scholastic mysticism of that earlier age (§§ 102,
3, 4, 6 ; 103, 4) by abandoning allegory and the scholastic
framework for the elevation of the soul to God, as well as
by indulgence in a somewhat pantheistic speculation on God
and the world, man and the God-Man, on "the incarnation
and birth of God in us, on our redemption, sanctification,
and final restoration. Its younger representatives however
cut off all pantheistic excrescences, and thus became more
practical and edifying, though indeed with the loss of specu-
lative power. In this way they brought themselves more
into sympathy with another mystic tendency which was
spreading through the Netherlands under the influence of
the Flemish canon, John of Ruysbroek. In France too
m3''sticism again made its appearance during the 15th cen-
tury in the persons of d'Ailly and Gerson (§ 118, 4), in a
form similar to that which it had assumed during the 12th
and 13th centuries in the Victorines and Bonaventura.
1, Meister Eckhart. — One of the profoundest thinkers of all the Christian
centuries was the Dominican Meister Eckhart, the true father of German
speculative mysticism. Born in Strassburg about a.d. 12G0, he studied
at Cologne under Albert the Great, but took his master's degree at Paris
in A.D. 1303. He had already been for some years prior at Erfurt and
provincial vicar of Thuringia. In a.d. 130i he was made provincial of
Saxony, and in a.d. 1307 vicar-general of Bohemia. In both positions he
did much for the reform of the cloisters of his order. In a.d. 1311 we
find him teacher in Paris ; then for some years teaching and preaching
in Strassburg ; afterwards ofQciating as prior at Frankfort ; and finally
as private teacher at Cologne, where he died in a.d. 1327. While at
Frankfort in a.d. 1320 he was suspected of heresy because of alleged
intercourse with Beghards (§ 98, 7) and Brothers of the Free Spirit
(§ 116, o). In A.D. 1325 the archbishop of Cologne renewed these charges,
but Eckhart succeeded in vindicating himself. The archbishop now set
up an inquisition of his own, but from its sentence Eckhart appealed to
the pope, lodged a protest, and then of his own accord in the Dominican
church of Cologne, before the assembled congregation, solemnly declared
that the charge against him rested upon misrepresentation and misunder-
standing, but that ho was then and always ready to withdraw anything
174 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
that might be erroneous. The papal judgment, given two years after
Eckhart's death, pronounced twenty-eight of his propositions to be pan-
theistic in their tendency, seventeen being heretical and eleven danger-
ous. He was therefore declared to be suspected of heresy. The bull,
contrary to reason and truth, went on to say that Eckhart at the end of
his life had retracted and submitted all his writings and doctrines to
the judgment of the Holy See. But Eckhart had indignantly protested
against the charge of pantheism, and certainly in his doctrine of God
and the creature, of the high nobility of the human soul, of retirement
and absorption into God, he has always kept within the limits of
Christian knowledge and life. Attaching himself to the Platonic and
Neoi^latonic doctrines, which are met with also in Albert and Thomas, and
appealing to the acknowledged authorities of the Church, especially the
Areopagite, Augustine, and Aquinas, Eckhart with great originality com-
posed a singularly comprehensive and profound system of religious
knowledge. Although in all his writings aiming primarily at quickening
and edification, he always grounds his endeavours on a theoretical inves-
tigation of the nature of the thing. But knowledge is for him essen-
tially union of the knowing subject with the object to be known, and
the highest stage of knowledge is the intuition where all finite things
sink into the substance of Deity. ^
2. Mystics of Upper Germany after Eckhart. — A noble band of mystics
arose during the 14th and 15th centuries influenced by Eckhart's writings,
who carefully avoided pantheistic extremes by giving a thoroughly prac-
tical direction to their speculation. Nearest to Eckhart stands the
author of " The German Theology," in which the master's principles are
nobly popularized and explained. Luther, who took it for a work of
Tauler, and published it in a.d. 1516, characterized it as "a noble little
book, showing what Adam and Christ are, and how Adam should die and
Christ live in us." In the most complete MS. of this tract, found in
A.D. 1850, the author is described as a " Friend of God." — The Dominican
John Tauler was born at Strassburg, studied at Paris, and came into
connection with Eckhart, whose mysticism, without its pantheistic
tendencies, he adopted. When Strassburg was visited with the Black
Death, he laboured as preacher and pastor among the stricken with
heroic devotion. Though the city was under an interdict (§ 110, 3), the
Dominicans persisted for a whole year in reading mass, and were stopped
only by the severe threats of the master of their order. The magistrates
gave them the alternative either to discharge their official duties or
leave the city. Tauler now, in a.d. 1311, retired to Basel, and afterwards
to Cologne. In a.d. 1437 we find him again in Strassburg, where he
^ See an admirable account of Eckhart by Dr. Adolf Lasson in
Ueberweg's '« History of Philosophy," vol. i., pp. 4G7-484.
§ 114. THE GERMAN MYSTICS. 175
died iu a.d. 1361. His thii-ty sermons, with some other short tracts,
appeared at Leipzig in a.d. 1498. The most important of all Tauler's
works is, " The Imitation of the Poverty of Christ." It was thought to
be of French authorship, but is now admitted to be Tauler's.' — Rulman
Merswin, a rich merchant of Strassburg, in his fortieth year, a.d. 1347,
with his wife's consent, retired from his business and forsook the world,
gave his wealth to charities, and bought in a.d. 1366 an old, abandoned
convent near the city, which he restored and presented to the order of St.
John. Here he spent the remainder of his days in pious contemplation,
amid austerities and mortifications and favoured with visions. He died
in A.D. 1382. Four years after his conversion he attained to clear con-
ceptions and inner peace. His chief work, composed in a.d. 1352, " The
Book of the Nine Rocks," was long ascribed to Suso. It is full of bitter
complaints against the moral and religious corruption of all classes, and
earnest warnings of Divine judgment. Its starting point is a vision.
From the fountains in the high mountains stream many brooks over the
rocks into the valley, and thence into the sea ; multitudes of fishes trans-
port themselves from their lofty home, and are mostly taken in nets,
only a few succeed in reaching their home again by springing over
these nine rocks. At the request of the " Friend of God from the Up-
lands " he wrote the " Four Years from the Beginning of Life." His
"Banner Tract " describes the conflict with and victory over the Brothers
of the Free Spirit under the banner of Lucifer (§ 116, 4, o).
3. The Friend of God in the Uplands. — In a book entitled "The Story
of Tauler's Conversion," originally called "The Master's Book," but
now assigned to Nicholas of Basel, it is told that in a.d. 1346 a great
" Master of Holy Scripture " preached in an unnamed city, and that soon
his fame spread through the land. A layman living in the Uplands,
thirty miles off, was directed in a vision thrice over to go to seek this
Friend of God, companion of Rulman. He listened to his preaching,
chose him as his confessor, and then sought to show him that he had
not yet the true consecration. Like a child the master submitted to
be taught the elements of piety of religion by the layman, and at his
command abstaining from all study and preaching for two years, gave
himself to meditation and penitential exercises. When he resumed his
preaching his success was marvellous. After nine years' labour, feeling
his end approaching, he gave to the layman an account of his conver-
sion. The latter arranged his materials, and added five sermons of the
master, and sent the little book, in a.d. 1369, to a priest of Rulman's
cloister near Strassburg. In a.d. 1486 the master was identified with
Tauler. This however is contradicted by its contents. The historical
^ Winkworth, "Life and Times of Tauler, with Twenty-five Sermons."
London, 1857. Herrick, " Some Heretics of Yesterday." London, 1884.
176 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
part is improbable and incredible, and its chronology irreconcilable with
known facts of Tauler's life. We find no trace of the original ideas or
characteristic eloquence of Tauler ; while the language and homiletical
arrangement of the sermons are quite different from those of the great
Dominican preacher.
4. Nicholas of Basel. — After long hiding from the emissaries of the
Inquisition the layman Nicholas of Basel, in extreme old age, was taken
with two companions, and burned at Vienna, as a heretic, between
A.D. 1393-1408. He has been identified by Schmidt of Strassburg with
the " Friend of God." This is more than doubtful, since of the sixteen
heresies, for the most part of a Waldensian character, charged against
Nicholas, no trace is found in the writings of the Friend of God ; while
it is made highly probable by Denifle's researches that the " Friend of
God " was but a name assumed by Rulman Merswin.
5. Henry Suso, born a.d. 1295, entered the Dominican cloister of Con-
stance in his 13th year. When eighteen years old he took the vow, and
till his twenty-second year unceasingly practised the strictest asceticism,
in imitation of the sufferings of Christ. He completed his studies, a.d.
1325-1328, under Eckhart at Cologne, and on the death of his pious
mother withdrew into the cloister, where he became reader and after-
wards prior. The first work which he here published, in a.d. 1335, the
"Book of the Truth," is strongly influenced by the spirit of his master.
Accused as a heretic, he was deposed from the priorship in a.d. 1336.
His " Book of Eternal Wisdom " was the favourite reading of all lovers
of German mysticism. Blending the knight's and fanatic's idea of love
with the Solomonic conception of Wisdom, which he identifies sometimes
with God, sometimes with Christ, sometimes with Mary, he chose her
for his beloved, and was favoured by her with frequent visions and
was honoured with the title of " Amandus."— Like most of his fellow
monks at Constance, Suso was a supporter of the pope in his contest
with Louis the Bavarian, while the city sided with the emperor. When,
in A.D. 1339, the monks, in obedience to the pajoal interdict, refused to
perform public worship, they were expelled by the magistrates. In his
fortieth year Suso had begun his painful career of self-discipline, which
he carried so far as to endanger his life. Now driven away as an exile,
be began his singularly fruitful wanderings, during which, passing from
cloister to cloister as an itinerant preacher, he became either personally
or through correspondence most intimately acquainted with all the most
notable of the friends of mysticism, and made many new friends in
all ranks, especially among women. In a.d. 1346, along with eight com-
panions, he ventured to return to Constance. There however he met
with his sorest trial. An immoral woman, who pretended to him that
she sorrowed over and repented of her sins, while really she continued in
the practice of them, and was therefore turned away by him, took her
/
)
§ 114. THE GERMAN MYSTICS. 177
revenge by charging him with being the father of the child she was about
to bear. Probably this jjainful incident was the occasion of his retiring
into the monastery of Ulm, where he died in a.d. 1366. In him the
poetic and romantic element overshadowed the speculative, and in his
attachment to ecclesiastical orthodoxy he kept aloof from all reformatory
movements.
6. Henry of Nordlingen is only slightly known to us by the letters
which he sent to his lady friend, the Dominican nun Margaret Ebner.
He was spiritually related to Tauler, as well as to Suso, and shared with
the great preacher in his sorrows over the calamities of the age, which his
sensitive nature felt in no ordinary degree during enforced official idleness
under the interdict. His mysticism, by its sweetly sentimental character,
as well as by its superstitious tendency to reverence Mary and relics,
was essentially distinguished from that of Tauler. His friend Margaret,
who had also a spiritual affinity to Tauler, and was highly esteemed by
all the "-Friends of God," was religiously and politically, as a supporter
of the anathematized emperor, much more decided. In depth of thought
and power of expression however she is quite inferior to the earlier
Thuriugian prophetesses (§ 107, 2). — Hermann of Fritzlar, a rich and
pious layman, is supposed to have written, a.d. 1343-1319, a life of the
saints in the order of the calendar, as a picture of heart purity, with
mystic reflections and speculations based on the legendary matter, and
all expressed in pure and simple German. Hermann, however, was only
the author of the plan, and the actual writer was a Dominican of Erfurt,
Giseler of Slatheim.— A Franciscan in Basel, Otto of Passau, published, in
A.D. 1386, "The Four-and-Twenty Elders, or the Golden Throne," which
became a very popular book of devotion, in which the twenty- four elders
of Eevelation iv. 4, one after another, show the loving soul how to win
for himself a golden throne in heaven. Passages of an edifying and
contemplative description from the Fathers and teachers of the Church
down to the 13th century are selected by the author, and adapted to the
use of the unlearned " Friends of God" in a German translation.
7. Mystics of the Netherlands. — (1) John of Ruysbroek was born, in
A.D. 1298, in the village of Ruysbroek, near Brussels. In youth he was
addicted more to pious contemplation than to scholastic studies, and in
his sixtieth year he resigned his position as secular priest in Brussels, and
retired into a convent of regular canons (§ 97, 3) near Brussels, where
he died as its prior in a.d. 1481, when eighty-eight years old. He was
called doctor ecstaticus, because he regarded his mystical views, which he
developed amid pious contemplation in the shades of the forest, and there
wrote out in Flemish speech, as the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. His
mysticism was essentially theistic. The unio mystica consisted not in the
deification of man, but was wrought only through the free grace of God in
Christ without the loss of man's own personality. His genuine practical
12
178 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
piety led him to see in the moral depravity of the clergy, not less than of the
people generally, the cause of the decay of the Church, so that even the
person of the pope did not escape his reproof. Numerous pilgrims from
far and near sought the pious sage for counsel and quickening. His
favourite disciple was Gerhard Groot of Deveuter, who impressed much of
his master's spirit upon the brotherhood of the Common Life (§ 112, 9). — ■
Of this noble school of mystics the three following were the most distin-
guished.— (2) Hendrik Mande, who died a.d. 1430, impressed by a sermon
of Groot's, and favoured during a long illness by visions, abandoned the
life of a courtier for the fellowship of the Brethren of Deventer, and in
A.D. 1395 entered the cloister of Windesheim, to which he bequeathed his
wealth, and where he continued to enjoy visions of the Saviour and the
saints. His works, written in Dutch, are characterized by spirituality
and depth of feeling, copious and appropriate imager^', and great moral
earnestness.— (3) Gerlacli Peters was the favourite scholar of Florentius
in Deventer. He subsequently entered the monastery of Windesheim,
where, after a painful illness, he died in a.d. 1411, in his thirty-third year.
" An ardent spirit in a body of skin and bone," praising God for his
terrible bodily sufferings as a means of grace bestowed on him, his
devotion reaches the sublimest heights of enthusiasm. He wrote the
Soliloquium, the voice of a man who has daily struggled in God's
presence to free his heart from worldly bonds, and by God's grace in
tbe cross of Christ to have Adam's purity restored and union with the
highest good secured. — (4) Thomas Ti Kempis, formerly Hamerken, was
born in a.d. 1380 at Kempen, near Cologne. He was educated at
Deventer, and died as sub-prior of the convent of St. Agnes, near Zwoll,
in A.D. 1471. To him, and not to the chancellor Gerson, according to
the now universally accepted opinion, belongs the world renowned
book De Imitatione Christi. Reprinted about five thousand times, oftener
than any other book except the Bible, it has been also translated into
more languages than any other. Free from all Romish superstition, it
is read by Catholics and Protestants, and holds an unrivalled position
as a book of devotion. A photographic reproduction of the original
edition of a.d. 1441 was published from the autograph MSS. of Thomas,
by Ch. Ruelans, London, 1879.^
1 Kettlewell, " The Authorship of the ' Imitation of Christ.' " London,
1877. Kettlewell, " Thomas n Kempis and the Brothers of the Common
Life." 2 vols. London, 1882. Ullmann, "Reformers before the Refor-
mation," vol. ii. Edin., 1855. Cruise, " Thomas a Kempis : Notes of a
Visit to the Scenes of his Life." London, 1887.
§ 115a. public worship of the people. 179
III.— The Church and the People.
§ 115a. Public Worship and the Religious Education
OF THE People.
Preaching in the vernacular was carried on mainly by
the Brothers of the Common Life, the mystics, and several
heretical sects, e.g. Waldensians, Wiclifites, Hussites, etc. ;
and stimulated by their example, others began to follow the
same practice. The so called Biblia paitperum set forth in
pictures the New Testament history with its Old Testament
types and prophecies ; Bible Histories made known among
the people the Scripture stories in a connected form ; and,
after the introduction of printing, the German Plena ries
helped also to spread the knowledge of Glod's word by
renderings for private use of the principal parts of the
service. For the instruction of the people in faith and
morals a whole series of Catechisms was constructed after
a gradually developed type. The " Dance of Death " in its
various forms reminded of the vanity of all earthly pleasures.
The spirit of the E,eformation was shown during this period
in the large number of hymns written in the vernacular.
Church music too received a powerful impulse.
1. Fasts and Festivals. — New Mary Festivals were introduced : F. prcc-
sentationis M. on 21st Nov. (Lev. xii. 5-8), F. visitationis 31. (Luke i.
39-51), on 2nd July. In the 15th century we meet with the festivals of
the Seven Pains of Mary, F. Spasmi i)/., on Friday or Saturday before
Palm Sunday. Dominic instituted a rosary festival, F. rosarii M., on
1st Oct., and its general observance was enjoined by Gregory XIII. in
A.D. 1571. — The Veneration of Ann (§ 57, 2) was introduced into Germany
in the second half of the 15th century, but soon rose to a height almost
equal to that of Mary. — The Fasts of the early Church (§ 56, 7) had, even
during the previous period, been greatly relaxed. Now the most special
fast days were mere days of abstinence from flesh, while most lavish
meals of fish and farinaceous food were indulged in. Papal and epi-
scopal dispensations from fasting were also freely given.
2. Preaching (§ 104, 1). — To aid and encourage preaching in the lan-
guage of tbe people, unskilled preachers were supplied with Vucabularia
180 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
prcedicantium. Surgant, a priest of Basel, wrote, iu the end of the 15th
century, a treatise on homiletics and catechctics most useful for his age,
Manuale Curatorum. In it he showed how Latin sermons might be
rendered into the tongue of the people, and urged the duty of hearing
sermons. The mendicants were the chief preachers, especially the mystics
of the preaching orders, during the 14th century (§ 114), and the Augus-
tinians, particularly their German Observants, during the 15th (§ 112, 5),
and next to them, the Franciscans. — The most zealous preacher of his
age was the Spanish Dominican Vincent Ferrer. In a.d. 1397 he began
his uni^recedentedly successful preaching tours through Spain, France,
Italy, England, Scotland, and Ireland. He died in a.d. 1419. He
laboured with special ardour for the conversion of the Jews, of whom he
is said to have baptized 35,000. Wherever he went he was venerated
as a saint, received with respect by the clergy and prelates, highly
honoured by kings and princes, consulted by rich and poor regarding
temporal and spiritual things. He was canonized by Calixtus HI. in
A.D. 1455. Certain Flagellants (§ 116, 3) whom he met in his travels
followed him, scourgiug themselves and singing his penitential songs, but
he stopped this when objected to by the Council of Constance. His
sermons dealt with the realities of actual life, and called all classes to
repent of their sins. Of a similar spirit was the Italian Dominican
Barletta, who died in a.d. 1480, whose burlesque and scathing satire
rendered him the most popular preacher of the day. In his footsteps
went the Frenchmen Maillard and Menot, both Franciscans, and the
German priest of Strassburg, Geiler of Kaisersberg, quite equal to them
in quaint terseness of expression and biting wit. All these were pre-
eminently distinguished for moral earnestness and profound spirituality.^
3. The Biblia Pauperum. — The typological interpretation of the Old
Testament history received a fixed and permanent form in the illustra-
tions introduced into the service boohs and pictures printed on the altars,
walls, and windows of churches, etc., during the 12tli century. A set of
seventeen such picture groups was found at Vienna, of which the middle
panels represent the New Testament history, sub gracia, above it an Old
Testament type from the period ante legem, and under it one from the
period sub lege. This picture series was completed by the Biblia pau-
perum, so called from the saying of Gregory I., that pictures were the poor
man's Bible. Many of the extant MSS., all depending on a common
source, date from tlie 14th and 15th centuries. The illustrations of the
New Testament are in the middle, and round about are pictures of the
four prophets, with volumes in their hands, on which the appropriate Old
Testament prophecies are written. On right and left are Old Testament
1 Baring-Gould, •' Mediseval Preachers: Some Account of Celebrated
Preachers of the 15th, IGth, and 17th Centuries." London, 18G5.
§ 115a. public worship of the people. 181
types. The multiplication of copies of this work by woodcuts and types
was one of the first uses to which printing was put.^
4. The Bible in the Vernacular.— The need of translations of the Bible
into the language of the people, specially urged by the Waldensians and
Albigensians, was now widely insisted upon by those of reformatory
tendencies (§ 119). On the introduction of printing, about a.d. 1450,
an opportunity was afforded of rapidly circulating translations already
made in most of the European languages. Before Luther, there were
fourteen printed editions of the Bible in High and five in Low German.
The translations, made from the Vulgate, were in all practically the
same. The translators are unknown. The diction is for the most part
clumsy, and the sense often scarcely intelligible. Translations had been
made in England by the Wiclifites, and in Bohemia by the Hussites.
In France, various renderings of separate books of Scripture were cir-
culated, and a complete French Bible was issued by the confessor of
Charles VIII,, Jean de Piely, at Paris, in a.d. 1487. Two Italian Bibles
were published in Venice, in a.d, 1471, one by the Camaldulite abbot
Malherbi, closely following the Vulgate ; the other by the humanist
Bruccioli, which often falls back on the original text. The latter was
highly valued by Italian exiles of the Eeformation age. In Spain a
Carthusian, Ferreri, attempted a translation, which was printed at
Valencia in a.d. 1478. More popular however than these translations
were the Bible Histories, i.e. free renderings, sometimes contracted,
sometimes expanded, of the historical books, especially these of the Old
Testament. From a.d. 1470 large and frequent editions were published
of the German Plenaries, containing at first only the gospels and epistles,
afterwards also the Service of the Mass, for all Sundays and festivals
and saints' days, with explanations and directions.
5. Catechisms and Prayer Books. — Next to preaching, the chief oppor-
tunity for imparting religious instruction was confession. Later cate-
chisms drew largely upon the baptismal and confessional services. In
the 13th and 14th centuries the decalogue was added, and afterwards
the seven deadly sins and the seven principal virtues. Pictures were
used to impress the main points on the minds of the people and the
youth. The catechetical literature of this period, both in guides for
priests and manuals for the people, was written in the vernacular. —
During the loth century there were also numerous so-called Artes mori-
endi, showing how to die well, in which often earnest piety appeared side
by side with the grossest superstition. There were also many prayer
books, Hortuli animce, published, in which the worship of Mary and the
saints often overshadowed that of God and Christ, and an extravagant
1 '• Biblia Pauperum," reproduced in facsimile from MS. in British
Museum, London, 1859,
182 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
belief in indulgences led to a mechanical view of prayer that was
thoroughly pagan.
6. The Dance of Death. — The fantastic humour of the Middle Ages
found dramatic and spectacular expression in the Dance of Death, in
which all classes, from the pope and princes to the beggars, in turn
converse with death. It was introduced into Germany and France in
the beginning of the 14th century, with the view of raising men out of
the pleasures and troubles of life. It was called in France the Dance of
the Maccabees, because first introduced at that festival. Pictures and
verbal descriptions of the Dance of Death were made on walls and doors
of churches, around MSS. and woodcuts, where death was generally
represented as a skeleton. Hans Holbein the Younger gave the finish-
ing touch to these representations in his Imagines Mortis, the originals
of which are in St. Petersburg. In this masterpiece, the idea of a
dancing pair is set aside, and in its place forty pictures, afterwards
increased to fifty-eight, full of humour and moral earnestness, pourtray
the power of death in the earthly life.^
7. Hymnology {§ 104, 10).— The Latin Church poetry of the 14th and
15th centuries was far beneath that of the 12th and 18tli. Only the
mystics, e.g. Thomas h Kempis, still composed some beautiful hymns.
We have now however the beginnings of German and Bohemian hymno-
logy. The German flagellators sang German hymns (§ IIG, 3), and
so obtained much popular favour. The Hussite movement of the 15th
century gave a great impulse to church song. Huss himself earnestly
urged the practice of congregational singing in the language of the
people, and himself composed Bohemian hymns. The Bohemian and
Moravian Brethren were specially productive in this department (§ 119,
8). In many churches, at least on high festivals, German hymns were
sung, and in some even at the celebration of mass and other parts of
public worship. The spiritual songs of this period were of four kinds :
some half German, half Latin ; others translations of Latin hymns and
sequences ; others, original German compositions by monks and min-
strels ; and adaptations of secular songs to spiritual purposes. In the
latter case the original melodies were also retained. Popular forms and
melodies for sacred songs were now secured, and these were subse-
quently appropriated by the Reformers of the 16th century.
8. Church Music (§ 104, 11).— Great improvements were made in organs
by the invention of pedals, etc. Church music was also greatly developed
by the introduction of harmony and counterpoint. The Dutch were
pre-eminent in this department. Ockcnhcim, founder of the second
Dutch school of music, at the end of the 15tli century, was the inventor
of the canon and the fugue. The greatest composer of this school was
1 Douce, " The Dance of Death." London, 1833.
§ 115b. national literature. 183
Jodocus Pratensis, about a.d. 1500, aud next to him may be named the
German, Adam of Fulda,
9. Legendary Relics. — The legend of angels having transferred the
house of Mary from Nazareth, in a.d. 1291, to Tersato in Dalmatia, in
A.D. 1294 to Eeccanati, and finally, in a.d. 1295, to Loretto in Ancona,
arose in the 14th century, in connection with the fall of Acre (§ 94, G)
and the overthrow of the last remnants of the kingdom of Jerusalem.
When and how the legend arose of the Scala santa at Rome being the
marble steps of Pilate's prffitorium, brought there by St. Helena, is
unknown. — Even Frederick the Wise, at an enormous cost, brought
together 1,010 sacred relics into his new chapel at Wittenberg, a mere
look at which secured indulgence for 100 years. In a catalogue of relics
in the churches of St. Maurice and Mary Magdalene at Halle, published
in A.D. 1520, are mentioned a piece of earth, from a field of Damascus,
of which God made the first man ; a piece from a field at Hebron, where
Adam repented ; a piece of the body of Isaac ; twenty-five fragments of
the burning bush of Horeb ; specimens of the wilderness manna ; six
drops of the Virgin's milk ; the finger of the Baptist that pointed to the
Lamb of God ; the finger of Thomas that touched the wounds of Jesus ;
a bit of the altar at which John read mass for the Virgin ; the stone
with which Stephen was killed ; a great piece of Paul's skull ; the hose
of St. Thomas of Canterbury ; the baret of St. Francis, etc. The col-
lection consisted of 8,933 articles, and could afford indulgence for
39,245,100 years and 220 days ! Benefit was to be had by contributions
to the church, which went into the pocket of the elector-archbishop,
Albert of Mainz. The craze for pilgrimages was also rife among all
classes, old and young, high and low. Signs and wonders and newly
discovered relics were regarded as consecrating new places of pilgrimage,
and the stories of pilgrims raised the fame of these resorts more and
more. In a.d. 1500 Diiren, by the possession of a relic of Ann, stolen
from Mainz, rapidly rose to first rank. The people of Mainz sought
through the pope to recover this valuable property, but he decided in
favour of Diiren, because God had meanwhile sanctioned the transfer by
working many miracles of healing.
§ 115b. National Literature axd Ecclesiastical
Art.
Toward the close of the 13th century, and throughout the
14th, a national literature, in prose and poetry, sprang up
in Italy, which in several respects has close relations to the
history of the church. The three Florentines, Dante, Pet-
184 THE GETIMANO-ROMANIC CHURCPI TO A.D. 1517.
rarcli and Boccaccio, boldly burst through the barriers of
traditional usage, which had made Latin the only vehicle
for literature and science, and became the creators of a
beautiful Italian style ; while their example powerfully in-
fluenced their own countrymen, and those of other western
nations, during the immediately succeeding ages. The
exclusive use of the Latin language had produced a uniform
hierarchical spirit, and was a restraint to the anti-hierar-
chical movements of the age after independent national
development in church and State. The breaking down of
this barrier to progress was an important step. But all
the three great men of letters whom we have named were
also highly distinguished for their classical culture. They
introduced the study of the ancient classics, and were thus
the precursors of the humanists. They also presented a
united front against the corruptions of the church, against
hierarchical pretensions, the greed and moral debasement
of the papacy, as well as against the moral and intellectual
degradation of the clergy and the monks. Petrarch and
Boccaccio too warred against the depraved scholasticism.
The Augustan age of German national poetry was contem-
porary with the age of the Hohenstaufens. It consisted in
popular songs, these often of a sacred character. During
the 14th century the sacred drama reached the highest
point of its development, especially in Germany, England,
France, and Spain. The spirit of the Eenaissance, which
during the 15th century dominated Italian art, made itself
felt also in the domain of ecclesiastical architecture and
painting.
10. The Italian National Literature. i— Dante Alighieri, born at Florence
in A.D. 12G5, was in a.d. 1302 banished as a Gbibelline from his native
city, and died an exile at Eavenna, in a.d. 1321. His boyish love for
1 Symonds, " Renaissance in Italy." 2 vols. London, 1881,
§ 115b. national literature. 185
Beatrice, which after her early death continued to fill his soul to the
end of his life, gave him an impulse to a " New Life," and proved the
unfailing source of his poetic inspiration. His studies at Bologna,
Padua, and Paris made him an enthusiastic admirer of Thomas, but
alongside of his scholastic culture there lay the quick perception of the
beautiful, combined with a lively imagination. He was thus able to deal
with the burning questions of his day in one of the greatest poetic
masterpieces of any age, people, or tongue. His Divina Commedia
describes a vision in which the poet is led, first by the hand of Virgil,
as the representative of human wisdom, through Hell and Purgatory;
then by Beatrice, whose place at times is taken by the German Matilda
(§ 107, 2), and finally by St. Bernard, as representatives of revealed reli-
gion, through Paradise and the several heavens up to the empyrajum, the
eternal residence of the triune God. The poet presents his readers with a
description of what he saw, and reports his conversations with his guides
and the souls of more important personages, most of them shortly before
deceased, in which the problems of philosophy, theology, and politics are
discussed. His political views, of wbich he treats e.v professo in the three
books of hisD^ monarcliia, are derived from Aquinas' theory of the State,
but breathe a strong Italiau Ghibelhne patriotism, so that he places
not only Boniface VHI. but also Frederick II. in Hell. In the struggle
between the empire and the papacy he stands decidedly on the side of
the former. With profound sorrow he bewails the corruption of the
church in its head and members, but holds firmly by its confession of
faith. And while lashing vigorously the corruptions of monkery, he eulo-
gizes the heavenliness of the lives of Francis and Dominic.^ Petrarch,
who died in a.d. 1374, broke away completely from scholasticism, and
turned with enthusiasm to classical studies. He combated supersti-
tion, e.g. astrology, but also contends against the unbelief of his age,
and in his letters and poems lashes with merciless severity the immora-
lity of the papacy and the secularization of the church.^ In Boccaccio
again, who died in a.d. 1375, antipathy to scholasticism, monkery, and
the hierarchy had reached its utmost stage. He has no anger and
1 Chm-ch, " Dante and other Essays." London, 1888. Plumptre,
" Commedia, etc., of Dante, with Life and Studies." 2 vols. London,
1886-1888. Oliphant, " Dante." Edinburgh, 1877. Ozanam, " Dante
and the CathoHc Philosophy of the 13th Century." London, 1854.
Barlow, " Critical, Historical, and Philosophical Contributions to the
Study of the Divina Commedia.'' London, 1884. Botta, " Dante as
Philosopher, Patriot, and Poet." New York, 1865. M. F. Eossetti,
" A Shadow of Dante." Boston, 1872.
- Reeve, " Petrarch," Edinburgh, 1879. Simpson, article on Petrarch
in Contemporary Review for July, 1874.
186 THE GEEMANO-ROMANTC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
denunciation, but only contempt, reproach, and wit to shoot against
them. He also makes light of the moral requirements of Christianity
and the church, especially the seventh commandment. But in later
years he manifested deep penitence for the lascivious writing of his
youth, to which he had given reckless and shameless expression in his
" Decameron."
11. The German National Literature. — The German prose style was
greatly ennobled by the mystics (§ 114), and the highest development of
German satire against the hierarchy, clergy, and monks was reached
by Sebastian Brant, of Strassburg, who wrote in a.d. 1494 his " Ship of
Fools." Among popular preachers John Tauler held the first rank
(§ 114, 2). In Strassburg, Geiler of Kaisersburg distinguished himself
as an original preacher. His sermons were full of biting wit, keen
sarcasm, and humorous expressions, but also of profound earnestness
and withering exposures of the sins of the clergy and monks. His best
known work is a series of sermons on Brant's " Ship of Fools," published
in A.D. 1498.
12. The Sacred Drama (§ 105, 5). — The poetic merit of most of the
German mysteries performed at high festivals is not great. The
Laments of Mary however often rose to true poetic heights. Comedy
and burlesque too found place especially in connection with Judas, or
the exchangers, or the unconverted Magdalene. A priest, Theodoric
Schernberg, wrote a play on the fall and repentance of the popess
Johanna (§ 82, G). On Shrove Tuesday plays were performed, in which
the clergy and monks were held up to ridicule. Hans Roseupliit of
Nuremberg, about a.d. 1450, was the most famous writer of German
Shrovetide plays. In France, about the end of the 14th century, a
society of young people of the upper rank was formed, called Enfans sans
souci, whose Softies, buffooneries, in which the church was ridiculed,
were in high repute in the cities and at the court. Their most distin-
guished poet was Pierre Gringoire, who, in the beginning of the 16th
century, in the French Chasse da Cerf des Cerfs, parodied the Serous
seroorinn (§ 46, 10), and the church is represented as the old befooled
mother. The numerous Italian mysteries were produced mainly by the
gifted and cultured sons of Tuscany, who had already developed their
native tongue into a beautiful and flexible language. In Spain, during
the 15th century, the Atitos, partly as Christmas plays and partly as
sacramental or passion plays, were based on the ancient mysteries, and
in form inclined more to the allegorical moralities.
13. Architecture and Painting (§ 104, 12, 14).— Gothic architecture was
the prevailing style in the churches of Germany, France, and England.
In Italy, the humanist movement (§ 120, 1) led to the imitation of
ancient classical models, and thus the Renaissance style was introduced,
which flourished for 300 years. Its real creator was the Florentine
§ 116. POPULAR MOVEMENTS. 187
Brunelesclii, who won imperishable renown by the grand cupola of the
cathedral of Florence. Bramante, died a.d. 1514, marks the transition
from the earlier Pienaissance of the loth century to the later of the
6th, at the summit of which stands Michael Angelo, a.d. 1471-1564.
After a plan of Bramante Julius II., in a.d. 1506, began the magnificent
reconstruction of St. Peter's at Kome, the execution of which in its
gigantic proportions occupied the reigns of twenty popes. It was com-
pleted under Urban VIII., in a.d. 1636. This great building, in conse-
quence of the traffic in indulgences, entered on to defray its cost, became
the occasion of the loss to the papacy of the half of western Christen-
dom.—Sacred Statuary, in the hands of Ghiberti, died a.d. 1455, and
Michael Angelo, reached the highest stage of excellence. — Of Painting,
the Augustan age of which was the 15th century, there were properly
four schools. Giotto, who died in a.d. 1336, was founder of the Floren-
tine school, which was specially distinguished by its delineations of
sacred history. To it belonged the Dominican Fra Giovanni da Fiesole,
who painted only as he prayed, Leonardo da Vinci, Fra Bartolomeo, and
Michael Angelo. Then there was the Lombard or Venetian School, at
the head of which stands Giovanni Bellini, died a.d. 1516, which turned
away from the church and applied itself with its fresh living colouring
to the depicting of earthly ideals. Its most eminent representatives
were Correggio, died a.d. 1534, and Titian, died a.d. 1576. In the
Umbrian school, again, the spirit of St. Francis continued still to
breathe. Its greatest master was Raphael of Urbino, the noblest and
most renowned of all Christian painters, distinguished also as an archi-
tect. The German school had its ablest representatives in the brothers
Hubert and John van Eyk, Albert Diirer, and Hans Holbein tbe Elder.
— Continuation § 149, 15.
§ IIG. Popular Move^iexts.
In consequence of the shameful debasement of the papacy
and the deep corruption of the clergy and monks, the
influence of the church on the moral and religious culture
of the people, in spite of the ardent zeal of the homilists
and catechists, was upon the whole much less than formerly.
Reverence for the church as it stood was indeed tottering,
but was not yet completely overthrown. The religious
enthusiasm of earlier times was fading away, but occasional
phenomena still continued to arise, like St. Bridget and St.
Catharine of Siena (§ 112, 4, 8), Claus of Fltie, and the
Maid of Orleans, But in order to elevate a John of Nepo-
188 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
muk into 'a recognised national saint.it was necessary to
produce forged legendary stories in post-E-eformation times.
The market-place tricks of John of Capistrano (§ 112, 3)
were of such a kind, that even the papal curia only after a
century and a half had passed coukl venture to adorn him
with the halo of saintship. The ever-increasing nuisance
of the sale of indulgences smothered religious earnestness
and crushed all religious spirit out of the people. But
earnestness showed itself again in the reactions of the Beg-
hards and Lollards, or in the explosions of the Flagellants,
and spirituality often found rich nourishment in the preach-
ing of the mystics. One current issuing from the wide-
spread Friends of God passed deep into the heart of the
Cierman people ; another, springing probably from the same
source, but with a quite different tendency, appears in the
Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit. On the other hand,
superstition also prevailed, and was all the more dangerous
the more it parted with its poetic and naive character
(§ 117, 4). Toward the end of that period however a new
era dawned in social life, as well as in national literature.
Knighthood paled before gunpowder. The establishment of
civic corporations developed a sense of freedom, and intro-
duced a healthy understanding and appreciation of civil
liberty. The printing of books began the dissemination of
knowledge, and the discovery of America opened to view a
new world for trade, colonization, and the spread of Chris-
tianity. To the pious heart of the discoverer the exten-
sion of Christ's kingdom proved the most powerful motive to
his continued exertions, and from the treasures of the new
world he hoped also to obtain the means for conquering again
the Holy Sepulchre and the Holy Land.
1. Two National Saints.— John of Nepomuk, of Pomnk in Bohemia,
was from a.d. 1880 i^astor, then canon, archiepiscopal secretary, and
vicar-general of Prague. King Wenzel had Lim seized, cruelly tortured,
§ 116. POPULAR MOVEMENTS. 189
and flung over the bridge into the Moldau, because, so runs the legend,
he as confessor of the queen sturdily refused to betray the secrets of the
confessional, but really because he had roused the king's anger to the
uttermost in a violent controversy between the king's archbishop, John
of Jenzenstein, and the chapter over their election and consecration of an
abbot. The confession legend appears first in an Austrian writer of a.d,
li51, who gives it distinctly as a tradition. It is evidently connected
with the Taborite rejection of the Catholic doctrine of auricular con-
fession (§ 119, 7). If it be accepted as true, then, seeing that all the
older chroniclers ascribe the cruel treatment of this prelate to the
share he took in the abbot's election, it will be necessary to assume two
victims of the king's wrath instead of one. The John Nepomuk of the
legend, and the confessor of the queen, was tortured by the king's com-
mand in A.D. 1383 ; the other, who figures in the old chronicles as
archiepiscopal vicar-general, and is simply called John, was tortured in
A.D. 1393, and then thrown over the bridge into the Moldau. This latter
story appears first in a Bohemian chronicle of a.d. 1511. In the 17th
century the Jesuits, in order to deprive the heretical national saint and
martyr John Huss of his supremacy by bringing forward another
genuine Bohemian, but also a thoroughly Catholic saint, gave currency
to the legend, adorned with many additional stories of miracles. Bene-
dict XIII. (^ 161, 1) was just the pope to aid such a device by sanctioning,
as he did in a.d. 1729, the canonization of a purely fictitious saint-
confessor John Nepomuk. He is patron saint of bridges, whose image
in Bohemia, and other strictly Catholic lands, is met with at almost
every bridge, aud is reverenced as the protector from unjust accusations,
as well as the dispenser of rain in seasons of great drought. Although
no mention is made of the story about the confessional in the letter of
complaint to Rome by Archbishop Jenzenstein, Catholic historians still
insist that the confessor's steadfastness was the real cause, the election of
the abbot the ostensible cause, of the martyrdom of a.d. 1393. i The need
of strengthening the position of the Romish church, in face of the pro-
gress of the Swiss Reformation of the 16th century, led also to the
elevation of the recluse, Nicolaus of Fliie upon the pedsstal of a Swiss
national saint. Esteemed even before his birth a saint by reason of
signs and wonders, " Brother Claus," after a long, active life in the world,
in his oOth year, the father of ten children, forsook house and home,
with the approval of his wife, abstained from all nourishment save that
of the sacrament, and died, after spending nineteen years in the wilder-
ness, in A.D. 1187. During this period he was the trusted adviser of
all classes upon public and private affairs. He is specially famous as
having saved Switzerland, by appearing personally at the Diet of Stanz,
1 Wratislaw Life and Legend of St. John Nepomuceu." Lon., 1873.
190 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
in A.D. 1481, stopping the conflict bet^Yeen cities and provinces, which
threatened to break up the confederation and bring about civil war, and
suggesting the peaceable compromise of the "Agreement of Stanz."
That Brother Glaus did assist in securing harmony is a well established
fact, but'it is also demonstrable that he was not personally present at
Stanz. He was beatified by Clement X. in a.d. 1671, but notwithstand-
ing repeated endeavours by his admirers, he has not yet been canonized.
2. The Maid of Orleans, A.D. 1428-1431.— Joan of Arc was the daughter
of a peasant in the village of Domremy, in Champagne. Even in her
thirteenth year she thought she saw a peculiar brightness and heard a
heavenly voice exhorting her to chastity and piety. She now bound
herself by a vow to perpetual virginity. Afterwards the heavenly voices
became more frequent, and the brightness took the shape of the arch-
angel Michael, St. Catharine, and other saints, who saluted her as saviour
of her fatherland. France was, under the imbecile king Charles VI., and
still more after his death, rent by the rival parties of the Armagnacs and
Burgundians. The former fought for the rights of the dauphin Charles
VII.; the latter supported his mother Isabella and the Enghsh king Henry
v., who was succeeded in a.d. 1422 by his son Henry VI., then only nine
months old. Joan was the enthusiastic supporter of the dauphin. He
found himself in a.d. 1428 in the greatest straits. The last bulwark of
his might, the city of Orleans, was besieged by the English, and seemed
near its fall. Then her voices commanded Joan to reheve Orleans,
and to accompany the dauphin to his coronation at Eheims. She now
published her call, which had been hitherto kept secret, overcame all
difficulties, was recognised as a messenger of heaven, assumed the male
attire of a soldier, and placed herself at the head of an enthusiastic
crowd. Great success attended the movements of this girl of seventeen
years. In the latter campaigns of the war she became the prisoner of
Burgundy, who delivered her over to the English. At Rouen she was
subjected to an ecclesiastical tribunal, which after four months' investi-
gation condemned her to the stake as a heretic and sorceress. In view of
the fire, her courage failed. Yielding to the persuasion of her confessor,
she acknowledged her guilt, and had her sentence commuted to that of
imprisonment for life. But eight days later she was led forth to the
stake. Her rude keepers had taken away her female attire, and forced
her to wear again male garments, and this act to which she was com-
pelled was made a charge against her. She died courageously and
piously in a.d. 1431. At the demand of her family, which had been
ennobled, a revision of the process against her was made in a.d. 1450,
when she was pronounced innocent, and the charges against her false.
The endeavour of Dupanloup, Bishop of Orleans, in a.d. 1876, in the
name of Catholic France, to have her canonized, was not responded to
by the papal curia. The infallible church, that had burnt her as a
§ 116. POPULAR MOVEMENTS. 191
witch in a.d. 14.31, could scarcely give her a place among its saints, even
after 450 years had gone.
3. Lollards, Flagellants, and Dancers. — During a plague at Antwerp in
A.D. 1300 the Lollards made their appearance, nursing the sick and bury-
ing the dead. They spread rapidly over the Netherlands and the
bordering German provinces. Like the Beghards however, and for the
same reasons, they soon fell under suspicion of heresy, and were sub-
jected to the persecution of the Inquisition, until Gregory XL, in a.d,
1347, again granted them toleration. But the name Lollard still con-
tinued to be associated with heresy or hypocrisy (§ 119, 1).^ The Fla-
gellant fraternities, wbich had sprung up in the 12th century (§ 106, 4),
greatly increased during this period, and reached their height during the
14th century. Their influence was greatest during the visitation of the
Black Death, a.d. 1348-1350, which cost Europe many millions of lives.
Issuing from Hungary, rushing forth with the force of an avalancbe,
and massing in great numbers on the upper Ehine, they spread over all
Germany, Belgium and Holland, Switzerland, England, and Sweden.
Eutrance into France was refused tliem at the bidding of the Avignon pope
Clement VI. In long rows of penitents, with uncovered head, screaming
forth their penitential songs, and with teai's streaming down ,their cheeks,
they rushed about lashing their bare backs. They -also from city to city
and from village to village read aloud a letter of warning, said to have been
written by Christ, and brought to the Patriarch of Jerusalem by an angel.
This paroxysm lasted for three years. In Lombardy. in a.d. 1399, when
famine, pestilence, the Turkish war, and expectation of the end of the
world inclined men to such extravagances, the Flagellants made their
appearance again, dressed in white robes, and so called BiancJii, Albati.
Princes, scholars, and popes, universities and councils sought to check
this silly fanaticism, but were not able to su^Dpress it. Many Flagellants
were also heretical in their views, spoke of the hierarchy as anti-
christ, withdrew from the worship of the church, declared the bloody
baptism of the scourge the only true sacrament, and died at the stake of
the Inquisition. — The Dancers, Chorisantes, were a segit closely related to
the Flagellants, but their fanaticism seemed more of a pathological than
of a religious order. Half naked and crowned with leaves they rushed
along the streets and into houses, dancing in a wild, tumultuous manner.
They made a great noise in the Khine Provinces in a.d. 1374 and in
A.D. 1418. They were regarded as demoniacs and cured by calling upon
St. Vitus.
4, The Friends of God. — During the 14th century many detachments of
mystic sects spread through all Southern Germany, and even from the
1 Gairdner and Spedding, '• Studies in English History": I. "The
Lollards."
192 THEl GIERMANO-ROMANIC CliURCH TO A.D. 1517.
Netherlands to Hungary and Italy. A powerful religious awakening,
with an undertone of contemplative mysticism, was now experienced in
the castles of the knights, in the shops of artisans, and in the stalls
of traders, as well as in the Beguine houses, the monasteries, and
nunneries of the Dominicans and other monkish orders. A great free
association was then called forth under the name of " Friends of God "
(John XV. 15), whose members maintained personal and epistolary corre-
spondence with one another. The headquarters of this movement were
Cologne, Strassburg, and Basel. Its preachers and supporters were
mostly Dominicans. They drew their intellectual and spiritual nourish-
ment from the writings of the German mystics. They repudiated all
sectarian intentions, carefully observed the rites and ceremonies and
attended on the worship of the church, and accepted all its dogmas.
But all the greater on this account was their sorrow over the deep decay
of religious and moral life, and their lamentations over the corruption
of the clergy and hierarchy. Fantastic visionary conceptions, however,
derived from the domain of mysticism, were by no means rare among
them.
5. Pantheistic Libertine Societies.— A demoniacally inspired counter-
part to the fraternity of the " Friends of God " is found in the sect of the
Brothers and Sisters of the Free Spirit. This sect, derived for the most
part from the artisan class, may be regarded as carrying out to a con-
sistent development the views of Amalrich of Bena (§ 108, 4). We meet
with these in the beginning of the 14th century wandering about, mis-
sionarisiug and agitating in all parts of Southern Germany as well as in
Switzerland, while they were particularly numerous in the Rhine Pro-
vinces, where Cologne and Strassburg were their main resorts. Often
associating with strolling Beghards (§ 98, 7) they are frequently con-
founded with these. They were communistic libertine pantheists.
Every pious man is a Christ, in whom God becomes man. Whatever
is done in love is pure. The perfect are free from the law, and cannot
sin. The church with her sacraments and institutions is a thorough
cheat ; purgatory, heaven, and hell are mere figments, the marriage bond
contrary to nature, all property is common good, and theft of it allow-
able. Their secret services ended with immoral orgies. The Inquisition
exterminated the sect by sword and stake. — The Adamites in Austria
in A.D. 1312 and the Turlupines in the Isle of France showed similar
tendencies. In the beginning of the 15th century they reappeared as
Humlncs inteUigentice at Brussels. In a.d. 1421 the Hussite leader Ziska
rooted out the Bohemian Adamites or Picards, who went naked after the
pattern of paradise, and had a community of wives. Picard is just a
modification of the heretical designation Beghard. They gained a foot-
ing in several villages, and built an establishment on a small island
in a tributary of the Moldau, from which they made excursions into the
§ 117. CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 193
surrounding districts, until Ziska put an end to them by conquering the
island in a.d. 1421.
^ 117. Church Discipline.
The reckless and shameless sale of indulgences often
made the exercise of church discipline impossible, and the
discreditable conduct of the mendicant monks destroyed all
respect for the confessional. The scandalous misuse of the
ban and interdict had shorn these of much of their terror.
Frightful curses were pronounced at Rome every Maundy
Thursday against heretics by the solemn reading of the bull
In Coena Domini. The Inquisition was still abundantly
occupied with persecuting and burning numerous heretics,
and at the end of our period Innocent VIII. carried to the
utmost extrem-C the persecution and burning of witches.
1. Indulgences. — The scholastic theory of indulgences (§ 106, 2) was
authoritatively proclaimed by Clement VI. in a.d. I3I3. The reforming
councils of the loth century wished only to prevent them being misused,
for the purpose of filling the papal treasury. Sixtus IV., in a.d. 1477,
declared that it was allowable to take money for indulgences for the dead,
and that their souls might be freed from purgatory. The pert question,
why the pope would not rather free all souls at once by the exercise
of his sovereign power, was answered by the assertion that the church,
in accordance with Divine righteousness, could dispense its grace only
discrete et cum moderamine. The institution of the jubilee gave a great
impulse to the sale of indulgences. In a.d. 1300 Boniface VIII., at the
bidding of an old man, proclaimed a complete indulgence for one hun-
dred years to all Christians who would do penance for fifteen days in
the churches of the apostles at Rome, and by this means gathered from
day to day 200,000 pilgrims within the walls of the Holy City. Later
popes made a jubilee every fiftieth year, then every thirty-third, and
finally every twenty-fifth. Instead of appearing personally at Eome,
it was enough to pay the cost of such a journey. The nepotism and
extravagance of the popes had left an empty exchequer, which this sale
of indulgences was intended to fill. The war with the Turks and the
building of St. Peter's gave occasion to repeated indulgence crusades.
TraflQckers in indulgences in the most barefaced way cried up the quality
of their wares ; the conditions of repentance and purpose of reformation
were scarcely so much as named. Indulgences were even granted before-
hand for sins that were contemplated.
13
194 THE GERMANO-BOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
2. The Inquisition, since a.d. 1282 under the direction of the Domini-
cans (§ 109, 2), spread through all European countries during the 14th
century. While the papal court resided at Avignon the Inquisition was
at its height in France, where Waldensians and Albigensians, Beghards
and Lollards, Fraticelli and Fanatical Spiritualists, were brought in
crowds to the stake and subjected to the most cruel tortures. Bernard
iDelicieux, a Franciscan, raised his voice, a.d. 1300-1320, against the
inhuman cruelty of the inquisitors, and with noble independence and
heroic bravery appealed to king and pope against the merciless sacri-
fice of so many victims. He was shut up for life in a dark dungeon, and
fed on bread and water. — In Germany, where, from the murder of Conrad
of Marburg in a.d. 1233 (§ 109, 3), for almost a century and a half we find
no trace of a regularly constituted Inquisition, it made its appearance
again in a.d. 1368. During that year Urban V. issued a bull, by which
he required that the civil and ecclesiastical authorities of Germany
should support with their counsel and influence the two inquisitors who
were searching out the heretical Beghards and Beguines (§ 116, 5), and
place their prisons at the disposal of the Holy Office, which had still no
prison of its own. His successor, Gregory XI., in a.d. 1372 increased
the number of inquisitors in Germany to five, one in each of the arch-
dioceses of Mainz, Cologne, Salzburg, Magdeburg, and Bremen ; while his
successor, Boniface IX., in a.d. 1399 added a sixth for North Germany.
But these papal bulls would probably, owing to the disinclination of the
Germans to the Inquisition, like the attempts of Gregory IX., never have
been put in force, had not Charles IV. (§ 110, 4, 5) taken up the matter
with an ardent zeal that even went beyond the intentions of Urban and
Gregory. During his second journey to Rome, in a.d. 1369, he issued
from Lucca four imperial decrees, and in a.d. 1378 from Treves a fifth,
by which he granted to the Inquisition throughout Germany all the
rights, powers, and privileges which it had anywhere, and required that
all civil and ecclesiastical authorities, under pain of severest penalties and
confiscation of all their goods, should support the Inquisition in its search
for heretics and in its discovery and burning of all religious writings
in the vulgar tongue composed and circulated by laymen or semi-lay-
men.— The Spanish Inquisition was re-established under Ferdinand
and Isabella in a.d. 1480, and thoroughly organized by the grand-
inquisitor Torquemada, a.d. 1483-1499. One of the first inquisitors
appointed by him in a.d. 1484 was an Augustinian, Pedro Arbires, who
amid the most unrelenting cruelties performed the duties of his office
with such zeal, that in sixteen months many hundreds had perished at
the stake ; but his fanatical career was ended by his murder at the altar
in A.D. 1485. Not only the two who did the deed, but also all their
relatives and friends, to the number of two hundred, suspected of com-
plicity in a plot, were burned, while the " martyr " himself was beatified
§ 117. CHURCH DISCIPLINE. 195
by Alexander VII. in a.d. 1661, and canonized by Pius IX. in a.d. 1867.
This terrible tribunal further undertook the persecution of the hated
Moors and Jews who had been baptized under compulsion (§ 95, 2, 3),
which through numerous confiscations greatly enriched the national
exchequer of Spain. This institution reached its highest point under
the grand-inquisitor the Cardinal Francis Ximenes, a.d. 1507-1517, under
whom 2,536 persons were burnt alive and 1,368 in effigy. The auto da
fes, which ended at the stake, were conducted with a horrible pomp.
Even those who were acquitted of the charge of heresy were compelled
for a long time to wear the sail benito, an armless robe with a red cross
marked on it before and behind. According to Llorente, who had been
general secretary of the Inquisition at Madrid, the Spanish inquisition,
down to its suppression by Joseph Buonaparte in a.d. 1808, had executed
in person 31,912, burned in effigy 17,059, and subjected to severe punish-
ments 291,4.56.1
3. The Bull " In Coeua Domini." — It was customary to repeat from
time to time the more important decrees of excommunication, to show that
they were still valid. In this way the famous bull In Cana Domini was
gradually constructed. The earliest sketch of it was given by Urban V.,
who died in a.d. 1370, and it was pubhshed in its final form by Urban
VIII. in a.d. 1627. It contains a summary of all the rights of the Eoman
hierarchy, with anathemas against all opposing claims, not only on the
l^art of secular princes and laymen, but also of antipapal councils, and
concludes with a solemn excommunication of all heretics, to which Paul
V. in A.D. 1610 added Lutherans, Zwinglians, and Calvinists, together
with all their sympathisers. Pius V., in a.d. 1567, in a new redaction
insisted that it should be read yearly in the Catholic churches of all lands,
but could not get this carried out, especially in France and Germany.
In A.D. 1770 Clement XIV. forbade its being read.
4. Prosecution of Witches. — Down to the beginning of the 13th century
many churchmen had spoken against the popular superstition regarding
sorcery, witchcraft, and compacts with the devil, and a whole series of
provincial councils had pronounced such belief to be heathenish, sinful,
and heretical. Even in Gratian's decretal (§ 99, 5) there was a canon
which required the clergy to teach the people that witchcraft was a
delusion, and belief in it incompatible with the Christian faith. But
upon the establishment of the Inquisition in the beginning of the 13th
century witchcraft came more and more to occupy the attention of the
ecclesiastical authorities. Heresy and sorcery were now regarded as
1 Baker, " History of the Inquisition in Portugal, Spain, Italy," etc.
London, 1763. Llorente, " History of the Inquisition from its Establish-
ment to Ferdinand VII." Philadelphia, 1826. Mocatta, " Jews in Spain
and Portugal, and the Inquisition." London, 1877.
196 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
correlates, like two agencies resting on and serviceable to the demoniacal
powers, and were therefore treated in the same way as offences to be
punished with torture and the stake. The Dominicans, as adminis-
trators of the Inquisition, were the most zealous defenders of the belief
in witchcraft, whereas the 'Franciscans generally spoke of it simply as
foolish, heathenish, and heretical. Thomas Aquinas included it in
his theological system, and Eymerich in his Directorium Inquisitorium
(§ 109, 2). Yet witch prosecutions were only occasional incidents during
the 14th and 15th centuries, especially in Germany, where clergy and
people were adverse to them. But it was quite otherwise after Innocent
VIII., on 3rd December, 1484, by his bull *S»?H7ms desidemntes affectibus,
complaining of previous laxity, called attention to the spread of witch-
craft in the country, and appointed two inquisitors, Sprenger and Insti-
tor, to secure its extermination. These administered their office with
such zeal and success, that in a.d. 1489 at Cologne they were able, as the
result of their experiences, to publish under the title Malleus maleficarum
a complete code for witch prosecutions. From the confessions wrung
from their victims by torture and suggestive questions, they obtained
a full, dogmatic system of compacts and intrigues with the devil, of
Succiihls and Incuhis, of witch ointment, broomsticks, and ovenforks, of
witches' sabbaths, Walpurgis nights, and flights up chimneys. Soon
this illusion spread like an epidemic, and thousands throughout Ger-
many and all other Catholic countries, mostly old women, but also some
young maidens, were subjected to the most horrible tortures, and after
confession had been extorted, to death by lire. The Malleus accounted
for the fact that women and very rarely men were found engaged in such
proceedings, by this statement : Dicitur enim femina a feret minus, quia
semper minorem habet et servatfidem, et hoc ex natiira. — The Reformation
of the 16th century made no change in these horrible proceedings, which
rather rose to a height during the 17th century. Theologians of all
confessions believed in the possibility and reality of compacts with the
devil, and regarded this to be as essential to an orthodox creed as belief
in the devil's existence. The jurists and civil judges in Protestant and
Catholic countries were no less narrow-minded and superstitious than the
theologians. Among Catholics the most celebrated defenders of the
witch j)rosecutions were Jean Bodin {§ 148, 3), Peter Binsfeld, and the
Jesuit Mart. Delrio (§ 149, 11). Among Protestant vindicators of these
prosecutions may be named the Heidelberg physician ThomasP Erastus
(§ 144, 1), James I. of England, and the famous criminal lawyer Carpzov
of Leipzig. Noble men however were not wanting on both sides who
were shrewd and sensible enough to oppose such crude conceptions.
In the 16th century we have the physician Weier, who wrote his Be
prastigiis damonorum in a.d. 1563, and in the 17th the Jesuits Tanner
and Spec (§ 149, 11 ; 156, 3), and the Dutch Protestant Bekker (§ 160, 5).
§ 118. ATTEMPTED REFORMS IN CHURCH POLITY. 197
The WTitinj:^s of tbo Hallo jurist Thomasius in a.d. 1701, 1701, were the
first to tell powerfully in favour of liberal views. In a.d. 1749 a nun of
seventy years old was burnt at Wiirzburg as a witch. In a.d. 1751 a girl
of thirteen and in a.d, 17o6 one of fourteen years were put to death at
Landshut as suspected of witchcraft. In German Switzerland a ser-
vant girl at Glarus in a.d. 1782 was the last victim. In bigoted Catholic
countries the delusion lasted longer, but prosecutions were seldomer
carried the length of judicial murder. In Mexico however, the Alcade
Ignaeio Castello of San Jacobo on 20th August, 1877, " with consent of
the whole population," burnt five witches alive. Altogether since the
issue of the bull of Innocent there have been certainly no less than
300,000 women brought to the stake as witches.
IV. Attempts at Reformation.
§ 118. Attempted Reforms in Church Polity.
The struggle between imperialism and hierarcliism, which
is present through the whole course of the Middle Ages, rose
to a height in the times of Louis the Bavarian, a.d. 1314-1347
(§ 110, 3, 4), and is of special interest here because of the
literary war waged against one another by the rival sup-
porters of the emperor and the pope. It concerns itself first
of all only with the questions in debate between the impe-
rial and the sacerdotal parties ; but soon on the imperialist
side there appeared a reforming tendency, which could not
be given effect to without carrying the discussion into a
multitude of other departments where reformation was also
needed. Of quite another kind was the " reformation of
head and members " desired by the great councils of the
15th century. The centention here was based, not so
much upon any superiority claimed by the emperor over the
pope and by the State over the church, but rather upon the
subordination of the pope to the supreme authority of the
universal church represented by the oecumenical councils.
Yet both agreed in this, that with like energy they attacked
the corruption of the papacy, in the one case in the interest
of the State, in the other in the interest of the church.
198 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
1. The Literary War iDetween Imperialists and Curialists in the 14th
Century. — The literary controversy over the debatable land between
church and State was conducted with special vigour in the earlier part of
our period, on account of the conflict between Boniface VIII. and Philip
the Fair of France (§ 110, 1). The ablest vindicators of the independence
of the State were the advocate Peter Dubois and the Dominican theologian
John of Paris, Among their scholars were the men who twenty years
later sought refuge from the wrath of Pope John XXII. at the court
of Louis the Bavarian at Munich. Of these the most important was
the Italian Marsilius of Padua. As teacher of theology, philosophy, and
medicine at Paris, in a.d. 1324, when the dispute betwen emperor and
pope had reached its height, he composed jointly with his colleague
John of Jandun in Champagne a Defensor pads, a civil and ecclesiastical
memoir, which, with an insight and clearness very remarkable for that
age, developed the evangelical mean of the superiority of the State over
the church, and of the empire over the papacy, historically, exegetically,
and dogmatically ; and for this end established theories of Scripture and
tradition, of the tasks and place of the church in the State, of excommuni-
cation and persecution of heretics, of liberty of faith and conscience,
etc., which even transcend the principles laid down on these points by
the Eeformation of the 16th century. Both authors accompanied Louis
to Italy in a.d. 1326, and there John of Jandun died in a.d. 1328. Marsi-
lius continued with the emperor as his physician, counsellor, and literary
defender, and died at Munich between a.d. 1341-1343. In a.d. 1327
John XXII. condemned the Defensor pads, and Clement VI. pronounced
its author the worst heretic of all ages. The book, often reprinted during
the 16th century, was first printed at Basel in a.d. 1522.
2. Alongside of Marsilius there also stood a goodly array of schis-
matical Franciscans, with their general, Michael of Cesena, at their head
(§ 112, 2), who were like himself refugees at the court of Munich. They
persistently contested the heresies of John XXII. in regard to the vision
of God (§ 110, 3) and his lax theory of poverty. Their polemic also
extended to the whole papal system, and the corruption of church and
clergy connected therewith. The most celebrated of them in respect of
scientific attainments was William Occam (^ 113, 3). His earlier treatises
dealt with the pope's heresies, and only after the Diet of Ehense (§ 110, 4)
did he take up the burning questions about church and State. In the
comprehensive Dialogus he rejects the infallibility of the pope as decidedly
as his temporal sovereignty, and denies the Divine institution of the
primacy. Also a German prelate, Leopold of Bebenburg, Canon of Wiirz-
burg, and from a.d. 1353 Bishoj) of Bamberg, inspired by genuinely Ger-
man patriotism, made his appearance in a.d. 1338 as a brave and prudent
defender of imperial rights against the assumptions of the papacy. — The
ablest of all Marsilius' opponents was the Spanish Franciscan Alvarus
§ 118. ATTEMPTED EEFORMS IN CHURCH POLITY. 199
Pelagius, who wrote in a.d. 1330 the treatise De planctu ecdesicc, in which,
while sadly complaining of the corruption of the church and clergy, he yet
ascribes to the pope as the vicar of Christ unlimited authority over all
earthly principalities and powers, and regards him as the fountain of all
privileges and laws. A still more thoroughgoing deification of the papacy
had appeared a few years earlier in ihe.Siumma dc yotcstate ecclesice ad
Johannem Paixim by the Augustinian Aiigustinus Triumplius of Ancona.
But neither he nor Pelagius, in view of the manifest contradictions of the
pope's doctrines of poverty (§ 112, 2), dared go the length of maintaining
jDapal infallibility. A German canon of Eegensburg, Conrad of Megens-
burg, also took part in the controversy, seeking to vindicate and glorify
the papacy.
3. Reforming Councils of the 15tli Century. — The longing for reform
during this period found most distinct expression in the councils of Pisa,
Constance, and Basel (§ 110, 7-9). The fruitlessness of these endeavours,
though they had the sympathy of the people generally, shows that there
was something essentially defective in them. The movement had kept
itself aloof from all sectaries and separatists, wishing to hold by and
reform the presently existing church. But its fault was this, that it
insisted only upon a reformation in the head and members, not in the
spirit, that it aimed at lopping off the wild growths of the tree, without
getting rid of the corrupt sa^D from which the very same growths would
again proceed. Only that which was manifestly unchristian in the pre-
tensions of the hierarchy, the covetousness and greed of the pope, the
immorality of the clergy, the depravity and ignorance of the monks,
etc. — in short, only abuses in hierarchical constitution and discipline —
were dealt with. There was no word about doctrine. The Eomish
system, in spite of all its perversions, was allowed to stand. The cur-
rent forms of worship, notwithstanding the introduction of many un-
evaugelical elements and pagan superstitions, were left untouched. It
w^as not seen that what was most important of all was the revival of the
preaching of repentance and of justification through Him who is the jus-
tifier of the ungodly. And so it happened that at Constance Huss, who
had pointed out and followed this way, was sent to the stake, and at
Basel the doctrine of the immaculate conception (§ 112, 4) was admitted
as a doctrine of the church. It was not merely the election of a new pope
opposed to the Reformation that rendered the negotiations at Pisa
and Constance utter failures, the wrong principle upon which they pro-
ceeded insured a disappointing result.
4. Friends of Reform in France during the ISth Century. — (1) Peter
d' Ailly, professor and chancellor of the University of Paris, Bishop of
Cambray in a.d. 1397 and cardinal in a.d. 1411, was one of the ablest
members of the councils of Pisa and Constance. He died in a.d. 1425
as cardinal-legate in Germany. His chief dogmatic treatise, the Quces-.
200 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
tiones on the Sentences of the Lombard, occupies the standpoint of Occam.
In many of his other works he falls back upon the position of the mystics
of St. Victor (§ 102, 4), and recommends with much warmth the diligent
study of the Scriptures. His ideas about church reform are centred in
the affirmation of the Gallican Liberties, which he had to maintain as a
French bishop, but are expressed with the moderation becoming a Roman
cardinal. In opposition to Occam and the Spirituals, he founds the tem-
poral sovereignty of the pope on the Donatio Constantini. He also holds
by the primacy of the Roman bishop, as firmly established by Scripture.
But the irerpa of Matthew xvi. 18 he understands not of Peter, but of Christ.
In this passage therefore no pre-eminence is given to Peter over the
other apostles in the potestas ordinis, but by the injunction of John xx.,
" Feed My sheep," such pre-eminence is given in the x>otestas regiyninis.
The oecumenical council, as representative of the whole church, stands
superior to the pope as administrative head. — (2) d'Ailly's successor as
professor and chancellor was the celebrated Jeau Charlier, better known
from the name of his birthplace near Rheims as Gerson. Having
denounced the Duke of Burgundy's murder of the Duke of Orleans, and
having thus incurred that prince's hatred, he withdrew after the Council
of Constance into Bavaria. Soon after the duke's death, in a.d. 1419, he
returned to France, and settled at Lyons, where he died in a.d. 1429.
Like d'Ailly, Gerson was a decided nominalist, and sought to give new
life to scholasticism by combining with it Scripture study and mysticism.
He, too, was powerfully influenced by the Victorine mystics, and yet
more by Bonaventura. He had no appreciation of the speculative ele-
ment in German mysticism. Gerson was the first French theologian
who employed the language of the people, particularly in his smaller
practical tracts. He was mainly instrumental in bringing about the
Council of Pisa. In the Council of Constance he was one of the most
conspicuous figures. Restrained by no personal or official relationship
with the curia, he could by speech and writing express himself much
more freely than d'Ailly. The principle and means of the reform of the
church, in its head and members, was recognised by Gerson in his state-
ment that the highest authority of the church is to be sought not in the
pope, but in the oecumenical council. He held however in every point
to the Romish system of doctrine. He did indeed unweariedly proclaim
the Bible the one norm and source of all Christian knowledge, but he
would not allow the reading of it in the vernacular, and regarded all as
heretics who did not in the interpretation of it submit unconditionally to
the judgment of the church.— (3) Nicholas of Clemanges was in a.d. 1393
rector of the University of Paris, but afterwards retired into solitude.
He had the profoundest insight into the corruption of the church, and
acknowledged Holy Scripture to be the only source of saving truth. From
this standpoint he denianded a thorough reform in theological study
§ 118. ATTEMPTED REFORMS IN CHURCH POLITY. 201
and the whole constitution of the church.— (4) Louis cI'Aleman, car-
dinal and Archbishop of Aries, who died in a.d. 1450, was the most
powerful and most eloquent of the anti-papal party at Basel. He was
therefore excommunicated by Eugenius IV. At last submitting to the
pope, he was restored by Nicholas V. and in a.d. 1527 beatified by
Clement VII.
5. Friends of Reform in Germany.— (1) Even before the appearance of
the Parisian friends of reform, a German, Henry of Langenstein, at Mar-
burg had insisted upon the princes and prelates calling an oecumenical
council for putting an end to schism and reforming the church. In a
treatise published in a.d. 1381 he gave a sad but only too true picture of
the desolate condition of the church. The cloisters he designated pro-
stibida meretricium, cathedral churches speluncce raptorum et latronum,
etc. From a.d. 1363 he taught in Paris, from a.d. 1390 in Vienna, where
in A D. 1397 be died as rector of the university.— (2) Theodorich or Dietrich
of Niem in WestphaHa accompanied Gregory XL from France to Rome
as his secretary in a.d. 1377. From a.d. 1395-1399 he was Bishop of
Verdun, was probably present at the Council of Pisa, and certainly at that
of Constance. He died in this latter place in a.d. 1417. His writings
are of great value for the history of the schism and of the councils of
Pisa and Constance. His language is simple, strong, and faithful. — (3)
GrcjOxy of Heimburg was present at the Basel Council, in terms of close
friendship with .Eneas Sylvius, who was then also on the side of reform.
He became in a.d. 1433 syndicus at Nuremberg, went to the council
at Mantua in a.d. 1459 as envoy of Duke Sigismund of Austria, was
banished in a.d. 1460 by his old friend, now Pius II., afterwards led a
changeful life, never fi-ee from the papal persecutions, and died at
Dresden in a.d. 1472. His principal writings on civil and ecclesiastical
polity, powerful indictments against the Roman curia inspired by love
for his German fatherland, appeared at Frankfort in a.d. 1608 under the
title Scripta nervosa jxistiticBque plena.— (i) Jacob of Jiiterboyk, who died
in A.D. 1465, was first a Cistercian monk in Poland and teacher of theo-
logy at Cracow, then Carthusian at Erfurt, and to the end of his life
a zealous defender of the positions of the Council of Basel, at which he
was present in a.d. 1441. His writings leave untouched the doctrines of
the church, but vigorously denounce the political and moral corruption
of the papacy and monasticism, the greedy misuse of the sale of
indulgences, and insist upon the subordinating of the pope under general
councils, and their right even to depose the pontiff. Whoever contests
this latter position teaches that Christ has given over the church to a
sinful man, like a bridegroom who surrenders his bride to the unre-
strained will of a soldier. All possession of property on the part of those
in sacred offices is with him an abomination, and unhesitatingly he calls
upon the civil power to put an end to this evil,— (5) The Cardinal Nicholas
202 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
of Cusa (§ 113, 6) also for a long time was one of the most zealous friends
of reform in the Basel Council. — (6) Felix Hemmerlin, canon at Ziirich,
was to the end of his life an ardent supporter of the reform measures of
the Council of Basel, at which he had been present. As he gave effect
to his views in his official position, he incurred the hatred and persecu-
tion of the inmates of his convent to such an extent, that they laid a plot
to murder him in a.d. 1439. His whole life was an almost unbroken
series of sufferings and persecutions. These in great part he brought
on himself by his zealous support of the reactionary party of the nobles
that sided with Austria in opposition to the patriotic revolutionary party
that struggled for freedom. Deprived of his revenues and deposed from
office, he was imprisoned in a.d. 1454, and died between a.d. 1457-1464
in the prison of the monastery of the Minorites at Lucerne, martyr as
much to his political conservatism as to his ecclesiastical reformatory
principles. His writings were placed in the Index loroliihltorum by the
Council of Trent. — (7) To this place also belongs the work written in the
Swabian dialect, <' The Reformation of the Emperor Sigismund," which de-
mands a thoroughgoing and radical reform of the clergy and the secular
priests, insisting upon the renunciation of all personal property on the
part of the latter, enforcing against prelates, abbots, monasteries, and
monks all the reforms of the Basel Council, and making proposals for
their execution in the spirit of the Taborites and Hussites. The author
is styled in the MSS. Frederick of Landscron, and describes himself as a
councillor of Sigismund. The tract was therefore regarded during the
loth and 16th centuries as a work composed under the direction of the
emperor, setting forth the principles of reformation attempted at the
Basel or Constance Council. According to Bohm its author was the
Taborite Reiser (§ 119, 9), who, under the powerful reforming impulse of
the Basel Council of a.d. 1435-1437, composed it in a.d. 1438.
6. An Italian Apostate from the Basel Liberal Party. — ^neas Sylvius
Piccolomini, born at Siena in a.d. 1405, appeared at Basel, first as sec-
retary of a bishop, then of a cardinal, and finally of the Basel anti-pope
Felix v., as a most decided opponent of Eugenius IV., and wrote in a.d.
1439 from this point of view his history of the council. In a.d. 1442
he entered the service of the then neutral Emperor Frederick III., was
made Poeta laureatus and imperial councillor, and as such still fought for
the independence of the German church. But in a.d. 1445, with all the
diplomatic arts which were so abundantly at his disposal, he wrought to
secure the subjection of the emperor and German princes under the pope
(§ 110, 10). Made bishop of Siena in a.d. 1450, he was raised to the
cardinalate by Calixtus III. in a.d. 1456, and two years later ascended
the papal throne as Pius II. The lasciviousness of his earlier life is
mirrored in his poems, novels, dialogues, dramas, and letters. But as
pope, old and weak, he maintained an honourable life, and in o, bull of
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFORTS AT REFORM. 203
retractation addressed to the University of Cologne exhorted Christendom
xEneam rejicite, Pium reclpite!
7. Reforms in Clnirch Policy in Spain. — Notwithstanding the church
feeling awakened by the struggle with the Moors, a vigorous opposition
to papal pretensions was shown during the 14th century by the Spanish
princes, and after the outbreak of the great schism the anti-pope Clement
VII., inA.D. 1381, purchased the obedience of the Spanish church by large
concessions in regard to appointment to its bishoprics and the removal
of the abuses of papal indulgences. The popes, indeed, sought not
unsuccessfully to enlist Sj^ain in their favour against the reformatory
tendencies of the councils of the loth century, until Ferdinand of Aragon,
A.D. 1479-151G, and Isabella of Castille, a.d. 1471-1504, who had on
account of their zeal for the Catholic cause been entitled by the pon-
tiff himself '• their Catholic majesties," entered so vigorous a protest
against papal usurpations, that toward the end of the loth century the
royal supremacy over the Spanish church had won a recognition never
accorded to it before. They consistently refused to acknowledge any
bishop appointed by the pope, and forced from Sixtus IV. the concession
that only Spaniards nominated by the Crown should be eligible for the
highest ecclesiastical offices. All papal rescripts were subject to the
royal approval, ecclesiastical tribunals were carefully supervised, and
appeals from them were allowed to the royal judicatures. The church
had also to give ordinary and extraordinary tithes of its goods and
revenues for State purposes. The Spanish inquisition (§ 117, 2),
thoroughly recognised in a.d. 1483, was more of a civil than an ecclesias-
tical institution. As the bishops and inquisitors were appointed by the
royal edict, the orders of knights (§ 98, 8), by the transference of the
grand-mastership to the king, were placed in complete subjection to
the Crown ; and whether he would or not Alexander VI. was obliged
to accord to the royal commission for church and cloister visitation and
reform the most absolute authority. But in everything else these rulers
were worthy of the name of " Catholics," for they tolerated in their
church only the purely mediaeval type of strict orthodoxy. The most
distinguished promoter of their reforms in church polity was a Fran-
ciscan monk, Francis Ximenes, from a.d. 1492 confessor to Isabella,
afterwards raised by her to the archbishopric of Toledo, made a Roman
cardinal by Alexander VI., and grand-inquisitor of Spain in a.d. 1507.
He died in a.d. 1517.
§ 119. Evangelical Efforts at Heform.
Alongside of the Parisian reformers, but far in advance
of them, stand those of the English and Bohemian churches
204 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
represented by Wiclif and Huss. The reformation aimed
at by these two was essentially of the same kind, Wiclif
being the more original, while Huss was largely dependent
upon his great English precursor. For in personal endow-
ment, speculative power, rich and varied learning, acuteness
and wealth of thought, originality and productivity of
intellect, the Englishman was head and shoulders above the
Bohemian. On the other hand, Huss was far more a man
for the people, and he conducted his contention in a sensible,
popular, and practical manner. There were also powerful
representatives of the reform movement in the Netherlands
during this period, who pointed to Scripture and faith in
the crucified Saviour as the only radical cure for the cor-
ruptions of the church. While Wiclif and Huss attached
themselves to the Augustinian theology, the Dutchmen
gave themselves to quiet, calm contemplation and the ac-
quirement of practical religious knowledge. In Italy too
a reformer appeared of a strongly evangelical spirit, who
did not however show the practical sense of those of the
Netherlands.
1. Wiclif and the Wiclifites.— In England the kings and the Parliament
had for a long time withstood the oppressive yoke of the papal hierarchy.
Men too Hke John of Salisbury, Robert Grosseteste, Roger Bacon, and
Thomas Bradwardine had raised their voices against the inner corrup-
tion of the church. John Wiclif, a scholar of Bradwardine, was born
about A.D. 1320. As fellow of the University of Oxford, he supported
in A.D. 1366 the English Crown against the payment of tribute to the
papal court then at Avignon, admitted by John Lackland {§ 96, 18), of
which payment had now for a long time been refused. This secured
him court favour, the title of doctor, and a professorship of theology at
Oxford ; and in a.d. 1374 he was chosen as member of a commission which
was to discuss at Brugge in the Netherlands with the papal envoys the
differences that had arisen about the appointing to ecclesiastical offices.
After his return he openly spoke and wrote against the papal " anti-
christ" and his doctrines. Gregory XI. now, in a.d. 1377, condemned
nineteen propositions from his writings, but the English court protected
him from the strict inquiry and punishment threatened. Meanwhile
Wiclif was ever becoming bolder. Under his influence religious societies
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFORTS AT REFORM. 205
were formed which sent out travelling preachers of the gospel among the
people. By their opponents thej' were called Lollards (§ 116, 3), a name
to which the stigma of heresy was already attached. Wiclif translated
for them the Scriptures from the Vulgate into English. The bitterness
of his enemies now reached its height. Just then, in a.d. 1381, a rebellion
of the oppressed peasants that deluged all England with blood broke out.
Its origin has been quite gratuitously assigned to the religious movement.
When he had directly repudiated the doctrine of transubstantiation, a
synod at London, in a.d. 1382, condemned his writings and his doctrine
as heretical, and the university also cast him out. Court and Parliament
could only protect his person. He now retired to his rectory at Lutter-
worth in Leicestershire, where he died on 31st December, 1384. — For
five centuries his able writings were left unprinted, to moulder away in
the obscurity of libraries. His English works have now been edited by
Matthews, London, 1880. Lechler of Leipzig edited Wiclif's most com-
plete and comprehensive work, the *' Trialogus " (Oxford, 1869), in which
his whole theological system is develoj)ed. Buddensieg of Dresden pub-
lished the keen antipapal controversial tract, "De Christo et suo adver-
sario Anticliristo " (Leipzig, 1880). The WicUf Societ}', instituted at the
fifth centenary of Wiclif's death for the purpose of issuing critical editions
of his most important works, sent forth as their first performance Bud-
densieg's edition of " twenty-six Latin controversial tracts of Wiclif's
from MSS. previously unprinted," in 2 vols., London, 1883. Among
Wiclif's systematic treatises we are promised editions of the Siimma
theologicCf De incarnatione Verbi, De veritate s. Scr., De dominio divino,
De ecclesia, De actibus animce, etc., some by English, some by German
editors. — As the principle of all theology and reformation Wiclif con-
sistently affirms the sole authority of Divine revelation in the Holy
Scriptures. He has hence been called doctor evangeliciis. Anything that
cannot be proved from it is a corrupting human invention. Consistently
carrying out this principle, he denounced the worship of saints, relics, and
images, the use of Latin in public worship, elaborate priestly choir sing-
ing, the multiplication of festivals, private masses, extreme unction, and
generally all ceremonialism. The Catholic doctrine of indulgence and
the sale of indulgences, as well as the ban and the interdict, he pro-
nounced blasphemous ; auricular confession he regarded as a forcing of
conscience ; the power of the keys he explained as conditional, its binding
and loosing powerless, except when in accordance with the judgment of
Christ. He denied the real presence of the body and blood of Christ in
the Lord's Supper, and affirmed, like Berengar, a spiritual communication
thereof, which however he makes dependent, not only on the faith of the
receiver, but also on the worthiness of the officiating priest. The doctrine
of purgatory he completely rejected, and supported Augustine's pre*
destinationism against the prevalent semipelagiauism. The papacy was
206 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
antichrist ; the pope has his power only from the emperor, not from
God. The hierarchical system should be replaced by the apostolic
presbyterial constitution. Ordination confers no indelible character;
a priest who has fallen into mortal sin cannot dispense the sacrament.
Every believer is as such a priest. The State is a representation of
Christ, as the God-Man ruler of the universe ; the clergy represent only
the poor and suffering Hfe of His humanity. Monkery is contrary to
nature, etc.— Wiclif's supporters, many of them belonging to the noblest
and most cultured orders, were after his death subjected to violent per-
secution, which reached its height when the House of Lancaster in the
person of Henry IV. ascended the English throne in a.d. 1399. An act
of parliament was passed in a.d. 1400 which made death by fire the
punishment of the heresy of the Lollards. Among the martyrs which
this law brought to the stake was the noble Sir John Oldcastle, who in
A.D. 1418 was hung up between two beams in iron chains over a fire and
there slowly burnt. The Council of Constance in a.d. 1415 condemned
forty-five propositions from Wichf's writings, and ordered his bones to
be exhumed and scattered abroad. Many germs sown by him continued
until the Keformation came.i
2. Precursors of the Hussite Movement.— Owing to its Greek origin
(§ 79, 2, 8), the Bohemian church had a certain character of its own
and barely tolerated the Koman constitution and ritual. In Bohemia
too the Waldensians had numerous supporters during the 13th century.
And even before the appearance of Huss three distinguished clergymen
in and around Prague by earnest preaching and pastoral work had
awakened in many a consciousness of crying abuses in the church. (1)
Conrad of Waldhausen was a famous preacher when called by Charles IV.
to Prague, where after fifteen years' labour he died in a.d. 1369. Preach-
ing in German, he inveighed against the cupidity, hypocrisy, and
immorahty of the clergy and monks, against the frauds connected with
the worship of images and relics and shrines, and threw back upon his
accusers the charge of heresy in his still extant A2)ologia.—{2) More
influential than Conrad as a preacher of repentance in Prague was John
Milicz of Cremsier in Moravia, who died in a.d. 1374. Believing the end
of the world near and antichrist already come, he went to Kome in a.d.
1367 to place before Urban V. his scheme of apocalyptic interpretation.
1 Lewis, " Hist, of Life and Sufferings of John Wiclif." Lond., 1720.
Vaughau, " John de Wycliffe. A Monograph." London, 1853. Lechler,
♦'John Wielif and his English Precursors." 2 vols. London, 1878.
Buddensieg, "John Wyclif, Patriot and Reformer; his Life and
Writings." London, 1884. Burrows, "Wiclif's Place in History."
London, 1882. Storrs, •« John Wycliffe and the first English Bible."
New York, 1880.
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFORTS AT BEFORM. 207
Escaping with difficulty from the Inquisition, he returned to Prague, and
there applied himself with renewed zeal to the preaching of repentance.
His preaching led to the conversion of 200 fallen women, for whom
he erected an institution which he called Jerusalem. But the begging
friars accused him before Gregory XI. as a heretic. Mihcz fearlessly
went for examination to Avignon in a.d. 1374, where he soon died before
judgment had been passed. The most important of his works is De
Anticliristo. — (3) Matthias of Janow, of noble Bohemian descent, died in
A.D. 137-1, after fourteen years' work as a preacher and pastor in Prague.
His sermons, composed in Bohemian, lashed unsparingly the vices of the
clergy and monks, as well as the immorality of the laity, and denounced
the worship of images and relics. None of his sermons are extant, but
we have various theological treatises of his on the distinguishing of the
true faith from the false and the frequent observance of the communion.
At a Prague synod of a.d. 1389 he was obliged to retract several of his
positions, and especially to grant the propriety of confessing and com-
municating half-yearly. Janow however, like Conrad and Milicz, did
not seriously contest any fundamental point of the doctrine of the
church.
3. John Huss of Hussinecz in Bohemia, born a.d. 1369, was Bachelor
of Theology at Prague, in a.d. 1391, Master of Liberal Arts in a.d. 1396,
became public teacher in the university in a.d. 1398, was ordained
priest in a.d. 1100, undertook a pastorate in a.d. 1402 in the Bethlehem
chapel, where he had to preach in the Bohemian language, was chosen
confessor of Queen Sophia in a.d. 1103, and was soon afterwards made
synodal preacher by the new archbishop, Sbynko of Hasenburg. Till
then he had in pious humility accepted all the doctrines of the Romish
Church, and even in a.d. 1392 he offered his last four groschen for an
indulgence, so that for a long time dry bread was his only nourishment.
But about A.D. 1102 he reached an important crisis in his life through
the study of Wiclif's theological works. — Bohemians who had studied
in Oxford brought with them Wiclif's philosophical works, and in a.d.
1318 the discussion on realism and nominalism broke out in Prague.
The Bohemians generally sided with Wiclif for realism ; the Germans
with the nominalists (§ 113, 3). This helped to prepare an entrance for
"Wiclif's theological writings into Bohemia. Of the national party which
favoured Wiclif's philosophy and theology, Huss was soon recognised
as a leader. A university decree of a.d. 1403 condemned forty- five pro-
positions from Wiclif's works as heretical, and forbade their promul*
gation in lectures or sermons. Huss however was still highly esteemed
by Archbishop Sbynko. In a.d. 1405 he appointed Huss, with other
three scholars, a commission to investigate a reputed miracle at Wils-
nack, where on the altar of a ruined church three blood-red coloured
hosts were said to have been found. Huss pronounced the miracle a
208 THE GERMANO-ROMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
cheat, and proved in a tract that the blood of Christ glorified can only he
invisibly present in the sacrament of the altar. The archbishop approved
this tract, and forbade all pilgrimages to the spot. He also took no
offence at Huss for uttering Wiclifite doctrine in his synod sermon.
Only when, in a.d. 1408, the clergy of his diocese complained that Huss
by his preaching made the priests contemptible before the people, did he
deprive him of his function as synod preacher. When the majority of
cardinals at Leghorn in a.d. 1408 took steps to put an end to the schism,
king Wenzel determined to remain neutral, and demanded the assent of
the university as well as the clergy of his realm. But only the Bohe-
mian members of the university agreed, while the rest, along with the
archbishop, supported Gregory XII. Sbynko keenly resented the revolt
of the Bohemians, and forbade Huss as their spokesman to preach with-
in his diocese. Huss paid no attention to the prohibition, but secured
a royal injunction, that henceforth in the university Bohemians should
have three votes and foreigners only one. The foreigners then withdrew,
and founded the University of Leipzig in a.d. 1409. Huss was made
first rector of the newly organized University of Prague ; but the very
fact of his great popularity in Bohemia caused him to be profoundly
hated in other lands. "^
4. The archbishop escaped prosecution only by unreservedly condemn-
ing the doctrines of Wiclif, burning his books, and prohibiting all
lectures upon them. Huss and his friends appealed to John XXIII.,
but this did not prevent the archbishop burning in his palace yard about
two hundred Wiclifite books that had previously escaped his search.
For this he was hooted in the streets, and compelled by the courts of
law to pay the value of the books destroyed. John XXIII. cited Huss
to appear at Rome. King, nobles, magistrates, and university sided
with him ; but the papal commission condemned him when he did not
appear, and the archbishop pronounced anathema against him and the
interdict against Prague (a.d. 1411). Huss appealed to the oecumenical
council, and continued to preach. The court forced the archbishop to
become reconciled with Huss, and to admit his orthodoxy. Sbynko re-
ported to the pope that Bohemia was free from heresy. He soon after-
Wards died. The pope himself was the cause of a complete breach, by
having an indulgence preached in Bohemia in a.d. 1412 for a crusade
against Ladislaus of Naples, the powerful adherent of Gregory XII.
Huss opposed this by word and writing, and in a public disputation
maintained that the pope had no right to grant such indulgence. His
most stanch supporter was a Bohemian knight, Jerome of Prague, who
had studied at Oxford, and returned in a.d. 1402 an enthusiastic adherent
^ Gillet, "Life and Times of John Huss." Boston, 2 vols., 1870.
Wratislaw, " John Huss." London, 1882.
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFOETS AT EEFOKM. 209
of Wiclif's doctrines. Their addresses produced an immense impression,
and two days later their disorderly followers, to throw contempt on the
papal party, had the bull of indulgence paraded through the streets, on
the breast of a public prostitute, representing the whore of Babylon, and
then cast into the flames. But many old friends now withdrew from
Huss and joined his opponents. The papal curia thundered against
him and his followers the great excommunication, with its terrible
curses. Wherever he resided that place was put under interdict. But
Huss appealed to the one righteous Judge, Jesus Christ. At the wish of
the kiDg he left the city, and sought the protection of various noble
patrons, from whose castles he went forth diligently preaching round
about. He spread his views all over the country by controversial and
doctrinal treatises in Latin and Bohemian, as well as by an extensive
correspondence with his friends and followers. Thus the trouble and
turmoil grew from day to day, and all the king's efforts to restore peace
were in vain.
5. The Eoman emperor Sigismund summoned Huss to attend the
Council of Constance (§ 110, 7), and promised him a safe-conduct.
Though not yet in possession of this latter, which he only got at Con-
stance, trusting to the righteousness of his cause, for which he was quite
willing to die a martyr's death, he started for Constance on 11th October,
A.D. 1414, reaching his destination on 3rd November. On 28th Novem-
ber he was sentenced to imprisonment at a private conference of the
cardinals, on the pretended charge of an attempt at flight, flrst in the
Dominican cloister, then in the bishop's castle of Gottlieben, where he
was put in chains, finally in the Franciscan cloister. Sigismund, who
had not been forewarned when he was cast into prison, ordered his release ;
but the council convinced him that Huss, arraigned as a heretic before a
general council, was beyond the reach of civil protection. His bitterest
enemies and accusers were two Bohemians, Michael of Deutschbrod and
Stephan of Palecz. The latter extracted forty-two points for accusations
from his writings, which Huss from his prison retracted. D'Ailly and
Gerson were both against him. The brave knight John of Chlum stood
faithfully by him as a comforter to the last. For almost seven months
was he harassed by private examinations, in which, notwithstanding his
decided repudiation of many of them, he was charged with all imagin-
able Wiclifite heresies. The result was the renewed condemnation of those
forty-five propositions from Wiclif's writings, which had been condemned
A.D. 1408 by the University of Prague. At last, on 5th June, a.d. 1415, he
was for the first time granted a public trial, but the tumult at tbe sitting
was so great that he was prevented from saying a single word. Even on
the two following days of the trial he could do little more than make a vain
protest against being falsely charged with errors, and declare his willing-
ness to be better instructed from God's word. The humility and gentle-
14
210 THE GERMANO-KOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
ness of his demeanour, as well as the enthusiasm and believing joyfulness
which he disiDlayed, won for him many hearts even outside of the council.
All possible motives were urged to induce him to submit. Sigismund
so exhorted him, with the threat that if he did not he would withdraw
his protection. The third and last day of trial was 8th June, a.d. 1415,
and judgment was pronounced in the cathedral church on the 6th July.
After high mass had been celebrated, a bishop mounted the pulpit and
preached on Romans vi. 0. He addressed Sigismund, who was present,
" By destroying this heretic, thou shalt obtain an undying name to all
ensuing generations." Once again called upon to recant, Huss repeated
his previous protests, appealed to the promise of a safe-conduct, which
made Sigismund wince and blush, and kneeling down prayed to God
for his enemies and unjust judges. Then seven bishops dressed him
in priestly robes in order to strip him of them one after another amid
solemn execrations. Then they put on him a high pyramidal hat, painted
with figures of devils, and bearing the inscription, Hceresiarclia, and
uttered the words, "We give thy soul to the devil." He replied: "I
commend it into the hands of our Saviour Jesus Christ." On that same
day he was given over by Sigismund to Louis Count-palatine of the
Rhine, and by him to the Constance magistrates, and led to the stake.
Amid prayer and praise he expired, joyfully, courageously, and confidently,
showing himself worthy to rank among the martyrs who in the best times
of Christianity had sealed their Christian confession with their blood.
His ashes were scattered on the Rhine. The later Hussites, in accordance
with an old Christian custom (§ 39, 5), celebrated the day of his death
as the dies natalis of the holy martyr John Huss. — Jerome of Prague had
gone unasked to Constance. When he saw that his longer stay would
not help his friend, but only involve himself in his fate, he left the city ;
but was seized on the way, and taken back in chains in April, a.d. 1415.
During a severe half-year's imprisonment, and wearied with the impor-
tunities of his judges, he agreed to recant, and to acquiesce in the
sentence of Huss. But he was not trusted, and after as before his recan-
tation he was kept in close confinement. Then his courage revived.
He demanded a public trial before the whole council, which was at last
granted him in May, a.d. 1416. There he solemnly and formally retracted
his previous retractation with a believer's confidence and a martyr's joy.
On May 80th, a.d. 1416, he, too, died at the stake, joyfully and coura-
geously as Huss had done. The Florentine humanist Poggio, who was
present, has given enthusiastic expression in a still extant letter to his
admiration at the heroic spirit of the martyr.
6. In all his departures from Romish doctrine Huss was dependent
upon Wiclif, not only for the matter, but even for the modes of expres-
sion. He did not however separate himself quite so far from the
Church doctrines as his English master. He firmly maintained the
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFORTS AT REFORM. 211
doctrine of transubstantiation ; he was also inclined to withhold the cup
from the laity ; and, though he sought salvation only from the Saviour
crucified for us, he did not refuse] to give any place to works in the
justification of the sinner, and even invocation of the saints he did not
wholly condemn. While he energetically protested against the corrup-
tion of the clergy, he never denied that the sacrament might be efficaciously
administered by an unworthy jDriest. In everything else however he was
in thorough agreement with the English reformer. The most complete
exposition of his doctrine is found in the Tractatus cle ecclesia of a.d. 1413.
Augustine's doctrine of predestination is its foundation. He distinguishes
from the church as a visible human institution the idea of the church as
the true body of Christ, embracing all elected in Christ to blessedness
from eternity. Its one and only head is Christ : not Peter, not the pope ;
for this church is no monster with two heads. Originally and according
to Christ's appointment the bishop of Rome was no more than the
other bishops. The donation of Constantine first gave him power and
dignity over the rest. As the church in the beginning could exist
without a pope, so the church unto the end can exist without one. The
Christian can obey the pope only where his commands and doctrines
agree with those of Christ. In matters of faith Holy Scripture is the only
authority. Fathers, councils, and popes may err, and have erred ; only
the word of Grod is infallible. — That this hberal reforming Council of
Constance, with a Gerson at its head, should have sentenced such a man
to death is not to be wondered at when we rightly consider how matters
stood. His hateful realism seemed to the nominahstic fathers of the
council the source of all conceivable heresies. It had even been main-
tained that reaHsm consistently carried out would give a fourth person to
the Godhead. His devotion to the national interests of Bohemia in the
University of Prague had excited German national feeling against him.
And, further, the council, which was concerned only with outward
reforms, had little sympathy with the evangelical tone of his spirit and
doctrine. Besides this, Huss had placed himself between the swords
of two contending parties. The hierarchical party wished, in order to
strike terror into their opponents, to show by an example that the church
had still the power to burn heretics ; and the liberal party refused to
this object of papal hate all protection, lest they should endanger the
cause of reformation by incurring a suspicion of sympathy with heresy. —
The prophecy said to have been uttered by Huss in his last moments,
•' To-day you burn a goose (this being the meaning of Huss in Sla-
vonian), but from its ashes will arise a swan (Luther's coat of arms),
which you will not be able to burn," was unknown to his contempo-
raries. Probably it originated in the Reformation age from the appeals
of both martyrs to the judgment of God and history. Huss had often
212 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
declared that instead of the weak goose there would come powerful eagles
and falcons.^
7. Calixtines and Taborites. — During the imprisonment of their leader
the Hussite party was headed by Jacob of Misa, pastor of St. Michael's
church in Prague. With consent of Huss he introduced the use of the
cup by the laity and rejected the jejunium eucharisticum as opposed to
Matthew xxvi. 20. This led to an interchange of controversial tracts
between Prague and Constance on the withholding of the cup. The
council decreed that whoever disobeys the Church on this point is to he
punished as a heretic. This decree, followed by the execution of Huss,
roused Bohemia to the uttermost. King Wenceslaw died in a.d. 1419 in
the midst of national excitement, and the estates refused to crown his
brother Sigismund, " the word-breaker." Now arose a civil war, a.d.
1420-143G, characterized by cruelties on both sides rarely equalled.
At the head of the Hussites, who hah built on the brow of a steep hill
the strong fortress Tabor, was the one-eyed, afterwards blind, John Ziska
of Troczuov. The crusading armies sent against the Hussites were one
after another destroyed ; but the gentle spirit of Huss had no place
among most of his followers. The two parties became more and more
embittered toward one another. The aristocratic Calixtines {calix,
cup) or Utraquists {sub utmque), at whose head was Bishop Rokycana of
Prague, declared that they would be satisfied if the Catholic church
would concede to them four articles : 1. Communion under both kinds ;
2. Preaching of the pure gospel in the vulgar tongue ; .3. Strict dis-
cipline among the clergy ; and 4. Renunciation by the clergy of church
property. On the other hand, the Taborites would have no reconciliation
with the Romish church, regarding as fundamentally corrupt in doctrine
and worship whatever is not found in Scripture, and passing over into
violent fanaticism, iconoclasm, etc. After Ziska's death of the plague
in A.D. 1424, the majority of the Taborites elected Procopius the Great
as his successor. A small party that regarded no man worthy of suc-
ceeding the great Ziska, refused him allegiance, and styled themselves
Orphans. They were the most fanatical of all.— Meanwhile the Council
of Basel had met (§ 110, 8) and after long fruitless negotiations it was
resolved in a.d. 1433 that 300 Hussite deputies should appear at Basel.
After a fifty days' disputation the four Calixtine articles with certain modi-
fications were accepted by the council. On the basis of this Basel Compact
the Calixtines returned to the Romish church. The Taborites regarded
this as shameful treason to the cause of truth, and continued the con-
flict. But in A.D. 1434 they were utterly annihilated at Bohmischbrod,
* Palacky, "Documenta Mag, J. H., Vitam, Doctrinam, Causam," etc.,
illust. Prag., 1869. Gillett, " Life and Times of John Huss." 2 vols.
Boston, 1863. Loserth, " Wiclif and Huss." London, 1884.
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFORTS AT REFORM. 213
not far from Prague. In the Treaty of Iglau in a.d. 1436 Sigismund
swore to observe the compact, and was recognised as king. But the
concessions sworn to by church and state were more and more restricted
and ultimately ignored. Sigismund died in a.d. 1437. In place of his
son-in-law, Albert II., the Utraquists set up a rival king in the person of
the thirteen year old Polish prince Casimir ; but Albert died in a.d. 1439.
His son, Ladislaus, born after his father's death, had, in George Podiebrad,
a Calixtine tutor. After he had grown up in a.d. 1453, he walked in his
grandfather's footsteps, and died in a.d, 1457. The Calixtines now elected
Podiebrad king, as a firm supporter of the compact. Pius II. recognised
him in the hope that he would aid him in his projected war against the
Turks. When this hope was disappointed he cancelled the compact, in
A.D. 1462. Paul II. put the king under him, and had a crusade preached
against him. Podiebrad however still held his ground. He died in
A.D. 1471. His successor, Wladislaw II., a Polish prince, though a
zealous Catholic, was obliged to confirm anew to the Calixtines at the
Diet of Cuttenberg, in a.d. 1485, all their rights and liberties. Yet they
could not maintain themselves as an independent community. Those
of them who did not join the Bohemian and Moravian Brethren gra-
dually during the IGth century became thoroughly amalgamated with
the Catholic church.
8. The Bohemian and Moravian Brethren. — George Podiebrad took
Tabor in a.d. 1453, and scattered the last remnants of the Taborites.
Joining with the evangelical Friends of God, they received from the
king a castle, where, under the leadership of the local pastor, Michael
of Bradacz, they formed a Unitas fratrum, and called themselves Bohe-
mian and Moravian Brethren. But in a.d. 1461 Podiebrad withdrew
his favour, and confiscated their goods. They fled into the woods, and
met for worship in caves. In a.d. 1467 the most distinguished of the
Bohemian and Moravian Brethren met in a Bohemian village, Shota,
with the German Waldensians, and chose three brethren by lot as
priests, who were ordained by Michael and a Waldensian priest. But
when the validity of their ordination was disputed, Michael went to the
Waldensian bishop Stephen, got from him episcopal consecration, and
then again ordained the three chosen at Shota, one, Matthias of Cone*
wald, as bishop, the other two as priests. This led Rokycana to perse-
cute them all the more bitterly. They increased their numbers how-
ever, by receiving the remnants of the Waldensians and many Utra-
quists, until by the beginning of the 16th century they had four hundred
congregations in Bohemia and Moravia. Under Wladislaw II. perse-
cution was stopped from a.d. 1475, but was renewed with great violence
in A.D. 1503. They sent in a.d. 1511 a confession of faith to Erasmus
(§ 120, 6), with the request that he would give his opinion about it ;
which he however, fearing to be compromised thereby, declined to do.
'2l4 TfiE GERMANO-BOMANlC CHtJRCH TO A.D. 1517.
After the death of Bishop Matthias, in a.d. 1500, a dislike of monarch}'
led to the appointment of four Seniors instead of one bishop, two for
Bohemia and two for Moravia. The most important and influential of
these was Luke of Prague, who died in a.d. 1518, rightly regarded as
the second founder of the union. He impressed a character upon the
brotherhood essentially distinct in respect of constitution and doctrine
from the Lutheran Reformation. — Continuation § 139, 19.
9. The Winkelers. — A sect sprang up in Bavaria, Swabia, and the Ehine
provinces during the first half of the 15th century, derived mainly from
the Waldensians and mystic Friends of God. They received their name
from holding their services in out of the way corners. They had lay mis-
sionaries, who went about evangelizing. To avoid the attentions of the
Inquisition they took part in Catholic worship, even confessed in case of
need to Catholic priests, but concealed their heretical views. About a.d.
1400 we get a trace of them at Strassburg ; thirty-two of them were taken
prisoners, and constrained under torture to confess. The Dominicans
insisted they should be burnt, but the council was satisfied with banish-
ing them from the city. One of their most distinguished teachers in
later times was Reiser of Swabia. In his travels he had gone to
Bohemia, and there joined the Hussites, was ordained a priest by them,
and in a.d. 1433 accompanied their deputies to the Council of Basel.
Procoi^ius had him appointed to a pastorate in Landscron, a Bohemian
town, which, however, he soon relinquished. He lingered on in Basel, then
went on evangelistic tours through Germany, at first on his own account,
afterwards at the head of twelve Taborite missionaries. Finally, in a.d.
1457, he went to Strassburg, intending to end his days there in peace. But
soon after his arrival he was cast into prison, and in a.d. 1458, along
with his faithful follower, Anna Weiler, put to death at the stake.
10. The Dutch Reformers sprang mostly from the Brothers of the
Common Life (§ 112, 9). — (1) John Pupper of Goch in Cleves, prior of a
cloister founded by him at Mecheln, died a.d. 1475. His works show
him to have been a man of deep spirituality. Love, which leads to the
true freedom of sons of God, is the material, the sole authority of
Scripture is the formal, principle of his theology, which rests on a purely
Augustinian foundation. He contends against the doctrine of righteous-
ness by works, the meritoriousness of vows, etc. — (2) John Ruchrath of
Wesel, professor in Erfurt, afterwards jDreacher at Mainz and Worms,
died in a.d. 1481. On the basis of a strictly Augustinian theology he
opposed the papal systems of anathemas and indulgences, and preached
powerfully salvation by Jesus Christ only. For the church doctrine of
transubstantiation he substituted one of impanation. He spiritualized
the doctrine of the church. Against the ecclesiastical injunction of
fasts, he wrote Dejejunio ; against indulgences, De indulfjentiis ; against
the hierarchy, De potestate ecdesiastica. The Dominicans of Mainz
§ 119. EVANGELICAL EFFORTS AT REFORM. 215
accused and coudemned him as a heretic in a.d. 1479. The old man,
bent down with age and sickness, was forced to recant, and to burn his
writings, and was sentenced to imprisonment for Hfe in a monastery. —
(3) John Wessel of Groningen was a scholar of the Brothers of the Com-
mon life at Zwoll, where Thomas a Kempis exerted a powerful influence
over him. He taught in Cologne, Lyons, Paris, and Heidelberg, and
then retired to the cloister of Agnes Mount, near Zwoll, where he died
in A.D. 1489. His friends called him Lux mundi. Scholastic dialectics,
mystical depths, and rich classical culture were in him united with a
clear and accurate knowledge of science. Luther says of him : " Had
I read Wessel before, my enemies would have said, Luther has taken
everything from Wessel, so thoroughly do our ideas agree." His views
are in harmony with Luther's, especially in what he teaches of Holy
Scripture, the universal priesthood of Christians, indulgence, repentance,
faith, and justification. He taught that not only popes but even
councils may err and have erred; excommunication has merely outward
efficacy, indulgence has to do only with ecclesiastical penalties, and God
alone can forgive sins ; our justification rests on Christ's righteousness
and God's free grace. Purgatory meant for him nothing more than the
intermediate position between earthly imperfection and heavenly per-
fection, which is attained only through various stages. The protection
of powerful friends saved him from the persecution of tbe Inquisition.
Many of his works were destroyed by the diligence of the mendicant
friars. The most important of his extant writings is the Farrago, a
collection of short treatises.^— (4) The priest of Rostock, Nicholas Russ,
in the end of the 15th century, deserves honourable mention alongside of
these Dutchmen. Living in intimate relations with Bohemian Walden-
siaus, he was subjected to many indignities, and died a fugitive in Livonia.
He wrote in the Dutch language a tract against the hierarchy, indul-
gences, worship of saints and relics, etc., which was translated into
German by Flacius. A copy of it was found in Rostock library in a.d.
1850. It is entitled, " Of the Rope or of the Three Strings." The rope
that will raise man from the depths of his corruption must be made up
of the three strings, faith, hope, and love. These three strings are
described in succession, and so the book forms a complete compendium
of Christian faith and life, with a sharp polemic against the debased
church doctrine and morals of the age.
11. An Italian Eeformer. — Jerome Savonarola, born a.d. 1452, monk
and from a.d. 1481 prior of the Dominican cloister of San Marco in
Florence, was born a.d. 1489, in high repute in that city as an elo
1 On these three consult Ullmann, " Reformers before the Refor-
mation." 2 vols. Edin., 1855. Brandt, " History of the Reformation
in the Low Countries," vol. i. London, 1720.
216 THE GEKMANO-EOMANIC CHUECH TO A.D. 1517.
quent and passionate preacher of repentance, with even reckless bold-
ness declaiming against the depravity of clergy and laity, princes and
people. With his whole soul a Dominican, and as such an enthusiastic
admirer of Thomas, practising rigid self-discipline by fasts and flagel-
lations, he was led by the study of Augustine and Scripture 'to a pure
and profound knowledge of the evangelical doctrine of salvation, which
he sought, not in the merits and intercession of the saints, nor in the
performance of good works, but only in the grace of God and justifi-
cation through faith in the crucified Saviour of sinners. But with this
he combined a prophetic-apocalyptic theory, according to which he
thought himself called and fitted by Divine inspiration, like the prophets
of the Old Testament, to grapple with the political problems of the age.
And, in fact, he made many a hardened sinner tremble by revealing con-
templated secret sins, and many of his political prophecies seem to have
been fulfilled with surprising accuracy. Thus he prophesied the death
of Innocent VIII. in a.d. 1492, and proclaimed the speedy overthrow
of the house of the Medici in Florence, as well as the punishment of
other Italian tyrants and the thorough reformation of the church by
a foreign king crossing the Alps with a powerful army. And lo, in the
following year, the king of France, Charles VIII., crossed the Alps to
enforce his claims upon Naples and force from the pope recognition of
the Basel reforms ; the Medici were banished from Florence, and Naples
unresistingly fell into the hands of the French. Thus the ascetic monk
of San Marco became the man of the people, who now began with Ruth-
less energy to carry out, not only moral and religious reformatory
notions, but also his political ideal of a democratic kingdom of God.
In vain did Alexander VI. seek by offer of a cardinal's hat to win over
the demagogical prophet and reformer; he only replied, "I desire no
other red hat than that coloured by the blood of martyrdom." In vain
did the pope insist that he should appear before him at Kome ; in vain did
he forbid him the pulpit, from which he so powerfully moved the people.
An attempt to restore the Medici also failed. At the carnival in a.d.
1497 Savonarola proved the supremacy of his influence over the people
by persuading them, instead of the usual buffoonery, to make a bonfire of
the articles of luxury and vanity. But already the political movements
were turning out unfavourably, and his utterances were beginning to
lose their reputation as true jDrophecies. Charles VIII. had been com-
pelled to quit Italy in a.d. 1495, and Savonarola's assurances of his
speedy return were still unfulfilled. Popular favour vacillated, while
the nobles and the libertine youth were roused to the utmost bitterness
against him. The Franciscans, as members of a rival order, were his
sworn enemies. The papal ban was pronounced against him in a.d. 1497,
and the city was put under the interdict. A monk of his cloister, Fra
Domeuico Pescia, offered to pass the ordeal of fire in behalf of his master,
§ 120. THE EEVIVAL OF LEARNING. 217
if any of his opponents would submit to the same trial. A Franciscan
declared himself ready to do so, and all arrangements were made. But
when Domenico insisted upon taking with him a consecrated host, the
trial did not come off, to the great disappointment of a people devotedly
fond of shows. A fanatical mob took the prophet prisoner. His bitterest
enemies were his judges, who, after torture had extorted from him a con-
fession of false prophecy most repugnant to his inmost convictions, con-
demned him to death by fire as a deceiver of the people and a heretic.
On 23rd May, a.d. 1498, he was, along with Domenico and another monk,
hung upon a gallows and then burned. The believing joy with which
he endured death deepened the reverence of an ever-increasing band of
adherents, who proclaimed him saint and martyr. His portrait in the
cell once occupied by him, painted by Fra Bartolomeo, surrounded with
the halo of a saint, shows the veneration in which he was held by his
generation and by his order. His numerous sermons represent to us
his burning oratory. His chief work is his Triumphus crucis of a.d.
1497, an eloquent and tlioughtful vindication of Christianity against the
half pagan scepticism of the Renaissance, then dominant in Florence and
at the court. An exposition of the 51st Psalm, written in prison and
not completed, works out, with a clearness and precision never before
attained, the doctrine of justification by faith. It was on this account
republished by Luther in a.d. 1523.^
§ 120. The Revival of Learning.
The classical literature of Greek, and especially of Roman,
antiquity was during the Middle Ages in the West by no
means so completel}^ unknown and unstudied as is commonly
supposed. Rulers like Charlemagne, Charles the Bald,
Alfred the Great, and the German Ottos encouraged its
study. Such scholars as Erigena, Gerbert, Barnard Syl-
vester, John of Salisbury, Roger Bacon, etc., were relatively
well acquainted with it. Moorish learning from Spain and
intercourse with Byzantine scholars spread classical culture
1 Heraud, " Life and Times of Savonarola." London, 1843. Villari,
" History of Savonarola." 2 vols. London, 1888. Madden, " The Life
and Martyrdom of Savonarola." 2 vols., London, 1854. MacCrie,
" History of Reformation in Italy." Edin., 1827. Roscoe, " Lorenzo
de Medici." London, 1796. See also chapters on Savonarola in Mrs.
Oliphant's "Makers of Florence." London, 1881. Milman, " Savona-
rola, Erasmus," etc. Essays. London, 1870.
218 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
during the 12th and 13th centuries, and the Hohenstaufen
rulers were its eager and liberal patrons. In the 14th
century the founders of a national Italian literature, Dante,
. Petrarch, and Boccaccio, earnestly cultivated and encouraged
classical studies. But an extraordinary revival of interest
in such pursuits took place during the 15th century. The
meeting of Greeks and Italians at the Council of Elorence
in A.D. 1439 (§ G7, 6) gave the first impulse, while the
Turkish invasion and the downfall of Constantinople in A.D.
1453 gave it the finishing touch. Immense numbers of
Byzantine scholars fled to Italy, and were accorded an
enthusiastic reception at the Vatican and in the houses of
the Medici. With the aid of printing, invented about A.D.
1450, the treasures of classical antiquity were made ac-
cessible to all. From the time of this immigration, too,
classical studies took an altogether new direction. During
the Middle Ages they were made almost exclusively to
subserve ecclesiastical and theological ends, but now they
were conducted in a thoroughly independent spirit, for the
purpose of universal human culture. This " humanism "
emancipated itself from the service of the church, assumed
toward Christianity for the most part an attitude of lofty
indifference, and often lost itself in a vain worship of pagan
antiquity. Faith was mocked at as well as superstition ;
sacred history and Creek mythology were treated alike.
The youths of all European countries, thirsting for know-
ledge, crossed the Alps, to draw from the fresh springs of the
Italian academies, and took home with them the new ideas,
transplanting into distant lands in a modified form the liber-
tinism of the new paganism that had now over-run Italy.
1. Italian Humanists.— Italy was the cradle of humanism, the Greeks
who settled there (§ 62, 1, 2j, its fathers. The first Greek who appeared
as a teacher in Italy was Emmanuel Chrysoloras, in a.d. 1396. After the
Council of Florence, Bessarion and Gemistlius Pletho settled there, both
ardent adherents of the Platonic philosophy, for which they created an
§ 120. THE EEVIVAL OF LEAENING. 219
enthusiasm throughout all Italy. From a.d. 1453 G-reek litterateurs came
in crowds. From their schools classical culture and pagan ideas spread
through the land. This paganism penetrated even the highest ranks of
the hierarchy. Leo X.^ is credited with saying, " How many fables about
Christ have been used by us and ours through all these centuries is very
well known." It may not be literally authentic, but it accurately expresses
the spirit of the papal court. Leo's private secretary, Cardinal Bembo,
gave a mythological version of Christianity in classical Latin. Christ
he styled " Minerva sprung from the head of Jupiter," the Holy Spirit
"the breath of the celestial Zephyr," and repentance was with him a
Deos superosque manesque placare. Even during the council of Florence
Pletho had expressed the opinion that Christianity would soon develop
into a universal religion not far removed from classical paganism ; and
when Pletho died, Bessarion comforted his sons by saying that the
deceased had ascended into the pure heavenly spheres, and had joined
the Olympic gods in mystic Bacchus dances. In the halls of the Medici
there flourished a new Platonic school, which put Plato's philosophy above
Christianity. Alongside of it arose a new peripatetic school, whose repre-
sentative, Peter Pompanazzo, who diedA.n. 152(3, openly declared that from
the philosophical point of view the immortality of the soul is more than
doubtful. The celebrated Florentine statesman and historian MaccMa-
velli," who died a.d. 1527, taught the princes of Italy in his '• Prince," in
direct contradiction to Dante's idealistic " Monarchia," a realistic polity
which was completely emancipated from Christianity and every system
of morality, and presented the monster Cffisar Borgia (§ 110, 12) as a pat-
tern of an energetic prince, consistently labouring for the end he had in
view. Looseness of morals went hand in hand with laxity in religion,
Obscene poems and pictures circulated among the humanists, and their
practice was not behind their theory. Poggio's lewd facetiae, as well as
Boccadelli's indecent epigrams, fascinated the cultured Christian world as
much by their lascivious contents as by their classical style. From the
dialogues of Laurentius Valla on lust and the true good, which were
meant to extol the superiority of Christian morals over those of the
Epicureans and Stoics, comes the saying that the Greek courtesans were
more in favour than the Christian nuns. The highly gifted poet, Pietro
Aretino, in his poetical prose writings reached the utmost pitch of obsce-
nity. He was called " the divine Aretino," and not only Charles V. and
Francis I. honoured him with presents and pensions, but also Leo X.,
Clement VIII., and even Paul III. showed him their esteem and favour.
In their published works the Italian humanists generally ignored rather
than contested the church and its doctrines and morality. But Lauren-
^ Eoscoe, " Leo X." London, 1805.
2 Villari, " Niccolo Macchiavelli, and his Times." 4 vols. Lend., 1878.
220 THE GEEMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.C. 1517.
tius Valla, who died a.d. 1457, ventured in his Adnotationes in N.T. freely
to find fault with and correct the Vulgate. He did even more, for he
pronounced the Donation of Constantine (§ 87,4) a forgery, and poured
forth bitter invectives against the cupidity of the papacy. He also
denied the genuineness of the correspondence of Christ with Abgarus
(§ 13, 2), as well as that of the Areopagite writings {§ 47, 11) and
questioned if the Apostles' Creed was the work of the apostles (§ 35, 2).
The Inquisition sought to get hold of him, but Nicholas V. (§ 110, 10)
frustrated the attempt and showed him kindness. With all his classical
culture, however, Valla retained no small reverence for Christianity. In
a still higher degree is this true of John Pious, Prince of Mirandola, the
phceuix of that age, celebrated as a miracle of learning and culture,
who united in himself all the nobler strivings of the present and the
past. When a youth of twenty-one he nailed up at Home nine hundred
theses from all departments of knowledge. The proposed disputation did
not then come off, because many of those theses gave rise to charges of
heresy, from which he was cleared only by Alexander VI. in a.d. 1493.
The combination of all sciences and the reconciliation of all systems of
philosophy among themselves and with revelation on the basis of the Cab-
bala was the main point in his endeavours. He has wrought out this idea
in his HejJtaplus, in which, by means of a sevenfold sense of Scripture, be
succeeds in deducing all the wisdom of the world from the first chapter
of . Genesis. He died in a.d. 1494, in the thirty-first year of his age. In
the last year of his life, renouncing the world and its glory, he set him-
self with all his powers to the study of Scripture, and meant to go from
land to land preaching the Cross of Christ. His intentions were frus-
trated by death. His saying is a very characteristic one : Philosophia
veritatem quccrit, theologia invenit, religio possidet.
2. German Humanism. — The home of German humanism was the
University of Erfurt, founded a.d. 1392. At the Councils of Constance
and Basel Erfurt, next to Paris, manifested the greatest zeal for the
reformation of head and members, and continued to pursue this course
during the twenty years' activity of John of Wesel (§ 119, 10). About
a.d. 1460 the first representatives of humanism made their appearance
there, a German Luder and a Floren>tine Publicius. From their school
went forth among others Rudolph of Langen, who carried the new light
into the schools of Westphalia, and John of Dalberg, afterwards Bishop
of Worms. When these two had left Erfurt, Maternus Pistorius headed
the humanist movement. Crowds of enthusiastic scholars from all
parts of Germany gathered around him. As men of poetic tastes, who
appreciated the ancient classics, they maintained excellent relations
with the representatives of scholasticism. But in a.d. 1504 Busch, a
violent revolutionist, appearing at Erfurt, demanded the destruction of
the old scholastic text-books, and thus produced an absolute breach
§ 120. THE REVIVAL OF LEAENING. 221
between the two tendencies. Maternus retired, and Mutian, an old
Erfurt student, assumed the leadership in Gotha. Erfurt and Gotha
were kept associated by a lively intercourse between the students resident
at these two places. Mutian had no literary ambitions, and firmly
declined a call to the new University of Wittenberg. All the more
powerfully he inspired his contemporaries. His bitter opposition to
hierarchism and scholasticism was expressed in keen satires. On retiring
from public life, he devoted himself to the study of Holy Scripture and
the Fathers. Shortly before his death he wrote down this as his con-
fession of faith : Multa scit rusticus, qucB philosophus ignorat ; Christus
vero pro nobis mortuus est, qui est vita nostra, quod certissime credo. The
leadership passed over to Eoban Hesse. The members of the society
joined the party of Luther, with the exception of Crotus Rubianus.
Ulrich von Hutten was one of the followers of Mutian, a knight of a
noble Franconian family, inspired with ardent patriotism and love of
freedom, who gave his whole life to battle against pedantry, monkery,
and intolerance. Escaping in a.d. 150^ from Fulda, where he was being
trained for the priesthood, he studied at Erfurt, fought in Maximilian's
army with the sword, in Mutian's and Reuchlin's ranks with the pen,
and after the fall of Sickingen became a homeless wanderer, until he
died in want, in a.d. 1523, on Ufenan, an island in the Lake of Ziirich.'
3. Next to Erfurt, Heidelberg, founded in a.d. 1386, afforded a con-
genial home for humanist studies. The most brilliant representative of
humanism there was Rudolph Agricola, an admirer and disciple of A.
Kempis and Wessel. His fame rests more on the reports of those who
knew him personally than on any writings left behind by him. His
pupils mostly joined the Reformation. — The University of Wittenberg,
founded by Frederick the Wise in a.d. 1502, was the nursery of a wise
and moderate humanism. Humanist studies also found an entrance into
Freiburg, founded in a.d. 1455, into Tubingen, founded in a.d. 1477, where
for a long time Reuchlin taught, and into Ingolstadt, founded in a.d.
1472, where the Duke of Bavaria spared no efforts to attract the most
distinguished humanists. Conrad Celtes, a pupil of Agricola, taught at
Ingolstadt until his removal to Vienna in a.d. 1497. Eck and Rbegius,
too, were among its ablest alumni. As a bitter opponent of Luther, Eck
gave the university a most pronounced anti-reformation character; whereas
Rhegius preached the gospel in Augsburg, and spent his life in the service
of the Reformation. Reuchlin also taught for a time in Ingolstadt, and
the patriotism and reformatory tendencies of Aventinus the Bavarian
historian received there the first powerful impulse. At Nuremberg the
humanists found a welcome in the home of the learned, wealthy, and
* Strauss, '♦ Ulrich von Hutten," trans, by Mrs. Sturge. London,
1874. Hausser, " Period of the Reformation." 2 vols. London, 1873,
222 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
noble Councillor Pirkheimer. In Reuchlin's controversy with the scholars
of Cologne he showed himself an eager apologist, and headed the party
of Eeuchlin. He greeted Luther's appearance with enthusiasm, and
entertained the reformer at his own house on his return from the discus-
sion with Cajetan (§ 122, 3), on account of which Eck made the papal bull
against Luther tell also against him. What he regarded as Luther's
violence, however, soon estranged him, while the cloister life of his
three sisters and three daughters presented to him a picture of Catholi-
cism in its noblest and purest form. His eldest sister, Christas, abbess
of the Clara convent at Nuremburg, one of the noblest and most cultured
women of the 16th century, had a powerful influence over him. He died
in A.D. 1530.
4. John Eeuchlin, born in a.d. 1455 at Pforzheim, went to the celebrated
school at Schlettstadt in Alsace, studied at Freiburg, Paris, Basel, and
Orleans, taught law in Tubingen, and travelled repeatedly in Italy with
Eberhard the Bearded of Wiirttemberg. After Eberhard's death he went
to the court of the Elector-palatine Philip, and along with D'Alberg did
much for the reputation of the University of Heidelberg. Afterwards
he was for eleven years president of the Swabian court of justiciary at
Tubingen. When in a.d. 1513 the seat of this court was removed to
Augsburg he retired to Stuttgart, was called in a.d. 1519 by William of
Bavaria to Ingolstadt as professor of Greek and Hebrew. On the outbreak
of the plague at Ingolstadt in a.d. 1520, he accepted a call back to Tiibin-
gen, where he died in a.d. 1522. He never gave in his adhesion to the
reforming ideas of Luther. He left unanswered a letter from the
reformer in a.d. 1518. But as a promoter of every scientific endeavour,
especially in connection with the study of the original text of the O.T.,
Reuchlin had won imperishable renown. He was well entitled to con-
clude his Riidimenta Ungues Hehraiccs of a.d. 1506 with Horace's words,
Stat monumentum aere j^erenniuo, for that book has been the basis of all
Christian Hebrew philology. ^ He also discussed the difficult subject of
1 A young Minorite, Conrad Pellicanus of Tubingen, had as early as
A.D. 1501 composed a very creditable guide to the study of the Hebrew
language, under the title De viodo legcndi et inteUigendi Hehrcexim,
which was first printed in Strassburg in a.d. 1504. Amid inconceivable
difficulties, purely self taught, and with the poorest literary aids, he had
secured a knowledge of the Hebrew language which he perfected by
unwearied application to study and by intercourse with a baptized Jew.
He attained such proficiency, that he won for himself a place among the
most learned exegetes of the Reformed Church as professor of theo-
logy at Basel in a.d. 1523 and at Zurich from a.d. 1525 till his death,
in A.D. 1556. His chief work is Gomvientaria Bibliorum, 7 vols, fol.,
1532-1539.
§ 120. THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING. 223
Hebrew accents in a special treatise, Be Ace. et Orthogr. Hebr. 11. iii, and
the secret doctrines of the Jews in his De arte Cahbalistica. He offered
to instruct any Jew who wished it in the doctrines of Christianity, and
also to care for his temporal affairs. His attention to rabbinical studies
involved him in a controversy which spread his fame over all Europe.
A baptized Jew, Pfefferkorn, in Cologne in a.d. 1507 exhibited a neo-
phyte's zeal by writing bitter invectives against the Jews, and in a.d. 1509
called upon the Emperor Maximilian to have all rabbinical writings burnt
because of the blasphemies against Christ which they contained. The
emperor asked the ojoinion of the universities of Mainz, Cologne, Erfurt,
and Heidelberg, as well as of Eeuchlin and the Cologne inquisitor Hoog-'
straten. Erfurt and Heidelberg gave a qualified, Reuchlin an unquali-
fied answer in opposition to the proposal. The openly abusive Jewish
writings, e.g. the notorious Toledoth Jeschu, he would indeed condemn,
but all other books, e.g. the Talmud, the Cabbala, the biblical glosses and
commentaries, books of sermons, prayers, and sacred songs, as well as
all philosophical, scientific, poetic, and satirical writings of the Jews, he
was prepared unconditionally to defend. Pfefferkorn contended against
him passionately in his " Handspiegel" of a.d. 1511, to which Reuchlin
replied in his " Augenspiegel." The theological faculty of Cologne,
mostly Dominicans, pronounced forty-three statements in the " Augen-
spiegel " heretical, and demanded its suppression. Reuchlin now gave
free vent to his passion, and in his Defensio c. calumniatores suos Colo-
nienses denounced his opponents as goats, swine, and children of the
devil. Hoogstraten had him cited before a heresy tribunal. Eeuchlin
did not appear, but appealed to Pope Leo X. (a.d. 1513). A commission
appointed by Leo met at Spires in a.d. 1514, and declared him not guilty
of heresy, found Hoogstraten liable in the costs of the process, which
was enforced with hearty satisfaction by Franz von Sickingeu in a.d. 1519.
But meanwhile Hoogstraten had made a personal explanation of his
affairs at Rome, and had won over the influential magister sacrl palatii,
Sylvester Prierias (§ 122, 2), who got the pope in a.d. 1520 to annul the
judgment and to condemn Reuchlin to pay the costs and observe eternal
silence. The men of Cologne triumphed, but in the public opinion of
Germany Reuchlin was regarded as the true victor.
5. A multitude of vigorous and powerful pens were now in motion on
behalf of Reuchlin. In the autumn of a.d. 1515 appeared the first book
of the Epistolse obscurorum virorum, which pretended to be the correspon-
dence of a friend with the Cologne teacher Ortuinus Gratius of Deventer.
In the most delicious monkish Latin the secret affairs of the mendicant
monks and their hatred of Reuchlin were set forth, so that even the
Dominicans, according to Erasmus, for a time regarded the correspon-
dence as genuine. All the more overwhelming was the ridicule which
fell upon them throughout all Europe. The mendicants inleed obtained
224 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
from Leo a bull against the wiiters of the book, but this only increased
its circulation. The authors remained unknown ; but there is no doubt
they belonged to the Mutian party. Justus Jonas, a member of that
guild, affirms that Crotus Rubianus had a principal hand in its com-
position. The idea of it was probably suggested by Mutian himself.
Ulrich von Hutten repudiated any share in it, and on internal and ex-
ternal grounds this is more than probable. Busch, Urban, Petrejus,
and Eoban Hesse most likely contributed to it. In order to keep up the
deception, Venice was given as the place of publication, the name of the
famous Aldus Manutius, the papal publisher of Venice, was put upon
the title, and a pseudo-papal imprimatur was attached. The second
book was issued in a.d. 1517 by Frobenius in Basel. The monkish party
published as a counterblast Lamentationes ohscurorum virorum oX Cologne
in A.D. 1518, but the lame and forced wit of the book marked it at once
as a ridiculous failure. The monks and schoolmen were once and for
ever morally annihilated.^
6. Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam was the most brilliant of all the
humanists, not only of Germany, but also of all Europe. Born in a.d.
1465, he was educated by the Brothers of the Common Life at Deventer
and Herzogenbusch, and afterwards forced by his relatives to enter a
monastery in a.d. 1486. In a.d. 1491 he was relieved from the monastic
restraints by the Bishop of Cambray, and sent to finish his studies at
Paris. He visited England in a.d. 1497, in the company of young Eng-
lishmen to whom he had been tutor. There the humanist theologian
Colet of Oxford exerted over him a wholesome influence that told upon
his whole future life. After spending a year and a half in England,
he passed the next six years, sometimes in France, sometimes in the
Netherlands ; was in Italy from a.d. 1507 till a.d. 1510 ; then again
for five years in England, for most of that time teaching Greek at
Cambridge; then other six years in the Netherlands ; and at last, in a.d.
1521, he settled with his publisher Frobenius in Basel, where he enjoyed
intercourse with the greatest scholars of the day, and maintained an
extensive correspondence. He refused every offer of official appointment,
even the rank of cardinal, but in reality held undisputed sway as king
in the world of letters. He did much for the advancement of classical
studies, and in various ways promoted the Protestant Reformation. The
faults of the scholastic method in the study of theology he unsparingly
exposed, while the misdeeds of the clergy and the ignorance and sloth of
the monks afforded materials for his merciless satires. The heathenish
spirit of many of the humanists, as well as the turbulent and revolu-
tionary procedure of Ulrich von Hutten, was quite distasteful to him ; but
his Pelagianising tendencies also prevented him from appreciating the
1 Strauss, " Ulrich von Hutten." London, 1874, pp. 120-140.
§ 120. THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING. 225
true character of the gosi^el. He desired a reformation of the Church,
but he had not the reformer's depth of religious emotion, world-conquer-
ing faith, self-denying love, and heroic preparation for martyrdom. He
was much too fond of a genial literary life, and his perception of the
corruption of the church was much too superficial, so that he sought
reformation rather by human culture than by the Di-vine power of the
gospel. "When the Reformation conquered at Basel in a.d. 1529, Erasmus
withdrew to Freiburg. He returned to Basel in a.d. 1536 for conference
with Frobenius, and died there under suspicion of heresy without the
sacraments of the church. His friends the monks at an earlier period,
on the occasion of a false report of his death, had said in their barbarous
Latin that he died " sine lux, sine crux, sine Deus.'' The most im-
portant of his works are his critical and exegetical treatises on the N.T.
The first edition of his Greek N.T., with Latin translation, short notes,
and three introductory sections, was published in a.d. 1516. In the
second edition of a.d. 1519, one of these introductory sections. Ratio vera
tlieolofjiie, appeared in a greatly extended form ; and from a.d. 1522 it
was issued separately, and passed through several editions. Scarcely less
important were his paraphrases of all the biblical books except the
ApocalyiDse, begun in a.d. 1517. He did much service too by his editions
of the Fathers. On his polemic with Luther see ^ 125, 8. His Eccle-
siastes s. concionator evangelicals of a.d. 1535 is a treatise on homiletics
admirable of its kind. In his "Praise of Folly" (Yl-^nuifnov /xupias, s.
Laus stultitice) of a.d. 1511, dedicated to his friend Sir Thomas More, he
overwhelms with ridicule the schoolmen, as well as the monks and the
clergy; and in his " Colloquies" of a.d. 1518, by which he hoped to make
boys latiniores et meliores, he let no opportunity pass of reproaching the
monks, the clergy, and the forms of worship which he regarded as super-
stitious. Also his Adagia of a.d. 1500 had afi'orded him abundant scope
for the same sort of thing, '.^piety of the purest and noblest type,
derived from the schools of the Brothers of the Common Life, and from
intercourse with Colet, breathes through his EiichiridionviiUtis christianl
of A.D. 1502.1— Continuation § 123, 3.
7. Humanism in England. — In England we meet with two men in the
end of the 15th century, closely related to Erasmus, of supreme influence
as humanists in urging the claims of reform within the Catholic church.
1 Erasmus, " Colloquies," trans, by Bailey, ed. by Johnson. Lond.,
1877. " Praise of Folly," trans, by Copner. Lond., 1878. Seebohm,
'' Oxford Reformers of 1498 : Colet, Erasmus, and More." Lond., 1869.
Drummond, " Erasmus, His Life and Character," 2 vols. Lond., 1873.
Penniugton, " Life and Character of Erasmus." Lond., 1874. Strauss,
"Ulrich von Hutten." Lond., 1874, pp. 315-346. Corner, "Hist, of
Prot. Theology," 2 vols. Edin., 1871, vol. i., p. 202.
IS
226 THE GERMANO-EOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
John Colet in a.d. 1496 returned to England after a long sojourn in
Italy, where he had obtained, not only humanistic culture, but also,
through contact with Savonarola and Miraudola, a powerful religious
impulse. He then began, at Oxford, his lectures on the Pauline epistles,
in which he abandoned the scholastic method and returned to the
study of Scripture and the Fathers. There, in a.d. 1498, he attached
himself closely to Erasmus and to young Thomas More, who was studying
in that place. In a.d. 1505 Colet was made doctor and Dean of St.
Paul's, in which position he expounded with great success whole biblical
books and large portions of others in his sermons. After his father's
death in a.d. 1510, he applied his great wealth to the founding of a gram-
mar school at St. Paul's for the instruction of more than 150 boys in classi-
cal, biblical, and patristic literature. A convocation of English bishops
in A.D. 1512, to devise means for rooting out heresy (§ 119, 1), gave him
the opportunity in his opening sermon to speak plainly to the assembled
bishops. He told them that reform of their own order was the best way
to protect the church against the incursion of heretics. This aroused
the bitter wrath of the old, bigoted Bishop Fitzjames of London, who
disliked him exceedingly on account of his reforming tendencies and his
pastoral and educational activity. But the archbishop, Warham of Can-
terbury, repelled the bishop's fanatical charge of heresy as well as King
Henry's suspicions in regard to the political sympathies of the simple,
pious man. Colet died in a.d. 1519. —Thomas More, born in a.d. 1480, was
recommended to the king by Cardinal Wolsey, and rose from step to step
until in a.d. 1529 be succeeded his patron as Lord Chancellor of England.
In bonds of closest intimacy with Colet and Erasmus, More also shared
in their desires for reform, but applied himself, in accordance with his
civil and ofHcial position, more to the social and political than to the
ecclesiastical aspects of the question. His most comprehensive con-
tribution is found in his famous satire, "Utopia," of a.d. 1516, in which
he sets forth his views as to the natural and rational organization of all
social and political relations of life in contrast to the corrupt institutions
of existing states. The religious side of this Utopian paradise is pure
deism, public worship being restricted to the use of what is common to
all religions, and peculiarities of particular religions are relegated to
special or private services. We cannot however from this draw any
conclusion as to his own religious beliefs. More continued to the end
a zealous Catholic and a strict ascetic, and was a man of a singularly
noble and steadfast character. In the controversy between the king and
Luther (§ 125, B) he supported the king, and as chancellor he wrote, in
direct contradiction to the principles of religious toleration commended in
his " Utopia," with venomous bitterness against the adherents of the anti-
Catholic reformation. But he decidedly refused to acquiesce in the king's
divorce; and when Henry quarrelled with the pope in a.d. 1532 and began
§ 120. THE REVIVAL OF LEARNING. 227
to carry out reforms in a Caesaro-papistic manner (§ 159, 4), he resigned
his oflBces, firmly refused to acknowledge the royal supremacy over the
English church, and, after a long and severe imprisonment, was be-
headed in A.D. 1535. ^
8. Humanism in France and Spain.— In France humanist studies were
kept for a time in the background by the world-wide reputation of the
University of Paris and its Sorbonne. But a change took place when the
young king Francis I., a.d. 1515-1547, became the patron and promoter
of humanism. One of its most famous representatives was Budseus, royal
librarian, who aided in founding a college for the cultivation of science
free from the shackles of scholasticism, and exposed the corruptions of
the papacy and the clergy. But much as he sympathized with the spirit
of the Reformation, he shrank from any open breach with the Catholic
church. He died in a.d. 1540. His like-minded contemporary, Faber
pupils around him, and from a.d. 1507 applied himself almost exclusively
Stapulensis, as a teacher of classical literature at Paris gathered crowds of
to biblical exegetical studies. He criticised and corrected the corrupt text
of the Vulgate, commented on the Greek text of the gospels and apo-
stolic epistles, and on account of this, as well as by reason of a critical
dissertation on Mary Magdalene of a.d. 1521, was condemned by the
Sorbonne. Francis I. and his sister Margaret of Orleans protected him
from further persecution. Also his former pupil, William Bri^onnet,
Bishop of Meaux, who was eagerly endeavouring to restore morality and
piety among his clergy, appointed him his vicar-general, and gave him an
opportunity to briug out his French translation of the New Testament from
the Vulgate in a.d. 1523, which was followed by a translation of the Old
Testament and a French commentary on the pericopes of the Sundays
and festivals. As Faber here represented the Scriptures as the only rule
of faith for all Christians, and taught that man is justified not by his
works, but only by faith in the grace of God in Christ, the Sorbonne
charged him with the Lutheran heresy, and Parliament, during the king's
imprisonment in Spain (§ 12(3, 5) in a.d. 1525, appointed a commission
to search out and suppress heresy in the diocese of Meaux. Faber's
books were condemned to the flames, but he himself, threatened with
the stake, escaped by flight to Strassburg. After his return the king
provided for him a safe retreat at Blois, where he wrought at his trans-
lation of the Old Testament, which he completed in a.d. 1528. He
Bpent his last years at Nerac, the residence of his patroness Margaret,
now Queen of Navarre, where he died in a.d. 1536 in his 86th year.
Though at heart estranged from the Catholic church, he never formally
forsook it. — In Spain Cardinal Ximenes (§ 118, 7) acted as the M^cenas
1 Seebohm, " Oxford Reformers." Lond., 1869. Walter, "Sir Thomas
More." Lond., 1840. Mackintosh, "Life of Sir Thomas More." Lond., 1844.-
228 THE GEEMANO-KOMANIC CHURCH TO A.D. 1517.
of humanist studies. The most distinguished Spanish humanist was
Anton of Lebrija, professor at Salamanca, a fellow labourer with Ximenes
on the Complutensian Polyglott, and protected by him from the Inqui-
sition, which would have called him to account for his criticism of the
Vulgate. He died in a.d. 1522.
9. Humanism and the Reformation of the Sixteenth Century.— Humanists,
in common with the reformers, inveighed against the debased scholasti-
cism as well as against the superstition of the age. They did so how-
ever on very different grounds, and conducted their warfare by very
different methods. While the reformers employed the word of God, and
strove after the salvation of the soul, the humanists employed wit and
sarcasm, and sought after the temporal well-being of men. Hence the
reaction of the despised scholasticism and the contemned monasticism
against humanism was often in the right. A reformation of the church
by humanism alone would have been a return to naked paganism. But,
on the other hand, classical studies afforded men who desired a genuine
reformation of the church a rich, linguistic, philosophical, and scientific
culture, without which, as applied to researches in church history, the
exposition of Scripture, and the revision of doctrine, the reforms of the
sixteenth century could hardly have been carried out in a comprehensive
and satisfactory manner. The most permanent advantage won for the
church and theology by the revival of learning was the removal of Holy
Scripture from under the bushel, and giving it again its rightful place as the
lamp of the church. It pointed back from the Vulgate, of which since
A.D. 1500, some ninety-eight printed editions had appeared, to the original
text, condemned the allegorical method of exposition, awakened an
appreciation of the grammatical and historical system of interpretation,
afforded scientific apparatus by its philological studies, and by issuing
printed Bibles secured the spread of the original text. From the time
of the invention of printing the Jews Avere active in printing the Old
Testament. From a.d. 1502 a number of Christian scholars, under the
presidency of Ximenes, wrought at Alcala at the great Complutensian
Polyglott, published in a.d. 1520. It contained the Hebrew and Greek
texts, the Targums, the LXX., and the Vulgate, as well as a Latin trans-
lation of the LXX. and of the Targums, with a much-needed grammatical
■and lexical apparatus. Daniel Bomberg of Antwerp published at Venice
various editions of the Old Testament, some with, some without, rab-
binical commentaries. His assistants were Felix Pratensis, a learned
Jew ; and Jacob ben Chaijim, a rabbi of Tunis. As the costly Comi^lu-
tensian Polyglott was available only to a few, Erasmus did great service
by his handy edition of the Greek New Testament, notwithstanding ita
serious critical deficiencies. Erasmus himself brought out five successive-
editions, but very soon more than thirty impressions were exhausted.
§ 121. CHARACTER OF MODERN CHURCH HISTORY. 229
THIRD DIVISION.
History of the Development of the Church under Modern
European Forms of Civilization.
§ 121. Character and Distribution of Modern Church
History.
In tlie Heformation of the sixteenth century the intelli-
gence of Grermany, which had hitherto been under the train-
ing and tutelage of the Romish church, reached maturity
by the application of the formal and material principles of
Protestantism, — the sole normative authority of Scripture,
and justification by faith alone without works of merit. It
emancipated itself from its schoolmaster, who, for selfish
ends, had made and still continued to make strenuous efforts
to check every movement towards independence, every endea-
vour after ecclesiastical, theological, and scientific freedom,
every struggle after evangelical reform. Yet this emanci-
pation was not completely effected in all the purety German
nationalities, much less among those Romanic and Slavonic
peoples which had bowed their necks to the papal hierarchy.
The Romish church of the Reformation not only adhered to
the form and content of its former unevangelical constitution,
but also still further developed and formally elaborated its
creed in the same unevangelical direction, and the result was
a split in the western church into an Evangelical Protestant
and a Roman Catholic church. Then again the principles of
the Reformation were set forth in different ways, and Pro-
testantism branched off into two divisions, the Lutheran
and the Reformed. Besides these three new western
churches and the one old eastern church, which all rested
upon the common oecumenical basis of the old Catholic
church, a variety of sects sprang out of them. Through
230 MODERN EUROPEAN CHURCH HISTORY.
these greater and lesser divisions, modern chnrcli history,
where, with some advantages and some disadvantages, one
church is pitted against another, possesses a character
entirely different from the church history of earlier times.
Modern church history naturally falls into four divisions. The dis-
tinguishing characteristic of each is found partly in the opposition of
particular churches to one another, partly in the antagonism of faith
and unbelief. The transition from one to another corresponds generally
with the boundaries of the centuries. The sixteenth century forms the
Reformation period, in which the new Protestantism, parted from the
old Roman Catholicism, cast off the deformatory elements which had
attached themselves to it, and developed for itself a system of doctrine,
worship, and constitution ; while the Roman Catholic church, from the
middle of the century, set to work upon a counter-Reformation, by which
it succeeded in large measure in reconquering the field that had been
lost. The seventeenth century was characterized on the Protestant side
as the age of orthodoxy, in which confessionalism obtained undivided
supremacy, deteriorating however in doctrine and life into a frigid
formalism, which called forth tbe movement of Pietism as a corrective ;
but, on the Roman Catholic side, it was characterized as a period of
continued successful restoration. In the eighteenth century begins the
struggle against the dominant church and the prevailing conceptions
of Christianity in the forms of deism, naturalism, and rationalism
within both the Protestant and Catholic churches. The fourth division
embraces the nineteenth century. The newly awakened faith strives
vigorously with rationalism, and then, on the Protestant side, splits
into unionism and confessionalism ; while, on the Roman Catholic side,
it makes its fullest development in a zealous ultramontauism. But
rationalism again renews its youth under the cloak of science, and
alongside of it appears a more undisguised unbelief in the distinctly
antichristian forms of pantheism, materialism, and communism, which
seeks to annihilate everything Christian in church and state, in science
and faith, in social and political life.
§ 122. BEGINNINGS OF THE REFORMATION 231
FIRST SECTION.
CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY,
I. The Reformation.^
§ 122. The Begixxixgs of the Wittenberg Reformation.
At tlie beginning of the sixteenth century everything seemed
to combine in favour of those reforming endeavours which
had been held back during the Middle Ages. There was a
lively perception of the corruptions of the church, a deep
and universal yearning after reformation, the scientific
apparatus necessary for its accomplishment, a pope, Leo
X., careless and indolent ; a trafficker in indulgences, Tetzel,
stupidly bold and shameless ; a noble, pious, and able prince,
Frederick the Wise (§ 123, 9), to act as protector of the
new creed ; an emperor, Charles V. (§ 123, 5), powerful
and hostile enough to kindle the purifying fire of tribulation,
but too much occupied with political entanglements to be
able to indulge in reckless and violent oppression. There
were also thousands of other persons, circumstances, and
relations helping, strengthening, and furthering the work.
^ Beard, " The Reformation of the 16th Cent, in its Relation to
Modern Thought and Knowledge." Lond., 1883. Wylie, " History of
Protestantism." 3 vols. Lond., 1875. Merle d'Anbigne, " History of
Reformation in the 16th Cent, in Switzerland and Germany." 5 vols.
Lond., 1840. D'Aubigne, " History of Reformation in Times of Calvin."
8 vols. Lond., 1863. Ranke, " History of Reformation in Germany."
3 vols. Lond., 18io. Hiiusser, " The Period of the Reformation." 2
vols. Lond., 1873. Hagenbach, " History of the Reformation." 2 vols.
Edinburgh, 1878.
Kostlin, " Life of Martin Luther." Lond., 1884. Bayne, " Martin
Luther : his Life and Work." 2 vols. Lond., 1887. Rae, " Martin
Luther, Student, Monk, Reformer." Lond., 1884.
Dale, " Protestantism : Its Ultimate Principle." Lond., 1875. Dorner,
" History of Protestant Theology." 2 vols. Edinburgh, 1871. Cun-
ningham, "Reformers and the Theology of the Reformation." Edin-
burgh, 1862. Tulloch, " Leaders of the Reformation." Edinburgh, 1859,
232 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
And now, at the right hour, in the fittest place, and with
the most suitable surroundings, a religious genius, in the
person of Luther, appeared as the reformer, with the rarest
combination of qualities of head and heart, character and
will, to engage upon that great work for which Providence
had so marvellously qualified him. This mighty under-
taking was begun by ninety-five simple theses, which he
nailed to the door of the church of Wittenberg, and the
Leipzig Disputation marked the first important crisis in its
histoiy.
1. Luther's Years of Preparation. — Martin Luther, a miner's son, was
born on November 10th, a.d. 1483. His childhood was passed under
severe parental control and amid pinching poverty, and he went to school
at Mansfeld, whither his parents had migrated ; then at Magdeburg,
where, among the Brothers of the Common Life, he had mainly to secure
his own support as a singing boy upon the streets ; and afterwards at
Eisenach, where Madame Ursula Cotta, moved by his beautiful voice and
earnest entreaty, took him into her house. In a.b. 1501 he entered on
the study of jurisprudence at Erfurt (i^ 120, 2), took the degree of
bachelor in a.d, 1502, and that of master in a.d. 1505. During a fearful
thunderstorm, which overtook him as he travelled home, he was driven
by terror to vow that he would become a monk, impressed as he was by
the sudden death of an unnamed friend which had taken place shortly
before. On the 17th July, a.d. 1505, he entered the Augustinian convent
at Erfurt. In deep concern about his soul's salvation, he sought by
monkish asceticism, fasting, prayer, and penances to satisfy his con-
science, but the inward struggles only grew stronger. An old monk pro-
claimed to the weaiy inquirer, almost fainting under the anxiety of spirit
and self-imposed tortures, the comforting declaration of the creed, " I
believe in the forgiveness of sins." Still more powerful in directing him
proved the conversation of his noble superior, John Staupitz (§ 112, 6).
He showed him the way of true repentance and faith in the Saviour
crucified not for painted sins. Following his advice, Luther diligently
studied the Bible, together with, of his own accord, Augustine's writings.
In a.d. 1507 he was ordained priest, and in a.d. 1508 Staupitz promoted
him to the University of Wittenberg, founded in a.d. 1502, where he
lectured on the "Dialectics'' and "Physics" of Aristotle; and in a.d. 1509
he was made Baccalaureus hiblicus. In the autumn of the same year he
went again, probably by Staupitz' advice, to Erfurt, until, a year and a
half afterwards, he obtained a definite settlement at Wittenberg. Highly
§ 122. EEG-INNIN&S OF TPIE REFORMATION. 283
important for bis subsequent development was the journey which, in a.d.
1511, he took to Rome in the interests of his order. On the first view
of the holy city, he sank upon his knees, and witli his hands raised to
heaven cried out, "I greet thee, holy Rome." But he withdrew utterly
disgusted with the godless frivolity and immorality which he witnessed
among the clergy on every side, and dissatisfied with the externalism of
the penitential exercises which he had undertaken. Daring his whole
journey the Scripture sounded in his ear, "The just shall live by his
faith." It was a voice of God in his soul, which at last carried the
blessed peace of God into his wounded spirit. After his return, in a.d.
1512, Staupitz gave him no rest until he took the degree of doctor of
divinity; and now he gave lectures in the university on Holy Scripture,
and afterwards preached in the city church of Wittenberg. He applied
himself more and more, by the help of Augustine, to the study of Scrip-
ture and its fundamental doctrine of justification by faith alone. About
this time too he was powerfully influenced by Tauler's mysticism and
tlie "Deutsche Theologie," of which he published an edition in a.d.
1516.
2. Luther's Theses of A.D. 1517. — The esthetic and luxurious pope Leo
X. (§ 110, 14), avowedly for the building of St. Peter's, really to fill his
own empty coffers, had proclaimed a general indulgence. Germany was
divided between three indulgence commissions. The elector-cardinal
Albert of Mainz, archbishop of Magdeburg, and brother of Elector Joachim
of Brandenburg, undertook the direction of the commission for his
archiepiscopal province, for which he was to receive half the proceeds for
the payment of his debts. The most shameless of the traffickers in
indulgences employed by him was the Leipzig Dominican jDrior, -Tohn
Tetzel. This man had been sentenced at Innsbrilck to be drowned for
adultery, but on the intercession of the Elector of Saxony had his sentence
commuted to imprisonment for life. He now was taken from his prison
in order to do this piece of work for Albert. With great success he went
from place to place, and offered his wares for sale, proclaiming their
virtues in the public market with unparalleled audacity. He went to
Jiiterbock, in the vicinity of Wittenberg, where he attracted crowds of
purchasers from all around. Luther discovered in the confessional the
corrupting influence of such procedure, and on the afternoon of All
Saints' Day, October 31st, A.D. 1517, he nailed on the door of the Castle
Church of Wittenberg ninety-five theses, explaining the meaning of
the indulgence. Although they were directed not so much against
the principle of indulgences as against their misunderstanding and
abuse, they comprehended the real germ of the Reformation movement,
negatively in the conception of repentance which they set forth, and
positively in the distinct declaration that the grace of God in Christ can
alone avail for the forgiveness of sin. With incredible rapidity the
234 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
theses spread over all Germany, indeed over all Europe. Luther accom-
panied them with a sermon on indulgence and grace. The immense
applause which its delivery called forth led the supporters of the old
views to gird on their armour. Tetzel publicly burnt the theses at
Jiiterbock, and with the help of Wimpina posted up and circulated at
Frankfort and other places counter-theses. The Wittenberg students
purchased quantities of these theses, and in retaliation burnt them, but
Luther did not approve their conduct. In April, a.d. 1518, Luther went
to Heidelberg, to take part there in a regular chapter of the Augustinians,
which was usually accompanied by public preaching and disputatious
by members of the order. The disputation, which on this occasion was
assigned to Luther, gave him the welcome opportunity of making known
to wider circles these philosophical and theological views which he had
hitherto uttered only in Wittenberg. The professors of the University
of Heidelberg repudiated and opposed them, but in almost every case
mildly and with tolerance. On the other hand, many of the young
theologians studying there enthusiastically accepted his doctrines, and
several of them, e.g. Martin Bucer of Strassburg (§ 125, 1), John Brenz
and Erhard Schnepf of Swabia (v^ 133, 3), as well as Theobald Billicanus,
afterwards reformer of Nordlingen, etc., there and then consecrated them-
selves to their life work.
3. Prierias, Cajetan, and Miltitz, A.D. 1518, 1519.— Leo X. at first re-
garded the matter as an insignificant monkish squabble, and praised
Brother Martin as a real genius. He gave no heed to Hoogstrateu's out-
cry of heresy, nor did he encourage the Dominican Prierias in his attack
on Luther. The book of Prierias was a harmless affair. Luther gave it
a short and crushing reply. Prierias answered in a second and third
tract, which Luther simply republished with sarcastic and overwhelming
prefaces. The pope then enjoined silence upon his luckless steward. In
May, A.D. 1518, Luther wrote a humble ei^istle to the pope, and added a
series of liesolntiones in vindication of his theses. Staupitz is said to
have revised both. Meanwhile it had been determined in Rome to deal
with the Wittenberg business in earnest. The papal procurator made a
complaint against Luther. A court was commissioned, which summoned
him to appear in person at Rome to answer for himself. But, on the
representations of the University of Wittenberg and the Elector Frederick
the Wise, the pope charged Cardinal Cajetan, his legate at the Diet of
Augsburg, to take up the consideration of the matter. Luther appeared,
and made his appeal to the Bible. The legate however wished him
to argue from the schoolmen, demanded an unconditional recantation,
and at last haughtily dismissed " the beast with deep eyes and wonderful
speculations in his head." Luther made a formal appeal a sanctissimo
Domino Leone male informato ad meliits informandum, and quitted Augs-
burg in good spirits. The cardinal now sought to rouse Frederick
§ 122. BEGINNINGS OF THE EEFORMATION. 235
against the refractory monk, but Luther's buoj'ant and humble con-
fidence won the noble elector's heart. Cajetan continued a vigorous
opponent of the reformed doctrine. But Luther's superiority in Scrip-
ture knowledge had so impressed the cardinal, that he now applied him-
self closely to the study of the Bible in the original tongues ; and thus,
while firmly attached to the Eomish system, he was led on many points,
e.g. on Scripture and tradition, divorce, injunctions about meats, the
use of the vernacular in public worship, the objectionableness of the alle-
gorical interpretation, etc., to adopt more liberal views, so that he was
denounced by some Roman Catholic controversialists as guilty of various
heresies. — Luther had no reason in any case to look for any good from
Rome. Hence he prepared beforehand an appeal for an cecumenical
council, which the publisher, against Luther's will, at once spread
abroad. In Rome the cardinal's pride was wounded by the failure of his
undertaking. A papal bull defined the doctrine of indulgences, in order
more exactly to guard against misrepresentations, and an accomplished
courtier, the papal chamberlain, Carl von Miltitz, a Saxon, was sent to
Saxony, in a.d. 1519, as papal nuncio, to convey to the elector the con-
secrated golden rose, and to secure a happy conclusion to the controversy.
The envoy began by addressing a sharp admonition to Tetzel, and met
Luther with hypocritical graciousness. Luther acknowledged that he
had acted rashly, wrote a humble, submissive letter to the pope, and
published " ^« Instr»cf/o;i on some Articles ascribed to him by ]iis Tra-
ducers.'' But after all the retractations which he made at the diet he
still firmly maintained justification by faith, without merit of works.
He promised the nuncio to abstain from all further polemic, on condition
that his opponents also should be silent. But silent these would not be.
4. The Leipzig Disputation, A.D. 1519. — John Eck of Ingolstadt had
engaged in controversy with a zealous supporter and colleague of Luther,
Andrew Bodenstein of Carlstadt, professor and preacher at Wittenberg,
and Luther himself took part in the discussion between the two. This
disputation came oft' at Leipzig, and lasted from June 27th to July 16th.
But Eck's vanity led him not only to seek the greatest possible fame from
his present disputation, but also to drag in Luther by challenging his
theses. Eck disputed for eight days with Carlstadt about grace and free
will, and with abundant eloquence, boldness, and learning vindicated
Romish semi-Pelagianism. Then he disputed for fourteen days with
Luther about the primacy of the pope, about repentance, indulgences,
and purgatory, and pressed him hard about the Hussite heresy. But
Luther sturdily opposed him on the grounds of Scripture, and confirmed
himself in the conviction that even oecumenical councils might err, and
that not all Hussite doctrines are heretical. Both parties claimed
the victory. Luther continued the discussion in various controversial
treatises, and Eck, too, was not silent. New combatants also, for and
236 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
against, from all sides appeared upon the scene. The liberal humanists
(§ 120, 2) had at first taken little notice of Luther's contention. But the
Leipzig Disputation led them to change their attitude. Luther seemed
to them now a newEeuchlin, Eck another specimen of Ortuinus Gratius.
A biting satire of Pirkheimer (§ 120, 3), "Der abgehobelte Eck," ap-
peared in the beginning of a.d. 1520, exceeding in Aristophanic wit any
of the epistles of the Obscurantists. It was followed by several satires
by Ulrich von Hutten, who received new inspiration from Luther's
appearance at Leipzig. Hutten and Sickingen, with their whole party,
undertook to protect Luther with body and soul, with sword and pen.
This was a covenant of some advantage to the Reformation in its early
years ; but had it not been again abrogated, it might have diverted the
movement into an altogether wrong direction. From this time forth
Duke George of Saxony, at whose castle and in whose presence the dis-
putation had been conducted, became the irreconcilable enemy of Luther
and his Reformation.
5. Philip Melanclithon. — At the Leipzig Disputation there also appeared
a man fated to become of supreme importance in the carrying out of
the Reformation. Born on February 16th, a.d. 1497, at Bretten in the
Palatinate, Philip Melanclithon entered the University of Heidelberg in
his thirteenth year, and at the age of sixteen published a Greek grammar.
He took the degree of master at seventeen, and at twenty-one, in a.d.
1518, on the recommendation of his grand-uncle Reuchlin, he was made
Professor of Greek in Wittenberg. His fame soon spread over all Europe,
and attracted to him thousands of hearers from all parts. Luther and
Elrasmus vied with one another in lauding his talents, his fine culture
and learning, and his contemporaries have given him the honourable
title of Pfceceptor Geniumup. He was an Erasmus of nobler form and
higher power, a thorough contrast to Luther. His whole being breathed
modesty, mildness, and grace. With childlike simplicity he received the
recognised truths of the gospel. He bowed humbly before the powerful,
practical spirit of Luther, who also, on his part, acknowledged with pro-
found thankfulness the priceless treasure God had sent to him and to his
work in this fellow labourer. Melanchthon wrote to his friend (Ecolam-
padius at Basel an account of the Leii^zig Disputation, which by chance
fell into Eck's hands. This occasioned a literary controversy, in which
Eck's vain over-estimation of himself appears in very striking contrast
to the noble modesty of Melanchthon. He took part in the Reformation
first in February, a.d. 1521, by a pseudonymous apology for Luther.^
6. George Spalatin. — In consequence of his influential position at the
court of the elector, which he obtained on Mutian's (§ 120, 2) recommen-
dation, after completing his philosopbical, legal, and theological studies
I Ledderhose, " Life of Melanchthon," trans, by Krotel. Philad., 1855.
§ 123. Luther's PERIOD OF conflict, a.d. 15'20-21. 237
at Erfurt, George Burkhardt, boru in a.d. 1484 at Spalt, in the diocese of
Eichstadt, and hence called Spalatiuus, played an important part in the
German Reformation. Frederick the Wise, who had, in a.d. 1509, en-
trusted him with the education of his nephew John Frederick, appointed
him, in a.d. 1514, his court chaplain, librarian, and private secretary, in
which capacity he accompanied the elector to all the diets, and was
almost exclusively the channel for communicating to him tidings about
Luther. John the Constant, in a.d. 1525, made him superintendent of
Altenburg, and took him with him to the diets of Spires, in a.d. 152(3,
1529, and of Augsburg in a.d. 1530. John Frederick the Magnanimous,
his former pupil, employed him in a.d. 1537 on important negotiations
at the conference of the princes at Schmalkald (§ 134, 1). From a.d.
1527 Spalatin was specially busy with the visitation and organization of
the Saxon church (§ 127, 1), conducted, in the interests of the Refor-
mation, an extensive correspondence, and composed several works on the
history of his times and the history of the Reformation.
§ 123. Luther's Period of Conflict, a.d. 1520, 1521.
The Leipzig Disputation had carried Luther to a more
advanced standpoint. He came to see that he could not
remain standing half way, that the carrying out of the
Reformation principle, justification by faith, was incom-
patible with the hierarchical system of the papacy and its
dogmatic foundation. But amid all the violence and sub-
jective one-sidedness which he showed at the beginning of
this period of conflict, he had sufficient control of himself
to make clear the spiritual character of his reforming en-
deavours, and firmly to reject the carnal weapons Avhich
Ulrich von Hutten and his revolutionary companions wished
him to take up, thankful as he was for their warm sympathy.
His standpoint as a reformer is shown in the writings which
he published during this period. The Romish bull of ex-
communication provoked him to strong words and extreme
measures, and with heroic boldness he entered Worms to
present to the emperor and diet an account of his doings.
The papal ban was followed by the imperial decree of out-
lawry. But the Wartburg exile saved him from the hands of
his enemies and— of his friends.
238 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
1. Luther's Three Chief Reformation Writings, A.D. 1520. — In the
powerful treatise, " To His Imperial Majesty and the Christian Nohility
of the German Nation on the Improvement of the Christian Condition,"
which appeared in the beginning of August, 'a. d. 1520, Luther bombards
first of all the three walls behind which the Romanists entrenched
themselves, the superiority of the spiritual to the civil power, the sole
right of the pope to interpret Scripture and to summon oecumenical
councils. Then he commends to the laity, as consecrated by baptism to
a spiritual priesthood, especially civil rulers ordained of God, the task of
carrying out the reformation which God's word requires, but the pope
and clergy hinder ; and then finally he makes a powerful appeal for
carrying out this work in a practical way. He exposes the false preten-
sions of the papal curia, demands renunciation of annats and papal
confirmation of newly elected bishops, complete abandonment of the
interdict and the abuse of excommunication, the prohibition of pilgri-
mages and the begging of the monks, a limitation of holy days, reform
of the universities, permission to the clergy to marry, reunion with the
Bohemian Picards (§ 119, 8), etc. — The second work, "On the Babylonish
Captivity of the Church," is a dogmatic treatise, and is directed mainly
against the misuse of the sacraments and the reckoning of them as
seven, which have been made in the hands of the pope an instrument
of tyranny over the church. Only three are recognised as founded on
Scripture : baptism, penance, and the Lord's Supper, with the remark
that, strictly speaking, even penance, as wanting an outward sign, can-
not be styled a sacrament. The doctrine of transubstantiation, the
withholding of the cup from the laity, and the idea of a sacrifice in the
mass are decidedly rejected. The third treatise, " On the Freedom of a
Christian Man," enters the ethical domain. It represents the life of the
Christian, rooted in justifying faith, as complete oneness with Christ.
His relation therefore to the world around is set forth in two proposi-
tions : A Christian man is a free lord over all things, and subject to no
one ; and a Christian man is a ministering servant of all things, and
subject to every one. On the one hand, he has the perfect freedom of a
king and priest set over all outward things ; but, on the other hand, he
yields complete submission in love to his neighbour, which, as considera-
tion of the weak, his very freedom demands.^
2. The Papal Bull of Excommunication, A.D. 1520.— In order to reap
the fruits of his pretended victory at Leipzig, Eck had gone to Rome,
and was sent back triumphant as papal nuncio with the bull Exaurye
1 Dorner, " History of Protestant Theology," vol. i., pp. 98-113. " The
First Principles of the Reformation Illustrated in the Ninety-five Theses
and Three Primary Works of Martin Luther," edited with historical and
theological introductions by Wace and Bucheim. Lond., 1884.
§ 123. Luther's period of conflict, a.d. 1520-21. 239
Domini of June 16tli. It charged Luther with forty-one heresies, recom-
mended the burning of his works, and threatened to put him and his
followers, if they did not retract in sixty days, under the ban. Miltitz
renewed his attempts at conciliation, which, however, led to no result,
although Luther, to show at least his good will, attended the conference,
and, as a basis for a mutual understanding, published his treatise, " On
the Freedom of a Christian Man," in Oct. , a.d. 1520. He accompanied this
with a letter to the pojae, in which he treated him with personal respect, as
a sheep among wolves and as a Daniel sitting among lions ; but there was
in it no word of repentance or of any desire to retract. It could easily
have been foreseen that these two documents would prove thoroughly
distasteful to the Romish court. Meanwhile Eck had issued the bull.
Luther published a scathing polemic against it, and renewed his appeal,
made two years before, to an cecumenical council. In Saxony Eck
gained only scorn and reproach with his bull ; but in Lyons, Mainz,
Cologne, etc., Luther's works were actually burnt. It was then that
Luther took the boldest step in his whole career. With a numerous
retinue of doctors and students, whom he had invited by a notice posted
up on the blackboard, on the 10th Dec, a.d. 1520, at the Elster gate
of Wittenberg, he cast into the blazing pile the bull and the papal
decretals with the words, " Because thou hast troubled the saints of the
Lord, let eternal fire consume thee." It was the utter renunciation of the
pope and his church, and with it he cut away every possibility of a return.
3. Erasmus, A.D. 1520. — Erasmus (§ 120, 0) had been hitherto on good
terms with Luther. They entertained for one another a genuine regard.
Diverse as their positive tendencies were, they were at one in contending
against scholasticism and monkery. Erasmus was not sorry to see such
heavy blows dealt to the detested monks, and constantly refused to write
against Luther; he had also, he confessed, no wish to learn from his
own experience the sharpness of Luther's teeth. When the papal bull
appeared, without hesitation he disapproved it, and indeed refused to
believe in its genuineness. He, as the oracle of his age, was applied to
by many for his opinion of the matter. His judgment was that not the
papal decision in itself but its style and form should be disapproved.
He desired a tribunal of learned, pious men and three princes (the
emperor and the kings of England and Hungary), to whose verdict
Luther would have to submit. When Frederick the W^ise consulted him,
he expressed the opinion that Luther had made two mistakes, in touching
the crown of the pope and the belly of the monks ; he regretted in Luther's
proceedings a want of moderation and discretion. Not without profit did
the elector hear the oracle thus discourse. — Continuation § 125, 3.
4. Luther's Controversy with Emser, A.D. 1519-1521. — Emser, secretary
and orator in the service of Duke George, after the Leipzig Disputation,
\Thich he had attended, sought by letter-writing to alienate the Bohe-
240 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
mians (§ 139, 19) from Luther, representing him as having there spoken
bitterly against them. This roused Luther to make a passionate reply.
After several pamphlets of a violent character had been issued by both
combatants, Emser issued his charge in a full and comprehensive treatise,
to which Luther replied in his work, " The Answer of Martin Luther to
the Unchristian, Ultra-ecclesiastical, and Over-ingenious Book of Emser
at Leipzig." They had also a sharp passage at arms with one another,
in A.D. 1524, over the canonization of Bishop;Benno of Meissen, in which
Emser, by his duke's order, took a zealous part (§ 129, 1). But all the
later writings in this controversy Luther left unanswered. Emser, with
great bitterness, assailed Luther's translation of the Bible, in which he
professed to have found 1,400 heretical falsifications and more than 1,000
lexical blunders. Luther was candid enough to acknowledge that several
of his animadversions were not unfounded. On Emser's own translation,
which appeared shortly before his death in a.d. 1527, see § 149, 14.
5. The Emperor Charles V. — The Emperor Maximilian had died on 12th
Jan., A D. 1519. The Elector of Saxony, as administrator of the empire,
managed to determine the election, which took place on 28th June, a.d.
1519, against the French candidate, Francis I., who was supported by
the pope, in favour of the young king of Spain, Charles I., grandson of
Maximilian. Detained at home by Spanish affairs, it was 23rd Oct.,
A.D. 1520, before he was crowned at Aachen. All hopes were now
directed toward the young emperor. It was expected that he would put
himself at the head of the religious and national movement in Germany.
But Charles, uninspired by German sentiment, and even ignorant of the
German language, had other interests, which he was not inclined to sub-
ordinate to German politics. The German crown was with him only an
integral part of his power. Its interests must accommodate themselves
to the common interests of the whole dominions, upon which the sun never
set. The German movement he regarded as one, indeed, of high import-
ance, but he regarded it not so much from its religious as from its poli-
tical side. It afforded him the means for keeping the pope in check and
obliging him to sue for his favour. Two things required he of the pope
as the price of suppressing the German movement : renunciation of the
Frejfci alliance, and repeal of the papal brief by which a transformation
had been recommended of the Spanish Inquisition, the main buttress of
absolute monarchy in Spain. The pope granted both demands, and the
hopes of the Germans in their new emperor, that he would finally free
their nation from the galling yoke of Rome, were thus utterly blasted.
6. The Diet at Worms, A.D. 1521. — Immediately after the arrival of
the bull the emperor gave it the full force of law in the Netherlands,
where he was then staying. He did not at once venture to make the
same proclamation for Germany, specially from regard to Frederick the
Wise, Luther's own prince, who insisted that he should not be con-
§ 123. LUTHER'S PERIOD OF CONFLICT, A.D. 1520-21, 241
demned unheard. Personal negotiations between Frederick and the
emperor and his councillors at Cologne, in November, a.d. 1520, ended
with a demand that the elector should bring Luther to the diet, sum-
moned to meet at Worms, on 28th January, a.d. 1521 ; but at the desire
of Aleander, the papal nuncio, who energetically protested against the
proposal that civil judges should treat of matters of faith with an already
condemned heretic, the emperor, in December, withdrew this summons.
In the beginning of February there came a papal brief, in which he
was urgently entreated to give effect to the bull throughout Germany.
Aleander even sketched an imperial mandate for its execution, but was
not able to prevent the emperor from laying it before his councillors for
their opinion and approval. This was done in the middle of February.
And now there arose a quite unexpected storm of opposition. The coun-
cillors demanded that Luther should be brought under an imperial safe
conduct to Worms, there to answer for himself. His attacks on Romish
abuses they would not and could not regard as crimes, for they them-
selves, with Duke George at their head, had presented to the pope a
complaint containing 101 counts. On the other hand, they declared
that if Luther would not retract his doctrinal vagaries, they would be
prepared to carry out the edict. They persisted in this attitude when
another scheme was proposed to them, which insisted on the burning of
Luther's writings. In the beginning of March a third proposal was
made, which asked only for the temporary sequestration of his works.
And to this they agreed. The emperor, though against his own will,
submitted to their demand, and cited the reformer of Wittenberg to
answer for himself at Worms. On Gth March he signed a summons,
accompanied with a safe conduct, both intended, as Aleander said in
writing to Rome, rather to frighten him from coming than with any
desire for his presence. But the result was not as they desired. The
courier appointed to deliver this citation was not sent, but instead of him,
on the 12th, an imperial herald, who delivered to Luther a respectful
invitation beginning with the address, " Noble, dear, and worshipful sir."
This herald was to bring him honourably and safely to Worms, and to
conduct him back again in safety. All this was done behind the bac^ of
Aleander, who first came to know about it on the 15th, and cert^ly
was not wrong in attributing the emperor's change of mind to a suspicion
of French political intrigues, in which Leo X., notwithstanding his nego-
tiations for an alliance with the emperor, was understood to have had
a share. Two weeks later, however, such suspicions were seen to be
unfounded. Too late the sending of the herald was regretted, and an
effort was made to conciliate the nuncio by the publication of the seques-
trating mandate, which had been hitherto suppressed.
7. Luther was meanwhile not idle at Wittenberg, while waiting with
heroic calm the issue of the Worms negotiations. He preached twice
i6
242 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
daily, delivered lectures at the university, taught and exhorted by books,
letters, and conversations, fought with his opponents, especially Emser,
etc. While Luther was engaged with these multifarious tasks the im-
perial herald arrived. He now set everything aside, and on 2nd April
boldly and confidently obeyed the summons. The fears of his Witten-
berg friends and the counsels to turn back which reached him on his way
were rejected with a heroic consciousness that he was in the path of duty.
He had written on 14th March to Spalatin, Intrablmus Wormatiam invitis
oinnihns portis inferni et potentatihus aeris ; and again from Oppenheim
he wrote him, that he would go to Worms even if there were as many
devils there as tiles upon the roofs. Still another attempt was nlade
upon him at Oppenheim. The emperor's confessor, Glapio, a Franciscan,
who was by no means a blind worshipper of the Roman curia, thought it
possible that a good understanding might be reached. He was of opinion
that if Luther would only withdraw the worst of his books, especially
that on the Babylonish Captivity, and acknowledge the decisions of the
Council of Constance, all might be agreeably settled. With this in his
mind he applied to the Elector of Saxony, and when he received no
encouragement there, to Franz von Sickingen, who invited Luther, on
his arrival at Ebernburg, near Worms, to an interview with Glapio ; but
Luther declined the invitation. — His journey all through was like a
triumphal march. On 16th April, amid a great concourse of people, he
entered Worms, along with his friends Justus Jonas and Nic. Amsdorf,
as well as his legal adviser Jerome Schurf. He was called to appear on
the following day. He admitted that the books spread out before him
were his, and when called on to retract desired one day's adjournment.
On the 18th the trial proper began. Luther distinguished three classes
of his writings, systematic treatises, controversial tracts against the
papacy and papal doctrine, and controyersi_al tracts against private indi-
viduals, and did not know that he had said anything in them that he
could retract. He was asked to give a direct answer. He then gave one
"without horns or teeth," saying that he could and would retract nothing
unless proved false from Scripture, or on other good and clear grounds,
and concluded with the words, "Here stand I; I can no otherwise!
God help me, Amen." Among the German knights and princes he had
won many hearts, but had made no favourable impression on the
emperor, who, when Luther denounced the absolute authority of coun-
cils, stopped proceedings and dismissed the heretical monk. On the
following day, without consulting the opinion of the councillors, he
passed sentence of unconditional condemnation. But the councillors
would not have the matter settled in this fashion, and the emperor was
obhged, on 24th April, to reopen negotiations before a select commis-
sion, under the presidency of the Archbishop of Treves. Of no avail
was a private conference of the archbishop and Luther on the 25th,
§ 123. luthee's period of conflict, a.d. 1520-21. 243
in which the prelate accompanied his exhortation to retract with
the promise of a rich priorate in his neighbourhood under his own and
the emperor's protection and favour. Luther supported his refusal by
confident reference to the words of Gamaliel, Acts v. 38. On 26th April
he left "Worms unhindered ; for the emperor had decidedly refused to
yield to the vile proposal that the safe conduct of a heretic should be
violated. — In consequence of Luther's persistent refusal to retract any-
thing, the majority of the diet pronounced themselves ready to agree
to the emperor's judgment against him. The latter now assigned to
Aleander the drawing up of anew mandate, which should in the severest
terms proclaim the ban of the empire against Luther and all his friends.
After it had been approved in an imperial cabinet council, and was ready
for printing in its final form in Latin and German, with the date 8th
May, it was laid before the emperor for signature, which, however, he
put off doing from day to day, and finally, in spite of all the nuncio's
remonstrances, he decided that it must be produced before the diet.
When it aj^peared that this must be done, the two nuncios were all im-
patient to have it passed soon. But it was only on the 25th May, after
the close of the diet, and after several princes, especially the Electors of
Saxony and the Palatinate, had gone, that Charles let them present the
edict, to which all present agreed. On the 26th May, after Divine service
in church, he solemnly signed the Latin and German forms, which were
published with blast of trumpets on the following day, and on Wednesday
the sequestrated books of Luther were burnt. — Undoubtedly political
motives occasioned this long delay in signing the documents. Perhaps
he suspected the pope of some new act of political treachery ; probably
also he wished to postpone the publication of the edict until the imperial
councillors had promised to contribute to his proposed journey to liome,
and perhaps until the nobles dissenting from the proceedings against
Luther had departed.
8. The Wartburg Exile, A.D. 1521, 1523. -Some days after Luther had
dismissed the imperial herald, his carriage was stopped in a wood near
Eisenach by two disguised knights with some retainers. He was himself
carried off with show of violence, and brought to the Wartburg, where he
was to remain in knight's dress under the name of Junker Georg with-
out himself knowing anything more of the matter. It was indeed a
contrivance of the wise elector, though probably he took no active share
in the matter, so that he could declare at Worms that he knew nothing
of the Saxon monk. The most contradictory reports were spread.
Sometimes the Cardinal Albert of Brandenburg (§ 122, 2) was thought
of as the perpetrator of the act, sometimes Franz von Sickingen (§124, 2),
sometimes a Franconian nobleman who was on intimate terms with
Frederick. And as the news rapidly spread that Luther's body, pierced
with a sword, had been found in an old silver mine, the tumult in
244 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Worms became so great that Aleander had good cause to fear for his life.
—From the Wartburg Luther maintained a lively correspondence with his
friends, and even to the general public he proved, by edifying and stirring
tracts, that he still lived, and was not inclined to be silenced or re-
pressed. He completed the exposition of the Marjnificat, wrought upon
the Latin exposition of the Psalms, issued the first series of his "Church
Postils," wrote an "Instruction to Penitents," a book " On Confession,
whether the Pope have the Power to Enjoin it," another " Against the
Abuses of the Mass," also " On Priestly and Monkish Vows," etc. When
Cardinal Albert, in September, a.d. 1521, proclaimed a pilgrimage with
unlimited indulgence to the relic shrine at Halle (§ 115, 9), Luther wrote
a scathing tract, " Against the New Idol at Halle." And when Spalatin
assured him that the elector would not suffer its being issued, he de-
clined to withhold it, but sent him the little book, with imperative orders
to give it ovQi- to Melanchthon for publication. While Spalatin still
delayed its issue, Luther left his castle, pushed his way toward W^itten-
berg through the very heart of Duke George's territories, and suddenly
appeared among his friends in the dress of a knight, with long beard
and hair. When he heard that the mere report of what he was propos-
ing to do had led those in Halle to stop the traffic in indulgences, he
decided not to proceed with the publication, but instead he addressed a
letter to Albert, in which the archbishop had to read many a strong
word about "the knavery of indulgences," "the Pharaoh-like hardened
condition of ecclesiastical tyrants," etc. The prelate sent a most humble,
apologetic, and gracious reply to the bold reformer. Luther then re-
turned to his protective exile, as he had left it, unmolested. But the
longer it continued the more insupportable did this electoral guardian-
ship become. He would rather " burn on glowing coals than spend thus
a half idle life." But it was just this enforced exile that saved Luther
and the Reformation from utter overthrow. Apart from the dangers of
the ban of the empire, which would have perhaps obliged him to throw
himself into the arms of Hutten and his companions, and thus have
turned the Reformation into a revolution, this confinement in the Wart-
burg was in various ways a blessing to Luther and his work. It was of
importance that men should learn to distinguish between Luther's work
and Luther's person, and of yet greater importance was the discipline of
this exile upon Luther himself. He was in danger of being drawn out of
the path of positive reformation into that of violent revolutionism. The
leisure of the Wartburg gave him time for calm reflection on himself and
his work, and the extravagances of the Wittenberg fanatics and the wild
excuses of the prophets of Zwickau (§ 121, 1) could be estimated with a
freedom from prejudice that would have been impossible to one living
and moving in the midst of them. Besides, he had not reached that
maturity of theological knowledge needed for the conduct of his great
§ 124. INFLUENCES CORKUPTING AND CORRECTIVE. 245
undertaking, and was in many ways fettered by a one-sided subjectivism.
In his seclusion be could turn from merely destructive criticism to con-
struction, and by undisturbed study of Scripture became able to enlarge,
purify, and confirm his religious knowledge. But most important of all
was the plan which he formed in the Wartburg, and so far as the New
Testament is concerned carried out there, of translating the whole of the
Scriptures.!
9. The Attitude of Frederick the "Wise to the Reformation. — Frederick
the Wise, x.b. 1486-1525, has usually been styled " the Promoter of the
Reformation." Kolde, however, has sought to represent him as favour-
ing Luther because of his interest in the University of Wittenberg
founded by him, the success of which was largely owing to Luther, and
because of his patriotic desire to have German questions settled at home
rather than in Rome. This author supposes that after the Diet of
Worms Frederick took no particular interest in the Reformation, beyond
watching to see how things would turn out. To all this Kostlin has
replied that Frederick's whole attitude during the Diet of Worms be-
trayed a warm and hearty interest in evangelical truth ; that his corre-
pondence with Tucher of Nuremberg, a.d. 1518-1528, supports this view;
that in one of these letters he addresses his correspondent with evident
satisfaction as a good Lutheran ; that in another he incloses a copy of
Luther's Assertio omnium articuloriim ; that at a later period he forwards
him a copy of Luther's New Testament, and expresses the hope that he
will gain spiritual blessing from its perusal. He himself found it his
greatest comfort in the hour of death, partook of the communion in
both kinds after the reformed manner, which takes away all ground for
the suspicion that he yielded only to the importunities of his brother
John and his chaplain Spalatin. And even though Frederick, as late as
A.D. 1522, continued to increase the rich collection of relics which he had
previously made for his castle church, this only proves that not all at
once but only bit by bit he was able to break away from his earlier
religious tendencies and predilections.
§ 124. Deterioration and Purification of the
Wittenberg Reformation, a.d. 1522-1525.
During Luther's cabsence, the Reformation at Wittenberg
advanced only too rapidly, and at last ran out into the
wildest extravagances. Bat Luther hastened thither, regu-
lated the movement, and guided it back into wise evan-
gelical ways. This fanaticism arose in Wittenberg, but soon
1 Morris, " Luther at the Wartburg and Coburg." Philad., 1882.
246 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
spread into other parts. The Reformation was at the same
time threatened with danger from another quarter. The
religious movement came into contact with the struggle of
the German knights against the princes and that of the
German peasants against the nobles, and was in danger of
being identified with these revolutionary proceedings and
sharing their fate. But Luther stood firm as a wall against
all temptations, and thus these dangers Avere avoided.
1. The Wittenberg Fanaticism, A.D. 1521, 1522— In a.d. 1521 an
Augustinian, Gabriel Didymus or Zwilling, preached a violent tirade
against vows and private masses. In consequence of this sermon,
thirteen of the brethren of his order at once withdrew. Two priests
in the neiglibourhood married. Carlstadt wrote against cehbacy and
followed their example. At the Wittenberg convent, secessions from the
order were allowed at pleasure, and mendicancy, as well as the sacrifice of
the mass, was abolished. But matters did not stop there. Didymus,
and still more Carlstadt, spread a fanatical spirit among the people and
the students, who were encouraged in the wildest acts of violence. The
public services were disturbed in order to stop the idolatry of the mass,
images were thrown out of the churches, altars were torn down, and a
desire evinced to put an end to theological science as well as to clerical
orders. A fanatical spirit began now also to spread at Zwickau. At the
head of this movement stood the tailor Nicolas Storcli and a literate
Marcus Stiibner, who boasted of Divine revelations ; while Thomas
Miinzer, with fervid eloquence, proclaimed the new gospel from the pulpit.
Restrained by energetic measures taken against them, the Zwickau
prophets wandered abroad. Miinzer went to Bohemia, Storch and
Stiibner to Wittenberg. There they told of their revelations and in-
veighed against infant baptism as a work of Satan. The excitement in
Wittenberg became greater day by day. The enemies of the Reforma-
tion rejoiced ; Melanchthon could give no counsel, and the elector was
confounded. Then could Luther no longer contain himself. Against
the elector's express command he left the Wartburg on 3rd March, a.d.
1522, wrote him a noble letter, availed himself of his knight's incognito
on the way, and appeared publicly at Wittenberg. For a week he preached
daily against fanaticism, and got complete control of the wild revolution-
ary elements. The prophets of Zwickau left Wittenberg. Carlstadt
remained, but for a couple of years held his peace. Luther and Melanch-
thon now laboured to secure a positive basis for the Reformation.
Melanchthon had already made a beginning in a.d. 1521 by the publi-
cation of his Loci communes rerum tlieologicannn. Luther now, in a.d.
§ 124. INFLUENCES CORRUPTING AND CORRECTIVE. 247
1522, against the decided wish of his friend, published his Aniiotationes
in epist. t. Pauli ad Rom. et Cor. In Sept. of the same year appeared
Luther's translation of the N.T. Besides these he also issued several
treatises in defence of the Reformation.
2. Franz von Sickingen, A.D. 1522, 1523.— A private feud led Franz von
Sickingen to attack the Elector and Archbishop of Treves in a.d. 1522, but
soon other interests were involved, and he was joined by the whole party
of the knights. Sickingen's opponent was a prelate and a pronounced
enemy of the Reformation, and he was also a prince and a peer of the
empire. In both characters he was opposed by Sickingen, who called for
support in the name of religion and freedom. The knights, discontented
with the imperial government and bureaucracy, with princes and
prelates, crowded to his standard. Sickingen would also have gladly
secured the monk of Wittenberg as an ally, but Luther was not to be
won. Sickingen's enterprise failed. The Elector of the Palatinate and
the young Landgrave of Hesse hasted to the help of their beleaguered
neighbours. The knights were overthrown one after another ; Sickingen
died of mortal wounds in May, a.d. 1523, immediately after the taking of
the shattered Ebernburg. The power of the knights was utterly broken.
The Reformation thus lost indeed brave and noble protectors, but it
was itself saved.
3. Andrew Bodenstein of Carlstadt, A.D. 1524, 1525.— Even after the
suppression of the Wittenberg fanaticism, Carlstadt continued to enter-
tain his revolutionary views, and it was only with difficulty that he
restrained himself for a few years. In a.d. 1524 he left Wittenberg and
went to Orlamiinde. With bitter invectives against Luther's popism, he
there resumed his iconoclasm, and brought forward his doctrine of the
Lord's Supper, in which the real presence of the body and blood of Christ
was absolutely denied (§ 131, 1). In order to prevent disturbance,
Luther, by the order of the elector, went to Jena, and there in Carlstadt's
presence preached most emphatically against image breakers and sacra-
mentarians. This roused Carlstadt's indignation. When Luther visited
Orlamiinde, he was received with stone throwing and curses. Carlstadt
was now banished from his territories by the elector. He then went to
Strassburg, where he sought to win over the two evangelical pastors,
Bucer and Capito. Luther issued a letter of warning, " To the Christians
of Strassburg." Carlstadt went to Basel, and published violent tracts
against Luther's " unspiritual and irrational theology." Luther replied
in A.D. 1525, earnestly, thoroughly, and firmly in his treatise, " Against
the Heavenly Prophets, or Images and the Sacraments." Carlstadt had
secured the support of the Swiss reformers, who continued the contro-
versy with Luther. He involved himself in the Peasants' War, and after-
wards, by Luther's intercession with the elector, obtained leave to return
to Saxony. He retracted his errors, but soon again renewed his old
248 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
disorderly practices ; and, after a singularly eventful career, died as
professor and preacher at Basel during the plague of a.d. 1541.
4. Thomas Miinzer, A.D. 1523, 1524.— The prophets when expelled from
Wittenberg did not remain idle, but set themselves to produce all sort
of disorders in church and state. At the head of these disturbers stood
Thomas Miinzer. After his expulsion from Zwickau, he had gone to
Bohemia, and was there received as an apostle of the Taborite doctrine
(§ 119, 7). In A.D. 1523 he returned to Saxony, and settled at Allstadt
in Thuringia, and when driven out by the elector he went to Miihl-
hausen. In both places he soon obtained a large following. The
Wittenberg Reformation was condemned no less than the papacy. Not
the word of Scripture but the Spirit was to be the principle of the
Reformation ; not only everything ecclesiastical but also everything
civil was to be spiritualized and reorganized. The doctrine of the evan-
gelical freedom of the Christian was grossly misconceived, the sacra-
ments despised, infant baptism denounced, and sole weight laid on the
baptism of the Spirit. Princes should be driven from their thrones,
the enemies of the gospel destroyed by the sword, and all goods be held
in common. When Luther wrote a letter of warning on these subjects
to the church at Miihlhausen, Miinzer issued an abusive rejoinder, in
which he speaks contemptuously of Luther's " honey-sweet Christ," and
''cunningly devised gospel." From Miihlhausen, Miinzer went forth on
a proselytising crusade in a.d. 1524, to Nuremberg, and then to Basel,
but found little response in either city. His revolutionary extravagances
were more successful among the peasants of Southern Germany.
5. The Peasant War, A.D. 1524, 1525.— The peasants of the empire had
long groaned under their heavy burdens. Twice already, in a.d. 1502,
1514, had they risen in revolt, with little advantage to themselves.
When Luther's ideas of the freedom of a Christian man reached them,
they hastily drew conclusions in accordance with their own desires.
Miinzer 's fanatical preaching led to the adoption of still more decidedly
communistic theories. In August, a.d. 1524, in the Black Forest, a
rebellion broke out, which was, however, quickly suppressed. In the
beginning of a.d. 1525 troubles burst forth afresh. The peasants stated
their demands in twelve articles, which they insisted upon princes, nobles,
and prelates accepting. All Franconia and Swabia were soon under
their power, and even many cities made common cause with them.
Miinzer, however, was not satisfied with this success. The twelve
articles were too moderate for him, and still more distasteful to him were
the terms that had been made with the nobles and clergy. He returned
to Thuringia and settled again at Miihlhausen. From thence he spread
his fanaticism through the whole land and organized a general revolt.
With merciless cruelty thousands were massacred, all cloisters, castles,
and palaces were ruthlessly destroyed. Boldly as Luther had attacked
§ 125. FKIENDS AND FOES OF LUTHER's DOCTRINE. 249
the existing ecclesiastical tyranny, he resolutely left civil matters alone.
He preached that the gospel makes the soul free, but not the body or
property. He had profound sympathy for the sorely oppressed peasants,
and so long as their demands did not go beyond the twelve articles, he
hoped to be able to regulate the movement by the power of the word.
The revolutionists had themselves in their twelfth article offered to
abandon any of their claims that might be found to have no countenance
from the word of God. When Miinzer's disorders began in Thuringia,
Luther visited the cities most threatened and exhorted them to quiet
and obedience. But the death of the elector on 5th May called him
back to Wittenberg. From thence he now published his "Exhortations
to Peace on the Twelve Articles of the Swabian Peasants," in which he
speaks pointedly to the consciences of the nobles no less than of the
peasants. But when the agitation continued to spread, and one enormity
after another was perpetrated, he gave vent to his wrath in no measured
terms in bis book, " Against the Robbing and Murdering Peasants."
He there, with burning words, called upon the princes vigorously to
stamp out the fanatical rebellion. Philip of Hesse was the first to take
the field. He was joined by the new Elector of Saxony, Frederick's
brother, John the Constant, a.d. 1525-1532, as well as by George of
Saxony and Henry of Brunswick. On 15th May, a.d. 1525, the rebels
were annihilated after a severe struggle at Frankenhausen. Miinzer
was taken prisoner and beheaded. Even in Southern Germany the
princes were soon in all parts masters of the situation. In this war
100,000 men had lost their lives and the most fertile districts had been
turned into barren wastes.
§ 125. Friends and Foes of Luther's Doctrine,
A.D. 1522-152G.
Luther's fellow labourers in the work ot the gospel in-
creased from day to day, and so too the number of the cities
in Northern and Southern Germany in which pure doctrine
was preached. But Wittenberg was the heart and centre of
the whole movement, the muster-ground for all who were
persecuted and exiled for the sake of the gospel, the gather-
ing point and nursery of new preachers. Among the theo-
logical opponents of Luther's doctrine appears a crowned
head, Henry YIII. of England, and also '' the king of litera-
ture," Erasmus of Rotterdam, entered the lists against him.
But neither the one nor the other, to say nothing of the rude
250 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
invectives of Thomas Miirner, was able to shake the bold
reformer and check the rapid spread of his opinions.
1. Spread of Evangelical Views.— The most powerful heralds of the
Reformation were the monkish orders. Cloister life had become so
utterly corrupt that the more virtuous of the brethren could no longer
endure it. Anxious to breathe a healthier atmosphere, evangelists in-
spired by a purer doctrine arose in all parts of Germany, first and most of
all among the Augustinian order (§ 112, G), which almost to a man went
over to the Reformation and had the glory of providing its first martyr
(§ 128, 1). The order regarded Luther's honour as its own. Next to
them came the Franciscans, prominent during the Middle Ages as a
fanatical opposition (§ 98, 4; 108, 5; 112, 2), of whom many had the
courage to free themselves of their shackles. From their cloisters
proceeded, e.g., the two famous popular preachers, Eberlin of Giinzburg
and Henry of Kettenbach in Ulm, the Hamburg reformer Stephen
Kempen, the fervent Lambert reformer of Hesse, Luther's friend
Mycouius of Gotha, and many more. Other orders too supplied their
contingent, even the Dominicans, to whom Martin Bucer, the Strassburg
reformer, belonged. Blaurer of Wiirttemberg was a Benedictine, Rhe-
gius a Carmelite, Bugenhagen a Premonstratensian, etc. At least one
of the German bishops, George Polenz of Samland, openly joined the
movement, preached the gospel in Konigsberg, and inspired the priests
of his diocese with the same views. Other bishops, such as those of
Augsburg, Basel, Bamberg, Merseburg, sympathised with the movement
or at least put no hindrance in its way. But the secular clergy gave
crowds of witnesses. In all the larger and even in some of the smaller
towns of Germany Luther's doctrines were preached from the pulpits
with the approval of the magistrates, and where these were refused the
preachers took to the market-places and fields. Where ministers were
wanting, artisans and knights, wives and maidens, carried on the work.
— One of the first cities which opened its gates freely to the gospel was
Strassburg. Nowhere were Luther's writings more zealously read, dis-
cussed, printed, and circulated than in that city. Shortly before Geiler
of Kaisersberg (§ 115, 11) had prepared the soil for receiving the first
seed of the Reformation. From a.d. 1518 Matthew Zell had wrought as
pastor at St. Laurence in Miinster. When the chapter forbade him the
use of the stone pulpit erected for Geiler, the joiners' guild soon made
him a wooden pulpit, which was carried in solemn procession to Miinster,
and set up beside the one that had been closed against him. Zell was
soon assisted by Capito, Bucer, Hedio, and others.
2. "The Sum of Holy Scripture" and its Author.— This work, called
also Deutsche Theologic, appeared anonymously at Leyden in a.d. 1523,
and was confiscated in March, a.jj. 1524. In various Dutch editions and
§ 125. FRIENDS AND FOES OF LUTHER's DOCTRINE. 251
in French, Italian, and English translations, it was soon widely spread
over Europe ; but so vigorously was it suppressed, that by the middle
of the century it had disappeared and was forgotten. In a.d. 1877 the
Waldensian Comba discovered and published an old Italian version, and
Benrath translated into German in a.d. 1880 an old Dutch edition of a.d.
1526, and succeeded in unravelling for the most part its interesting
history. He found that it was composed in Latin, and on the entreaty
of the author's friends rendered into Dutch. This led to the discovery,
in the possession of Prof. Toorenenberger of Amsterdam, of the Latin
original, which had appeared anonymously at Strassburg in a.d. 1527
with the title, ^Economica Christiana. Benrath has also discovered the
author to be Hendrik van Bommel, who was in the first half of a.d.
1520 priest and rector of a sisterhood at Utrecht, expelled in a.d. 1536
from Cleves, from a.d. 1542 to 1560 evangelical teacher and preacher
at Wesel, dying in a.d. 1570 as pastor at Duisburg. The "Sum" is
evidently influenced by those works of Luther which appeared up to a.d.
1523, its thoroughly popular, edifying, and positive contents are based
upon a careful study of Scripture, and it is throughout inspired by the
one grand idea, that the salvation of sinful men rests solely on the grace
of God in Christ appropriated by faith.
3. Henry VIII. and Erasmus.— Henry VIIL of England, as a second
son, had been originally destined for the church. Hence he retained
a certain predilection for theological studies and was anxious to be
regarded as a learned theologian. In a.d. 1522 he appeared as the
champion of the Eomish doctrine of the seven sacraments in opposition
to Luther's book on the " Babylonish Captivity of the Church," treating
the peasant's son with lordly contempt. Luther paid him in the same
coin, and treated his royal opponent with less consideration than he had
shown to .Emser and Eck. The king obtained what he desired, the
papal honorary title of Defensor Jidei, but Luther's crushing reply
kept him from attempting to continue the controversy. He complained
to the elector, who consoled him by reference to a general council (comp.
§ 129, 1). The pretty tolerable relations between Erasmus and Luther
now suffered a severe shock. Erasmus, indebted to the English king for
many favours, was roused to great bitterness by Luther's unmeasured
severity. He had hitherto refused all calls to write against Luther.
Many pulpits charged him with having a secret understanding with the
heretic ; others thought he was afraid of him. All this tended to drive
Erasmus into open hostihty to the reformer. He now diligently studied
Luther's writings, for which he obtained the pope's permission, and
seized upon a doctrine which would not oblige him to appear as defender
of Romish abuses, though to gauge and estimate it in its full meaning he
was quite incompetent. Luther's life experiences, joined with the study
of Paul's epistles and Augustine's writings, had wrought in him the con-
252 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
viction that man is by nature incapable of doing any good, that his will is
imfree, and that he is saved without any well doing of his own by God's
free grace in Christ. With Luther, as with Augustine, this conviction
found expression in the doctrine of absolute predestination. Melanchthon
had also formulated the doctrine in the first edition of his Loci com-
munes. This fundamental doctrine of Luther was now laid hold upon by
Erasmus in a.d. 1524 in his treatise, ALarpL^rj de libra arUtrio, pronounced
dangerous and unbibHcal, while his own semi-Pelagianism was set over
against it. After the lapse of a year, Luther replied in his treatise, De
servo arbitrio, with all the power and confidence of personal, experimental
conviction. Erasmus answered in his Hyperaspistes diatribes adv. Lutheri
servum arbitrium of a.d. 1526, in which he gave free vent to his passion,
but did not advance the argument in the least. Luther therefore saw
no need to continue the discussion.^
4. Thomas Murner.— Tlie Franciscan, Thomas Muruer of Strassburg,
had published in a.d. ,1509 his " Fools' Exorcism " and other pieces,
which gave him a high place among German satirists. He spared no
class, not even the clergy and the monks, took Eeuchlin's part against
the men of Cologne (§ 120, 4), but passionately opposed Luther's move-
ment. His most successful satire against Luther is entitled, "On the
Great Lutheran Fool as Exorcised by Dr. Murner, a.d. 1522." It does
not touch upon the spiritual aspect of the Reformation, but lashes with
biting wit the revolutionary, fanatical, and rhetorical extravagances
which were often closely associated with it. Luther did not venture
into the lists with the savagely sarcastic monk, but the humanists
poured upon him a flood of scurrilous replies.
5. A notable Catholic witness on behalf of the Reformation is the
" Onus ecclesiEe," an anonymous tract of a.d. 1524, written by Bishop
Berthold Pirstinger of Chiemsee. In apocalyptic phraseology it describes
the corruption of the church and calls for reformation. The author
however denounces Ltither as a sectary and revolutionist, though he dis-
tinctly accepts his views of indulgences. He would reform the church
from within. Four years after, the same divine wrote a " Tewtsche Theo-
logey,'^ in which, with the exception of the doctrine of indulgence, the
whole Romish system is vindicated and the corruptions of the church
are ignored.
§ 12G. Development of the Eeformation in the
Empire, a.d. 1522-1526.
In consecxnence of the terms of his election, Charles V. had,
^ Weber, " Luther's Treatise, De Servo Arbitrio,'' in Brit, and For.
Evan. Review, 1878, pp. 799-816.
§ 126. THE REFOEMATION IN THE EMPIRE. 253
at the Diet of AVornis, to agree to the erection of a standing
imperial government at Nuremberg, which in his absence
would have the supreme direction of imperial affairs.
Within this commission, though presided over by Archduke
Ferdinand, the emperor's brother, a majority was soon
found which openly favoured the new religion. Thus
protected by the highest imperial judicature, the Reforma-
tion was able for a long time to spread unhindered and so
made rapid progress (§ 125, 1). The Nuremberg court
succumbed indeed to the united efforts of its political
opponents, among whom were many nobles of an evan-
gelical spirit, but all the more energetically did these press
the interests of the Reformation. And their endeavours
were so successful, that it was determined that matters
should be settled without reference to pope and council at
a general German national assembly. But the papal legate
Campegius formed at Regensberg, in a.d. 1524, a league
of the Catholic nobles for enforcing the edict of Worms,
against which the evangelical nobles established a defensive
league at Torgau, in a.d. 1526. The general national assembly
was vetoed by the emperor, but the decision of the Diet of
Spires of a.d. 152G gave to all nobles the right of determining
the religious matters of their provinces after their own
views.
1. The Diet at Nuremberg, A.D. 1.522, 1523. — The imperial court held its
first diet in the end of a.d. 1522. Leo X. had died in Dec, a.d. 1521, and
Hadrian VI. (§ 149, 1), strictly conservative in doctrine and worship,
a reformer of discipline and hierarchical abuses, had succeeded with
the determination " to restore the deformed bride of Christ to her pris-
tine i^urity," but vigorously to suppress the Lutheran heresy. His
legate presented to the diet a letter confessing abuses and promising
reforms, but insisting on the execution of the edict of Worms. The
diet declared that in consequence of the admitted corruptions of the
church, the present execution of the Worms edict was not to be thought
of. Until a general council in a German city, with guarantee«i freedom
of discussion, had been called, discussion should be avoided, and the
254 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
word of God, with true Christian and evangelical explanation, should
be taught.
2. The Diet at Nuremberg, A.D. 1524. — A new diet was held at Nurem-
berg on 14th Jan., a.d. 1524. It dealt first of all with the question of
the existence of the imperial court. The reformatory tendencies of the
government showed that what was vital to this court was so also to the
Eeformation. This party had important sui3porters in the arch-catholic
Ferdinand, who hoped thus to strengthen himself in his endeavour to
obtain the Roman crown, in the Elector of Mainz, the" prime mover in
the traffic in indulgences, who had personal antipathies to the foes of the
court, in the elector of Saxony, its proper creator, and in the princes of
Brandenburg. But there were powerful opponents : the Swabian league,
the princes of Treves, the Palatinate and Hesse, who had been success-
ful in opposition to Sickingen, and the imperial cities, which, though at
one with the court in favouring the Reformation, were embittered against
it because of its financial projects. The papal legate Campegius also
joined the opposition. Hadrian VI. had died in a.d. 1523, and was
succeeded by Clement VII., a.d. 1523-1534. A skilful politician with no
religious convictions, he determined to strengthen in every possible way
the temporal power of the papal see. His legate was a man after his
own mind. The opposition prevailed, and even Ferdinand after a struggle
gave in. The newly organized governing body was only a shadow of the
old, without power, influence, or independence. Thus a second (§ 124, 2)
powerful support was lost to tbe Reformation, and the legate again pressed
for the execution of the edict of Worms. But the evarrgelicals mustering
all their forces, especially in the cities, secured a majority. They were
indeed obliged to admit the legality of the edict ; they even promised to
carry it out, but with the saving clause " as far as possible." A council
in the sense of the former diet was demanded, and it was resolved to call
a general national assembly at Spires, to be wholly devoted to religious
and ecclesiastical questions. In the meantime the word of God in its
simplicity was to be preached.
3. The Convention at Eegensburg, A.D. 1524.— While the evangeHcal
nobles, by their theologians and diplomatists, were eagerly preparing
for Spires, an assembly of the supporters of the old views met at Regens-
burg, June and July, a.d. 1524. Ignoring the previous arrangement,
they proceeded to treat of the religious and ecclesiastical questions
which had been reserved for the Spires Diet. This was the result of the
machinations of Campegius. The Archduke Ferdinand, the Bavarian
dukes, the Archbishop of Salzburg, and most of the South German
bishops, joined the legate at Regensburg in insisting upon the edict of
Worms. Luther's writings were anew forbidden, their subjects were
strictly enjoined not to attend the University of Wittenberg ; several
external abuses were condemned, ecclesiastical burdens on the people
§ 126. THE REFORMATION IN THE EMPIRE. 255
lightened, the number of festivals reduced, the four Latin Fathers,
Ainb]?ose, Jerome, Augustine, and Gregory, set up as the standard of
faith and doctrine, while it was commanded that the services should be
conducted unchanged after the manner of these Fathers. Thus was
produced that rent in the unity of the empire which never again was
healed. — The imperial and the papal policies were so bound up with one
another, that the proceedings of the Nuremberg diets, with their national
tendencies, were distasteful to the emperor ; and so in the end of July
there came an imperial rescript, making attendance at the national
assembly a crimen lasie majestatis, punishable with ban and double-ban.
The nobles obeyed, and the assembly was not held. With it Germany's
liopes of a peaceful development were shattered.
4. The Evangelical Nobles, A.D. 1524.— Several nobles hitherto in-
different became now supporters of the Reformation. Philip of Hesse,
moved by an interview with Melanchthon, gave himself enthusiastically
to the cause of evangelical truth. Also the Margrave Casimir, George of
Brandenburg- Ansbach, Duke Ernest of Liineburg, the Elector Louis of
the Palatinate, and Frederick I. of Denmark, as Duke of Schleswig and
Holstein, did more or less in their several countries for the furtherance
of the Reformation cause. The grand-master of the Teutonic order,
Albert of Prussia, returned from the Diet of Nuremberg, where he had
heard Osiander preach, doubtful of the scripturalness of the rule of his
order. He therefore visited Wittenberg to consult Luther, who advised
him to renounce the rule, to marry, and obtain heirs to his Prussian
dukedom (§ 127, 3). The cities took up a most decided position. At two
great city diets at Spires and Ulm in a.d. 1521, it was resolved to allow
the preaching of a pure gospel and to assist in preventing the execution
of the edict of Worms in their jurisdiction.
5. The Torgau League, A.D. 1526. — Friends and foes of the Reforma-
tion had joined in putting down the peasant revolt. Their religious
divergences however immediattiy after broke out afresh. George con-
sulted at Dessau in July, a.d. 1525, with several Catholic princes as to
means for preventing a renewal of the outbreak, and they unanimously
decided that the condemned Lutheran sect must be rooted out as the
source of all confusion. Soon afterwards two Leipzig citizens, who were
found to have Lutheran books in their possession, were put to death.
But Elector John of Saxony had a conference at Saalfeld with Casimir of
Brandenburg, at which it was agreed at all hazards to stand by the word
of God ; and at Friedewald in November Hesse and the elector pledged
themselves to stand true to the gospel. A diet at Augsburg in December,
for want of a quorum, had reached no conclusion. A new diet was
therefore summoned to meet at Spires, and all the princes were cited
to appear personally. Duke George meanwhile gathered the Catholic
princes at Halle and Leipzig, and they resolved to send Henry of
256 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Brunswick to Spain to the emperor. Shortly before his arrival, the
emperor had concluded a peace at Madrid with the king of France, who
had been taken prisoner in the battle of Pavia. Francis I., feeling he
could not help himself, had agreed to all the terms, including an umler-
taking to join in suppressing the heretics. Charles therefore fully
believed that he had a free hand, and determined to root out heresy in
Germany. Henry "of Brandenburg brought to the German princes an
extremely firm reply, in which this view was expressed. But before its
arrival the elector and the landgrave had met at Gotha, and had subse-
quently at Torgau, the residence of the elector, renewed the league to
stand together with all their might in defence of the gospel. Philip
undertook to gain over the nobles of the uplands. But the fear of the
empire hindered his success. The elector was more fortunate among the
lowland nobles. On 9th June the princes of Saxony, Liineberg, Gruben-
hagen, Anhalt, and Mansfeld met at Magdeburg, and subscribed the
Torgau League. Also the city of Magdeburg, emancipated since a.d. 1524
from the jurisdiction of its archbishop, Albert of Mainz, and accepting
the Lutheran confession, now joined the league.
6. The Diet of Spires, A.D. 1526.— The diet met on 25th June, a.d.
1526. The evangelical princes were confident ; on their armour was the
motto, Verhum Dei iiianet in csteriiuin. In spite of all the prelates'
oiDposition, three commissions were approved to consider abuses. When
the debates were about to begin, the imperial commissioners tabled an
instruction which forbade them to make any change upon the old doc-
trines and usages, and finally insisted upon the execution of the edict of
Worms. The evangelicals however took comfort from the date affixed to
the document. They knew that since its issue the relation of pope and
emperor had become strained. Francis I. had been relieved by the pope
from the obligation of his oath, and the pope had joined with Francis
in a league at Cognac, to which also Henry VIII. of England adhered.
All Western Europe had combined to break the supremacy gained by the
Burgundian- Spanish dynasty at Pavia, and the duped emperor found
himself in straits. Would he now be inclined to stand by his instruc-
tion? The commissioners, apparently at Ferdinand's wish, had kept
back the document till the affairs of the Catholics became desperate.
The evangelical nobles felt encouraged to send an embassy to the
emperor, but before it started the emperor realized their wishes. In a
letter to his brother he communicated a scheme for abolishing the
penalties of the edict of Worms and referring religious questions to a
council. At the same time he called for help against his Italian enemies.
Seeing then that in present circumstances it did not seem advisable to
revoke, still less to carry out the edict, the only plan was to give to each
prince discretionary power in his own territory. This was the birthday
of the territorial constitution on a formally legitimate basis.
§ 127. OEGANIZATION OF PEOVINCIAL CHUECHES. 257
§ 127. Organization of the Evangelical Provincial
Churches, a.d. 1526-1529.
The nobles had now not only the right but also had it
enjoined on them as a duty to establish church arrange-
ments in their territories as they thought best. The three
following years therefore marked the period of the founding
and organizing of the evangelical provincial churches. The
electorate of Saxony came first with a good example. After
this pattern the churches of Hesse, Franconia, Llineburg,
East Eriesland, Schleswig and Holstein, Silesia, Prussia,
and a whole group of Low German states modelled their
constitution and worship.
1. The Organization of the Church of the Saxon Electorate, A.D. 1527-
1529. — Luther wrote in a.d. 1528 an instruction to visitors of pastors in
tlie electorate, which showed what and how ministers were to preach,
indicated the reforms to be made in worship, protested against abuse
of the doctrine of justification by urging the necessity of preaching the
law, etc. The whole territory was divided under four commissions,
comprising lay and clerical members. Ignorant and incompetent reli-
gious teachers were to be removed, but to be provided for. Teachers
were to be settled over churches and schools, and superintendents over
them were to inspect their work periodically, and to these last the
performance of marriages wa^ assigned. Vacant benefices were to be
applied to the improvement of churches and schools ; and those not
vacant were to be taxed for maintenance of hospitals, support of the
poor, founding of new schools, etc. The dangers occasioned by the
often incredible ignorance of the people and theh teachers led to Luther's
composing his two catechisms in a.d. 1529.
2. The Organization of the Hessian Churches, A.D. 1526-1528.— Philip of
Hesse had assembled the peers temporal and spiritual of his dominions
in Oct., A.D. 152(3, at Homberg, to discuss the question of church reform.
A reactionary attempt failed through the fervid eloquence of the Francis-
can Lambert of Avignon, a notable man, who, awakened in his cloister at
Avignon by Luther's writings, but not thoroughly satisfied, set out for
^Yittenberg, engaged on the way at Ziirich in public disputation against
Zwingli's reforms, but left converted by his opponent, and then passed
through Luther's school at Wittenberg. There he married in a.d. 1523,
and after a long unofficial and laborious stay at Strassburg, found at last,
in a.d. 1526, a permanent residence in Hesse. He died in a.d. 1530. —
17
'258 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Lambert's personality dominated the Homberg synod. He sketched an
organization of the church according to his ideal as a communion of
saints with a democratic basis, and a strict discipline administered by the
community itself. But the impracticability of the scheme soon became
evident, and in a.d. 1528 the Hessian church adopted the principles of
the Saxon church visitation. Out of vacant church revenues the Univer-
sity of Marburg was founded in a.d. 1527 as a second training school in
reformed theology. Lambert was one of its first teachers.
3. Organization of other German Provincial Churches, A.D. 1528-1530.—
George of Franconian-Brandenburg, after his brother Casimir's death,
organized his church at the assembly of Anspach after the Saxon model.
Nuremberg, under the guidance of its able secretary of council, Lazarus
Spengler, united in carrying out a joint organization. In Brunswick-
Luneburg, Duke Ernest, powerfully impressed by the preaching of Ehegius
at Augsburg, introduced the evangelical church organization into his
dominions. In East Friesland, where the reigning prince did not interest
himself in the matter, the development of the church was attended to by
the young nobleman Ulrich of Dornum. In Schleswig and Holstein the
prelates offered no opposition to reorganization, and the civil authorities
carried out the work. In Silesia the princes were favourable, Breslau
had been long on the side of the Reformation, and even the grand-duke
who, as king of Bohemia, was suzerain of Silesia, felt obliged to allow
Silesian nobles the privileges provided by the Diet of Spires. In Prussia
(§ 126, 4), Albert of Brandenburg, hereditary duke of these parts, with
the hearty assistance of his two bishops, provided for his subjects an
evangelical constitution.
4. The Reformation in the Cities of Northern Germany, A.D. 1524-1531.
— In these cities the Reformation spread rapidly after their emancipa-
tion from episcopal control. It was organized in Magdeburg as early
as A.D. 1524 by Nic. Amsdorf, sent for the purpose by Luther (§ 126, 5).
In Brunswick the church \tas organized in a.d. 1528 by Bugenhagen of
Wittenberg. In Bremen ^ in a.d. 1525 all churches except the cathedral
were in the hands of the Lutherans; in a.d. 1527 the cloisters were turned
into schools and hospitals, and then the cathedral was taken from the
Catholics. At Lubeck, nobles, councillors, and clergy had oppressed and
driven away the evangelical pastors ; but the councillors in their financial
straits became indebted to sixty- four citizens, who stipulated that the
pastors must be restored, the Catholics expelled, the cloisters turned into
hospitals and schools, and finally Bugenhagen was called in to prepare
for their church a Lutheran constitution.
§ 128. Martyrs for Evangelical Truth, a.d. 1521-1529.
On the publication of the edict of Worms several Catholic
§ 128. MARTYRS FOR TRUTH, A.D. 1521-1529. 259
princes, most conspicuously Duke George of Saxony, began
the persecution. Luther's followers were at first imprisoned,
scourged, and banished, and in a.d. 1521 a bookseller who
sold Luther's books was beheaded. The persecution was
most severe in the Netherlands, a heritage of the emperor
independent of the empire. Also in Austria, Bavaria, and
Swabia many evangelical confessors were put to death by the
sword and at the stake. The peasant revolt of a.d. 1525
increased the violence of the persecution. On the pretence
of punishing rebels, those who took part in the Regensburg
Convention (§ 126, 3) were expelled the country, thousands
of them with no other fault than their attachment to the
gospel. The conclusion of the Diet of Spires in a.d. 1526
(§ 126, 6) added new fuel to the flames. While the evan-
gelical nobles, taking advantage of that decision, proceeded
vigorously to the planting and organizing of the reformed
church, the enemies of the Reformation exercised the power
given them in cruel persecutions of their evangelical subjects.
The vagaries of Pack (§ 132, 1) led to a revival and intensi-
fication of the spirit of persecution. In Austria, during a.d.
1527, 1528, a church visitation had been arranged very much
in the style of that of Saxony, but with the object of track-
ing out and punishing heretics. In Bavaria the highways
were watched, to prevent pilgrims going to preaching over
the borders. Those caught were at first fined, but later on
they were drowned or burned.
The first martyrs for evangelical truth were two young Augustinian
monks of Antwerp, Henry Voes and John Esch, who died at the stake in
A.D. 1523, and their heroism was celebrated by Luther in a beautiful
hymn. They were succeeded by the prior of the cloister, Lampert Thorn,
who was strangled in prison. The Swabian League, which was renewed
after the rising of the Diet of Spires, with the avowed pm-pose of rooting
out the Anabaptists, directed its cruel measures against all evangelicals.
The Bishop of Constance in a.d. 1527 had John Hiiglin burnt as an
opposer of the holy mother church. The Elector of Mainz cited the
court preacher, George Winkler, of Halle, for dispensing the sacrament
260 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
in both kinds at Ascheffenburg. Winkler defended himself, and was
acquitted, but was murdered on the way. Luther then wrote his tract,
" Comfort to the Christians of Halle on the Death of their Pastor." In
North Germany there was no bloodshedding, but Duke George had those
who confessed their faith scourged by the gaoler and driven from the
country. The Elector Joachim of Brandenburg with his nobles resolved
in A.D. 1527 to give vigorous support to the old religion. But the gospel
took deep root in his land, and his own wife Elizabeth read Luther's
writings, and had the sacrament administered after the Lutheran form.
But the secret was revealed, and the elector stormed and threatened.
She then escaped, dressed as a peasant woman, to her cousin the Elector
of Saxony.
§ 129. Luther's Private and Public Life,
A.D. 1523-1529.'
Only in December, a.d. 1524, did Luther leave the cloister,
the last of its inhabitants but the prior, and on 13th June,
A.D. 1525, married Catherine Bora, of the convent of Nimpt-
schen, of whom he afterwards boasted that he prized her
more highly than the kingdom of France and the gover-
norship of Venice. Though often depressed with sickness,
almost crushed under the weight of business, and harassed
even to the end by the threats of his enemies against his
life, he maintained a bright, joyous temper, enjoyed himself
during leisure hours among his friends with simple enter-
tainments of song, music, intellectual conversation, and
harmless, though often sharp and pungent, interchange of
wit. Thus he proved a genuine comfort and help in all
kinds of trouble. By constant writing, by personal inter-
course with students and foreigners who crowded into
Wittenberg, by an extensive correspondence, he won and
maintained a mighty influence in spreading and establishing
the Reformation. By Scripture translation and Scripture
exposition, by sermons and doctrinal treatises, he impressed
upon the people his own evangelical views. A peculiarly
powerful factor in the Reformation was that treasury of
§ 129. Luther's private and public life. 261
sacred song (§ 142, 3) which Luther gave his people, partly
in translations of old, partly in the composition of new
hymns, which he set .to bright and pleasing melodies. He
was also most diligent in promoting education in churches
and schools, in securing the erection of new elementary and
secondary schools, and laid special stress on the importance
of linguistic studies in a church that prized the pure word
of God.
1. Luther's Literary "Works. — In a.d. 1524 appeared the first collection
of spiritual songs and psalms, eight in number, with a preface by Luther.
His reforms of worship were extremely moderate. In a.d. 1523 he
pubUshed little tracts on baptism and the Lord's Supper, repudiating the
idea of a sacrifice in the mass, and insisting on communion in both
kinds. In a.d. 1527 he wrote his " German Mass and Order of Public
Worship " (§ 127, 1) which was introduced generally throughout the
elector's dominions. He wrote an address to burgomasters and coun-
cillors about the improvement of education in the cities. Besides his
polemic against Erasmus and Carlstadt, against Milnzer and the rebellious
peasants, as well as against the Sacramentarians (§ 131), he engaged at
this time in controversy with Cochlaeus. A papal bull for the canonization
of Bishop Benno of Meissen (§ 93, 9) called forth in a.d. 1524 Luther's
tract, " Against the new God and the old Devil being set up at Meissen."
He was persuaded by Christian II. of Denmark to write, in a.d. 1526,
a very humble letter to Henry VIII. of England (§ 125, 3), which was
answered in an extremely venomous and bitter style. "When his enemies
triumphantly declared that he had retracted, Luther answered, in a.d.
1527, with his book, " Against the Abusive Writing of the King of Eng-
land," in which he resumed the bold and confident tone of his earlier
polemic. A humble, concihatory epistle sent in a.d. 1526 to Duke George
was no more successful. He now unweariedly continued his Bible trans-
lation. The first edition of the whole Bible was published by Hans
Lufft in Wittenberg, in a.d. 1534. A collection of sayings of Luther
collected by Lauterbach, a deacon of Wittenberg, in a.d. 1538, formed the
basis of later and fuller editions of "Luther's Table Talk." A chronolo-
gically arranged collection was made ten years later, and was published
in a.d. 1872 from a MS. in the Royal Library at Dresden. Aurifaber in
his collection did not follow the chronological order, but grouped the
utterances according to ;their subjects, but with many arbitrary altera-
tions and modifications. The saying falsely attributed to Luther, " Who
loves not wine, women, and song? " etc., is assigned by Luther himself
to his Erfurt landlady, but has been recently traced to an Italian source.
262 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
2. The famous Catholic Church historian Dollinger, who in his history
of the Reformation had with ultramontane bitterness defamed Luther
and his work, twenty years later could not forbear celebrating Luther
in a public lecture as " the most powerful patriot and the most popular
character that Germany possessed." In a.d. 1871 he wrote as follows :
"It was Luther's supreme intellectual ability and wonderful versatility
that made him the man of his age and of his nation. There has never
been a German who so thoroughly understood his fellow countrymen
and was understood by them as this Augustinian monk of Wittenberg.
The whole intellectual and spiritual making of the Germans was in his
hands as clay in the hands of the potter. He has given more to his
nation than any one man has ever done : language, popular education,
Bible, sacred song ; and all that his opponents could say against him and
alongside of him seemed insipid, weak, and colourless compared with his
overmastering eloquence. They stammered, he spoke. It was he who
put a stamp upon the German language as well as upon the German
character. And even those Germans who heartily abhor him as the
great heretic and betrayer of religion cannot help speaking his words
and thinking his thoughts."
§ 130. The Reformation in Gterman Switzerland,
A.D. 1519-1531.
While Luther's Reformation spread in Germany, a similar
movement sprang up in the neighbouring provinces of Ger-
man Switzerland. Its earliest beginnings date back as far
as A.D. 1516. The personal characteristics of its first pro-
moter, and the political democratic movement in which it
had its rise, gave it a complexion entirely different from
that of the Lutheran Reformation. The most conspicuous
divergence occurred in the doctrine of the supper (§ 131),
and since the Swiss views on this point were generally
accepted in the cities of the uplands, the controversy passed
over into the German Reformed Church and hindered com-
mon action, notwithstanding common interests and common
dangers.
1. Ulrich Zwingli.— Zwingli, born at Wildhaus in Toggenburg on
January 1st, a.d. 1484, a scholar of the famous humanist Thomas Wyt-
§ 130. THE EEFOEMATION IN GEEMAN SWITZEELAND. 263
lenbacli at Basel, was, after ten years' service as pastor at Glarus, made
pastor of Maria-Einsiedeln in a.d. 1516. The crowding of pilgrims to
the famous shrine of Mary at that place led him to preach against super-
stitious notions of meritorious performances. But far more decisive in
determining his attitude toward the Eeformation was his appointment on
January 1st, a.d. 1519, as Lent priest at Zurich, where he first became
acquainted with Luther's works, and took sides with him against the
Romish court party. Zwingli soon took up a distinctive position of his
own. He would be not only a religious, but also a political reformer.
For several years he had vigorously opposed the sending of Swiss youths
as mercenaries into the armies of foreign princes. His political oppo-
nents, the oligarchs, whose incomes depended on this traffic, opposed also
his religious reforms, so that his support was wholly from the democracy.
Another important distinction between the Swiss and German move-
ments was this, that Zwingli had grown into a reformer not through
deep conviction of sin and spiritual conflicts, but through classical and
biblical study. The writings of Pico of Mirandola (§ 120, 1), too, were
not without influence upon him. To him, therefore, justification by
faith was not in the same degree as to Luther the guiding star of his
life and action. He began the work of the Eeformation not so much
with purifying the doctrine, as with improving the worship, the con-
stitution, the ecclesiastical and moral life. His theological standpoint is
set forth in these works: Comment, de vera et falsa relip., a.d. 1525;
Fidei ratio ad Car. Imp., a.d. 1530 ; Christian. Jidei hrevis at clara expos.,
ed. Bullinger, a.d. 1536; Be providentia Dei ; and Apologeticus. Of the
two principles of the anti-Eomish Eeformation (§ 121) the Wittenberg
reformer placed the material, the Zurich reformer the formal, in the
foreground. The former only rejected what was not reconcilable with
Scripture ; the latter repudiated all that was not expressly enjoined in
Scripture. The former was cautious and moderate in dealing with forms
of worship and mere externals ; the latter was extreme, immoderate, and
violent. Luther retained pictures, altars, the ornaments of churches,
and the priestly character of the service, purifying it simply from un-
evangelical corruptions ; Zwingli denounced all these things as idolatry,
and burnt even organ pipes and clock bells. Luther recognised no action
of the Holy Spirit apart from the word and sacrament ; Zwingli separated
it from these, and identified it with mere subjective feeling. The sacra-
ments were with him mere memorial signs ; justification solely by the
merits of Christ as a joyous assurance of salvation had for him a negative
rather than a positive significance, i.e. opposition to the Eomish doctrine
of merits ; original sin was for him only hereditary moral sickness, a
naturalis defectus, which is not itself sin, and virtuous heathens, like
Hercules, Theseus, Socrates, and Cato were admitted as such into the
society of the blessed, without apparently sharing in the redemption of
Christ. His speculations, whicli led on one side almost to pantheism,
favoured a theory of predestination, according to which the moral will
has no freedom over against Providence.^
2. The Reformation in Zitrich, A.D. 1519-1525.— In a.d. 1518 a trafficker
in indulgences, the Franciscan Bernard Samson, of Milan, carried on his
disreputable business in Switzerland. At Zwingli's desire Zurich's gates
were closed against him. In a.d. 1520 the council gave permission to
priests and preachers in the city and canton to preach only from the
0. and N.T. All this happened under the eyes of the two papal nuncios
staying in Zurich ; but they did not interfere, because the curia was
extremely anxious to get auxiliaries for the papal army for an attack on
Milan. Zwingli was promised a rich living if he would no more preach
against the pope. He refused the bait, and went on his way as a
reformer. The continued indulgence of the curia allowed the Reforma-
tion to take even firmer root. Zwingli published, in a.d. 1522, his first
work, " Of Election, and Freedom in Use of Food," and the Zurichers
ate flesh and eggs during Lent of a.d. 1522. He also claimed liberty to
marry for the clergy. At this time Lambert came from Avignon to
Zurich (§ 127, 2). He preached against the new views, disputed in July
with Zwingli, and confessed himself defeated and convinced. Zwingli's
opponents had placed great hopes in Lambert's eloquence and dialectic
skill. All the greater was the effect of the unexpected result of the
disputation. The council, now impressed, commanded that the word
of God should be preached without human additions. But when the
adherents of the Romish party protested, it arranged a public disputa-
tion on 29th Jan., a.d, 1523, on sixty-seven theses or conclusiones drawn
up by Zwingli: "All who say, The gospel is nothing without the
guarantee of the Church, blaspheme God ;— Christ is the one way to sal-
vation ; — Our righteousness and our works are good so far as they are
Christ's, neither right nor good so far as they are our own," etc. A
former friend of Zwingli, John Faber, but quite changed since he had
made a visit to Rome, and now vicar-general of the Bishop of Constance,
undertook to support the old doctrines and customs against Zwingli.
Being restricted to Scripture proof he was forced to yield. The cloisters
were forsaken, violent polemics were published against the canon of the
mass and the worship of saints and images. The council resolved to
decide the question of the mass and images by a second disputation in
October, a.d. 1523. Leo Juda, Lent priest at St. Peter's in Ziirich, con-
tended against image worship, Zwingli against the mass. Scarcely any
^ Myconius, "Vita Zwinglii." Basel, 1536. Hess, "Life of Zwingli,
the Swiss Reformer." London, 1832. Christoffel, " Zwingli ; or. The
Rise of the Reformation in Switi^erland." Edin., 1858. Blackburn,
" Ulrich Zwingli." London, 18G8.
§ 130. THE EEFOEMATION IN GEEMAN SWITZEELAND. 265
opposition was offered to either of them. At Pentecost, a.d. 1524, the
council had all images withdrawn from the churches, the frescoes cut
down, and the walls whitewashed. Organ playing and bell ringing were
forbidden as superstitious. A new simple biblical formula of baptism was
introduced, and the abohtion of the mass, in a.d. 1525, completed the
work. At Easter of this year Zwingli celebrated a lovefeast, at which
bread was carried in wooden trenchers, and wine drunk from wooden
cups. Thus he thought the genuine Christian apostolic rite was restored.
In A.D. 1522 he had married a widow of forty-three years of age, but he
pubhcly acknowledged it only in a.d. 1524. He penitently confesses that
his pre-Eeformation celibate life, like that of most priests of his age,
had not been blameless; but the moral purity of his later life is beyond
suspicion.
3. Reformation in Basel, A.D. 1520-1525. — In Basel, at an early period,
Capito and Hedio wrought as biblical preachers. But so soon as they
had laid a good foundation they accepted a call to Mainz, in a.d. 1520,
which they soon again quitted for Strassburg, where they carried on the
work of the Eeformation along with Bucer. Their work at Basel was
zealously and successfully continued by Eoublin. He preached against
the mass, purgatory, and saint worship, often to 4,000 hearers. On the
day of Corpus Christi he produced a Bible instead of the usual relies,
which he scornfully called dead bones. He was banished, and afterwards
joined the Anabaptists. A new epoch began in Basel in a.d. 1523. (Eco-
lampadius or John Hausschein, born at Weinsberg in a.d. 1482, Zwingli's
Melanchthon, was preacher in Basel in a.d. 1516, and was on intimate
terms there with Erasmus. He accepted a call in a.d. 1518 to the cathedral
of Augsburg, but a year after withdrew into an Augsburg convent of St.
Bridget. There he studied Luther's writings, and, in a.d. 1522, found
shelter from persecution in Sickingen's castle, where he officiated for
some months as chaplain. He then returned to Basel, became preacher
at St. Martin's, and was soon made, along with Conrad Pellican (§ 120, 4,
footnote), professor in the university. Around these two a group of
younger men soon gathered, who energetically supported the evangelical
movement. They dispensed baptism in the German language, admi-
nistered the communion in both kinds, and were indefatigable in preach-
ing. In A.D. 1524 the council allowed monks and nuns, if they so wished,
to leave their cloisters. Of special importance for the progress of the
Eeformation in Basel was the arrival in a.d. 1524 of William Farel from
Dauphine (§ 138, 1). He had been obliged to fly from France, and was
kindly received by (Ecolampadius, with whom he stayed for some months.
In February he had a public disputation with the opponents of the Ee-
formation. University and bishop had interdicted it, but all the more
decided was the council that it should come off. Its result was a great
impulse to the Eeformation, though Farel in this same year, probably at
2C)() niTTncTT ittrtoky of the sixteenth centuey.
the sngfjcstion of Erasmus, whom ho had dcscribod as a now ]]alaam,
was banislicd by tlic council (§ 138, 1).'
4. The Reformation in the other Cantons, A.D. 1520-1525. In Bern,
from A.n. 15] 8 llallcv, Kolb, and Mayer carried on tlie work of the Refor-
mation as iiolilical and roligions reformers after the style of Zwingli.
Nic. Manuel, poet, satirist, and painter, supported their preaching by his
satirical writings against pope, priests, and superstition generally. Also
in his Dance of Death, which he painted on the walls of a cloister at
Bern, ho covered tho clergy with ridicule. In A.n. 1523 the council
allowed departures from the convents, and several monks and nuns
withdrew and married. The opposition called in the Dominican John
Haim, as their spokesman, in a.d. 1521. Between him and the Franciscan
Mayer there arose a passionate discussion, and the council exiled both.
Dut Ilallor continued his work, and the Reformation took firmer root
from day to day.— In Muhlhansen, where Ulr. von Huttcn spent his last
days, the council issued a mandate in A.n. 1521 which gave free course
to the Reformation. At Biel, too, it was allowed unrestricted freedom.
In East Switzerland, St. Gall was specially prominent under its burgo-
master Joachim v. Watt, who zealously advanced the interests of the
Reformation by word, writing, and action. John Karsler, who had studied
theology in Wittenberg in a.d. 1522, and was then obliged, in order to
avoid reading the mass, to learn and practise the trade of a saddler,
preached the gospel here in the Trades' Ilall in his saddler's apron in
A.n. 1521 , and took the office of reformed pastor and Latin preceptor in
a.d. 1537. He died in a.b. 1574 as President of St. Gall. In Schaff-
hausen Erasmus Hitter, called upon to oppose in discussion tho reformed
pastor llofmeistcr, owned himself defeated, and joined the reform party.
In the canton Vaud Thos. IMutter, the original and learned sailor, after-
wards rector of the high school at Burg, laid the foundations of tho
Reformation. In Appenzel and Glarus the work gradually advanced.
But in the Swiss midlands the nobles raided opposition in behalf of their
revenues, and the people of Berg, whose whole religion lay in pilgrimages,
images, and saints, constantly opposed the introduction of the new
views. Lucerne and Freiburg were the main bulwarks of the papacy in
Switzerland.
5. Anabaptist Outbreak, A.D. 1525.— In Switzerland, though the re-
formers there had taken very advanced ground, a number of ultra-
reformers arose, who thought they did not go far enough. Their leaders
were Iliitzer (§ 148, 1), Grebel, Manz, luiublin, Hubmeier, and Stor.
They began disturbances at Zolticon near Ziirich. Hubmeier held a
council at Waldshut, Easter Eve, a.d. 1525, and was rebaptized by
1 Blackburn, " William Farel (1487-1531) : The Story of the Swiss
Reformation." Edin., 18G7.
§ 180. THE REFORMATION IN GERMAN SWITZERLAND. 207
Roublin. During Easter week 110 received baptism, and Rnl)seqnently
more than 300 besides. The Basel Canton, where Miinzer had been living,
broke out in open revolt against the city. 8t. Gall alone had 800 Ana-
baptists. Ziirich at Zwingli's request at once took decided measures.
Many were banished, some were mercilessly drowned. Bern, Basel, and
St. Gall followed this example. ^
G. Disputation at Baden, A.D. 1526. — The reactionary party could not
decline the challenge to a disputation, but in the face of all protests it
was determined to be held in the Catholic district of Baden. The
champions and representatives of the cantons and bishops appeared
there in May, a.d. 1520, Faber and Eck leading the papists and Haller
of Bern and fficolampadius of Basel representing the party of reform.
Zwingli was forbidden by the Zurich council to attend, but he was kept
daily informed by Thos. Platter. Eck's theses were combatted one after
another. It lasted eight days. Eck outcried CEcolampadius' weak voice,
but the latter was immensely superior in intellectual power. At last
Thomas Murner (§ 125, 4) appeared with forty abusive articles against
Zwingli. CEcolampadius and ten of his friends persisted in rejecting
Eck's theses ; all the rest accepted them. The Assembly of the States
pronounced the reformers heretics, and ordered the cantons to have
them banished.
7. Disputation at Bern, A.D. 1528. — The result of the Bern disputation
was ill received by the democrats of Bern and Basel. A final disputation
was arranged for at Bern, which was attended by .350 of the clergy and
many noblemen. Zwingli, fficolampadius, Haller, Capito, Bucer, and
Farel were there. It continued from 7th to 27th January, a.d. 1528.
The Catholics were sadly wanting in able disputants, and they sustained
an utter defeat. Worship and constitution were radically reformed.
Cloisters were secularized ; preachers gave their oflicial oath to the civil
magistrates. There were serious riots over the removal of the images.
The valuable organ in the minster of St. Vincent was broken up by the
ruthless iconoclasts. A political reformation was carried out along with
the religious, and all stipendiaries received their warning.
8. Complete Victory of the Reformation at Basel, St. Gall, and Schaffhausen ,
A.D. 1529. — The Burgomaster von Watt brought to St. Gall the news of
the victorious issue of the disputation at Bern. This gave the finishing
blow to the Catholic party. Thus in a.d. 1528, certainly not without
some iconoclastic excesses, the Reformation triumphed. — In Basel,
the council was divided, and so it took but half measures. On Good
Friday, a.d. 1528, some citizens broke the images in St. Martin's Church.
They were apprehended. But a rising of citizens obliged the council
to set them free, and several churches from which the images had been
Burrage, "History of the Anabaptists in Switzerland." Philad, 1882
268 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
■withdrawn were given over to the reformers. In December, a.d. 1528,
the trades presented a petition asking for the final abolition of idolatry.
The Catholic party and the reformed took to arms, and a civil war
seemed imminent. The council, however, succeeded in quelling the
disturbance by announcing a disputation where the majority of the
citizens should decide by their votes. But the Catholic minority pro-
tested so energetically that the council had again recourse to half
measures. The dissatisfaction of the reformed led to an explosion of
violent image breaking in Lent, a.d. 1529. Huge bonfires of images and
altars were [set a blaze. The strict Catholic members of the council
fled, the rest quelled the revolt by an unconditional surrender. Even
Erasmus gave way (§ 120, 6). CEcolampadius had married in a.d. 1528.
He died in a.d. 1531. In Schaffhausen up to a.d. 1529 matters were
undecided, but the proceedings at Basel and Bern gave victory to the re-
formed party. The drama here ended with a double marriage. The abbot
of All Saints married a nun, and Erasmus Ritter married the abbot's
sister. Images were removed without tumult and the mass abolished.
9. The first Treaty of Cappel, A.D. 1529.— In the five forest cantons the
Catholics had the upper hand, and there every attempted political as well
as religious reform was relentlessly put down. Ziirich and Bern could
stand this no longer, Unterwalden now revolted, and found considerable
support in the other four cantons, and the position of the cities became
serious. The forest cantons now turned to Austria, the old enemy of
Swiss freedom, and concluded at Innsbriick in a.d. 1529 a formal league
with King Ferdinand for mutual assistance in matters touching the faith.
Trusting to this league, they increased their cruel persecutions of the
reformed, and burnt alive a Ziirich preacher, Keyser, whom they had
seized on the public highway on neutral territory. Then [the Ziirichers
rose up in revolt. With their decided preponderance they might certainly
have crushed the five cantons, and then all Switzerland would have
surrounded Zwingli in the support of reform. But Bern was jealous of
Zurich's growing importance, and even many Ziirichers for fear of war
urged negotiations for peace with the old members of the league. Thus
came about the First Treaty of Cappel in a.d, 1529, The five cantons
gave up the Austrian league document to be destroyed, undertook to
defray the costs of the war, and agreed that the majority in each canton
should determine the faith of that canton. As to freedom of belief it
was only said that no party should make the faith of the other penal.
This was less than Zwingli wished, yet it was a considerable gain.
Thurgau, Baden, Schaffhausen, Solothurn, Neuenburg, Toggenburg, etc.,
on the basis of this treaty, abolished mass, images, and altars.
10. The Second Treaty of Cappel, A.D. 1531,— Even after the treaty
the five cantons continued to persecute the reformed, and renewed their
alliance with Austria. Their undue preponderance in the assembly led
§ 131. SACRAMENTAL CONTROVEESY, A.D. 1525-1529. 269
Zurich to demand a revision of the federation. This led the forest
cantons to mcrease their cruelties upon the reformed. Zurich declared
for immediate hostilities, but Bern decided to refuse all commercial
intercourse with the five cantons. At the diet at Lucerne, the five
cantons resolved in September, a.d. lo3i, to avert famine by immediately
declaring war. They made their arrangements so secretly that the
reformed party was not the least prepared, when suddenly, on the 9th
October, an army of 8,000 men, bent on revenge, rushed down on the
Zurich Canton. In all haste 2,000 men were mustered, who were almost
annihilated in the battle of Cappel on 11th October. There, too, Zwingli
fell. His body was quartered and burnt, and the ashes scattered to the
winds. Ziirich and Bern soon brought a force of 20,000 men into the
field, but the courage of their enemies had grown in proportion as all
confidence and spirit departed from the reformed. Further successes
led the forest cantons, which had hitherto acted only on the defensiye, to
proceed on the offensive, and the reformed were constrained to accept on
humbling terms the Second Treaty of Cappel of a.d. 1531. This granted
freedom of worship to the reformed in their own cantons, but secured the
restoration of Catholicism in the five cantons. The defeated had also to
bear the costs of the war, and to renounce their league with Strassburg,
Constance, and Hesse. The hitherto oppressed Catholic minority began
now to assert itself on all hands, and in many places were more or less
successful in securing the ascendency. So it was in Aargau, Thurgau,
Rapperschwyl, St. Gall, Rheinthal, Solothurn, Glarus, etc.
§ 131. The Sacramentarian Controversy, a.d. 1525-1529.^
Luther in his " Babylonish Captivity of the Church," of
A.D. 1520, had, in opposition to prevailing views, which made
the efficacy of the sacraments dependent on the objective
receiving without regard to the faith of the receiver, ojms
operatum^ pressed forward the subjective side in a somewhat
extreme manner. During the earlier period of his career
as a reformer, and indeed even at a later period, as his letter
to the men of Strassburg shows, he was in danger of going
to the extreme of overlooking or denying the real objective
and Divine contents of the sacrament. But decided as the
opposition was to the scholastic theory of transu bstantia-
1 Cunningham, " Reformers and Theology of the Reformation," Edin.,
1862, pp. 212-291 ; " Zwingli and the Doctrine of the Sacraments."
/
270 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
tion, and convinced as he was that the bread and wine were
to be regarded as mere symbols, the text of Scripture seemed
clearly to say to him that he must recognise there the pre-
sence of the true body and blood of Christ. His anxiety to
avoid the errors of the fanatics, and his simple acceptance
of the word of Scripture, led him to that conviction which
inspired him to the end, that in, with, and under ^the bread
and wine the true body and blood of the Lord are received, by
believers unto salvation, by unbelievers unto condemnation.
Carlstadt (§ 124, 3) had denied utterly the presence of the body and
blood of the Lord in the sacrament. He sought to set aside the force of
the words of institution by giving to tovto an absurd meaning : Christ
had pointed to His own present body, and said, " This here is My body,
which in death I will give for you, and in memory thereof eat this
bread." When Carlstadt, expelled from Saxony, came to Strassburg, he
sought to interest the preachers there, Bucer and Capito, in himself and
his sacramental view. But Luther was not moved by their attempts at
conciliation. Zwingli, too, took the side of Carlstadt. In essential agree-
ment with Carlstadt, but putting the matter on another basis, Zwingli
interpreted the words of institution, " This is," by " This signifies," and
reduced the significance of the sacrament to a symbolical memorial of
Christ's suffering and death. In an epistle to the Lutheran Matthew
Alber at Reutlingen in a.d. 1524 he set forth this theory, and sided with
Carlstadt against Luther. He developed his views more fully in his
dogmatic treatise, Commentarius de vera et falsa relig., a.d. 1525, where
he characterizes Luther's doctrine as an opinio non solum rustica sed
etiam impia et frivola. (Ecolampadius, too, took part in the controversy
as supporter of his friend Zwingli when attacked by Bugenhagen, and
wrote in a.d. 1525 his De genuina verhorum Domini, Hoc est corpus
meum, expositione. He wished to understand the <rw/Aa of the words of
institution as equivalent to " sign of the body." (Ecolampadius laid his
treatise before the Swabian reformers Brenz and Scbnepf ; but these, in
concert with twelve other preachers, answered in the Syngramma Suevi-
ciim of A.D. 1525 quite in accordance with Luther's doctrine. The con-
troversy continued to spread. Luther first openly appeared againsi. the
Swiss in a.d. 1256 in his " Sermon on the Sacrament against the^Frnatics,"
and to this Zwingli replied. Luther answered again in his tract, " That
the words, This is My body, stand firm"; and in a.d. 1528 he issued his
great manifesto, " Confession in regard to the Lord's Supper " (§ 144, 2,
note). Notwithstanding the endeavours of the Strassburgers at con-
ciliation the controversy still continued. Zwingli's statement was the
§ 132. EVANGELICAL PROTEST AND CONFESSION. 271
shibboleth of the Swiss Reformation, and was adopted also in many
of the upland cities. Strassburg, Lindau, Meiningen, and Constance
accepted it; even in Ulm, Augsburg, Reutlingen, etc., it had its sup-
porters.— Continuation, § 132, 4.
§ 132. The Protest and Confession of the Evangelical
Nobles, a.d. 1527-1530.
For three years after the diet at Spires in a.d. 1526 no
public proceedings were taken on religious questions. The
success of the Reformation however during these years
roused the Catholic party to make a great effort. At the
next diet at Spires, in a.d. 1529, the Catholics were in the
majority, and measures were passed which, it was hoped,
would put an end to the Reformation. The evangelicals
tabled a formal protest (hence the name Protestants), and
strove hard to have effect given to it. The union negotia-
tions with the Swiss and uplanders were not indeed suc-
cessful, but in the Augsburg Confession of a.d. 1530 they
raised before emperor and empire a standard, around which
they henceforth gathered with hearty goodwill.
1. The Pack Incident, A.D. 1527, 1528.— In a.d. 1527 dark rumours of
dangers to the evangelicals began to spread. The landgrave, suspecting
the existence of a conspiracy of the German Catholic princes, gave to
an officer in Duke George's government. Otto von Pack, 10,000 florins
to secure documents proving its existence. He produced one with the
ducal seal, which bound the Catholic princes of Germany to fall upon the
elector's territories and Hesse, and to divide the lands among them, etc.
The landgrave was all fire and fury, and even the Elector John joined
him in a league to make a vigorous demonstration against the purposed
attack. But Luther and Melanchthon pressed upon the elector our Lord's
words, " All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword," and
convinced him that he ought to abide the attack and restrict himself to
simple defence. The landgrave, highly offended at the failure of his pro-
ject, sent a copy of the document to Duke George, who declared the whole
affair a tissue of lies. Philip had begun operations against the elector,
but was heartily ashamed of himself when he came to his sober senses.
Pack when interrogated became involved in contradictions, and was
found to be a thoroughly bad subject, who had been before convicted of
falsehood and intrigues. The landgrave expelled him from his territories.
272 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
He wandered long a homeless exile, and at last, in a.d. 1536, was executed
by Duke George's orders in the Netherlands. All this seriously injured
the interests of the gospel. Mutual distrust among the Protestant leaders
continued, and sympathy was created for the Catholic princes as men who
had been unjustly accused.
2. The Emperor's Attitude, A.D. 1527-1529.— The faithlessness of the
king of France and the ratification of the League of Cognac (§ 126, 6)
led to very strained relations between the pope and the emperor. Old
Frundsberg raised an army in Germany, and the German peasants, with-
out pay or reward, crossed the Alps, burning with desire to humiliate
the pope. On 6th May, a.d. 1527, the imperial army of Spaniards and
Germans stormed Rome. The so-called sack of Rome presented a scene
of plunder and spoliation scarcely ever paralleled. Clement VII., besieged
in St. Angelo, was obliged to surrender himself prisoner. But once again
Germany's hopes were cast to the ground by the emperor. Considering
the opinion that prevailed in Spain, and influenced by his own antipathy
to the Saxon heresy, besides other political combinations, he forgot that
he had been saved by Lutheran soldiers. In June, a.d. 1528, at Barcelona,
he concluded a peace with the pope, and promised to use his whole pow;er
in suppressing heresy. By the Treaty of Cambray, in July, a.d. 1529, the
French war also was finally brought to a conclusion. In this treaty both
potentates promised to uphold the papal chair, and Francis I. renewed
his undertaking to furnish aid against heretics and Turks. Charles now
hastened to Italy to be crowned by the pope, meaning then by his personal
attentions to settle the affairs of Germany.
3. The Diet at Spires, A.D. 1529.— In the end of a.d. 1528 the emperor
issued a summons for another diet at Spires, which met on 21st Feb.,
A.D. 1529. Things had changed since a.d. 1526. The Catholics were
roused by the Pack episode, halting nobles were terrorized by the
emperor, the prelates were present in great numbers, and the Catholics,
for the first time since the Diet at Worms, were in a decided majority.
The proposition of the imperial commissioners to rescind the conclusions
of the diet of a.d. 1526 was adopted by a majority, and formulated as
the diet's decision. No innovations were to be introduced until at least
a council had been convened, mass was everywhere to be tolerated, the
jurisdiction and revenues of the bishops were in all cases to be fully
restored. It was the death-knell of the Reformation, as it gave the
bishops the right of deposing and punishing preachers at their will. As
Ferdinand was deaf to all remonstrances, the evangelicals presented a
solemn protest, with the demand that it should be incorporated in the
imperial statute book. But Ferdinand refused to receive it. The Pro-
testants now took no further steps, but drew up a formal statement of
their case for the emperor, appealed to a free council and German
national assembly, and declared their constant adherence to the decisions
^ 132. EVANGELICAL PROTEST AND CONFESSION. 273
of the previous diet. This document was signed by the Elector of Saxony,
the Landgrave of Hesse, George of Brandenburg, the two dukes of Liine-
burg, and Prince Wolfgang of Anholt. Of the upland cities fourteen
subscribed it.
4. The Marburg Conference, A.D. 1529.— The Elector of Saxony and
Hesse entered into a defensive league with Strassburg, Ulm, and Nurem-
berg at Spires. The theologians present agreed only with hesitation to
admit the Zwinglian Strassburg. The landgrave at the same time formed
an alliance with Zurich, which attached itself to the interests of Francis
I. of France. Thus began the most formidable coalition which had ever
yet been formed against the house of Austria. But one point had been
overlooked which broke it all up again, viz. the religious differences
between the Lutheran and Zwinglian confessions. Melanchthon returned
to Wittenburg with serious qualms of conscience ; Luther had declared
against any league, most of all against any fraternising with the " Sacra-
mentarians," and the elector to some extent agreed with him. Even the
Nuremberg theologians had their scruples. The proposed league was to
have been ratified at Rotach in June. The meeting took place, but no
conclusion was reached. The landgrave was furious, but the elector was
resolute. Philip now summoned leading theologians on both sides to a
conference at Marburg in his castle, which lasted from 1st till 3rd Oct.,
A.D. 1529. On the one side were Luther, Melanchthon, Justus Jonas, from
"Wittenberg, Brenz from Swabia, and Osiander from Nuremberg ; on the
other side, Zwingli from Ziirich, CEcolampadius from Basel, Bucer and
Hadio from Strassburg. After, by the landgrave's well-meant arrange-
ment, Zwingli had discussed privately with Melanchthon, and Luther with
Qilcolampadius, during the first day, the public conference began on the
second. First of all several points were discussed on the divinity of
Christ, original sin, baptism, the word of God, etc., in reference to which
suspicions of Zwingli's orthodoxy had been current in Wittenberg. On all
these Zwingli willingly abandoned his peculiar theories and accepted the
doctrines of the cecumenical church. But his views of the Lord's Supper
he stoutly maintained. He took his stand upon John vi. 63, " The
flesh profiteth nothing"; but Luther wrote with chalk on the table
before him, " This is My body," as the word of God which no one may
explain away. No agreement could be reached. Zwingli declared that
notwithstanding he was ready for brotherly fellowship, but this Luther
and his party unanimously refused. Luther said, " You are of another
spirit than we." Still Luther had found his opponents not so bad as he
expected, and also the Swiss found that Luther's doctrine was not so
gross and capernaitic as they had imagined. They agreed on fifteen
articles, in the fourteenth of which they determined on the basis of the
oecumenical church doctrine to oppose the errors of Papists and Ana-
baptists, and in the fifteenth the Swiss admitted that the true body and
•274 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
blood of Christ are in the sacrament, but they could not admit that they
were corporeally in the bread and wine. Three copies of these Marburg
articles were signed by the theologians present. — Continuation, § 133, 8.
5. The Convention of Schwabach and the Landgrave Philip. — A conven-
tion met at Schwabach in Oct., a.d. 1529, at which a confession of seven-
teen articles was proposed to the representatives of the Swiss, but
rejected by them. Meanwhile the imperial answer to the decisions of
the diet had arrived from Spain, containing very ungracious expressions
against the Protestants. The evangelical nobles sent an embassy to the
emperor to Italy ; but he refused to receive the protest, and treated the
ambassadors almost as prisoners. They returned to Germany with a
bad report. Hitherto there had been only a defensive federation against
attacks of the Swabian League or other Catholic princes. Luther's hope
that the emperor might yet be won was shattered. The question now
was, what should be done if an onslaught upon the reformed should be
made by the emperor himself. The jurists indeed were of opinion that
the German princes were not unconditionally subject to the emperor ;
they too have authority by God's grace, and in the exercise of this are
bound to protect their subjects. But Luther did not hesitate for a
moment to compare the relation of the elector to the emperor with that of
the burgomaster of Torgau to the elector ; for he maintained the idea of
the empire as firmly as that of the church. He insisted that the princes
should not withstand the emperor, and that they should bear everything
patiently for God's sake. Only if the emperor should proceed to per-
secute their own subjects for their faith should they renounce their
obedience. The landgrave's negotiations with Zwingli also led to no
result. For political purposes, notwithstanding the opposition of Witten-
berg, there was formed a coalition of all the Protestants of the north with
the exception of Denmark, extending also to the south and embracing
even Venice and France. The Swiss would stop the way of the emperor
over the Alps ; Venice would be of service with her fleet, and the most
Christian king of France was to be summoned as the protector of political
and religious freedom of Germany. But these fine plans were seen to
be vain dreams when the time for putting them in practice came round.
6. The Diet of Augsburg, A.D. 1530. — From Boulogne, where the pope
crowned him, the emperor summoned a diet to meet at Augsburg, at
which for the first time in nine he was to be personally present. He
would once again seek to induce the Protestants quietly to return to the
old faith, and so his missive was very conciliatory. But before its arrival
new irritations had arisen at Augsburg. . The Elector John allowed the
preachers accompanying him, Spalatin and Agricola, to engage freely in
preaching. The emperor was greatly displeased at this, and sent him a
request to withdraw this permission, which, however, he did not regard.
On 15th June, accompanied by the papal legate Campegius (§ 12G, 2,3),
§ 132. EVANGELICAL PROTEST AND CONFESSION. 275
be made a brilliant entrance, tbe Protestants, on tbe ground of 2 Kings
V. 17, 18, offering no opposition to all tbe civil and ecclesiastical reception
ceremonies. Tbis gave tbe emperor greater confidence in renewing tbe
demand to stop tbe preaching. But tbe Protestants stood firm, and
Margrave George called down tbe unmeasured wratb of tbe emperor by bis
decided but bumble declaration, tbat before be would deny God's word,
be would kneel wbere be stood and bave bis bead struck off. Just as
decidedly be refused tbe emperor's call to join tbe Corpus Cbristi
procession on tbe following day, even witb tbe addition that it was "to
tbe glory of Almighty God." At last they yielded the matter of tbe
preaching so far as to discontinue it during the emperor's stay, on tbe
other party undertaking to discontinue controversial discourses. On
20tb June tbe diet opened. Tbe matter of tbe Turkish war was on tbe
emperor's motion postponed, to allow of tbe thorough discussion of the
religious questions.
7. The Augsburg Confession, 25th June, A.D. 1530. — In view of the diet
the evangelical theologians prepared for the elector a short confession in
the form of a revision of tbe seventeen Schwabach Articles, tbe so called
Torgau Articles. Melanchthon employed tbe days that preceded the
opening of tbe diet in drawing up on tbe basis of tbe Torgau Articles, in
constant correspondence wdth the evangelical theologians, tbe Augsburg
Confession, Confessio Augustana. This concise, clear, and decided though
temperate document received tbe hearty approval of Luther, who, as still
under tbe ban, was kept back by the elector at Coburg. It contained
twenty-one Articuli fidei pracipui, and also seYen Articuli in quibus re-
censentur abusiis mutati. On 24th June the Protestants said they desired
their confession to be publicly read. But it was with difficulty that they
obtained tbe emperor's consent to allow its being read on the 25tb June,
and even then not in the public ball, but in a much smaller episcopal
chapel, wbere only members of the diet could find room. The two chan-
cellors of tbe electorate, Baier and Brilck, appeared, the one with a
German, tbe other with a Latin copy of the confession. The emperor
wished the Latin, but the elector insisted that on German soil tbe German
copy should be read. When tbis was done Dr. Briick banded both copies
to the emperor, who kept tbe Latin one and gave the German one to the
Elector of Mainz. Both were subscribed by Elector John, Margrave
George, Duke Ernest of Liineburg, Landgrave Philip, Prince Wolfgang
of Anhalt, and the cities of Nuremberg and Reutlingen. Tbe confession
made a favourable impression on many of tbe assembled princes, and
many prejudices were dissipated; while tbe evangelicals were greatly
strengthened by the unanimous confession of their faith before tbe
emperor and the empire. The Catholic theologians Faber, Eck, Cocbl^us,
and Wimpina were ordered by the emperor to controvert the confession.
Meanwhile Melanchthon entered into negotiations with the legate Cam-
276 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
pegius, in which his love of peace went so far as to withdraw all demands
for marriage of the clergy, and the giving of the cup to the laity, and to
allow the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the bishops, reserving the question
about the mass to the decision of a council. But these weak concessions
found little or no favour among the other Protestants, and the legate could
make no binding engagement until he consulted Eome. On 3rd Aug.
the confutation of the Catholic theologians was read. The emperor
declared that it maintained the views by which he would stand. He
expected the princes would do the same. He was defender of the Church,
and was not disposed to suffer ecclesiastical schism in Germany. The
Protestants demanded for closer inspection a copy of the confutation.
This was refused. The landgrave now left the diet. To the elector he
said that he gave over to him and to God's word body and goods, land
and people ; and to the representatives of the cities he wrote : " Say to
the cities that they are not women, but men. There is no fear; God is on
our side." The zealous Papist Duke William of Bavaria declared to Eck,
" If I hear well, the Lutherans sit upon the Scripture and we alongside of
it." The cities siding with Zwingli, Strassburg, Memmingen, Constance,
and Lindau, presented their own confession drawn up by Bucer and
Capilo, the Confessio Tetmpolitinia. lu its eighteenth article it taught
that Christ gives in the sacrament His true body and His true blood to be
eaten and drunk for the feeding of the soul. The emperor had a Catholic
reply read, with which he expressed satisfaction. Luther had meanwhile
from Coburg supported those contending for the confession by prayer,
counsel, and comfort. He preached frequently, wrote many letters, nego-
tiated with Bucer (§ 133, 8), wrought at the translation of the prophets,
and composed several evangelical works of edification.
8. The Conclusions of the Diet of Augsburg. — The firm bright spirit of the
minority made it seem to the Catholic majority too considerable to allow
of an open breach. A further attempt was therefore made to reach some
agreement. A commission was appointed, comprising from either side
two princes, two doctors of canon law, and three theologians. On the
twenty-one doctrinal articles, with the exception of that on the sacra-
ments, they were practically agreed, but the Protestants were called upon
to abandon everything in regard to constitution and customs. Thus the
attempt failed. Five imperial cities took the side of the emperor, the
rest attached themselves to the Protestant princes. The Protestants
wished to read Melanchthon's apology for the Augsburg Confession against
the charge of the Catholic confutation, but the emperor with unbending
stubbornness refused. This was the most decided piece of work Melanch-
thon ever did. At the close of the diet, 22nd Sept., the Protestant
princes were informed that time for reflection would be allowed them
till 15th April of the following year ; meanwhile they should not enforce
any innovations and should allow confession and the mass in their
§ 133. INCIDENTS OF THE YEAES A.D. 1531-1536. 277
territories. The early calling of a council was expressly promised. The
princes of the church had all their rights restored. The emperor declared
his firm determination to enforce in its full rigour the edict of "Worms,
and commissioned the public prosecutor to proceed against the dis-
obedient even to the length of putting them under the ban. The judi-
cature was formally and expressly empowered to carry out the conclusions
of the diet. Finally, the emperor expressed the wish that on account
of his frequent absence his brother Ferdinand should be chosen King of
Eome. The election was accordingly soon carried out at Frankfort ;
but the elector lodged a protest against it.
§ 133. Incidents of the Years a.d. 1531-1536.
The Protestants now made an earnest effort to effect a
union by forming in A.D. 1531 the Schmalcald League. To
this decided action and the political difficulties of the
emperor we owe the Peace of Nuremburg of a.d. 1532. The
bold step of the landgrave freed Wlirttemberg from the
Austrian yoke and papal oppression. At the same time the
Reformation triumphed in Anhalt, Pomerania, and several
Westphalian cities. All Westphalia might have been one but
for the Anabaptists. Bucer's unwearied efforts at last suc-
ceeded by the Wittenberg concordat in opening the way for
the Schmalcald League into the cities of the Uplands. The
league now comprised an imposing array of powerful members.
1. The Founding of the Schmalcald League, A.D. 1530, 1531.— The con-
ferring upon the court of justiciary the power to execute the decrees of the
Diet of Augsburg was most dangerous to the Protestants. For protection
against this design, the Protestant nobles at a convention at Schmalcald
in Dec, a.d. 1530, formed the bold resolution, that all should stand as
one in resisting every attack of the court. But when the question came
to be discussed, whether in case of need they should go the length of
armed resistance to the emperor opinion was divided. The views of the
jurists finally prevailed over those of the theologians, and the elector
insisted on a league against every aggressor, even should it be the emperor
himself. At a new convention at Schmalcald in March, a.d. 1531, a league
on these terms was concluded for six years. The members of it were
the electorate of Saxony, Hesse, Liineburg, Anhalt, Mausfeld, and eleven
cities.
2. The Peace of Nuremberg, A.D. 1532.— The energetic combination of
278 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
tlie Protestants Lad now rendered them formidable, and the Sultan
Soliman was threatening a new attack. If the Protestants were to be con-
quered, an agreement must be come to with the Turks ; if the Turks
were to be humbled, a peaceable settlement with the Protestants was in-
dispensable. Ferdinand's policy at first inclined to the latter direction,
and by his advice the emperor summoned a diet at Piegensburg, and till
the meeting forbade any prosecutions on the basis of the decrees of the
Diet of Augsburg. But soon the catastrophe in Switzerland (§ 130, 10)
changed Ferdinand's policy. It seemed to him now the fittest time to
deal a similar blow to the evangelicals in Germany. He therefore sent
an embassy to the sultan, empowered to make the most humiliating con-
ditions of peace. But Soliman rejected all proposals with scorn, and
in April, a.d. 1532, advanced with an army of 300,000 men. Meanwhile
the Diet of Eegensburg had opened on 17th April, a.d. 1532. The Pro-
testants no longer presented a humble petition, as they had done two
years before, but they firmly made their demands. There was no longer
talk of compromise or suffrance. They demanded peace in matters of
religion ; the annulling of all religious prosecutions ; and, finally, a free
general council, where matters should be decided solely by God's word.
So long as Ferdinand had any hope^of getting a favourable answer from
the Turks, he would not seriously consider proposals for peace. But when
that hope was shattered, and Soliman's terrible host approached, there
was no time to lose. At Nuremberg the peace was concluded on 23rd
July, A.D. 1532. The faithful elector was allowed to see the happy day,
but died in that same year. He was succeeded by his son, John Frederick
the Magnanimous, a.d. 1532-1547. A noble army was soon raised from
the imperial guards. SoHman suffered various misfortunes on land and
water, and withdrew without accomplishing anything. The emperor now
went to Italy, and insisted on the pope calling a general council. But
the pope thought the time had not come for that. Also the annulHng of
prosecutions promised in the treaty remained long unfulfilled. Pending
prosecutions, mostly about restitution of ecclesiastical goods and juris-
diction, were pronounced to be not matters of religion, but of spoliation
and breach of the peace. The Protestants made a formal complaint in
Jan., A.D. 1534. This was disregarded, and arrangements were being made
to put certain nobles under the ban when events occurred at Wilrttemberg
which changed the aspect of affairs.
3. The Evangelization of Wilrttemberg, A.D. 1534, 1535.— The Swabian
League in the interest of Austria had obtained the banishment of Duke
Ulrich in a.d. 1528, and frustrated every attempt to secure his return.
His son Christopher had been educated at the court of Ferdinand, and
in A.D. 1532 accompanied the emperor to Spain. He made his escape
into the Alps, and publicly claimed his German inheritance. The Land-
grave Philip, Ulrich's personal friend, had long resolved to reconquer
§ 133. INCIDENTS OF THE YEARS A.D. 1531-1536. 279
Wiirttemberg for liim. At last, in the spring of a.d. 1534, with aid of
French gold, he carried out his plan. At Laufeu Ferdinand's army
was almost annihilated, and he himself was obliged in the Peace of
Cadau of a.d. 1534 to restore Ulrich to Wiirttemberg as an under-
feudatorj'-, but with seat and vote in the imperial diet, and to allow him
a free hand in carrying out the Keformation in his territory. Luther's
views had from the first found hearty reception in Wiirttemberg. The
oldest and most distinguished of the Swabian reformers, whose reputa-
tion had spread far beyond Wiirttemberg, was John Brenz (§§ 131, 1 ;
132, 4; 135, 2; 136, 6, 8). He was preacher in Swabian Halle from
A.D. 1522, provost in Stuttgart from a.d. 1553, and died in a.d. 1570.
But Ferdinand's government had stretched its arm so far as to visit with
death all manifestations of sympathy with the Reformation. All the
more rapidly did the work of evangelization now proceed. Ulrich
brought with him Ambrose Blaurer, a disciple of Zwiugli and friend of
Bucer, and Erhard Schnapf, a decided supporter of Luther ; to the
former he assigned the evangelization of the upper, and to the latter
the evangelization of the lower division of his territories. Both had
agreed in accepting a [common formula of Reformation principles. By
the founding of the University of Tiibingen, organized after the pattern
of Marburg, Ulrich rendered important service to the cause of Protes-
tant learning. Several neighbouring courts and cities were encouraged
to follow Wiirttemberg's example.
4. The Reformation in Anhalt and Pomerania, A.D, 1532-1534. —
Wolfgang of Anhalt had at an early date introduced the Reformation on
the banks of the Saale and into Zerbst. Another prince of Anhalt,
George, at first an opponent of Luther, but converted by means of his
writings, began in a.d. 1532 the Reformation of the country east of the
Elbe. And when the Bishop of Brandenburg refused to ordain his
married priests, he sent them to be ordained by Luther in Wittenberg,
Much more violent was the Reformation of Pomerania. Nobles and
clergy sought to rouse the people against Lutheranism. Prince Barnim
was an ardent supporter of Luther, but his brother George was bitterly
opposed. On George's death, his son Philip joined with Barnim in
introducing the Reformation into the land. At the Assembly of Treptow,
in Dec, a.d. 1534, they presented a scheme of Reformation, which the
nobles heartily accepted. It was carried into operation by Bugenhagen
by a church visitation after the pattern of that of Saxony,
5. The Keformation in Westphalia, A.D. 1532-1534.— In the Westpha-
]ian cities much was accomplished by Luther's hymns, Pideritz, priest
of Lamgo, was a supporter of Eck; but wishing to see the working of the
new views for himself, he went to Brunswick, and returned to inaugurate
the Reformation in his own city. At Soest, the Catholic council con-
demned to death a workman who had spoken of it with disrespect. Two
280 CHUKCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
blundering attempts were made upon the scaffold, and the victim at last
was conducted home by the crowd in triumph. He died next day. The
council precipitately fled from the city. And thus in July, a.d. 1533,
Catholicism lost its last prop in that place. In Paderbom, where liberty
of preaching had been enjoyed, the Elector of Cologne (§ 135, 7) had
some of the leading Lutherans imprisoned ; and when some on the rack
confessed to a treasonable correspondence with the Landgrave of Hesse,
of which they had been falsely accused, he condemned them to death.
But moved by the request of an old man to share their death, and by
the weeping of the wives and maidens, Hermann spared their lives.
In Miinster, Luther's doctrines were preached as early as a.d. 1531 by
Eottmann, and soon the evangelicals won the ascendency, so that
council and clergy left the city. The Bishop of Waldeck, after an
unsuccessful attempt by force of arms, was obliged in a.d. 1533 to grant
unconditional religious freedom. The neighbouring cities were about
to follow the example of the capital, when a catastrophe occurred which
resulted in the complete restoration of Catholicism.
6. Disturbances at Miinster, A.D. 1534, 1535.— Eottmann had added to
his Zwinglian creed the renunciation of infant baptism, and prepared the
way for Anabaptist excesses. John of Leyden appeared in a.d. 1534,
gained great popularity as a preacher, and the council was weak enough
to grant legal recognition to the fanatics. Mad enthusiasts flocked into
the city. One of their prophets proclaimed it as God's will that un-
believers should be expelled. This was done on 27th February, a.d.
1534. Seven deacons divided what was left among the believers. In
May the bishop laid siege to the city. This had the effect of confining
the mad disorder to Miinster. After the destruction of all images,
organs, and books, with exception only of the Bible, community of goods
was introduced. John of Leyden got the council set aside as required
by his revelations, and appointed a theocratic government of twelve
elders, who took their inspiration from the prophet. He proclaimed
polygamy, himself taking seventeen wives, while Eottmann contented
himself with four. In vain did the moral conscience of the inhabitants
protest. The objectors were executed. One of his fellow prophets pro-
claimed John king of the whole world. He set up a showy and expensive
establishment, and committed the most frightful abominations. He
regarded himself as called to inaugurate the millennium, sent out twenty-
eight apostles to extend his kingdom, and named twelve dukes who
should rule the world under him. The besiegers made an unsuccessful
attempt in August, a.d. 1534, to storm the city. Had not aid been sent
them before the end of the year from Hesse, Treves, Cleves, Mainz, and
Cologne, they would have been obliged to raise the siege. Even then
they could only think of reducing the city by famine. It was already in
great straits. On St. John's night, a.d. 1535, a deserter led the troops
§ 134. INCIDENTS OF THE YEAES A.D. 1537-1539. 281
to the walls. After a stubborn resistance the Anabaptists were beaten.
Rottmann threw himself into the hottest of the fight, and there perished.
John, with his chief officers, was taken prisoner, put to death with fright-
ful tortures on 22nd Jan., a.d. 1536, and then hung in chains from St.
Lambert's tower. Catholicism was thus restored to absolute supremacy.
7. Extension of the Sclimalcald League, A.D. 1536.— A war with France
had broken out in a.d. 1536, which taxed all the emperor's resources.
Francis I. had made a league with Soliman for a combined attack upon
the emperor. Instead therefore of punishing the Protestant princes for
their proceedings in "Wiirttemberg, he was obliged to do all he could to
conciliate them, as Francis was bidding for their alliance. Ferdinand
therefore, from the summer of a.d. 1585, sought to ingratiate himself
with the Protestants. In November he received a visit of the elector
in Vienna, and granted the extension of the Peace of Nuremberg to all
nobles who since its ratification had become Protestants. The elector
then went to an assembly at Schmalcald, where the Schmalcald League
was extended for ten years, the French embassy dismissed, and the
opposition to Austria abandoned. On the basis of the Vienna compact
Wiirttemberg, Pomeraoia, Anhalt, and several cities were added to the
league. Signature of the Augsburg Confession was the indispensable
condition of reception. Bucer managed to win over the upland cities to
accept this condition.
8. The Wittenberg Concordat of A.D. 1536.— Bucer and ultimately CEco-
lampadius, made such concessions on the doctrine of the sacraments as
satisfied Luther, but they were rejected by Bullinger of Ziirich, In
December, a.d. 1535, there was a conference at Cassel between Bucer
and Melanchthon. A larger conference was afterward held at Witten-
berg, at which Bucer and Capito from Strassburg, and eight other
distinguished theologians from the uplands, were present. As they
accepted the formula "in, with, and under," the only question remain-
ing was whether unbelievers partook of the body of Christ. They
admitted this in regard to the unworthy, but not, as Luther wished,
in regard to the godless and unbelieving. Luther was satisfied. On
25th May, a.d. 1536, Melanchthon composed the " Wittenberg Concord,"
which was signed by all, and ratified by the common partaking of the
sacrament. In consequence of this union effort, three of the Swiss
theologians, Bullinger, Myconius, and Grynaeus seceded, and produced
the Confessio Helvetica prior, in which the ZwingUan doctrine of the
sacraments was moderately but firmly maintained.
§ 134. Incidents of the Years a.d. 1537-1539.
Clement VII. made many excuses for postponing the calling
of a council. At last, in a.d. 1533, he declared himself
282 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
willing to do so in the course of the year ; but he required
of the Protestants unconditional acceptance of its decisions,
to which they would not agree. His successor, Paul III.,
A.D. 1534-1549, called one to meet at Mantua in a.d. 1537.
Luther composed for it as a manifesto the Schmalcald Arti-
cles ; but finally the Protestants renewed their demand for
a free council in a German city. In A.D. 1538 the Catholic
nobles concluded the Holy Alliance at Nuremberg for carry-
ing out the decrees of the Diet of Augsburg ; but the
political difficulties of the emperor compelled him to make
new concessions to the Protestants in the Frankfort Interim
of A.D. 1539. But in the same year the duchy of Saxony
and the electorate of Brandenburg went over to the Refor-
mation. By the beginning of a.d. 1540 almost, ail North
Germany was won. Duke Henry of Brunswick alone held
out for the old faith.
1. The Schmalcald Articles, A.D. 1537.— In a.d. 1535 Paul III. sent his
legate Vergerius (§ 139, 24) into Germany to fix a place of meeting for
the council. At Wittenberg lie conferred with Luther and Bugenhagen,
who scarcely expecting the council were indifferent as to the place. The
council was formally summoned to meet at Mantua on May 23rd, a.d.
1537. At a diet at Schmalcald in Feb., a.d. 1537, the Protestants stated
their demands. Luther, by the elector's orders, had drawn up the articles
of which the council must treat. These Schmalcald Articles are distinctly
polemical, and indicate boldly the limits of the papal hierarchy demanded
by evangelicals. The first part states briefly four uncontested positions
on the Trinity and the Person of Christ ; the second part deals with the
office and work of Christ or our redemption, and marks abruptly the
points of difference between the two confessions ; the third part treats
of those points which the council may further discuss. In the second
part Luther unconditionally rejected the primacy of the pope, as not
of Divine right and inconsistent with the character of a true evangelical
Church. When the articles had been subscribed by the theologians,
Melanchthon added under his name : "As to the pope, I hold that if he
will not oppress the gospel, for the sake of the peace and unity of those
Christians who are or may be under him, his superiority over bishops
jure liumano might be allowed by us." Melanchthon's tracts on "The
Power of the Pope" and the "Jurisdiction of Bishops" were also sub-
§ 134. INCIDENTS OF THE YEARS A.D. 1537-1539. 283
scribed by the theologians and added to the Schmalcald Articles. It
v.ras then decided that in order to secure a free Christian council it must
be held in a German city. The elector even made the bold proposal to
have a counter-council summoned, say, at Augsburg, by Luther and his
feUow bishops.
2. The League of Nuremberg, A.D. 1538. — The Protestant princes were
astonished at the close of the Schmalcald convention to be told by Vice-
Chancellor Held, on behalf of the emperor, that he did not recognise the
Peace of Cadau or the Vienna Compact, and that the prosecutions would
be resumed. They therefore resumed their old attitude of opposition.
But Held visited all the Catholic courts in order to complete the forma-
tion of a Catholic league for the suppression of Protestantism. Ferdinand,
who knew well that Held exceeded his instructions, was very angry, for
the emperor was in the greatest straits, but he could not offer direct
opposition without offending the Catholic princes. So on July 10th, a.d.
1538, the Holy Alliance was actually formed at Nuremberg, embracing
George of Saxony, Albert of Brandenburg, Henry and Eric of Brunswick,
King Ferdinand, and the Archbishop of Salzburg. The Schmalcald nobles
prepared to meet force with force. A general bloody engagement seemed
unavoidable.
3. The Frankfort Interim, A.D. 1539. — As the emperor needed help
against Soliman, he recalled Held, and sent in his place John, formerly
Archbishop of Leyden. The electors of Brandenburg and the Palatinate
went as mediators with the new envoy to Frankfort, where negotiations
were opened with the Protestants present, who demanded an uncon-
ditional, lasting peace, and a judiciary court with Protestant as well as
Catholic members. These demands were at first refused, but pressing
need obliged the emperor to reopen negotiations, proposing that a diet
should be held, consisting of learned theologians and simple, peaceable
laymen, to effect a final union of Christians in faith and worship. He
would also grant suspension of all proceedings against the Protestants
for eighteen months. The Protestants accepted in this " Frankfort
Interim" what had been greatly sought for at the Diet of Nuremberg.
It was a victory of the Schmalcald over the Nuremberg League. The
public confidence in Protestantism grew, and the cause rapidly spread
into new regions.
•1. The Reformation in Albertine Saxony, A.D. 1539. — Duke George
of Saxony, a.d. 1500-1539, was a devoted adherent of the old faith. Of
his four sons only one survived, and he almost imbecile. He had him
married, but he died two months after the marriage. The old prince
was in perplexity, for his brother Henry, an ardent supporter of the
Reformation, was his next heir. He could ill brook the idea of having
the whole work of his life immediately undone. On the day of the death
of his last son he proposed to his nobles a scheme of succession, accord-
284 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
ing to which his brother Henry should succeed him only if he joined the
Nuremberg League ; otherwise it should go to the emperor or the King
of Rome. Duke Henry rejected the proposal, and Duke George died
before he could produce another scheme. With loud rejoicing the people
received their new prince, and their allegiance was sworn to him at
Leipzig. Luther was there, for the first time for twenty years, and
preached with extraordinary success. The Reformation proceeded rapidly
throughout the whole district. The King of Rome wished indeed to
question George's claim, but the Schmalcald League resolved to stand
by him, so that Ferdinand thought it prudent to take no further
steps.
5. The Reformation in Brandenburg and Neighbouring States, A.D. 1539.
— Henry of Neumark joined the Schmalcald League, and introduced the
Reformation into his territories ; but his brother Joachim II. of Branden-
burg, A.D. 1535-1571, for several years adhered to the old faith without
forbidding evangelical preaching, which gradually made an impression
on his own mind. In the beginning of a.d. 1539, with the approval
of his nobles, he gave his adhesion to the reformed doctrines. The city
of Berlin asked for communion in both kinds, and a considerable section
of the nobles of Brandenburg expressed a hearty longing for the pure
gospel. On November 1st, a.d. 1539, Joachim assembled all the preachers
of his land in the Nicolai Church at Spandau, the Bishop of Brandenburg
held the first evangelical communion, and the whole court and many
knights received the communion in both kinds. The people followed
the example of the prince. Joachim sketched a service which let several
of the old ceremonies remain, but justification by faith was the central
point of the doctrine, and communion in both kinds the centre of the
worship. The Duchess Elizabeth of Calenberg-Brunswick followed her
brother's example. After the death of her husband Eric, who was other-
wise minded, she exercised her influence as regent for the spread of the
reformed religion. The Cardinal-archbishop and Elector of Mainz,
Albert of Brandenburg, sought to preserve his archiepiscopal diocese of
Magdeburg, but his constant calls for money would be responded to only
on condition that he granted liberty of preaching. At his Halle residence
he made vigorous resistance, but there too was obliged to yield. Before
his eyes, Justus Jonas, Luther's most trusted friend and fellow labourer,
Prof, and Provost of Wittenberg since a.d. 1521, carried on the work
of Reformation in the city. The cardinal, in a rage, left Halle and the
" idol of Halle " (§ 123, 8) for Mainz. — Mecklenburg also about this time
adopted the evangelical constitution, mainly promoted by one of its
princes, Magnus Bishop of Schwerin, The Abbess of Quedlinburg, Anna
von Stolberg, had not ventured, so long as Duke George of Saxony lived,
to bring forward her evangelical confession ; but now without opposition
she reformed her convent and the city.
§ 135. UNION ATTEMPTS OF A.D. 1540-1546. 285
§ 135. Union Attempts of a.d. 1540-1546.
The Frankfort Interim revived the idea of a free union
among those who in the main agreed upon matters of faith
and worship. With the object of realizing this idea a whole
series of religious conferences were held. But near as its
realization at one time seemed to be all the measures taken
proved one after another abortive, because the emperor
w^ould not recognise the conclusions of any conference at
which a papal legate was not present. And just at this
time, when the imposing might of the Protestant nobles
excited the brightest hopes, the Protestant princes them-
selves laid the grounds of their deepest humiliation: the
landgrave by his double marriage, and the elector by his
quarrels with the ducal Saxon court.
1. The DouWe Marriage of the Landgrave, A.D. 1540. — Landgrave
Philip of Hesse had married Christina, a daughter of the deceased Duke
George of Saxony. Various causes had led to an estrangement between
them, and a strong sensuous nature, which he had been unable to control,
had driven him to repeated acts of unfaithfulness. His conscience reproved
him ; he felt himself unworthy to be admitted to communion, great as
his desire for it was, and doubted of his soul's salvation. From regard
to his wife he could not think of a divorce. Then came the idea, suggested
by the O.T. polygamy that had not been abrogated in the N.T., that
with consent of his wife he might enter into a regular second marriage
with Margaret von der Saale, one of his sister's lady's-maids. In Nov.,
A.D. 1539, he sent Bucer to Wittenberg in order to get the advice of
Luther and Melanchthon. The alternative was either continued adultery,
or an honourable married Ufe with a second wife taken with consent of the
first. Luther and Melanchthon entreated him earnestly for his own and
for the gospel's sake to avoid this terrible scandal, but haltingly admitted
that the latter alternative was less heinously wicked than the former.
They added, however, that in order to avoid scandal the marriage should
be private, and their answer regarded not as a theological opinion, but
confidential counsel. The landgrave had the marriage consummated
in May, a.d. 1540. But the story soon spread. The court of Albertine
Saxony was deeply incensed, the elector beside himself with rage, the
theologians in most extreme embarrassment. Melanchthon started to
attend a religious conference at Hagenau, but the excitement over the
unhappy business prostrated him on a sick-bed at Weimar. The emperor
286 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
threatened Philip with the infliction of capital punishment, which by the
law of the empire was attached to the crime of bigamy. At last the
elector called a convention of Saxon and Hessian theologians at Eisenach
to consult about the matter. Luther refused to treat it as a question
of law, and demanded absolute privacy as the condition of permission.
Among the opponents of the Reformation, it was Duke Henry of Bruns-
wick who insisted upon exacting the utmost penalties of the law. He
indeed was least fitted by his own character to assume the part of de-
fender of morals. It was well known that he was then living in adultery
with Eva von Trott, after her pretended death and burial. In his per-
plexity, Philip turned to the imperial chancellor [Granvella, who was
willing to intercede for him, but on conditions to which the landgrave
could not accede. At last, at the Diet of Regensburg, in a.d. 1541,
Philip undertook to further the imperial interests and to join no union
in any way inimical to these ; and upon these terms the emperor agreed
to grant him a full indemnity.
2. The Eeligious Conference at Worms, A.D. 1540. — Negotiations for
peace with France having failed, the emperor still required the support
of the Protestant party. He therefore agreed to the holding of a religious
conference at Worms, in order to reach if possible a good mutual under-
standing on the basis of Holy Scripture. It was held in Nov., a.d. 1540,
under the j)residency of Granvella. On one side were Melanchthon,
Bucer, Capito, Brenz, and Calvin; on the other, Eck, Gropper, canon
of Cologne, the Spaniard Malvenda, etc. But the emperor had insisted
on the papal nuncio Marone taking part, and this, contrary to his inten-
tion, brought the whole affair to naught. For Marone first of all pre-
sented a number of formal objections, and when at last, in Jan., a.d.
1541, the conference began, and awakened the utmost apprehensions for
the papacy, he rested not till Granvella, even before the first article on
original sin had been discussed, dissolved the conference in the name
and by command of the emperor. But the emperor did not give up the
idea of conciliation, and called a diet at Regensburg, at which the nego-
tiations were to be renewed.
3. The Eeligious Conference at Regensburg, A.D. 1541.— The diet at
Regensburg was opened on April 5th, a.d. 1541. The emperor, anxious
to reach a peaceable conclusion, named as members of the conference
Eck, Gropper, and Julius von Pflugk, Dean of Meissen, on the one side ;
and Melanchthon, Bucer, and Pistorius, on the other side ; with Granvella
and Frederick, count-palatine, as presidents. The nuncio Contarini
was representative of the curia.. By such a gathering the emperor hoped
to reach the wished for conclusion. In Italy (§ 139, 22) there had sprung
up a number of men well instructed in Scripture, who sought to reform
the doctrine of the church by adopting the principle of justification by
faith without touching the primacy of the pope and the whole hierarchical
§ 135. UNION ATTEMPTS OF A.D. 1540-1546. 287
system. Contarini was one of the leaders of this party. He had come
to an understanding with the emperor that justification by faith, the use
of the cup in communion by the laity, and marriage of priests should
be allowed for Germany, and that, on the other hand, the Protestants
were to agree to the primacy of the pope. The justitia ijnputativa was
acknowledged by both parties ; and even when Contarini, on the basis
of that imputation, insisted upon a justitia inluerens, i.e. not merely
a declaring but a making righteous, seeing that he grounded it solely
on the merits of Christ, the Protestants acquiesced. Differences arose
over the doctrine of the church, which were reserved for another occasion.
And now they came to the sacrament of the altar. Communion in both
kinds was agreed to by both ; but trouble arose over the word tran-
substantiation. Not only Eck, who had opposed all concessions, but
even Contarini, who had his orders from Eome, would not yield. No
more would the Protestants. The conference had therefore to be dis-
solved. The emperor wished both parties to accept the articles agreed
on as a common standard, and to have toleration granted upon the
disputed points ; but the Catholic majority would not agree to this.
The Regensburg Interim, therefore, as the decision of the diet is usually
called, extends the Nuremberg Peace (§ 133, 2) to all presently members
of the Schmalcald League, and enforced upon Protestants only the
accepted articles.
4. The Regeasburg Declaration, A.D. 1541. — The emperor, in order
to satisfy the naturally dissatisfied Protestants, made a special declara-
tion, annulling the prosecutions decree of the Augsburg Diet and
relieving the adherents of the Augsburg Confession from all disabilities.
Also the injunction that no one should withhold their dues from the
clergy was extended to the Protestant ministers. But on the very day
when the declaration was issued the emperor held a private session with
the Catholic majority, in which the Nuremberg League was renewed and
the pope received into it. Thus he hoped to receive help from all
parties and to ward off internecine conflict till a more convenient season.
He concluded a separate treaty with the landgrave and the Elector
Joachim II., both undertaking to support imperial interests. The elector
expressly promised not to join the Schmalcald League ; and the land-
grave promised to oppose all consorting of the league not only wdth
foreign powers (England and France), but also with the Duke of Cleves,
with whom the emperor had a standing feud. In return the landgrave
was granted an amnesty for all previous delinquencies and undisturbed
liberty in matters of religion. The emperor's negotiations with the
Elector of Saxony broke down over the Cleves dispute, for the Duke of
Cleves was his brother-in-law.
5. The Naumburg Bishopric, A.D. 1541, 1542.— Since a.d. 1520 the
Lutheran doctrines had spread in the diocese of Xaumburg. When the
288 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
bishop died, in a.d. 1541, the chapter elected the learned and mild
provost Julius von Pflugk. But the elector regarded it as proper in
a Lutheran state to have a Lutheran bishop, and so refused to confirm
Pflugk's appointment, and had Nic. von Arnsdorf (§ 127, 4) ordained bishop
by Luther, in a.d. 1542, " without chrism, butter, suet, lard, tar, grease,
incense, and coals." The civil administration of the diocese was com-
mitted to an electoral officer ; Arnsdorf was satisfied with the small
income of 600 florins and the rest of the revenues were applied to pious
uses. After the battle of Miihlberg, in a.d. 1547, Arnsdorf was expelled
and Pflugk restored. On his death in 1564, the chapter, though then
Lutheran, did not restore Arnsdorf, but gave over the administration to
a Saxon prince. The elector's violent procedure in this case caused
great offence to the Albertine court. Duke Henry had died in a.d. 1541,
and was succeeded by his son Maurice. The elector and the young duke
quarrelled over a question of jurisdiction, and it was only with great
difficulty that Luther and the landgrave managed to effect a peace-
ful solution of the dispute. But the mutual estrangement and rivalry
between the courts soon afterwards broke out in a violent form.
6. The Eeformation in Brunswick and the Palatinate, A.D. 1542-1546. —
Duke Henry of Brunswick accused the city of Goslar of the destruction
of two monasteries, and in spite of all the concessions to Protestants the
court pronounced the ban against the city, and empowered Henry to
carry it out. The elector and the landgrave, acting for the Schmalcald
League in defence of the city, entered Henry's territory in a.d. 1542
and conquered it. The gospel was now preached, and an evangelical
constitution was given to Brunswick by Bugenhagen. This completed
the conquest of North Germany for the gospel. — In South Germany
Regensburg received the Reformation in a.d. 1542 ; but Bavaria, owing
to Ferdinand's influence, gave no place to the heretics. In the Upper
Palatinate evangelical preachers had for a long time been tolerated.
The young prince of the Neuburg Palatinate in a.d. 1543 called Osiander
from Nuremburg, and joined the Schmalcald League. The Elector-
palatine Louis died in a.d. 1543. His brother Frederick II., who suc-
ceeded him was not unfavourable to the Reformation, and formally
introduced it into his dominions in a.d. 1546. Even in Austria evan-
gelical views made such advance that Ferdinand neither could nor would
attempt those violent measures that he had previously tried.
7. The Reformation in the Electorate of Cologne, A.D. 1542-1544.—
Hermann von Weid (§ 133, 5), Archbishop and Elector of Cologne, now
far advanced in life, by the study of Luther's Bible had convinced him-
self of the scripturalness of the Augsburg Confession. He resolved to
reform his province in accordance with God's word. At the Bonn
Assembly of March, a.d. 1542, he made known his plan, and found
himself supported by his nobles. He invited Bucer to inaugurate the
5 185. UNION ATTEMPTS OF A,D. 1540-1546. 289
work, aud he was soon joiuecl by Melauclitlion. In July, a.d. 1543,
the elector laid before the nobles his Eeformation scheme, and they
unanimously accepted it. The cathedral chapter and the university
opposed it in the interests of the papacy ; also the Cologne council from
fear of losing their authority. Nevertheless the movement advanced,
and it was hoped that the opposition would gradually be overcome.
Cologne was to remain after as before an ecclesiastical principality, but
with an evangelical constitution. The Bishop of Miinster prepared to
follow the example, and had the work in Cologne been lasting, certainly
many others would have pursued the same course.
8. The Emperor's Difficulties, A.D. 1543, 1544.— Soliman in a.d. 1541
had overrun Hungary, converted the principal church into a mosque,
and set a pasha over the whole land, which now became a Turkish
province. Aid against the Turks was voted at a diet at Spires in the
beginning of a.d. 1542, and the Protestants were left unmolested for five
years after the conclusion of the war. The campaign against the Turks
led by Joachim II. was unsuccessful. Meanwhile new troubles arose with
France, and Soliman prepared for a second campaign. The emperor
now summoned a diet to meet at Nuremberg, Jan., a.d, 1543. Ferdi-
nand was willing to grant to the Protestants the Eegensburg Declara-
tion, but \\'illiam of Bavaria would rather see the whole world perish
or the crescent ruling over all Germany. In summer of a.d, 1543 the
emperor was beset with dangers from every side; France .attacked the
Netherlands, Soliman conquered Grau, the Danes closed the Sound
against the subjects of the emperor, a Turco-French fleet held sway in
the Mediterranean and had already taken Nizza, and the Protestants
were assuming a threatening attitude. Christian III. of Denmark and
Gustavus Vasa of Sweden asked to be received into the Schmalcald
League. The Duke of Cleves, too, broke his truce. This roused the
emperor most of all. He rushed down upon Cleves and Gelderland,
and conquered them, and restored Catholicism. The emperor's circum-
stances now improved : Cleves was quieted ; Denmark and England came
to terms with him. But his most dangerous enemies, Soliman and
Francis I., were still in arms. He could not yet dispense with the
powerful support of the Protestants.
9. Diet at Spires, A.D. 1544. — In order to get help against the Turks
and French, at the Diet of Spires, in Feb., a.d. 1544, the emperor
relieved the Protestants of all disabilities, promised a genuine, free
Christian council to settle matters in dispute, and, in case this should
not succeed, in next autumn a national assembly to determine matters
definitely without pope or council. The emperor promised to propose
a scheme of Eeformation, and invited the other nobles to bring forward
schemes. After such concessions the Protestants went in heartily with
the emperor's political projects. He wished first of all help against the
19
290 CHURCH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Freneli. In the same year the emperor led against France an army
composed mostly of Protestants, and in Sept., a.d. 1544, obliged the king
to conclude the Peace of Crespy. The Turks had next to be dealt with,
and the Protestants were eager to show their devotion to tlae emperor.
In prospect of the national assembly the Elector of Saxony set his
theologians to the composition of a plan of Reformation. This docu-
ment, known as the " Wittenberg Reformation," allows to the prelates
their siJiritual and civil functions, their revenues, goods, and jurisdiction,
the right of ordination, visitation, and discipline, on condition that
these be exercised in an evangelical spirit.
10. Differences between the Emperor and the Protestant Nobles, A.D.
1545, 1546. — The pope by calling a council to meet at Trent sowed seeds
of discord between the emperor and the Protestants. The emperor's
proposals of reform were so far short of the demands of the Protestants
that they were unanimously rejected. The Reformation movement in
Cologne had seriously imperilled the imperial government of the Nether-
lands. An attempt of Henry to reconquer Brunswick was frustrated by
the combined action of the Landgrave of Hesse and the Duke of Saxony.
Frederick II., elector-palatine, began to reform his provinces and to
seek admission to the Schmalcald League. Four of the six electors
had gone over, and the fifth, Sebastian, who after Albert's death in a.d.
1545 had been, by Hessian and Palatine influence, made Elector of
Mainz, had just resolved to follow their example. All these things had
greatly irritated the emperor. He concluded a truce with the Turks
in Oct., A.D. 1545, and arranged with the pope, who pledged his whole
possessions and crown, for the campaign against the heretics. On 13th
Dec, A.D. 1545, the pope opened the Council of Trent, and made it no
secret that it was intended for the destruction of the Protestants. The
emperor attempted to get the Protestants to take part. In Jan., a.d.
1546, a conference was held in which Cochlteus (§ 129, 1) and others
met with Bucer, Brenz, and Major ; but it was soon dissolved, owing to
initial differences. The horrible fratricide committed at Neuburg upon
a Spaniard, Juan Diaz, showed the Protestants how good Catholics
thought heretics must be dealt with. The murderer was seized, but by
order of the pope to the Bishop of Trent set again at liberty. He
remained unpunished, but hanged himself at Trent a.d. 1551.
11. Luther's Death, A.D. 1546. — Luther died at Eisleben in his G3rd
year on 18th Feb., 1546. During his last years he was harassed with
heavy trials. The political turn that affairs had taken was wholly
distasteful to him, but he was powerless to prevent it. In Wittenberg
itself much was done not in accordance with his will. Wearied with
his daily toils, suffering severe pain and consequent bodily weakness, he
often longed to die in peace. In the beginning of a.d. 1546 the Counts
of Mansfeld called him to Eisleben in order to compose differences
§ 136. SCHMALCALD WAE, INTEEIM, AND COUNCIL. 291
between them by bis impartial judgment. In order to perform this
business he spent the three last weeks of his life in his birthplace, and,
with scarcely any previous illness, on the night of the 18th Feb., he
peacefully fell asleep in Jesus. His body was taken to Wittenberg and
there buried in the castle church.
§ 136. The Schmalcald War, the Interim, and the
Council, a.d. 1546-1551.
All attempts at agreement in matters of religion were at
an end. The pope, however, had at last convened a council
in a German city. The emperor hoped to conciliate the
Protestants by bringing about a reformation after a fashion,
removing many hierarchical abuses, conceding the marriage
of the clergy, the cup to the laity, and even perhaps accepting
the doctrine of justification. But he soon came to a rupture
with the Protestants, and war broke out before the Schmalcald
Leaguers were prepared for it. Their power, however, was
far superior to that of the emperor ; but through needless
scruples, delays, and indecision they let slip the opportunity
of certain victory. The power of the league was utterly
destroyed, and the emperor's powxr reached the summit of
its strength. All Southern Germany was forced to submit
to the hated interim, and in North Germany only the out-
lawed Magdeburg ventured to maintain, in spite of the
emperor, a pure Protestant profession.
1. Preparations for the Schmalcald War, A.D. 1546. — In consequence of
variances among the members of the league the emperor conceived a
plan of securing allies from among the Protestants themselves by a
judicious distribution of favours. The Margrave Hans of Ciistrin and
Duke Eric of Brunswick, the one cousin, the other son-in-law, of the
exiled and imprisoned Duke of Wolfenbiittel, were ready to take part in
war against the robbers of their friend's dominions. Much more eager,
however, was the emperor to win over the young Duke Maurice of
Saxony. He tempted him with the promise of the electorate and the
greater part of the elector's territory, and was successful. The emperor
could not indeed formally release any of them from submission to the
council, but he promised in any case to reserve for their countries the
21)'J ciniiicii iiis'iM)iiv ov 'v\\\'] srxT]':j<:N'rir (;i<:ntuuv.
doctiino of juHlidciiiioi), ilio cup in lay communion, and tlio marriago of
pricKtH. Now wli(!ii lie wan siiro of Miiurico tlic (iiiip(!r()i' j)rococdcd
ojxMily witli liiH pr(4)amiions, and made no wjcnit of liin intention to
pimiish those priiiccH wiio liad (los])iHcd liiH imi)Oi'ial autliority and taken
to tlicniHulvoB tlio possoHHionH of otlicrH. 'JMio Schmalcald Loaf^'iiors
could nolon}j;cr deceive tlionisolves, and so thoy bo^'iin tlioir iiroparations.
With Kiicli ii,n open hrcu-ch l.li(f J )icl, ol' Kc^^cnshiiiv cndiid in Jiiiic, a.d.
in JO.
y. The Cain i)aif:,ni on tlic Danube, A.D. 154G. Sc-hiiitlin, at tlu^ lioid of
a powf^rl'iil iuiiiy, ('.onid liavo attacked tlu! ciupcior or tiikcii l\\<: Tyiol ;
hut tli(! coiiiicil of war, liHtoning to William of i'.iLvni'iii,, who pn.fcHKcd
n(!nti-ality, and hoping to win over Ferdinand, foolishly ordered d(!ln,y.
Thus the emperor gained time to collect an arjny. On 20th -Juno, ad.
miC), he issued from Kegensburg a ban against the Landgrave riiilip and
the Elector John Fredcsrick as oath-breaking vassals. These princes
at the head of their forces had joined Schiirtlin at ])onauw()iah. I'apal
d(!Spatch(!H fell into their hands, in which the pope proclaimed a ciusado
for tli(' rootin;; out of heretics, ])romising indulgence to all who would
aid in the work. I'atal indecision still prevailed in the couiujil of wai',
and winter came on without a battle being fought. The neWs that
Maurice liad taken i)ossession of the elector's domains hid the landgrave
and the ex-elector to return liome, andHchiirtlin, for want of money aiul
ammunition, was unable to face a winter campaign in Fianconia, Thus
the whole country lay open to the eitii)ei'or. One city after another
accepted terms more or less severe. In the beginning of a.d. 1547 he
was master of all Southern Germany. Now at last he put an end to the
Cologne movement {^ liJ5, 7). Tlu; pope had issued the ban against the
archbishop in a.t>. 151(), and now tin; emperor luul the former coadjutor
proclaimed archbishop and elector, in spite of the opposition of the nobles,
Hermann was willing to secure the religious peace of his dominions by
resignation, but this was refused, and being too weak to offer resistance
he resigned unconditionally. Thus tlu; Khiue ])rovin(',(!S wen; irretrievably
lost to I'rotostantism.
:{. The Campaign on the Elbe, A.D. 1547. After ra|)idly reconquering
his own teri'itories, the l''il(;c,toi' .Joini Fred(!rick hast(!ned with a con-
siderable army to meet his enemy. At Miihlb(!rg he suddenly came upcm
th(! enip(!ror's forces. There scarcely was a battle. His comparatively
sniiill iirniaiiient melted away Ih^Ioio the superioi' ninnhcis of the imperial
host, and the elector was taken jtrif^oner on 2lth A])iil, a.d. ].'j47. Ho
luid already been sentenced to death as a rebel and heretic. Jt was
deemed more prudent to require of liim only the surrender of his I'oilresses,
The i)ious ]n-incc willingly resigned all tem])oral dignities, hut in matters
of religion ho was inllexibh;. He was sentenced to lif(;-long im))rison-
uient and his possessions wore mostly given to Maurice. The Landgrave
§ 136. SCHMALCALD WAR, INTERIM, AND COUNCIL. 293
Philip, for want of money, ammunition, and troops, had been prevented
from doing anything. The news of John Frederick's misfortunes brought
him ahnost to despair. Too powerless to offer opposition, he surrendered
at discretion to the emperor. He was to prostrate himself before the
emperor, surrender all his fortresses, neither now nor in future suffer
enemies of the emperor in bis lands, and for all his life to renounce all
leagues, to liberate Henry of Brunswick and restore him to his dominions.
The ceremony of prostration was performed at Halle on 19th July. The
two electors with the landgrave then went by invitation to a supper
with the Duke of Alba. After supper the duke declared the landgrave
his prisoner. The elector's remonstrances then with Alba and next
day with the imperial councillors were all in vain. The emperor was
equally deaf to all representations.
4. The Council of Trent, A.D. 1545-1547.— The Council of Trent opened
in Dec, a.d. 1515 (§ 149, 2). At the outset, contrary to the emperor's
wishes, the pope laid down conditions that excluded Protestants from
taking part in it. Scripture and tradition were first discussed. The
O.T. Apocrypha (§§ 59, 1 ; 160, 8) had equal authority assigned it with
the other books of the 0. and N.T., and the Vulgate was declared to be
the only authentic text for theological discussions and sermons. Tradi-
tion was placed on equal terms alongside of Scripture, but its contents
were carefully defined. Original sin was extinguished by baptism, and
after baptism there is only actual transgression. The scholastic doctrine
of justification was sanctioned anew, but accommodated as far as possible
to Scripture phraseology ; justification is the inward actual change of a
sinner into a righteous man, not merely the forgiveness of sins, but
pre-eminently the sanctification and renewal of the inner man. It is
effected, not so much by the imputation of Christ's merits, as by the
infusion of habitual righteousness, which enables men to win salvation by
works. It is not forensic, but a physical act of God, is wrought not once
for all, and not by faith alone, but gradually by the free co-operation of the
man. The emperor, who saw in these decisions the overthrow of his
attempts at conciliation, was highly displeased, and wished at least to
postpone^their promulgation. The pope obeyed for a time ; but when the
emperor threatened to interfere in the proceedings of the council, he
had the decrees published, Jan., a.d. 1547, and some weeks after, on the
plea of a dangerous plague having broken out, removed the council to
Bologna, where for the time proceedings were suspended.
5. The Augsburg Interim, A.D. 1548. — ^At a diet at Augsburg in Sept.,
A.I). 1547, the Protestants declared themselves willing to submit to a
council meeting again at Trent, and beginning afresh ; but as the pope
refused this, the emperor was obliged to plan an interim, which should
form a standard for all parties till a settlement at a proper council
should be reached. It granted the cup to the laity and marriage of
294 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
priests, but held by the Tridentine doctrine of justification. It repre-
sented the pope as simply the highest bishop, in whom the unity of
the church is visibly set forth. The right of interpreting Scripture
was given exclusively to the church. The sacraments were enumerated
as seven, and the doctrine of transubstantiation emphatically main-
tained. The duty of fasting, and seeking the intercession of the mother
of God and the saints, observing all Catholic ceremonies of worship,
processions, festivals, etc., was strictly insisted upon. The emperor
was satisfied, and so too some of the Protestant princes. Maurice, how-
ever, felt that his people would not agree to its adoption. He gave at
last a half assent, which the emperor accepted as approval. The emperor
took no notice of those who opposed it, the presence of his Spaniards
in their dominions would prevent all trouble. The emperor was not
strong enough to force the Catholic nobles to accept his interim,''and so
its observance was to be binding only on the Protestants. Landgrave
Philip, whose power was for ever broken, gave in, but nothing in the world
would induce the noble John Frederick to submit. The pope too refused
persistently to recognise the interim, and only in Aug., a.d. 15-19, did he
allow the bishops to agree to the concessions made by it to the Protestants.
6. The Execution of the Interim had on all sides to be compulsorily
enforced. Nuremberg, Augsburg, Ulm were one after another coerced
into adopting it. Constance resisted, was put under the ban, and lost all
privileges, till at last instead of the interim the papacy found entrance,
and evangelical Protestantism got its death-blow. The other cities sub-
mitted to the inevitable. All preachers refusing the interim were exiled
and persecuted. Over 400 true servants of the word wandered with
wives and children through South Germany homeless and without bread.
Frecht of Ulm was taken in chains to the emperor's camp. Brenz, one
of the most determined opponents of the interim, during his wanderings
often by a miracle escaped capture. Much more lasting was the opposi-
tion in North Germany. In Magdeburg, still lying under the imperial
ban, the fugitive opponents of the interim gathered from all sides, and
there alone was the press still free in its utterances against the interim.
A flood of controversial tracts, satires, and caricatures were sent out
over all Germany. In Hesse and Brandenburg the princes were unable
to enforce the obnoxious measures ; still less could Maurice do so in the
electorate.
7. The Leipzig- or Little Interim, A.D. 1549. — Maurice in his difficulties
sent for Melanchthon. Since the death of Luther and the overthrow of
John Frederick of Saxony, Melanchthon's tendency to yield largely for
peace' sake had lost its wholesome checks. In writing to the minister
Carlo witz, the bitterest foe of Luther and the elector, he even went so
far as to complain of Luther's combativeness. The result of various
negotiations was the drawing up of a document at the assembly in Leipzig,
§ 136. SCHMALCALD WAE, INTERIM, AND COUNCIL. 295
22nd December, a.d. 1518, by tlie Wittenberg theologians in accordance
with the views of Melanchthon. This modified interim became the stan-
dard for rehgious practice in Saxony, and a directory of worship in
harmony with it was drawn up by the theologians, and published in July,
A.D. 1549. Calvin and Brenz wrote letters that cut Melanchthon to the
heart. The measure was everywhere viewed by zealous Lutherans with
indignation, and the Interim of Leipzig was even more hateful to the
people than that of Augsburg. Imprisonment and exile were vigorously
carried out by means of it, yet the revolution and ferment continued to
increase. — The Leipzig Interim treated Romish customs and ceremonies
almost as things indifferent, passed over many less essential doctrinal
differences, and gave to fundamental differences such a setting as might
be applied equally to the pure evangelical doctrine as to that of the
Augsburg Interim. The evangelical doctrine of justification was essen-
tially there, but it was not decidedly and unambiguously expressed; and
still less were Romish errors sharply and unmistakably repudiated.
Good works were said to be necessary, but not in the sense that one
could win salvation by means of them. Whether good works in excess
of the law's demands could be performed was not explicitly determined.
On church and hierarchy, the positions of the Augsburg Interim were
simply restated. To the pope as the highest bishop, as well as to the
other bishops, who performed their duties according to God's will for
edification and not destruction, all churchmen were to yield obedience.
The seven sacraments were acknowledged, though in another than the
Romish sense. In the mass the Latin language was again introduced.
Images of saints were allowed, but not for worship ; so too the festivals of
Mary and of Corpus Christi, but without processions, etc.
8. The Council again at Trent, A.D. 1551.— In September, a.d. 1549,
Paul III. dissolved the council at Bologna, where it had done nothing.
His successor, Julius IIL, a.d. 1550-1555, the nominee of the imperial
party, acceded to the emperor's washes to have the council again held at
Trent. The Protestant nobles declared their willingness to recognise it,
but demanded the cancelling of the earlier proceedings, a seat and vote
for their representatives. This the emperor was prepared to grant, but
the pope and prelates would not agree. The council began its proceed-
ings on 1st May, a.d. 1551, with the doctrine of the Lord's Supper.
Meanwhile the Protestants prepared a new confession, which might form
the basis of their discussions in the council. Melanchthon, who was
beginning to take courage again, sketched the Confessio Saxonica, or,
as it has been rightly named, the Repetitlo Covfessionis Augustana, in
which no trace of the indecision and ambiguity of the Leipzig Interim
is to be found. The pure doctrine is set forth firmly, with even a
polemical tone, though in a moderate and conciliatory manner. Brenz,
who had been in hiding up to this time, by order of Duke Christopher
296 CHURCH HISTOBY OP THS SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
of Wiirtteinberg, sketched for a like purpose the " Wiirttemberg Con-
fession." In November, a.d. 1551, the first Protestants, lay delegates
from Wiirttemberg and Strassburg, appeared in Trent. They were
followed in January by Saxon statesmen. On 24th January, a.d. 1552,
these laid their credentials before the council, but, notwithstanding all
the effort of the imperial commissioners, they could not gain admission.
In March the Wiii'ttemberg and Strassburg theologians arrived, with
Brenz at their head, and Melanchthon, with two Leipzig preachers, was
on the way, when suddenly Maurice put an end to all their well con-
certed plans.
§ 137a. Maurice and the Peace of Augsburg,
A.D. 1550-1555.
In the beginning of A.D. 1550 tlie affairs of the Preforma-
tion were in a worse condition than ever before. In the
fetters of the interim, it was like a felon on whom the death
sentence was about to be passed. Then just at the right
time appeared the Elector Maurice as the man who could
break the fetters and lead on again to power and honour.
His betrayal of the cause had brought Protestantism to the
verge of destruction ; his betrayal of the emperor proved its
salvation. The Compact of Passau guaranteed to Protest-
ants full religious liberty and equal rights with Catholics
until a new council should meet. The Heligious Peace of
Augsburg removed even this limitation, and brought to a
conclusion the history of the Grerman Reformation.
1. The State of Matters in A.D. 1550.— It was a doleful time for Germany.
The emperor at the height of his power was laying his plans for securing
the succession in the imperial dignity to his sou Philip of Spain. In
a bold, autocratic spirit he trampled on all the rights of the imperial
nobles, and contrary to treaty he retained the presence of Spanish troops
in the empire, which daily committed deeds of atrocious violence. The
deliverance of the landgrave was stubbornly refused, though all the
conditions thereof were long ago fulfilled. Protestant Germany groaned
under the yoke of the interim ; the council would only confirm this, if
not rather enforce something even worse. Only one bulwark of evan-
gelical liberty stood in the emperor's way, the brave, outlawed Magde-
burg. Lut how could it continue to hold out ? Down to autumn, a.d.
1552, all attempts to storm the city had failed. Then Maurice under-
§ 137a. maueice and the peace op augsburg. 297
took, by the order of the emperor and at the cost of the emph-e, to
execute the ban.
2. The Elector Maurice, A.D. 1551.— Maurice had lost the hearts of his
own people, and was regarded with detestation by the Protestants of
Germany, and notwithstanding imperial favour his position was by no
means secure. Yet he was too much of the German and Protestant
prince to view with favour the emperor's proceedings, while he felt
indignant at the illegal detention of his father-in-law. In these circum-
stances he resolved to betray the emperor, as before he had betrayed
to him the cause of Protestantism. A master in dissimulation, he con-
tinued the siege of Magdeburg with all diligence, but at the same time
joined a secret league with the Margrave Hans of Ciistrin and Albert
of Fraucouian Brandenburg, as also with the sons of the landgrave, for
the restoration of evangelical and civil libert}', and entered into negotia-
tions with Henry II. of France, who undertook to aid him with money.
Magdeburg at last capitulated, and Maurice entered on 4th November,
A.D. 1551. Arrears of pay formed an excuse for not disbanding the
imperial troops, and, strengthened by the Magdeburg garrison and the
auxiliary troops of his allies, he threw off the mask, and issued public
proclamations in which he brought bitter charges against the emperor,
and declared that he could no longer lie under the feet of priests and
Spaniards. The emperor in vain appealed for help to the Catholic
princes. He found himself without troops or money at Innsbriick, which
could not stand a siege, and every road to his hereditary territories
seemed closed, for where the leagued German princes were not the
Ottomans on sea and the French on land were ready to oppose him.
Maurice was already on the way to Innsbriick " to seek out the fox in
his hole." But his troops' demands for pay detained him, and the
emperor gained time. On a cold, wet night he fled, though not yet re-
covered from fever, over the mountains covered with snow, and found
refuge in Villach. Three days after Maurice entered Innsbriick; the
council had already dissolved.
.3. The Compact of Passau, A.D. 1552.— Before the flight of the emperor
from Innsbriick, Maurice had an interview with Ferdinand at Linz,'
where, besides the liberation of the landgrave, he demanded a German
national assembly for religious union, and till it met unconditional
toleration. The emperor, notwithstanding all his embarrassments,
would not listen to the proposal. Negotiations were reopened at Passau,
and Maurice's proposals were in the main accepted. Ferdinand con-
sented, but the emperor would not. Ferdinand himself travelled to
Villach and employed all his eloquence, but unconditional toleration the
emperor would not grant. His stubbornness conquered ; the majority
gave in, and accepted a compact which gave to the Protestants a full
amnesty, general peace, and equal rights, till the meeting of a national
298 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
or oecumenical council, to be arranged for at the next diet. Meanwhile
the emperor had made great preparations. Frankfort was his main
stronghold, and against it Maurice now advanced, and began the siege.
Matters were not promising, when the Passau delegate appeared in his
camp with the draft of the terms of peace. Had he refused his signa-
ture, the ban would have been pronounced against him, and his cousin
would have been restored to the electorate. He therefore subscribed
the document. With difficulty Ferdinand secured the subscription of the
emperor, who believed himself to be sufficiently strong to carry on the
battle. The two imprisoned princes were now at last liberated, and the
preachers exiled by the interim were allowed to return. John Frederick
died in a.d. 1554, and the Landgrave Philip in a.d. 1567.
4, Death of Maurice, A.D. 1553.— The Margrave Albert of Brandenburg
had been Maurice's comrade in the Schmalcald war, and with him also he
turned against the emperor. But after the ratification of the Passau
Compact, to which he was not a party, Albert continued the war against
the prelates and their principalities. He now fell out with Maurice, and
was taken into his service by the emperor, who not only granted him
an amnesty for all his acts of spoliation and breaches of the truce, but
promised to enforce recognition of him from all the bishops. Albert
therefore helped the emperor against the French, and then carried his
conquests into Germany. Soon an open rupture occurred between him
and Maurice. In the battle of Sievershausen Maurice gained a brilliant
victory, but received a mortal wound, of which he died in two days.
Albert fled to France. The rude soldier was broken down by misfortune,
the religious convictions of his youth awakened, and the composition of
a beautiful and well-known German hymn marks the turning point in his
life. He died in a.d. 1557.— The year 1554 was wholly occupied with
internal troubles. A desire for a lasting peace prevailed, and the cala-
mities of both parties brought Protestants and Catholics nearer to one
another. Even Henry of Brunswick was willing to tolerate Protestantism
in his dominions.
5. The Religious Peace of Augsburg, A.D. 1555.— When the diet met
at Augsburg in February, a.d. 1555, the emperor's power was gone. To
save his pride and conscience he renounced all share in its proceedings
in favour of his brother. The Protestant members stood well together
in claiming unconditional religious freedom, and Ferdinand inclined to
their side. Meanwhile Pope Julius died, and the cardinals Morone and
Truchsess hasted from the diet to Rome to take part in the papal
election. The Catholic opposition was thus weakened in the diet. The
Protestants insisted that the peace should apply to all who might in
future join this confession. This demand gave occasion to strong
contests. At last the simple formula was agreed upon, that no one
should be interfered with on account of the Augsburg Confession. But
§ 137b. GERMANY AFTER THE RELIGIOUS PEACE. 299
a more vehement dispute arose as to what should happen if prelates
or spiritual princes should join the Protestant party. This was a vital
question for CathoHcism, and acceptance of the Protestant view would
be its deathblow. It was therefore proposed that every prelate who went
over would lose, not only his spiritual rank, but also his civil dominion.
But the opposition would not give in. Both parties appealed to Ferdi-
nand, and he delayed giving a decision. Advice was also asked about
the peace proclamation. The Protestants claimed that the judges of the
imperial court should be sworn to observe the Religious Peace, and should
be chosen in equal numbers from both religious parties. On 30tli Aug.
Ferdinand stated his resolution. As was expected, he went with the
Catholics in regard to prelates becoming Protestants, but, contrary to
all expectations, he also refused lasting unconditional peace. On this
last point, however, he declared himself on 6th Sept. willing to yield
if the Protestants would concede the point about the prelates. They
sought to sell their concession as dearly as possible by securing to
evangelical subjects of Catholic princes the right to the free exercise of
their religion. But the Catholic prelates, on the ground of the territorial
system (§ 126, 6) advocated by the Protestants themselves, would not
give in. It was finally agreed that every noble in matters of religion
had territorial authority, but that subjects of another faith, in case of
the free exercise of their religion being refused, should have guaranteed
unrestricted liberty to withdraw without loss of honour, property, or
freedom. On 25th Sept., a.d. 1555, the decrees of the diet were pro-
mulgated. The Reformed were not included in the Religious Peace ;
this was first done in the Peace of Westphalia (§ 153, 2).
§ 137b. GrERMAXY AFTER THE RELIGIOUS PeACE.
The political importance of the Protestant princes was
about equal to that of the Catholics ; the Electors of
Cologne, Mainz, and Treves were not more powerful than
those of Saxony, the Palatinate, and Brandenburg; and the
great array of Protestant cities, with almost all the minor
princes, were not behind the combined forces of Austria
and Bavaria. The maintenance of the peace was assigned
to a legally constituted corporation of Catholic and Protes-
tant nobles, which held power down to a.d. 1806. The hope
of reaching a mutual understanding on matters of religion
was by no means abandoned, but the continuance of the
peace was to be in no way dependent upon its realization.
300 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
A new attempt to effect a union, which like all previous
efforts ended in failure, was soon made in the Worms
Consultation. Equally unsuccessful was a union project
of the emperor Ferdinand I. Protestantism could get no
more out of the Catholic princes. A second attempt to
protestantize the Cologne electorate broke down as the first
had done (§ 130, 2).
6. The Worms Consultation, A.D. 1557. — Another effort was matle after
the failure of the council in the interests of union. Catholic and
Protestant delegates under the presidency of Pflugk met at Worms in a.d.
1557. At a preliminary meeting the princes of Hesse, Wiirttemburg, and
the Palatinate adopted the Augsburg Confession as bond of union and
standard for negotiations. The Saxon delegates insisted upon a distinct
repudiation of the interim and the insertion of other details, which gave
the Catholics an excuse for putting an end to the negotiations. They
had previously expressly refused to acknowledge Scripture as the uncon-
ditional and sole judge of controversies, as that was itself a matter in
dispute (§ 136, 4).
7. Second Attempt at Eeformation in the Electorate of Cologne, A.D. 1582.
— The Archbishop and Elector of Cologne, Gebhard Truchsess of Wald-
burg went over in a.d. 1582 to the Protestant Church, married the
Countess Agnes of Mansfeld, proclaimed religious freedom, and sought
to convert his ecclesiastical principality into a temporal dominion. His
plan was acceptable to nobles and people, but the clergy of his diocese
opposed it with all their might. The pope thundered the ban against
him, and Emperor Rudolph II. deposed him. The Protestant princes
at last deserted him, and the newly elected archbishop, Duke Ernest of
Bavaria, overpowered him by an armed force. The issue of Gebhard's
attempt struck terror into other prelates who had been contemplating
similar moves.
8. The German Emperor Ferdinand I., a.d. 1556-1564, conciliatory
toward Protestantism, thoroughly dissatisfied with the Tridentine Council,
once and again made attempts to secure a union, which all ended in
failure. Maximilian II., a.d. 1564-1576, imbued by his tutor, Wolfgang
Severus, with an evangelical spirit, which was deepened under the influ-
ence of his physician Crato von Crafftheim (§ 141, 10), gave perfect liberty
to the Protestants in his dominions, admitted them to many of the
higher and lower offices of state, kept down the Jesuits, and was pre-
vented from himself formally going over to l*rotestantism only by his
political relations with Spain and the Catholic princes of the empire.
These relations, however, led to the adoption of half measures, out of
§ 138. THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND. 1)01
which afterwards sprang the Thirty Years' War. His son Eudolpli II., a.d.
1576-1612, educated by Jesuits at the Spanish court, gave again to that
order unHmited scope, injured the Protestants on every side, and was
only prevented by indecision and cowardice from attempting the complete
suppression of Protestantism.
§ 138. The Eeformation in French Switzerland .i
In French Switzerland the Reformation appeared some-
what later, but in essentially the same form as in German
Switzerland. Its special character was given it by Far el
and Viret, the successors of Calvin. The powerful genius of
Calvin secured for his views victory over Zwinglianism in
Switzerland, and won the ascendency for them in the other
Reformed Churches.
1. Calvin's Predecessors, A.D. 1526-1535.— William Farel, the pupil and
friend of the liberal exegete Faber Stapulensis (§ 120, 8), was born in
A.D. 1189 at Gap in Dauphine. When in a.d. 1521 the Sorboune con-
demned Luther's doctrines and writings, he was obliged, as a suspected
adherent of Luther, to quit Paris. He retired to Meaux, w4iere he was
well received by Bishop Bri(^onnet, but so boldly preached the reformed
doctrines, that even the bishop, on renewed complaints being made,
neither could nor would protect him. He then withdrew to Basel
(§ 130, 3). His first permanent residence was at Neuchatel, where in
November, a.d. 1530, the Reformation was introduced by his influence.
He left Neuchatel in a.d. 1532 in order to work in Geneva. But the civil
authorities there could not protect him against the bishop and clergy.
He was obliged to leave the city, but Saunier, Fromant, and Olivetan
(§ 143, 5) continued the work in his spirit. A revolution took place ;
the bishop thundered his ban against the refractory council, and the
senate replied by declaring his office forfeited. Farel now returned to
Geneva, a.d. 1535, and there accompanied him Peter Viret, afterwards the
reformer of Lausanne. Viret was born at Orbe in a.d. 1511, and had
attached himself to the Protestant cause during his studies in Paris. He
therefore had also been obliged to quit the capital. He retired to his
1 Calvin, " Tracts relating to the Reformation, with Life of Calvin by
Beza." 3 vols. Edinburgh, 1814-1851. Henry, " Life of John Calvin."
2 vols. London, 1849. Audin (Cath.), " History of Life, Writings, and
Doctrines of Calvin." 2 vols. London, 1854. Dyer, " The Life of John
Calvin." London, 1850. Bungener, "Calvin: his Life, Labours, and
Writings." Edinburgh, 1863.
302 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
native town, and sought there diligently to spread the knowledge of the
gospel. The arrival of these two enthusiastic reformers in Geneva led to
a life and death struggle, from which the evangelicals went forth trium-
phant. As the result of a public disputation in August, a.d. 1535, the
magistracy declared in their favour, and Farel gave the movement a doc-
trinal basis by the issuing of a confession. In the following year Calvin
was passing through Geneva. Farel adjured him in God's name to
remain there. Farel indeed needed a fellow labourer of such genius and
power, for he had a hard battle to fight.
2. Calvin before his Genevan Ministry. — John Calvin, son of diocesan
procurator Gerhard Cauvin, was born on 10th July, a.d. 1509, at Noyou
in Picardy. Intended for the church, he was, from his twelfth year, in
possession of a benefice. Meeting with his relation Olivetan, he had
his first doubts of the truth of the Catholic system awakened. With
his father's consent he now turned to the study of law, which he
eagerly prosecuted for four years at Orleans and Bourges. At Bourges,
Melchior Wolmar, a German, professor of Greek, exercised so powerful an
influence over him, especially through the study of the Scriptures, that
he decided, after the death of his father, to devote himself exclusively to
theology. With this intention he went to Paris in ad, 1532, and there
enthusiastically adopted the principles of the Eeformation. The newly
appointed rector of the university, Nic. Cop, had to deliver an address
on the Feast of All Saints. Calvin prepared it for him, and expressed
therein such liberal and evangelical views, as had never before been
uttered in that place. Cop read it boldly, and escaped the outburst of
wrath only by a timely flight. Calvin, too, found it prudent to quit
Paris. The bloody persecution of the Protestants by Francis I. led him
at last to leave France altogether. So he went, in a.d. 1535, to Basel,
where he became acquainted with Capito and Grynasus. In the follow-
ing year he issued the first sketch of the Institutio Religioms Christiance.
It was made as a defence of the Protestants of France, persecuted by
Francis on the pretext that they held Anabaptist and revolutionary views.
He therefore dedicated the book to the king, with a noble and firm
address. He soon left Basel, and went to the court of the evangelical-
minded Duchess Eenata of Ferrara (§ 139, 22), in order to secure her
good offices for his fellow countrymen suffering for their faith. He won
the full confidence of the duchess, but after some weeks was banished
the country by her husband. On his journey back to Basel, Farel and
Viret detained him in Geneva in a.d. 1536, and declared that he was
called to be a preacher and teacher of theology. On 1st October, a.d.
1536, the three reformers, at a public disputation in Lausanne, defended
the principles of the Eeformation. Viret remained in Lausanne, and
perfected the work of Eeformation there. As a confession of faith, a
catechism, not in dialogue form, was composed by Calvin as a popular
§ 138. THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND. 303
summary of his Institutio in the French language, and was sworn to, in
A.D. 1536, by all the citizens of Geneva. The Catechismus Geiievensis,
highly prized in all the Reformed churches, was a later redaction, which
ajDpeared first in French in a.d. 15i2, and then in Latin, in a.d. 1545.^
3. Calvin's First Ministry in Geneva, A.D. 1536-1538. — In Geneva, as
in other places, there sprang up alongside of the Reformation, and soon
in deadly opposition to it, an antinomian libertine sect, which strove for
freedom from all restraint and order (§ 146, 4). In the struggle against
this dangerous development, which found special favour among the aris-
tocratic youth of Geneva, Calvin put forth all the power of his logical
mind and unbending will, and sought to break its force by the exercise
of an excessively strict church discipline. He created a spiritual consis-
tory which arrogated to itself the exclusive right of church discipline
and excommunication, and wished to lay upon the magistrates the duty
of inflicting civil punishments on all persons condemned by it. But not
only did the libertine sections offer the most strenuous opposition, but
also the magistrates regarded with jealousy and suspicion the erection of
such a tribunal. Magistrates and libertines therefore combined to over-
throw the consistory. A welcome pretext was found in a synod at
Lausanne in a.d. 1538, which condemned the abolition of all festivals
but the Sundays, the removal of baptismal fonts from the churches, and
the introduction of leavened bread at the Lord's Supper by the Genevan
church as uncalled for innovations. The magistrates now demanded
the withdrawal of these, and banished the preachers who would not obey.
Farel went to Neuchatel, where he remained till his death in a.d. 1565 ;
Calvin went to Strassburg, where Bucer, Capito, and Hedio gave him
the office of a professor and preacher. During his three years' residence
there Calvin, as a Strassburg delegate, was frequently brought into close
relationship with the German reformers, especially with Melanchthon
(§§ 134, 135). But he ever remained closely associated with Geneva,
and when Cardinal Sadolet (§ 139, 12) issued from Lyons in a.d. 1539 an
appeal to the Genevese to return to the bosom of the Romish church,
Calvin thundered against him an annihilating reply. His Genevan
friends, too, spared no pains to win for him the favour of the council
and the citizens. They succeeded all the more easily because since the
overthrow of the theocratic consistory the libertine party had run into
all manner of riotous excesses. By a decree of council of 20th Oct.,
A.D. 1540, Calvin was most honourably recalled. After long considera-
tion he accepted the call in Sept., a.d. 1541, and now, with redoubled
energy, set himself to carry out most strictly the work that had been
interrupted.
1 M'Crie, " The Early Years of John Calvin, a.d. 1509-1536." Ed. by
W. Fergusson. Edinburgh, 1880.
804 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
4. Calvin's Second Ministry in Geneva, A.D. 1541-1564. — Calvin set
np again, after his return, the consistory, consisting of six ministers
and twelve lay elders, and by it ruled with almost absolute power. It
was a thoroughly organized inquisition tribunal, which regulated in all
details the moral, religious, domestic, and social life of the citizens,
called them to account on every suspicion of a fault, had the incorrigible
banished by the civil authorities, and the more dangerous of them
put to death. The Ciceronian Bible translator, Sebastian Castellio,
appointed rector of the Genevan school by Calvin, got out of sympathy
with the rigorous moral strictures and compulsory prescriptions of mat-
ters of faith under the Calvinistic rule, and charged the clergy with in-
tolerance and pride. He also contested the doctrine of the descent into
hell, and described the Canticles as a love poem. He was deposed, and
in order to escape farther penalties he fled to Basel in a.d. 1544. A
libertine called Gruet was executed in a.d. 1547, because he had circu-
lated an abusive tract against the clergy, and blasphemous references
were found in his papers ; e.g. that Christianity is only a fable, that
Christ was a deceiver and His mother a prostitute, that all ends with
death, that neither heaven nor hell exists, etc. The physician, Jerome
Bolsec, previously a Carmelite monk in Paris, was imprisoned in a.d.
1551, and then banished, because of his opposition to Calvin's doctrine
of predestination. He afterwards returned to the Eomish church, and
reveuged himself by a biography of Calvin full of spiteful calumnies.
On the execution of Servetus in a.d. 1533, see § 148, 2. Between the
years 1542 and 1546 there were in Geneva, with a population of only
20,000, no less than fifty-seven death sentences carriied out with Calvin's
approval, and seventy-six sentences of banishment. The magistrates
faithfully supported him in all his measures. But under the inquisi-
torial reign of terror of his consistory, the libertine party gained strength
for a vehement struggle, and among the magistrates, from about a.d.
1546, there arose a powerful opposition, and fanatical mobs repeatedly
threatened to throw him into the Rhone. This struggle lasted for nine
years. But Calvin abated not a single iota from the strictness of his
earlier demands, and so great was the fear of his powerful personality
that neither the rage of riotous mobs nor the hostility of the magistracy
could secure his banishment. In a.d. 1555 his party again won the as-
cendency in the elections, mainly by the aid of crowds of refugees from
France, England, and Scotland, who had obtained residence and thus
the rights of citizens in Geneva. From this time till his death on 27th
March, a.d. 1564, his influence was supreme. The impress of his strong
mind was more and more distinctly stamped upon every institution of
the commonwealth, the demands of his rigorous discipline were willingly
and heartily adopted as the moral code, and secured for Geneva that
pre-eminence which for two centuries it retained among all the Reformed
§ 138. THE REFOEMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND. 305
churches as an honourable, pious, and strictly moral city. In spite of a
weak body and frequent attacks of sickness Calvin, during the twenty-
three years of his two residences in Geneva, performed an amazing
amount of work. He had married in a.d. 1540, at Strassburg, Idaletta
de Bures, the widow of an Anabaptist converted by him. His wife died
in A.D. 1549. He preached almost daily, attended all the sittings of the
consistory and the preachers' association, inspired all their deliberations
and resolutions, delivered lectures in the academy founded by his orders
in A.D. 1559, composed numerous doctrinal, controversial, and apologe-
tical works, conducted an extensive correspondence, etc.
o. Calvin's Writings.— The most important of the writings of Calvin
is his already mentioned Institutio Eeligionis Christiana, of which the
best and most complete edition appeared in a.d. 1559, a companion
volume to Melanchthon's Loci, but much more thorough and complete
as a formal and scientific treatise. In this work Calvin elaborates his
profound doctrinal system with great speculative power and bold, relent-
less logic, combined with the peculiar grace of a clear and charming
style. Next in order of importance came his commentaries on almost
all the books of Scripture. Here also he shows himself everywhere
possessed of brilliant acuteness, religious geniality, profound Christian
sympathy, and remarkable exegetical talent, but also a stickler for small
points or seriously fettered by dogmatic prejudices. His exegetical pro-
ductions want the warmth and childlike identification of the commen-
tator with his text, which in so high a degree distinguishes Luther, while
in form they are incomparably superior for conciseness and scientific
precision. In the pulpit Calvin was the same strict and consistent logi-
cian as in his systematic and polemical works. Of Luther's popular
eloquence he had not the slightest trace. ^
6. Calvin's Doctrine. — Calvin set Zwingli far below Luther, and had no
hesitation in characterizing the Zwinglian doctrine of the sacraments as
profane. With Luther, who highly respected hun, he never came into
close personal contact, but his intercourse with Melanchthon had a
powerful influence upon the latter. But decidedly as he approached
Luther's doctrine, he was in principle rather on the same platform with
Zwingli. His view of the Protestant principles is essentially Zwinglian.
Just as decidedly as Zwingli had he broken with ecclesiastical tradition.
In the doctrine of the person of Christ he inclined to Nestorianism, and
could not therefore reach the same believing fulness as Luther in his
1 " English Translation of Calvin's Works," by Calvin Translation
Society, in 52 vols. Edinburgh, 1842-1853. For a more sympathetic
and true estimate of Calvin as a commentator, see Farrar, " History
of Interpretations." London, 1886. Also papers by Farrar on the
" Reformers as Commentators," in Expositor, Second Series.
20
306 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
doctrine of the Lord's Supper. He taught, as Berengar before had done,
that the believer by means of faith partakes in the sacrament only
spiritually, but yet really, of the body and blood of the Lord, through a
power issuing from the glorified body of Christ, whereas the unbeliever
receives only bread and wine. In his doctrine of justification he formally
agrees with Luther, but introduced a very marked difference by his strict,
almost Old Testament, legahsm. His predestination doctrine goes
beyond even that of Augustine in its rigid consistency and unbending
severity.^
7. The Victory of Calvinism over Zwinglianism.— By his extensive
correspondence and numerous writings Calvin's influence extended far
beyond the Hmits of Switzerland. Geneva became the place of refuge
for all who were exiled on account of their faith, and the university
founded there by Calvin furnished almost all Reformed churches with
teachers, who were moulded after a strict Calvinistic pattern. Bern,
not uninfluenced by political jealousies, showed most reluctance in
adopting the Calvinistic doctrine. Ziirich was more compliant. After
Zwingli's death, Henry Bullinger stood at the head of the Ziirich clergy.
With him Calvin entered into doctrinal negotiations, and succeeded in
at last bringing him over to his views of the Lord's Supper. In the
Conseimis Tigurinus of a.d. 1519, drawn up by Calvin, a union was
brought about on a Calvinistic basis; but Bern, where the Zwinghans
contending with the Lutheranised friends of Calvin had the majority,
refused subscription. The Consensus pastorum Genevensivm, of a.d.
1554, called forth by the conflict with Bolsec, in which the predestination
doctrine of Calvin had similar prominence, not only Bern, but also
Zih-ich refused to accept. Yet these two confessions gradually rose in
repute throughout German Switzerland. Even Bullinger's personal
objection to the predestination doctrine was more and more overcome
from A.D. 1556 by the influence of his colleague Peter Martyr (§ 139,
24), though he never accepted the Calvinistic system in all its severity
and harshness. When even the Elector-palatine Frederick III. (§ 144,
1) wished to lay a justificatory confession before the Diet of Augsburg in
A.D. 1566, which threatened to exclude him from the peace on account
of his going over to the Reformed church, Bullinger, who was entrusted
with its composition, sent him, as an appendix to the testament he had
composed, a confession, which came to be known as the Covfessio Helve-
tica posterior (§ 133, 8). This confession, not only obtained recognition
in all the Swiss cantons, with the exception of Basel, which likewise
after eighty years adopted it, but also gained great consideration in the
1 See Dorner, "History of Protestant Theology," vol. i., pp. 384-414,
for a much truer outhne of Calvin's doctrine from another Lutheran
pen.
§ 138. THE REFOKMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND. 307
Reformed churches of other lands. Its doctrine of the sacraments is
Calviuistic, with not unimportant leanings toward the Zwinglian theory.
Its doctrine of predestination is Calvinism, very considerably modified.
8. Calvin's Successor in Geneva.— Theodore Beza was from a.d. 1559
Calvin's most zealous fellow labourer, and after his death succeeded him
in his offices. He soon came to be regarded at home and abroad with
something of the same reverence which his great master had won. He
died in a.d. 1605. Born in a.d. 1519 of an old noble family at Vezelay
in Burgundy, he was sent for his education in his ninth year to the
humanist Melcliior Wolmar of Orleans, and accompanied his teacher when
he accepted a call to the Academy of Bourges, until in a.d. 1534 Wol-
mar was obliged to return to his Swabian home to escape persecution as
a friend and promoter of the Reformation. Beza now applied himself to
the study of law at the University of Orleans, and obtained the rank of a
licentiate in a.d. 1539. He then spent several years in Paris as a man of
the world, where he gained the reputation of a poet and wit, and wasted
a considerable patrimony in a loose and reckless life. A secret marriage
with a young woman of the city in humble circumstances, in a.d. 1544,
put an end to his extravagances, and a serious illness gave a religious
direction to his moral change. He had made the acquaintance of Calvin
at Bourges, and in a.d. 1543 he went to Geneva, was publicly married,
and in the following year received, on Viret's recommendation, the pro-
fessorship of Greek at Lausanne. Thoroughly in sympathy with all
Calvin's views, he supported his doctrine of predestination against the
attacks of Bolsec, justified the execution of Servetus in his tract Be
hceretidii a civili magiatratu ininiendis, zealously befriended the per-
secuted Waldcnsians, along with Farcl made court to the German Pro-
testant princes in order to secure their intercession for the French
Huguenots, and negotiated with the South German theologians for a
union in regard to the doctrine of the supper. In a.d. 1558 Calvin
called him to Geneva as a preacher and professor of theology in the
academy erected there. In a.d. 1559 he vindicated Calvin's doctrine
of the supper against Westphal's attacks (§ 141, 10) in pretty moderate
language ; but in a.d. 1560 he thundered forth two violent polemical
dialogues against Hesshus (§ 144, 1). The next two years he spent
in France (§ 139, 14) as theological defender and advocate of the
Huguenots. After Calvin's death the whole burden of the government
of the Genevan church fell upon his shoulders, and for forty years the
Reformed churches of all lands looked with confidence to him as their
well-tried patriarch. Next to the church of Geneva, that of his native
land lay nearest to his heart. Repeatedly we find liim called to France
to direct the meetings of synod. But scarcely less lively was the interest
which he took in the controversies of the German Reformed with their
Lutheran opponents. At the Religious Conference of Mompelgard, which
308 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
the Lutheran Count Frederick of Wiirttemberg called in a.d. 1586, to
make terms if possible whereby the Calvinistic refugees might have the
communion together with their Lutheran brethren, Beza himself in
person took the field in defence of the palladium of Calvinistic orthodoxy
against Andrea, whose theory of ubiquity (§ 141, 9, 10) he had already
contested in his writings. Very near the close of his life the Catholic
Church, through its experienced converter of heretics, Francis de Sales
(§ 156, 1), made a vain attempt to win him back to the Church in which
alone is salvation. To a foolish report that this effort had been successful
Beza himself answered in a satirical poem full of all his youthful fire.^
§ 139. The Reformation in Other Lands.
The need of reform was so great and widespread, that the
movement begun in Germany and Switzerland soon spread
to every country in Europe. The Catholic Church opposed
the Reformation everywhere with fire and sword, and suc-
ceeded in some countries in utterly suppressing it ; while
in others it was restricted within the limits of a merely
tolerated sect. The German Lutheran Confession found
acceptance generally among the Scandinavians of the north
of Europe, the Swiss Reformed among the Romanic races of
the south and west ; while in the east, among the Slavs and
Magyars, both confessions were received. Calvin's power-
ful personal influence had done much to drive the Lutheran
Confession out of those Romance countries where it had
before obtained a footing. The presence of many refugees
from the various western lands for a time in Switzerland,
as well as the natural intercourse between it and such coun-
tries as Italy and France, contributed to the same result.
But deeper grounds than these are required to account for
this fact. On the one hand, the Romance people are inclined
to extremes, and they found more thorough satisfaction in
the radical reformation of Geneva than in the more moderate
reformation of Wittenberg ; and, on the other hand, they
^ Cunningham, "Reformers and Theology of the Reformation," Essay
vii., " Calvin and Beza," pp. 345-412. Edin., 1862.
§ 139. THE EEFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 309
have a love for democratic and republican forms of govern-
ment which the former, but not the latter, gratified. —
Outside of the limits of the German empire the Lutheran
Reformation first took root, from a.d. 1525, in Prussia, the
seat of the Teutonic Knights (§ 127, 3) ; then in the
Scandinavian countries. In Sweden it gained ascendency
in A.D. 1527, and in Denmark and Norway in A.d. 1537.
Also in the Baltic Provinces the Reformation had found
entrance in a.d. 1520; by a.d. 1539 it had overcome all
opposition in Livonia and Esthonia, but in Courland it took
other ten years before it was thoroughly organized. The
Reformed church got almost exclusive possession of England
in A.D. 1562, of Scotland in a.d. 15G0, and of the Netherlands
in A.D. 1579. The Reformed Confession obtained mere tolera-
tion in France in a.d. 1598 ; the Reformed alongside of the
Lutheran gained a footing in Poland in a.d. 1573, in Bohemia
and Moravia in a.d. 1609, in Hungary in a.d. 1606, and in
Transylvania in a.d. 1557. Only in Spain and Italy did the
Catholic Church succeed in utterly crushing the Reformation.
Some attempts to interest the Gfreek church in the Lutheran
Confession were unsuccessful, but the remnants of the Wald-
ensians were completely won over to the Reformed Confession.
1. Sweden. — For fifty years Sweden bad been free from the Danish
yoke which had been imposed upon it by the Calmar union of a.d. 1397.
The higher clergy, who possessed two-thirds of the land, had continuously
conspired in favour of Denmark. The Archbishop of Upsala, Gustavus
Trolle, fell out with the chancellor, Sten Sture, and was deposed. Pope
Leo X. pronounced the ban and interdict against Sweden. Christian II.
of Denmark conquered the country in a.d. 1520, and in the frightful
massacre of Stockholm during the coronation festivities, in spite of his
sworn assurances, 600 of the noblest in the land, marked out by the arch-
bishop as enemies of Denmark, were slain. But scarcely had Christian
reached home when Gustavus Vasa landed from Liibeck, whither he had
fled, drove out the Danes, and was elected king, a.d. 1523. In his exile
he had become favourably inclined to the Reformation, and now he joined
the Protestants to have their help against the opposing clergy. Olaf
Peterson, who had studied from a.d. 1516 in Wittenberg, soon after his
310 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
return home, in a.d. 1519, began as deacon in Strengnies, along with
Lawrence Anderson, afterwards administrator of the diocese of Strengn^es,
to spread the reformed doctrines. Subsequently they were joined by Olaf's
younger brother, Laurence Peterson. During the king's absence in a.d.
1521, two Anabaptists visited Stockholm, and even the calm-miuded Olaf
was for a time carried away by them. The king quickly suppressed the
disturbances, and entered heartily upon the work of reformation. Ander-
son, appointed chancellor by Vasa, in a.d. 1526 translated the N.T., and
Olaf with the help of his learned brother undertook the O.T. The people,
however, still clung to the old faith, till at the Diet of Westnses, in a.d.
1527, the king set before them the alternative of accepting his resigna-
tion or the Reformation. The people's love for their king overcame
all clerical opposition. Church property was used to supply revenues
to kings and nobles, and to provide salaries for pastors who should
preach the gospel in its purity. The Reformation was peacefully intro-
duced into all parts of the land, and the diets at Orebro, in a.d. 1529,
1537, and at Westnaes, in a.d. 1544, carried out the work to completion.
The new organization adopted the episcopal constitution, and also in
worship, by connivance of the people, many Catholic ceremonies were
allowed to remain. Most of the bishops accepted the inevitable. The
Archbishop Magnus of Upsala, papal legate, went to Poland, and Bishop
Brask of Linkoping fled with all the treasures of his church to Danzig.
Laurence Peterson was made in a.d. 1531 first evangelical Archbishop
of Upsala, and married a relative of the royal house. But his brother
Olaf fell into disfavour on account of his protest against the king's
real or supposed acts of rapacity. He and Anderson, because they had
failed to report a conspiracy which came to their knowledge in the con-
fessional, were condemned to death, but were pardoned by the king.
Gustavus died in a.d. 1560. Under his son Eric a Catholic reaction set
in, and his brother John III., in a.d. 1578, made secret confession of
Catholicism to the Jesuit Possevin, urged thereto by his Catholic queen
and the prospect of the Polish throne. John's son Sigismund, also king
of Poland, openly joined the Romish Church. But his uncle Charles of
Sodermanland, a zealous Protestant, as governor after John's death,
called together the nobles at Upsala in a.d. 1593, when the Latin mass-
book introduced by John was forbidden, and the acknowledgment of
the Augsburg Confession was renewed. But as Sigismund continued to
favour Catholicism, the peers of the realm declared, in a.d. 1604, that he
had forfeited the throne, which his uncle now ascended as Charles IX.—
The Reformation had, been already carried from Sweden into Finland.^
^ Butler, "The Refoljmation in Sweden, its Rise, Progress, and Crisis,
and its Triumph under pharles IX." New York, 1883. Geijer, "History
of the Swedes," trans, fi'om the Swedish by Turner. Lond., 1847.
§ 139. THE REFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 311
2. Denmark and Norway. — Christian II., nephew of the Elector of
Saxony and brother-in-law of the Emperor Charles V., although he had
associated himself with the Eomish hierarchy in Sweden for the over-
throw of the national party, had in Denmark taken the side of the
Eeformation against the clergy, who were there supreme. In a.d. 1521 he
succeeded in getting Carlstadt to come to his assistance, but he was soon
forced to quit the country. In a.d. 1523 the clergy and nobles formally
renounced their allegiance, and gave the crown to his uncle Frederick I.,
Duke of Schleswig and Holstein. Christian fled to Saxony, was there
completely won over to the Eeformation by Luther, converted also his
wife, the emperor's sister, and had the first Danish N.T., by Hans
Michelsou, printed at Leipzig and circulated in Denmark. To secure the
emperor's aid, however, he abjured the evangelical faith at Augsburg in
A.D. 1530. In the following year he conquered Norway, and bound him-
self on his coronation to maintain the Catholic religion. But in a.d.
1532 he was obliged to surrender to Frederick, and spent the remaining
twenty-seven years of his life in prison, where he repented his apostasy,
and had the opportunity of instructing himself by the study of the Danish
Bible.— Frederick I. had been previously favourable to the Eeformation,
yet his hands were bound by the express terms of his election. His son
Christian III. unreservedly introduced the Eeformation into his duchies.
In this he was encouraged by his father. In a.d. 1526 he openly professed
the evangelical faith, and invited the Danish reformer Hans Tausen, a dis-
ciple of Luther, who had preached the gospel amid much persecution since
a.d. 1524, to settle as preacher in Copenhagen. At a diet at Odensee in
A.D. 1527 he restricted episcopal jurisdiction, proclaimed universal religious
toleration, gave priests liberty to marry and to leave their cloisters, and
thus laid the foundations of the Eeformation. Tausen in a.d. 1530 sub-
mitted to the nobles his own confession, Confessio Hafinca, and the
Eeformation rapidly advanced. Frederick died in a.d. 1533. The bishops
now rose in a body, and insisted that the estates should refuse to
acknowledge his son Christian III. But when the burgomaster of Liibeck,
taking advantage of the anarchy, plotted to subject Denmark to the
proud commercial city, and in a.d. 1534 actually laid siege to Copen-
hagen, the Jutland nobles hastened to swear fealty to Christian. He
drove out the Liibeckers, and by a.d. 1536 had possession of the whole
land. He resolved now to put an end for ever to the machinations of the
clergy. In August, a.d. 1536, he had all bishops imprisoned in one day,
and at a diet at Copenhagen had them formally deposed. Their pro-
perty fell into the royal exchequer, all monasteries were secularized^
some presented to the nobles, some converted into hospitals and schools.
In order to complete the organization of the church Bugenhagen was
called in in a.d. 1537. He crowned the king and queen, sketched a direc-
tory of worship, which was adopted at the Diet of Odensee in a.d. 1539,
312 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
and returned to Wittenberg in a.d. 1542. In place of bishops Lutheran
superintendents were appointed, to whom subsequently the title of
bishop was given, and the Augsburg Confession accepted as the standard.
The Reformation was contemporaneously introduced into Norway, which
acknowledged the king in a.d. 1536. The Archbishop of Drontheim,
Olaf Engelbrechtzen, fled with the church treasures to the Netherlands.
Iceland stood out longer, but yielded in a.d. 1551, when the power of the
rebel bishops was broken. ^
3. Courland, Livonia, and Esthonia. — Livonia had seceded from the
dominion of the Teutonic knights in a.d. 1521, and under the grand-
master Walter of Plattenburg assumed the position of an independent
principality. In that same year a Lutheran archdeacon, Andr. Knopken,
expelled from Pomerania, came to Riga, and preached the gospel with
moderation. Soon after Tegetmaier came from Rostock, and so vigorously
denounced image worship that excited mobs entered the churches and
tore down the images ; yet he was protected by the council and the
grand-master. The third reformer Briesmann was the immediate scholar
of Luther. The able town clerk of Riga, Lohmliller, heartily wrought
witli them, and the Reformation spread through city and country. At
Wolmar and Dorpat, in a.d, 1524, the work was carried on by Melchior
Hoffmann, whose Lutheranism was seriously tinged with Anabaptist
extravagances (§ 147, 1). The diocese of Oesel adopted the reformed
doctrines, and at the same time a Lutheran church was formed in
Reval. After strong opposition had been offered, at last, in a.d. 1538,
Riga accepted the evangelical confession, joined the Schmalcald League,
and in a short time all Livonia and Esthonia accepted the Augsburg
Confession. Political troubles, occasioned mainly by Russia, obliged the
last grand-master, Kettler, in a.d. 1561 to surrender Livonia to Sigismund
Augustus of Poland, but with the formal assurance that the rights of
the evangelicals should be preserved. He himself retained Courland as
an hereditary duchy under the suzerainty of Poland, and gave himself
unweariedly to the evangelical organization of his country, powerfully
assisted by Biilau, first superintendent of Courland. — The Lutheran
church of Livonia had in consequence to pass through severe trials.
Under Polish protection a Jesuit college was established in Riga in a.d.
1584. Two city churches had to be given over to the Catholics, and
Possevin conducted an active Catholic propaganda, which was ended only
v/hen Livonia, in a.d, 1629, as also Esthonia somewhat earlier, came
under the rule of Sweden. In consequence of the Norse war both coun-
t-ries were incorporated into the Russian empire, and by the Peace of
Nystadt, of a.d, 1721, its Lutheran church retained all its privileges, on
^ Pontoppidan, " Annales eccles. Dan ," ii., iii. Han., 1741. Ranke,
" History of the Reformation," vol. iii.
§ 139. THE REFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 313
condition that it did not interfere in any way with the Greek Orthodox
Church in the province. In a.d. 1795 Courland also came under Russian
sway, and all these are now known as the Baltic Provinces.
4. England. 1— Henry VIII., a.d. 1509-1547, after the literary feud with
Luther (§ 125, 3), sought to justify his title, " Defender of the Faith,"
by the use of sword and gibbet. Luther's writings were eagerly read in
England, where in many circles Wiclif's movements were regarded with
favour, and two noble Englishmen, John Fryth and William Tyndal,
gave to their native laud a translation of the N.T. in a.d. 1526. Fryth
was rewarded with the stake in a.d. 1533, and Tyndal was beheaded in
the Netherlands in a.d. 1535. ^ But meanwhile the king quarrelled with
the pope. On assuming the government he had married Catharine of
Arragon, daughter of Ferdinand the Catholic and Isabella, six years older
than himself, the widow of his brother Arthur, who had died in his 16th
year, for which he got a papal dispensation on the ground that the former
marriage had not been consummated. His adulterous love for Anne
Boleyn, the fair maid of honour to his queen, and Cranmer's biblical
opinion (Lev. xviii. 16, xx. 21) convinced him in a.d. 1527 of the sinful-
ness of his uncanonical marriage. Clement VII., at first not indisposed
to grant his request for a divorce, refused after he had been reconciled
to the emperor, Catharine's nephew (§ 132, 2). Thoroughly roused,
the king now threw off the authority of the pope. Convocation was
forced to recognise him in a.d. 1531 as head of the English Church,
and in 1532 Parliament forbade the paying of annats to the pope. In
the same year Henry married Anne, and had a formal divorce from
Catharine granted by a spiritual court. Parliament in a.d. 1531 formally
abolished papal jurisdiction in the land, and transferred all ecclesiastical
rights and revenues to the king. The venerable Bishop Fisher of
Rochester and the resolute chancellor, Sir Thomas More (§ 120, 7), in
a.d. 1535 paid the price of their opposition on the scaffold. Now came
^ The chief documentary authorities for the whole period are the State
Papers edited by Brewer and others. See also Froude, "History of
England from Fall of Wolsey till Death of Elizabeth. " 12 vols. Lond.,
1856-1869. Burnet, " History of Reformation of Church of England."
2 vols. Lond., 1679. Blunt, " Reformation of the Church of England,"
4th ed. Lond., 1878. Strype, "Ecclesiastical Memorials." 3 vols.
Lond., 1721. " Annals of the Reformation." 4 vols. 1709-1731. Foxe,
"Acts and Monuments " (pub. a.d. 1563). 8 vols. Lond., 1837-1841.
- Demaus, " Life of William Tyndal." London, 1868. Fry, "A
Bibliographical Description of the Editions of the N.T., Tyndale's Ver-
sion in English, etc., the notes in full of the Edition of 1534." London,
1878. "Facsimile Edition of Tyndale's first printed N.T." Edited by
Arber. London, 1871.
314 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
the long threatened ban. Under pretext of a highly necessary reform
no less than 376 monasteries were closed during the years 1536-1538,
their occupiers, monks and nuns, expelled, and their rich property con-
fiscated.^ Nevertheless ■ in doctrine the king wished to remain a good
Catholic, and for this end passed in the Parliament of a.d. 1539 the law
of the Six Articles, which made any contradiction of the doctrines of
trausubstantiation, the withholding of the cup, celibacy of the clergy,
the mass, and auricular confession, a capital offence. Persecution raged
equally against Lutherans and Papists, sometimes more against the one,
sometimes more against the other, according as he was moved by his own
caprice, or the influence of his wives and favourites of the day. On the
one side, at the head of the Papists, stood Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester,
and Bonner, Bishop of London ; and on the other, Thomas Cranmer,
whom the king had raised in a.d. 1533 to the see of Canterbury, in order
to carry out his reforms in the ecclesiastical constitution. But Cranmer,
who as the king's agent in the divorce negotiations had often treated
with foreign Protestant theologians, and at Nuremberg had secretly
married Osiander's niece, was in heart a zealous adherent of the Swiss
Reformation, and furthered as far as he could with safety its introduc-
tion into England. Among other things, he secured the introduction in
A.D. 1539, into all the churches of England, of an English translation of
the Bible, revised by himself. He was supported in his efforts by the
king's second wife, Anne Boleyn ; but she, having fallen under suspicion
of unfaithfulness, was executed in a.d. 1536. The third wife, Jane
Seymour, died in a.d. 1537 on the death of a son. The fourth, Anne
of Cleves, was after six months, in a.d. 1540, cast aside, and the pro-
moter of the marriage, the chancellor, Thomas Cromwell, was brought to
the scaffold. The king now in the same year married Catharine Howard,
with whom the Catholic party got to the helm again, and had the Act
of the Six Articles rigorously enforced. But she, too, in a.d. 1543, was
charged with repeated adulteries, and fell, together with her friends and
those reputed as guilty with her, under the executioner's axe. The sixth
wife, Catharine Parr, who again favoured the Protestants, escaped a like
fate by the death of the tyrant. ^
5. Edward VL, a.d. 1547-1553, son of Henry VIII. and Jane Seymour,
succeeded his father in his tenth year. At the head of the regency stood
his mother's brother, the Duke of Somerset. Cranmer had now a free
1 Gasquet, "Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries." 2 vols.
London, 1888.
- Hook, " Lives of Archb. of Canterbury," vols, vi., vii. Bayly, " Life
and Death of Fisher, Bishop of Rochester." London, 1655. Dixon,
♦'History of Church of England." London, 1878. Vol. i., "Henry
VIII." Froude, " History of England," vols, i.-iii.
§ 139. THE REFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 315
hand. Private masses and image worship were forbidden, the supper
was administered in both kinds, marriage of priests was made legitimate,
and a general church visitation appointed for the introduction of the
Reformation. Gardiner and Bonner, who opposed these changes, were
sent to the Tower. Somerset corresponded with Calvin, and invited at
Cranmer's request distinguished foreign theologians to help in the visita-
tion of the churches. Martin Bucer and Paul Fagius from Strassburg
came to Cambridge, and Peter Martyr to Oxford.^ Bernardino Ochiuo
was preacher to a congregation of Italian refugees in London. A com-
mission under Cranmer's presidency drew up for reading in the churches
a collection of Homilies, for the instruction of the young a Catechism,
and for the service a liturgy mediate between the Catholic and Protestant
form, the so-called Book of Common Prayer of a.d. 1549 ; but from the
second edition of which were left out chrism and exorcism, auricular
confession, anointing the sick, and prayer for the dead. Then followed,
in A.D. 1553, a confession of faith, consisting of forty-two articles,
drawn up by Cranmer and Bishop Ptidley of Rochester, which was dis-
tinctly of the reformed type, and set forward the ecclesiastical supremacy
of tlie king as an article of faith. The young king, who supported the
Pieformation with all his heart, died in a.d. 1553, after nominating as his
successor Jane Grey, the grand-daughter of a sister of his'father. Not
she, however, but a fanatical Catholic, Mary, a.d. 1553-1558, daughter
of Henry VIII. and Catharine of Spain, actually ascended the throne.
The compliant Parliament now abrogated all the ecclesiastical laws of
Edward VI., which it had itself sanctioned, reverted to Henry's law of
the Six Articles, and entrusted Gardiner as chancellor with its execution.
The Protestant leaders were thrown into the Tower, the' bones of Bucer
and Fagius were publicly burnt, married priests with wives and children
were driven in thousands from the land. In the following year, a.d.
1554, Cardinal Reginald Pole, who had fled during Henry's reign, re-
turned as papal legate, absolved the repentant Parliament, and received
all England back again into the fold of the Romish church. ^ The noble
and innocent Lady Jane Grey, only in her sixteenth year, though she
had voluntarily and cheerfully resigned the crown, was put to death with
her husband and father. In the course of the next year, a.d. 1555,
Bishops Ridley, Latimer, Ferrar, and Hooper with noble constancy
endured death at the stake.^ In prison, Cranmer had renounced his
^ Heppe, " The Reformers of England and Germany in the Sixteenth
Century ; their Intercourse and Correspondence." London, 1859.
2 Phillip, •' History of the Life of Reg. Pole." 2 vols. London, 1765.
Hook, " Lives of Archb. of Cant.," vol. viii. Lee, "Reginald Pole, Car-
dinal-Archbishop of Canterbury : an Historical Sketch." London, 1888.
2 Demaus, "Life of Latimer." London, 1869.
316 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
evangelical faith, but abundantly atoned for this weakness by the heroic
firmness with which he retracted his retractation, and held the hand
which had subscribed it in the flames, that it might be first consumed.
He suffered in a.d. 1556.— The queen had married in a.d. 1554 Philip II.
of Spain, eleven years her junior, and when in a.d. 1555 he returned to
Spain, she fell into deep melancholy, and under its pressure her hatred
of Protestantism was shown in the most bloody and cruel deeds. A
heretic tribunal, after the fashion of the Spanish Inquisition, was created,
which under the presidency of the " Bloody Bonner," consigned to the
flames crowds of confessors of the gospel, clergymen and laymen, men
and women, old and young. After the persecution had raged for five
years, "Bloody Mary" died of heart-break and dropsy.^
6. Elizabeth, a.d. 1558-1603, the daughter of Anne Boleyn, though
previously branded by the Parliament as a bastard, now ascended the
throne unopposed as the last living member of the family of Henry VIII.
Educated under the supervision of Cranmer in the Protestant faith of
her mother, she had been obliged during the reign of her sister outwardly
to conform to the Romish church. She proceeded with great prudence
and moderation; but when Paul IV. pronounced her illegitimate, and
the Scottish princess Mary Stuart, grand-daughter of Henry's sister, as-
sumed the title of queen of England, Elizabeth more heartily espoused
the cause of Protestantism. In a.d. 1559 the Parliament passed the Act
of Uniformity, which reasserted the royal supremacy over the national
church, prescribed a revision of the Book of Common Prayer, which set
aside the prayer for deliverance from the " detestable enormities " of
the papacy, etc. , and practically reproduced the earlier, less perfect of
the Prayer Books of Edward VI., while every perversion to papacy was
threatened with confiscation of goods, imprisonment, banishment, and
in cases of repetition with death, as an act of treason. At the head of
the clergy was Matthew Parker, consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury
by some bishops exiled under Mary. He had formerly been chaplain
to Anne Boleyn. Under his direction Craumer's forty-two articles were
reduced to thirty-nine, giving a type of doctrine midway between Luther-
anism and Calvinism ; these were confirmed by convocation in a.d.
1562, and were adopted as a fundamental statute of England by Act of
Parliament in a.d. 1571. This brings to a close the first stage in the
history of the English Reformation,— the setting up by law of the
Anglican State Church with episcopal constitution, with apostolical suc-
1 Hayward, " Life of Edward VI." London, 1630. Hook, "Lives of
Archb. of Cant.," vols. vii. and viii. Fronde, " History of Eng.," vols,
iv. and v. Strype, " Life of Cranmer." London, 1694. Norton, " Life
of Archb. Cranmer." New York, 1863. Foxe, " Acts and Monuments."
Maitland, " Essays on the Reformation in England." London, 1849.
§ 139. THE REFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 317
cession, under royal supremacy, as the Established Church.^ (For the
Puritan opposition to it see § 143, 3.) The somewhat indulgent manner
in which the Act of Uniformity was at first enforced against the Catho-
lics encouraged them more and more in attempts to secure a restoration.
Even in a.d. 1568 ^Yilliam Allen founded at Douay a seminary to train
Catholic Englishmen for a mission at home, and Gregory XIII. some
years later, for a similar purpose, founded in Rome the "English College."
His predecessor, Pius V., had in a.d. 1570 deposed and issued the ban
against the queen, and threatened all with the greater excommunication
who should yield her obedience. Parliament now punished every with-
drawal from the State church as high treason. Day and night houses
were searched, and suspected persons inquisitorially examined by torture,
and if found guilty they were not infrequently put to death as traitors.-
— Continuation, §§ 153, 6 ; 154, 3.
7. Ireland.— Hadrian IV., himself an Enghshman (§ 96, 14), on the
plea that the donation of Constantine (§ 87, 4) embraced also the
" islands," gave over Ireland to King Henry II. as a papal fief in a.d.
1154. Yet the king only managed to conquer the eastern border, the
Pale, during the years 1171-1175. Henry VIII. introduced the Reforma-
tion into this province in a.d. 1535, by the help of his Archbishop of
Dublin, George Brown. The ecclesiastical supremacy of the Crown was
proclaimed, monasteries closed and their property impropriated, partly
divided among Irish and English peers. But in matters of faith there
was little change. More opposition was shown to the sweeping reforma-
tion of faith and worship of Edward VI. The bishops, Brown included,
resisted, and the inferior clergy, who now were required to read the Book
of Common Prayer in a language to most of them strange, diligently
fostered the popular attachment to the old faith. The ascension of
Queen Mary therefore was welcomed in Ireland, while Elizabeth's
attempt to reintroduce the Reformation met with opposition. Repeated
outbreaks, in which also the people of the w^estern districts took part,
ended in a.d. 1601 in the complete subjugation of the whole island. By
wholesale confiscation of estates the entire nobility was impoverished
and the church property was made over to the Anglican clergy ; but
the masses of the Irish people continued Catholic, and willingly sup-
1 Procter, " History of Book of Common Prayer." Cambr., 1855.
Hole, " The Prayer Book." London, 1887. Hardwick, "History of the
Articles of Religion." Cambr., 1851. Stephenson, " Book of Common
Prayer," 3 vols. London, 1854. Burnet, " Exposition of the Thirty-
Nine Articles." London, 1699. Browne, " Exposition of Thirty-Nine
Articles." London, 1858.
^ Froude, " History of England," vols, vi.-xii. Hook, " Lives of
Archb. of Cant.," vol. ix.
318 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
ported their priests out of their own scanty resources. i — Continuation,
§ 153, 6.
8. Scotland. — Patrick Hamilton, who had studied in Wittenberg and
Marburg, first preached the gospel in Scotland, and died at the stake in
his twenty-fourth year in a.d. 1528.- Amid the political confusions of
the regency during the minority of James V., a.d. 1513-1542, a sister's
son of Henry VIII. of England, the Reformation obtained firm root
among the nobles, who hated the clergy, and among the oppressed people,
notwithstanding that the bishops, with David Beaton, Archbishop of St.
Andrew's at their head, sought to crush it by the most violent perse-
cution. When Henry VIII. called on his nephew to assist him in his
Reformation work, James refused, and yielding to Beaton's advice formed
an alliance with France and married Mary of Guise. This occasioned
a war in a.d. 1540, the disastrous issue of which led to the king's death
of a broken heart. According to the king's will Beaton was to under-
take the regency, for Mary Stuart was only seven days old. But the
nobles transferred it to the Protestant Earl of Arran, who imprisoned
Beaton and had the royal child affianced to Henry's son Edward. Beaton
escaped, by connivance of the queen-mother got possession of the child,
and compelled the weak regent, in a.d. 1543, to abjure the English
alliance. The persecution of the Protestants by fire and sword now
began afresh. After many others had fallen victims to his persecuting
rage, Beaton had a famous Protestant preacher, George Wishart, burnt
before his eyes ; but was soon after, in a.d. 1546, surprised in his castle
and slain. When in a.d. 1548 Somerset, the English regent after
Henry's death, sought to renew negotiations about the marriage of
Mary, now five years old, with Edward VI., her mother had her taken
for safety to France, where she was educated in a convent and affianced
to the dauphin, afterwards Francis II. By hypocritical acts she con-
trived to have the regency transferred in a.d. 1554 from Arran to herself.
For two years the Reformation progressed without much opposition. In
December, a.d. 1557, its most devoted promoters made a " covenant,"
pledging themselves in life and death to advance the word of God and up-
root the idolatry of the Romish church. The queen-regent, however, after
the marriage of her daughter with the dauphin in a.d. 1558, felt herself
strong enough to defy the Protestant nobles. The old strict laws against
heretics were renewed, and a tribunal established for the punishment of
apostatizing priests. The last victim of the persecution was Walter Mill,
^ Killen, " Ecclesiastical History of Ireland from Earliest to Present
Times." 2 vols. Lond., 1875. Mant, " Hist, of Church of Ireland from
Reformation." London, 1839. Ball, " Hist, of the Church of Ireland."
2 Lorimer, " Patrick Hamilton, First Preacher and Martyr of the
Scottish Reformation." Edinburgh, 1857.
§ 139. THE EEFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 319
a priest eighty-two years old, who died at the stake at Perth (?) in a,d.
1559.^ Tbe country now rose in open revolt. The regent was thus
obliged to make proclamation of universal religious toleration. Bat
instead of keeping her promise to have all French troops withdrawn,
their number was actually increased after Francis II. ascended the
French throne. Elizabeth, too, was indignant at the assumption by the
French king and queen of the English royal title, so that she aided the
insurgents with an army and a fleet. During the victorious progress of
the English the regent died, in a.d. 1560. The French were obliged to
withdraw, and the victory of the Scotch Protestants was decisive.
9. There was one man, whose unbending opposition to the constitu-
tion, worship, doctrine, and discipline of the Church of Rome, manifested
with a rigid determination that has scarcely ever been equalled, left its
indelible impress upon the Scottish Reformation. John Knox, born in
A.D. 1505, was by the study of Augustine and the Bible led to adopt
evangelical views, which in a.d. 1542 he preached ia the south of
Scotland. Persecuted in consequence by Archbishop Beaton, he joined
the conspirators after that prelate's assassination, in a.d. 1546, was taken
prisoner, and in a.d. 1547 served as slave in the French galleys. The ill
treatment he thus endured developed his naturally strong and resolute
character and that fearlessness which so characterized all his subsequent
]ife. By English mediation he was set free in a.d. 1549, and became in
A.D. 1551 chaplain to Edward VI., but took offence at the popish leaven
allowed to remain in the English Reformation, and consequently declined
an offered bishopric. When the Catholic Mary ascended the throne
in A.D. 1553, he fled to Geneva, where he enjoyed the closest intimacy
with Calvin, whose doctrine of predestination, rigid presbyterianism, and
rigorous discipline he thoroughly approved. After presiding for some
time over a congregation of English refugees at Frankfort-on-the-Maine,
he returned in a.d. 1555 to Scotland, but in the following year accepted
a call to the church of English refugees at Geneva that had meanwhile
been formed. The Scottish bishops, who had not ventured to touch him
while present, condemned him to death after his departure, and burned
him in effigy. But Knox kept up a lively correspondence with his native
land by letters, proclamations, and controversial tracts, and with the help
of several friends translated the Scriptures into English. In a.d. 1558 he
pubhshed with the title, " The First Blast of the Trumpet against the
Monstrous Regiment of Women," the most violent of all his contro-
1 It was certainly at St. Andrew's that the execution took place. The
best and fullest account of Walter Mill is given by Mr. Scott, of Arbroath,
in his " Martyrs of Angus and Mearns." London, 1885, pp. 210-271. For
George Wishart, see same book, pp. 99-209 ; and Rogers, " Life of George
Wishart." Edinburgh, 1876.
320 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
versial works, directed mainly against the English Queen Mary, who was
now dead. It roused against him the unconquerable dislike of her suc-
cessor, and increased the hatred of the other two Maries against him to
the utmost pitch. Yet he accepted the call of the Protestant lords, and
returned next year to Scotland, and was the heart and soul of the revo-
lution that soon thereafter broke out. Images and mass-books were
burnt, altars in churches broken in pieces, and 150 monasteries were
destroyed; for said Knox, *' If the nests be pulled down, the crows will
not come back." After the death of the regent in a.d. 1560, the Par-
liament proclaimed the abolition of the papacy, ratified the strictly
Calviuistic Confessio Scotica, and forbade celebrating the mass on pain of
death. Then in December, the first General Assembhj prescribed, in the
"First Book of Discipline," a strictly presbyterial constitution under
Christ as only head, with a rigidly puritan order of worship (§ 163, 3).
10. In Aug., A.D. 1561, Queen Mary Stuart, highly cultured and high-
spirited, returned from France to Scotland, a young widow in her 19th
year. Brought up in a French convent in fanatical attachment to the
Romish Church, and at the French court, with absolutist ideas as well as
easy-going morals, the severe Calvinism and moral strictness of Scottish
Puritanism were to her as distasteful as its assertion of political inde-
l)endence. At the instigation of her half-brother James Stuart, whom
she raised to the earldom of Moray, and who was head of the ministry
as one of the leaders of the reformed party, she promised on her arrival
not to interfere with the ecclesiastical arrangements of the country, but
refused to give royal sanction to the proceedings of a.d. 1560, held
Catholic service in her court chapel, and on all hands favoured the
Romanists. By her marriage, in a.d. 1565, with the young Catholic
Lord Darnley, grandson by a second marriage of her grandmother Mar-
garet of England, who now assumed the title of king, Moray was driven
from his position, and '.the restoration of Catholicism was vigorously
and openly prosecuted by negotiations with Spain, France, and the pope.
The director of all those intrigues was the Italian musician David
llizzio, who came to the country as papal agent, and had become Mary's
favourite and private secretary. The rudeness and profligacy of the
young king had soon estranged from him the heart of the queen. He
therefore took part in a conspiracy of the Protestant lords, promising
to go over to their faith. Their first victim was the hated Rizzio. He
was fallen upon and slain on 9th March, a.d. 1566, while he sat beside
the queen, already far advanced in pregnancy. Darnley soon repented
his deed, was reconciled to the queen, fled with her to the Castle of
Dunbar, and an army gathered by the Protestant Earl of Bothwell soon
suppressed the rising. The rebels and assassins were at Mary's entreaty
almost all pardoned. Darnley, now living in mortal enmity with the
heads of the Protestant nobility, and again on bad terms with the queen.
§ 139. THE EEFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 321
fell sick in Dec, a.d. 1566, at Glasgow. On bis sick-bed a reconciliation
witb bis wife was effected, and apparently in order tbat she migbt tbe
better nurse him, be was brougbt to a villa near Edinburgh . But on
tbe nigbt of 9tb Feb., a.d. 1567, wbile Mary was present at tbe marriage
of a servant, tbe bouse witb its inhabitants was blown up by an explosion
of gunpowder. Public opinion charged Bothwell and the queen with
contriving the horrible crime. Bothwell was tried, but acquitted by the
lords. Suspicion increased when soon after Bothwell carried off the
queen to his castle, and married her on 15tb May. In the civil war that
now broke out Mary was taken prisoner, and on 24th July obliged to
abdicate in favour of her one-year old son James VI,, for whom Mary
undertook the regency. Bothwell fled to Denmark, where be died in
misery and want ; but Mary was allowed to escape from prison by the
young George Douglas. He also raised on her behalf a small army,
which, however, in May, a.d. 1568, was completely destroyed by Moray
at tbe village of Langside. The unhappy queen could now only seek pro-
tection with her deadly enemy Ehzabeth of England, who, after twenty
years' imprisonment, sent her to the scaffold in a.d. 1587, on tbe plea
tbat she was guilty of murdering her own husband and of high treason
in plotting the death of the English queen. — Mary's guilt would be con-
clusively established, if a correspondence with Bothwell, said to have
been found in her desk, should be accepted as genuine. But all her
apologists, with apparently strong conviction, have sought to prove that
these letters are fabrications of her enemies. Tbe thorough investiga-
tion given to original documents, however, by Bresslau, has resulted in
recognising only the second of these as a forgery, and so proving, not
indeed Mary's complicity in the murder of her husband, but her adul-
terous love for Bothwell, and showing too that her apparent reconciliation
with Darnley on his sick-bed was only hypocritical. i
11. The young queen had at first sought to win by her fair speeches
the bold and influential reformer John Knox, who was then preacher in
Edinburgh. But bis heart was cased in sevenfold armour against all her
flatteries, as afterwards against her threats ; even her tears found him
as stern and cold as her wrath. When be called an assembly of nobles
to put a stop to the Catholic worship introduced by her at court, be was
charged witb high treason, but acquitted by the lords. Tbe marriage
with Darnley and all tbat followed from this unhappy union only in-
creased bis boldness. He publicly preached without reserve against the
1 Strickland, " Life of Mary Stuart." 5 vols. Lond., 1875. Hosack,
"Mary Queen of Scots and Her Accusers." 2 vols. Lond., 1874.
Schiern, "Life of James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, from the Danish."
Edin., 1880. Skelton, " Maitland of Lethington and the Scotland of
Mary Stuart." 2 vols. Edin., 1887 f.
21
322 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
papacy and the light carriage of the queen, on the outbreak of the civil
war urged her deposition, and demanded her execution for adultery and
the murder of her husband. The assassination of Regent Moray in a.d.
1570 threw the country into further confusion, which was only over-
come by his third successor, Morton. The fugitive Knox now returned
to Edinburgh, and soon after died, on 24th Nov., a.d. 1572. Of his
extant writings the most important is his " History of the Reformation,"
reaching down to a.d. 1567. Morton's vigorous government completely
destroyed Mary's party, but also restricted the pretensions of Presby-
terianism. After his overthrow in a.d. 1578, James VI., now in his 12th
year, himself undertook the government at the head of a council of state.
His weakness of character showed itself in his vacillating between an
alliance with Catholic Spain and one with Protestant England, as well
as between secret favouring of Catholicism and open endeavouring to
supersede puritan Presbyterianism by Anglican-Protestant episcopacy.
In a.d. 1584 the parliament, enlarged by the introduction of the lower
orders of the nobility, so defined the royal supremacy as to deprive the
Presbyterian church of several of her rights and privileges. But in a.d.
1592 the king was obliged absolutely to restore these. After Elizabeth's
death in a.d. 1603, as the great-grandson of Henry VII., he united the
kingdoms of England and Scotland under the title of James I.i — Con-
tinuation, § 154, 5.
12. The Netherlands. — By the marriage of Mary of Burgundy, the heiress
of Charles the Bald, with Maximilian I., in a.d. 1478, the Netherlands
passed over to the house of Hapsburg, and after Maximilian's death, in a.d.
1519, went to his grandson Charles V. Even in the previous period the
ground was broken in these regions for the introduction of the Refor-
mation of the 16th century by means of the Brothers of the Common
Life (§ 112, 9) and the Dutch precursors of the Reformation (§ 119, 10),
working as they did among an intrepid and liberty loving people. The
writings of Luther were introduced at a very early date into Holland, and
1 " The Works of John Knox." Collected and edited by David Laing.
7 vols. Edin., 1846-1864. M'Crie, " Life of Knox." 2 vols. Edin.,
1811. Lorimer, " John Knox and the Church of England." Lond.,
1875. Calderwood, " History of Church of Scotland." Lond., 1675.
Stuart, " History of Reformation in Scotland." Lond., 1780. Cook,
" History of Church of Scot, from Ref." 3 vols. Edin., 1815. M'Crie,
*• Sketches of Scottish Church History." 2 vols. Lond., 1841. Cunning-
ham, " History of the Church of Scotland." 2 vols. Edin., 1859. Lee,
" Lectures on History of Church of Scotland from Ref. to Rev." 2 vols.
Edin., I860.— General Histories of Scotland: "Robertson," 2 vols., Edin.,
1759 ; " Tytler," 9 vols., Edin., 1826 ; " Burton," 8 vols. Edin., 1873 ;
"Mackenzie," Edin., 1867.
§ 139. THE REFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 323
the first martyrs from the Lutheran Confession (§ 128, 1) were led to the
stake at Antwerp, in a.d. 1523. The alliance with France and Switzer-
land, however, was the occasion of subsequently securing the triumph
of the Reformed Confession (see § 160, 1). But fanatical Anabaptists
soon followed in the wake of the reform movement, and sent forth their
emissaries into Germany and Switzerland. As the emperor had here
an authority as absolute as his heart could desire, he proceeded to execute
unrelentingly the edict of Worms, and multitudes of witnesses for the
gospel as well as fanatical sectaries were put to death by the sword and at
the stake. Still more dreadful was the havoc committed by the Inqui-
sition after Charles' abdication, in a.d. 1555, under his son and successor
Philip II. of Spain, which had for its aim the overthrow alike of ecclesias-
tical and political liberty. In order the more successfully to withstand
the Reformation, the four original bishoprics were increased by the addi-
tion of fourteen new bishoprics, and three were raised into archbishoprics,
Utrecht, Mechlin, and Cambray. But even these measures failed in
securing the end desired, because the Dutch, even those who hitherto had
remained faithful to the Romish Church, saw in them simply an instru-
ment for advancing Spanish despotism. — In a.d. 1523 Luther's trans-
lation of the N.T. had already been rendered into Dutch and printed
at Amsterdam. In a.d. 1515 Jacob van Liesfield translated the whole
Bible, and was for this sent to the scaffold in a.d. 1515. A^Calvinistic
symbol was set forth in a.d. 1562 in the Belgic Confession! The league
formed by the nobles, in a.d. 1566, to offer resistance to the tyranny of
the Spaniards, to which their oppressors gave the contemptuous desig-
nation of the Beggars — a name which they themselves adopted as a
title of honour — increased in strength and importance from day to day,
and the people, thirsting for revenge, tore down churches, images, and
altars. The prudent regent, however, Margaret of Parma, Philip's half-
sister, would have been more successful in preventing an outburst of re-
belHon by her conciliatory manoeuvres, had her brother given her greater
freedom of action. Instead of doing so he sent to her aid, in a.d. 1587,
the terrible Duke of Alva, with a standing army of 10,000 Spaniards.
The "Bloody Council" instituted by him for stamping out the revolt
now began its horrible proceedings, sending thousands upon thousands
to the rack and the scaffold. The regent, protesting against such acts,
demanded her recall, and Alva was put in her place. The bloody
tribunal moved now from city to city ; all the leading throughfares were
covered with victims hanging from gibbets, and when Alva at last, in a.d.
1573, was at his own request recalled, he could boast of having carried
out in six years 18,600 executions. Meanwhile the great Prince of Orange,
William the Silent, formerly royal governor of the Dutch Provinces, but
since a.d. 1568 a fugitive under the ban, had now openly signified his
adhesion to Protestantism, and in 1572 placed himself at the head of
]\
324 CHTJECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
the revolt. After gaining several victories by land and by sea, he suc-
ceeded, in the so called Pacification of Ghent, of a.d. 1576, in uniting
almost all the provinces, Protestant and Catholic, under a resolution to
exercise toleration to one another and show resistance to the common
foe. The new governor, Alexander Farnese, Duke of Parma, managed
indeed to detach the southern Catholic provinces from the league, but
all the more closely did the seven northern provinces bind themselves
together in the Union of Utrecht of a.d. 1579, promising to fight to the
end for their religious and political liberty. Wilham's truest friend,
counsellor, and director of his political actions, since the formation of
he league of a.d. 1566, was Philip van Marnix, Count of St. Aldegonde.
He had drawn up the articles of the league, and was equally celebrated
as a statesman and soldier, and as theologian, satirist, orator, and ipoet.
He was pre-eminently an ardent patriot, and an enthusiastic adherent
of Calvin's Reformation. He had been himself a pupil of the great
Genevan. Besides a spirited material version of the Psalter, his chief
satirico-theological work was " The Beehive of the Holy Roman Church,"
written in the Flemish dialect. — After William's assassination by the
hand of a Catholic, in a.d. 1584, he was succeeded by his son Maurice,
who after long years of bloody conflict succeeded, in a.d. 1609, in com-
pletely freeing his country from the Spanish yoke.^
13. France. — The Reformation in France had its beginning from
Wittenberg, but subsequently the Genevan reformers obtained a domi-
natin" influence. Even in a.d. 1521, the Sorbonne issued a Detcrminatio
super doctr. Lnth., pronouncing Luther's teaching and writings heretical,
which Melanchthon in the same year answered with unusual vigour in
his Apologia adv.furiosum Parisiensiwn theologastrorum decretum. Every-
thing depended upon the attitude which the young king Francis I., a.d.
1515-1547, might assume in reference to the various religious parties.
His love of humanist studies, now flourishing in France, whose zealous
promoter and protector he was against the attacks of the scholastic
Sorbonne (§ 120, 8), as well as the traditional policy of his family in
ecclesiastical matters since the time of St. Louis (§ 96, 21), seemed to
favour the hope that he would not prove altogether hostile to the ideas
of the Reformation. But even as early as a.d. 1516 he had, in his con-
cordat witb the pope (§ 110, 14), surrendered the acquisitions of the Basel
Council by the revocation of the Pragmatic Sanction of Charles VII., and
in this way, by the right given him to nominate all the bishops and
abbots, he obtained a power over all the clergy of his realm which was
too much in accordance with his dynastic ideas to allow of his sacrificing
1 Brandt, *' History of the Reformation in the Low Countries." 4 vols.
Lond.,1720. Motley, "Rise of the Dutch Repubhc." 3 vols. Lond.,
1856.
§ 139. THE KEFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 325
it in favour of the Lutheran autonomy in the management of the church,
let alone the yet more radical demands of the Calvinistic constitution.
Even in his antagonism to the emperor (§§ 126, 5, 6 ; 133, 7), which led
him to befriend in a very decided manner the German Protestants, his
interests crossed one another, inasmuch as he required to retain the good-
will of the pope. Suppression of Protestantism in his own land and
the fostering of it in Germany were thus the aims of his crooked policy.
He did indeed for a time entertain the idea of introducing a moderate
Reformation into France after the Erasmian model, in order to secure
closer attachment to and union with German Protestantism. He entered
into negotiations with Philip the Magnanimous, and had Melanchthon
invited in a.d. 1535 to attend a conference on these matters in France.
Melanchthon was not indisposed to go, but was interdicted by his prince
the elector, who feared lest he might make too great concessions. And
just about this time fanatically violent pamphlets and placards were
published, which were even thrown into the royal apartments, and thus
the anger of the king was roused to the utmost pitch. The persecutions,
which, [from a.d. 1524, had already brought many isolated witnesses
to the scaffold and the stake, now assumed a systematic and general
character. Li a.d. 1535, an Inquisition tribunal was set up, with mem-
bers nominated by the pope, and as supplementary thereto there was
instituted in the Parliament of Paris the so-called chambre ardente : the
former drew up the process against the heretics, the latter pronounced
and executed the sentence. Thousands of heroic confessors died under
torture, on the gallows, by sword, or by fire. Under Henry II., a.d. 1547-
1559, who continued his father's crooked policy, the chambre ardente
became more and more active, and the cruelty of the persecution in-
creased. Among the sworn foes of the Reformation, Diana of Poitiers,
an old love of his father's, had for a time the greatest influence over the
king. He raised her to the rank of duchess. With diabolic satisfaction
she gloated upon the spectacle of autos-de-fe carried out at her request,
and enriched herself with the confiscated goods of the victims. Side by
side with her, inspired by a like hate of Protestantism, stood the great
marshal and all-powerful minister of state, the Constable Montmorency.
These two were further backed up by all the influence of the powerful
ducal family of the Guises, a branch of a Lorraine house naturalized
in France, consisting of six brothers, at their head the two eldest, the
Cardinal Charles of Lorraine, Archbishop of -Rheims, who died in a.d. 1574,
and Francis, the conqueror of Calais. The least influential in the league
at that time was the queen, Catharine de Medici.
14. In spite of all persecutions, the Reformed church made rapid
progress, especially in the southern districts. Its adherents came to
be known by the name of Huguenots, meaning originally Leaguers, Cove-
nanters, on account of their connection with Geneva. A popular ety-
326 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
mology of the word derives it from the nightly assemblies in a locality
haunted by the spirit of King Hugo. Calvin and Beza, as sons of France,
assisted the young church with counsel and help. But even within the
bounds of the kingdom it had very important political supporters. Cer-
tain members of the house of Bourbon, a powerful branch of the royal
family, Anton, who married the brilliant heiress of Navarre, Jeanne
d'Albret, and his brother Louis de Conde, had attached themselves to
the Protestant cause. Also other distinguished personages, e.g. the noble
Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, a nephew of Montmorency, and several
prominent members of Parliament, were enthusiastically devoted to Pro-
testantism, and, withdrawing from the frivolous and licentious court,
gave to the profession of the reformed faith a wide reputation for strict
morality and deep piety. The first general synod of the reformed
church was held in Paris from 25th to 28th May, a.d. 1559. It adopted
a Calvinistic symbol, the Confessio GalUcana, and, as a directory for the
constitution and discipline of the church, forty articles, also inspired by
the spirit of Calvin. — Henry II. was followed in succession by his three
sons, Francis, Charles, and Henry, all of whom died without issue.
Under Francis II., a.d. 1559, 1560, who ascended the throne in his six-
teenth year, the two Guises, the uncles of his queen Mary Stuart, held
unlimited sway and gave abundance of work to the chambre ardente. A
conspiracy directed against them in a.d. 1560 led to the execution of
1,200 persons implicated in it. Even the two Bourbons were cast into
prison, and the younger condemned to death. The king's early death,
however, prevented the execution of the sentence. The queen-mother,
Catharine de Medici, now succeeded in breaking off the yoke of the
Guises and securing to herself the regency during the minority of her
son Charles IX., a.d. 1560-1574. But the attempts of the Guises to
undermine her authority obliged her to seek supporters meanwhile
among the Protestants. Coligny was able in a.d. 1560 to demand reli-
gious toleration of the imperial Parliament, and succeeded at last so far
that in a.d. 1561 an edict was issued abolishing capital punishment
for heresy. In order to bring about wherever that was possible an under-
standing between the two great religious parties, a five weeks' religious
conference was held in September of that same year in the Abbey of
Poissy, near Paris, to which on the evangelical side Beza from Geneva
and Peter Martyr from Ziirich, besides many other theologians, were
invited. On the Catholic side, the Cardinal of Lorraine represented the
doctrine of his church, and subsequently also the general of the Jesuits,
Lainez. The proceedings, in which Beza's learning, eloquence, and
praiseworthy courtesy toward his opponents had great weight, were con-
centrated on the doctrines of the Church and the Lord's Supper, but
yielded no result. In order that they might be able to inflame the
Lutherans and the Reformed against one another, the Catholics endea-
§ 189. THE EEFOKMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 327
voured to bring forward supporters of the Augsburg Confession into
the discussions on those points. Five German theologians were actually
brought forward, among them Jac. Andrea of Wiirttemberg, but too late
to take part in the conference. On 17th January, a.d. 1562, the regent
issued an edict, by which the Protestants were allowed to hold religious
services outside of the towns, and also to have meetings of synod under
the supervision of royal commissioners.
15. The rage of the Guises and their fanatical party at this edict knew
no bounds. Francis of Guise swore to cut it up with his sword, and on
1st March, a.d. 1562, at Passy in Champagne, he fell upon the Huguenots
assembled there for worship in a barn, and slew them almost to a man.
At Cahors, a Huguenot place of worship was surrounded by a Catholic
mob and set on fire. None of those gathered together there survived,
for those who escaped the flames were waylaid and murdered. At
Toulouse, the oppressed Protestants, with wives and children, to the
number of 4,000, had betaken themselves to the capitol. They were
promised a free outlet, and were then slaughtered, because no one, it was
said, should keep his word with a heretic (§ 200, 3). Louis Conde sum-
moned his fellow Protestants to take up arms in their own defence against
such atrocities, entrenched himself in Orleans, and obtained, by the help
of the Landgrave Philip of Hesse, German auxiliaries. The Guises, on
the other hand, won over to their side the king and his mother. And
now the strict legitimist Coligny placed himself at the head of the
Huguenot movement. The battle of Dreux in Dec, a.d. 1562, resulted
unfavourably to the Protestants, but during the siege of Orleans Francis
of Guise was assassinated by a Huguenot nobleman. The regent now,
in the peace edict of Amboise, of 19th Nov., a.d. 1563, allowed to the
Protestants liberty of worship except in certain districts and cities, of
which Paris was one. After securing emancipation from the yoke of the
Guises, however, she soon began openly to show her old hatred of the
Protestants. She joined in a league with Spain for the extirpating of
heresy, restricted in a d. 1564 by the Edict of Roussillon her previous
concessions, and laid incessant plots in order to effect the capture or
murder of the two great leaders of the Huguenot party. The threatening
incursions of the Duke of Alva upon the neighbouring provinces of the
Netherlands, in a.d. 1567, occasioned the outbreak of the second reli-
gious war. The projected removal of the court to Monceaux fell through
indeed, in consequence of the hasty flight of the king to Paris, but the
overthrow of the royal army in the battle of St. Denys, in Nov., a,d.
1567, in which Montmorency fell, as well as the reinforcement of the
Huguenot army by an auxiliary corps under the leadership of John
Casimir, the prince of the Palatinate, led Catharine to conclude the
Peace of Longjumeau, of March, a.d. 1568, which guaranteed anew all
previous concessions. But when the persecution of the Huguenots was
328 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
continued in numberless executions, before the year was out they had
again, for the third time, to have recourse to arms. England supported
them with money and ammunition, and Protestant Germany gave them
11,000 auxiliaries ; while Spain helped their opponents. Louis Conde
fell by the hand of an assassin in a.d. 1569, but the Huguenots had so
evidently the best of it, that the king and his mother found themselves
obliged to grant them complete liberty of conscience and of worship in
the peace treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye, on 8th Aug., a.d. 1570, except-
ing in Paris and in the immediate surroundings of the palace. As a
guarantee for the treaty, four strongholds in southern France were sur-
rendered to them. It was further stipulated, in order to confirm for ever
the good undertaking, that Henry of Navarre, son of Jeanne d'Albret,
should marry Margaret, the sister of Charles IX.
16. At the marriage, consummated on 18th August, a.d. 1572, subse-
quently known as the Bloody Marriage, the chiefs of the Huguenot party
were gathered together at Paris. Jeanne d'Albret had died at the court,
probably by poison, on 9th June, and Coligny had been fatally wounded
by a shot on 22nd August. On the night of St. Bartholomew, between
the 23rd and 24th August, the castle bell tolled. This was the concerted
signal for the destruction of all the Huguenots present in Paris. For
four days the carnage was unweariedly carried on by the city militia
appointed for the purpose, the royal Swiss guards, and crowds of fanatical
artisans. Coligny fell praying amid the blows of his murderers. No
Huguenot was spared, neither children, nor women, nor the aged. Their
princely chiefs, Henry of Navarre and Henry Conde, the son of Louis,
were offered the choice between death and taking part in the celebration
of mass. They decided for the latter. Meanwhile messengers had
hasted into the provinces with the death-warrants, and there the slaugh-
ter began afresh. The whole number of victims is variously estimated
at from 10,000 to 100,000 ; in Paris alone there fell from 1,000 to 10,000.
— The death decree was not indeed so much the result of long planned
and regularly conceived conspiracy, as a sudden resolve suggested by
political circumstances. The queen-mother was at variance with her
son with respect to his anti-Spanish policy, which had always inclined
him favourably to Coligny ; and so, in concert with her favourite son,
Henry of Anjou, she succeeded in dealing a deadly stroke at the great
admiral by the hand of an assassin. The king swore to take fearful ven-
geance on the unknown perpetrators of this crime. Catharine now made
every effort to avert the threatened blow. She managed to convince the
king, by means of her fellow conspirators, that the Huguenots regarded
him as an accomplice in the perpetrating of the outrage, and that so his
life was in danger because of them. He now swore by God's death that
not merely the chiefs, to whom Catharine and her auxiliaries had du'ected
special attention, but all the Huguenots in France, should die, in order
§ 139. THE REFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 329
that not one should remain to bring this charge against him. On the
other hand, it is all but certain that the thought of such a diaboHcal
deed had previously suggested itself, if indeed expression had not been
explicitly given to it. To the Spanish and Romish courts, the French
government represented the deed as an acte premedite, to the German
court as an acte non premedite. But even before this a letter from Rome
to the Emperor MaximiHan II. (§ 137, 8) had contained the following :
" At that hour (referring to the marriage festivities) lohen all the birds are
in the cage, they can seize upon them altogether, and can have any one that
they desire.'' He was profoundly excited about the villany of the trans-
action, while Philip II. of Spain on hearing of it is said to have laughed •
for the first time in his life. Pope Gregory XIII. indeed feared the worst
consequences, but soon changed his mind, and had Rome illuminated,
all the bells rung, the cannons fired, a Te Deum performed, processions
made, and a medal struck, with the inscription, Ugonottorum strages.
He instructed the French ambassador to inform his king that this perfor-
mance was a hundred times more grateful to him than fifty victories
over the Turks. ^
17. The dreadful deed, however, completely failed in accomplishing
the end in view. Even after 100,000 had been slaughtered there still
remained more than ten times that number of Huguenots, who, in posses-
sion of their strongholds, occupied positions of great strategetical import-
ance. After a brief breathing time of peace, therefore, they were able,
on five occasions, in a.d. 1573, 1576, 1577, 1580, to renew the religious
civil war, when once and again the truce had been broken by the Catho-
lics. Charles IX. was succeeded by Catharine's favourite son, Henry III.,
A.D. 1574-1589, who, joining the most shameless immorality to the nar-
rowest bigotry and asceticism (§ 149, 17), was no way behind his brother
in dissoluteness, and was still more conspicuous for dastardliness and
cowardice. Henry Conde had, just immediately after Charles's death,
abjured again the Catholic confession, and put himself at the head of the
Huguenot revolt. Henry of Navarre rejoined his old friends two years
later, after having in the meantime vied with his brother-in-law and his
incestuous wife in frivolity and immoraUty. He was able to take part
successfully in the fifth religious war, in which the Huguenots, supported
once more by the German auxiliaries under the Count-palatine John
Casimir, secured such advantages, that the court, in the Treaty of Beau-
lieu, of A.D. 1576, were obliged to grant them complete religious freedom
1 Bersier, " Coligny : the Earlier Life of the Great Huguenot." Lond.,
1884. White, *' The Massacre of St. Bartholomew." 2 vols. London,
1868. Lord Mahon, " Life of Louis, Prince of Conde." New York, 1848.
Baird, •' History of the Rise of the Huguenots.'' 2 vols. London and
New York, 1880.
330 CHURCH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
and a larger number of strongholds. But now Henry of Guise, in concert
with his brothers Louis, cardinal and Archbishop of Rheims, and Charles,
Duke of Mayenne, formed the Holy League, which he compelled the king
to join, and renewed the war with increased vigour. In the eighth war
since a,d. 1584, which on the part of the Guises was really as much
directed against the king's Huguenot policy as against the Huguenots
themselves, Henry was obliged, by the Treaty of Nemours, of a.d. 1585, to
declare that the Protestants were deprived of all rights and privileges.
In the battle of Coutras, however, in a.d. 1587, Henry of Navarre anni-
hilated the opposing forces. But as he failed to follow up the advantages
then secured, the Guises again recruited their strength to such a degree
that they were able openly to work for the dethronement of the king.
Henry could save himself only by the murder of both the elder Guises at
the Diet of Blois. There was now no alternative left him but to cast
himself into the arms of the Huguenots, and on this account, at the
siege of the capital, he was murdered by the Dominican Clement. Henry
of Navarre, as the only legitimate heir, now ascended the throne as
Henry IV., a.d. 1589-1610. After a hard struggle, lasting for four years,
in which he was supported by England and Germany, while his oppo-
nents, headed by the Duke of Mayenne, were aided with money and men
by Spain, Savoy, and the pope, he at last decided, in a.d. 1593, to pass
over to Catholicism, because, as he said, " Paris is well worth a mass."
He secured, however, for his former co-religionists, by the Edict of Nantes,
of 13th April, a.d. 1598, complete liberty of holding religious services in
all the cities where previously there had been reformed congregations, as
well as thorough equality with the Catholics in all civil rights and privi-
leges, especially in regard to eligibility for all civil and military offices.
The fortresses and strongholds hitherto held by them were to be left with
them for eight years, and in the Parliament a special " Chamber of the
Edict " was instituted, with eight Catholic and eight Protestant members.
But, on the other hand, they continued to be under the Catholic marriage
laws, were obliged to cease from work on the Catholic festivals, and to
pay tithes to the Catholic clergy. After a stubborn resistance on the part
of the Parliament of Paris, the university, and the Sorbonne, as well
as on that of the bishops, the king, in February, a.d. 1599, secured the
incorporation of the edict among the laws of France. On 14tli May,
A.D. 1610, he was struck down by the dagger of the Feuillant Ravaillac, a
fanatical Jesuit. Notwithstanding his many moral shortcomings, France
has rightly celebrated him as one of the greatest and best of her kings.
With wisdom, prudence, and humanity he wrought unweariedly for the
advancement of a commonwealth that had been reduced to the lowest
depths. He protected the Protestants in the enjoyment of privileges
guaranteed to them, and though he did indeed put upon his old Huguenot
friends some gentle pressure to get them to follow his exgimple, he yet
§ 139. THE EEFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 331
honoured those who steadfastly refused. His minister Sully, although
it is supposed that he had felt obliged to advise the king to go over
to Catholicism, stood himself unhesitatingly true to his profession of the
Huguenot faith, while he retained the king's confidence, and proved his
most faithful adviser and administrator during all the negotiations of
peace and war. Philip du Plessis Mornay, on the other hand, distin-
guished even more as a statesman, diplomatist, and field marshal than
as a theologian and author,i but above all as a Christian and a man in
the noblest sense of the word, who, in the belief that evangelical truth
would, even in the Catholic church, assert its conquering power, had
agreed with the Catholic League to instruct the king in the Catholic faith,
and had thus made the act of apostasy appear to him less offensive. But
just because the mere presence of a friend of high moral character and
true religious principles acted as too sharp a sting to the king's con-
science, he had to submit to be relegated to an honorary post as governor
of Saumur, where he became founder of the famous academy which
Louis XIV. suppressed in a.d. 1685. Theodore Agrippa d'Aubigne, too,
distinguished as a brave warrior in the army of the Huguenots, as well as
a historian, poet, and satirist, stood high in favour with the king, though
Henry, often roused by his unbending pride, repeatedly expelled him
from the court. After Henry's death D'Aubigne returned to Geneva,
where he died in a.d. 1630."-
18. Poland.— The Reformation had been introduced into Poland first
of all by the exiled Bohemian Brethren, and Luther's writings soon after
their appearance were eagerly read in that region. Sigisraund I., a.d.
1506-1548, opposed it with all his might. It met with most success in
Prussian Poland. Dantzig, in a.d. 1525, drove out the Catholic council.
Sigismund went down there himself, had several citizens executed, and
restored the old mode of worship in a.d. 1526. But scarcely had he left
the town when it again went back to the profession of the Lutheran
1 The following have been translated into English : " Treatise on the
Church," London, 1579; "The Truth of the Christian Religion, partly
by Sir Phil. Sydney," London, 1587; "On the Eucharist," London, 1600.
2 De Felice, " History of Protestants in France from Beginning of
Reformation to the Present-Time." London, 1853. Jervis, " History of
the GaUican Church from a.d. 1516 to the Revolution." 2 vols. Lon-
don, 1872. Baird, " Huguenots and Henry of Navarre." 2 vols. New
York, 1886. Ranke, " Civil Wars and Monarchy in France in the 16th
and 17th Centuries." 2 vols. London, 1852. Smedley, "History of the
Reformation in France." 3 vols. London, 1832. Weiss, " History of
the Protestant Reformation in France. 2 vols. London and New York,
1854. "Memoirs of Duke of Sully, Prime Minister to Henry IV."
4 vols. London (Bohn).
332 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
faith. Elbing and Thorn followed its examijle. In Poland proper
also the new doctrines made way. In spite of all prohibitions many
young Poles flocked to Wittenberg, and brought away from it to their
native country a glowing enthusiasm for Luther and his teaching. The
Swiss Confession had already found entrance there, and the persecutions
which Ferdinand of Austria carried on after the Schmalcald war in
Bohemia and Moravia led great numbers of Bohemian Brethren to cross
over into the Polish territories. Sigismund Augustus, a.d. 1548-1572,
was personally favourable to the Reformation. He studied Calvin's
" Institutes," received letters from him and from Melanchthon, and, in
accordance with the decisions of a national assembly at Petrican in a,d.
1555 demanded of the pope a national counail, as well as permission
for the marriage of priests, the communion in both kinds, the celebration
of mass in the vernacular, and abolition of annats. The pope naturally
refused to yield, but in a.d. 1556 sent into the country a legate of a
despotic and violent temper, called Aloysius Lippomanus, who was re-
placed in A.D. 1563 by the bland and eloquent Commendone. Both were
powerfully supported in their struggle against heresy by the fanatically
CathoHc cardinal Stanislaus Hosius, Bishop of Ermeland. The Pro-
testant nobility then recalled, in a.d. 1556, their celebrated countryman
Jolin a Lasco, who twenty years before had, on account of his evangelical
faith, resigned his office as provost of Gnesen and left his fatherland.
He had meanwhile taken part in the Reformation of East Friesland, and
had acted for several years as preacher at Emden. After that, he had
gone, at the calPof Cranmer, in a.d. 1550, to England; upon the death of
Edward VI., along with ajpart of his London flock of foreign exiles, had
sought refuge in Denmark, which, however, was refused on account of
his attachment to Zwingli's doctrine ; and at last settled down at Frank-
fort-on-the-Maine as pastor to a congregation of French, English, and
Dutch exiles. After his return home he endeavoured to bring about a
union of the Lutherans and Reformed, in concert with several friends
made a translation of the Bible, and died in a.d. 1560. At a general
synod at Sendomir, in a.d. 1570, a union was at last effected between the
three dissentient parties, by which the Lutheran doctrine of the Lord's
Supper was acknowledged, yet in so indefinite a form that Calvin's view
might also be entertained. The Lutheran opposition at the synod had
been suppressed by urgent entreaty, but afterwards broke out again in a
still more violent form. At the Synod of Thorn, in a.d. 1595, the Lutheran
pastor Paul Gericke was the leader of it ; but one of the nobles present
held a dagger to his heart, and the synod suspended him from his office
as a disturber of the peace. Sigismund Augustus had meanwhile died,
in A.D. 1572. During the interregnum that followed, the Protestant nobles
formed a confederation, which before the election of a new king suc-
ceeded in obtaining a comprehensive religious peace, the Pax dissidentium
§ 139. THE REFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 333
of A.D. 1573, by means of which CathoHcs and Protestants were for all
time to live together in peace and enjoy equal civil rights. The newly
elected king, Henry of Anjou, sought to avoid binding himself by oath to
the observance of this peace, but the imperial marshal addressed him in
firm and decided language, Si nonjumbis, non regnabis. In the follow-
ing year, however, the new king left Poland in order to mount the
French throne as Henry III. Stephen Bathori, a.d. 1576-1586, swore
without hesitation to observe the peace, and kept his oath. Under his
successor, Sigismund III., a Swedish prince, a.d. 1587-1632, the Pro-
testants had to complain of the infringement of many of their rights,
which from this time down to the overthrow of the Polish kingdom, in
A.D. 1772, they never again enjoyed.^ — Continuation, § 161, 4.
19. Bohemia and Moravia. — The numerous Bohemian and Moravian
Brethren (§ 119, 8), at whose head was the elder Luke of Prague, greeted
the appearance of Luther with the most hopeful joy. By messages and
writings, however, which in a.d. 1522-1521 were interchanged between
them, some important diversities of view were discovered. Luke dis-
liked Luther's realistic theory of the Lord's Supper, continued to hold
.by the seven sacraments, rejected the doctrine of justification by faith
alone, and took special offence at Luther's view of Christian freedom,
which seemed to him to want the necessary rigour of the apostolic dis-
cipline of the life and to under-estimate the importance and worth of
celibacy and virginity. Luther, on the other hand, charged them with a
want of grasp of the doctrine and a Novatian over-estimation of mere
outward exercises and discipline. And so these negotiations ended in
mutual recrimination, and only after Luke's death, in a.d. 1528, and
the glorious Diet of Augsburg, in a.d. 1530, were they reopened. The
Lutheranizing tendency, for which especially the two elders John Koh
and John Augusta laboured, now gained the upper hand for two decades.
In A.D. 1532 the Brethren presented to the Margrave George of Bran-
denburg an apology of the doctrine and customs, which was printed at
Wittenberg, and had a preface by Luther, in which he expressed himself
in very favourable terms about the doctrine of the " Picards," and only
objected to their spiritualizing tendency, of w^hich their doctrine of the
supper and of baptism was not altogether free, inasmuch as they, while
practising infant baptism, required that each one should on reaching
maturity take the vows upon himself and have baptism repeated. Still
more favourably did he speak of their confession presented in a.d. 1535
to King Ferdinand, in which they had left out the rebaptizing, substi-
tuting for it the solemn imposition of hands as confirmation. When the
* Dalton, " John a Lasco : His Earlier Life and Labours." London,
1886. Krasinski, " Historical Sketch of the Rise, Progress, and Decline
of the Reformation in Poland." 2 vols. London, 1838.
334 CHUKCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Brethren at Luther's request had modified the two articles at which he
took offence, their unsatisfactory theory of justification, and that of the
wholesomeness, though not necessity, of clerical celibacy, he declared
himself thoroughly satisfied, and at their last personal conference, in a.d.
1542, he stretched his hand over the table to Augusta and his comijanions
as the pledge of indissoluble brotherly fellowship, although not agreed in
regard to various matters of constitution and discipline. The refusal of
the Brethren to fight against their German fellow Protestants in the
Schmalcald war led to their king Ferdinand upon its close issuing some
penal statutes against them. Driven away into exile in a.d. 1548, many
of them went to Poland, the larger number to Prussia, from whence they
returned to their native land in a.d. 1574. Meantime matters had there
in many respects taken an altogether new turn. In the later years of his
reign Ferdinand had become more favourable to the evangelical move-
ment in his hereditary dominions, and Maximilian 11., a.d. 1564-1576,
gave it an absolutely fi-ee course (§ 137, 8). Thus the Brethren could not
only go on from day to day increasing in numbers and in influence, but
alongside of them there grew up a genuine Lutheran community and an
independent Calvinist body. The Crypto-calvinism which was also at
the same time gaining the victory in Saxony (§ 141, 10) cast its shadow
upon the Lutheranizing movement among the Brethren. And this
movement told all the more against the Lutheran party there from the
circumstance that at an earlier period there had been powerful influences
at work, inspired by a national Bohemian spirit, to resist German inter-
ference in matters of religion. Since the death of the elder Luke the
national party had succeeded more and more in working back to the
genuine Bohemian constitution, discipline, and confession of their fathers.
At the head of this movement stood John Blahoslaw, from a.d. 1553
deacon of Jungbunzlau, after Luke of Prague and before Amos Comenius
(§ 167, 2) the most important champion of the Bohemian-Moravian
Confession. To him chiefly are the Brethren indebted for the high
development of literary and scientific activity which they manifested
during the second half of the century, and his numerous writings, but
pre-eminently his translation of the N.T., proved almost as influential
and epoch-making for the Bohemian language as Luther's translation of
the Bible did for the written language of Germany. Himself one of the
ablest among the very numerous writers of spiritual songs in Bohemian,
he was the restorer of the simple and majestic Bohemian chorales. As he
had himself, in a.d. 1568, translated the N.T. from the original Greek text,
he also undertook, with the help of several younger men of noble gifts, a
similar translation of the O.T. and a commentary on the whole Bible.
But he died in a.d. 1571, in his forty-eighth year, before the issue of
his great work, upon the inception of which he had expended so much
thought and care. This great undertaking was completed and published
§ 139. THE REFOEMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 335
in six volumes between a.d. 1579-1593. The strong spiritual affinity
between the society of the Brethren and the Calvinistic church, especially
in its doctrine of the supper and in its zeal for rigid church discipline,
was meanwhile again brought into prominence, and had led to a more
and more decided loosening of attachment to the Lutheran church, and,
in spite of the antagonism of its episcopalianism to the Calvinistic pres-
byterianism, to the formation of closer ties with Calvinism. But now,
on the other hand, the common danger that threatened them from
Rudolph II., who had been king of Bohemia from a.d. 1575, at the insti-
gation of Jesuits through the Spanish court, led all non-Catholics, of
whatever special confession, to draw as closely together as possible. Thus
a league came to be formed in the same year in which the Brethren were
far outnumbered by Lutherans, Reformed, and Calixtines (§ 119, 7), by
means of which, in the Confessio Bohemica of a.d. 1575, a common
symbol was drawn up, and all the four parties were placed under the
management of a common consistory. But when, after Maximilian's
death, Rudolph II. proceeded more and more rigorously in his efforts to
completely suppress all heresy, the Bohemians rose with one heart, and
at last, in a.d. 1609, extorted from him the rescript which gave them
absolute rehgious liberty according to the Bohemian Confession, a com-
mon consistory of their own, and an academy at Prague. Bohemia was
now an almost completely evangelical country, and scarcely a tenth
part of its inhabitants professed attachment to the Catholic faith. ^ —
Continuation, g§ 153, 2 ; 167, 2.
20, Hungary and Transylvania. — From a.d. 1521, Martin Cyriaci, a
student of Wittenberg, wrought in Hungary for the spread of the true
doctrine. King Louis 11. threatened its adherents with all possible
penalties. But in a.d. 1526 he fell in battle against the Turks at Mohacz.
The election of a new king resulted in two claimants taking possession
of the field ; Ferdinand of Austria secured a footing in the western, and
the Woiwode John Zapolya in the eastern provinces. Both sought to
suppress the Reformation, in order to win over the clergy to support them.
But it nevertheless gained the ascendency, favoured by the political con-
fusions of the time. Matthias Devay, a scholar of Luther, and for a time
a resident in his house, from a.d. 1521 preached the gospel at Ofen,
having been called thither by several of the leading inhabitants on
Melanchthon's recommendation, and in a.d. 1533 had a Hungarian
translation of the Pauline epistles printed at Cracow. In a.d. ^1541
Erdosy issued the complete New Testament, which was also the first
book printed in Hungary, At a synod at Erdod, in a.d. 1545, twenty-
nine ministers drew up a confession of faith in twelve articles, in agree-
^ " History of Persecutions in Bohemia from a.d. 894 to a.d. 1632."
London, 1650.
3B6 CHUKCH HISTOKY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
ment with the Augshurg Confession. But also the Swiss doctrine had
now found entrance, and won more and more adherents from day to day.
These adopted at a council at Czengar, in a.d. 1557, a Calvinistic con-
fession, with decided repudiation of the Zwinglian as well as the Lutheran
theory of the Lord's Supper, describing the latter as an insania sarco-
phagica. The government of Maximilian II. did not interfere with the
progress of the Reformation; but when Rudolph II. attempted to
interfere with violent measures, the Protestants rose in revolt under
Stephen Bocskai, and compelled the king to grant them complete religious
liberty by the Vienna Peace of a.d. 1606. Among the native Hungarians
the Reformed confession prevailed, but the German residents remained
true to Lutheranism. (Continuation § 153, 3.) — As early as a.d. 1521
merchants had brought into Transylvania from Hermanstadt copies
of Luther's writings. King Louis II. of Hungary, however, carried his
persecution of the evangelicals even into this territory, which was con-
tinued after his death by Zapolya. In a.d. 1529, however, Hermanstadt
ventured to expel all adherents of the Romish church from within its
walls. In Cronstadt, the work of the Reformation was carried on from a.d.
1533 by Jac. Honter, who had studied at Basel. Since Zapolya through
an agreement with Ferdinand, in a.d. 1538, was assured of possession for
his lifetime of Transylvania, he acted more mildly toward the Protes-
tants. After his death the monk Martinuzzi, as Bishop of Grosswardein,
assumed the helm of affairs for Zapolya's son during his minority,
oppressing the Protestants with bloody .persecutions, while Isabella,
Zapolya's widow, was favourable to them. Martinuzzi therefore handed
over the country to Ferdinand, but was assassinated in a.d. 1551. After
some years Isabella returned with her son, and a national assembly at
Clausenburg, in a.d. 1557, gave an organization to the country as an inde-
pendent principality, and proclaimed universal rehgious liberty. The
Saxon population continued attached to the Lutheran confession, and
the Czecks and Magyars preferred to adopt the Reformed. ^
21. Spain. — The connection brought about between Spain and Germany
through the election of Charles V. as emperor led to the very early intro-
duction into the Peninsula of Luther's doctrine and writings. Indeed
many of the theologians and statesmen who went in Charles' train
into Germany returned with evangelical convictions in their hearts, as,
e.g., the Benedictine Alphonso de Virves, the fiery Ponce de la Fuente,
both court chaplains of the emperor, and his private secretary Alphonso
Valdez. A layman, Roderigo de Valer, by earnest study of the Bible
^ Bauhoffer, "History of the Protestant Church of Hungary, from the
beginning of the Reformation to 1850, with Reference also to Transyl-
vania." Trans, by Dr. Craig of Hamburg, with introd. by D'Aubigne-
Lond., 1854.
§ 139. THE EEFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 337
attained unto a knowledge of the gospel, and became the instrument of
leading many others into the way of salvation. The Inquisition confis-
cated his goods and condemned him to wear the san benito (§ 117, 2).
Juan Gil, a friend of Valer, Bishop of Tortosa, founded a society for the
study of the Bible. The Inquisition deposed him, and only Charles'
favour protected him from the stake ; but subsequently his bones were
dug up and burnt. Many other prelates also, such as Carranza of
Toledo, Guerrero of Granada, Guesta of Leon, Carrubias of Ciudad
Eoderigo, Agostino of Lerida, Ayala of Segovia, etc., admitted the
necessity for a thoroughgoing revision of doctrine, without detaching
themselves from the pope and the Romish church ; and in this direction
they laboured with zeal and success amid the threatenings of the Inquisi-
tion. The first Protestant martyr in Spain was Francisco san Romano,
a merchant who had become acquainted with Luther's doctrine at
Antwerp. He was led to the stake at Valladolid, in a.d. 1544. Francis
Enzina, in a.d. 1543, translated the New Testament. He was cast into
prison, and the book prohibited. A complete Spanish Bible was printed
by Cassiod. de Reyna at Basel, in a.d. 1569. In Seville and Valladolid
first of all, and at a later period also in many other Spanish cities,
evangelical congregations held secret services. Even so soon as about
A.D. 1550, the Reformation movement threatened to become so general
and widespread, that a Spanish historian of that age, Ilesca, in his
history of the popes, expresses the conviction that all Spain would have
become overrun with heresy if the Inquisition had delayed for three
months longer to put an end to the pestilence. But it now applied that
remedy in the largest and strongest doses possible. The measures of
the Inquisition were specially prompt and vigorous during the reign of
Philip II., A.D. 1555-1598. Scarcely a year passed in which there were
not at each of the twelve Inquisition courts one or more great autos-de-fe,
in which crowds of heretics were burnt. And the remedy was effectual.
After two decades the evangelical movement was stamped out. How
determinedly the crusade was carried out is shown by the proceedings
in the case of the Archbishop of Toledo, Barthol. Carranza. This
prelate had published a " Commentary on the Catechism," in which he
expressed a wish to see '• the ancient spirit of our forefathers and of
the early church revived in its simplicity and purity." The grand-
inquisitor discerned therein Lutheran heresy, and though he bore one
of the highest positions in the Spanish church, Carranza was kept close
prisoner for eight years in the dungeons of the Inquisition, and after he
had at last reached the pope with his appeal, he was kept for nine years
in the castle of St. Angelo at Rome. There at last, upon his abjuring
sixteen heretical propositions, especially about justification, saint and
image worship, he was sentenced to five years' imprisonment in the
Dominican cloister at Orvieto, but died some weeks after, in a.d. 1576, in
22
338 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
his seventy- third year. At the Quemadero, the scene of tlie autos-de-fS
of the Madrid Inquisition court, there were till quite recently discernible
the traces of the human hecatombs that had there been offered up to
the insatiable Moloch of religious fanaticism. The official newspaper
of the capital of the 12th April, a.d. 18G9, reports how on the removal
of the soil for the purpose of lengthening a street, the grim geological
archives of the burnings of the Inquisition were laid bare, while with
horrifying minuteness it proceeds to describe the maximum reached, and
the gradual diminution of these papal atrocities.^
22. Italy. — The Reformation made progress in Italy in various direc-
tions. A large number of the humanists (§ 120, 1) had in a self-sufficient
paganism lost all interest in Christianity, and were just as indifferent
toward the Reformation as toward the old church ; but another section
were inclined to favour a reformation after the style of Erasmus. Both
remained in outward connection with the old church. But besides these
there were many learned men of a more decided tendency, some of them
attempting reforms at their own hand, and so not infrequently rejecting
fundamental doctrines of Christianity, such as the various Anti-trini-
tarians of that age (§ 118), some who attached themselves to the German,
but more frequently to the Swiss reformers. Both brought the reforming
ideas before the people by preaching and writing. Almost all the works
of the German and Swiss reformers were immediately after their pub-
lication circulated in Italy in translations, and under the shield of
anonymity scattered broadcast through the land, before the Inquisition
laid hold upon them. Among the princely supporters of the Reformation
movement, the most prominent was Renata of Este, Duchess of Ferrara,
and sister-in-law of the French king Francis, distinguished as much for
piety as for culture and learning. Her court was a place of refuge and
a rallying point for French and Italian exiles. Calvin stayed some weeks
with her in a d. 1536, and confirmed her in her evangelical faith by
personal conversation, and subsequently by epistolary correspondence.
Her husband, Hercules of Ferrara, whom she married in a.d. 1534, at first
let her do as she liked, but in a.d. 1536 expelled Calvin from his domi-
nions, and had his wife confined, in a.d. 1554, as an obstinate Lutheran
heretic, in the old castle of Este. Still she was allowed to return to her
husband after she had brought herself to confess to a Romish i^riest.
But when after his death, in a.d. 1560, Alphonso, her son, put before her
the alternative of either recanting her faith or leaving the country, she
1 Bochmer, " Spanish Reformers, Lives and Writings." 2 vols. Strass-
burg, 1874. M'Crie, "History of the Progress and Suppression of
Reformation in Spain." Edin., 1829. Be Castro, " The Spanish Pro-
testants, and their Persecutions by Philip II." Lond., 1852. Prescott,
" History of the Reign of Philip II." 3 vols. Boston, 1856.
§ 139. THE REFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 339
returned to France, and there openly made profession of her faith and
attached herself to the Huguenots. Francis of Guise was her son-in-law,
and she was subjected on account of her Protestantism to the incessant
persecutions of the Guises. She died in a.d. 1575. — We have seen already,
in § 135, 3, that the idea had been mooted of a propaganda of Catholic
Christians in Italy. With a strong and lively conviction of the importance
of the doctrine of justification by faith they made it the central point of
religious life and knowledge, and thus, without directly opposing it, they
inspired new life into the Catholic church. The first germ of this move-
ment appeared in the so-called Oratory of Divine Love, slxi a,ssocisition
formed in the beginning of a.d. 1520 at Rome, after the apostolic model,
for mutual religious edification, consisting of fifty or sixty young, eager
men, mostly of the clerical order. One of the original founders was Jac.
Sadolet, who in this spirit expounded the Epistle to the Romans. To it
also belonged such men as the founder of the Theatine order (§ 149, 7),
Cajetan of Thiene. and John Pet. Caraffa, Bishop of Chieta, and after-
wards Pope Paul IV., who sought the church's salvation rather in the
practice of a rigorous inquisitorial discipline. The sack of Rome (§ 132,
2) broke up this association in a.d. 1527, but spread its efforts over all
Italy. The fugitive English cardinal, Reginald Pole, attached himself
in Venice to the party of Sadolet. In Ferrara there was Italy's most
famous poetess, Vittoria Colonna ; at Modena the Bishop Morone,who,
although as papal legate in Germany, a zealous defender of the papal
claims (§§ 135, 2 ; 137, 5), yet in his own diocese even subsequently aided
the evangelical tendencies of his companions with much ardour, and
hence under Paul IV. was cast into the Inquisition, to come out only
under Pius V., after undergoing a three years' imprisonment. In Naples
there was Juan Valdez, Alphonso's brother, secretary of the Spanish
viceroy of Naples, and author of the " One Hundred and Ten Divine
Considerations," as well as a book of Christian doctrine for the young
in the Spanish language. In Siena there was Aonio Paleario, professor
of classical literature, famous as poet and orator. In Rome there was
the papal notary Carnesecchi, formerly the personal friend of Clement
VII. In other places there were many more. The most conspicuous
representative of the party was the Venetian Gasparo Contarini (§ 135,
3), who died in a.d. 1512.
23. The tendency of the thought of these men is most clearly and
fully set forth in the Httle work, " The Benefit of Christ's Death." At
Venice, where it first appeared in a.d. 1512, within six years 60,000 copies
of this tract were issued, and afterwards innumerable reprints and
translations of it were circulated. Since Aonio Paleario had written,
according to his own statement, a tract of a similar character, he came
to be generally regarded as its author, until Ranke discovered a notice
among the acts of the Inquisition, according to which the heretical jewel
340 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
was to be assigned to a monk of San Severino in Naples, a disciple of
Juan Valdez, and afterwards Benrath succeeded in proving his name to
be Don Benedetto of Mantova. The conciliatory spirit of these friends
of moderate reform gave grounds for large expectation, all the more that
Paul III. seemed all through his life to favour the movement. He
nominated Contarini, Sadolet, Pole, and Carafifa cardinals, instituted in
A.D. 1536 a congrcgatio prcejiaratoria, and made Contarini the represen-
tative of the curia at the rehgious Conference of Regensburg in a.d. 1541
(§ 135, 3), which sought to bring about the conciliation of the German
Protestants. But just about this time, probably not without the co-opera-
tion of the Jesuit order founded in a.d. 1540, a split occurred which
utterly blasted all these grand expectations. The zeal of Caraffa set
himself at the head of the opposition, and Paul III., in accordance with
his proposal in his hull Licet ab initio of a.d. 1542, reorganized the defunct
Roman Inquisition after the Spanish model as the central institution
for the uprooting of the Protestant heresy. This " Holy Office " hence-
forth pursued its violent career under the pontificate of Caraffa himself,
who mounted the papal throne in a.d. 1555 as Paul IV. Subsequently,
too, under the obstinate, fanatical, and hence canonized monkish pope
Pius v., from a.d. 1566 every suspicion of Protestantism was rigorously
and mercilessly punished with imprisonment, torture, the galleys, the
scaffold, and the stake. So energetically was the persecution carried out
against the adherents and the patrons of the Reformation, that by the end
of the century no trace of its presence was any longer to be found within
the bounds of Italy. One of the last victims of this persecution was
Aonio Paleario. After he had been for three years in the prisons of
the Inquisition, he was strangled and then burnt. A similar fate had
previously befallen Carnesecchi. How thoroughgoing and successful the
Holy Office was in the suppression of books suspected of a heretical
taint appears from the war of extermination carried on against that
liber perriiciosissimus, "On the Benefit of Christ's Death." In spite of
the hundred thousand copies of the book that had been in circulation,
the Inquisition so carefully and consistently pursued its task of extirpa-
tion, that thirty years after its appearance it was no longer to be found
in the original and after a hundred no translation even was supposed
to exist. In Rome alone a pile of copies were burnt which reached
to the height of a house. In a.d. 1853 a copy of the original was found
in Cambridge, and was published in London, 1855, with an English
translation made by the Duke of Devonshire in a.d. 1548.^
1 M'Crie, " History of the Progress and Suppression of the Reforma-
tion in Italy." 2nd ed. Edinburgh, 1833. Wiffen, " Life and Writings
of Juan Valdez." London, 1865. Young, " Life and Times of Aonio
Paleario." 2 vols. London, 1860.
§ 139. THE KEFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 341
24. Among the Italian reformers who shook themselves entirely free
from the papacy, and only by flight into foreign lands escaped prison,
torture, and the stake, the following are the most important. — (1) Ber-
nardino Ochino, from a.d. 1538 general of the Capuchins, became by his
glowing eloquence one of the most popular of Italian preachers. The
study of the Bible had led him to accept the doctrine of justification
when, in a.d. 1536, he was called to Naples as Lenten preacher. He
was there brought into close contact with Juan Valdez, who confirmed
him in his evangelical tendencies, and made him acquainted with the
writings of the German reformers. In order to escape arrest and the
Inquisition, he fled in a.d. 1542 to Geneva, and wrought successively
at Basel, Augsburg, Strassburg, and London. After the death of Edward
VI. he was obliged to make his escape from England, went as preacher
to Ziirieh, adopted Socinian views, and even justified polygamy. He
was consequently deposed from his office, fled to Poland, and died in
Moravia in a.d. 1565.^ — (2) Peter Martyr Vermilius, an Augustinian monk
and popular preacher. The study of the writings of Erasmus, Zwingli,
and Bucer led him to quit the Catholic church. He fled to Ziirieh, be-
came iDrofessor in Strassburg, and on Cranmer's invitation came to Eng-
land, where he was made professor in Oxford. When Mary came to the
throne, he returned to Strassburg, and died as professor at Ziirieh in
A.D. 1562. — (3) Peter Paul Vergerius in a.d. 1530 accompanied Campegius
to the Diet of Augsburg as papal legate {§ 132, 6) ; was sent again, in a.d.
1535, to Germany by Paul III., in order to get the German princes to
agree to the holding of the council at Mantua (§ 134, 1), and on this
point he conferred personally but unsuccessfully with Luther. On his
return home, in a.d. 1536 the pope conferred upon him, in recognition of
his faithful service, the bishopric of his native city, Capo d'Istria. In
A.D. 1540 we find him again present during the religious conference at
Worms (§ 135, 2), where his conciliatory efforts called down on him the
displeasure of the pope and the suspicion of his enemies as a secret
adherent of Luther. In order to clear hmiself of suspicion he studied
Luther's writings with the intention of controverting them, but had his
heart opened to gospel truths, and was obliged to betake himself to flight.
At Padua the dreadful end of the jurist Speira, who had abjured his
evangelical convictions, and feeling that he had committed the unpardon-
able sin died amid the most fearful agonies of conscience, made an in-
delible impression upon him. He now, in a.d. 1548, formally joined the
evangelical church, wrought for a long time in the country of the Grisons,
not as a member of the Reformed but of the Lutheran church, and died
^ Benrath, " Bernardius Ochino of Siena." London, 1876. Gordon,
" Bernardius Tommassini (Ochino)," in Theological Revieio for October,
1876, pp. 532-561.
342 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
as professor at Tubingen in a.d. 1565. — (4) The Piedmontese Coelius
Secundus Curio was the youngest of a family of twenty-three, and was
early left an orphan. He studied at Turin, where an Augustinian monk,
Jerome Niger, made him acquainted with the writings of Luther and
others. Unweariedly devoted to spreading the gospel in the various
cities of Italy, he was repeatedly subjected by the persecution of the
Inquisition to severe imprisonment, but always managed to escape in
almost a miraculous way. At last he found, iu a.d. 1542, on the recom-
mendation of the Duchess Renata, an asylum in Switzerland, first of all
in Bern ; then he taught in Lausanne for four years, and in Basel for
twenty-two. He died at Basel in a.d. 1569. His latitudinarian theology
gave no offence among the liberal-minded folk of Basel, but he was
looked upon with much displeasure by the theologians of Geneva, whose
prosecutions of heretics he had condemned ; and even from Tubingen,
Vergerius, who had been his intimate friend, brought the charge of
Pelagianism against him. — (5) Galeazzo Carraccioli, Marquis of Vico, on
his mother's side a nephew of Paul IV., was led by intercourse with Juan
Valdez and the preaching of Peter Martyr to abandon the gay, worldly
life of the Neapolitan court for one of religious earnestness and devotion,
and by means of a visit to Germany in company with the emperor he
was confirmed in his evangelical convictions. In order to be able to live
in the undisturbed profession of his faith, he fled, in a.d. 1551, to Geneva.
Neither the tears nor the curses of his aged father, who had hurried after
him to that place, nor the promise of indulgence from his papal uncle,
nor the complaining, the tears, and despair of his tenderly loved wife
and children, whom at great risk he had visited at Vico in a.d. 1558, were
able to shake the steadfastness of his faith. But equally in vain were
his incessant entreaties and tears to induce his wife and children to come
and join him on some neutral territory, where he might be allowed to
follow the evangelical and they the Catholic confession. On the ground
of this obstinate and persistent refusal, the Genevan consistory, with
Calvin at its head, at last granted him the divorce that he claimed,
and in a.d. 1560 Carraccioli entered into a second marriage. Down to
his death, in a.d. 1586, by his active and industrious life he afforded a
pattern, and by his successful labours he proved a powerful support to
the Italian congregation in Geneva, whose pastor, Balbani, raised to him
a well deserved memorial in the history of his life, which ho published in
Geneva in a.d. 1587. — To the sketch of these noble reformers we may
now add the name of a woman who is well deserving of a place alongside
of them for her singular classical culture, her rich poetic endowment, and
her noble and beautiful life. Fulvia Olympia Morata, of Ferrara, in her
sixteenth year began to deliver public lectures in her native city, where
she enjoyed the friendship and favour of the Duchess Renata. She mar-
ried a German physician, Andrew Grunthler, went with him to his home
§ 139. THE REFORMATION IN OTHER LANDS. 348
at Schweinfurt, and there attached herself to the Protestant church.
"When that city was plundered by the Margrave Albert in a.d. 1553
(§ 137, 4), they lost all their property. She died in a.d. 1555 at Heidel-
berg, where Grunthler had been appointed professor of medicine.^
25. The Protestantizing of the Waldensians (§ 108, 10).— The news of
the Reformation caused great excitement among the Waldensians. Even
as early as a.d. 1520 the Piedmontese barba, or minister, Martin of
Lucerne, undertook a journey to Germany, and brought back with him
several works of the reformers. In a.d. 1530 the French Waldensians
sent two delegates, George Morel and Peter Masson, who conferred ver-
bally and in writing with fficolampadius at Basel, and with Bucer and
Capito at Strassburg. The result was, that in a.d. 1532 a synod was held
in the Piedmontese village of Chauvoran, in the yalley of Angrogna, at
which the two Genevan theologians Farel and Saunier were present.
A number of narrow-minded prejudices that prevailed among the old
Waldensians were now abandoned, such as the prohibition against taking
oaths, the holding of magisterial offices, the taking of interest, etc.; and
several Catholic notions to which they had formerly adhered, such as
am-icular confession, the reckoning of the sacraments as severe, the
injunction of fasts, compulsory celibacy, the doctrine of merits, etc.,
were abandoned as unevangelical, while the Reformed doctrine of pre-
destination was adopted. On this foundation the complete Protestan-
tizing of the whole Waldensian community now made rapid progress,
but called down upon them from every side bloody persecutions. In
Provence and Dauphine there were, in a.d. 1545, four thousand murdered,
and twenty-two districts devastated with fire. Their remnants got mixed
up with the French Reformed. When the Waldensian colonies in Calabria
were told of the Protestantizmg of their Piedmontese brethren, they sent,
in A.D. 1559, a delegate to seek a pastor for them from Geneva. Ludovico
Pascale, by birth a Piedmontese Catholic, who had studied theology at
Geneva, was selected for this mission ; but soon after his arrival he was
thrown into prison at Naples, and from thence carried off to Rome, where
in A.D. 1560 he went with all the martyr's joy and faith to the stake
erected for him by the Inquisition. In the trials of this man Rome for
the first time came to understand the significance and the attitude of the
Calabrian colonies, and now the grand-inquisitor, Alexandrini, with some
Dominicans, was sent for their conversion or extermination. The
flourishing churches were in a.d. 1561 completely rooted out, amid scenes
of almost incredible atrocity. The men who escaped the stake were
made to toil in the Spanish galleys, while their wives and children were
sold as slaves. In Piedmont, the duke, after vain military expeditions
^ Bonnet, "Life of Olympia Morata : an Episode of the Renaissance
and the Reformation in Italy." Edin., 1854.
344 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
for their conversion, which the Waldensians, driven to arms had success-
fully withstood, was obliged to allow them, in the Peace of Cavour of a.d.
1561, a restricted measure of religious liberty. But when the violent
attempts to secure conversions did not cease, they bound themselves
together, in a.d. 1571, in the so-called " Union of the Valleys," by which
they undertook to defend one another in the exercise of their evangelical
worship. — Continuation, § 153, 5.
26. Attempt at Protestantizing the Eastern Church. —The opposition to
the Roman papacy, which was common to them and the eastern church,
led the Protestants of the West to long for and strive after a union with
those who were thus far agreed with them. A young Cretan, Jacob
Basilicus, whom Heraclides, prince of Samos and Paros, had adopted,
on his travels through Germany, Denmark, and Sweden had come into
friendly relations with Melanchthon and others of the reformed party,
and attempted, after he entered upon the government of his two islands
in A.D. 1561, to introduce a reformation of the local church according to
evangelical principles. But he was murdered in a.d. 1563, and with him
every trace of his movement passed away. — In a.d. 1559 a deacon from
Constantinople, Demetrius Mysos, spent some months with Melanchthon
at Wittenburg, and took with him a Greek translation of the Augsburg
Confession, of which, however, no result ever came. At a later period,
in A.D. 1573, the Tiibingen theologians, Andrea, Luc. Osiander, and others,
reopened negotiations with the patriarch Jeremiah II. (§ 73, 4), through
a Lutheran pastor, Stephen Gerbach, who went to Constantinople in the
suite of a zealous Protestant nobleman, David of Ungnad, ambassador
of Maximilian II. The Tiibingen divines sent with him a Greek trans-
lation of the Augsburg Confession, composed by Mart. Crusius, with a
request for his judgment upon it. The patriarch, in his reply in a.d.
1576, expressed himself candidly in regard to the errors of the book.
The doctors of Tiibingen wrote in vindication of their formula, and in a
second answer, in a.d. 1579, the patriarch reiterated the objections stated
in the first. After a third interchange of letters he declined all further
discussion, and allowed a fourth epistle, in a.d. 1581, to remain un-
answered.— Continuation, § 152, 2.
II. The Churches of the Eeformation.
§ 140. The Distinctive Character of the Lutheran
Church.i
In the Lntheran Church, that specifically German type of
Christianity which from the days of Charlemagne was ever
^ Krauth, " The Conservative Reformation and its Theology." Phila-
delphia, 1872. Dollinger, " The Church and the Churches." Lond., 1802.
? 140. CHARACTEE OF THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 345
panting after independent expression reached its maturity
and full development. The sacred treasure of true catho-
licity, which the church of early times had nurtured in the
form of Grreek-E-oman culture, is taken over freed from
excrescences, and enriched by those acquisitions of the
Middle Ages that had stood the proof. Its vocation was
to set forth the " happy mean " between the antagonistic
ecclesiastical movements and struggles of the West, and
to give its strength mainly to the development of sound
doctrine. And if it has not exerted an equal influence in all
departments, paying most attention to the worship and least
to matters of constitution, it cannot, on the other hand, be
denied that even in those directions an effort has been
made to modify the violent contradiction of extremes
(§ 142, 1, 2).
The Mediate and Mediating Attitude of the Lutheran Church shows itself
iu its fundameutal conception of the essence of Christianity as the
union of the Divine and human, of which the prototype is found in the
Person of Christ, and illustrations of it in the Scriptures, the church, the
sacraments, the Christian life, etc. In the varied ways in which this
union is conceived of lies the deepest and most inward ground of the
divergence that exists between the three western churches. The Catholic
church wishes to see the union of the Divine and human ; the Lutheran,
wishes to believe it ; the Reformed, wishes to understand it. The tendency
prevails in the Catholic church to confound these two, the Divine and the
human, and that indeed in such a way that the human loses its human
character, and its union with the Divine is regarded as constituting identity.
The Reformed church, again, is prone to separate the two, to look upon
the Divine by itself and the human by itself, and to regard the union as a
placing of the one alongside of the other, as having not an objective but
a merely subjective, not a real but a merely ideal, connection. But the
Lutheran church, guarding itself against any confusion as well as any
separation of the two elements, had sought to view the union as the
most vital, rich, and inward communion, interpenetration, and reciprocity.
In the view of the CathoHc church the human and earthly, which is so
often a very imperfect vehicle of the Divine, in which the Divine often
attained to a very incomplete development, is to be regarded as in and
by itself already the Divine. So is it in the idea of the church, and
hence the doctrine of a merely external and visible church, which as
346 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
such is only the channel of salvation. So is it in the historical develop-
ment of the church, and hence the absolute authority of tradition and
the reversal of the true relations between Scripture and tradition. So
too is it with the doctrine of the sacraments, and hence the idea of an
opus operatum and of transubstantiation. So in regard to the priesthood,
hence hierarchism ; so in regard to the idea of sanctification, and hence
semipelagianismand the doctrine of merits. Thoroughly antagonistic to
all this was the view of the Reforpa^l church. It was inclined rather
to sever completely the Divine in Christianity from its earthly, visible
vehicle, and to think of the operation of the Divine upon man as merely
spiritual and communicated only through subjective faith. It renounced
all tradition, and thereby broke off from all historical development,
whether normal or abnormal. In its doctrine of Scripture, the literal
significance of the word was often exalted above the spirit ; in its
doctrine of the church, the significance of the visible church over that of
the invisible. In its doctrine of the Person of Christ, the human nature
of the glorified Saviour was excluded from a personal full share in all
the attributes of His divinity. In the doctrine of the sacraments, super-
natural grace and the earthly elements were separated from one another ;
and in the doctrine of predestination the Divine foreknowledge of man's
volitions was isolated, etc. The Lutheran jihurch, on the other hand, had
at least made the effort to steer between those two extremes, and to bind
into a living unity the truth that lies at the foundation of both. In the
Scripture it wishes as little to see the spirit without the word, as the word
without the spirit ; in hisbory it recognises the rule and operation of the
Spirit of God within the human 'and ecclesiastical developments ; and it
rejects only the false tradition which has not had its growth organically
from Holy Scripture, but rather contradicts it. In its doctrine of the
church it holds with equal tenacity to the importance of the visible
church and that of the invisible. In its doctrine of the Person of Christ
it affirms the perfect humanity and the perfect divinity in the living
union and richly communicating reciprocity of the two natures. In its
doctrine of the sacraments it gives full weight as well to the objective
Divine fact which heavenly grace presents in earthly elements as to the
subjective condition of the man, to whom the sacrament will prove
saving or condemning according as he is a believer or an unbeliever.
And, finally, it expresses the belief that in the Divine decree the apparent
contradiction between God's foreknowledge and man's self-determination
is solved, while it regards predestination as conditioned by the foreknow-
ledge of God : whereas Calvinism reverses that relation.
§ 141. CONTROVERSIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH, 347
§ 141. Doctrinal Controversies in the Lutheran
Church.1
Even during Luther's lifetime, but mucli more after his
death, various doctrinal controversies broke out in the
Lutheran church. They arose for the most part upon the
borderlands either of Calvinism or of Catholicism, and were
generally occasioned by offence taken at the attitude of the
more stiff and dogged ot Luther's adherents by those of
the Melanchthonian or Philippist school, who had irenical
and unionistic feelings in regard to both sides. The scene
of these conflicts was partly in the electorate of Albertine
Saxony and in the duchy of Ernestine Saxony. Wittenberg
and Leipzig were the headquarters of the Philippists, and
Weimar and Jena of the strict Lutherans. There was no
lack on either side of rancour and bitterness. But if the
Gnesio-Lutherans went far beyond the Melanchthonians in
stiffnecked irreconcilableness, slanderous denunciation, and
outrageous abuse, they yet showed a most praiseworthy
strength of conviction, steadfastness, and martyrlike devotion ;
whereas their opponents not infrequently laid themselves
open to the charge, on the one hand, of a pusillanimous and
mischievous pliability, and, on the other hand, of using
unworthy means and covert, deceitful ways. Their contro-
versies reached a conclusion after various alternations of
victory and defeat, with often very tragic consequences to
the worsted party, in the composition of a new confessional
document, the so called Formula Concordlce.
1. The Antinomian Controversy, a.d. 1537-1541, which turned upon the
place and significance of the law under the Christian dispensation, lay
outside the range of the Philippist wranglings. John Agricola, for a time
pastor in his native town of Eisleben, and so often called Master Eisleben,
in A.D. 1527 took offence at Melanchthon for having in his visitation
articles (§ 127, 1) urged the pastors so earnestly to enjoin upon their
1 Dorner, " History of Protestant Theology," vol. i., pp. 338-383.
348 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
people the observance of the law. He professed, indeed, for the time to
be satisfied with Melanchthon's answer, which had also the approval of
Luther, but soon after he had, in a.d. 1536, become a colleague of both in
Wittenberg, he renewed his opposition by publishing adverse theses. He
did not contest the pedagogical and civil-political use of the law outside
of the church, but starting from the principle that an enjoined morality
could not help man, he maintained that the law has no more significance
or authority for the Christian, and that the gospel, which by the power
of Divine love works repentance, is alone to be preached. Melanchthon
and Luther, on the contrary, held that anguish and sorrow for sin are the
fruits of the law, while the saving resolution to reform is the effect of
the gospel, and insisted upon a continued preaching of the law, because
from the incompleteness of the believer's sanctification in this world a
daily renewing of repentance is necessary. After several years of oral
and written discussion, Agricola took his departure from Wittenberg in
A.D. 1540, charging Luther with having offered him a personal insult, and
was made court preacher at Berlin, where, in a.d. 1541, having discovered
his error, he repudiated it in a conciliatory exposition. The reputation
in which he was held at the court of Brandenburg led to his being at a
subsequent period made a coUahoratenr in drawing up the hated Augs-
burg Interim (§ 136, 5). As his antinomianism every now and again
cropped up afresh, the Formula Concordice at last settled the controversy
by the statement that we must ascribe to the law, not only a usus politicns
and usus elenchticus for terrorizing and arresting the sinner, but also a
usus didacticus for the sanctifying of the Christian life.
2. The Osiander Controversy, A.D. 1549-1556. — Luther had, in opposi-
tion to the Romish doctrine of merits, defined justification as purely an
act of God, whose fruit can be appropriated by man only by the exercise
of faith. But he distinguished from justification as an act of God for
man, sanctification as the operation of God in man. The former con-
sists in this, that Christ once for all has offered Himself up on the cross
for the sins of the whole world, and that now God ascribes the merit
of the sacrificial death of Christ for every individual as though it had
been his own, i.e. juridically; the believer is thus declared, but not made
righteous. The believer, on the ground of his having been declared
righteous, is made righteous by means of a sanctifying process penetrating
the whole earthly life and constantly advancing, but in this world never
absolutely perfect, which is effected by the communication of the new life
which Christ has created and brought to light. Andrew Osiander proposed
a theory that diverged from this doctrine, and inclined toward that set
forth in the Tridentine Council (§ 136, 4), but distinguished from the
Romish view by decided attachment to the Protestant principle of justifi-
cation by faith alone. He had been from a.d. 1522 pastor and reformer at
Nuremberg, and had proclaimed his ideas without thereby giving offence.
§ 141. CONTROVEESIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 849
This first happened when, after his expulsion from Nuremberg on account
of the interim, he had begun to announce his peculiar doctrine in the
newly founded University of Konigsberg, where he had been appointed
professor by Duke Albert of Prussia in a.d. 1549 (§ 126, 4). Confounding
sanctification with justification, he wished to define the latter, not as a
declaring righteous but as a making righteous, not as a juridical but
as a medicinal act, wrought by an infusion, i.e. a continuous influx of
the righteousness of Christ. The sacrificial death of Christ is for him
only the negative condition of justification, its positive condition rests
upon the incarnation of Christ, the reproduction of which in the believer
is justification, which is therefore to be referred not to the human but
rather to the Divine nature in Christ. Along with this, he also held by
the conviction that the incarnation of God in Christ would have taken
place in order to complete the creation of the image of God in man even
had the fall never happened. The main point of his opposition was
grounded upon this : that he believed the juridical theory to have over-
looked the religious subjective element, which, however, is still present
in faith as the subjective condition of declaring righteous. The keen
and bitter controversy over these questions spread from the university
among the clergy, and thence to the citizens and families, and soon came
to be carried on on both sides with great passionateness and heat. The
favour publicly shown to Osiander by the duke, who set him as Bishop
of Samland at the head of the Prussian clergy, increased the bitterness
felt toward him by his opponents. Among these was Martin Chemnitz,
a scholar of Melanchthon, and from a.d. 1548 rector of the High School
at Konigsberg. Also Professor Joachim Morlin, a favourite pupil of
Luther, Francis Staphylus, who afterwards went back to the Eomish
church (§ 137, 8), and Francis Stancarus of Mantua, a man who bears a
very bad reputation for his fomenting of quarrels, were among Osiander's
most inveterate foes. Stancarus carried his opposition to Osiander so far
as to maintain that Christ has become our righteousness only in respect
of His human nature. The opinions received from abroad were for the
inmost part against Osiander. John Brenz, of Wiirttemburg, however,
clined rather to favour Osiander's view than that of his opponents,
while Melanchthon, in giving utterance to the Wittenberg opinion, endea-
voured by removing misunderstand'' ings to reconcile the opposing parties,
but on the main point decided against him. Even Osiander's death in
A.D. 1552 did not put an end to the controversy. At the head of his
party now appeared the court preacher, John Funck, who, standing
equally high in favour with the duke, filled all positions with his own
followers. In his overweening conceit he mixed himself up in political
affairs, and put himself in antagonism with the nobles and men of im-
portance in the State. A commission of investigation on the Polish
sovereignty at their instigation found him guilty of high treason, and
350 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
had him beheaded in a.d. 1566. The other Osiandrianists were deposed
and exiled. Morlin, from a.d. 1533 general superintendent of Bruns-
wick, was now honourably recalled as Bishop of Samland, reorganized
the Prussian church, and in conjunction with Chemnitz, who had been
from A.D. 1554 preacher in Brunswick, where he died in a.d. 1586 as
general superintendent, composed for Prussia a new doctrinal standard in
the Corpus doctrhice PrutJienicum of a.d. 1567.^
3. Of much less importance was the iSpinus Controversy about Christ's
descent into hell, which John ^pinus, first Lutheran superintendent at
Hamburg, in his exposition of the 16th Psalm, in a.d. 1542, interpreted,
after the manner of the Reformed theologians, of His state of humiliation,
and as the completion of the passive obedience of Christ in the endu-
rance of the pains of hell ; whereas the usual Lutheran understanding
of it was, that it referred to Christ's triumphing over the powers of hell
and death in His state of exaltation. An opinion sent from Wittenberg,
in A.D. 1550, left the matter undetermined, and even the Formula of Con-
cord was satisfied with teaching that Christ in His full personality
descended into hell in order to deliver men from death and the power
of the devil. — An equally peaceful settlement was brought about in the
Kargian Controversy, a.d. 1563-1570, about the significance of the active
obedience of Christ, which the pastor of Anspach, George Karg or
Parsimonius, for a long time made a subject of dispute ; but afterwards
he retracted, being convinced of his error by the Wittenberg theologians.
4. The Philippists and their Opponents. — Not long after the Augsburg
Confession had been accepted as the common standard of the Lutheran
church two parties arose, in which tendencies of a thoroughly diver-
sant character were gradually developed. The real basis of this oppo-
sition lay in the diverse intellectual disposition and development of the
two great leaders of the Reformation, which the scholars of both inherited
in a very exaggerated form. Melanchthon's disciples, the so-called
Philippists, strove in accordance with their master's example to make as
much as possible of what they had in common, on the one hand, with the
Reformed and, on the other hand, with the Catholics, and to maintain
a conciliatory attitude that might aid toward effecting union. The
personal friends, scholars, and adherents of Luther, on the contrary, for
the most part more Lutheran than Luther himself, emulating the rugged
decision of their great leader and carrying it out in a one-sided manner,
were anxious rather to emphasise and widen as far as possible the gulf
that lay between them and their opponents, Reformed and Catholics
alike, and thus to make any reconciliation and union by way of com-
^ Calvin, " Institutes," bk. iii., ch. xi. 5-12. Ritschl, " History of the
Christian Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation." Edin., 1872,
pp. 214-283.
§ 141. CONTEOVERSIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 351
promise impossible. Luther attached himself to neither of these parties,
but tried to restrain both from rushing to extremes, and to maintain
as far as he could the peace between them. — The modification of strict
Augustinianism which Melanchthon's further study led him to adopt in
the editions of his Loci later than a.d. 1535 was denounced by the strict
Lutherans as Catholicizing, but still more strongly did they object to the
modification of the tenth article of the Augsburg Confession which he
introduced into a new rendering of it, the so-called Variata, in a.d. 1540.
In its original form it stood thus : Docent, quod corpus et sanguis Domini
vere adsint et distribuajitur vescentihus in cana Domini et improbant
secus docentes. For these words he now substituted the following : Quod
cum pane, et vino vere exhibeantur corpus et sanguis Ghristi vescentihus in
ccena Domini. This statement was indeed by no means Calvinistic, for
instead of vescentihus the Calvinists would have said credentibus. Yet
the arbitrary and in any case Calvinizing change amazed the strict
Lutherans, and Luther himself bade its author remember that the book
was not his but the church's creed. After Luther's death the Philippist
party, in the Leipzig Interim of a.d, 1519, made several other very impor-
tant concessions to the Catholics (§ 136, 7), and this led their opponents
to denounce them as open traitors to their church. Magdeburg, which
stubbornly refused to acknowledge the interim, became the city of refuge
for all zealous Lutherans ; while in opposition to the Philippist Witten-
berg, the University of Jena, founded in a.d. 1548 by the sons of the ex-
elector John Frederick according to his desire, became the stronghold of
strict Lutheranism. The leaders on the Philippist side were Paul Eber,
George Major, Justus Menius, John Pfefiinger, Caspar Cruciger, Victorin
Strigel, etc. At the head of the strict Lutheran party stood Nicholas
Amsdorf and Matthias Flacius. The former lived, after his expulsion
from Naumburg (§ 135, 5), an "exul Christi," along with the young dukes
at Weimar. On account of his violent opposition to the interim, he
was obliged, in a.d. 1548, to flee to Magdeburg, and after the surrender
of the city he was placed by his ducal patrons in Eisenach, where he
died in a.d. 1565. The latter, a native of Istria, and hence known as
Illyricus, was appointed professor of the Hebrew language in Wittenberg
in A.D. 1544, fled to Magdeburg in a.d. 1549, from whence he went to
Weimar in a.d. 1556, and was called to Jena in a.d. 1557.
5. The Adiaphorist Controversy, a.d. 1548-1555, as to the permissibility
of Catholic forms in constitution and worship, was connected with the
drawing up of the Leipzig Interim. That document described most of
the Catholic forms of worship as adiaphora, or matters of indifference,
which, in order to avoid more serious dangers, might be treated as
allowable or unessential. The Lutherans, on the contrary, maintained
that even a matter in itself unessential under circumstances like the
present could not be treated as permissible. From Magdeburg there
852 CHUECH HISTOEY OP THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
was poured out a flood of violent controversial and abusive literature
against the Wittenberg renegades and the Saxon apostates. The altered
position of the latter from a.d. 1551 hushed up in some measure the
wrath of the zealots, and the religious Peace of Augsburg removed all
occasion for the continuance of the strife.
6. The Majorist Controversy, A.D. 1551-1562.— The strict Lutherans
from the passing of the interim showed toward the Philippist party un-
qualified disfavour and regarded them with deep suspicion. When in
A.D. 1551, George Major, at that time superintendent at Eisleben, in
essential agreement with the interim, one of whose authors he was, and
with Melanchthon's later doctrinal views, maintained the position, that
good works are necessary to salvation, and refused to retract the state-
ment, though he somewhat modified his expressions by saying that it
was not a necessitas merlti, but only a neccssitas coujunctionis s. conse-
quent ice ; and when also Justus Menius, the reformer of Thuringia,
superintendent at Gotha, vindicated him in two tractates,— Amsdorf in
the heat of the controversy set up in opposition the extreme and objec-
tionable thesis, that good works are injurious to salvation, and even in
A.D. 1559 justified it as " a truly Christian proposition preached by St.
Paul and Luther." Notwithstanding all the passionate bitterness that
had mixed itself up with the discussion, the more sensible friends of
Amsdorf, including even Flacius, saw that the ambiguity and indefinite-
ness of the expression was leading to error on both sides. They acknow-
ledged, on the one hand, that only faith, not good works in themselves,
is necessary to salvation, but that good works are the inevitable fruit and
necessary evidence of true, saving faith; and, on the other hand, that not
good works in themselves, but only trusting to them instead of the merits
of Christ alone, can be regarded as injurious to salvation. Major for the
sake of peace recalled his statement in a.d. 1562.
7. The Synergistic Controversy, A.D. 1555-1567.— Luther in his con-
troversy with Erasmus (§ 125, 3), as well as Melanchthon in the first
edition of his Loci, in a.d. 1521, had unconditionally denied the capacity
of human nature for independently laying hold upon salvation, and taught
an absolute sovereignty of Divine grace in conversion. In his later edition
of the Loci, from a.d. 1535, and in the Augsburg Confession of a.d. 1540,
however, Melanchthon had admitted a certain co-operation or synergism
of a remnant of freewill in conversion, and more exactly defined this in
the edition of the Loci of a.d. 1548 as the ability to lay hold by its own
impulse of the offered salvation, facultas se apjplicancU ad gratiam ; and
though even in the Leipzig Interim of a.d. 1549 the Lutheran shibboleth
sole, was constantly recurring, it was simply with the object of thoroughly
excluding any claim of merit on man's part in conversion. Luther with
indulgent tolerance had borne with the change in Melanchthon's convic-
tions, and only objected to the incorporation of it in the creed of the
§ 141. CONTROVERSIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 353
church. But from the date of the interim the suspicion and opposition
of the strict Lutherans increased from day to day, and burst forth in a
violent controversy when John PfefSnger, superintendent at Leipzig, also
one of the authors of the detested interim, published, in a.d. 1555, his
Propositiones de libero arbitrio, in defence of Melanchthou's synergism.
The leaders of the Gnesio-Lutherans, Arnsdorf in Eisenach, Flacius in
Jena, and Musacus in Weimar, felt that they durst not remain silent,
and so they maintained, as alone the genuine Lutheran doctrine, that the
natural man cannot co-operate with the workings of Divine grace upon
him, but can only oppose them. By order of the Duke John Frederick they
prepared at Weimar, in a.d. 1559, as a new manifesto of the restored
Lutheranism, a treatise containing a refutation of all the heresies that
had hitherto cropped up within the Lutheran church. One of those
invited to take part in the work, Victorin Strigel, professor at Jena, was
made to suffer for the sympathy which he evinced for synergism by
enduring close and severe imprisonment. The duke, however, soon
again became more favourable to Strigel, who in a.d. 1560 vindicated
himself at a public disputation in Weimar against Flacius, and was
soon afterwards called to Leipzig. When in a.d. 1561 the duke set up
a consistory in Weimar, and transferred to it the right hitherto ex-
clusively exercised in Jena of ecclesiastical excommunication and the
censorship of theological books, and the Flacian party opposed this
" Cffisaro-papism " with unmeasured violence, all the adherents of the
party were driven out of Jena and out of the whole territory, and their
places filled with Melanchthonians. This victory of Philippism, how-
ever, was of but short duration. In order to regain the lost electoral
rank, the duke allowed himself to be beguiled into taking part in the
so-called Grumbach affair. He was cast into the imperial prison,
and his brother JoLn William, who now assumed the government, has-
tened, in A.D. 1567, to restore the overthrown theological party. Even in
electoral Saxony interest in the Catholicizing synergism, at least, after
Melanchthou's death, in a.d. 1560, was gradually lost sight of in pro-
portion as the controversy about the Calvinistic doctrine of the Lord's
Supper gradually gained prominence.
8. The Flacian Controversy about Original Sin, a.d. 1560-1575. — In the
heat of the controversy with Strigel at the conference at Weimar, in a.d.
1560, Flacius had committed himself to the statement that original sin
in man is not something accidental, but something substantial. His
own friends now urged him to retract this proposition, which his opponents
had branded as Manichaean. Its author had not indeed intended it in
the bad sense which it might be supposed to bear. Flacius, however,
was of a character too dogged and obstinate to agree to recall what he
had uttered. Expelled with the rest of the Lutherans in a.d. 1562, and
not recalled with them in a.d. 1567, he wandered without any fixed place
23
354 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
of abode, driven away from almost every place that he entered, until
shortly before his death he recalled his overhasty expression. He died
in the hospital at Frankfort-on-the-Maine, in a.d. 1575. In him a power-
ful character and an amazing wealth of learning were utterly lost in
consequence of unpropitious circumstances, which were partly his fault
and partly his misfortune.
9. The Lutheran Doctrine of the Lord's Supper. — The union effected by
the Wittenberg Concord of a.d. 1536 (§ 133, 8) with the South German
cities, which originally favoured Zwinglian views, had been in many cases
threatening to dissolve again, and the attacks of the men of Ziirich
obliged Luther in a.d. 1544 to compose his last " Confession of the Holy
Sacrament against the Fanatics." The breach with the Zwinglians was
now seen to be irreparable, but it appeared as if it were yet possible to
come to an understandiug with the more profound theory of the Lord's
Supper set forth by Calvin. To carry out this union was a thought very
dear to the heart of Melanchthon. He had the conviction, not indeed
that the Lutheran doctrine of the real presence of the body and blood
in the bread and wine is erroneous, but rather that by the Calvinistic
doctrine of a spiritual enjoyment of the body and blood of Christ in the
supper by means of faith no essential element of religious truth was
lost, and so he sought thereby to get over the difference in confession
and doctrine. But with this explanation the strict Lutherans were by no
means satisfied, and long continued and extremely passionate discussions
were carried on in the various Lutheran countries, especially in Lower
Saxony, in the Palatinate, and in the electorate. But the controversy
was not restricted to the question of the supper ; it rather went back
upon a deeper foundation. Luther, carrying out the principles of the
third and fourth oecumenical councils, had taught that the personal con-
nection of the two natures in Cbrist implies a communication of the
attributes of the one to the other, conmvnicatio idioviatum, that there-
fore Christ, since He has by His ascension entered again upon the full
exercise of His attributes, is, as God-Man, even in respect of His body,
omnipresent, uhiquitas corporis Christi, and refused to allow himself to
be perplexed by the incomprehensibility for the human understanding of
an omnipresent body. It is here that we come upon the radical distinc-
tion between Luther's view and that of Zwingli and Calvin, according to
which the body of Christ cannot be at one and the same time in heaven
at God's right hand and on the earth in bread and wine. But Calviu,
as well as Zwingli, from his very intellectual constitution, could only
regard the Lutheran doctrine of the ubiquity of the glorified body of
Christ as an utter absurdity, and so, repudiating the commumcatio
idiomatum, he taught that the glorification of Christ's body is restricted
to its transfiguration, and that now in heaven, as before upon the earth,
it can be present only in one place. A necessary consequence of this
§ 141. CONTEOYERSIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 355
view was the rejection of His corporeal presence in the supper, and at
the very most the admission of a communication in the sacrament to
behevers of a spiritual influence from the glorified body of Christ. — The
ablest vindicator of the Lutheran doctrine of the supper in this aspect of
its development was the Wiirttemberg reformer John Brenz (§ 133, 8).
In the Syngramvia Suevicum of a.d. 1525 (§ 131, 1), he has taken his
place most decidedly on the side of Luther, and tliis he had also done
again, in a.d. 1529, at the Marburg Conference (§ 132, 4). Then in a.d.
1559, as provost in Stuttgart, in consequence of the doubtful attitude of
a Swabian pastor on the question of the supper, he summoned a synod
at Stuttgart, before which he laid a confession which expressed the doc-
trine of the supper and the ubiquity in strict accordance with Lutheran
views. In defence of the idea of ubiquity he quoted Ephesiansiv. 10, as
affording sufficient Scripture support. The synod unanimously adopted
it, and the duke gave approval to this Confessio et doctr. theologor. et
ministror. Verhi Dei in Ducatu Wirth. de vera prcesentia Corp. et sang, J.
Clir. in Coena Domini, by ordering that all preachers should adopt it,
and that it should have symbolic authority throughout the "Wiirttemberg
church. Melanchthon, who had hitherto been on particularly intimate
terms with Brenz, was very indignant at this "unseasonable" creed-
making in " barbarous Latin." Brenz, however, would not be deterred
from giving more adequate expression and development to the objection-
able dogma, and for this purpose published, in a.d. 1560, his book, De
personali unione dvarum natur. in Christo.
10. Cryptocalvinism in its First Stage, A.D. 1553-1574. — The struggle
of the Gnesio-Lutherans against Calvin's doctrine of the supper, and
the secret favour shown toward it by several Lutheran theologians, was
begun in a.d. 1552 by Joachim Westphal, pastor in Hamburg. Calvin
and Bullinger were not slow in giving him a sharp rejoinder. In a yet
more violent form the dispute broke out in Bremen, where the cathedral
preacher Hardenberg, and in Heidelberg, where the deacon Klebitz,
entered the lists against the Lutheran dogma. In both cases the struggle
ended in the defeat of Lutheranism (§ 144, 1, 2). In Wittenberg, too,
the Philippists George Major, Paul Eber, Paul Crell, etc., supported by
the very influential court physician of the electoral court of Saxony,
Caspar Peucer, Melanchthon's son-in-law, from a.d. 1559 successfully
advanced the interests of Cryptocalvinism. Melanchthon himself, how-
ever, was not to live to see the troubles that arose over this, a truly
gracious dispensation of Providence on behalf of a man already sorely
borne down and trembling with hypochondriac fears, to have him thus
delivered a rabie theologicorum. He died on 19th April, a.d. 1560. While
the Elector Augustus, a.d. 1553-1586, intended that his Wittenberg should
always be the main stronghold of strict Lutheranism, the Philippists
were always coming forward with more and more boldness, and sought to
356 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
prepare the way for themselves by getting all places filled with members
of their party. They persuaded the elector to give a nominative authority
throughout Saxony to a collection of Melanchthonian doctrinal and con-
fessional documents compiled by them, Corpus doctrince Philippicum s.
Misnicwn, 1560. The Wittenberg Catechism, Catecliesis, etc., ad usum
scholar, puer ilium, loll, set forth a doctrine of the sacraments and the
person of Christ so manifestly Calvinistic, that even the elector was
obliged to give way on account of the strong objections brought against
it. The Philippists, however, succeeded in satisfying him by the Con-
i^ensus Dresdensis, of 10th Oct., a.d. 1571, to this extent, that after the
death of Duke John William, in the exercise of his authority as regent,
he was induced to expel the Lutheran zealots Wigand and Hesshus
from Jena, and in a.d. 1573 had more than a hundred clergymen of the
duchy of Saxony deposed. In Breslau their interests were also zealously
advanced by the influential imperial physician, John Krafft, to whom the
Emperor Maximilian II. had granted a patent of nobility in a.d. 1568,
with the new name of Crato von Crafftheim. Another Silesian physician,
Joachim Curseus, also a scholar of Melanchthon, published in a.d. 1574,
without any indication of author's name, place of publication, or date
of issue, his Exegesis perspicua controversice de coena, which represented
Melanchthon's doctrine of the Lord's Supper as the only tenable one,
controverted that of the Lutherans as popish, eulogized that of the
Reformed church as one most honouring to God, and urgently counselled
union with the Calvinists. The warm recommendation of this treatise
on the part of the Wittenberg Philippists, however, rather contributed
to its failure. For now, at last, even the elector had become convinced
of the danger that threatened Lutheranism through hints given him
by the princes, and information obtained from intercepted letters. The
Philippists were banished, their chiefs thrown into prison, Peucer being
confined for twelve years, a.d. 1574-1586. A thanksgiving service in all
the churches and memorial medal celebrated the rooting out in a.d. 1574
of Calvinism, and the final victory of restored Lutheranism. — In Den-
mark, Nicholas Hemming, pastor and professor at Copenhagen, dis-
tinguished alike by adequate scholarship and rich literary activity, and
by mildness and temperateness of character, and hence designated the
Preceptor of Denmark, was the recognised head of the Melanchthonian
school. As a decided opponent of the doctrine of ubiquity, though
otherwise on all points, and especially in his doctrine of the Lord's
Supper, a good Luther, he fell under the suspicion of the German Gnesio-
Lutherans as a Cryptocalvinist, and was accordingly opposed by them.
In A.D. 1579, by order of the Elector Augustus, his brother-in-law, the
King of Denmark removed him from his offices in Copenhagen, appoint-
ing him to a canonry in the cathedral at Roeskilde, where in a.d. 1600
he died.
§ 141. CONTROVERSIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 357
11. The Frankfort Compact, A.D. 1558, and the Naumhurg Assembly of
Princes, A.D. 1561. — After the disgraceful issue of the Worms Conference
of A.D. 1,557 (§ 137, 6), the Protestant princes, the electors Augustus of
Saxony, Joachim of Brandenburg, and Ottheinrich of the Palatinate, "with
Philip of Hesse, Christopher of Wiirttemberg, and the Count-palatine
Wolfgang, who were gathered together about the Emperor Ferdinand,
consulted as to the means which they should employ to insure and
confirm the threatened unity of the evangelical church of Germany.
The result of their deliberations was, that they agreed to sign a statement
drawn up by Melanchthon and known by the name of the Frankfort
Compact, in which they declared anew their unanimous attachment to
the doctrine set forth in the Augustana, the Variata, and the Saxonic'i
(§ 136, 8), and in regard to controversial questions that had been dis-
cussed within the church expressed themselves in moderate terms as
inclined to the views of Melanchthon. The Flacian party in Jena
hastened to set forth their opposing sentiments in the manifesto of
A.D. 1559, already referred to, in which the strict Gnesio-Lutheranism
was laid down in the hardest and boldest manner possible. — The
divisions that arose within the Lutheran church after Melanchthon's
death and the imminent reassembling of the Tridentiue Council led the
evangelical princes of Germany, who, with the exception of Philip of
Hesse, all belonged to a new generation, once more to put forth every
effort to restore unity by adoption of a common evangelical confession.
At the Assembly of Princes appointed to meet for this purpose at Naum-
burg in a.d. 1561, most of them appeared personally. There was no
thought of preparing a new confession, because it was feared that in
those times of agitation it might be impossible to draw up such a
document, or that, even if they succeeded in doing so, it might not close
the breach, but rather widen it. Thus the only alternative remaining
was to attempt the healing of the schism by reverting to the standpoint
of the Augsburg Confession. But then the question arose whether the
original form of statement of a.d. 1530, or its later elaboration of a.d.
1540, should be taken as the basis of union negotiations. — This
at least was to be said in favour of the latter, that it had been unani-
mously adopted as the common confession of all the evangelicals of
Germany at the peace Conference of Worms in a.d. 1540, where even
Calvin had signed it, and at Regensburg in a.d. 1541 (§ 135, 2, 3) ; and
now Philip of Hesse and Frederick III. of the Palatinate came forward
decidedly in its favour. But all the more persistently did the Duke John
Frederick of Saxony oppose it, and make every endeavour to get the rest
of the princes to give their votes in favour of the Augsburg Confession of
A.D. 1530. But the duke's further wish to have added to it the Schmal-
cald Articles found very little favour. Finally a compromise was effected,
in accordance with which, in a newly drawn up preface, the Apology of
358 CHUKCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
the Augustana, as well as the edition of a.d. 1540, was acknowledged,
while the Sclimalcald Articles, as well as the Gonfessio Saxonica (§ 136, 8)
and the Frankfort Compact, were passed over in silence. John Frederick
now demanded the adoption of an express condemnation of the Cal-
vinising Sacramentarians. This led to a hot discussion between him
and his father-in-law, the elector-palatine. He took his departure on
the following day without having received his dismissal, leaving behind
him a sharply worded protest. Ulrich of Mecklenburg also refused to
subscribe, but allowed himself at last to be persuaded into doing so. At
the sixteenth session two papal legates personally delivered to the princes
a brief inviting them to attend the council. This latter, however, was
returned unopened when they discovered in the address the usual but
artfully concealed formula " dilecto filio." Also the demand of the
imperial embassy accompanying the legates to take part in the council
was determinedly rejected, because that would mean not revision but
simply a continuation of the previous sessions of the council, at which
the evangelical doctrine had already been definitely condemned.
12. The Formula of Concord, A.D. 1577. — Already for a long time had
the learned chancellor Jac. Andrea of Tiibingen wrought unweariedly for
the restoration of peace among the theologians of the Lutheran church.
In order also to win over the general membership in favour of peace, he
attempted in six popular discourses, deliveredj in a.d. 1573, to instruct
them in reference to the points in dispute and proper means for over-
coming these differences. He was so successful in his efforts, that he
soon ventured to propose that these lectures should be made the basis
of further negotiations. But when Martin Chemnitz, the most distin-
guished theologian of his age, pronounced them unsuitable for that
purpose, Andrea wrought them up anew in accordance with Chemnitz's
critical suggestions into the so called " Swabian Concord." But even in
this form they did not satisfy the theologians of Lower Saxony. The
Swabian theologians, however, in their criticisms and emendations, had
answered various statements in it, and in a.d. 1576 they produced a
new union scheme, drafted by Luc. Osiander, called the ^^ Maulhronn
B'ormxday The Elector Augustus of Saxony then summoned a theological
convention at Torgau, at which, besides Andrea and Chemnitz, there
were also present Chytricus from Rostock, as well as Korner and Andr.
Musculus from Frankfort-on-the-Oder. They wrought up the material
thus accumulated before them into the "Book of Torgau," of a.d. 1576.
In regard to this book also the evangelical princes delivered numerous
opinions, and now at last, in obedience to the order of the princes,
Andrea, Chemnitz, Selnecker (§ 142, 4), Chytraeus, Musculus, and Korner
retired into the cloister of Berg at Magdeburg in order to make a final
revision of all that was before them. Thus originated, in a.d. 1577, the
Book of Berg or the Formula of Concord, in two different forms, first in
§ 141. CONTROVERSIES IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH. 359
the most compressed style possible in what is known as the Epitome, and
then more completely in the document known as the Solida declaratio.
This document dealt with all the controverted questions that had been
agitated since a.d. 1530 in twelve articles. It set forth the doctrine of the
Person of Christ, giving prominence to the theory of ubiquity, as the basis
of the doctrine of the supper, leaving it, however, undetermined in accor-
dance with the teaching of Brenz, whether the ubiquity is to be regarded
as an absolute or as a relative one, if only it be maintained that Christ
in respect of His human nature, therefore in respect of His body, is pi'e-
sent ^'ubicimque velit,'" more particularly in the holy supper. An op-
portunity was also found in treating of the synergistic questions to set
forth the doctrine of predestination, although within the Lutheran church
no real controversy on this subject had ever arisen. Luther, who at
first (§ 125, 3) had himself given expression to a particularist doctrine of
election, had gradually receded from that position. It was so too with
Melanchthon, only with this important difference, that whereas Luther,
afterwards as well as before, excluded every sort of co-operation of man
in conversion, Melanchthon felt himself obliged to admit a certain
degree of co-operation, which even the censure of Calvin himself could
not lead him to repudiate. "When now the Formula of Concord, rejecting
synergism in the most decided manner, affirmed that since the fall t?here
was in men not even a spark remaining, ne scintillula quidem, of spiri-
tual power for the independent free appropriation of offered grace, it
had gone over from the platform of Melanchthon to that which Calvin,
following the course of hard, logical consistency, had been driven to
adopt, in the assertion of a doctrine of absolute predestination. The
formula was thus in the main in agreement with the speculation of
Calvin. But it declined to accept the conclusions arrived at in Calvinism
by declaring that while man indeed of himself wanted the power to lay
hold upon Divine grace and co-operate with it in any way, he was yet able
to withstand it and refuse to accept it. In this way it was able to hold
by the express statements of Scripture which represent God as willing
that all men should be saved, and salvation as an absolute work of grace,
but condemnation as the consequence of man's own guilt. It regards
the salvation of men as the only object of Divine predestination, con-
demnation as merely an object of the Divine foreknowledge. — At a later
period an attempt was made to set at rest the scruples that prevailed
here and there by securing at Berg, in February, a.d. 1580, the adoption
of an addition to it in the form of a Pmfatio drawn up by Andrea as
a final determination of the controversy. The character of this new
symbolical document, in accordance with its occasion and its aim, was not
so much that of a popular exposition for the church, but rather that of
a scientific theological treatise. For that period of excitement and
controversy it is quite remarkable and worthy of high praise for its good
360 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
sense, moderation, and circumspection, as well as for the accm-acy and
clearness with which it performed its task. The fact that nine thousand
of the teachers of the church subscribed it affords sufficient j^roof of it
having fulfilled the end contemplated. Denmark and Sweden, Holstein,
Pomerania, Hesse, and Anhalt, besides eight cities, Magdeburg, Dantzig,
Nuremberg, Strassburg, etc., refused to sign from various and often con-
flicting motives. In a.d. 1581 Frederick II. of Denmark is said indeed
to have thrown it into the fire. Yet in later years it was adopted in not
a few of these regions, e.g. in Sweden, Holstein, Pommerania, etc. The
Elector Augustus of Saxony, in the Book of Concord, brought out a
collection of all general Lutheran confessional writings which, signed by
fifty-one princes and thirty-five cities, was solemnly promulgated on the
anniversary of the Augsburg Confession, 25th June, a.d. 1580. By this
means the whole Lutheran church of Germany obtained a common
corpus doctrincB, and the numerous collections of confessional and doc-
trinal documents acknowledged by the church, which hitherto separate
national churches had drawn up for this purpose, henceforth lost their
authority.
13. Second Stage of Cryptocalvinism, A.D. 1586-1592. — Yet once
more the Calvinising endeavours of the Philippists were renewed in
the electorate of Saxony under Augustus' successor Christian I., who
had obtained this position in a.d. 1586, through his relationship with the
family of the count-palatine. His chancellor Nicholas Crell filled the
offices of pastors and teachers with men of his own views, abolished
exorcism at baptism, and had even begun the publication of a Bible
with a Calvinising commentary when Christian died, in a.d. 1591. The
Duke Frederick William of Altenburg, as regent during the minority,
immediately re-introduced strict Lutheranism, and, preparatory to a
church visitation, had a new anti-Calvinistic standard of doctrine com-
piled in the so called Articles of Visitation of a.d. 1592, whicli all civil
and ecclesiastical officers in Saxony were required to accept. In short,
clear, and well defined theses and antitheses the doctrinal differences on
the supper, the Person of Christ, baptism, and election were there set
forth. In reference to baptism, the anti-Calvinistic doctrine was pro-
mulgated, that regeneration takes place through baptism, and that
therefore every baptized person is regenerate. The most important
among the compilers of these Articles of Visitation was jEgidius Hun-
nius, shortly before called to Wittenberg, after having, from a.d. 1576
to 1592, as professor at Marburg, laboured with all his might in opposition
to the Calvinising of Hesse. He bad also, by his defence of the doctrine
of ubiquity, in his " Confession of the Doctrine of the Person of Christ"
in German, in ad. 1577, and his Latin treatise, ^^ Libelli IV. de pers.
Chr. ejusque ad dcxtcram sedentes divina majestatc,''^ in a.d. 1585, shown
himself an energetic champion of strict Lutheranism. He died in a.d.
§ 142. CONSTITUTION, ETC., OF LUTHERAN CHURCH. SQl
1603.— The unfortunate chancellor Crell, however, who had made him-
self hateful to the Lutherans as the promoter and chief instigator of all
the Calvinising measures of the deceased elector, and yet more so by his
energetic interference with the usurpations of the nobles, suffered an
imprisonment of ten years in the fortress of Konigsteiu, and was then,
after a trial conducted in the most arbitrary manner, declared to be a
traitor and an enemy of the public peace, and executed in a.d. 1601.
14. The Huber Controversy, A.D. 1588-1595.— Samuel Huber, reformed
pastor in the Canton Bern, became involved in a controversy with Wolfgang
Musculus over the doctrine of election. Going even beyond the Lutheran
doctrine, he affirmed that all men are predestinated to salvation, al-
though through their own fault not all are saved. Banished froni Bern in
A.D. 1588, after a disputation with Beza, be entered the Lutheran church
and became pastor at Wiirttemberg. Here he charged the Professor Ger-
lach with Cryptocalvinism, because he taught that only believers are
predestinated to salvation. The controversy was broken off by his call
to Wittenberg. But even his Wittenberg colleagues, Folic. Leyser and
J^gidius Hunuius, fell under the suspicion of Cryptocalvinism, and were
accordingly opposed by him. When all disputation and conferences
had failed to get him to abandon his doctrine, and parties began to be
formed among the students, he was, in a.d. 1o9-1, removed from Wittenberg.
With increasing rancour he continued the controversy, and wandered
about Germany for many years in order to secure a following for his
theory, but without success. He died in a.d. 102L
15. The Hofmann Controversy in Helmstadt, A.D. 1598. — The great in-
fluence which the study of the Aristotelian philosojohy in connection with
that of humanism obtained iu the Julius University founded at Helm-
stadt in A.D. 1576, seemed to its theological professor, Daniel Hofmann,
to threaten injury to theological study, and to be prejudicial to pure
Lutheran doctrine. He therefore attached himself to the Romists
(§ 143, 6), and took advantage of the occasion of the conferring of doctor's
degrees to deliver a violent invective against the incursions of reason
and philosophy into the region of religion and revelation. In conse-
quence of this his philosophical colleagues complained of him to the
senate as a reproacher of reason, and as one injurious to their faculty.
That court obliged him to retract and apologise, and then deprived him
of his ofltice as professor of theology.
§ 142. Constitution, Worship, Life, and Science in
THE Lutheran Church.
In reference also to tlie ecclesiastical constitution, by hold-
ing firmly to the standpoint and to the working out of the
362 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
system wliich it had sketched out in its confession and
doctrinal teaching, the Lutheran church sought to mediate
between extremes, although, amid the storms from without
and from within by which it was threatened, it was just at
this point that it was least successful. It reflected its
character more clearly and decidedly in its order of wor-
ship than in its constitution. — The Reformation at last
relaxed that hierarchical ban which for centuries had put
an absolute restraint upon congregational singing, aucl had
excluded the use of the vernacular in the services of the
church. Even within the limits of the Reformation era,
the German church song attained unto such a wonderful
degree of excellence, as affords the most convincing evidence
of the fulness, power, and spirituality, the genuine elevation
and fresh enthusiasm, of the spiritual life of that age. The
sacred poetry of the church is the confession of the Lutheran
people, and has accomplished even more than preaching for
extending and deepening the Christian life of the evan-
gelical church. No sooner had a sacred song of this sort
burst forth from the poet's heart, than it was everywhere
taken up by the Christian people of the land, and became
familiar to every lip. It found entrance into all houses and
churches, was sung before the doors, in the workshops, in
the market-places, streets, and fields, and won at a single
blow whole cities to the evangelical faith. — The Christian
life of the people in the Lutheran church combined deep,
penitential earnestness and a joyfully confident conscious-
ness of justification by faith with the most nobly steadfast
cheerfulness and heartiness natural to the German citizen.
Faithful attention to the spiritual interests of their people,
vigorous ethical preaching, and zealous efforts to promote
the instruction of the young, on the part of their pastors,
created among them a healthy and hearty fear of God, with-
out the application of any very severe system of church
§ 142. COXSTITUTION, ETC., OF LUTHERAN CHURCH. 363
discipline, a thorough and genuine attachment to the church,
strict morality in domestic life, and loyal submission to civil
authority. — Theological science flourished especially at the
universities of Wittenberg, Tubingen, Strassburg, Marburg,
and Jena.
1. The Ecclesiastical Constitution.— As a mean between hierarcliism
and Cffisaro-papism, between the intrusion of the State into the province
of the church, and the intrusion of the church into the province of the
State, the ecclesiastical constitution of the Lutheran church was theo-
retically right in the main, though in practice and even in theory many
defects might be pointed out. It presented at least a protest against all
commingling or subordinating of one or the other in these two spheres.
Owing to the urgent needs of the church, the princes and magistrates, in
the character of emergency-bishops, undertook the supreme administra-
tion and management of ecclesiastical affairs, and transferred the exer-
cise of these rights and duties to special boards called consistories, made
up of lay and clerical members, which were to have jurisdiction over the
clergy, the administration of discipline, and the arranging and enforcing
of the marriage laws. What had been introduced simply as a necessity
in the troubled condition of the church in those times came gradually
to be claimed as a prescriptive right. According to the Episcopal System,
the territorial lord as such claimed to rank and act as sumnms episcopxis.
After introducing some cautious modifications that were absolutely in-
dispensable, the canon law actually left the foundation of jurisprudence
untouched. The restoration of the biblical idea of a universal priest-
hood of all believers would not' tolerate the retaining of the theory of an
essential distinction between the clergy and the laity. The clergy were
properly designated the servants, viinistri, of the church, of the word,
of the altar, and all restrictions that had been imposed upon the clergy,
and distinguished them as an order, were removed. Hierarchical dis-
tinctions among the clergy were renounced, as opposed to the spirit of
Christianity ; but the advantage of a superordination and subordination
in respect of merely human rights, in the institution of such offices as
those of superintendents, provosts, etc., was recognised. — Ecclesiastical
property was in many cases diverted from the church and arbitrarily
appropriated by the greed and rapacity of princes and nobles, but still in
great part, especially in Germany, it continued in the possession of the
church, except in so far as it was applied to the endowment of schools,
universities, and charitable institutions. The monasteries fell under a
doom which by reason of their corruptions they had richly deserved.
A restoration of such establishments in an evangelical spirit was not to
364 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
be thought of during a period of convulsion and revolution. — Continua-
tion, § 166, 5.
2. Public Worship and Art. — While the Roman Catholic order of wor-
ship was dominated almost wholly by fancy and feeling, and that of the
reformed church chiefly by the reason, the Lutheran church sought
to combine these two features in her services. In Romish worship all
appealed to the senses, and in that of the Calvinistic churches all
appealed to the understanding ; but in the Lutheran worship both sides
of human nature were fully recognised, and a proportionate place assigned
to each. The unity of the church was not regarded as Iving in the rigid
uniformity of forms of worship, but in the unity of the confession.
Altars ornamented with candles and crucifixes, as well as all the images
that might be in churches, were allowed to remain, not as objects of
worship, but rather to aid in exciting and deepening devotion. The
liturgy was closely modelled upon the Romish ritual of the mass, with
the exclusion of all unevangelical elements. The preaching of the word
was made the central point of the whole public service. Luther's style
of preaching, the noble and powerful popularity of which has probably
never since been equalled, certainly never surpassed, was the model and
pattern which the other Lutheran preachers set before themselves.
Among these, the most celebrated were Ant. Corvin, Justus Jonas,
George Spalatin, Bugenhagen, Jerome Weller, John Brenz, Veit Dietrich,
J. Mathesius, Martin Chemuitz. It was laid down as absolutely essen-
tial to the idea of public worship, that the congregation should take part
in it, and that the common language of the people should be exclusively
employed. The adoration of the sacrament on the altar, as well as tbe
Romish service of the mass, were set aside as unevangelical, and the
sacrament of the supper was to be administered to the whole congrega-
tion in both kinds. On the other hand, it was admitted that baptism was
necessary, and might and should be administered in case of need by
laymen. The customary formulary of exorcism in baptism was at first
continued without dispute, and though Lutber himself attached no great
importance to it, yet every attempt to secure its discontinuance was
resisted by the later Gnesio-Lutherans as savouring of Cryptocalvinism.
Yet it should be remembered that such orthodox representatives of
Lutheranism as Hesshus, iEgidius Hunnius, and Martin Chemnitz, as
well as afterwards John Gerhard, Quenstedt, and Hollaz, were only in
favour of its being allowed, but not of its being regarded as necessary.
Spener again declared himself decidedly in favour of its being removed,
and in the eighteenth century it passed without any serious opposition
into disuse throughout almost the whole of the Lutheran church, until
re-introduced in the nineteenth century by the Old Lutherans (§ 176, 2).
— The church festivals were restricted to celebrations of the facts of
redemption ; only such of the feasts of Mary and the saints Avere retained
§ 142. CONSTITUTION, ETC., OF LUTHERAN CHURCH. 365
as had legitimate ground in the Bible history ; e.g. the days of the apo-
stles, the annunciation of Mary, Michael's Day, St. John's Day, etc. Art
was held by Luther in high esteem, especially music. Lucas Cranach,
who died in a.d. 1553, Hans Holbein, father and son, and Albert Diirer,
who died in a.d. 1528, placed their art as painters at the service of the
gospel, and adorned the churches with beautiful and thoughtful pictures.
3. Church Song. — The character common to the sacred songs of the
Lutheran church of the sixteenth century is that they are thoroughly
suited for congregational purposes, and are truly popular. They are
songs of faith and the creed, with a clear impress of objectivity. The
writers of them do not describe their subjective feelings, nor their in-
dividual experiences, but they let the church herself by their mouths
express her faith, her comfort, her thanksgiving, and adoration. But
they are also genuinely songs of the people ; true, simple, hearty, bright,
and bold in expression, rapid in movement, no standing still and looking
back, no elaborate painting and describing, no subtle demonstrating and
teaching. Even in outward form they closely resemble the old German
epics and the popular historical ballad, and were intended above all not
merely to be read, but to be sung, and that by the whole congregation.
The ecclesiastical authorities began to introduce hymn-books into the
several provinces toward the end of the seventeenth century. Previously
there had only been private collections of sacred songs, and the hymns
were distinguished only by the words of the opening line ; and so widely
known were they, that the mentioning of them was sufficient to secure
the hymn so designated being sung by the congregation present at the
public service. — The sacred songs of the Reformation age possess all
these characteristics in remarkable degree. Among all the sacred poets
of that time Luther stands forth pre-eminent. His thirty-six hymns or
sacred poems belong to five different classes. (1) There are free trans-
lations of Latin hymns: "Praised be Thou, 0 Jesus Christ " ; "Thou
who art Three in unity " ; " In our true God we all believe " ; " Lord God,
we praise do Thee " ; " In the midst of life we are aye in death's em-
braces " ; " Come God, Creator, Holy Ghost," etc. (2) There are repro-
ductions of original German songs : " Death held our Lord in prison " ;
" Now pray we to the Holy Ghost " ; " God the Father with us be " ;
*' Let God be praised, blessed, and uplifted." (3) We have also para-
phrastic renderings of certain psalms: "Ah, God in heaven, look down
anew" (Ps. xii.) ; "Although the mouth say of the unwise" (Ps. xiv.) ;
" Our God, He is a castle strong" (Ps. xlvi.) ; "God, unto us right
gracious be " (Ps. Ixvii.) ; "Had God not been with us this time" (Ps.
cxxiv.) ; " From trouble deep I cry to Thee " (Ps. cxxx.), etc. (4) We
have also songs composed on particular Scripture themes : " There are the
holy ten commands " ; " To Isaiah the prophet this was given " (Isa.
vi.) ; " From heaven on high I come to you " (Luke ii.) ; " To Jordan,
366 CHURCH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
where our Lord has gone," etc. (5) There are, finally, poems original
in form and contents: "Dear Christians, let us now rejoice"; "Jesus
Christ, our Saviour true"; "Lord, keep us by Thy word in hope."* —
After Luther, the most celebrated hymn-writers in the Lutheran church
of the sixteenth century are Paul Speratus, reformer in Prussia, who
died in a.d. 1554 ; Nicholas Decius, first a monk, then evangelical pastor
at Stettin about a.d. 1524. Paul Eber, professor and superintendent in
Wittenberg, who died in a.d. 1569, author of the hymns, " When in the
hour of utmost need"; "Lord Jesus Christ, true Man and God" ; and
one of which our well-known " Jesus, Thy blood and righteousness," is
a paraphrase.2 Hans Sachs, shoemaker in Nuremberg, who died in a.d.
1567, wrote during the famine in that city in a.d. 1552 the hymn, " Why
art thou thus cast down, my heart ? " John Schneesin?, pastor in Gotha-
schen, who died in a.d. 1567, wrote " Lord Jesus Christ, in Thee alone."
John Mathesius, rector and deacon in Joachimsthal, who also delivered
sermons on Luther's life, died in a.d. 1565, wrote a beautiful morning
hymn, and other sweet sacred pieces. Nicholas Hermann, who died in
A.D. 1561, precentor at Joachimsthal, wrote out Mathesius' sermons in
hymns, " The happy sunshine all is gone," the burial hymn, " Now hush
your cries, and shed no tear," etc. Michael Weisse closes the series of
hymn-writers of the Reformation age. He was a German pastor in
Bohemia, translator and editor of the sacred songs of the Bohemian
Hussites, and died in a.d. 1540. He wrote "Christ the Lord is risen
again," and the burial hymn to which Luther added a verse, " Now
lay we calmly in the grave." •*
4. In the period immediately following, from a.d. 1560 to a.d. 1618,
we meet with many poetasters who write on sacred themes in doggerel
rhymes. Even those who are poets by natural endowment, and inspired
with Divine grace, are much too prolific; but they have bequeathed to us
a genuine wealth of beautiful church songs, characterized by healthful
objectivity, childlike simplicity, and a singular power of appealing to the
hearts of the great masses of the people. But a tendency already begins
to manifest itself in the direction of that excessive subjectivity which was
the vice of hymn-writers in the succeeding period ; the doctrinal element
too becomes more and more prominent, as well as application to particu-
* All the hymns of Luther quoted above are translated by George
Macdonald in his " Luther the Singer," contributed to the Sunday
Magazine for 1867.
2 On Speratus, Decius, and Eber, see an interesting paper by the late
Dr. Fleming Stevenson in Good Words for 1863, p. 542.
** All the hymns referred to above, as well as those which are given
in the next paragraph, are translations by Miss Winkworth in " Lyra
Germanica," new edition. London, 1885.
§ 142. CONSTITUTION, ETC., OF LUTHERAN CHURCH. 367
lar circumstances and occasions in life ; but the objective confession of
faith is always still predominant. Among the sacred poets of this period
the most important are Bartholmaus Eingwaldt, pastor in Brandenburg,
who died in a.d. 1597, author of " 'Tis sure that awful time will come " ;
Nicholas Seluecker, at last superintendent in Leipzig, who died in a.d.
1592, as Melanchthon's scholar suspected at one time of Cryptocal-
vinism, but, after he had taken part in the composition of the Formula
of Concord, the object of the most bitter hatred and constant persecu-
tion on the part of the Cryptocalvinists of Saxony : he wrote, " 0 Lord
my God, I cry to Thee " ; Martin Schalling, pastor at Regensburg and
Nuremberg, who died in a.d. 1G08, wrote, "Lord, all my heart is fixed
on Thee " ; Martin Eohme or Behemb, pastor in Lusatia, who died in a.d.
1621, author of "Lord Jesus Christ, my Life, my Light." The series
closes with Philip Nicolai, a violent and determined opponent of Calvinism,
who was latterly pastor in Hamburg, and died in a.d. 1608. His vigorous
and rhythmical poetry, with its deep undertone of sweetness, is to some
extent modelled on the Song of Songs. He wrote " Awake, awake, for
night is flying" ; the chorale in Mendelssohn's '-St. Paul," " Sleepers,
wake, a voice is calling," is a rendering of the same piece. — Continuation,
§ 159, 3.
5. Chorale Singing. — The congregational singing, which the Reforma-
tion made an integral part of evangelical worship, was essentially a
reproduction of the Ambrosian mode (§ 59, 5) in a purer form and with
richer fulness. It was distinguished from the Gregorian style pre-
eminently by this, that it was not the singing of a choir of priests, but
the popular singing of the whole congregation. The name chorale
singing, however, was still continued, and has come to be the technical
and appropriate designation of the new mode. It is further distin-
guished from the Gregorian mode by this other characteristic, that
instead of singing in a uniform monotone of simple notes of equal
length, it introduces a richer rhythm with more lively modulation. And,
finally, it is characterized by the introduction of harmony in place of
the customary unison. But, on the other hand, the chorale singing may
be regarded as a renewal of the old cantiis finnns, while at the same
time it sets aside the secular music style and the artificialities of counter-
point and the elaborate ornamentation with which the false taste of the
Middle Ages had overlaid it. The congregation sang the cantus firmus
or melody in unison, the singers in the choir gave it the accompaniment
of a harmony. The organ during the Reformation age was used for
support, and accompanied only in elaborate, high-class music. But the
melody was pitched in a medium key, which as the leading voice was
called Tenor. The melodies for the new church hymns were obtained,
partly by adaptation of the old tunes for the Latin hymns and sequences,
partly by appropriation of popular mediseval airs, especially among tbe
368 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Bohemian Brethren, partly also and mainly by the free use of the popular
song tunes of the day, to which no one made any objection, since indeed
the spiritual songs were often parodies of the popular songs whose airs
were laid hold upon for church use. The few original melodies of this
age were for the most part composed by the authors of the hymns them-
selves or by the singers, and were the outflow of the same inspiration as
had called forth the poems. They have therefore been rarely equalled
in impressiveness, spiritual glow, and power by any of the more artistic
productions of later times. Acquaintance with the new meloilies was
spread among the people by itinerant singers, chorister boys in the
streets, and the city cornet players. From the singers or those who
adapted the melodies are to be distinguished the composers, who as
technical musicians arranged the harmony and set it in a form suitable
for church use. George Rhaw, precentor in Leipzig, aftervv^ards printer
in Wittenberg, and Hans Walter, choirmaster to the elector, both inti-
mate friends of Luther, were amongst the most celebrated composers of
tbeir day. The evangelical church music reaches its highest point of
excellence toward the end of the sixteenth century. The great musical
composer, Joliu Eccart, who was latterly choirmaster in Berlin, and died
in A.D. 1611, was tbe most active agent in securing this perfection of his
art. In order to make the melody clearer and more distinctly heard, it
was transferred from the middle voice, the tenor, to the higher voice or
treble. The other voices now came in as simple concords alongside of
the melody, and the organ, which had now been almost perfected by the
introduction of many important improvements, now came into general
use with its pure, rich, and accurate full harmony, as a support and
accompaniment of tbe congregational singing. The distinction too
between singers and composers passed more and more out of view. The
skilled artistic singing was thus brought into closer relations with the
congregational singing, and the creative power, out of which an abundant
supply of original melodies was produced, grew and developed from year
to year.
G. Theological Science. — Inasmuch as the Keformation had its origin
in the word of God, and supported itself upon that foundation alone
the theologians of the Reformation were obliged to give special attention
to biblical studies. John Forster, who died in a.d. 1556, and John
Avenarius, who died in a.d. 1576, both of Wittenberg, compiled Hebrew
lexicons, which embodied the results of independent investigations.
Matthias Flacius, in his Claris Scr. s., provided what for tbat time was
a very serviceable aid to the study of Scripture. The first part gives in
alphabetical order an explanation of Scripture words and forms of speech,
the second forms a system of biblical hermeneutics. Exegesis proper
found numerous representatives. Luther himself beyond dispute holds
the front rank in this department. After him the most important
§ 142. CONSTITUTION, ETC., OF LUTHERAN CHURCH. 369
Lutheran exegetes of that age are for the New Testament, Melanchtbon ;
Victoriu Strigel, who wrote Ilypomn. in Novum Testamenturn ; Y\a.ciuH,
with his Glossa compendiaria in Novum resfamenfum; Joachim Camerarius,
with his Notationes in Nov. Testanientum ; Martin Chemnitz, with his
Harmonia IV. Evaiifjeliorum, continued by Folic. Leyser, and comi)lete(l
at last by John Gerhard : for the Old Testament, especially John Brenz,
whose commentaries are still worthy of being consulted. Of less conse-
quence are the numerous commentaries of the comprehensive order, com-
piled by the once scarcely less influential David Chytrteus of Rostock,
who died in a.d. 1600. The series of Lutheran dogmatists opens with
Melanchihon, who published his Loci communes in a.d. 1521. Martin
Chemnitz, in his Loci theologici, contributed an admirable commentary to
Melanchthon's work, and it soon became the recognised standard dog-
matic treatise in the Lutheran church. In a.d. 1562 he published his
Examen Cone. Trident., in which he combated the Romish doctrine with
as much learning and thoroughness as good sense, mildness, and modera-
tion. Polemical theology was engaged upon with great vigour amid the
many internal and external controversies, conducted often with intense
passion and bitterness. In the department of church history we have the
gigantic work of the Magdeburg centuriators, the result of the bold scheme
of Matthias Flacius. By his CataUxjus testium veritatis he had previously
advanced evidence to show that at no point in her history had the
church been without enlightened and pious heroes of faith, who had
carried on the uninterrupted historical continuity of evangelical truth,
and so secured an unbroken succession from the early apostolic church
till that of the sixteenth century. — Continuation, § 158, 4.
7. German National Literature.— The Reformation occurred at a time
when the poetry and natioLial literature of Germany was in a condition
of i^rofound prostration, if not utter collapse. But it brought with it a
reawakening of creative powers in the national and intellectual life of
the people. Under the influence and stimulus of Luther's own example
there arose a new prose literature, inspired by a broad, liberal spirit, as
the expression of a new view of the world, which led the Germans both
to think and teach in German. It was mainly the intellectual friction
from the contact of one fresh mind with another in regard to questions
agitated in the Reformation movement that gave to the satirical writings
of the age that brilliancy, point, and popularity which in the history of
German literature was not attained before and never has been reached
since. In innumerable fugitive sheets, in the most diverse forms of style
and language, in poetry and prose, in Latin and German, these satires
poured forth contempt and scorn against and in favour of the Reforma-
tion. As we have on the Catholic side Thomas Murner (§ 125, 4), and
on the Reformed side Nicholas Manuel (§ 130, 4), so we have on the
Lutheran side John Fischart, far excelling the former two, and indeed the
24
370 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
greatest satirist that Germany lias yet produced. To him we are mainly
indebted for the almost incessant stream of anonymous satires of the
sixteenth century. He belonged, like Sebastian Brandt and Thomas
Murner, to Strassburg, was for a long time advocate at the royal court of
justice at Spires, and died in a.d. 1589, His satirical vein was exercised
first of all upon ecclesiastical matters : " The Night Raven (Rube) and
the Hooded Crow," against a certain J. Eabe, who had become a Roman
Catholic. "On the Pretty Life of St. Dominic and St. Francis," an
abusive effusion against the Dominicans and Francisaus. "The Beehive
of the Romish Swarm," the best known of all his satires, an independent
and original working up of the theme of the book bearing the same name
by Phihp von Marnix (§ 139, 12). " The Four-horned Bat of the Jesuits,"
in rhyme, the most stinging, witty, and scathing satire which has ever been
written against the Jesuits. Then he turned his attention to secular sub-
jects. His " Beehive" may be regarded as a companion piece to Murner's
" Lutheran Buffoon " ; but excelling this passionately severe production
in spirit, wit, and bright, laughiug sarcasm, it is as certain to win the
pre-eminence and be awarded the victory. Among tlie secular poets of
that century the shoemaker of Nuremberg, Hans Sachs, who died in a.d.
1576, an admirable specimen of the Lutheran burgher, holds the first
rank. As a minstrel he is almost as unimportant as any of his contem-
poraries, but conspicuously excelling in the poetic rendering of many
tales, legends, and traditions by his naive drollery, honest good-hearted-
ness, and fresh, lively vigour and style. He left behind him 203 comedies
and tragedies, 1,700 humorous tales, 4,200 lays and ballads. He gave
a bright and cbeery greeting to the Reformation in a.d. 1523 in his
poem, " The Wittenberg Nightingale," and by this he also contributed
very much to further and recommend the introduction of the teachings
of the Reformation among his fellow citizens.
8. For Missions to the Heathen very little was done during this period.
The reason of this indeed is not far to seek. The Lutheran church felt
that home affairs had the first and in the meantime an all-engrossing
claim upon her attention and energies. She had not the call which the
Roman Catholic church had, in consequence of political and mercan-
tile relations with distant countries, to prosecute missions in heathen
lands, nor had she the means for conducting such enterprises as those
on which the monkish orders were engaged. Yet we find the beginnings
of a Lutheran mission even in this early period, for Gustavus Vasa of
Sweden founded, in a.d. 1559, an association for carrying the gospel to
the neglected and bt nighted Lapps. ^
1 Warneck, " Outlines of the History of Protestant Missions from the
Reformation to the Present Time." Edinburgh, 1881.
§ 143. DEVELOPMENT OF THE REFORMED CHURCH. 371
§ 113. The Ixxer Development of the Reformed
Church.
The close connection which all Lutheran national churches
had obtained in their possession of one common confession
was wanting to the Reformed church, inasmuch as there
each national church had drawn up its own confession. The
victory of Calvinistic dogmatic over the Zwinglian in the
Swiss mother church (§ 138, 7) was not without influence
upon the other Reformed national churches ; and Calvinism,
partly in its entire stringency and severity, partly in a form
more or less modified, without expressing itself in one
common symbol, formed henceforth a bond of union and
a common standard for attacks on Lutheran dogmatics.
Quite similar was the origin of the divergence that arose
between Zwinglianism and Calvinism in the department of
the ecclesiastical constitution. In this case also the victory
was with the Calvinistic organization. Its ideal embraced
the restoration of the primitive apostolic presbyterial and
synodal constitution, together with the church's uncondi-
tional independence of the State. This proved much more
acceptable than the theory which, under Zwingli's auspices,
had been adopted in German Switzerland, according to which
church government and the administration of discipline
were put in the hands of the Christian civil magistrates.
A rigid system of ecclesiastical penitential diseipline, how-
ever, was on all sides applied to the public and private
lives of all church members. Under such discipline the
community came generally to present a picture of singularly
pure and correct morality, and not infrequently we see
exhibited a remarkable development of high moral char-
acter. It fostered the noble confidence of the martyr spirit,
which indeed only too often ran out into extremes and
made an unjustifiable use of Old Testament precedents and
patterns.— In reference to worship, the Reformed church.
372 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
witli its simplest possible form of service, stripped of all
pomp and ceremoDy, presents the most thorongh and
marked contrast to the gorgeous and richly ceremonial
worship of the Roman Catholic church. — Yet the episcopal
Anglican national church (§ 139, 6), in almost all particulars
relating to constitution, worship, discipline, and customs,
comjoletely severed its connection with the distinctive
characteristics of the Reformed church, and allied itself to
the traditional forms and ceremonies of the Roman Catholic
church. On the other hand, in reference to dogma it ap-
proaches in its mediating attitude nearer in several respects
to the view of the Lutheran church. But all the more
rigidly and exclusively did the Puritans who separated
themselves from the Anglican church, as well as the strict
Presbyterian church of Scotland, appropriate, and even
carry out to further extremes, the rigorism of the Genevan
model in regard both to worship and to doctrine.
1. The Ecclesiastical Constitution. — Just as in the Lutheran church,
the ecclesiastical leaders had been driven by necessity to submit to the
so-called super-episcopate of the princes, it also happened here in German
Switzerland that, under pressure of circumstances, this power, as well
as church discipline and infliction of ecclesiastical censures, was put
in the hands of the magistrates. By order of Zwingli aud fficolam-
padius there were founded in Zurich, in a.d. 1528, and in Basel in a.d.
1530, synods to be held yearly for church visitation. These were to be
attended by all the pastors of the city and district, and one or more
honourable men should be appointed from each congregation, in order to
take up and dispose of any complaints that might be made against the
life and doctrine of their pastors. But the intention of both reformers
to give this institution a controlling influence in church government and
ecclesiastical organization was thwarted in consequence of the jealousy
•with wbich the ruling magistrates clung to tbe authority that had been
assigned them in ecclesiastical matters. In Geneva, on the contrary,
Calvin's unbending energy succeeded, after long and painful contendings
(§ 138, 3, 4), in transferring from the magistrates the government of the
church, together with church discipline and the imposition of censures,
to which here also they laid claim, to a consistory founded by him,
composed of six pastors and twelve lay elders or presbyters, which was
§ 143. DEVELOPMENT OF THE KEFORMED CHURCH. 373
supreme iu its owq domain, and free from all interference on the part of
the civil authorities, while the magistrates were bound to execute civil
penalties upon those excommunicated by the ecclesiastical tribunal. The
introduction of this presbyterial constitution into Reformed national
churches of large extent must have contributed to their further exten-
sion and to the maintenance of the national church unity. At the head
of each congregation now stood a presbytery, called in French consistoire,
composed of pastor and elders, the latter having been chosen either
directly by the congregation, or by the local magistrate in accordance
with the votes of the congregation, subsequently they were also allowed
to add to their own number. Then, again, the presbyters of a particular
circuit were grouped into so-called classes, with a moderator chosen for
the occasion ; and then, also, an annual classical synod, consisting of
one pastor and one lay elder chosen from each of the presbyteries. In a
similar way, at longer intervals, or just as necessity called for it, provin-
cial synods were convened, composed of deputies from several classical
synods; and from its members were chosen representatives to the general
or national synod, which constituted the highest legislative authority for
the whole national church.^
2. Public Worship. — Zwingli wished at first to do away with church
bells, organ playing, and church psalmody, and even Calvin would not
tolerate altars, crucifixes, images, and candles in the churches. These
he regarded as contrary to the Divine law revealed in the decalogue, inas-
much as the commandment that properly stood second as a distinct and
separate statute, though it had slipped out of the enumeration usual
among the Catholics and Lutherans, was understood to forbid the use of
images. The churches were reduced to bare and unadorned places for
prayer and assembly rooms for preaching, and simple communion tables
took the place of altars. Kneeling, as savouring of ceremonialism, was
discountenanced ; the breaking of bread was again introduced in the
administration of the Lord's Supper as forming an important part of the
symbolism ; private confession was abolished ; exorcism at baptism, as
well as baptism in emergencies as a necessary thing, was discontinued ;
the liturgy was reduced to simple prayers spoken, not sung, and from
a literalist purism the usual Vater iinser was changed into Unser Vater,
The festivals were reduced to the smallest number possible, and only the
principal Christian feasts were celebrated, Christmas, Easter, Pentecost ;
while the Sunday festival was observed with almost the Old Testament
strictness of Sabbath keeping. — In securing the introduction of psalm-
ody into the worship of the German Reformed church, John Zwick,
pastor at Constance, who died in a.d. 1542, was particularly active. In
A.D. 1536 he pubhshed a small psalmody, with some Bible psalms set to
1 Hodge, " The Church and its PoHty." Edin., 1879. Page lU.
374 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Lutheran melodies. At Calvin's request, Clement Marot set a good num-
ber of the Psalms to popular French airs in a.d. 1541-1543 ; Beza com-
pleted it, and then Calvin introduced this French psalter into the church
of Geneva. Claude Goudimel (§ 149, 15) in a.d. 1562 published sixteen
of these psalms with four-part harmonies. He was murdered in the
massacre of St. Bartholomew at Lyons, in a.d. 1572. A professor of law
at Kunigsberg, Ambrose Lobwasser, in a.d. 1573 made an arrangement
of the Psalter in the German language after the style of Marot. This
psalter, notwithstanding its poetical deficiencies, continued in use for
a long time in Germany and Switzerland, Zwingli's aversion to con-
gregational singing was given effect to only in Zurich, but even there the
service of praise was introduced by a decree of the council in a.d. 1508.
In the other German Swiss cantons they did not confine themselves to
the use of the Psalms, but adopted unhesitatingly spiritual songs by
both Reformed and Lutheran poets. Among the former, who neither iu
number nor in ability could approach the latter, the most important were
John Zwick and Ambrose Blaurer (§ 133, 3). It was only in the seven-
teenth century that the Lutheran sister church abandoned her rigid
adherence to the exclusive use of Lobwasser's psalms in congrega-
tional singing, when the rise of Pietism, and afterwards the spread of
rationalism, overcame this narrowmindedness.^
3. The Englisli Puritans.— The Reformation under Elizabeth (§ 139, 6),
with its Lutheranizing doctrinal standpoint and Catholicizing forms of
constitution and worship, had been sanctioned in a.d. 1559 by the Act of
Uniformity iu the exercise of the royal supremacy that was claimed over
the whole ecclesiastical institutions of the country. But the Protestants
who had fled from the persecutions of Bloody Mary and had returned in
vast troops when Elizabeth ascended the throne brought vdth them from,
their foreign resorts, in Switzerland from Geneva, Zurich, Basel, in
Germany from Strassburg, Frankfort, Emden, entirely diliferent notions
about the nature of genuine evangelical Christianity ; and now with all
the assumption of confessors they sought to have these ideas realized
in their native land. Inspired for the most part with the rigorist spirit
of the Genevan Reformation, they desired, instead of the royal supre-
macy, to have the independence of the church proclaimed, and instead
of the hierarchical episcopal system a presbyterial constitution with
strict church discipline, arranged iu accordance with the Genevan model.
They also gave a one-sided prominence to the formal principle of the
Holy Scripture, adhered rigidly to the doctrinal theory of Calvin and
to a mode of woi'ship as bare as possible, stripped of every vestige of
l)opish superstition, such as priestly dress, altars, candles, crucifixes,
sign of the cross, forms of prayer, godfathers, confirmation, kneeling at
1 Morley, "Clement Marot." London, 1871.
§ 143. DEVELOPMENT OF THE EEFOKMED CHURCH. 375
the sacrament, bowing the head at the mention of the name of Jesus,
bells, organs, etc. On account of their opposition to the Act of Uni-
formity, these were designated Nonconformists or Dissenters. They
were also called Puritans, because they insisted upon an organization of
the church purified from every human invention, and ordered strictly
in accordance with the word of God. Their principles, which were
enunciated first of all in private conventicles, found a very wide accep-
tance amongst ministers and people. This movement proved too strong
to be suppressed, even by the frequent deprivation and banishment
of the ministers, or the fining and imprisonment of their adherents.
Amid the severity of persecution and oppression Puritanism continued
to grow, and in a..d. 1572 numerous separatist congregations provided
themselves with a presbyterial and synodal constitution; the former for
the management of the affairs of particular congregations, the latter for
the settlement of questions affecting the whole church. Specially offen-
sive to the queen, and therefore strictly forbidden by her and rigorously
suppressed, were theprophesyings introduced into many English churches
after the pattern of the prophesyings of the church of Zurich. These
were week-day meetings of the congregation, at which the Sunday sermons
were further explained and illustrated from Scrij^ture by the preachers,
and applied to the circumstances and needs of the church of that day.i
4. Even before the sixteenth century had come to an end an ultra-
puritan tendency had been developed, the adherents of which were
called Brownists, from their leader Eobert Brown. As chaplain of the
Duke of Norfolk, he was brought into contact at Norwich with Dutch
Anabaptist refugees ; and stirred up by them, he began a violent and
bitter polemic, not only against the Caesaro-papism and ejDiscopacy of the
State church, but also against the aristocratic element in the presbyterial
and synodal constitution. He taught that church and congregation were
t<\ be completely identified ; that every separate congregation.Tecause
subject to no other authority than that of Christ and His word, has the
right of independently arrangmg and administering its own affairs accord-
ing^ to the decisions ot the^aj^ority. Hyping been cast into prison, but
again liberated through the powerful influence of his friends, he retired
in A.I). 1581 tO'HoUaud, and founded a small congregation there at Middle-
burg in Zealand. When this soon became reduced to a mere handful, he
returned to England in a.d. 1589, and there renewed his agitation ; but
afterwards submitted to the hierarchical State church, and died in a.d.
1630 in the enjoyment of a rich living. Alter his apostasy, the jurist
Henry Barrow took his place as leader of the Brownists, who still num-
^ Lee, " The Church under Queen Elizabeth." 2 vols. London, 1880.,
M'Crie, " Annals of English Presbytery from the Earliest Period to the
Present Time." London, 1872.
376 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
bered many thousands, and were now called after him Barrowists. Per-
secuted by the government and harassed by severe measures from a.d.
1594, whole troojos of them retreated to the Netherlands, where in several
of the principal cities they formed considerable congregations, and issued,
in A.D. 1598, their first symbolical document, " The Confession of Faith
of certain English People exiled." — The second founder of the party, a
more trustworthy leader and more vigorous apologist, was the pastor John
Robinson, who, in a.d. 1608, with his Norwich congregation settled at
Amsterdam, and in a.d. 1610 moved to Leyden. He died in a.d. 1625.
'L'he fundamental points in the constitution under his leadership were
I these : (1) Complete equality of all the members of the church among
themselves, and consequently the setting aside of all clerical preroga-
I t^es ; (2) Thorough subordination of the college of presbyters to the
Avill of the majority of the congregation, from which circumstance they
/obtainedTthe name of Congregationalists ; and (3) The perfect autonomy
of separate congregations and their independence alike of every civil
authority and of every synodal judicature, from which characteristic
they obtained the name of Independents. Synodal assemblies were allowed
merely for the purpose of mutual consultation and advice, and when so
restricted were regarded as beneficial. With this end in view a Congre-
gational board was appointed to sit in London, which formed a common
centre of union. And as in constitution, so also in worship there was a
complete breach made with all the traditions and developments of church
, liistory. With the exception of Sunday all feast days were abolished.
/ In the assemblies forjpublic worship each individual had the right of free
/ speech for the edification of the congregation. All liturgical formularies
and prescribed prayers, even the Lord's Prayer not excepted, were set
aside, as hindering the mission of the Holy Spirit in the congregation.
—In order to preserve for their descendants the sacred heritage of their
faith, and their native English language and nationality, and in order to
save them from the moral dangers to which they were exposed in large
cities, but to an equal extent at least inspired by the wish to break new
ground for the kingdom of God in the New World, many of their fami-
lies set out, in a.d. 1620, from Holland for North America, and there, as
" Pilgrim Fathers," amid indescribable hardships, established a colony
in the wastes of Massachusetts, and laid the foundations of that Con-
gregational denomination which has now grown into so powerful and
influential a church.^
^ Neal, " History of the Puritans." 4 vols. London, 1731. Paul,
"Life of Whitgift." London, 1699. Brook, "Lives of the Puritans,"
3 vols. London, 1813. Marsden, "The Early Puritans," London,
1852 ; " The Later Puritans," London, 1853. Hopkins," The Puritans."
3 vols. London, 1860. Walker, " History of Independency." 3 vols.
§ 143. DEVELOPMENT OF THE EEFORMED CHURCH. 377
5. Theological Science, — In a.d. 1523, the grand council at Ziiricli set
up the peculiar institution of prophesying (1 Cor. xiv. 29) or biblical
conferences. Pastors along with students, as well as certain scholars
specially called for the purpose, were required to meet together every
morniug, with the exception of Sundays and Fridays, in the choir of the
cathedral, where, after a short opening prayer, public exegetical exposi-
tions of the Old Testament were given in the regular order of books and
chapters, with a strict and detailed comparison of the Vulgate, the LXX.
and the original text ; and then at the close one of the professors stated
the results of the conference in a practical discourse for the edification
of the congregation. At a later period theological studies flourished at
Geneva and Basel, in the French church at the academy of Saumur
and the theological seminaries of Montauban, Sedan, and Montpellier.
Sebastian Mtinster, formerly at Heidelberg, afterwards at Basel, issued,
in A.D. 1528, a complete Hebrew lexicon. The Ziirich theologians, Leo
Juda and others, in a.d. 1524-1529 translated Luther's Bible into the
Swiss dialect, making, however, an independent revision in accordance
with the original text. At the instigation of the Waldensians, Robert
Olivetan of Geneva (§ 138, 1) undertook, in ad. 1535, a translation of the
Holy Scriptures from the original into the French language ; but in so
far as the New Testament is concerned he followed almost literally the
translation of Faber (§ 120, 8). In subsequent editions it was in various
particulars greatly improved, although even to this day it remains very
unsatisfactory. Theodore Beza gave an improved recension of the New
Testament text and a new Latin translation of it. Sebastian Miinster
edited the Old Testament text with an independent Latin translation.
Also Leo Juda in Zurich undertook a similar work, for which he was well
qualified by a competent knowledge of languages. Sebastian Castellio in
Geneva endeavoured to make the prophets and apostles speak in classical
Latin and in full Ciceronian periods. Most successful was the Latin
translation of the Old Testament which Immanuel Tremellius at Heidel-
London, 1648. Hanbury, " Memorials relating to the Independents."
3 vols. London, 1839. Fletcher, " History of Independ. in England."
4 vols. London, 1862. Waddington, " Congregational History." Lon-
don, 1874. Dexter, " The Congregationalism of the last Three Himdred
Years, as seen in its Literature." London, 1880. Marshall, " History
of the Mar-Prelate Controversy." London, 1845. Kobinson, " Apologie,
or Defence of Christians called Brownists." 1604. Ashton, " Works
of John Robinson, Pastor of Pilgrim Fathers, with Memoir and Anno-
tations." 3 vols. London, 1851. Mather, " Ecclesiastical History of
New England, from its Planting in 1620 till 1698." London, 1702.
Doyle, " The English in America : The Puritan Colonies." 2 vols. Lon-
don, 1888. Bancroft, " History of the United States."
378 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
berg, in connection with his son-in-haw Francis Junius, produced. John
Piscator, dismissed from Heidelberg under the Elector Louis VI. (§ 144, 1),
from A.D. 1584 professor in the academy founded at Herborn during that
same year, published a new German translation of the Bible, which was
authoritatively introduced into the churches at Bern and in other
Eeformed communities. Commentators on ..Holy Scripture were also
numerous during this age. Besides Calvin, who far outstrips them all
(§ 138, 5), the following were distinguished for their exegetical perform-
ances : Zwingli, CEcolampadius, Conrad Pellican (§ 12 >, 4, footnote),
Theodore Beza, Francis Junius, John Piscator, John Mercer, and the
Frenchman Marloratus. — As a dogmatist Calvin again beyond all ques-
tion occupies the very front rank. In speculative power and thorough
mastery of his materials he excels all his contemporaries. Leo Juda's
catechisms, two in German and one in Latin, in which the scholar puts
the question and the teacher gives the answer and explanation, con-
tinued long in use in the Zurich church. Among the German Reformed
theologians Andrew Hyperius of Marburg, who died in a.d. 1564, takes
an honourable place as an exegete by his expositions of the Pauline
epistles, as a dogmatist by his Methodus theologies, as a homilist by his
Be formandis concionihu^ s., and as the first founder of theological ency-
clopajdia by his De recte formando theolog. studio.— The pietistic efforts
of the English Puritan party found a fit nursery in the University of
Cambridge, where William WMtaker, who died in a.d. 1598, the author
of Catechismus s. institutio pietatis, and especially William Perkins, who
died in a.d. 1602, author of De casibus conscientice, besides many other
English works of edification, laboured unweariedly in endeavouring to
infuse a pious spirit into the theological studies. Both were also eager
and enthusiastic supporters of the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination ;
but the attempt, through the "Nine Lambeth Articles," laid before
Archbishop Whitgift in his palace in a.d. 1598, and accepted and approved
by him, to make this doctrine an absolute doctrinal test for the university
was frustrated by the decided veto of Queen Elizabeth. — Continuation,
§ 160, 6.
6. Philosophy.— For the formal scientific construction of systematic
theology the Aristotelian dialectic, as the heritage bequeathed by the
medigeval scholasticism, continued to exercise upon the occupants of the
Eeformed professorial chairs, as well as in Lutheran seminaries, a domina-
ting influence far down into the seventeenth century. To emancipate
philosophy, and with it also in the same degree theology, from these fetters,
which hindered every free movement, and inaugurate a simpler scientific
method, was an attempt made first of all by Peter Ramus, who from a.d.
1551 was professor of dialectic and rhetoric in Paris, distinguished also as
a polyhistor, humanist, and mathematician, and diligent in disseminating
his views from the platform and by the press. As he had openly declared
§ 144. CALYINIZING OF LUTHERAN CHURCHES. 379
himself a Calvinist, lie had repeatedly to seek refuge in flight. After a
long residence in Switzerland and Germany, where he gained many
adherents, who were known by the name of Ramists, he thought that
after the Peace of St. Germain (§ 139, 15), in a.d. 1571, he might with
safety return to Paris ; but there, in a.d. 1572, he fell a victim to Romish
fanaticism on the night of St. Bartholomew. —Continuation, § 163, 1.
7. The Reformed church made one missionary attempt in a.d. 1557.
A French adventurer, Villegagnon, laid before Admiral Coligny a plan
for the colonization of the persecuted Huguenots in Brazil. With this
proposal there was linked a scheme for conducting a mission among the
heathen aborigines. He sailed under Coligny's patronage in a.d. 1555
with a number of Huguenot artisans, and founded Fort Coligny at Rio
de Janeiro. At his request Calvin sent him two Geneva pastors in a.d.
1557. The intolerable tyranny which Villegagnon exercised over the unpro-
tected colonists, the failure of their efforts among the natives, famine,
and want impelled them in the following year to seek again their native
shores, which they reached after a most disastrous voyage. All were not
able to secure a place in the returning ships, and even of those who
started several died of starvation on the way. — Continuation, § IGl, 7.^
§ 144. CalvixizixCt of Germax Lutherax Natioxal
Churches.
The Cryptocalvinist controversies conducted with such
party violence proved indeed in vain so far as winning over
to Pliilippist Calvinism the Lutheran church as a whole was
concerned (§ 141, 10, 13) ; but they did not succeed in
hindering, but rather fostered and advanced, the public
adoption of the Reformed Confession on the part of several
national churches in Germany or their being driven by
force to accept the Calvinistic constitution and creed. The
first instance of a procedure of this sort is to be found in the
Palatinate. It was followed by Bremen, Anhalt, and in the
beginning of the next century by Hesse Cassel and the
electoral dynasty of Brandenburg (§ 154a).
1. The Palatinate, A.D. 1560. — Tilemann Hesshus, formerly the
scholar and devoted admirer of Melanchthon, had been banished by the
1 Parkman, " Pioneers of France in the New World." London, 1885.
Baird, " Rise of the Huguenots of France," vol. i., p. 291 ff.
380 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
magistrates as a disturber of the peace from Goslar, and then from
Rostock, on account of his reckless and severe administration of church
discipline. At Melanchthon's recommendation, the Elector Ottheinrich
of the Palatinate called him as professor and general superintendent to
Heidelberg, in a.d. 1558. Here he came into collision with his deacon
William Klebitz. The latter had produced, on the occasion of his receiv-
ing his bachelor's degree, a thesis in which he vindicated a Calviniziug
theory of the Lord's Supper, whereupon Hesshus condemned and sus-
pended him, in a.d. 1559. But Klebitz would not move. Passion on
both sides developed into senseless fury, which found expression in the
pulpit and at the altar. The new elector, Frederick III. the Pious, a.d.
1559-1576, sent both into exile, and obtained an opinion from Melanch-
thon, which advised him to hold by the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians x.
IG, " the bread is the communion of the body of Christ." The elector,
who hadlongbeen favourably inclined to the Reformed doctrine and wor-
ship, now introduced, in a.d, 1560, into all the churches of his domains a
Reformed order of service, had altars, baptismal fonts, images, and even
organs removed from the churches, filled the professors' chairs with foreign
Calvinistic teachers, and in a.d. 1562 had the " Heidelberg Catechism "
composed by two Heidelberg professors, Zach. Ursinus and Caspar Ole-
vianus, for use in the schools throughout his territories.^ In respect of
thatsimplicity which befits a popular manual, in power and spirituality,
it is not to be compared to Luther's " Short Catechism," but it is cer-
tainly distinguished by learning, theological genius, Christian fervour,
and moderate, peaceful spirit, and deserves in an eminent degree the
acceptance which it has found, not only among the German, but also
among the foreign Reformed churches. Calvin's doctrine of predestina-
tion is avoided, and his theory of the Lord's Supper is taught in a form
approaching as near as possible to the Lutheran view, but the Roman
Catholic mass is characterized as execrable idolatry. The introduction
of this catechism, however, completed the severance of the Palatinate
from the Lutheran church. Brenz in Stuttgart attacked its doctrine
of the supper ; Bullinger in Ziirich and Beza in Geneva defended it with
passionate eagerness ; and the conference arranged by the elector to be
held at Maulbronn, in a.d. 1564, between the theologians of the Palatinate
and of Wiirttemberg, during its six days' discussions increased the bitter-
ness of parties, and made the split perpetual. The Lutheran German
states, irritated by the secession of the elector, complained of him to the
Diet of Augsburg, in a.d. 1564, that he had broken the religious Peace
of Augsburg by the forcible introduction of Calvinism. He answered in
1 The " Heidelberg Catechism" was translated into English, and pub-
lished at Oxford, 1828. Ursinus' expositions of the catechism have been
translated : " The Summe of Christian Religion," etc. Lond., 1611.
§ 144. CALVINIZING OF LUTHERAN CHUECHES. 381
defence, that he had not himself read Calvin's works, and was therefore
not in a position to know what Calvinism was ; that at Naumburg, in
A.D. 1561 (§ 141, 11), he had subscribed the Augustana, more correctly the
Vanata, and still adhered to the confession he then made. The diet
then did not venture to interfere with him, and was satisfied with a
simple expression of disapproval. By the introduction of presbyteries by
the order of the elector, in a.d. 1570, for the administration of church
discipline, Olevianus embroiled Limself in controversy with the electoral
councillor and professor of medicine at Heidelberg, Thomas Erastus
(§ 117, 4), who would much rather have the Zurich church order intro-
duced {§ 143) than the Zwinglian theory of the supper. This idea he
very persistently pressed, but without success. Although himself a
member of the ecclesiastical council, he yet fell under its ban, along with
Neuser and Sylvanus (§ 148, 3) as susj^ected of unitarianism, but tliis
charge has never been proved against him. In a.d. 1510 he settled in
Basel, and died there, in a.d. 1583, as professor of moral philosophy.
His controversial treatise, " Explicatio gravissiynce quastioiiis, ntrnm
excommxuiicatio mandato nitatur divino, an exCogituta sit ah homiuibus,^^
was published after his death. Beza answered in two dissertations : "De
preshyterlis " and " De excommunicationey Notice of his theory was
now taken in England and Scotland, and among the names of sects in
these countries during the seventeenth century we find that of Erastians.
At this very day all subordinating of church government under the
authority of the State is commonly styled Erastianism.^ — The reign of
Louis VI., A.D. 1576-1583, a zealous friend of the Formula of Concord,
was of too short duration to secure the complete restoration of Luther-
anism throughout his dominions. The count-palatine, John Casimir,
who conducted the government as regent during the minority, systemati-
cally drove out all Lutheran pastors and trained up his ward Frederick
IV. in Calvinism. — Continuation, § 153, 3.
2. Bremen, A.D. 1662.— In Bremen the cathedral preacher, Albert
Eizseus von Hardenberg, long lay under suspicion of favouring the Zwin-
glian theory of the sacraments. He publicly repudiated the Lutheran
doctrine of the ubiquity of the body of Christ, which his colleague John
Timann had defended in his treatise, " Farra^ro s^Hiena'arwm . . . de
C(jcna Domini,'' of a.d. 1555. Upon this there began a lively controversy
between them. All the pastors took Timann's side, but Hardenberg had
a powerful supporter in the burgomaster Daniel van Biiren, and an
1 An English translation of Erastus' treatise was published in 1699,
and re-issued with a preface by Dr. Eob. Lee, Edin,, 1844. One of the
fullest and ablest statements on " The Erastian Controversy" is that
given in chap, xxvii. of Principal Cunningham's " Historical Theology "
(Edin., 1870), vol. ii., pp. 557-587.
382 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
opinion obtained from Melanchthon in a.d. 1557 also favoured him by
counselling concession. Through his refusal to subscribe a confession
of faith in reference to the supper submitted to him by the council, the
excitement in Bremen was increased, and spread from thence over all the
provinces of Lower Saxony. Timanu died in a.d. 1557. His place as
champion of the Lutheran doctrine of the supper was taken by Hesshus,
who had been driven out of Heidelberg in a.d. 1559, and had almost
immediately afterward been called to Bremen. He challenged Harden-
berg to a public disputation, which, however, did not come off, because
the new Archbishop of Bremen, Duke George of Brunswick-Liineberg,
forbade Hardenberg to take part in it, and instead of this brought the
matter before the league of the cities of Lower Saxony. The league
held a provincial diet at Brunswick, in a.d. 1561, where Hardenberg was
removed from his office, yet without detracting from his honour. He
went now to Oldenburg, and died in a.d. 157'1 as jDastor at Emden.
Hesshus had left Bremen in a.d. 1560, having accepted a call to Magde-
burg, and from thence continued his controversy with Hardenberg. His
successor in Bremen, Simon Musseus, no less passionately than he
insisted upon the expulsion of all adherents of Hardenberg, and had
indeed managed to get the council to agree to the proposal when things
took a turn in an altogether different direction. Biiren, in spite of all
opposition, became the chief burgomaster in a.d. 1562. Musaeus and
other twelve pastors were now expelled, and also the councillors who
were in favour of Lutheranism felt that they could do nothing else than
quit the city. By foreign mediation an understanding was come to in
A.D. 1568, by which those who had been driven out were allowed to
return to the city, but not to their offices. All the churches of Bremen,
with the exception of the cathedral, which obtained a Lutheran pastor
again in a.d. 1568, continued in the possession of the Reformed party. —
But Hesshus was in a.d. 1562 expelled also from Magdeburg, as well as
afterwards from his position as court preacher in Neuburg, in a.d. 1569,
and from his professorship at Jena in a.d. 1573 (§ 111, 10), on account
of his passionate and violent polemics. He was also expelled from his
bishopric of Samland, in a.d. 1577, as a teacher of error, because he
had ascribed omnipotence, etc., to the human nature of Cbrist etiam
ill ahstracto. He died in a.d. 1588 as professor in Helmstadt.
3. Anhalt, A.D. 1597.— After the death of Prince Joachim Ernest four
Anhalt dynasties were formed by his sons, Dessau, Bemburg, Kothen,
Zerbst. John George, first head of the family of Anhalt-Dessau, reigned
on behalf of his brothers, who had not yet come of age, from a.d. 1587 till
A.D. 1603, and married a daughter of John Casimir, the count-palatine.
After having refused to sign the Formula of Concord, he began the
Calvinization of the land in a.d. 1589 by striking out the exorcism, and
then, in a.d. 1596, he put the Reformed church order in place of the
§ 145. CHARACTER OF THE DEFORMATION. 333
Lutheran. Soon after tbis Luther's catechism was set aside, and in a.d.
1597 a document was produced, consisting of twenty-eight Calvinistic
articles with a modified doctrine of predestination, whicli all the pastors
under pain of banishment from the country, were required to subscribe.
The most active agents in this movement were Caspar Peucer (§ 141, 10),
who had been expelled from Wittenberg, and the superintendent Wolf-
gang Amling of Zerbst. In a.d. 1644, however, Anhalt-Zerbst returned
to the old Lutheran Confession, under Prince John, who had been trained
up by his mother in the Lutheran faith.
III. The Deformation.
§ 145. Character of the Deformation.
That in a spiritual movement so powerful as that which
the Reformation called forth enthusiasts and extremists of
various sorts should seek to push forward their fancies and
vagaries is nothing more than might have been expected.
But that such excrescences are not to be charged against
the Reformation, as constituting an essential part of it, may-
be shown from the way in which the Reformation and the
Deformation are constantly put in antagonism with one
another. The starting point is clearly the same in the one
case as in the other; namely, opposition to and revolt against
the debased condition of the church of the age. But the
Reformation distinguishes itself completely from the very
first from the Deformation, often joins its forces even with
those of Catholicism in order to secure the overthrow of
what it regarded as a false and dangerous development ;
and so generally we find the champions of that movement
manifesting as bitter a hatred toward the Protestant re-
formers as toward the Romanists. Its origin is to be
explained by the tendency inherent in human nature, when
once embarked on a course of opposition, to rush to the
extreme of radicalism, which showed itself in this case
partly in the form of rationalism, partly in the form of mys-
ticism. The Reformation recognised the word of God in
Holy Scripture as the only rule and standard in matters
384 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
of religion, and as a judge and arbiter over tradition. The
rationalistic spirit in the deformatory movement, on the
other hand, subordinates Holy Scripture to reason, and
estimates revealed truth in accordance with the supposed
requirement of logical thought. The Reformation offers
opposition to the Catholic deification of the church, but the
Deformation goes the length of contesting the divinity of
Christ (Antitrinitarians and Unitarians). On the other hand,
the mystical side of the Deformation, which not infrequently
amounts to a more or less clearly expressed pantheism, may
be regarded as an extreme and exaggerated statement of the
reformers' demand for a more spiritual conception of the
religious life in opposition to the externalism of Romanism.
It places alongside of the word as expressed in Holy Scrip-
ture what it calls an inner illumination by the Holy Spirit
as an equally high or even a higher kind of revelation, de-
spises the sacraments, as well as all public or external forms
of Divine worship. A third deformatory tendency, and that
indeed which during the Reformation era was most powerful,
is represented by Anabaptism. The ultra-reformatory en-
deavours of the movement aimed, not only at directing the
private and ecclesiastical life of the individual Christian,
but also at reconstructing, according to what it regarded as
the apostolic standard, the whole fabric of the social and
civil life. It derived its name from the demand for re-
baptism which was made as a consequence of the denial of
the usefulness and validity of infant baptism. This was,
indeed, the one common term of its confession, in which its
members, giving way in many directions to individualistic
subjective peculiarities, were required to agree. Adult
baptism was thus made the characteristic note of their com-
munity as a distinct sect.
The Catholic notions jorevailing during tbe Middle Ages as to the
manner in which heretics ought to be treated were so firmly held
§ 146. mysticis:m and pantheism. 385
by the Protestants, tliat even Calvin without hesitation, in a.d, looB,
delivered over one who denied the doctrine of the Trinity (§ 148, 2) to be
punished by the civil authorities. Their sentence of death by fire at the
stake was carried out under his sanction and that of almost all the
notable reformers of the day, BuUinger and Farel, Beza and Viret, (Eco-
lampadius, Bucer, and Peter Martyr, even Melanchthou and Urbanus
Pihegius. At an earlier period indeed Luther had occasionally, roused to
indignation by what he beheld of the horrors of the Inquisition, opposed
the idea that heretics as such should be punished with torture and
death, and gradually he secured the victory in Protestant theory and
practice for the view that heretics as such should neither be compelled to
retract nor be put to death, but rather should be brought to a better mind
and put out of the way of doing harm by imprisonment or banishment.
§ 146. Mysticism and Pantheism.
Besides the true evangelical mysticism within the church,
which Luther throughout his whole life esteemed very
highly as a deepening of the Christian religious life, and
which the Lutheran church had never ruled out of its pale,
an unevangelical as well as thoroughly anti-ecclesiastical
mysticism broke out at a very early period in quite a
multitude of different forms. In the case of Schwenkfeld
this tendency, though characterized by very decided hos-
tility to the church, occupied an advantageous position, as
well by the attitude which it assumed to theology as from
the quiet and sober manner in which it conducted its propa-
ganda. Agrippa and Paracelsus are representatives of a
mysticism with a basis in natural philosophy, which was
wrought out into fantastic forms by Valentine Weigel in his
theosophy. Sebastian Pranck drew his mysticism from the
fountains of Eckhart's and Tauler's writings ; and Giordano
Bruno, by his wild, almost delirious mysticism, culminating
in the boldest pantheism, won for himself the fiery stake.
The French Libertins splrituels embraced a sublime anti-
nomian pantheism, while the Pamilists, who appeared at a
later period in England, were banded together in the service
of an apotheosis of love like the members of one family.
25
386 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
1. Schwenkfeld and his Followers. — Among the myptics of the Refor-
mation period hostile to the church, Caspar Schwenkfeld, a Silesian
nobleman of an old family, of the line of Ossingk, holds a prominent and
honourable place as a man of deep and genuine piety. At first he
attached himself with enthusiasm to the Wittenberg Reformation ; but as
it advanced his heart, which was exclusively set upon an inward, mystical
Christianity, became dissatisfied. In a.d. 1525 he met personally with
Luther at Wittenberg. The friendly relations that were maintained there,
notwithstanding all the divergences that became apparent on funda-
mental matters and in the way of looking at things, soon gave place on
Schwenkfeld's side to open antagonism. He expressed himself strongly
iu reference to his dissatisfaction with the Wittenberg reformers, saying
that he would rather join the papists than the Lutherans. Even in
A.D. 1528 he had been expelled from his native land, and now began
operations at Strassburg, where Bacer opposed him; and then, in a.d.
1534, in Swabia, where he encountered the vigorous opposition of
Jac. Andrea. In every place he set himself in direct antagonism, not
onl}' to the German, but also to the Swiss reformers, and engaged in
incessant controversies with the theologians, working steadily in the
interests of a reformation in accordance with his own peculiar views.
He died in a.d. 1561 at Ulm, and left behind him in Swabia and Silesia
a handful of followers, who, in a.d. 1563, issued a complete edition of
the " Christian Orthodox Books and Writings of the Noble and Faithful
Man, Caspar Schwenkfeld," in four folio volumes. Expelled from
Silesia in a.d. 1728, many of them fled into the neighbouring state of
Lausitz, others to Pennsylvania in North America, where they found
some small communities. What Schwenkfeld so keenly objected to iu
the Lutheran Reformation was nothing else than its firm biblico-eccle-
siastical objectivity. Luther's adherence to the unconditional authority
of the word of God he declared to be a worship of the letter. He
himself gave to the inner word of God's Spirit iu men a place superior
to the outward word of God in Scripture. All external institutions of
the church met with his most uncompromising opposition. In a manner
similar to that of Osiander (§ 141,2), he identified justification and sauc-
tification, and explained it as an incarnation of Christ iu the believer.
Rejecting the doctrine of the communicatio idiomatum, he taught a
thorough " deifying of the flesh of Christ," having its foundation in the
birth by the Virgin Mary, regenerated in faith and completed by suffering,
death, and resurrection ; so that ia His state of exaltation His Divine
and human natures are perfectly combined into one. Infant baptism he
condemned, and affirmed that a regenerate person can live without sin.
In the Lord's Supper according to him everything depended upon the
iaward operation of the Spirit. The bread in the sacrament is only a
symbol of the spiritual truth that Christ is the true bread for the soul.
§ 146. MYSTICISM AND PANTHEISM. 387
He laid special emphasis on John vi, 51, and regarded the tovto of the
words of institution not as the subject but as the predicate: " My body
is this " ; i.e. is bread unto eternal life.^
2. Agrippa, Paracelsus, and "Weigel — Agrippa von Nettesheim, who died
in A.D. 1535, a man of extensive and varied scholarship, who boasted of
his knowledge of secret things, led an exceedingly changeful and adven-
turous career as a statesman and soldier, taught medicine, theology, and
jurisprudence, lashed the monks with his biting satires, so that they
had him persecuted as a heretic, contended against the belief in witch-
craft, exposed mercilessly in his treatise De incertltudine et vanitate scien-
tiarum the weak points of the dominant scholasticism, and in opposition
to it wrought out in his book De occulta philosophia his own system of
cabbalistic mystical philosophy. — A man of a quite similar type was
the learned Swiss physician Philip Aureolus Theoj^hrastus Bombastus
Paracelsus of Hohenheim, who died in a.d. 15il ; a man of genius and a
profound thinker, but with an ill-regulated imagination and an over-
luxuriant fancy, which led him to profess that he had found the solu-
tion of all the mysteries of the Divine nature, as well as of terrestrial and
super-terrestrial nature, and that he had discovered the philosopher's
stone. These two continued to retain their position within the limits of
the Catholic church, — Valentine Weigel, on the contrary, who died in a. p.
1588, was a Lutheran pastor at Schopau in Saxony, universally respected
for his consistent, godly character and his earnest, devoted labours. His
mystico-theosophical tendency, influenced by Tauler and Paracelsus,
came to be fully understood only long after his death by the publication
of his practical works, " Church and House Postils on the Gospels,"
"A Book on Prayer," " A Directory for Attaining the Knowledge of all
things without Error," etc. ; and down to the nineteenth century he had
many followers among the quiet and contemplative throughout the land.
While utterly depreciating as well the theology of the church as all sorts
of external forms in worship, he placed all the more weight upon the
inner light and the anointing with the Spirit of God, without which all
teaching and prayer will be vain. In man he sees a microcosmus of the
universe, and man's growth in holiness he regarded as a continuation of
the incarnation of God in him. He still allowed a place to the doctrine
of the church as an allegorical shell for the knowledge of the soul to
God and the world, and from this it may be explained how he was able
unhesitatingly to subscribe the Formula of Concord. Bened, Biedermann,
who was for a long time his deacon, and then his successor in the
^ Dorner, " History of Protestant Theology," vol. i., pp. 182-189 :
" The False Theoretical Mystics: Schwenkfeld." Piitschl, " History of
the Chr. Doctr. of Justification and Eeconciliation." Edinburgh, 1872;
p. 292.
388 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
pastoral office, sympathised with his master's views, and subsequently
made vigorous attempts to disseminate them in his writings. On this
account he was deposed in a.d. 1660. i
3. Franck, Thamer, and Bruno. — Sebastian Tranck of Donauwort, in
Swabia, a learned printer and voluminous writer in German and Latin,
for some time also a soap-boiler, had attached himself enthusiastically to
the Reformation, which for several years he served as an evangelical
pastor. Subsequently, however, he broke off from it, condemned and
abused with sharp criticism and biting satire all the theological move-
ments of his age, demanded unrestricted religious liberty, defended the
Anabaptists against the intolerance of the theologians, and sought satis-
faction for himself in a mysticism tending toward pantheism constructed
out of Erigena, Eckhart, and Tauler. Among his theologico-philo-
sophical writings, the most important are the " Golden Ark, or Tree of
Knowledge of Good and Evil," and especially the 280 spirited " Paradoxa,
i.e. Wonderful Words out of Holy Scripture." Against what he regarded
as the idolatrous worship of the letter in Luther's theology he directed
" The Book sealed with Seven Seals." In unreconciled contradictions
collected in this tract out of Scripture he thinks to be able to prove
that God Himself wished to warn us against the deifying of the letter.
The letter is the devil's seat, the sword of antichrist ; he has the letter
on his side, the spirit against him. With the letter the old Pharisees slew
Christ, and their modern representatives are doing the same to-day. The
letter killeth, the spirit alone giveth life. He also attached very little im-
portance to the sacrament and external ordinances. He makes no distinc-
tion, or at most only one of degree, between God and nature. God, God's
Word, God's Son, the Holy Spirit, and nature are with him only various
aspects or manifestations of the same power, which is all in all ; and his
theory of evil inclines strongly to dualism. On the other side, he deserves
the heartiest recognition as a German prose writer in respect of the
purity, copiousness, and refinement of his style, and as the author of the
first text books of history and geography in the German language. After
a changeful and eventful life in several cities of South Germany, having
been expelled successively from Nuremberg, Strassburg, and Ulm, he
died at Basel in a.d. 1542. — A career in every point resembling his was
that of Theobald Thamer, of Alsace. After having sat at the feet of
Luther in Wittenberg as an enthusiastic disciple, he took up an atti-
tude of opposition to the Reformation by giving absolute determining
authority to the subjective principle of conscience, and by the rejection
of the Lutheran doctrine of justification. He went over ultimately to the
Roman Catholic church in a.d. 1557, to seek there the peace of soul that
he had lost, and died as professor of theology at Freiburg, in a.d. 1569.
Morley, " Life of Agrippa von Nettesheim." 2 vols. Londo'n, 1856.
§ 146. MYSTICISM AND PANTHEISM. 389
— A far more powerful thinker than either of these two was the Italian
Dominican monk, Giordano Bruno of Nola, His violent and abusive
invectives against monkery, transubstantiation, and the immaculate con-
ception obliged him, in a.d. 1580, to flee to Geneva. From thence he
betook himself to Paris, where he delivered lectures on the ars magna of
Lullus (§ 103, 7) ; afterwards spent several years in London engaged in
literary work, from a.d. 1586 to a.d. 1588 taught at "Wittenberg, and on
leaving that place delivered an impassioned eulogy on Luther. After a
further continued life of adventure duriug some years in Germany, he
returned to Italy, and was burnt in Eome in a.d. 1600 as a heretic. A
complete edition of his numerous writings in the Italian language does
not exist. These are partly allegorico-satirical, partly metaphysical, on
the idea of the Divine unity and universality, in which the poetical and
philosophical are blended together. He adopted the doctrine of God set
forth by Nicholas of Cusa (§ 113, 6), representing the deity as at once
the maximum and the minimum, and carried out this idea to its logical
conclusion in pantheism. Bruno deserves special recognition as a con-
sistent protester against the geocentric theories of ecclesiastical scho-
lastic science, and for this merits a place among the first apologists of the
Copernican system. i
4. The Pantheistic Libertine Sects of the Spirituals in France, reminding
us in theory and practice of the mediaeval Brothers and Sisters of the
Free Spirit (§ 116, 5), had their origin in the Walloon provinces of the
Netherlands. As early as a.d, 1529 a certain Coppin preached their gospel
in his native city of Lille or Eyssel. Quintiu and Pocquet, both from
the province of Hennegau, transplanted it to France in a.d. 1530. At
the court of the liberal-minded and talented Queen Margaret of Navarre
(§ 120, 8), they found at first a hearty w^elcome, and from this centre
carried on secretly a successful propaganda, until Calvin's influence over
the queen, as well as his energetic polemic," Against the Fantastic and
Mad Sect of the Libertines, who call themselves Spirituals, a.d. 1545,"
put a stop to their further progress. The contemporary Libertines of
Geneva (§ 138, 3, 4), who rose up against the rigoristic church discipline
of Calvin, are not to be confounded with these Netherland-French Liber-
tines, although their apostle Pocquet also lived and laboured for along
time in Geneva. The impudent immorality of the Genevan Libertines
■was quite different from the moral levity of the Spirituels, which had
always a spiritualistic-pantheistic significance, their characteristics con-
1 Symmonds, " The Age of the Despots." Dorner, " History of Pro-
testant Theology," vol i., pp. 191-195. See also two articles in the July
and October parts of the Scottish lieview for 1888, pp. 67-107, 244-270 :
" Giordano Bruno before the Venetian Inquisition," and " The Ultimate
Fate of Giordano Bruno."
390 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
sisting rather in a broad denial of and contempt for Cl::ristian doctrines
and the facts of gospel history.
5. Under the name of Familists, Familia charitatis, Henry Nicolai or
Nicholas of Miinster, who had previously been closely related to David
Joris (§ 148, 1), founded a new mystical sect in England during the reign
of Elizabeth. They were distinguished from the Anabaptists by treating
with indifference the question of infant baptism. Nicholas appeared as
the apostle of love in and through which the mystical deification of man
is accomphshed. Although uneducated, he composed several works,
and in one of these designated liimself as " endowed with God in the
spirit of His love." His followers have been charged with immoral
practices, and the doctrine has been ascribed to them that Christ is
}iothing more than a Divine condition communicating itself to all the
saints.^
§ 147. Anabaptism.-
The fanatical ultra-reforming tendencies whicli character-
ize the later so called Anabaptism, first made their appear-
ance within the area of the Saxon reformation. They now
broke forth in wild revolutionary tumults, and were funda-
mentally the same as the earlier Wittenberg exhibitions
(§ 124). In this instance, too, passionate opposition was
shown to the continuance of infant baptism, without, how-
ever, proceeding so far as decidedly to insist upon rebaptism,
and making that a common bond and badge to distinguish
and hold together separate communities of their own, inspired
by that fundamental tendency. This was done first in a.d.
1525 among the representatives of ultra-reform movements,
who soon secured a position for themselves on Swiss soil.
And thus, while in central Grermany this movement was being
utterly crushed in the Peasant War, Switzerland became the
1 More, "Mystery of Godliness," bk.vi., chaps, xii.-xviii. Also E nthu-
niasmus Triuiiiphatus in hi>^ ''CoW. Phil. Works." London, 16G2. Ruther-
ford, " A Survey of the Spiritual Antichrist, opening the Secrets of
Familism and Antinomianism." London, 1648.
2 Mosheim, " Ecclesiastical History," cent, xvi., sect. iii.,part ii.,chap.
iii. Ranke, " History of the Reformation," vol. iii., bk. vi., chap. ix.
Brandt, " History of the Reformation in the Low Countries," vol. i.
§ 147. ANABAPTISM. 391
nursery and hotbed of Anabaptism. Its leaders when driven
out spread through southern and south-eastern Germany as
far as the Tyrol and Moravia, and founded communities in
all the larger and in many of the smaller towns. And
although in a.d. 1531 the Anabaptists, with the exception
of some very small and insignificant remnants, were rooted
out of Switzerland, yet in a.d. 1540 they were able to send
out a new colony to settle in Venice, in order to carry on
the work of proselytising in Italy. — Chiefly through the
instrumentality of the south German apostles, Anabaptist
communities and conventicles were sown broadcast over the
whole of the north-west as far as the Baltic and the North
Sea. And even as early as the beginning of a.d. 1530 there
issued from the Netherlands an independent movement of a
peculiarly violent, fanatical, and revolutionary character,
which spread far and wide. In A.D. 1534, John of Leyden
set up his Anabaptist kingdom in Miinster with endless
glitter and display, and sent out messengers over all the
world to gather the " people of God " together into the
" new Zion." The unfortunate termination of his short
reign, however, had a sobering influence upon the excited
enthusiasts, so that they resolved to abandon those revolu-
tionary and socialistic tendencies, to which their brethren in
south and east Germany had never given w^ay, or, if at all,
only in isolated cases where they had been carried away by
chiliastic expectations. Yet were they in the north as w^ell
as in the south, afterwards as well as before, mercilessly per-
secuted on all hands, almost as severely by the Protestant
as by the Catholic governments, and often imprisoned in
crowds, banished, scourged, drowned, hanged, beheaded,
burnt. Under all these tribulations they developed a truly
wonderful persistency of belief, and exhibited a heroic
martyr spirit. To collect their scattered remnants, and to
save them from destruction by a calm and sensible reforma-
392 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
tion, was tlie work to which from a.d. 1536 Menno Simons
unweariedly applied himself.
1. The Anabaptist Movement in General. — The name of Anabaptists has
always been repudiated by those so designated as a cahimnious nick-
name and term of reproach. And, in fact, it is clearly inadequate, inas-
much as it does not characterize either the regulating principle or the
essential core and nature of the aim of the party, which had been already
fully developed before rebaptism had been set up as a term of member-
ship. Within their own constituted congregations no second baptism
found place, but only one baptism of adults on the ground of a personal
profession of faith. Nevertheless, the rejected designation had, at the
time at which it had originated, this justification, that then all the mem-
bers of this community actually were rebaptizers or had been rebaptized ;
and the introduction of a second baptism, as it was the result and con-
sequence of their fundamental princij)le, became also the occasion, means,
and basis for their incorporation into an independent denomination. — The
rein'esentatives of the Anabaptist movement showed their ultra-reforming
character by this, that while at one with Luther and Zwingli in seeking
the overthrow of all views and practices of the Roman Catholic church
regarded by them as unevangelical, they characterized the position of
the reformers as a halting half way, and so denounced^them as still
deeply rooted in the antichristian errors *of the papacy. And because
the reformers firmly repudiated them, and vigorously opposed and re-
fused to countenance those radical demands and fanatical chiliastic
expectations of theirs that went so much further, they turned upon them
and their reformed institutions often with a fury and bitterness even
more intense than they manifested to their Romish opponents. Most
offensive to them was the attitude of the reformers toward the civil
authorities. They were especially indignant at the reformers for not
rejecting with scorn the help of magistrates in carrying out the Refor-
mation movement, for recognising, not only the right, but the duty of
civil rulers to co-operate in the reconstruction of the church, to exercise
control over the ecclesiastical and religious life of the community as
well as of each individual, to see to the maintenance of church order,
and to visit the refractory with civil penalties. Then their innermost
principle was the endeavour to make a complete and thorough distinc-
tion jDetween the kingdom of nature andTfhe kingdom of grace, the king-
dom of God and the kingdom of the world, of the converted and the
unconverted, so as to restore a visible kingdom of saints by gathering
together~air~true believers from all sectioiis of the utterly corrupted
church into a new holy communion of the regenerate. Thus they would
prepare the way for the promised millennium, when the saints shall rule
§ 147. ANABAPTISM. 393
the world. The State, with its penalties and punishments, belongs essen-
tially to the domain of evil, and is to be endured only so long as there
are unbelievers and unconverted people, who alone are under its juris-
diction. The community of true Christians, on the other hand, is in
no need of any secular magistracy, for this law, which the civil power
administers, concerns only the unrighteous and evildoers. But in
matters of religion and the inner man, the civil authority can have no
manner of right to interfere ; as, on the other hand, believers ought not
to accept any sort of magisterial office or civic rank. Freedom in matters
of conscience, religion, worship, and doctrine is a fundamental axiom,
which forms the primary privilege of every religious denomination, and
the only admissible punishment in connection with religious questions
is exclusion from the particular community. The only unconditionally
valid legislative code for Christians is the Bible. To the law of the
State, however, he is not to submit at all in spiritual things, and even in
temporal things only in so far as Holy Scripture and his own conscience,
enlightened by the Spirit of God, do not enter a protest ; but where the
injunction of a magistrate oversteps the limit, he must offer strenuous
resistance, and contend even to blood and death. — With respect to the
mode of life and activity within the ranks of the community, the pecu-
liarly high claims which they put forth to be regarded as a congregation
of chosen saints demanded that they should insist upon the actual
personal conversion and regeneration of each individual member, the
exclusion of everything sinful and worldly by means of a rigidly strict
discipline, and where necessary by expulsion from church fellowship, as
well as the avoiding of all needless intercourse with the unconverted
and unbelieving, and the exercise of true and perfect brotherly love
toward one another, which also, so far as present circumstances might
admit, should evidence itself in the voluntary sharing of goods. As a
condition of the admission of any individual into the community proof
had to be given of repentance and faith, and as an authenticating seal
on the one side of the entrance being granted, and on the other side of
the obligation being undertaken, baptism was administered, which now,
as infant baptism was denounced as an invention of the devil, was under-
stood simply of adult baptism, for the most part administered in the usual
way by sprinkling. Th^_ecclesia^ticalconstitution of t^ie regularly formed
congregations was modelled after what they regarded as the apostolic
type] Their congregational worship was extremely^simple, quite free of
any ornament or ceremony. Their doctrinal system, owing to the promi-
n'ence given to the practical and the ethical, was but poorly developed,
and was therefore never set forth in a confession of faith obligatory on
all The communitie"s] Upon the whole, they inclm'ed more to the Zwin-
glian than to the Lutheran type of doctrine, especially in their views of
baptism and the Lord's Supper. The grand Keformation dogma of justi-
394 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
fication by faith alone was rejected, as also the idea that even the regene-
rate may not in this world attain unto perfect sinlessuess. Here and
there, too, antitrinitarian views found entrance, but the majority firmly
adhered to the oecumenical faith of the church, or at least soon returned
to it. Chiliastic theories and expectations were widely spread, but the
attempts to realize them in the present by means of revolutionary move-
ments were soon recognised and denounced as mischievous, and so, too,
tlje fanatical, pseudo-prophetic craze by which many of the leaders of
the movement were carried away came by-and-by to be discredited.
2. Keller, in his Refurmation iihcl die alt. Reformparteien of 1885, has
undertaken to give a historical basis to a view of the origin and character
of the Anabaptist movement diverging in several important respects from
the one that has hitherto been generally accepted. He sees in the ten-
dency of the Swiss Anabaptist to go beyond the position taken up by
Luther and Zwingli not merely, as several earlier investigators had
already done, a revival of certain mediaeval endeavours at reform, but
an actual, uninterrupted continuation of these, involving, not only a rela-
tionship, whether conscious or unconscious, but also a close historico-
genetic and personal connection with "those old evangelical brother-
hoods, which through many centuries, under many names," in spite of
persecutions that raged against them, still survived in secret remnants
down into the 16th century. Of these brotherhoods, during the 12th
century, the Waldensians formed the heart and core. Their precursors
were the Petrubrusians, the Apostolic Brothers, the Arnoldists, the
Humiliati, etc. ; their successors and spiritual kinsmen were the here-
tical Beghards and Lollards, the Spirituals together with Marsilius of
Padua and King Louis of Bavaria, the German mystics, the Friends of
God and Winkelers, the Dutch Brethren of the Common Life, and, in
specially close association with the German Waldensians, the Bohemian
and Moravian Brethren ; of like character, too, were John Staupitz, the
Zucker family of Nuremberg, Albert DLirer, and a great number of
other notables belonging to the first decades of the 16th century. And
these all, as belonging to one and the same spiritual family, and forming
an unbroken chain, link joined to link, when church and State raged
against them with fire and sword, found always nurseries and places of
refuge in those " noble corporations of builders and masons," whose tried
organization was made by them the basis of the church constitution, and
has thus been handed down to modern times. Luther, who, moved by
Staupitz and the study of Tauler and the "Deutsche Theologie," was at
first inclined to throw himself into the spiritual current, from a.d. 1521
more and more withdrew himself from it, and even Zwingli detached
himself from it on account of some proceedings which he did not approve.
The origin of the so called Anabaptism is thus, not merely traced back
to these two great reformers, but rather is conditioned by the firm main-
§ 147. ANABAPTISM. 395
tenance of a primitive evangelical tendency, from which those two turned
aside. In the one case we have " new evangelicals," founding a new com-
munion ; in the other, " old evangelicals," conserving and continuing
the old communion. And not Zurich, where the Anabaptist movement
began to get a footing in a.d. 1524, but Basel, was its true birthplace.
There in a.d. 1515 the liberal-minded printers Frobenius, Curio, and
Cratander, who first printed the reformatory writings of the Middle
Ages, repeatedly gathered the secret representatives and friends of those
old brotherhoods from their hidings in the mountains of Switzerland
and Savoy, as well as from the south of France and Germany, in their
" chapter sessions," held there in order to consult about the founding of
new brotherhoods ; and from thence the opposition to infant baptism was
first transplanted to Ziirich. — But these " chapter sessions " served quite
another purpose than the fostering of Waldensian and Anabaptist socie-
ties, and were rather devoted to advancing the interests of liberalistic
humanism and scholarship. Aad the embracing together of all the
above-named sects as representing one and the same spiritual current,
though supported by a great many combinations, guesses, suppositions,
and deductions, which from their very boldness and the confidence with
which they are stated are often startling, seems to be utterly untenable,
and to proceed not so much from an unbiassed study of original sources
as from a prejudiced judgment manipulating the facts with great art and
skill. In conclusion, then, Keller proceeds to deal with the later actors
in the Anabaptist movement, and finds them not only in the Mennonites
and Puritans, but also in the freemason lodges, the Rosicrucians, and
Pietists. Even the spiritual tendencies of Lessing, Kant, to a certain
extent also of Schiller, also of Schleiermacher, through his connection
with the Brethren of Herrnhut, seem to him determined and dominated
by this same fundamental principle ! The baselessness of Keller's argu-
ments has been thoroughly exposed by Kolde and Carl Miiller, yet he
continues unweariedly to repeat and set them forth.
3. The Swiss Anabaptists. — Even in German Switzerland, although the
reformers of that country had proceeded much further than the Saxon
reformers in the direction of removing every vestige of Roman Catholi-
cism in constitution, doctrine, worship, and discipline, ultra-reforming
tendencies soon made their appearance among those who thought that
such chauges were not radical and thorough enough. Here, too, the re-
fusal to recognise infant baptism was made specially prominent. Indeed
even Zwingli himself at first pronounced against its necessity and
serviceableness. According to him, baptism was not, as with Luther, a
means of grace, but analogous to the circumcision of the Old Testament
— a sign of obligation, by means of which the subject of baptism accepted
the Christian faith and life as binding upon him. Thus he was in-
clined for a time to depreciate infant baptism, without however declaring
396 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
it absolutely unallowable. But when subsequently it became apparent
that the radical opi^osition to it on the part of its former friends, and
their insisting upon the obligation to observe only adult baptism, pro-
ceeded from an ultra-reforming tendency, which threatened with ruin
much that was necessary to ecclesiastical and civil order, and tended to
make the extremest consequences of these views the very foundation of
their system, he expressed himself all the more decidedly in favour of
having infant baptism obligatorily retained. — The most zealous leaders
of the Anabaptist movement in Switzerland were Conrad Grebel, a
cultured humanist, son of a distinguished Ziirich senator, already desig-
nated by Zwingli as " the coryphaeus of the Baptists " ; Felix Manz, also
a humanist, and famous as an earnest promoter of Hebrew studies, but
drowned in a.d. 1527 by order of the Ziirich council ; George Jacobs, a
monk of Chur in the Grison country, commonly called Blaurock, on ac-
count of his dress ; Louis Hiitzer of Thurgau, etc. Besides these native
Swiss, the following also wrought with equal enthusiasm for the promo-
tion of the Anabaptist cause : William Eoubli, a priest banished from
Eottenburg on the Neckar on account of his evangelical zeal ; Simon
Stumpf, who had migrated from Franconia, and Michael Sattler from
Breisgau ; but above all the famous Balthazar Hubmeier, a scholar of
John Eck, distinguished as a popular preacher and an indefatigable
apologist and skilful polemical writer on the side of the Anabaptists.
He was, in a.d. 1512, professor of theology at Ingolstadt, in a.d. 1516
pastor of the cathedral church of Eegensburg; from whence, in a.d. 1522,
already powerfully influenced in favour of evangelical truth by Luther's
writings, he removed to Waldshut, and there entered on the work of tbe
Reformation, but afterwards decided against the continuance of infant
baptism and in favour of Anabaptism. The Austrian government, under
whose protectorate Waldshut was, demanded that he should be delivered
up, which the governor steadfastly refused to do. But when, in Dec,
1525, Waldshut was obliged to surrender at discretion, he fied to Ziirich,
was there taken prisoner, and was driven, through fear of being delivered
up to Austria, to make a public recantation. He then left Ziirich and
passed over into Moravia. — The original home of the Anabaptist move-
ment in Switzerland was Zurich and its neighbourhood. At Wyticon and
Zollicon, Roubli publicly preached in a.d. 1524 against infant baptism,
and persuaded several parents to refuse to have their young children
baptized. When, in Jan., 1525, the Ziirich council voted for the expul-
sion of all ultra-reform agitators, these assembled together on the evening
preceding their departure for mutual edification and establishment by
prayer and Scripture reading. Then Blaurock rose, and besought Grebel
" for God's sake to baptize him with the true Cbristian baptism into the
true faith," and, when this was done, imparted it himself to all others
present. The same sort of thing happened soon after at Waldshut, where
§ 147. ANABAPTIST. 397
Hubmeier on Easter Eve received baptism by the hand of Edubli, and then
on Easter Day conferred it upon 110 and afterwards upon more than 300
individuals. In this way a thorough break was made, not only with the
old Catholics, but also with the young reformed Church, and the founda-
tion of an independent Anabaptist community laid, which now with rapid
strides spread over the whole of reformed Switzerland. Thus origi-
nated, e.g., the twelve Anabaptist congregations that existed in Ziirich
and neighbourhood as early as a.d. 1527, the twenty-five in the Ziirich
highlands, and also the sixteen which in ad. 1531 were to be found
in the Ziirich lowlands. An attempt was next made to diffuse informa-
tion among the sectaries and convert them from their errors by means
of discussions and controversial tracts, Zwingli lending his aid by word
and pen ; and then resort was had to fines and imprisonment. In
June, 1525, St. Gall, following the example of Ziirich, issued sentence
of banishment against the Baptists. But as the expulsion of tbe leaders
in no degree contributed to the crushing of the communities, which
rather gathered strength in secret, and as the exiles were now for the
first time fully able to spread over all lands the seeds of their Anabaptist
doctrines, it was finally concluded that capital punishment was a neces-
sity. The Ziirich council, in March, 1527, issued an edict, according
to which all rebaptizers and rebaptized were without exception to be
drowned, and this example was followed by the other magistrates. In
consequence of the general persecution that followed the Anabaptist agi-
tation in Switzerland might be regarded as stamped out in a.d. 1531,
although here and there little groups meeting in remote and hidden
corners, under constant threat of prison and death, dragged out a mise-
rable existence for some twenty years more.^
4. The South German Anabaptists.— The Anabaptists expelled from
Switzerland in a.d. 1525 spread first of all over the neighbouring south
German provinces. Blaurock, publicly whipped in Ziirich, returned
to the Grison country, and, when again driven out of that refuge, to the
Tyrol, where the Anabaptist views found uncommonly great favour.
Eoubli and Sattler retired to Alsace, where Strassburg especially became
one of the chief nurseries of Anabaptism, and from thence they carried
on a successful mission work in Swabia. Louis Hiitzer and John Denck
(§ 148, 1) gathered a large following in Nuremberg, Augsburg, and Strass-
burg ; also in Passau, Kegensburg, and Munich ; then pressing eastward
along the Inn and the Danube, their adherents founded Anabaptist com-
munities in Salzburg, Styria, Linz, Stein, and even in Vienna. They
found the greatest success of all among the industrial classes, and tra-
velling artisans proved their most zealous apostles. Although, beyond
^ Burrage, " History of the Anabaptists in Switzerland." Philadelphia,
1882.
398 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
carrying on an unwearied propaganda on behalf of their own religious
confession, they almost invariably refused to identify themselves with
any other sort of social and political agitation, they were on all hands
most cruelly persecuted ; no city, no country town, no village was be-
yond the reach of inquisitorial scrutiny. Their radical extirpation was,
by the decision of the diet at Spires in a.d. 1529, represented as a duty
to the empire resting upon all; for the sixth section of its decrees en-
joined that " each and all of the rebaptizers and rebaptized, both men
and women, come to years of discretion, should be brought to the stake
and block or suchlike death without any ^trial before the spiritual judge."
Most blood was indeed shed in lands under Catholic governments. In
the Tyrol and in Gorz, for example, it is said that, even in a.d. 1531, the
number executed was over 1,000, among whom was Blaurock, who was
burnt in a.d. 1529. Sebastian Franck, in a.d. 1530, estimated the num-
ber of the slain at somewhere about 2,000, and the heat of the persecu-
tion only began with that year. Duke William of Bavaria went farthest,
with the atrocious order, " Whoever recants, let him be beheaded ;
whoever refuses to recant, let him be burnt alive." But also Protestant
governments, princes, and magistrates took part more or less zealously
in the work of extermination recommended in the interests of the empire.
Only the Landgrave Philip of Hesse and the magistrates of Strassburg
kept at least their hands clean from blood, although they also by im-
prisoning and banishing did their best to prevent the spread of this
heresy in their domains.
5. The Moravian Anabaptists, — Balthazar Hubmeier, banished, in a.d.
1526, from Ziirich, had found in Nikolsburg in Moravia a place of refuge.
Under the powerful and far-reaching protection of the lords of Liechten-
stein, which he obtained for his gospel, Moravia became " a delightsome
land," and Nikolsburg a " New Jerusalem " to the sorely oppressed
Anabaptists, who had been hunted like wild beasts and made homeless
wanderers. And there they remained, notwithstanding severe hostile
attacks, from which they repeatedly suffered, especially between the years
1536 and 1554. This was followed by " the good time," from a.d. 1554
to 1565, and from a.d. 1565 to 1592 by " the golden age " of the com-
munity, now consisting of 15,000 brethren. With a.d. 1592 began again
"the times of tribulation," until their church, as well as Protestantism
generally throughout the country, received its deathblow. According to
their numerous " chronicles " and " memoirs," describing to their pos-
terity the fortunes of the community, dating from a.d. 1524, the number
of Anabaptists put to death up to a.d. 1581 in Switzerland, South
Germany, and throughout the Austrian States was 2,419. Hubmeier
had already, by the end of a.d. 1527, after Moravia had come under
Austrian rule, been made prisoner in Vienna, along with his wife ;~ and
there, in the spring of a.d. 1528, he went to the stake with the heroic spirit
§ 147. ANABAPTISM. 399
of a martyr. Three days later bis wife, showing the same bold contempt
for death, was drowned in the Danube. In a.d. 1531 James Huter, from the
Tyrol, stood at the head of the Moravian Anabaptists. Owing to the per-
secution which from a.d. 1529 raged there against his companions in the
faith, he migrated thence with 150 brethren. He succeeded in compos-
ing the many splits and quarrels which had broken out in consequence
of these migrations among the various sorts of Anabaptists from Silesia,
Bavaria, Swabia, and the Palatinate, and managed to organize them in
one united body with the earlier settlers. His reputation and influence
were consequently so great that the community took the name from him
of the "Huterian Brethren." During the persecution which was directed
against them in a.d. 1535 he fled to the Tyrol, but was there taken
prisoner and burnt in March, 1536. — The Moravian Anabaptists, who
had been with perfect propriety designated " the quiet of the land,'" were
characterized by exemplary piety, strict discipline, moral earnestness,
industrial diligence, conscientious obedience to the laws, unexampled
patience and gentleness amid all sufferings, but, above all, by the as-
tonishing courage of their martyrs and fortitude under torture. In
regard to doctrine, with the exception of a few "false brethren " affected
with Socinian views, tbey unanimously and from the first acknowledged
their adherence to the oecumenical symbols. Their mode of worship was
of an extremely simple character. As sacraments, i.e. as "symbols of a
holy thincr," they recognised (1) true Christian baptism, i.e. that of grown
up people who professed repentance and faith ; (2) the Lord's Supper as
a festival, in memory of the sufferings and death of Christ, as well as a
thanksgiving for the grace of God thereby enjoyed, and as expression of
the church's faith in it ; (8) Marriage as a symbol of the esj^ousals of
Christ and His church (Eph. v. 23-32) ; and in some fashion (4) the lay-
ing on of the hands of the elders in the ordination of the clergy. Mass,
confirmation, extreme unction, confession, and indulgence, worship of
images, saints, and relics, as well as infant baptism, were utterly rejected
by them. They were equally decided in denying all merit in fasting and
observing the feast days, in repudiating the doctrine of purgatory, and
many of the ceremonies of the Eomish church. They also rejected the
Lutheran and Zwinglian doctrine of justification, which they regarded as
a remnant of antichristian Eomanism. But as the true and only com-
munion of saints they regarded themselves as alone constituting the true
church. At the head of their community stood (1) a bishop ; and (2)
next him the ministers of the Lord, divided into apostles with the mis-
sionary calling for the spread of the church, preachers, and pastors over
particular congregations, and helpers to give assistance to these ; (3)
ministers of benevolence, i.e. dispensers to the poor and administrators
of the possessions of the church ; and (4) the elders, as representatives
of the church in conducting its government. A particularly important
400 CHURCH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
factor for maintaining the union of the scattered communities was the
synodal constitution introduced by Hubmeier. The superintendents of
the smaller circuits met together for consultation weekly, and the depu-
ties from the larger circuits met together once a n^ionth ; while the
general synods, embracing also the brethren beyond the bounds of
Moravia, were convened for purposes of administration once a year, when
that was possible. — Continuation, § 162, 2.
6. The Venetian Anabaptists. — Down to the year 1540 the evangelical
reform movement in Italy (§ 139, 22-24) had an essentially Lutheran
orthodox character. But after that an Anabaptist current set in, coming
probably from Switzerland, and communicated through Italian refugees
residing there, which subsequently took the direction of a unitarian
rationalistic movement. Its main centre was in the domain of Venice,
and its most zealous promoter an Italian, an exile from home on account
of his faith, Tiziano, who, with no fixed place of abode, resided sometimes
on this side, sometimes on the other side of the Alps. Fuller knowledge
of him we owe to the confessions of one of his scholars, Manelfi, recently
discovered in the Venetian archives, which he wrote out voluntarily and
penitently before the Inquisition, first at Bologna and then at Rome, in
Oct. and Nov., 1551. Don Pietro Manelfi, priest at San Vito, was led, in
A D. 1540 or 1541, by the preaching of a Capuchin, Jerome Spinazola, to
the conclusion that the Romish church is contrary to Holy Scripture, and
is a human, yea, a devilish invention. This same priest also introduced
him to Bernardino Ochino (§ 139, 24), who furnished him with several
writings of Luther and Melanchthon, and taught him that the pope is
antichrist and the mass satanic idolatry. Called by the " Lutherans "
of Padua, he now for two years travelled through all northern Italy and
Istria as Lutheran " minister of the word." Then in Florence he made
the acquaintance of Tiziano, and after long resistance yielded at last to
be baptized by him. During a conversation which, in a.d. 1549, Tiziano
had with him and several other friends at Vincenza, the question was
raised, over Deuteronomy xviii. 18, whether Christ is God or man. It was
agreed in order to decide the matter to summon an Anabaptist council, to
meet at Vienna in Sept., 1550. There were somewhere about sixty depu-
ties who responded, of whom between twenty and thirty were from Swit-
zerland, mostly Italian refugees, who at the fortieth session of their secret
conclave, " after prayer, fasting, and reading of Scripture," laid down the
following doctrinal propositions as binding upon all their congregations :
"Christ is not God, but man, yet a man full of Divine power, son of
Joseph and Mary, who after him bore also other sons and daughters :
There are neither angels nor devil in the proper sense ; but when in Holy
Scripture angels appear, they are men sent by God for special purposes,
and where the devil is spoken of the fleshly mind of man is meant : There
is no other hell than the grave, in which the elect sleep in the Lord till
§ 147. ANABAPTIST. 401
they shall be awaked at the last day ; while the souls of the ungodly, as
well as their bodies, like those of the beasts, perish in death : To the
human seed God has given the capacity of begetting the spirit as well as
the body : The elect will be justified only by God's mercy and love, with-
out the merits, the blood, and the death of Christ : Christ's death serves
merely as a witness to the righteousness, i.e. " the mercy and love " of
God. On their specifically Anabaptist doctrine, because not the subject
of controversy, there was no deliverance. The denial of the supernatural
birth of Christ, however, led to a limitation of the fundamental doctrine
of the absolute authority of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament
by the exclusion of the first chapters of the gospels of Matthew and Luke,
which it was now affirmed had been forged by Jerome at the command of
Pope Damasus. The decrees of the council were adopted by all the com-
munities, with the exception of that of Citadella, which in consequence
was cast out of the union. Manelfi, elected bishop, travelled in this
capacity during a whole year among the churches assigned to him,
always accompanied by a brother. Then he became penitent, and cast
himself upon the grace of the papal Inquisition. His confessions, espe-
cially as bearing on the names and whereabouts of his former companions,
Lutherans as well as Anabaptists, were sent from Rome to the Venetian
tribunal of the Inquisition, which now began its work of persecution and
vengeance with such zeal and success, that after some decades every
trace of Lutheranism and Anabaptism was rooted out. Many escaped
imprisonment by opportune flight ; many also failed in courage, and
retracted ; but the steadfast confessors were burnt or drowned in
great numbers. Meanwhile this fiery tribulation had proved in most of
the communities a purifying fire. The radical heretic tendency that had
prevailed since the council gave place by degrees to the more moderate
views of earlier days. This change was greatly furthered by the close
intimacy existing between the Italian Anabaptists and the Moravian
Brethren from about the middle of a.d. 1550. The credit of having
effected this alliance, and securing its benefits to their fellow country-
men, belongs especially to two noble-minded men, Francesco della Saga,
formerly a student of Rovigo, and Giulio Gherardi, formerly subdeacon
at Rome. But the latter, in a.d. 1561, the former a year later, fell into
the hands of the Venetian Inquisition. After all attemj)ts at conver-
sion proved in vain, both were thrown by night into the Venice canal,
Gherardi in a.d. 1562, and Saga in a.d. 1565.
7. The older Apostles of Anabaptism in the North-West of Germany. — In
the north-west no less than in the south and east, from the lower Rhine
as far as Friesland and Holstein, in Jiilich, Cleves, Berg, in Hesse, West-
phalia, and Lower Saxony, as well as in Holland and Brabant, where the
Reformation had begun to gain some footing, Anabaptism also secured
an entrance and some success. Among their older apostles labouring
26
402 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
in these regions the most distinguished were Hoffmann and Ring. —
(1) Melchior Hoffmann, a currier from Swabia, had even in his early home
taken part in the religious movements of the age, and in a.d. 1524, in
the prosecution of his handicraft, went to Livonia, and became the
herald of these views in Wolmar, Dorpat, and Reval. When his followers
in Dorpat broke down the images and attacked the monasteries, he was
obliged to flee, and carried on his operations for some time in Stockholm
(§ 159, 1). Expelled by-and-by from that city, he next made his appear-
ance in Wittenberg. Luther took offence at his prophetic-apocalyptic
fanaticism, and pointed him to his handicraft as his legitimate calling.
He now went to Holstein, where King Frederick of Denmark afforded
him a fixed residence at Kiel, with permission to preach throughout the
whole land. By contesting the Lutheran doctrine of the Lord's Supper,
and representing the sacrament as of merely symbolical import, and
the partaking as purely spiritual, he caused offence even here, and was,
after a public disputation with Bugenhagen at Flensburg in a.d. 1529,
driven out of the country. He sought refuge in Strassburg, where Bucer
received him with open arms. There for the first time, under the in-
fluence of the Swiss Anabaptists, was full and clear expression given to
those objections to infant baptism which long before had been cherished
iu his heart. He had himself baptized, and became from this time forth
the most zealous apostle of Anabaptism throughout all North Germany.
In this capacity he wrought unweariedly and successfully, issuing forth
from Emden in East Friesland, where he had settled in a.d. 1529, and by
his travels, preaching, and writings spread his doctrines far and wide.
Besides his heterodox doctrine of the sacraments and his apocalyptic-
fanaticism, which led him to proclaim that the second coming of Christ
would take place within seven years, and ultimately to announce that he
himself was the prophet Elias foretold in Malachi iv. 5, 6 as its fore-
runner, he brought forward his theory about the incarnation of Christ,
according to which the eternal Word did not assume from Mary flesh and
blood, but Himself became flesh and passed through Mary, simply "as the
sun shines through glass," because otherwise not Christ's but Mary's
flesh would have suffered for us. In other respects he utterly rejected
the wild, fantastic notions of the Anabaptists which were some years later
developed in Miinster. In his own life he was thoughtful, pure, and
strictly moral, in disposition mild, benevolent, and charitable. In a.d.
1533 we find him again at Strassburg, where his fanatical-prophetical
preaching soon produced such dangerous results that the magistrates
felt obliged to shut him up under bolts and bars, where he could be out
of the way of doing mischief. He was still in prison in a.d. 1543, and
from that time onward nothing more is known of him. But a sect of
^lelchiorites, by no means few in number, held their ground for a
long time in Alsace and Lower Germany. —(2) According to other accounts
§ 147. ANABAPTISM. 403
MelcMor Ring, a currier of Swabia, is represented as having wrought
during the same period and throughout the same places in Sweden, Livo-
nia, Holstein, and East Friesland, entertaining similar christological,
prophetico-apocalyptic, and Anabaptist views. The identity of the Chris-
tian name, fatherland, handicraft, doctrinal tenets, date, and spheres of
labour is so striking, that one is almost tempted to identify him with
Melchior Hoffmann, especially as John of Leyden in his later examina-
tion is said to have affirmed that Melchior Hoffmann had actually
borne the name of Ring. We feel compelled, however, to maintain the
distinctness of their pei'sonalities, since, according to Hochbuth's re-
searches in the history of the Anaba.ptists in the Hessian state, Ring
had been actively engaged in Hesse at a time during which it can be
proved that Hoffmann was at work elsewhere.
8. So far in respect of place and time as the influence of Hoffmann
reached, — and it seems down to the time of his imprisonment to have
been widely predominant throughout the whole of the north-western dis-
trict,— the life and movement of the Anabaptists there kept clear of any
social revolutionary tendencies, and in their aberrations from the ways
of the reformers were restricted to the purely religious domain. In the
beginning of the year 1530, however, a movement broke forth again in
Holland, in which there was a resurrection of the spirit of Thomas
Miinzer, and the demand for a thoroughly radical and revolutionary re-
construction of social and political relations was brought into prominence.
The most important representative of this tendency was a baker, Jan
Matthys of Haarlem, who, claiming to be a prophet, proclaimed the in-
troduction of the millennium of glory as the proper and principal task
of the Baptists. For the fulfilment of this task he insisted upon the
overthrow of the present order in church and State, resistauce to their
enemies with weapons in hand, even the destruction of all " the un-
godly " from the face of the earth, in order that " the saints," as pro-
mised in Scripture, should rule over the world, and lead to completion the
kingdom of God. The doctrine of the new prophets may even already
have taken root in the minds of the Baptists, roused and excited by con-
tinued persecution, without their having clearly perceived what it would
ultimately lead to if successfully carried out. But when in Miinster
these fanatical theories were shown forth as actual reahzed facts, when
John of Leyden set up his pretentious kingdom in that '* New Jeru-
salem," and sent out into all the world his numerous apostles with the
demand for adhesion, in many cases they found a too willing audience.
The miserable collapse of the Miinster kingdom was the first thing that
again called people back to their senses, and rendered their remnants
susceptible to the purification of Anabaptism to which Menno Simons
devoted his whole life.
9. The Miiuster Catastrophe, A.D. 1534, 1535.— The preacher Rothmann
404 CHURCH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
of Miinster had for some time maintained the Zwinglian theory of the
Lord's Supper, and then he took a further sten in the repudiation of
infant baptism. A pubHc disputation in a.d. 153. yielded no result, and
he refused to obey an order to retire into exile. He now sought, and
that successfully, to increase his following, by the adoption of new
elements of the Anabaptist creed. On ine festival of the Three Holy
Kings in a.d. 1534, John of Leyden or John Bockelssohn made his
entrance into the city. An illegitimate son of a girl in the Miinster
province, brought up by relaiiv/s in Leyden, whither he returned after
several years spent in travelling about as a journeyman tailor, he was
in the autumn of a.d. 1533 converted by the prophet Matthys, and soon
became his mo?t zealous apostle. In Miinster the young man, now in
his twenty-fifth year, handsome in appearance and endowed with rich
intellectual abilities, was favourably received in the house of a rich and
respectable cl^th merchant, Bernard Knipperdolling, who had been long
interested in the religious movement, and married his daughter. In the
meantime Jan Matthys also was called from Amsterdam to Miinster,
Both now wrought in common among the inhabitants of the city. Their
sermons, delivered with glowing eloquence, produced a great impression,
especially among the women, and their following grew to such an extent
that they believed they might act in defiance of the council. In conse-
quence of a riot the magistrates were weak and yielding enough to enter
into an agreement Avith them by which they obtained legal recognition.
Then from all sides Anabaptist fanatics crowded into Miinster. After
some weeks they secured a majority in the council, and Knipperdolling
was made burgomaster. The prophet Matthys declared it to be God's
will that all unbelievers should be expelled. This was done on 27th
February, 1534. Seven deacons divid'ed among the believers the property
of those who had been banished. In May the bishop began the siege of
the city. This much at least resulted from that proceeding, that the
epidemic was confined to Miinster. After all images, organs, and books,
with the exception of the Bible, had been destroyed, they introduced
the principle of community of goods. Matthys, who regarded himself
as called to slay the besieging foes, in a sortie fell by their swords.
Bockelssohn took his place. The council in consequence of his revela-
tions was dissolved, and a theocratical government of twelve elders, who
were ready to receive their inspiration from the new prophet, was set up.
In order that he might marry Matthys' beautiful widow, he introduced
polygamy. He took seventeen wives ; Eothmann satisfied himself with
four. In vain did the remnants of moral consciousness existing still
among the inhabitants protest. The discontented, who gathered round
the smith Mollenhok, were overcome and all of them were put to death.
Bockelssohn, proclaimed by one of his fellow prophets, John Dusend-
schur, king of the whole earth, set up a splendid court, and perpetrated
§ 147. ANABAPTISM. 405
the most revolting iniquities. He regarded himself as called to bring in
the millennium, sent o'l', twenty-eight apostles to spread his kingdom, and
appointed twelve dukes to govern the world under him. The besiegers
had meanwhile, in August, 1534, made an utterly unsuccessful attempt to
storm the city. Had they no'- toward the end of the year received assist-
ance from Treves, CJeves, Mai iz, and Cologne, they would have been
obliged to raise the siege. F ven then they could only think of securing
the surrender of the city by famine. It had already been reduced to sore
straits. But on St. John's night, 1535, i deserter led the soldiers to the
wall. After a most determined struggle the Anabaptists were utterly
overthrown. Kothmann rushed into the hottest of the battle, and there
met his death. King John and his premier Knipperdolling and his chan-
cellor Kr editing were taken prisoners, and on 22ud January, 1536, were
pinched to death with redhot pincers and then hung in iron chains from
St. Lambert's tower. Catholicism was finally restored t absolute and
exclusive supremacy.
10. Menno Simons and the Mennonites. — Menno Simons, born at Witt-
marsum in Friesland in a.d. 1-492, from a.d. 1516 a Catholic jiriest,
had from careful study of Holy Scripture come to entertain, serious
doubts as to the Eomish doctrine. The martyr courage of the Baptists
called his attention to the Baptist views of this sect, and soon he came
to feel convinced of their correctness. He resigned his priest's office at
Wittmarsum in a.d. 1536, and had himself baptized. Amid indescribable
difficulties and with unwearied patience he laboured on, wandering from
place to place, devoting all his powers to the reorganization of the sect.
He gave it a definite doctrinal formula, " The Fundamental Book of the
True Christian Faith," in a.d. 1539, which in point of doctrine attached
itself to the Keformed confessions, and was distinguished from these only
by the rejection of infant baptism, and by an unconditional spiritualiza-
tion of the idea of the church as a pure communion of true saints. It
distinctly forbade mihtary and civil service, as well as all taking of oaths,
introduced feet washing in addition to baptism and the Lord's Supper,
and by severe church discipline maintained a simple manner of life and
strict morality. The quiet, pious demeanour of the Mennonites soon
secured for them in Holland, and later also in Germany, toleration and
religious freedom. Menno died in a.d. 1559. — Even during Menno's life-
time his Dutch followers split up into two parties, called " the Fine "
and " the Coarse." The former enforced in all its severity Menno's
strict discipline, and indeed went beyond it by prohibiting all intercourse
with the excommunicated, even should these be parents or husbands
and wives. The latter wished to allow to the ban only ecclesiastical
and not civil disabilities, and to have it exercised only after repeated
exhortations had proved ineffectual. — Continuation, § 162, 1.
406 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
§ 148. Antitrinitarians and Unitarians.^
The first to contest the doctrine of the Trinity arose from
among the German Anabaptists. The Spaniard Michael
Servetns wrought out his Unitarianism into connection with
a system that was fundamentally pantheistic. The real
home of Antitrinitarianism, however, was Italy, a fruit of
the half-pagan humanism that flourished there. Banished
the countr}^, its representatives sought refuge in Switzer-
land. Expelled by-and-by from these regions, they betook
themselves mostly to Poland, Hungary, and Transylvania,
where they found protection from the princes and nobles.
A thoroughly developed system of doctrine, elaborated by
Lselius and Faustus Socinus, uncle and nephew, was now
accepted by them, and by this means they were consolidated
into a corporate society.
1. Anal)apti8t Antitrinitarians in Germany. — (1) John Denck from the
Upper Palatinate, was, on fficolampadius' recommendation, whose lec-
tures he had attended at Basel, made rector of St. Sebald's school in
Nuremberg in a.i>, 1523. On account of his maintaining views incon-
sistent with Lutheran orthodoxy, he came into collision with the re-
former of that place, Andrew Osiander, in a.d. 1524, and on the ground
of a written confession of faith extorted from him he was deposed
from his office and expelled the city. Nor did he find a permanent
abode in Augsburg, to which he went in a.d. 1525 ; for Urbanus lihegius,
who at first received him in a friendly manner, was obliged at last to turn
against him on account of his Anabaptist views and the great scandal
he caused by maintaining the belief that the devil and all the ungodly
would finally repent. He now, in a.d. 1526, went to Strassburg, where
Hatzer induced him, as a zealous student of Hebrew, to assist him in
his translation of the Old Testament prophets. When here also his
influence assumed dangerous proportions, a disputation was arranged
for between him and Bucer, in consequence of which he was expelled also
from Strassburg. Like treatment awaited him at Bergzahern and also
1 Wallace, " Antitrinitarian Biography." 3 vols. London, 1850.
Dorner, " Hist. Dev. of Doctr. of Person of Christ." Bitschl, "Hist, of
CLr. Doctr. of Justification," p. 289.
§ 148. ANTITRINITARIANS AND UNITARIANS. 407
at Landau. He then went to Worms along with Hiitzer, who had mean-
while been banished from Strassburg. There they completed their trans-
lation of the prophets, but from this retreat also after three months they
were again driven out. Denck now once again, through fficolampadius'
mediation, who unweariedly endeavoured, but in vain, to win him- back
from his errors, found a fixed abode among the more liberal-minded
citizens of Basel ; but he died there of the plague in a.d. 1527. Denck
was indeed one of the most talented men of his day. His high intel-
lectual endowments and his pure and noble moral life were acknowledged
by his most bitterly prejudiced orthodox opponents. Of his numerous
tracts and pamphlets only that "On the Law of God, how the Law
Abolished and yet must be Fulfilled," is still accurately known. It is rich
in deep thoughts cleverly put, as is also the confession of faith already
mentioned, but in direct antagonism to the Lutheran doctrine on several
most vital and cardinal points. He placed the inner word of God above
the outward, taught that man had a natural inclination toward good,
attached a fundamental importance to the fulfilling of the moral law
for the attainment of salvation, gave the person of Christ only the sig-
nificance of a pattern and exhibition of the Divine love, resolved the
doctrine of the Trinity into pantheistic speculative ideas, and by his
rejection of infant baptism became the acknowledged head of the whole
German Anabaptist movement of his age, so that Bucer could desig-
nate him "the pope of the Baptists." — (2) Louis Hatzer, from Bischop-
zell in Thurgau, was priest at Wadenschwyl, on the Ziirich lake. At
first an enthusiastic follower of Zwingli and his fellow labourer, he
soon transcended the Zwinglian reforming tendencies, and with fanatical
radicalism launched out into fierce iconoclasm, and attached himself
to the Anabaptists, residing partly in Switzerland, in Ziirich, Basel, St.
Gall, etc., partly in Germany, in Augsburg, Strassburg, Worms, etc., but
soon driven out of every place, and meanwhile leading a wandering, un-
stable life, until at last, in a.d. 1529, he was beheaded at Constance as a
bigamist and adulterer. From Denck, who far excelled him in origi-
nality and depth of thought, he derived his peculiar views. Among his
literary productions only his German translation of the Old Testament
prophets, which he produced in conjunction with Denck, is of any impor-
tance. It was published at Worms in a.d. 1527, two years before the
Ziirich version, and five years before that of Luther, and passed through
several editions until it was displaced by Luther's. He also holds no
mean position as a composer of spiritual songs. — (3) John Campanus of
Jiilich was expelled from Cologne, where he had studied, and went to
Wittenburg, as tutor to some young noblemen, in a.d. 1528. He accom-
panied the reformers to Marburg, where he sought to unite different
parties by explaining " This is My body" to mean the body created by Me.
But when he began to spread Anabaptist and Arian views in Wittenberg,
408 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
and to calumniate the reformers by speech and writing, he was obliged,
in A.D. 1532, to quit Saxony. He now returned to Jiilich, but after
labouring there for a considerable time, he was arrested on a charge of
preaching revolutionary and chiliastic sermons, and died in prison after
twenty years' confinement at Cleves about a.d. 1578. His Arian-
trinitarian doctrine of God was just as peculiar as his doctrine of the
supper. He would acknowledge in the Godhead only two Persons, just
as its type marriage is a union of only two persons. He regarded the
Holy Spirit, on the one hand, as the Divine nature common to both, and,
on the other hand, as the operation of these upon man. — (4) David Joris,,
a painter on glass in Delft, received his first impulse from Luther's
writings about a.d. 1524, but soon plunged into wild excesses of icono-
clasm and anabaptism. After the overthrow of the short-lived rule of
the Mlinster fanatics (§ 133, 6), he travelled up and down through the
whole of Germany, in order to gather together the scattered remnants
of the Anabaptists, and to proclaim his revelations. He was not to be
deterred or terrified by imprisonment, scourging, or banishment. At last
he was pronounced an outlaw, and a price was set upon his head. He
went now, in a.d. 1544, to Basel, and lived there under the assumed name
of John of Bruges, outwardly professing attachment to the Keformed
church, but in secret, by the diligent circulation of letters and treatises,
working for his own ends, till his death in a.d. 1556. When afterwards
his true name was discovered, the authorities had his bones dug up and
burnt by the public hangman. In theory and practice an antinomian,
he taught in his fantastic production, " T'Wonderboek " of a.d. 1542,
on the ground of the most naked naturalism, how the perfection of the
spiritual life and the true reconciliation of all things must be brought
about. He conceived of the Trinity as the self-revelation of God in
three different ways. That of the Holy Spirit came to pass with him-
self ; the end and aim of that dispensation he represented as consisting
in the gathering together of the people of God, i.e. all Anabaptists,
who were to take possession of the whole earth, as before Israel had of
the land of Canaan.
2. Michael Servetus was born in a.d. 1509 at Villanueva in Arragon.
He was a man of rich speculative ability, wide knowledge of science, and
restless, inquiring spirit. At Toulouse he devoted himself first of all to
the study of law, but soon after turned his attention with great eager-
ness to theological questions. He became convinced that the funda-
mental Christian doctrine of the Trinity in its accepted ecclesiastical
form is equally opposed to Scripture and to reason, and that in this
quarter pre-eminently a reformation was needed. At a later period in
Paris he gave himself to the study of medicine, and is reputed the first
discoverer of the circulation of the blood, and secured for himself an
eminent rank as a practical physician and a writer on medical subjects.
§ 148. ANTITRINITAEIANS AND UNITARIANS. 409
He began his polemic against the prevaihng doctrine of the Church at
Strassburg in a.d. 1531 with the treatise De Trinitatis eiroribus, II. vii.
Next in order appeared at Hagenau, in a.d. 1532, his palliating and to
some extent retractation al Dialogorum de Trin., II. ii. In a.d. 1553 he
issued anonymously at Vienna his radical and revolutionary principal
work, Christianismi Restitutio, which was the means of bringing him to the
stake. As he succeeded in escaping from his prison io Vienne they were
able there only to burn him in effigie ; but at Geneva he was, at Calvin's
instigation, arrested again, and on his refusing to make a recantation was
sent to the stake on 27th Oct., a.d. 1553. The last words heard from the
dying man in the flames were, "Jesus, Thou Son of the eternal God,
have mercy upon me." — The reformatory aim of Servetus in his doctrinal
system was to raise God as high as possible above the creature. In its
very earliest form it was fundamentally pantheistic, yet even here God is
thought of as the original substance, and everything existing outside of
Him is conceived of as conditioned by a substantial emanation from His
being. Those pantheistic principles, however, make their appearance in a
much more decided form in the later and more complete developments
of his system which are completely dominated by Neoplatonic specula-
tions. In particular he regards the Logos as an emanation of the Divine
element of light, which first came into possession of personal existence
in the incarnation of Christ. The gross matter of His corporeity He
received from His mother ; the place of the male seed was taken by the
Divine element of light. In both respects he is bfioovaios, for even the
earthly matter is only a grosser form of the primal light. Son and Spirit
are only different dispositiones Dei, the Father alone is tola substantia
et unus Deus. And as the Trinity makes its aj)pearance in connection
with the redemption of the world, it will disappear again when that
redemption has been completed. The polemic of Servetus, however,
extended beyond the doctrine of the Trinity to an attack upon the church
doctrine of original sin, and the repudiation of infant baptism. He also
set forth a spiritualistic theory of the Lord's Supper, contended against
the Lutheran doctrine of justification and the Calvinistic doctrine of
predestination, sketched out a scheme of chiliastic expectations, etc.
Amid all these vagaries he maintained his high estimate of Christ as
the Logos, become Son of God by the incarnation, and the centre and
end of all history ; he also continued to reverence Holy Scripture as
IP^t which from its first book to its last testifies of Christ. His mys-
tical piety, too, was deep and sincere. But owing to the immoderate
violence with which he denounced views opposed to his own as doc-
trines of devils, among other reproachful terms applying to the church
doctrine of the Trinity the name of " triceps Cerberus,'' the three-
headed dog of hell, his contemporaries were prevented from getting
even a glimpse of the bright side of his life and endeavours, so that all
410 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
the most notable theologians voted for Lis death as salutary and neces-
sary (§ 145, l).i
3. Italian and other Antitrinitarians before Socinus.— Claudius of Savoy
in A.D. 1534, at Bern, brought forward the idea tbat Christ is to be called
God only because the fulness of the Divine Spirit has been communicated
to Him. He was on this account expelled from that city, and soon after
even from Basel, and was very coldly received at Wittenberg. He
retracted before a synod at Lausanne in a.d. 1537, afterwards played the
part of a popular agitator at Augsburg, and was regarded in Memmingen
down to A.D. 1550 as a prophet. After that no further trace of him is
found. — Closely connected with the previously named Tiziano, by bonds
of friendship and of spiritual affinity, and subsequently also with Laelius
Socinus, was the Sicilian exile from his native land, Camillo Renato. In
A.D. 1545 he obtained at Chiavennain Veltlin, which then belonged to the
country of the Grisons, a situation as a private tutor, and soon became
highly respected. He by-and-by, however, involved himself in a violent
controversy with the evangelical pastor there, Agostino Mainardo, about
the sacraments, which led to his being excommunicated by the Grison
synod in a.d. 1550. The central point in his theology is the doctrine of
predestination. Duly the elect are by God's Spirit awakened into life,
and while the children of the Spirit only slumber in death, and in the
resurrection assume a renewed, purely spiritual form of being, the soul
of the non-elect die just like their bodies. Although a decided opponent
of infant baptism, he did not go so far as to insist upon rebaptism,
because he depreciated baptism generally as a mere outward sign, and
therefore not necessary. And although he carefully avoided any express
repudiation of the doctrine of the Trinity, it can scarcely be doubted that
he and all his friends and followers favoured antitrinitarian views. —
Matthew Gribaldo, a jurist of Padua, the physician George Blandrata
of Saluzzo in Piedmont, and Valentine Gentilis of Calabria, fugitives
from their native lands, took up a position of hostility to Calvin in
Geneva after Servetus' death. When Calvin proposed to have them
brought before a legal tribunal Gribaldo and Blandrata retired from
^ The sketch of Servetus given above is based upon the one-sided and
wholesale eulogies of his resolute apologist Tollin. A thoroughly
impartial and objective statement of his doctrinal system is given by
Dorner, " History of Prot. Theology," vol. i., pp. 189-191. Principal
Cunningham, in a very thorough manner, examines the grounds upon
which his enemies seek to fix upon Calvin the odium of Servetus' death
in " Reformers and Theology of Reformation," Essay VI., pp. 314-333.
RilHet, " Calvin and Servetus," trans, by Dr. Tweedie. Edinburgh, 1846.
Drummond, " Life of Servetus." London, 1848. Willis, " Servetus and
Calvin." London, 1876.
§ 148. ANTITRINITARIANS AND UNITAEIANS. 411
Geneva aud went to Poland. Only Gentilis remained, and he subscribed
a confession of faith which Calvin laid before him, but soon declared
that he could not continue to hold by it, and set forth as consistent with
Scripture doctrine the opinion that the Father as Essentiator is not a
person in the Godhead, but the whole substance of the Godhead, and that
the Son as Essentiatus proceeding from Him, is only the perfect reflex
and highest image of the one deity of the Father. Having been cast
into prison and condemned to death he retracted once again, and then
withdrew also to Poland. Subsequently, however, he returned to Switzer-
land, was arrested at Bern, and beheaded as an apostate in a.d. 1566.^
Blandrata had meanwhile betaken himself to Transylvania, was there
appointed physician to the prince, secure! the interest of Zapolya II.
and many of the nobles for his Unitarianism, so that public recognition
was given to it as a fourth confessional form of religion. According to
the doctrine set forth by him worship is rendered to Jesus as the man
endowed by God with grace beyond all others and raised to universal
dominion. But in a.d. 1588 he was murdered by his own nephew, who
had remained a Catholic, as he had not patience to wait for his death in
order to secure possession of his property. Besides Blandrata we may
also mention as one of the chief founders of the Unitarian sect in Tran-
sylvania Franz Davidis of Clausenburg. From a.d. 1552 Lutheran pastor,
he became a Calvinist in a.d. 1564, and was made a Reformed superinten-
dent, and, at Blandrata's recommendation, Zapolya's court preacher. He
then openly attached himself by word and writing to the Unitarians, and
became, in a.d. 1571, first Unitarian superintendent of Transylvania. On
account of his opposing the doctrine of the supernatural conception of
Christ and His right to be worshipped, he was repudiated by Blandrata,
and was, in a.d. 1579, condemned by Prince Christopher Bathori, as a
blasphemer and enemy of Christ, to imprisonment for life. After three
months he died in prison.— The Italian Antitrinitarians who had fled
to Poland attached themselves there to the Reformed church, and secured
many followers not only among the nobles, but also among the Reformed
clergy. At their head in Cracow stood the pastor Gregor Pauli, and
in Princzov George Schomann. At the Synod of Patrikaw, in a.d. 1562,
they first appeared as a close phalanx, making a regular attempt to
have the doctrine of the Trinity set aside. Their attack, however, was
repelled. A royal edict of a.d. 1561 enacted that all Italian Antitrini-
tarians should be banished, and a second synod at Patrikaw, in a.d.
1565, excommunicated all their followers. A final endeavour to arrive
at a mutual understanding by means of yet another religious conference,
while a diet was summoned in connection with this matter at Patrikaw,
1 Aretius, " History of Val. Gentilis, the Tritheist, put to Death at
Bern." London, 1696.
412 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
led to no successful result. From this time forth the Polish Anti-
trinitarians, who have generally been called Arians, occupy a distinct
jDosition as a separate religious denomination. — In the Reformed church
of the Palatinate, too, this Unitarian movement ended in an equally
tragical scene. The pastor Adam Neuser and the Reformed inspector John
Sylvanus took their place about a.d, 1570 along with the Transylvanian
Unitarians. During an investigation into their doctrinal views, a manu-
script written out by Sylvanus in his own hand was found: "A Con-
fessional Statement against the Tripersonal Idol and the Two Natures
of Christ." He was beheaded in a.d. 1572 in the market-place of Heidel-
berg. Neuser fled to Transylvania, and at a subsequent period went over
to Mohammedanism. — Out of the Italian infidelity of this age j^robably
also arose that reneNval of an idea that had already appeared duriug the
Middle Ages (§ 96, 19) in the book De tribus impostoribus, Moses, Jesus,
Mohammed. Of a similar tendency is the Colloquium Heptaplomeres of
the French jurist Jean Bodin (§ 117, 4), who died in a.d. 1597. He
was one of seven freethinking Venetian scholars who carried on a
discussion upon religion, in which he maintained that deficiencies and
mistakes are inherent in the same degree in all positive religions. But
an ideal deism is commended as the true religion.
4. The Two Socini and the Socinians. — Lselius Socinus, member of a
celebrated family of lawyers in Siena, and himself a lawyer, became
convinced at an early period that the Romish system of doctrine was
not in accordance with Scripture. In order to reach an assured and
certain knowledge of the truth, he learnt the original languages in which
Scripture was written, by travelling made the acquaintance of the most
celebrated theologians in Switzerland, Germany, and Poland, and
wrought out for himself a complete and consistent theory of Unitarian
belief. He died in Ziirich in a.d. 1562 in his thirty-seventh year. His
nei^hew, Faustus Socinus, born at Siena in a.d. 1539, was from his early
days trained by personal intercourse and epistolary correspondence with
his uncle, and adopted similar views. He was obliged in a.d. 1559 to
make his escape to Lyons, but returned in a.d. 1582 to Italy, where for
twelve years he was loaded with honours and offices at the court of the
Grand-duke Francis de Medici. In order that he might carry on his
studies undisturbed, he retired in a.d. 1574 to Basel, from whence in a.d.
1578, at Blandrata's request, he proceeded to Transylvania to combat
Davidis' refusal of adoration to Christ. In the following year he went to
Poland in order to unite, if possible, the various sections of the Unitarians
in that country. At Cracow they insisted that he should allow them to
rebaptize him, and when he firmly refused they declined to admit him to
the communion table. But tbe decision of his character, his unwearied
endeavours to secure peace and union, as well as the superiority of his
^heological scholarship, in the end won for his ideas a complete victory
§ 148. ANTITEINITAEIANS AND UNITAEIAXS. 413
over the opposing party strifes. He" succeeded gradually in expelling
from the ranks of the Polish Antitriuitarians non-adorationism as well
as Anabaptism, and all their ethical, social, and chiliastic outgrowths,
and finally at the Synod of Eacau, in a.d. 1603, he secured recognition
for his own theological views as he had developed them in disputa-
tions and in writings. Persecutions and ill-treatment on the part of the
Catholics were not wanting ; as, e.g., in a.d. 1594 by the Catholic sol-
diers, and in a.d. 1598 by the Catholic students at Cracow, who dragged
him from a sick-bed on Ascension Day, drew him half naked through
the city, beat him till the blood flowed, and would have drowned him
had not a Catholic professor dehvered him out of their hands. He
died in a.d. 1604.— The chief symbol of the Socinian denomination is
the Eacovian Catechism, pubhshed in the Polish language in a.d. 1605.
Socinus himself, in company with several others, compiled it, mainly
from an earlier short treatise, Relig. christ. brevissima institutio. It
was subsequently translated into Latin and also into German.^ — The
Socinian system of doctrine therein set forth is essentially as follows :
The Scriptures are the only source of knowledge of saving truth, and
as God's word Scripture can contaua nothing that is in contradiction
to reason. But the doctrine of the Trinity contradicts the Bible and
reason ; God is only one Person. Jesus was a mere man, but endowed
with Divine powers for the accomplishment of salvation, and as a
reward for his perfect obedience raised to Divine majesty, entrusted
with authority to judge the living and the dead, so that to him also
Divine homage should be paid. The Holy Spirit is only a power or attri-
bute of God. The image of God in men consisted merely in dominion
over the creatures. Man was by nature mortal, but had he remained
without sin he would by the supernatural operation of God have entered
into eternal life without death. There is no such thing as original sin,
but only hereditary evil and an inherited inclination toward what is bad,
which, however, does not include in it any guilt. The idea of a Divine
foreknowledge of human action is to be rejected, because it would lead
to the acceptance of the idea of an absolute predestination. Eedemption
consists in this, that Christ by life and teaching pointed out the better
way ; and God rewards every one who pursues this better way with the
forgiveness of sins and eternal life. The death of Christ was no atoning
sacrifice, but merely attached a seal to the teaching of Christ and formed
for him a pathway to Divine glory. Conversion must begin by the
exercise of one's own powers, but can be perfected only through the
assistance of the Holy Spirit. The sacraments are only ceremonies,
which may even be dispensed with, though it is more becoming to
1 Toulmin, " Memoirs of the Life, Char., etc., of Faustus Socinus."
London, 1777.
414 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
retain them as old and beautiful customs. The immortality of the pious
Cliristian is conditioned and made possible by the resurrection of
Christ. But the ungodly, along with the devil and his angels, are anni-
hilated ; and because in this their punishment consists, Holy Scripture
designates the annihilation as eternal death and eternal condemnation.
There is no resurrection of the flesh ; the living indeed have their
bodies restored in the resurrection ; but these are not fleshly, but, as Paul
teaches in 1 Corinthians xv., spiritual.' — Continuation, § 163, 1.
IV. The Counter-Reformation.
§ 149. The Internal Strengthening and Revival of
THE Catholic Church.^
The strenuous endeavours put forth by the Eoman Catholic
church to restrict within the narrowest limits possible the
victorious course of the Reformation, and so far as might be
to reconquer lost ground, bulk so largely in its sixteenth
century movement, that we may review that entire era in
its history from the standpoint of the counter-reformation.
This development was carried out, on the one hand, by
means of increased strengthening and revival, and, on the
other hand, by polemics and attack on those without, in this
latter case advanced by missions to the heathen and by violent
persecution and suppression of Protestantism. The Triden-
tine Council, a.d. 1545-1547, a.d. 1551, 1552, a.d. 1562, 1563,
was devoted to the realization of these ends. The curia-
listic side of mediseval scholastic Catholicism was again
presented as the sole representation of the truth, compacted
with iron bands into a rigid system of doctrine, and declared
to be incapable in all time to come of any alteration or
1 Ritschl, " Hist, of Chr. Doctr. of Justification," pp. 298-309. Cun-
ningham, "Historical Theology," chap, xxiii., "The Socinian Contro-
versy," pp. 155-236. Stillingfleet gives an account of the Racovian
Catechism in the preface to his work on " Christ's Satisfaction." 2nd
ed. London, IG97.
" Ranke, " History of the Popes," bk. ii., " Beginnings of a Regenera-
tion of Catholicism."
§ 149. STEENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 415
reform ; while at the same time it set aside or modified many
of the more flagrant abuses. With two long breaks caused
by political considerations, it had completed its w^ork be-
tween 1545 and 15G3 in twenty-five sessions. The first ten
sittings were held a.d. 1545-1547, under Paul III.; the next
six in A.D. 1551 and 1552, under Julius III.; and the last
nine in a.d. 1562, 1563, under Pius IV. — The old and utterly
corrupt monkish orders, which had once formed so powerful
a support to the papacy, had not proved capable of surviving
the shock of the Reformation. In their place there now arose
a new order, that of the Jesuits, which for centuries formed
a buttress to the severely shaken papacy, and hemmed in on
all sides the further advances of the Protestant movement.
Besides this great order there arose a crowd of others, partly
new, partly old ones under reformed constitutions, mostly
of a practical churchly tendency. The strifes and rivalries
that prevailed betw^een the different Protestant sects stirred
up with the Homish Church a new and remarkable activity
in the scientific study of doctrine ; and mysticism flourished
again in Spain, and succeeded in reaching there a consider-
able development.
1. The Popes before the Council.— Leo X. {§ 110, 11) the accomplished,
extravagant, luxurious, and frivolous Medici, was succeeded by one who
was in every respect diametrically opposed to his predecessor, Hadrian
VI., A.D. 1522, 1523, the only pope who for many centuries before down
to the present day retained his own honourable Christian name when
he ascended the throne of St. Peter. Hadrian Dedel, the son of a poor
ship-carpenter of Utrecht, a pious and learned Dominican, had raised
himself to a theological professorshiiD in the University of Louvain, when
Maximilian I. chose him to be tutor to his grandson, who afterwards
became the Emperor Charles V. He was thus put in the way for obtain-
ing the highest offices in the church. He was made Bishop of Tortosa,
grand-inquisitor, cardinal, and viceroy of Spain for Charles during his
absence. When, after Leo's death, neither the imperial candidate Julius
Medici nor any other of the cardinals present in conclave secured the
necessary votes, the imperial commissioner pointed to Hadrian, and so
out of the voting box came the name of a new pope whom no one par-
416 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
ticularly wished. A thoroughly learned, scholastic commentator on the
Lombard, pious and strict in his morals even to rigorism, in his domestic
economy practising peasant-like simplicity, and saving even to the extent
almost of niggardliness ; a zealot for the Thomist system of doctrine, but
holding in abhorrence the Renaissance, with all its glitter of classical
culture, art, and poetry ; mourning bitterly over the worldliness and cor-
ruption of the papacy, as well as over the unfathomable depravity through-
out the church, and firmly resolved to inaugurate a thorough reformation
in the head and members (§ 126, 1), — he seemed in that position and age,
and with those surroundings, a Flemish barbarian, who could not even
understand Italian, and spoke Latin with an accent intolerable to Roman
ears, the greatest anomaly that had ever yet appeared in the history of
the popes. The Roman people hated him with a deadly hatred, and
Pasquino ^ was inexhaustibly fruitful in stinging epigrams and scurrilous
verses on the new pope and his electors. The German reformers were
not inclined to view him with favour ; for he had previously, in his capa-
city as grand-inquisitor, condemned, according to Llorente, between
20,000 and 30,000 men under the Spanish Inquisition, and had more than
1,600 burnt alive. Two attempts were made by the Romans to assassi-
nate him by dagger and by poison, but neither succeeded. He died, how-
ever, after a short pontificate of one and a half years, the last German
and indeed the last non-Italian occupant of the papal throne. But the
Romans wrote on the house door of his physician, " To the deliverer of
the fatherland," and enjoyed themselves, when the corpse of the deceased
pope was laid between those of Pius I. and Pius II., by repeating the
feeble pleasantry, " Impius inter Pios.'' The jubilation in Rome, how-
ever, was extravagant, when by the next conclave a member of the
family of the Medici, the illegitimate son of the murdered JuHus (§ 110,
11), the Cardinal Julius Medici, who had been rejected on the former
occasion, was now proclaimed under the title of Clement VII., A.D. 1523-
1534. Tbe brave Romans did not indeed anticipate that this pope, in
consequence of the shiftiness of his policy and the faithlessness of his
conduct toward the emperor (§ 126, 6), to whose favour and influence
mainly he owed his own elevation, would reduce their city to a con-
dition of wretchedness and depression such as had never been witnessed
since the days of Alaric and Geuseric (§ 132, 2). The position of a pope
like Clement, who regarded himself as called upon, not only as church
prince to set right the ecclesiastical institutions of the age, which in
every department had been thrown into utter confusion by the storms
^ Pasquino was a statue which shortly before had been dug up and
placed on the spot where formerly had stood the booth of a cobbler of
tbat name, dreaded for his pungent wit. It was used for the posting up
of " pasquins " of every sort, especially about the popes and the curia.
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 417
of the German Reformation (§ 126, 2), but also as a temporal prince to
deliver Italy and the States of the church from threatened servitude to
Germany and Spain, no less than from France, was one of peculiar
difficulty, so that even a much more astute politician than Clement
would have found it hardly possible to maintain successfully.
2. The Popes of the Time of the Council.— After Clement VII. the papal
dignity was conferred upon Alexander Farnese, who took the name of
Paul III., A.D. 153J:-lo49, a man of classical culture and extraordinary
cunning. He owed his cardinal's hat, received some forty years before,
to an adulterous intrigue of his sister Julia Orsini with Pope Alex-
ander VI. His entrance upon this ecclesiastical dignity, however, did
not lead him to give up his sensual and immoral course of life, and
after his elevation to the papal chair he practised nepotism after the
example of the Borgias and the Medicis. He was, however, the only
pope, at least for a long time, who seemed to be actually in earnest
about coming to an understanding on doctrinal points with the German
Protestants (§ 139, 23). He at last summoned the oecumenical council, so
long in vain demanded by the emperor, to meet at Mantua on 23rd May,
A.D. 1537 ; but afterwards postponed the opening of it, on account of the
Turkish war, until 1st Nov. of that year, and then again until 1st May,
A.D. 1538. On the latter day it was to meet at Vicenza, and after this
date had elapsed, it was suspended indefinitely. The emperor's con-
tinued insistence upon having a final and properly constituted council
in a German city led him to fix upon Trent, where a council was
summoned to meet on 1st Nov., a.d. 1542, but the troubles that mean-
while arose with France gave a welcome excuse for further postpone-
ment. Persistent pressure on the part of the emperor led to the issuing
of a new rescript by the pope on 15th March, a.d, 1515 ; there was the
usual delay because of the failure to secure a sufficient number of ortho-
dox and competent bishops and delegates ; and thus at last the council
opened at Trent on 13th Dec, A.D. 1545. The skilful management of
the council by the Cardinal-legate del Monte, the statement carefully
prepared beforehand of the distinctly anti-protestant basis upon which
they were to proceed (§ 136, 4), and the well arranged scheme of the
legates to secure its adoption by having the votes reckoned not according
to nations, but by individuals (§ 110, 7), contributed largely during the
earlier sessions to neutralize the conciliatory tendencies of the emperor
as well as to prevent the possibility of Protestants taking any active share
in the proceedings. When the emperor, who had now reached the very
-summit of his power, forbade the promulgating of these arrangements,
the pope declared that he did not think it a convenient and proper thing
that the council should be held in a German city ; and so, on the pretext
of a plague having broken out in Trent, he issued an order at the eighth
session that on 11th March, a.d. l^il, it should resume at Eolrgna,
27
418 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
The emperor's decided protest obliged the German bishops to remain
behind in Trent, and the bishops who assembled at Bologna under these
circumstances did not venture to continue their proceedings. As the
emperor persistently refused to recognise the change of seat, and in con-
sequence the bishops present had one after another left the city, the
pope issued a decree in Sept., a.d. 1547, again postponing the meeting
indefinitely.— Paul was succeeded by the Cardinal-legate del Monte, who
took his place on the papal throne as Julius III., a.d. 1550-1555. He
could indulge in nepotism only to a limited extent, but he did in that
direction what was possible. Driven to it by necessity, he again opened
the Council of Trent on 1st May, a.d. 1551. Protestant delegates were
also to be present at it. But without regard to them the council con-
tinued to hold firmly by the anti-protestaut doctrines (§ 136, 8). The
position of matters was suddenly and unexpectedly changed by the appear-
ance of the Elector Maurice. On the approach of his victorious army
the council broke up, after it had at its sixteenth session, on 28th
April, A.D. 1552, promulgated articles condemning all the Protestants,
and resolved to sist further proceedings for two years. After the death
of Julius III., Marcellus II. was elected in his stead, one of noblest popes
of all times, who once exclaimed, that he could not understand how a
pope could be happy in the strait-jacket of the all-dominating curialism.
He occupied the chair of St. Peter only for twenty-one days. He was
succeeded by John Peter Caraffa (§ 139, 23), as Paul IV., a.d. 1555-1559.
He carried on the operations of the Inquisition, reintroduced into Rome
at his instigation under Paul IH. for the suppression of all Protestant
movements, with the most reckless severity and insistency, was un-
wearied in searching out and burning all heretical books, and protested
against the Religious Peace of Augsburg. He also opposed the elevation of
Ferdinand I. to the imperial throne, which led the new emperor to issue
a decree of state, which concluded with the words : " And every one may
from this judge that his holiness, by reason of age or other causes, is no
longer in full possession of his senses." This pope also in the bull. Cum
ex apostolatus officio of a.d. 1558, released subjects from the duty of
obedience to heretical princes, and urged orthodox rulers to undertake the
conquest of their territories. But he also embittered himself among the
Roman populace by his inquisitorial tyranny, so that they upon the
report of his death destroyed all the buildings of the Inquisition, broke
in pieces the papal statues and arms, and under threat of death forced
all the members of the Caraffa family to quit the city. — The mild dis-
position of his successor, Pius IV., a.d. 1500-1565, moderated and reduced,
as far as he thought safe, the fanatical violence and narrowness of the
Inquisition, and the reforming influence'.which he allowed to his talented
nephew Charles Borromeo over the affairs of the curia bore many excel-
lent fruitSi Without much opposition he again opened the Tridentine
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 419
Council on 18th Jan., a.d. 1562, wliich now it appeared could be resumed
■with less danger, beginning with the seventeenth session and ending with
the twenty-fifth on the 3rd or 4tli Dec, a.d. 1563. Of the 255 persons
who throughout took part in it more than two-thirds were Italians. The
papal legates domineered without restraint, and it was an open secret that
"the Holy Ghost came from Rome to Trent in the despatch box." In
the doctrinal decisions, the mediaeval dogmas, with a more decidedly anti-
protestant complexion, but with a careful avoidance of points at issue
between Franciscans and Dominicans (§ 113, 2), were set forth, togetlier
with a formal condemnation of the opposed doctrines of Protestantism.
In the proposals for reformation, decided improvements were introduced
in church order and church discipline, in so far as this could be done
without prejudice to the interests of the hierarchy. German, Spanish,
and especially French bishops, as well as the commissioners for Catholic
courts urged at first, in the interests of conciliation and reform, for jaer-
mission to priests to marry and the granting of the cup to the laity, the
limiting of the number of fasts and of the worship of saints, relics, and
images, as well as the more extreme hierarchical extravagances. But
the legates knew well how to gain time by wily intrigues, to disgust their
opponents by exciting subtle theological disputes, and to weary them out
with tedious delays; and so when it came at last to the vote, the compact
majority of the Italians withstood all opposition that could be shown.
At the close of the last session Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine (§ 132, 13),
who from the opposition had passed over to the majority, cried out,
" Anathema to all heretics ! " and the prelates answered in full chorus.
The pope confirmed the decrees of the council, but forbade on pain of
excommunication any exposition of them, as that jjertained solely to
the papal chair. They found unhesitating acceptance in Italy, Portugal,
and Poland, and in Spain in so far as they were agreeable to the laws
of the empire. In Germany, Hungary, and France the governments
refused to acknowledge them ; but the reforming decrees, which could
really be recognised as improvements, were willingly accepted, and even
the objection to particular conclusions in matters of faith was soon
silenced before the sense of the importance of having the thing settled,
and securing at any cost the unity of the church. i
1 An admirable paper by Hase on Theiner's "Acts of the Council of
Trent " has been translated in the Brit, and For. Evan. Jieview for
1876, pp. 358-369. Mendham, " Memoirs of the Council of Trent."
London, 1834. Father Paul Sarpi's " History of the Council of Trent,"
3rd ed., fol. London, 1640. Bungener, "History of the Council of
Trent." Edin. 1852. Buckley, " Canons and Decrees of Council of
Trent." London, 1851. Buckley, " Catechism of Council of Trent."
London, 1852.
420 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
3. The Popes after the Council.— Pius V., a.d. 15G6-1572, is the only pope
for many centuries before and down to the present time who has been
canonized. This was done by Clement XI. in a.d. 1712. He was
previously a Dominican and grand-inquisitor, and even as pope continued
to live the life of a monk and an ascetic. He strove hard to raise
Roman society out of its deep moral degradation, condemned strict
Augustinianism in the person of Bains, made more severe the bull In
Ccena Domini (§ 117, 3), and set the Roman Inquisition to work with a
fearful activity never before equalled. He also released all the subjects
of Queen Elizabeth of England from their oaths of allegiance, threatened
the Emperor Maximilian with deposition should he grant religious free-
dom to the Protestants, and in league with Spain and Venice gained
a brilliant naval victory over the Turks at Lepanto in a.d. 1571.' —
Gregory XIII., a.d. 1572-1585, celebrated the Bloody Marriage as a glorious
act of faith, produced an improved edition of the Corjnis juris canoiiici,
and carried out in a d. 1582 the calendar reform that had been already
moved for at the Tridentiue Council. The new or Gregorian Calendar,
which passed over at a bound ten days in order to get rid of the diver-
gence that had arisen between the civil or Julian and the natural year, was
only after considerable opposition adopted even by Catholic states. The
evangelical governments of Germany introduced it only in a.d. 1700, Eng-
land in A.D. 1752, and Sweden in a.d. 1753 ; while Russia and all the coun-
tries under the dominion of the Greek church continue to this day their
adherence to the old Julian Calendar. Gregory's successor, Sixtus V., a.d.
1585-1590, was the greatest and most powerful of all the popes since the
Reformation, not indeed as a spiritual head of the church, but as a
statesman and ruler of the Papal States. Sprung from a thoroughly
impoverished family, Felix Peretti was as a boy engaged in herding
swine. In his tenth year, however, through the influence of his uncle, a
Minorite monk, he obtained admission and elementary education in bis
cloister at Montalto near Ancona. After completing his studies, he dis-
tinguished himself as a pulpit orator by his eloquence, as a teacher and
writer by his learning, as a consulter to the Inquisition by his zealot
devotion to the interests of orthodoxy, as president of various cloisters
by the strictness with which he carried out moral reforms, and, after he
had passed through all the stages of the monkish hierarchy and risen to
be vicar-general of his order, he was elevated by Pius V. to the rank of
bishop and cardinal. He now took the name of Cardinal Montalto, and
as such obtained great influence in the administration of the curia. The
death of his papal patron and the succession of Gregory XIII., who from
an earlier experience as joint commissioner with him to Spain enter-
tained a bitter enmity toward him, condemned him to retirement into
1 Mendham, " The Life and Pontificate of Pius V." Loudon, 1832.
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 421
private life for thirteen years. He spent the period of his enforced quiet
in architectural undertakings, laying out of gardens, editing the works
of St. Ambrose, in the exercise of deeds of benevolence, exhibiting
toward every one by the whole course of his conduct mildness, gentle-
ness, and friendliness, and, notwithstanding occasional sharp and wicked
criticisms about the pope, showing a conciliatory spirit toward his
traducers. Thus the cardinals became convinced that he would be a
gentle, tractable pope, and so they elected him on Gregory's death to be
his successor. There is still a story current regardiug him as to how, on
the very day of his elevation, he threw away the stick on whicb, with all
the appearance of the feebleness of age, he had up to that time been
wont to lean ; but it is an undoubted fact, that from that same day he
appeared in the guise of an altogether different man. Cold and reserved,
crafty and farseeing in his schemes, recklessly and unhesitatingly
determined even to the utmost extremes of harshness in carrying out
his devices, greedy and insatiable in amassing treasures, parsimonious
toward his dependants and in his own housekeeping, but lavish in his
expenditure on great buildings for the adornment of the eternal city and
for its public weal. He delivered the States of the Church from the
power of the bandits, who had occasioned unspeakable confusion and
introduced throughout these dominions a reign of terror. By a series of
draconic laws, which were carried out in the execution of many hundreds
without respect of person, he spread an indescribable fear among all evil-
doers, and secured to the city and the state a security of life and
property that had been hitherto unknown. In theological controversies
he kept himself for the most part neutral, but in the persecution of
heretics at home and abroad there was no remission of his earlier zeal
In the political movements of his time he took a most active sharC;
and the fact that the interests of the Papal States lay nearer to his
heart than the interests of the church had the most important and far
reaching consequences for the future developments of State and church
in Europe. That the Hapsburg universal sovereignty aspired after
by Philip II. of Spain threatened also the independence of the Papal
States and the political significance of the papacy was perceived by him
very distinctly ; but he did not perceive, or at least would not admit,
that the success of this scheme would have been the one certain way to
secure the utter extinction of Protestantism and the restoration of the
absolute unity of the church. This was the reason why he was only half-
hearted in supporting Philip in the war against the Protestant Elizabeth
of England, and also so lukewarm toward the Catholic league of the
Guises in France that wrought in the direction of Spanish interests. He
did indeed succeed in weakening the Spanish power in Italy and in
hindering Spanish aggressions in France, but at the same time he failed
through these very devices in obtaining a victory over Protestantism in
42 2 CHUPtCn history of the sixteenth century.
England and in the Netherlands, while the weakness of the German
Hapsburgs over against the German Protestant princes was in great part
the result of his policy. The Eoman populace, excited against him, not
so much by his severity as by the heavy taxes laid upon them, broke
down after his death the statue which the senate had erected to his
memory in the capitol.^ The next three popes, who had all been elected
in the Spanish interest, died soon after one another. Urban VIII. had a
pontificate of only twelve days ; Gregory XIV. reigned for ten months ;
and Innocent IX. survived only for two months. Then Clement VIII. ,
A.D. 1592-1005, ascended the papal throne, his pontificate in respect of
civil and ecclesiastical polity, " a weak copy of that of Sixtus." His
successor, Leo XI., died after he had occupied the chair for twenty-seven
days. — Continuation, § 155, 1.
4. Papal Infallibility. — The counter-reformation' during this period
exerted itself in bringing again into the foreground the assertion of the
infallibility of the pope, which had been postponed or set to one side
during the previous century (§ 110, 15). The noble Hadrian VI. indeed
had, in his scholastic work, Qucestiones de sacramentis, of a.d. 1516,
reissued during his pontificate, laid it down as beyond all doubt that
even the joopes in matters of faith might errand often had erred, " plures
enim fuerunt pontifices Eom. haretici." On the other hand, Leo X., in
the bull issued against Luther, had distinctly affirmed that the popes of
Kome had never erred in their decrees and bulls. Gregory XHL declared
in A.i>. 1584, that all papal bulls which contained disciplinary decisions
on points of order were infallible. Sixtus V., in the bull JEternus ille,
with which he issued his unfortunate edition of the Vulgate in a.d. 1589,
claimed for the popes the right of infallibly deciding upon the correct-
ness of the readings of the biblical text ; but he hastened by the recall-
ing or suppressing of the bull to have the mistake covered in oblivion.
Bellarmine taught that the pope is infallible only when he speaks ex
cathedra ; i.e. defines a dogma and prescribes it for the belief of all
Christendom. But when, in spite of all the efforts of the Jesuit general
Lainez, no final decision was come to at Trent upon the question as to
whether or how far the pope was to be regarded as infallible, the matter
remained undefined and uncertain for more than three centuries (§ 187, 3).
5. The Prophecy of St. Malachi.— In his book " Lignum Vitoe," pub-
lished at Venice in a.d. 1595, the Benedictine Wion made public for the
first time a iH'ophecy ascribed to St. Malachi, Archbishop of Armagh,
who died in a.d. 1148, in which all the popes from Coclestine II., in a.d.
1143, down to the end of the world, embracing in all one hundred and
eleven, are characterized by short descriptive sketches. He also issued a
^ Hiibner, " The Life and Times of Sixtus V.," trans, by Jerningham.
2 vols. London, 1872.
§ 149. STEENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHUHCH. 423
paper purporting to be written by the Dominican Ciaconius, wlio died
in A.D. 1599, the author of a history of the po^^es, ^Yhich, however, in
many particulars does not harmonize with this document. In this addi-
tional fragment we have short and frequent characterizations of the
first seventy-four popes, reaching down to Urban VII., in a.d.1590. The
devices for the most part correctly represent the coat of arms, the name,
the birthplace, the monkish order, etc., of the several popes ; but these
in every case are derived from the history of the man before he ascended
the papal throne. On the other hand, the devices used to designate the
three succeeding popes down to a.d. 1595 are utterly inapplicable and
arbitrary. The same is true in almost every case of attempts to char-
acterize the later popes. It can therefore be regarded as only the
result of a chance coincidence, if now and again there should seem to
be some fair measure of correspondence. ThusXo. 83, il/o???tM?H custos,
describes Alexander VII., whose arms show six mountains; No. 100, De
halneis Etnai(p, answers to Gregory XVI., who belonged to a Tuscan
cloister; and No. 102, Lumen in calo, designates Leo XIII. , who has a
star in his coat of arms. If after Leo's death, as Harnack remarks, a
German pope were possible. No. 103, Igiiis ardens, might be most exactly
realized by the election of the Cardinal Hohenlohe. Still more striking,
though breaking through the principle that is rigidly followed with re-
spect to the earlier numbers from 1 to 71, is the way in which under No.
96, Peregrinus apostolicus, ridicule is cast upon the misfortune of Pius
VL (§ 161, 10, 13) ; and in No. 101 Crux de cruce is appHed to Pius IX.
(§ 181, 2, 3). Upon the whole, there can be no doubt that the composi-
tion of the document belongs to a.d. 1590, and indeed to the period
during which the conclave sat for almost two months after the death of
Urban VII., and that the author, though unsuccessfully, endeavoured to
influence the cardinals in their election by making it appear that the
appointment of Cardinal Simoncelli of Orvieto, i.e. Urbs vetus, with
the device, De antiquitate ^lrhis, had been thus divinely indicated. He
chose the name of St. Malachi, because his friend and biographer, St.
Bernard, had ascribed to him the gift of prophecy. His series of popes
had, therefore, to begin with a contemporary of St. Malachi; and since
the author must speak of him as a pope that has yet to be elected, he
gives designations to him, and to all who follow down to his own times,
which point exclusively to characteristics and relations belonging to them
before their election to the papal dignity. 'Weiugarteu thinks that Wiou
himself is author both of the prophecy and of its explanatory appendix,
but Harnack has given weighty reasons for questioning this conclusion.
6. Reformation of Old Monkish Orders. — (1) The controversies that pre-
vailed within the ranks of the Franciscans (§ 112, 3) were finally put to rest
by Pope Leo X. in a.d. 1517. The Conventuals and Observants were
allowed to choose respectively their own independent general, and from
424 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
that time forth maintained on equal terms a more peaceful relation to one
another. The general of the Observants, however, Avho were in number, in-
fluence, and reputation greatly the superior, boasted of pre-eminence over
his Conventual colleague. Although all Observants under him formed a
close and thoroughly united society, there were still distinguished within
the same regular, strict, and most strict Observants. Among the regulars
the most prominent were the Cordeliers of France, so called because they
were girt merely with a cord ; to the strict belonged the Barefooted monks ;
and to the most strict the Alcantarines, founded by Peter of Alcantara
in Spain. The founder of the Capucliins was the Italian Observant
Minorite Matth. de Bassi. As he reported that St. Francis had worn a
cowl with long sharp peak or capouch, and soon thereafter saw the saint
himself in a vision dressed in such a garb, he withdrew from his cloister,
went to Rome, and obtained from Clement VII., in a.d. 1526, the right
of restoring the capouch. Falling out with the Observants over this,
his followers attached themselves, in a.d. 1528, to the Conventuals as an
independent congregation with their own vicar-general. The unusual
style of dress produced a sensation. Whenever one of the brethren
appeared the gutter children would run after him, crying out in mockery,
Capiicino. But the name that was given in reproach they accepted as a
title of honour. Their self-denying benevolence upon the outbreak of
the pestilence in Italy in a.d. 1528 soon won high reputation to the order,
and secured its further spread. In consequence of their vicar-general,
Bernardino Ochino (§ 139, 24), going over to the Reformed church, the
order came for a long time into disrepute. Thoroughly characteristic of
them was their utter deficiency in scientific culture, which often went
the length of a relapse in utter rudeness and vulgarity, and debased their
preaching into burlesque " caimchinades." — (2) A reformation of the
Carmelites was brought about by St. Theresa de Jesus in a.d. 15G2. The
restored order bore the name of the " Shoeless Carmelites," and its mem-
bers distinguished themselves as teachers of the young and in works of
charity. Alongside of her, as restorer of the male Carmelites, stood the
pious mystic John of the Cross. i — (3) A reformed congregation of Cis-
terciaus was founded in a.d. 1586 by Jean de la Barriere, abbot of the mon-
astery of Feuillans. The mode of life of these Feuillauts was so severe
that fourteen brothers sank under the burden within a short time, and
this led to the modification of the rules in a.d. 1595. The founder was
called by Henry III. to establish a monastery near Paris. He continued
faithful to the king after he had withdrawn from the league, and thus
drew down upon himself the hatred of the fanatical Catholic members
of the order to such a degree that they deposed and banished him in
^ In "Spanish Mystics" (London, 1886) there is an admirable sketch
of Theresa, pp. 39-8G, and of John of the Cross, pp. 106-llB.
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 426
A.D. 1592. A later commission of inquiry, however, uniler Cardiual
Bellarmine pronounced him innocent.
7. New Orders for Home Missions. — (1) The Theatines had their origin
in an association of pious priests at Theate, which Cajetan, at the advice
of John Peter Caraffa, bishop of that place, afterwards Pope Paul IV.,
constituted into an order. In a.d. 1521, having been organized as derici
regulares, they chose to live not by begging but by depending on Divine
providence, i.e. on gifts bestowed without asking, and came to be of
importance as a training school for the higher clergy. Their statutes
expressly i-equired of them to instruct the people by frequent preach-
ing, to attend to the bodies and souls of the sick, to seek the spiritual
good of criminals, and to labour for the overthrow of heresy. — (2j The
Barnabites, also a society of regular clergy, founded by Antonio Maria
Zaccaria at Milan, and confirmed by Clement VII. in a.d. 1533. They
assigned to themselves the duty of devoting their whole life to works of
mercy, pastoral care, education of the young, preaching, hearing con-
fession, and conducting missions. They took the name Barnabites from
the church of St. Barnabas, which was given over to them. To them
was also attached the order of Angelicals, founded by Louisa Torelli,
Countess Guastalla, a rich laJy who was widowed for the second time in
her twenty-fifth year, and confirmed by Paul III. in a.d. 1531. At first
they accompanied the Barnabites on their missions, and wrought for tie
conversion of women, while the Barnabites devoted their attention to the
men. Subsequently, however, on account of loose behaviour, they were
obliged to keep within their convents. Each of the nuns in addition to
her own name took that of the order, Angelica, which was intended to
remind her of her obligation to keep herself pure as the angels. — (3) The
congregation of the Somaskians, or regular clergy of St. Majolus, trace
their origin from Jerome Emiliani of Somascho, a town of Lombardy.
While serving as an officer in the army, a thoroughly careless man of
the world, he happened to be cast into prison. In his gloomy cell he
repented of his past sinful life, and made his escape, it is said, by the
assistance of the blessed Virgin, in a manner similar to that recorded in
Acts V. 19. Some years after, in a.d. 1518, he entered holy orders, and
now devoted his whole life to a self-denying j)ractice of benevolence, by
founding orphanages and training schools, asylums for fallen women,
etc. In order to secure support, instruction, and pastoral care for his
numerous and varied dependants, he joined with himself several like-
minded clergymen in a.d. 1532, and formed a benevolent society. Its
richly blessed activity extended over all northern Italy as far down as
Rome, and was not arrested even by the founder's early death in a d.
1537. Pius V. in a.d. 1568 prescribed to the society the rule of St. Augus-
tine, and on the ground of this raised it into an order of St. Majolus, so
called from a church gifted to it at Pavia by St. Charles Borromeo. — (4)
426 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
The Brothers of Charity, iu Spain called Hospitallers, in France Freres cle
Charite, were originally a secular fraternity for giving gratuitous attention
to the sick, which was founded iu Granada, in a.d. 1540, by a Portuguese,
Juan Ciudad, poor in'goods but rich in love, to whom his bishop gave the
honourable title John of God, Juan di Dios, and who was canonized by
Pope Alexander VIII. in a.d. 1690. ^ After Pius V. had in a.d. 1572 given
the order the character of a monkish order by putting its members
under the rule of St. Augustine, it soon spread over Italy, France, Ger-
many, and Poland. Its cloisters were arranged as well-equipped hospitals
for the destitute sick, without distinction of religious confession, so that
their studies were directed even more to the medical than to the theo-
logical sciences. — (5) The Ursuline Nuns, founded in a.d. 1537 by a pious
virgin, Angela Merici of Brescia, for affording help to needy sufferers of
every sort, but especially for the education of girls. — (6) The Priests of the
Oratory, or the Order of the Holy Trinity, founded by St. Philip Neri
of Florence in a.d. 1518, a saint of the most profound piety, possessed
at the same time with a bright and genial humour. They combined
works of charity with exercises of common prayer and Bible study, which
they conducted in the oratory of a hospital erected by them.- — Continua-
tion, § 155, 7.
8. The Society of Jesus : Founding of the Order. — Iguatius Loyola, Don
Inigo Lopez de Eecalde, born at the castle of Loyola in a.d. 1491, was
descended from a distinguished family of Spanish knights. Seriously
wounded at the siege of Pampeluna by the French in a.d. 1521, he sought
to relieve the tedium of a prolonged and painful sickness by reading
romances of chivalry and, when he had finished these, the legends of the
saints. These last made a deep impression upon him, and enkindled in
him a glowing zeal for the imitation of the saints in their abandonment of
the world, and their superiority to the world's thoughts and ways. Ner-
vous convulsions and appearances of the queen of heaven gave their
Divine consecration to this new tendency. After his recovery he dis-
tributed his goods among the poor, and in beggar's garb subjected him-
self to the most rigorous asceticism. At the age of thirty-three years
he began, in a.d. 1524, sitting among boys, to learn the first elements
of Latin, then studied philosophy at Complutum and theology at Sala-
manca and Paris. With iron determination of will he overcame all
difficulties. In Paris, six like-minded men joined together with him :
Peter Favre of Savoy, who was already a priest ; Francis Xavier, belong-
ing to a family of Spanish grandees ; James Lainez, a Castilian ; Simon
Rodriguez, a Portuguese ; Alphonso Salmeron and Nicholas Bobadilla,
^ " Spanish Mystics," p. 7, note.
2 " Life of St. Philip Neri, Apostle of Rome, and Founder of the
Congregation of the Oratory." 2 vols. London, 1847.
§ 149. STEEXGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 427
both Spaniards. With glowing enthusiasm they drew out the plan of a
new order, which, by its very name, " Compailia de Jesus," indicated its
character as that of a spiritual army, and by combining in itself all those
features which separately were found to characterize the several monkish
orders, advanced the bold claim of being the universal and principal order
of the Eomish church. But pre-eminently they put themselves under
obligation, in A. D. 1534, by a solemn vow of absolute poverty and chastity,
and promised to devote themselves to the service of the Catholic faith at
the bidding of the pope. Practising the strictest asceticism they completed
their studies, and obtained ordination as priests. As insurmountable
difficulties, arising from the war carried on by Venice with the Turks,
prevented the accomplishing of their original intention of a spiritual cru-
sade to the Holy Land, they travelled to Piome, and after some hesitation
Paul III., in A.D. 1510, confirmed their association as the Ordo Societatis
Jesu. Ignatius was its first general. As such he continued to devote
himself with great energy of will to spiritual exercises, to the care of the
sick, to pastoral duties, and to the conflict with the heretics. He died
in A.D. 155G, and was beatified by Paul V. in a.d. 1609, and canonized by
Gregory XV. in a.d. 1622. A collection of his letters was published in
three vols, by the Jesuits in a.d. 1874. ^ — Among his disciples who emulated
their master in genius, insight, and wide, world-embracing schemes, we
must name the versatile Lainez, the energetic Francis Borgia, a Sj^anish
grandee, grandson of the murdered Giovanni Borgia, son of Pope Alex-
ander VI. (§ 110, 12), but above all the Neapolitan Claudio Aquaviva, a.d.
1581-1615, who in many respects deserves to be regarded as a new founder
of Loyola's creation. Under these the order entered upon a career of
universal signiGcance in history, as a new spiritual army for the defence of
the papacy. The popes showed their favour by heaping unheard of privi-
leges upon it, so that it grew from year to year more and more powerful
and comprehensive. Never has any human society come to understand
better how to prove spirits, and to assign to each individual a place, and
to set him to work for ends for which he is best suited ; and never has a
system of watchful espionage been more consistently and strictly carried
out. Everything must be given up to the interests of the order in un-
conditional obedience to the commands of the superior, even that which is
to men most dear and sacred, fatherland, relations, likings and dislikings.
One's own judgment and conscience count for nothing ; the order is all
in all. They have understood how to rise everything that the world
affords, science, learning, art, worldly culture, politics, and, in carrying
out their foreign missions, colonization, trade, and industry, as means
for accomplishing their own ends (§ 155, 13). The order got into its own
^ Coleridge, "Life of Ignatius Loyola." London, 1872. Ranke, "His-
tory of the Popes," vol. i.
428 CHURCH HTSTOilY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
hands the education of the children of the higher ranl?s, and thus secured
devoted and powerful patrons. By preaching, pastoral work, and the
founding of numerous brotherhoods and sisterhoods they wrought upon
the people, became advisers of the princes through the confessional,
wormed they way into connections and into all secrets. And all these
innumerable appliances, all these conspicuous powers and talents, united
under the direction of one will, were unwaveringly directed to one end : on
the positive side, the furthering and spread of Catholicism ; on the nega-
tive side, the overthrow and uprooting of Protestantism. On the death
of the founder, in a.d. 1556, the order already numbered over 1,000 mem-
bers in thirteen provinces and 100 colonies ; and seventy years later, the
number of provinces had increased to thirty-nine, with 15,493 members
in 803 houses.^ — Continuation, §§ 151, 1 ; 104, 9.
9. Constitution of the Jesuit Order. — Required to yield obedience and
render an account of their doings only to the pope, exempted from every
other kind of ecclesiastical supervision, and therefore scorning to accept
any spiritual dignities and benefices, such as bishoprics, canonries,
pastorates, etc., this order, thoroughly self-contained, presents a more
perfect and compact organization than any large association on this earth
has ever been able to show. Only those who had good bodily health and
intellectual ability were admitted to the two years' novitiate. After
this period of probation had been passed in a satisfactory manner, the
novices were released from the discipline of the novice master and put
under the usual three monkish vows of obedience, poverty, and chastity.
They now either entered immediately as " secular coadjutors " on the
duties assigned to such in administrating and taking care of tbe outward
affairs of the houses of the order, or as " scholastici approhati " for their
further intellectual culture were received into collegiate establishments
provided for such under tlie direction of a rector. After completing the
prescribed studies and exercises, they proceeded as ^^ scliolastlci formaW^
to engage upon their duties as "spiritual coadjutors, ^^ who were required
to continue the prosecution of their studies, teach the young, and per-
form pastoral work. After many years' trial, the most able and active
of them were received into the number of the "prq/(?sst," who live purely
on alms in a distinct and special kind of institution presided over by a
superior. But among the professi, there is a distinction made between
those who adopt three and those who adopt four vows. The latter, who,
in addition to the other usual vows, take also one of obedience to the pope
in regard to any mission among heatbens and heretics which he may
^ Rose, " Ignatius Loyola, and the Early Jesuits." London, 1870.
Nicolini, " History of the Jesuits." Edin., 1853. Sir James Stephens
on " The Founders of Jesuitism," in his "Essays on Ecclesiastical Bio-
graphy," vol. i., p. 249.
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 429
please to commission them t j undertake, as the choice spirits of the order,
constitute its very core and form the circle immediately around the general,
who with monarchical absolutism stands at the head of all. Even this
autocrat however is himself watched over by the four assistants associated
with him and by an admonisher, who is at the same time his confessor,
so that he may not commit anything contrary to the rules of the order
and unduly stretch his own prerogatives ; and he is also answerable to the
general congregation of all the profcssi, which is convened every third
year. The provincials otliciate as his viceroys in different countries in
which the order has a footing. Alongside of the spiritual superior of
every house of the order stands a procurator, usually of clerical rank, for
the administration of the property and the superintendence of the secular
coadjutors. Like the general all the other superiors are watched over by
the assistants or advisers associated with them, and by the admonishers
or father confessors. The Constitutiones Societatis Jesu (Rom., 1583), p.
vi., c. i. 1, thus describe the obedience that must be rendered to the supe-
riors : Quisquis sill ijcrsuadeat, quod qui sub ohedientia vivunt, se ferri
oc regi a divina jJrovidentia per superiores suos sinere dcbent per hide ac
.St cadaver essent, quod quoquoversus ferri ct quacunque ratione tractari
se sinit : vel similiter atque senis baculus, qui ubicuuque et quacunque in
re velit eo 2iti, qui cum iiianu tenet, ei inservit. By all members of the
order, of every rank of degree, by novices and adepts alike, four weeks
were usually devoted once a year under an exercise master chosen for
that work to exercitia spiritualia, in which rigid attention was given to
prayer, meditation, examination of conscience, mortification, etc., as an
effectual means of breaking in and breaking down the individual will.
The first sketch of a directory for exercises of this sort was made by the
founder himself in his Exercitia Spiritualia (Antwerp, 1638). This work,
annotated, enlarged, and completed, was finally adopted by the general
congregation in a.d. 1594, and issued under the title Directorium in exer.
sp.—The original rule of the Jesuits is set forth in the Constitutiones
Societatis Jesu already referred to ; their later rule, finally perfected at
the eighteenth general congregation, is given in the Iiistitutuni Soc. Jesu
(2 vols., Prag., 1757). The so called Monita secreta Soc. Jesu, first pub-
lished at Cracow in a.d. 1612, professing to have been obtained from
private instructions communicated by Aquaviva, the fifth general of the
order, only to the most trustworthy of the very elite of the professi,
which gives without the slightest reserve an account of the devices, often
of the most unscrupulous description, to be practised in order to secure an
increase to the order of power, reputation, influence, and jDossessions,
have been repudiated with horror by the order as a malevolent calumny,
by which probably some offender who had been ejected sought vent for
his revenge. The author, who at all events betrays a thorough acquaint-
ance with the internal arrangements of the or.ler, under the fictitious
430 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
form of a course of instruction given by the general named, may have
communicated, with considerable exaggerations, an account of the prac-
tices current within the society of his own day.^
10. The Doctrinal and Moral System of the Jesuits. — In dogmatics
Loyola himself and his immediate disciples were firmly attached to the
prevailing doctrinal system of Thomas (§ 113, 2). Gradually, however,
it came to be seen, that upon this ground their conflict with the Pro-
testants in regard to the fundamental doctrines of sin and grace, justi-
fication and sanctification wa"? in various ways precarious, and tliis
occasioned an inclination more and more toward the Scotist side. Their
general Aquaviva, in his order of study prescribed in a.d. 1586, publicly
announced this departure from the doctrine of the Doctor Angelicus,
restricting it, however, to the doctrines of grace and of the immaculate
conception. On the other hand, they were the most zealous defenders
of the characteristic doctrines of St. Thomas (§ 96, 23) even in their
extremest form, the papal infallibility, the pope's universal episcopate,
and his absolute supremacy over every earthly potentate. In the inte-
rests of the papacy they thus laid the foundations of a theory of the
sovereignty of the people in matters of civil life : Only the papal power
is, according to Matthew xvi. 18, immediately from God, that of the
princes is from the people. The people therefore, if their prince be
a heretic or a tyrant, can rid themselves of him by dsposing, banish-
ing, or even putting him to death ; i.e. tyrannicide. Thus taught
Bellarmine, who died in a.d. 1621, speaking for the whole order, in
his treatise De j^otestate 2yontiJicis in temiwralihus, and still more decidedly
and openly the careful and reliable Spanish historian Juan Mariana,
who died in a.d. 1624, in his " Mirror for Princes," De rege et regis
institutione, which was therefore condemned by the parliament of Paris
to be burnt ; while another work of his, published only after his death,
reflecting upon the despotic proceedings of the general of the order,
Aquaviva, and mercilessly exposing many other offences of the society,
was condemned by Urban VIII. Alongside of the Pelagianizing Jesuit
doctrine of grace there was also developed a lax doctrine of morals,
which threatened to sap the very foundations of morality. This they
made familiar to people generally through the confessional. The fol-
lowing are the principal points upon which their quibbling casuistry has
been exercised in sucli a manner as to bring the morality of the Jesuits
into thorough disrepute : (1) Prohahilism, which teaches, that in a case
where the conscience is undecided as to what should be done or borne in
that particular instance, one is not necessarily bound to the more certain
and probable meaning, but may even take a less certain and less probable
1 Cartwright, " The Jesuits, their Constitution and Teaching." Lon-
don, 1876.
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 431
view, if this were supported by weighty reasons, or couki be sustained
by the authority of some distinguished theologian, a doctor gravis. (2)
Intentionalism, or the doctrine that any action, even it be in itself sinful,
is to be judged only according to the intention with which it was per-
formed, pointedly expressed in the saying, The end justifies the means,
'' quia cum finis est licitus etiam media sunt licita'* (Busembaum). (3)
The distinction between ijliilosophical and theological sin, according to
which only the latter, as a sin committed with a clear understanding
of the sinfulness of the deed, and with the present consciousness and
intention thereby expressly to break a Divine command, is condemnable
before God. [i) The doctrine of the permissibility of a secret reserve,
reservatio vientalis, and the use of ambiguous language, by means of
which, if one, upon giving a solemn afiirmation or denial upon oath, has so
arranged his words, that besides the meaning naturally to be taken from
them that is contrary to the truth or the intention, they admit of anotber
that is in accordance with fact, he is not to be regarded as guilty of giving
false witness, of breach of faith, deceit, or perjury. These and other such-
like moral axioms, not indeed expressed for the first time by the Jesuit
order, but already for the most part rooted in the medieval system of
casuistry, were certainly first carried out with reckless consistency in the
moral code of the Society of Jesus. In the most frivolous and lighthearted
way they were applied to the life, and openly and unreservedly set forth
in the confessional, by the most celebrated moralists of the order. They
were laid down as well established principles, not merely in learned
theological discussion, but in the regularly authorized handbooks of
morals, approved by the congregation of the order, of which some fifty or
seventy treatises, e.g. those of Escobar and Busembaum (§ 157, 1), are
still extant. They cannot therefore be repudiated as the individual
opinions of some rash and inconsistent writers. They will also be found
to lie at the foundation of the whole scheme and procedure of the order
in their prosecution of foreign missions (^§ 150; 155, 12) and in their
attempts to proselytise Protestants ( § 151, 1, 2), to supply the principle
underlying their ecclesiastical and civil policy, their industrial and com-
mercial activity (§ 155, 13), their pastoral and educational work. They
are also thoroughly illustrative of their well known motto, Omnia in
majorem Dei gloriam. It need not, however, be denied that the order has
at all times numbered among its members many distinguished by deep
piety and strict moral principles, and indeed some among them expressly
combated from Scripture and experience those doctrines so perilous to
moral truth and purity. The most notorious of the Jesuit moralists who
taught and defended these pernicious views were Francis Toletus, who
died in a.d. 1596, Gabriel Vasquez, who died in a.d. 1601, Thomas San-
chez, who died in a.d. 1610, Francis Suarez, who died in a.d. 1617, the
Westphalian Hermann Busembaum, who died in a.d* 1668, and the
432 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Spaniard Escobar cle Mendoza, who died in a.d. 1C99. The name of the
last mentioned has obtained an unenviable notoriety by the adoption of
the word escohardtrie into the French language.^
11. Jesuit Influence upon Worship and Superstition.— As .Jesuitism itself
may be described as in every respect a reproduction in an exaggerated
form of the Catholicism of the mediaeval papacy, with all its unevangelical
and anti-evangelical deterioration, all this showed itself pre-eminently
and characteristically in reference to worship and superstition. Above
all, this appeared in the mariolatry, in which the doctrine and practice of
the Jesuits far outstripped all the extravagances of the Middle Ages. In
the scheme of worship recommended and practised by the Jesuits the
Divine Trinity was supplanted by a quaternity, in which Mary was
assigned her place as the adopted daughter of the Father, mother of the
Sou, and spouse of the Holy Ghost, and thus her fervent devotees made
her worship overshadow that of the three Persons of the Godhead.
Along with the worship of Mary the order gave a new impetus to the
veneration of St. Ann (§ 57, 2), whom Thomas do St. Cyrillo in his book,
De laiuUbus b. Aiuue, celebrated as "the grandmother of God and
mother-in-law of the Holy Ghost." In like manner it gave an impulse
to worship of saints, images, and relics, to processions, pilgrimages, and
rosary devotions, as well as to superstitious beliefs about wonder working
ssapularies, girdles, medals, amulets, and talismans (§ 186, 20), Ignatius
and Xavier-water, endowed with healingproperties through contact with
the relics or models of these saints. The Jesuits were also making end-
less discoveries of new miracle legends and relics previously unknown.
They originated the worship of the heart of Jesus (§ 155, G), renewed
the practice of flagellation, gave a new vitality to the indulgence
nuisance, and diligently fostered belief in sorcery, demoniacal possession,
apparitions of the devil, and exorcism. They also encouraged the silly
notions of the people about witches, with all their cruel and horrible
consequences (§ 117, 4). The Jesuit Delrio, with the ap])roval of his
order, published, in a.d. 1599, a book with the title, " Disquisiliones
Magicae," which, as a worthy companion volume to the " Hammer for
Witches," branded as heresy every doubt as to the truth of witchcraft
witnessed to by so many infallible popes, and gave a powerful impetus
to witch persecutions throughout Roman Catholic countries. That two
noble Jesuits, Tanner, who died in a.d. 1632, and Spee, who died in a.d.
1035, are to be numbered among the first opponents of the gross delusion,
does not in the very least affect the indictment brought against the order ;
^ Griesinger, "The Jesuits: from the Foundation of the Oi-der to
the Present Time." London, 1885. Pascal, *' Provincial Letters," trans-
lated by Dr. M'Crie. Edin., 1851. "The Jesuits' Morals, collected
out of the Jesuits' own Books." London, 1070.
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHUECH. 433
for Tanuer was persecuted on account of his utterances being contrary
to the principles of the society, and Spec's " Cautio Criminalis " could
venture into the light only anonymously, and be printed only in a Pro-
testant town (Ruiteln, 1G31).
12. Educational Methods and Institutions of the Jesuits.— The Jesuit
order never interested itself in elementary and popular education. The
pulpit and confessional, as well as the founding and control of spiritual
brotherhoods and sisterhoods, afforded ample means and opportunities
for impressing their influence upon the lower orders of the people.
On the other hand, the order laboured unweariedly to secure pro-
fessorships in gymnasiums, seminaries for priests, and universities, and
that, not merely in the department of theology, but also in all the other
faculties. By these means and by the founding of regular Jesuit schools
they sought to get into their own hands the education of the higher
ranks, so as to secure from among them as large a number as possible
of members, friends, and protectors. Under the general Aquaviva this
movement obtained an authorized directory and rule in the Btitio ct
iiistitutio studioruin Soc. J., published in A.n. 158(3. And very remarkable
although thoroughly one-sided, and thus no doubt most effectually rea-
lizing the ends desired, were the results which the order gained in the
department of Catholic education, which had been thrown into deep shade
by the brilliant advances of Protestant scholarship and educational
methods. The study of philology had for its almost sole object the acquir-
ing of the Latin language with Ciceronian elegance, but this only pro-
duced fluency in writing and speaking. Greek was studied only by the
way ; and the knowledge of classical antiquities, as well as the arts
and sciences generally, with the exception of mathematics, was utterly
neglected. But special attention was devoted to rhetoric, and by means
of disputations, public lectures, and dramatic representations readiness
in speaking and replying was obtained ; but freedom of thought and
independent culture were rigorously suppressed. The whole course of
instruction, as well as the method of tuition, had for its aim the
breaking in and subduing of the pupil's will. Adherence to rigid order,
and unconditional obedience to reasonable demands, and a mild discipline,
with strict control, and a regular system by which one was set to watch
another, were the means used for arousing to the utmost a spirit of
emulation and giving a sharp spur to ambition. The course of study
which a scholastic of the order had to pass through in the collegiate
establishments was divided into the studia inferiora and superiora. The
former, consisting of three classes, embraced the Grammatica as a pre-
liminary basis for the two higher classes of the Humanitas and the
Rhetorica. The superiora comprised a three years' course of Aristotelian
philosophy, and a four years' course of scholastic thoology upon the
Sentences of the Lombard and the Summa of St. Thomas, together with
28
434 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Bible study upon tlie Vulgate and the original texts, a little Church his-
tory, and, as the crown of the whole curriculum, casuistic ethics.
13. Theological Controversies. — (1) The old controversy about the
immaculate conception of the blessed Virgin Ivad not by any means
obtained a final settlement at Trent. By firmly maintaining the decree
on the universality of original sin the Franciscans hoped, with the zealous
support of the Jesuits Lainez and Salmeron, to obtain express recognition
of the pet doctrine of their order (§ 104, 7) ; but, on the other hand, the
Dominicans so vehemently protested, that the council, in order to prevent
a threatened schism, was obliged to leave the point in dispute undecided,
and was satisfied with renewing the constitution of Sixtus IV., of a.d.
1483 (§ 112, 4), and thus prohibiting the one party from accusing the
other of heresy. — Continuation, § 155, 5. (2) The council for the same
reason was just as little able to set at rest the burning controversy
between Thomists and Scotists on the doctrine of grace (§ 113, 2) by
issuing any decisive statement on the subject. When the pious and
learned professor Michael Bains of Lyons came forward in lectures and
writings as a zealous defender of Augustinianism, the Franciscans ex-
tracted from his works seventy-six i)ropositions, which were condemned
by Pius v., A.D. 15G7. And when again the Jesuits came forward in
support of the papal verdict, the theological faculty of Lyons in a.d. 1587,
took the field and passed censure upon thirty-four Pelagianizing pro-
positions of the Jesuits Leonard Less and John Hamel as opposed to
Holy Scripture and St. Augustine. In the following year the Portuguese
Jesuit Louis Molina, in his treatise Liberi arbitrii cum gratue clonis Con-
cordia of A.D. 1588, set forth a semi-pelagian modification of the disputed
propositions ; the Dominicans, with the learned Dominions Baiiez at their
head, opposed with a bitter polemic. But now the whole order of the
Jesuits stood together as one man on the side of Molina. Besieged from
both sides into complaints and demands, Clement VIII., in a.d. 1597,
appointed a commission, the so called congregatio de auxiliis, to make a
thorough investigation into the matter, and to give an exhaustive report.
After this commission had spent ten years in vainly endeavouring to
construct a formula which would give satisfaction to both parties,
Paul V. dissolved it in a.d. 1G07, promised to make known his decision
at a more suitable time, and then in a.d. IGll forbade all further dis-
putings on that question. But after little more than thirty years the
controversy broke out again at another place in a far more threatening
and dangerous form (§ 156, 5).
14. Theological Literature. — Various kinds of expedients were tried in
order thoroughly to secure the establishment of the Tridentine system
of belief. Paul IV. had as early as a.d. 1499 drawn up a list of prohi-
bited books, which was again ratified at Trent in a.d. 1562, and has been
since then continued and enlarged through some forty editions as the
§ 149. steengtheninct of the catholic church. 435
Index librorum jprohihitorum et eximrgandorum (with the note, donee
corrigatnr). Pius V. founded in a.d. 1571 a special " Congregation of the
Index," for looking after this business. i The Professio fidei Tridentince
of A.D, 15GI, and the Catechismus Romamis of a.d. 1566, were issued as
authentic statements of the Tridentine doctrine ; and in a.d. 1588 a
permanent congregation was instituted for the explaining of that system
in all cases of dispute that might arise. Also the new Breviarinm
Ilomanum of a.d. 1568 (§ 56, 2), as well as the Missale Romanum of a.d.
1570, served the same end. In a.d. 1566 Pius V. had appointed a com-
mission, the so called Correctores Romani, for the preparing of a new
edition of the Corpus juris canonici, which Gregory XIII. issued as the
only authentic form in a.d. 1582. Sixtus V. published in a.d. 1589 a
new edition of the Vulgate, Editio Sixtina, and, notwithstanding its
numerous errata, often only pasted over or scratched out, pronounced it
authentic. Clement VIII., however, issued a much altered revision, Editio
Clementina, in a.d, 1592, and strictly forbade any alteration of it, but
was induced himself to send out next year a second edition, which was
guilty of this very fault. Meanwhile Roman Catholics and scholars
began, in spite of the Tridentine decree as to the authenticity of the
Vulgate, to give diligent attention to the study of the original text of
Holy Scripture. The Dominican Santes Pagninus of Lucca, who died
in A.D. 1511, a pupil of Savonarola, after careful study of all rabbinical
aids, produced a Hebrew lexicon in a.d. 1529, a Hebrew grammar in
A.D. 1528, a literally exact rendering of the Old and the New Testaments
from the original texts, upon which he was engaged for thirty years, an-
introduction, with a thorough treatment of the tropical language of
Scripture, and commentaries on the Pentateuch and Psalms. The literal
meaning was with him palea, folium, cortex ; the mystical, triticum,-
f nidus, nucleus suavissinms. More importance was attached to the his-
torical sense by the Dominican Sixtus of Siena, by birth a Jew, who died
in A.D. 1569. His Bibliotheca sancta is an introduction to Holy Scripture
extremely credible for that age. The Roman Inquisition condemned-
him to death because of heretical expressions in that work, especially
with regard to the deuterc-canonical books of the Old Testament ; but
Pius V. pardoned him, after he had prevailed upon him to retract. The
Jesuit Cardinal Eobert Bellarmine, who died in a.d. 1621, in his LI. IV. de
verhoDei controverted the Protestant principle, Scriptura scripturce inter-
pres. Jerome Emser bitterly inveighed against Luther's translation of the
Bible, and, in a.d. 1527, set over against it an attempted translation of his
own, which, however, is nothing more than a reprint of Luther's, with the
changes necessary in consequence of following the Vulgate and unimpor-
^ Gibbings, " An Exact Reprint of the Roman Index Expurgatorius."
The only Vatican Index of this kind ever published. Dublin, 1837.
436 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
taut transpositions and alterations of Tvords. The same barefaced impu-
dence was practised by John Dietenberger of Mainz, in whose pretended
rendering of the Old Testament of a.d. 153-4, the translation of Luther and
Leo Judii is followed almost word for word. John Eck of Ingolstadt pro-
duced, in A.D. 1537, a translation of the Bible from the Vulgate in the
most wretched German, without the least consultation of the original
text. On the other hand, the Augustinian monk Luis de Leon, who died
in A.D. 1591, was not only celebrated as a learned and brilliant exegete,
but also distinguished as a poet and prose writer of the first rank in the
national literature of Spain. He was thrown into the prison of the
Spanish Inquisition because of a translation and exposition of the Song
of Songs in the mystico-ecclesiastical sense, circulated only in manu-
script, and because of his depreciation of the Vulgate ; and only after a
five years' confinement, during which he narrowly escaped the hands of
the hangman, was he set free. The learned Spaniard Arias Montanus,
under the patronage of King Philip 11. , edited the Antwerp polyglott in
eight vols, folio, with learned notes and excursuses, in a.d. 1569 ff. The
number of exegetes who now gave decided prominence to the literal
sense became very considerable toward the end of the century. The
most notable of these are Arias Montanus, who died in a.d. 1598, having
commented on almost the whole Bible; the Jesuit John Maldonatus, who
died in a.d. 1583, on the four gospels ; John Mariana, who died in a.d.
1624, Scholia in V. et N.T.; Nich. Serrarius, who died in a.d. 1609,
on the Old and New Testaments ; and also William Estius of Douay, who
died in a.d. 1613, on the New Testament epistles. — In the department
of dogmatics the old traditional method was still followed by com-
menting on the Lombard. The most important schoolman of the age
was the Spanish Jesuit Francis Suarez. In a.d. 1528 Berth. Pirstinger,
Bishop of Chiemsee, under the title " Tewtsche Theologey," wrote a com-
plete handbook of theology in the High German dialect, which had
completely emancipated itself from the scholastic forms (§ 125, 5). John
Eck also produced a rival work to Melanchthon's Loci, the Enchiridion
locorum communium, which within fifty years passed through forty-six
editions. But of much greater importance are the Loci theologici of the
Spanish Dominican Melch. Canus,who died in a.d. 1550, which werepub«
lished at Salamanca in a.d. 1563. They consist not so much of a system
of doctrines properly so called, as rather of comprehensive and learned
preliminary investigations about the sources, principles, method, and
fundamental ideas of dogmatics. He rejects the charge of absolute
perversity brought against scholasticism, but grants that the method
should be simplified) and what is good in it preserved. For instructions
in higher and lower schools the two catechisms of the first German Jesuit
provincial, PetruB Canisius (§ 161, 1), Cat. major of a.d. 1554, and Cat.
l)arvus of a.d. 1566, were epoch-making. They were circulated in number*
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 437
less editions aud translations,— the Little CatecLism being printed more
than 500 times, — and used for two centuries in all the Catholio schools in
Germany ; and even yet they are held in high esteem. Among the Catho-
lic polemical writers, Cardinal Bellarmine occupies beyond dispute the
foremost rank. HisDi^iputationes de coiitroversiis chr.fidei adv. hujus temp.
Itaretlcos, a.d. 1588-1593, are in many respects unsurpassed even to this
day. Before him William Lindanus, Bishop of Ghent, author of PanoplUi
cvangelica (Colon., a.d. 1563), and the Jesuit Francis Coster of Mechlin,
author of Enchiridion controversiarum (Colon., a.d. 1585), had won a great
reputation among their own party as disputants against Protestantism.
The services rendered to church history by Cardinal Baronius have
already been referred to under § 5, 2.
15. Art and Poetry,— In the second Dutch school (§ 115, 8) musical
taste was thoroughly depraved, and Churcli music especially became so
artificial, florid, and secularized, that some of the Tridentine fathers in all
seriousness proposed that figured music should be completely banished
from the church services, at least in the performance of mass. It was
when matters had reached this low ebb that Palestrina, Giovanni Pietro
Aloisio Sante of Palestrina, appeared as the saviour and regenerator of
sacred musical art. He was a scholar of Goudimel, who, before he passed
over to the Reformed church (§ 143, 2), had founded a school of music in
Rome. As early as a.d. 1560. in his sacred compositions on Micah vi. 3 ff.,
which to this day are performed always on Good Friday in the Sistine
Cbapel, Palestrina secured a firm position as an unsurpassed master of
genuine ecclesiastical music. The commission appointed by Pius IV. for
the reformation of church music called upon him therefore to submit
specimens of his compositions. He produced three masses in a.d. 1565,
among which was the celebrated Missa Marcelli, dedicated to his former
patron, the deceased i)ope Marcellus II. With this masterpiece, which
represents the highest perfection of Catholic church music, and entitled
its author to rank as a prince of musical art, Mmica princeps, the
retention of the figured music in the mass, so keenly contested in the
council, was decided upon. — The immense success of the sacred song of
the Protestant church as a means for spreading the Reformation con-
strained the Catholic church, very unwillingly, to seek to counteract
this danger by the translation of Latin hymns and the composition of
songs of praise in German (§ 115, 7), as well as by the liberal introduc-
tion of them into the public services. Between a.d. 1470 and a.d. 1631
there have been enumerated no fewer than sixty-two collections of Ger-
man Catholic church hymns. The most important are those of Michael
Vehe, Provost of Halle, A.D. 1537; of George Witzel, a renegade Lutheran,
A.D. 1550; of John Leisetritt, dean of the cathedral at Budissin, a.d. 1567;
and Gregory Corner, Abbot of Gottweih, in his " Great Catholic Hymn-
book," A.D. 1625. Caspar Uleuberg, previously a Lutheran, in a.d. 1582
438 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
rendered the psalms of David into German rhyme ; and Rutzer Eding
published in a.d. 1583 a German mass, with translation of the Latin
church hymns. The names of the poets and translators are for the most
part unknown. Many a beautiful sacred song, too, is met with among
these rich materials, an evidence of what might have been the result if
the Catholic church of Germany, instead of having been opposed or only
half-hearted, had fostered and encouraged this important part of the
Divine service with whole-hearted enthusiasm. — The arts of architecture
and painting continued to be still cultivated successfully in the Roman
Catholic church (§ 115, 13). Besides Correggio and Titian, and after them,
named with the noble masters of painting, are the two Caracci, uncle
and nephew, Domenichino and Guido Reni. Michael Angelo Buonarotti,
who died in a.d. 1564 an old man of ninety years, gave expression to the
most profound Christian ideas in his works of painting and sculpture.
The Renaissance style during the 16th century gave scope for the further
application and development of ecclesiastical architecture. The most
magnificent church building of the century was the rebuilding of St.
Peter's church at Rome, undertaken by Pope Julius II. in a.d. 1506,
which Bramante began and Michael Angelo after his plan carried out.
As painter and statuary, Angelo had refused slavishly to follow the tra-
ditions of the church in respect of the worship of Mary and the saints,
and so, too, as a poet in glowing sonnets he only gave expression to deep
sorrow for sin, and his true spiritual faith in the crucified Sin-bearer.
His countryman Torquato Tasso, who died in a.d. 1595, in his " Jeru-
salem Delivered," celebrated the Christian heroic of medieval Catho-
licism. In the history of Spanish poetry, the Christian lyrics of St.
Theresa and Luis de Leon are regarded even to this day as unsurpassed
in excellence.
16. The Spanish Mystics.— In consequence of the Reformation, the
Roman Catholic church was compelled to have recourse to the revivifi-
cation of the mediaeval mysticism from which it had become alienated
in life and doctrine, in order by means of it to give that intensity and
inward power to the religious life which was now felt to be indispens-
ably necessary without falling away from the church in which alone
salvation can be found, and without making surrender to the iiiani.'<
fuhicia hcEreticornm. Thus there arose from about the middle of the
century, first of all in Spanish cloisters, a new development of mysticism,
which, without exjiressly attacking the " outer way " of the ecclesias-
tical practice of piety, introduced and recommended a second higher and
nobler method, called the " inner way," because leading to Christian
perfection. This consisted in a regular and deeply spiritual exercise in
prayer and contemplation, with a decided preference for inward unuttered
prayer, with complete mortification of one's own self-will and absolute
self-surrender to the Divine guidance, having for itsaini and climax the
§ 149. STRENGTHENING OF THE CATHOLIC CHUECH. 489
most blessed rest in fellowship with God. A pious Minorite, St. Peter of
Alcantara, gave to this tendency a doctrinal basis by his treatise, Be ora-
tione et meditatione, published in a.d. 1515, in which he manifests a most
bitter opposition to Protestantism, and a zealous readiness to co-operate
in all the horrid cruelties of the Spanish counter-reformation. Its highest
point is reached in the famous Carmelite nun of Avila in Old Castile, St.
Theresa de Jesus, who died in a.d. 1582, the most celebrated saint of the
Spanish church. Introduced by Peter of Alcantara in a.d. 1560 to the
profound mysteries of contemplation, and favoured amid the convulsions
of her life of prayer with frequent visions of Christ, she undertook, in a.d,
1562, by the founding of a new cloister, to lead her order back to the strict
observance of this old rule. The fame of her sanctity soon had spread
over all Spain, but all the more did the hatred of the brothers and sisters
of her order who favoured the lax observance increase. They even carried
the bitterness so far as to get the Inquisition to originate a heretic pro-
secution against her in a.d. 1579, on the ground of her pretension to have
visions, but this was abandoned by command of the king. Among her
numerous writings, of which Luis de Leon, in a.d. 1583, issued a com-
plete edition, which have been translated into all the languages of Europe,
the -'Castillo interior," i.e. the City of Mansoul, or the seven Residences
of the Soul, is the one in which her mysticism is most completely de-
veloped. It describes the stages through which the soul must pass in
order to become wholly one with God. Her faithful fellow labourer in
the reforming of the order, St. John of the Cross, who died in a.d. 1591,
in regard to mysticism occupied the same ground with her. His writings,
among which the Subula del Monte Carmel, " The Climbing of Mount
Carmel," is the most comprehensive, are not to be compared with those
of St. Theresa in the rare witchery of an enchanting stjde, but are dis-
tinguished by solidity and maturity of tliought. The brethren of the
order opposed to reform showed toward John a far more severe and con-
tinuous bitterness than they did toward Theresa. Even in a.d, 1575 he
was imprisoned in one of their cloisters, and cruelly ill used. He made
his escape indeed in the following year by flight, but only in a.d. 1588
did a papal brief, by a formal establishment of the Congregation of the
Barefooted Carmelites, put an end to all oppressions and persecutions.
The mysticism recommended by him and St. Theresa found entrance
now more and more into the cloisters, not only of the Carmelites, but also
of the other orders, and numbered many adherents among the higher and
lower clergy, as well as among cultured laymen. — But while on this side
the traditional forms and doctrines usual in the i^ractice of piety in the
church sank indeed into the background, but were never expressly repu-
diated or contradicted, there arose upon this same mystical basis nume-
rous sects designated enlightened '' A\i\mhr£^dos,'^ who went all the length
of pouring abuse and contempt upon every kind of church form and doc-
440 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
trine, and thus calling forth down to the 17th century constant persecU'
tion from the Inquisition. Theresa was canonized in a.d. 1622, Peter of
Alcantara in a.d. 1GG9, and John of the Cross in a.d. 1726. — Continuation,
§156.
17. There were also many noble products of the practical Christian life
brought forth in that new departure which Catholicism after the Reforma-
tion in the interests of self-preservation had been obliged to undertake.
Evidence of this practical endeavour was given in the zealous manner in
which home missions were prosecuted. From out of the general body of
Catholicism there sprang up a new series of saints, who were quite worthy
to rank alongside those of the Middle Ages. Most highly distinguished
among these 'svas Charles Borromeo, born a.d. 1538, died a.d. 1584, who,
from his position as nephew of Pope Pius IV., and from his high rank in
the church as cardinal and Archbishop of Milan, exerted a powerful in-
fluence upon the Tridentine Council and the curia, which he used for the
removal of many abuses. His life is the realization of the perfect ideal
of that of a Catholic pastor and prelate. He also proved himself worthy
of being so regarded during the dreadful pestilence that raged in Milan
in A.D. 1576. Paul V. canonized him in a.d. 1610, and to this day his tall
figure in a colossal statue looks out upon the province of Milan as the
patron of the state. ^ — Along with the intensification of the specifically
Catholic sentiment awakened in the cloisters by means of the endeavours
put forth in the counter- reformation and spreading out from these into
the general Catholic community, we meet with a revival of the old zeal
for monkish asceticism. The Jesuits especially laboured earnestly for the
restoration of the discipline of the lash, brought at an early period into
discredit by the extravagances of the Flagellants (§ 116, 3). And besides
these many also of the new and reformed orders gave themselves to
further and advance the counter-reformation. Cardinal Borromeo, above
referred to, took a lively interest in this mode of spiritual disciplinary
exercise. After he had at a council at Milan, in a.d. 1569, given a
new organization to the flagellant societies of his diocese, and Pope
Gregory XIII., in a.d. 1572, had endowed with a rich indulgence all the
associations of that sort, they in a very short time spread again over all
Italy. In Rome alone they numbered over a hundred, which, according
to their colours, were designated as white, gray, black, red, green, blue,
etc. Especially on Good Friday they vied with one another in getting
up their flagellant processions on the most magnificent scale. In France
they were patronized by Cardinal Charles of Lorraine, and King Henry
III. was himself a devoted and enthusiastic member of the order. In Ger-
many, too, the Jesuits brought the flagellants into favour, wherever they
* Butler, " Life of Cardinal Borromeo." London, 1835. Martin, "Life
of Borromeo." London, 1817.
§ 150. FOREIGN MISSIONS. 441
could get a footing, especially in the north German cities. The learned
Jesuit, Jac. Gretson, in lugolstadt, in the very beginning of the 17th cen-
tury, wrote seven elaborate rhetorical controversial tracts. Be spontanea
disciplinarum s. flagellorum critce, etc., against the Protestant opponents
of the flagellant craze. Afterwards, however, the ardour and zeal for
the practice of this discipline cooled down more and more in most of the
monkish orders as well as in general society, and local flagellant proces-
sions, in which there was generally more of a vain, empty show than of
real penitential earnestness, are to be met with now only as occasional
displays in Spain and Italy, and in the Romish states of America.
§ 150. Foreign Missions.
The grand discoveries of new continents which had pre-
ceded the Reformation age, and the serious losses sustained
in European countries, revived the interest in missions
throughout the Roman Catholic church. Commercial enter-
prise and campaigns for the conquest of the world, which
were still almost exclusively in the hands of the Catholic
states, afforded opportunities for the prosecution of mission
work in the New World ; and abundant means for carrying
it on were furnished by the numerous monkish orders.
1. Missions to the Heatlian : East Indies and China. — The Portuguese
founded the first bishopric in the East Indies, at Goa on the Malabar
Coast, in a.d. 1534. Soon thereafter a tribunal of the Inquisition was
established alongside of it. The bishop confined his attention to the
European immigrants, and the inquisitors applied themselves mainly to
secure the destruction of the Thomas-Christians settled there. Neither
of them had the remotest idea of doing any properly speaking mission
work among the native races. But it was quite different when, in a.d.
154.2, Loyola's companion Francis Xavier, the Apostle of the Indians,
made his appearance as papal nuncio in this wide field along with two
other Jesuits. Working with glowing zeal and unparalleled self-denial,
he baptized in a short time a hundred thousand, mostly of the low,
despised caste of pariahs, going forward certainly with a haste which
never allowed him time to make sure that the spiritual fruits should bear
any proportion to the outward successes. His unmeasured missionary
fervour, to which characteristic expression was given in his saying,
Ampllus ! amplius ! impelled him constantly to go on seeking for new
fields of labour. From the East Indies he moved on to Japan, and only
his death, which occurred in a.p. 1552, hindered him from pushing his
442 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
way into China. Numerous successors from Loyola's or-ler undertook
the carrying on of his work, and so soon as a.d. 1565 the converto u£ tne
East Indies numbered 300,000.^ — Commerce opened the way for missions
into China, where all traces of earlier Christianity (§§ 72, 1 ; 93, 15) had
already completely vanished, and proud contempt of everything stood in
the way of the introduction of any western customs or forms of worship.
But the Jesuits, with Matthew Ricci of Ancona at their head, by making
use of their knowledge of mathematical, mechanical, and physical
science, secured for themselves access even to the court. Ricci at first
completely nationalized himself, and then began his missionary enter-
prise by introducing Christian instructions into his mathematical and
astronomical lectures. In order to render the Chinese favourable to the
adoption of Christianity, he represented it to be a renewal and restora-
tion of the old doctrine of Confucius. The confession of faith which the
new converts before baptism were required to make was confined to
an acknowledgment of one God and recognition of the obligation of the
ten commandments. And even in worship he tolerated many heathen
practices and customs. The mathematical and astronomical writings
composed by him in the Chinese language are said to have extended to
150 volumes. The Chinese artillery also stood under his immediate
supervision. When he died, in a.d. 1610, the Jesuits had even then
formed a network of hundreds of churches spread over a great part of
the land.2— Continuation, § 155, 11, 12.
2. Japan. — Xavier had here, chiefly on account of his defective
acquaintance with the language, relatively speaking only a very small
measure of success. But other Jesuits followed in his footsteps, and
enjoyed the most brilliant success ; so that in a.d. 1581 there were already
more than two hundred churches and about 150,000 Christians in the
land, of whom many belonged to the old feudal nobility, the daimios,
while some were even imperial princes. This distinguished success was
greatly owing, on] the one hand, to the favour of the then military com-
mander-in-chief Nobunaga, who greeted the advance of Christianity as a
welcome means for undermining the influence of the [Buddhist bonzes,
which had become supreme, and, on the other hand, to the abundance of
money put by Portugal and Spain at the disposal of the Jesuits, which
they used as well in the' adorning of the Catholic services as in the be-
stowing of liberal gifts upon the converts. It was, however, chiefly owing
to the close and essential relationship between the Romish ritual and
constitution and those of Buddhism, which rendered the transition from
1 Venn, " Missionary Life and Labours of Xavier." Lond., 1863.
- Logge, " Christianity in China : Nestorianism, Roman Catholicism,
Protestantism ; with the Chinese and Syriac Texts of the Nestorian
Monument of Hsi-an-Fu." London, 1888.
§ 150. FOEEIG-N MISSIONS. 448
the one to the other by no means very difficult. Then everything that
had gone to secure for Buddhism in Japan a superiority over the simple
old national Sintuism or ancestor- worship, as well as everything that the
Japanese- Buddhists had been wont to regard as indispensable requisites
of worship, the elegance of the temples, altars glittering with bright
colours blending together, theatrical display in the vestments for their
priests, grand solemn processions and masses, incense, images, statues
and rosaries, a hierarchical system, the tonsure, celibacy, cloisters for
monks and nuns, worship of saints and images, pilgrimages, etc., was
given them in even an exaggerated degree in -Jesuit Christianity. The
zealous neophytes from among the daimios effectually backed up to the
preaching of the Jesuit fathers by fire and sword. They compelled the
subjects of their provinces to go over to the Christian religion, banished
or put to death those who proved refractory, and overthrew the Buddhist
temples and cloisters. In a.d. 1582 they sent an embassy of four young
noblemen to Europe to pay homage to the pope. After they had
received the most flattering reception in Madrid from Philip II., and
in Eome from Gregory XIII. and Sixtus V, , they returned to their own
home in a.d. 1590, accompanied by seventeen Jesuit priests, who were
soon followed by whole crowds of mendicant friars. By the close of the
century the number of native Christians had increased to 600,000. But
meanwhile the axe was already being laid at the root of the tree that had
thriven so wondrously. Nobunaga's successor Hidejoshi found occasion,
in A.D. 1587, to issue a decree banishing from the country all foreign
missionaries. The Jesuits were wise enough to cease at once all public
preaching, but the begging monks treated the decree with contempt and
open defiance. In consequence of this six Franciscans and seventeen
Japanese converts of theirs, and along with them also three Jesuits, were
arrested at Nagasaki and there crucified (§ 186, 16). Soon afterwards
Hidejoshi died. One of his generals, Ijejasu, to whom he had assigned
the regency during the minority of his six year old sou, assumed the
sovereign power to himself. A civil war was the result, and in a.d. 1600
his opponents, among whom were certain Christian daimios, were con-
quered in a bloody battle. Ijejasu persuaded the mikado to give him
the hereditary rank of shiofjun, i.e. field-marshal of the empire ; and his
successors down to the revolution of a.d. 1867 (§ 182, 5), as military vice-
emperors alongside of the really powerless mikado, had all the power of
government in their own hands. Thus were corrupting elements intro-
duced which led to the complete overthrow of the Japanese church. ^
3. America. — The desire to spread Christ^s kingdom was not by any
^ Adams, "History of .Japan from the Earliest Period." 2 vols.
London, 1871. On the religion of Japan before the introduction of Chris-
tianity, see Ebrard, "Apologetics," vol. iii., pp. 66-73. Edin., 1887.
444 CHUECH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
means the smallest among the impulses that contributed to Christopher
Columbus' enthusiasm for the discovery of new countries ; but the greedi-
ness, cruelty, and animosity of the Spanish concpierors, who had less
interest in converting the natives into Christians than in reducing them to
slavery, was a terrible hindrance to the Christianizing of the New World.
The Christian missionaries indeed most emphatically, but with only a
small measure of success, defended the human rights of the ill-used
Indians. The noble Mexican bishop, Bartholomew de las Casas, in par-
ticular wrought unweariedly, devoting his whole life, a.d. 1474 to a.d. 156G,
to the sacred task, not only of instructing the Indians, but also of saving
tliem from the hands of his greedy and bloodthirsty fellow countrymen.
Six times he journeyed to Spain in order to use personal influence in
high quarters for amehorating the lot of his 2)rot<^gcs, and he was obliged
to undertake a seventh journey in order to justify himself and repel the
violent accusations of his enemies. Even in a.d. 1517 Charles V. had, at
the bishop's entreaty, granted personal liberty to the Indians, but at the
same time gave permission to the Spanish colonists to introduce African
negro slaves for the laborious work in the mines and on the plantations.
The enslaving of the natives, however, was still continued, and only in
A.D. 1547 were vigorous measures taken to secure the'suppression of the
practice, after many millions of Indians had been already sacrificed. So
far as the Spanish dominion extended Christianity also spread, and was
established by means of the Inquisition. — In South America the Portu-
guese held sway in the rich and as yet little known empire of Brazil.
In A.D. 1549 King John III. sent thither a Jesuit mission, with Emanuel
Nobreya at its head. Amid unspeakable hardships they won over the
native cannibals to Christianity and civilization.^
4. The newly awakened missionary zeal of the church made an attempt
also upon the schismatical Churches of the East. The enterprise, how-
ever, was even moderately successful only in reference to a portion of
the Persian and East Indian Nestorians (§ 72, 1), who in Persia were called
Syrian or Chalda3an Christians, because of the language which they used
in their liturgy, and in India Thomas-Christians, because they professed
to have had the Apostle Thomas as their founder. They had their origin
really, in a.d. 1551, in Mesopotamia, in consequence of a double episcopal
election there. The one party chose a iDriest Sulakas, whom Pope Julius
III. had consecrated priest under the name of John, but the other party re-
fused to acknowledge him. The Archbishop Alexius Menezius also became
involved in these controversies, and succeeded in getting the former
party to recognise the Roman primacy and accept the Catholic doctrine ;
while, on the other hand, Rome permitted the retention of its ancient
' Helps, " Life of Rarth. de las Casas." 2ud ed. Lond., 1868. Prescott,
" History of Conquest uf Mexico.'' Loudon, 188G, pp. 178-184.
§ 151. ATTEMPTED CAT^HOLIC EEGE^^EEATION. 415
ritual and form of constitution. These united Nestorians were now
called by way of eminence Cbaldc^au Christians. Their chief, chosen by
themselves and approved by the pope, was called Bishop of Babylon, but
had his residence at Mosul in Mesopotamia. The Thomas-Christians
of India, however, proved much more troublesome. But even they were
obliged, after a long, protracted struggle, at a sj-nod at Diampur in a.d.
159U, to abjure the Nestorian heresy. All Syrian books were burnt, and
a new Malabar liturgy in accordance with the Romish type was introduced.
— The existence of an independent Jacobite Christian church in Abys-
sinia (§ 6i, 1) first became known in Europe in the beginning of the
sixteenth century through Portuguese commercial and diplomatic mis-
sions. The Abyssinian sultan, David, in a.d. 1514, upon promise of
Portuguese help, of which he stood in need because of the aggressions
of the neighbouring Mohammadan states, agreed to receive the physician
Bermudez as Catholic patriarch. But the next sultan, Claudius, expelled
him from his land. In a.d. 151)2 Jesuit missionaries began to settle in
the country; but Claudius denounced them as Arians, and wished the
people to have nothing to do with them. As the result of a friendly com-
munication from the Coptic patriarch, Paul V., in the beginning of
the 17th century, sent the Jesuit Rodriguez into Egypt. The patriarch
accepted the rich presents which the Jesuit brought with him, and then
made him return home without having gained the object of his mission.
§ 151. Attempted Regeneration of Roman
Catholicism^!.
Paul III. had in a.d. 1542 erected a new tribunal of the
Inquisition for the suppression of Protestantism, which Paul
IV. (§ 149, 2) brought up to the highest point of its develoi3-
ment. And scarcely had the Catholic church secured for itself
a stable position throughout its own domains by the happy
conclusion of the Tridentine Council, than it directed all it:;
powers with the utmost energy to reconquer as far as then
possible the ground that had been lost. The means used for
this end were mainly of two sorts : the territorial sj^stem,
legitimated by a law of the empire (§ 137, 5), which, devised
originally in order to save Protestantism (§ 126, 6), was now
employed for its overthrow; and the Jesuits, who, some-
times openly and sometimes with carefully concealed plans,
sometimss in conjunction with the civil power, sometimes
446 CHUECH HISTOEY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTUEY.
intriguing against it, sj^read like swarms over all the coun-
tries of EurojDe where Protestantism had already struck its
roots. The craftiness of the members of this order, their
diplomatic acts, their machinations, their practice in con-
troversy, succeeded in some cases in fanning the scarcely
glimmering embers of Catholicism into a bright flame, in
other cases in blighting Protestant churches that had been
in a flourishing condition. They hoped thus to be able to
destroy these churches root and branch, or to reduce Pro-
testantism within the narrow limits of a barely tolerated
sect. But above all they were careful to get into their
hands the control of the higher and lower schools, in order
to be able to implant in the hearts of the young and rising
generation a bitter hatred of Protestantism.
1. Attempts at Eegeneration in Germany.— From the time of the Passau
Compact the poHtical convulsions and the weariness of controversy
shown by the princes proved strongly in favour of Protestantism. In
Catholic states, too, the Protestant religion had made rapid advances.
The deputies of provinces, and especially the nobles, gave unmistakable
expression to their sympathies, and for every grant of territory demanded
a religious concession from the prince. Many prelates or spiritual princes
had more Protestant than Catholic councillors. The Protestant nobles
frequented their courts without constraint. Their residences were often
Protestant cities, and their revenues not unfrequently in the hands of
evangelical superiors. But for the Jesuits, in spite of territorial influ-
ence and pvelatical restrictions (§ 137, 5), in a few decades all Germany
would have fallen into the hands of the evangelical church. In a.d. 1558
a Venetian observer of the country and the people could bring back the
report that in Germany only a tenth of the population remained true to
the old church; that of the other nine parts seven had gone over to
the Lutherans, and two were distributed among the various anti-catholic
denominations. Of all the German cities Ingolstadt was the first, in a.d.
1549, to be favoured with a visit of the Jesuits, who were brought there
by William IV. of Bavaria as teachers of theology. Next in order
comes Vienna, where, in a.d. 1551, thirteen Jesuits, under the name of
Spanish priests, were introduced by Ferdinand. Some years later they
settled in Prague, as also in Cologne. From those four capitals they
spread out within a few years over the whole territorially Catholic Ger-
many, and throughout the Austrian ntales. In a.d. 1552 Loyola founded
§ 151. ATTEMPTED CATHOLIC REGENERATION. 447
at Rome the Collegium Germanicum, which was subsequently extended
under the name of the Collegium Germ.-Ungaricum, for the training of
German youths for the conversion of Protestants in their native land.
The first Jesuit provincial for Germany was the Dutchman Peter Canisius,
who, first of all from Vienna, and afterwards, when Maximilian II. (i^ l.'iT,
8) put the .Jesuits in Austria under intolerable restrictions, from Frics-
burg, had so successfully carried the regeneration into Switzerland, until
his death in a.d. 1598, that while the Protestants designated him C'ani.s
Austriacus because of his ruthless persecution, the members of his order
honoured him as the second Apostle of the Germans, and Pius IX., in
recognition of his services, beatified him in a.d. 1864. — The Catholic
regeneration began in Bavaria in a.d. 1564. Duke Albert V., converted
into a zealous Catholic by the opposition of his Protestant members
of parliament, excluded the Protestant nobles from the Bavarian diet,
banished the evangelical pastors, compelled his Protestant subjects who
refused to abandon their faith to emigrate, and obliged all professors and
oflicials to subscribe the Tridentine FroJ'esaiofidci. The .Jesuits praised
him as a second Josiali and Theodosius, called Munich a second Rome,
and the pope invested him with the ecclesiastico-political privileges of a
aiimmus eplacopwi throughout his own dominions. When by inheritance
he became Count of the Hague, and also Baden-Baden came under his
rule as regent, Protestantism was there thoroughly rooted out. Bavaria's
example was followed, though in a more temperate manner, by the
electors of Treves (Jac. von Eltz) and Mainz (Daniel Brendel). The
latter restored Catholicism in a.d. 1574 into the hitherto thoroughly
Protestant city Eichsfelde. In a.d. 1575 the Abbot of Fulda also, Balth.
von Dernbach, who in all his territory was almost the only Catholic, acted
in a similar manner. In making this attempt Balthasar came into colli-
sion with his chapter, and was by it and his knights expelled. The
Bishop of Wiirzburg, Jul. Echter of Mispelbrunn, who had been aiding
them in the revolution, in a.d. 1576 undertook the administration of the
diocese. But m the beginning of the followmg year the abbot was re-
stored by an imperial order, and thus the last vestige iOf Protestantism
was rooted out. Julius of Wiirzburg, seriously compromised, would
probably have followed the example of Gebhard of Cologne (§ 137, 7),
though that prelate's proceedings were dictated by altogether different
considerations ; but by a.d. 1584 he worked himself into power again by
completely rooting out Protestantism from his own territory, which had
been almost completely Protestant. The bishops of Bamberg, Salzburg,
Hildesheim, Miinster, Paderborn, etc., pursued a similar policy. At all
points Jesuits were at the front and Jesuits were in the rear. In the
newly constituted nuncio court, at Vienna, in a.d. 1581, at Cologne, in a.d.
1582, they had the grand centres of their consphacies and machinations.
Ferdinand II. of Styria, emperor from a.d. 1619, and Maximihan 1. of
448 CHURCH HISTORY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Bavarica, were both educated by the Jesuits at Ingolstadt. When in a.d.
1596 Ferdinand celebrated Easter at Griitz, lie was the only one there
who communicated according to the Roman Catholic rite. Two years
later he successfully carried out the counter-reformation, and his cousin,
the Emperor Rudolph II., followed his example, — Continuation, § 153, 2.
2. But the regeneration was not confined to Germany. It spread out
over all Europe. The Jesuits pressed into every country, and were suc-
cessful in compassing their ends even in places where there had been
very little prospect of success. The Cardinal Charles Borromeo (§ 149,
17) laboured with peculiar energy to establish Catholicism, and spread it
yet more widely in the Catholic and mixed cantons of Switzerland. He
himself undertook a journey thither in a.d. 1570; contrived in a.d. 1574
to get the Jesuits introduced into Lucerne, in a.d. 158G into Freiburg ;
founded at Milan a Collegium Helveticum for the training of Catholic priests
for Switzerland, and secured the appointment of a permanent nuncio,
who had his residence at Lucerne. In the province of Chablais on Lake
Geneva, under Piedmontese rule, St. Francis de Sales, by the forcible
conversion of 80,000 heretics in a.d. 1590, completely rooted out Protes-
tantism (§ 150, 1). — In France the bloody civil wars began in a.d. 1502.
The Duke of Alva appeared in the Netherlands in a.d. 1567. In Poland
the Jesuits secured an entrance first in a.d. 1569, and from thence made
their way over into Livonia. In a.d. 1578 the crafty Jesuit Ant. Pos-
sevin gained access to Sweden, and there converted the king {§ 139, 1).
Even in England, where Elizabeth in a.d. 1582 had threatened every
Jesuit with capital j)unishment, crowds of them wrought away in secret,
and in hope of better times tended the flickering spark of Catholicism
smouldering under the ashes (§ 153, 6).
3. Russia and the United Greeks. — The attempts, renewed from time
to time since the meeting of the Florentine Council {§ 73, 6), to win over
the Russian church, had always failed of the end in view. In a.d. 1581,
when the war so disastrous for Russia between Ivan IV. Wassiljewitch
and Stephen Bathori of Poland afforded to the pope the desired excuse
for putting in an appearance as a peacemaker, Gregory XIII. sent the
clever Jesuit Possevin for this purpose to Poland and Russia. The tsar
gave him a most flattering reception, allowed him to hold a religious con-
ference, but was not prepared either to attach himself to Rome or to
banish the Lutherans. On the other hand, Rome scored a victory, inas-
much as in the West Russian province detached and given to Poland
the union was consummated, partly by force, partly by manoeuvre, and
obtained ecclesiastical sanction at the Council of Brest, in a.d. 1596.
These " United Greeks " were obliged to acknowledge the Roman supre-
macy and the Romish doctrines, but were allowed to retain their o\Yn
ancient ritual.— Continuation, § 203,2.
APPENDIX.
ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
Substitute foUoKUuj^ § 98, 3-9, /or § 98, ?>-o, pp. 69-73.
3. The Beginnings of the Franciscan Order down to A.D. 1219.— The
founder of this order was St. Francis, boru in a.d. 1182, son of a rich
merchant of Assisi in Umbria. His proper name was Giovanni Bernar-
done. The name of Francis is said to have been given him on account
of his early proficiency in the French language ; " Francesco " — the little
Frenchman. As a wealthy merchant's son, he gave himself to worldly
pleasures, but was withdrawn from these, in a.d. 1207, by means of a
severe illness. A dream, in which he saw a multitude with the sign of
the cross, bearing weapons designed for him and his companions, led
him to resolve upon a military career. But a new vision taught him
that he was called to build up the fallen house of God. He understood
this of a ruined chapel of St. Damiani at Assisi, and began to apply the
proceeds of valuable cloth fabrics from his father's factory to its restora-
tion. Banished for such conduct from his father's house, he lived for
a time as a hermit, until the gospel passage read in church of the send-
ing forth of the disciples without gold or silver, without staff or scrip
(Matt. X.), fell upon his soul like a thunderbolt. Divesting himself of
all his property, supplying the necessaries of life by the meanest forms
of labour, even begging when need be, he went about the country from
A.D. 1209, sneered at by some as an imbecile, revered by others as a
saint, preaching repentance and peace. In the unexampled power of his
self-denial and renunciation of the world, in the pure simplicity of his
heart, in the warmth of his love to God and man, in the blessed riches
of his poverty, St. Francis was like a heavenly stranger in a selfish world.
Wonderful, too, and powerful in its influence was the depth of his
natural feeling. With the birds of the forest, with the beasts of the field,
he held intercourse in childlike simplicity as with brothers and sisters,
exhorting them to praise their Creator. The paradisiacal relation of
man to the animal world seemed to be restored in the presence of this
saint. — Very soon he gathered around him a number of like-minded
men, who under his direction had decided to devote themselves to a
similar vocation. For the society of ^'Viri pcenitentiales de civitate
Assisii oriundi " thus formed Francis issued, in a.d. 1209, a rule, at the
basis of which lay a literal acceptance of the precepts of Christ to His
449 29
450 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
disciples, sent forth to preach the kingdom of God (Matt. x. ; Luke x.),
along with similar gospel injunctions (Matt. xix. 21, 29 ; Luke vi. 29,
ix. 23, xiv. 2G), and then he went to Rome to get for it the papal con-
firmation. The pope was, indeed, unwilling; but through the iDious
man's simplicity and humility he was prevailed upon to grant his
request. In later times this incident was in popular tradition trans-
formed into a legend, representing the pope as at first bidding him go to
attend the swine, which the holy man literally obeyed. Innocent III.
was the more inclined to yield, owing to the painful experiences through
which the church had passed in consequence of its unwise treatment
of similar proposals made by the Waldensians thirty years before. He
therefore gave at least verbal permission to Francis and his companions
to live and teach according to this rule. At the same time also Francis
heartily responded to the demand to place at the head of his rule the
obligation to obey and reverence the pope, and to conclude with a vow of
the most rigid avoidance of every kind of addition, abatement, or change.
There was no thought of founding a new monkish order, but only of a
free union and a wandering life, amid apostolic poverty, for i)reaching
repentance and salvation by word and example. On entering the society
the brothers were required to distribute all their possessions among the
poor, and dress in the poor clothing of the order, consisting of a coarse
cloak bound with a cord and a capouch, to preach the gospel of the king-
dom of God wherever their master sent them, and to earn their liveli-
hood by their usual occupation, or any other servile work. In case of
need they were even to beg the necessaries of life. Thus mendicancy,
though only allowed in case of necessity, soon came to be transformed
by the lustre of the example of the poverty of Jesus and His disciples
and mother, who all had lived upon alms, and by the idea of a twofold
merit attaching to self-abnegation, inasmuch as not only the Receiver,
by voluntarily submitting to the disgrace which it involved in the eyes
of the world, but also the giver of alms, obtained before the judgment
seat of God a great reward. But neither as wages for work nor as alms
were the brothers permitted to accept money, but only the indispensable
means of life, while that which remained after their own wants had been
supi^lied was divided among the poor. From time to time they with-
drew, either singly or in little groups, for prayer, contemplation, and
spiritual exercises into deserts, caves, or deserted huts ; and annually at
Pentecost they assembled for mutual edification and counsel in the
small chapel at Assisi, dedicated to "Mary of the Angel," given to St.
Francis by the Benedictines. This church, under the name of the Por-
tiuncula, became the main centre of the order, and all who visited it on
the day of its consecration received from the pope a plenary indulgence.
The number of the brothers meanwhile increased from day to day.
"When representatives of all ranks in society and of all the various
ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 451
degrees of culture sought admission, it soon became evident that the
obligation to preach, hitherto enjoined upon all the members of the
order, should be restricted to those who were specially qualified for the
work, and that the rest should take care to carry out in their personal
lives the ideal of poverty, joined with loving service in institutions for
the poor, the sick, and the lepers. A further move in the development
of the order, tending to secure for it an independent ecclesiastical posi-
tion, was the admission into it of ordained priests. Their missionary
activity among Christian people was restricted at first to Urdbria and the
neighbouring districts of central Italy. Bat soon the thought of a mis-
sionary vocation among the unbelievers got possession of the mind of
the founder. Even in a.d. 1212 he himself undertook for this purpose
a journey to the East, to Syria, and afterwards to Morocco ; in neither
case, however, were his efforts attended with any very signal success.
In A.D. 1218, Elias of Cortona, with some companions, again took up the
mission to Syria, with equally little success ; and in a.d. 1219 five
brethren were again sent to Morocco, and there won the crown of mar-
yrdom. In that same year, a.d. 1219, the Pentecost assembly at Assisi
passed the resolution to include within the range of their call as itine-
rants the sending of missions, with a ^^ minister" at the head of each,
into all the Christian countries of Europe. They began immediately,
privileged with a papal letter of recommendation to the higher secular
clergy and heads of orders in France, to carry out the resolution in
France, Spain, Portugal, and Germany; while at the same time Francis
himself, accompanied by twelve brethren, again turned his steps toward
the East.
4. The Franciscans from A.D. 1219 to A.D. 1223.— Soon after the depar-
ture of St. Francis the report of his death s^jread through Italy, and
loosened the bonds which, by reason of the obligation to render him
obedience hitherto operative, had secured harmony among the brethren.
Francis had, on the basis of Luke x. 7, 8, laid upon his companions only
the commonly accepted rules of fasting, but the observance of a more
rigorous fast required his own special permission. Now, however, some
rigorists, at a convention of the elders, gave expression to the opinion,
that the brethren should be enjoined to fast not as hitherto, like all the
rest of Christendom, only on two, but on four, days of the week, a resolu-
tion which not only removed the rule altogether from its basis in Luke x.
7, 8, but also broke the solemn promise to observe the wish of Innocent
III., incorporated in it, that in no particular should it be altered. And
while the rule forbade any intercourse with women, brother Philip ob-
tained a papal bull which appointed him representative of the order of
" poor women," afterwards the Nuns of St. Clara, founded in a.d. 1212
on the model of the Franciscan ideal of poverty. Another brother, John
of Capella, sought to put himself at the head of an independent order
452 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
of poor men and women. Many such projects were being planned. So
soon as news reached Francis of tliese vagaries, he returned to Italy, ac-
companied by his favourite pupil, the energetic, wise, and politic Elias
of Cortona, whose organizing and governing talent was kept within
bounds down to the founder's death. Perceiving that all these confu-
sions had arisen from the want of a strictly defined organization, legiti-
mized by the pope and under papal protection, 'Francis now endeavoured
to secure such privileges for his order. He therefore entreated Honorius
III. to appoint Cardinal Ugolino of Ostia, afterwards Pope Gregory IX.,
previously a zealous promoter of his endeavours, as protector and
governor of his brotherhood ; and he soon with a strong hand put a stop
to all secessionist movements in the community. A vigorous effort was
now made by the brotherhood, suggested and encouraged by the papal
chair, to carry out a scheme of transformation, by means of which the
order, which had hitherto confined itself to simple religious and ascetic
duties, should become an independent and powerful monkish order, to
place it " with the whole force of its religious enthusiasm, with its ex-
traordinary flexibility and its mighty influences over the masses, at the
service of the papacy, and to turn it into a standing army of the pope,
ever ready to obey his will in the great movements convulsing the
church and the world of that time." Honorius III. took the first step in
this direction by a bull addressed, in Sept., a.d. 1220, to Francis himself
and the superiors of his order, there styled " Ordo fratrum minorum," by
which a novitiate of one year and an irrevocable vow of admission were
prescribed, the wearing of the official dress made its exclusive privilege,
and jurisdiction given to its own tribunal to deal with all its members.
Francis was now also obliged, willing or unwilling, to agree to a revision
of his rule. This new rule was probably confirmed or at least approved
at the famous Pentecost chapter held at the Portiuncula chapel in a.d.
1221, called the " Mat Chapter " (C storearum), because the brethren
assembled there lived in tents made of rush-mats.^ It is, as Carl Miiller
has incontestably proved, this same rule which was formerly regarded
by all as the first rule composed in a.d. 1209. The older rule, however,
formed in every particular its basis, and the enlargements and modifica-
tions rendered necessary by the adoption of the new ideas appear so evi-
dently as additions, that the two different constituents can even yet with
^ According to Giordano of Giano, who himself was there, the number
of brothers present was about 3,000, and the people of the neighbour-
hood supplied them so abundantly with food and drink that they had at
last to put a stop to their bringing. But soon the tradition of the order
multiplied the 3,000 into 5,000, and transformed the quite natural ac-
count of their support into a ^' vdraculum ntupendum,'' parallel to the
feeding of the 5,000 in the wilderness (Matt. xiv. 15-21).
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GEEMAN EDITION. 453
tolerable certainty be distinguisliecl from one another, and so the older
rule can be reconstructed. But the development and modification of
the order necessarily proceeding in the direction indicated soon led to a
gradual reformation of the rule, which in this new form was solemnly and
formally ratified by Honorius III. in November, a.d. 1223, as possessing
henceforth definite validity. In it the requirement of the literal accept-
ance of the commands of Jesus on sending out His disciples in Matthew x.
and Luke x, is no longer made the basis and pattern, as in the two ear-
lier rules, but all the stress is laid rather upon the imitation of the lives
of poverty led by Jesus and His apostles ; as an offset to the renuncia-
tion of all property, the obligation to earn their own support by work
was now set aside, and the practice of mendicancy was made their proper
object in life, came indeed to be regarded as constituting the special
ideal and sanctity of the order, which in consequence was now for the
first time entitled to be called a mendicant or begging order. At its
head stood a general-minister, and all communications between the
order and the holy see were conducted through a cardinal-protector.
The mission field of the order, comprising the whole world, was divided
into provinces with a provincial-minister, and the provinces into custodies
with a custos at its head. — Every third year at Pentecost the general
called together the provincials and custodes to a general chapter, and
the custodes assembled the brethren of their dioceses as required in pro-
vincial and custodial chapters. The dress of the order remained the
same. The usual requirement to go barefoot, however, was modified by
the permission in cases of necessity, on journeys and in cold climates,
to wear shoes or sandals,
5, The Franciscans from A.D. 1223.— There was no mention in the rule
of A.D. 1223 of any sort of fixed place of abode either in cloisters or in
houses of their own. The life of the order was thus conceived of as a
homeless and possessionless pilgrimage ; and as for the means of life
they were dependent on what they got by begging, so also it was con-
sidered that for the shelter of a roof they should depend upon the
hospitable. The gradual transition from a purely itinerant life had
already begun by the securing of fixed residences at definite points in
the transalpine district and first of all in Germany. After the first send-
ing forth of disciples in a.d, 1219, without much attention to rule and
without much plan, had run its course there with scarcely any success, a
more thoroughly organized mission, under the direction of brother Caesarius
of Spires, consisting of twelve clerical and thirteen lay brethren, includ-
ing John V. Piano Cupini, Thomas v. Celano, Giordano v. Giano, was
sent by the " Mat Chapter " of a.d. 1221 to Germany, which, strength-
ened by oft-repeated reinforcements, carried on from a.d. 1228 a vigorous
propaganda in Bohemia, Hungary, Poland, Denmark, and Norway. In
accordance with the rule of a.d, 1223 Germany as forming one province
454 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
was divided into five custodies, but in a.d. 1230 into two distinct pro-
vinces, the Ehineland and Saxony, with a corresponding number of
custodies. Even more brilliant was the success attending the mission
to England in a.d. 1224. On their missionary tours the brethren took
up their residence temporarily in hospitals and leper houses, or in
hospitable parsonages and private houses, and preached by preference
in the open air, where the people flocked around them in crowds, occa-
sionally at the invitation of a bishop or priest in the churches. Presents
of lands gave them the opportunity of erecting convents of their own,
with churches and burying-grounds for themselves, which, placed under
the charge of a guardian, soon increased in number and importance.
The begging, which was now made the basis of the whole institution,
was regulated by the principle, that, besides the benefactions voluntarily
paid into the cloister, monks sent forth at particular terms, hence called
Terminants, with a beggar's bag, should beg about for the necessaries
of life. With agriculture and industrial work, and generally all bodily
labour, the brothers had nothing to do. On the contrary, what was
altogether foreign to the intention of the founder and their rules, and
so originating not from within the order itself, but from without, first
of all by the admission of scientifically cultured priests, a strong current
set in in favour of scientific studies, stimulated by their own personal
ambition as well as by rivalry with the Dominicans. These scholarly
pursuits soon yielded abundant fruit, which raised the reputation, power,
and influence of the order to such a height, that it has been enabled
to carry out in all details the task assigned it in the papal polity.
Architecture, painting, and poetry also found among the members of
the order distinguished cultivators and ornaments. — Supported by
accumulating papal privileges, which, for example, gave immunity from
all episcopal jurisdiction and supervision, and allowed its clergy the
right in all parts, not only of preaching, but also of reading mass and
hearing confessions, and aided in its course of secularization by papal
modifications and alterations of its rule, which permitted the obtaining
and possessing rich cloister property, the order of Minor Brothers or
Minorites soon could boast of an extension embracing several thousands
of cloisters. — Francis, wasted by long-continued sickness and by increas-
ing infirmities, was found dead, in a.d. 1226, stretched on the floor of the
Portiuncula chapel. Two years afterwards he was canonized by Gregory
IX., and in a.d. 1230 there was a solemn translation of his relics to the
beautiful basilica built in his honour at Assisi. The legend, that a
seraph during his last years had imprinted upon him the bloody wound-
prints or stigmata of the Saviour was also turned to account for the
glorification of the whole order, which now assumed the epithet
^^ serapliic.'^ — The one who possessed most spiritual affinity to his
master of all the disciples of St. Francis, and after him most famous
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GEEMAN EDITION. 455
among bis contemporaries and posterity, was St. Anthony of Padua.
Born in a.d. 1195 at Lisbon, when an Augustinian canon at Coimbra
be was, in a.d. 1220, received into the communion of tbe Minorites,
when tbe relics of tbe five martyrs of Morocco were deposited tbere, and
thereupon be undertook a mission to Africa. But a severe sickness
obliged bim to return borne, and driven oat of bis course by a storm, be
landed at Messina, from whence be made a pilgrimage to Assisi. Tbe
order now turned bis learning to account by appointing bim teacher of
theology, first at Bologna, then at Montpellier. For three years be
continued as custos in tbe south of France, going up and down through
tbe land as a powerful preacher of repentance, till the death of tbe
founder and tbe choice of a successor called him back to Italy. He died
at Padua in a.d. 1231. Tbe pope canonized him in a.d. 1232, and in
A.D. 1263 bis relics were enshrined in tbe newly built beautiful church
at Padua dedicated to bim. Among tbe numerous tales of prodigies,
which are said to have accompanied his goings wherever he went, the
best known and most popular is, that when be could obtain no ready
bearing for bis doctrine among men, he preached on a lonely sea-shore
to shoals of fishes that crowded around to listen. His writings, sermons,
and a biblical concordance, under the title Concordantice Morales SS.
Bihliorum, are often printed along with tbe Letters, Hymns, Testament,
etc., ascribed to St. Francis. — Among tbe legends of tbe order still
extant about the life of St. Francis is tbe Vita I. of Thomas of Celano,
written in a.d, 1229, the oldest and relatively the most impartial. On
tbe other hand, the later biographies, especially that of tbe so-called
Tres socii and the Vita II. of Thomas, which has been made accessible
by tbe Roman edition of Amoni of 1880, written contemporaneously some-
where about A.D. 1245, as well as tbat of St. Bonaventura of a.d. 1263,
recognised by the chapter of tbe order as the only authoritative form
of the legends, are all more or less influenced by tbe party strifes that
bad arisen within its ranks, while all are equally overladen with reports
of miracles. In a.d. 1399, by authority of the general chapter at Assisi,
the '^ Liber Conforniitatum^'' of Bartholomew of Pisa pointed out forty
resemblances between Christ and St. Francis, in which the saint has
generally the advantage over the Saviour. In tbe Reformation times
an anonymous German version of this book was published by Erasmus
Alber with a preface by Luther, under tbe title, Der Barfilssermonche
Eulenspiegel unci Allcoran, Wittenberg, 1542. Tbe most trustworthy
contemporary source of information has been only recently again rendered
accessible to us in the Memorahilia de Primitiv. Fratrum in Teutoniam
3Iissorum Conversatione et Vita of the above-named Giordano of Giano,
embracing tbe years 1207-1238, which G. Voigt discovered among bis
father's papers, and has published with a full and comprehensive intro-
duction. Tbe Franciscans of Quaracchi near Florence have re-edited
4o6 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
it "after the unique Berlin manuscript," as well as the supplemen-
tary document, the De Adventu Fratrum Minorum in Anglia, in the first
volume of their Analecta Franciscana, Qiiar., 1885.— Thode, in his Fr.
V. A. iind die Anfcinge d. Knnst d. Benaissance in Ital. (Berl., 1885), has
described in a thorough and brilliant style the mighty influence which
St. Francis and his order exerted upon the development of art in Italy,
especially of painting and architecture, as well as of poetry in the ver-
nacular ; for he has shown how the peculiar and close relation in which
the saint stood to nature gave the first effective impulse to the emanci-
pation of art from the trammels of formalism, and how the new artistic
tendency, inspired by his sp)irit, was first given expression to in the
building and adorning of the basilica at Assisi dedicated to him.
6. Party Divisions within the Franciscan Order. — That the founder was
by no means wholly in sympathy with the tendency which prevailed in
his order from a.d. 1221, and only tolerated what he was no longer in a
position to prevent, might have been guessed from the fact that from
that time he withdrew himself more and more from the supreme direc-
tion of the order, and made it over to Elias of Cortona, as his general-
vicar, who in existing circumstances was better fitted for the task. But
from his Testament it appears quite evident that he strictly adhered
to the views of his early days, and even attempted a last but fruitless
reaction against the tendency to worldly conformity that had set in.
Thus, for example, it still puts all the brethren under obligation to
perform honourable labour, and will allow them to beg only in case of
necessity, but especially forbids them most distinctly by their sacred
vow of obedience from asking any privilege from the papal chair,
or altering the simple literal meaning of the rule of the order, and
of this his last will and testament by addition, abatement, or change.
After his death, on 4th October, 1226, Elias retained in his hand
the regency till the next meeting of the Pentecost chapter ; but then
he was deprived of office by the election of John Parens as general-
minister, a member of the stricter party. Meanwhile the increasing
number and wealth of their cloisters and churches, with their appurte-
nances, made it absolutely necessary that the brethren should face the
question how the holding of such possessions was to be reconciled with
the strict injunction of poverty in the sixth chapter of their rule, accord-
ing to which " the brothers are to possess nothing of their own, neither
a house, nor an estate, nor anything whatsoever, but are to go about for
alms as strangers and pilgrims in this world." At the next general
chapter, in a.t), 1230, this question came up for discussion, along with
that of the validity of the testament above referred to. When they
could not agree among themselves, it was decided, in spite of all the
protestations of the general, to request by a deputation the advice of the
pope, Gregory IX,, on this and cert^iii other disputed questions. With
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 457
reference to the testament, the pope declared that its demands, because
issued without the consent and approval of the general chapter, could
not be binding upon the order. With reference to the property question,
he repudiated the rendering of the rule in such a way as if in this, just
as in all other orders, only the possession of property on the part of
individual brothers was forbidden ; but the membership of the order as
a whole could not be prevented from holding property, as directly con-
trary to the literal statements of the rule, without, however, entering
upon the question as to whose property the movables and immovables
standing really at the call of the order were to be considered. And as
he had at an earlier date, on the occasion of sending a new Minorite
mission to Morocco, granted as a privilege to the order to take alms
in money, which was allowed by the rule only for the support of sick
brethren, for the reason that without money they would not be able
there to procure the necessaries of life, so he now extended this permis-
sion for other purposes essential to the good of the order, e.g. building
and furnishing of cloisters and churches, as not contrary to the rule, if
the collecting and spending of the money is carried on, not by members
of the order, but by procurators chosen for the work. It was probably
to this victory of the lax party that Elias owed his elevation at the next
election, in a.d. 1332, to the office of general. It also enabled him to
maintain his position for seven years, during which he showed himself
particularly active and efficient, not only as general of the order, but
also in political negotiations with the princes of Italy, especially as
mediator between the pope and the emperor, Gregory IX. and Frederick
II. But his government of the order in a despotic and lordly manner,
and his reckless endeavours to conform to worldly customs, intensified
the bitterness of his pious opponents, and his growing friendhness with
the emperor lost him the favour of the pope. And so it came about
that his overthrow was accomplished at the general chapter in Eome, in
A.D. 1239. He now openly passed over into the service of the emperor,
acainst whom the ban had anew been issued, accompanied him on his
military campaigns, and inveighed unsparingly against the pope in
public speeches. As partisan of the banned emperor, already dc jure
excommunicated, the ban was pronounced against him personally in
A.D. 12i4, and he was expelled from the order. He died in a.d. 1253,
reconciled with the church after a jsenitential recantation and apology.
His four immediate successors in the generalship all belonged to the
strict party ; but the growing estrangement of the order from the in-
terests and purposes of the curia, especially too its relations to the
Evangelhini aternum, pronounced heretical in a.d. 1251 (§ 108, 5), pro-
duced a reaction, in consequence of which the general, John of Parma,
was deprived of office in a.d. 1257. With his successor, St. Bonaveutura,
the opposition succeeded to the undisputed control of the order. The
458 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
difficult question, how the really pre-eminently rich cloister property was
to be reconciled with the rule of the order requiring absolute abandon-
ment of all possessions, found now among the preiDonderatiug lax party,
the so-called Fratres de communitate, its solution in the assertion, that
the goods in their hands had been bestowed upon them by the donors
only in usufruct, or even that they were presented not so much to the
order, as rather to the Romish Church, yet with the object of supporting
the order. Nicholas III., in a.d. 1279, legitimated the theory, for he
decided the question in dispute in his bull Exiit qui seminat, by saying
that it is allowed to the disciples of St. Francis to hold earthly goods in
usufruct, but not in absolute possession, as this is demanded by the
example of Christ and His apostles. But now arose a new controversy,
over the form and measure of using with a distinction of a mus mode-
ratus and a 2isus tenuis or pauijcr, the latter permitting no store even of
the indispensable necessaries of life beyond what is absolutely required
to satisfy present needs. Those, on the other hand, who w^ere dissatisfied
with the principles affirmed in the papal bull, the Spirituales or Zelatores,
with Peter John de Oliva and Ubertino de Casale at their head, assumed
an attitude of open, fanatical opposition to the papacy, identifying it with
antichrist (§ 108, 6). A section of them, which, besides the points about
poverty, took offence at the lax party also over questions of clothing
reform, obtained permission from Ctelestine V,, in a.d. 1294, to separate
from the main body of the order, and, under the name of Ccelestine
Eremites, to form an independent communion with a general of their
own. They settled for the most part in Greece and on the islands of
the Archipelago. Boniface VIII., in a.d. 1302, peremptorily insisted
upon their return to the West and to the present order. But as he died
soon after, even those who had returned continued their separate exis-
tence and their distinctive dress. — Continuation, § 112, 2.
7. The Dominican or Preaching Order.— St. Dominic, to whom this order
owes its origin, was boro, in a.d. 1170, at Calaruega, in Old Castile, of a
distinguished family (De Guzman?). As a learned Augustinian canon
at Osma, he had already wrought zealously for the conversion of
Mohammedans and heretics, when Bishop Diego of Osma, entrusted in
A.D. 1201, by King Alphonso VIII. with obtaining a bride for his son Fer-
dinand, took him as one of his travelling retinue. The sudden death
of the bride, a Danish princess, rendered the undertaking nugatory. On
their homeward journey they met at Montpellier with the Cistercian
mission, sent out for the conversion of the Albigensians (§ 109, 1), the
utter failure of which had become already quite apparent. Dominic,
inflamed with holy zeal, prevailed upon his bishop to enter along with
himself upon the work already almost abandoned in despair ; and after
the bishop's early death, in a.d. 120(), he carried on the enterprise at his
own hand. For Albigensian women, converted by him, he founded a
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 459
sort of conventual asylum at Prouille, and a bouse at Toulouse, which
was soon afterwards gifted to him, became the first centre where his
disciples gathered around him, whence by-and-by they removed into
the cloister of St. Eomanus, assigned to them by Bishop Fulco. During
the Albigensian crusade, the thought ripened in his mind that he might
secure a firmer basis and more powerful support for his enterprise
by founding a new, independent order, whose proper and exclusive task
should be the combating and preventing of heresy by instruction,
preaching, and disputation. In order to obtain for this proposal eccle-
siastical sanction, he accompanied his patron. Bishop Fulco of Toulouse,
in A.D. 1215, to the Fourth Lateran Council at Kome. But pope and
council seemed little disposed to favour his idea. The former, indeed,
sought rather to persuade him to join some existing ecclesiastical insti-
tution, and carry out his scheme under its organization. Consequently
Dominic, with his sixteen companions, resolved to adopt the rule of St,
Augustine, augmented by several Prfemonstratensian articles. When,
however, Honorius III. had ascended the papal chair, Dominic hastened
again to Rome, and in a.d. 1216 obtained from this pope without diffi-
culty what Innocent III. had refused him, namely, permission to found
a new, independent order, with the privilege of preaching and hearing
confession everywhere. Then, and also subsequently, he preached fre-
quently with great acceptance to those living in the papal palace, and
thus an oi^portunity was afforded of establishing the office of a viarjister
sacri palatii, or papal court preacher, which was immediately occupied,
and has ever since continued to be held, by a Dominican. At a later
period the supreme censorship of books was also assigned to this same
official. The first general chapter of the order met at Bologna in a.d.
1220. There the vow of poverty, which was hitherto insisted upon only
in the sense of all the earlier orders as a mere abandonment of property
on the part of individuals, was put in a severer form, so that even the
order as such kept itself free from every kind of possession of earthly
goods and revenues, except the bare cloister buildings, and exhorted all
its adherents to live only on begged alms. Thus the Dominicans, even
earlier than the Franciscans, whose rule then permitted begging only in
case of need, constituted themselves into a regular mendicant order.
Dominic, however, chose voluntary poverty for himself and his disciples,
not like St. Francis simply for the purpose of securing personal holiness,
but rather only to obtain a perfectly free course for his work in the sal-
vatioa of others. The official designation, " Ordo fratrum Prsedicatum,"
was also fixed at this chapter. At the second general chapter, in a.d.
1221, there were already representatives from sixty cloisters out of eight
provinces. Dominic died soon after, at Bologna, on Gth August, 1221,
uttering anathemas against any one who should corrupt his order by
bestowing earthly goods upon it. He was canonized by Gregory IX. in
460 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
A.D. 1233. His immediate successor, Jordanus, wrote his first biograpLy,
adorned, as we might expect, with endless miracles.
8. According to the constitutional rules of the order, collected and re-
vised by the third general of the order, Raimund de Pennaforte, about
A.D. 1238, the general who stands at the head of the whole order, resid-
ing at Rome, magister generah's, is elected to office for life at the general
chapter held annually at Pentecost, and he nominates his own socli as
advisory assistants. The government of the provinces is conducted by
a provincial chosen every four j'ears by the provincial chapter, assisted
by four advisory dejini tores, and each cloister elects its own prior. The
mode of life was determined by strict rules, severe fasts were enjoined,
involving strict abstinence from the use of flesh, and during particular
hours of the day absolute silence had to be observed. In the matter of
clothing, only woollen garments were allowed. The dress consisted of a
white frock with white scapular and a small peaked capouch ; but outside
of the cloister a black cloak with capouch was worn over it. From the
favourite play upon the name Dominican, Domini canes, in contrast to the
dumb dogs of Isaiah Ivi. 10, the order adopted as its coat of arms a dog
with the torch of truth in its mouth. The special vocation of the order
as preachers and opponents of heresy required a thorough scientific
training. Every province of the order was therefore expected to have a
seminary capable of giving a superior theological education to the mem-
bers of the order, to which they gave the name of a studium generale,
borrowed from the universities, although the predicate was here used in
a sense much more restricted (comp. § 99, 3). But ambitious desires for
scientific reputation incited them to obtain authority for instituting
theological chairs in the University of Paris, the most celebrated theo-
logical seminary of that age. The endeavour was favoured by a conflict
of Queen Blanca with the Parisian doctors, in consequence of which
they left the city and for a time gathered their students around them
partly at Rheims, partly at Angers, while the Dominicans, encouraged
by the bishop, established their first chair in the vacant places in a.d.
1230. The Franciscans too accomplished the same end about this time.
The old professors on their return used every means in their power to
drive out the intruders, but were completely beaten after almost thirty
years of passionate conflict, and the nurture of scholastic theology was
henceforth all but a monopoly of the two mendicant orders (§ 103, 3).
The art of ecclesiastical architecture and painting, which during this
age reached a hitherto unattained degree of perfection, found many of
its most distinguished ornaments and masters in the preaching order.
And in zeal for missions to the Mohammedans and the heathen the
Franciscans alone could be compared with them. But the order reached
the very climax of its reputation, influence, and power when Gregory IX.,
in A.D. 1232, assigned to it exclusive control of the inquisition of heretics
ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 4G1
(§ 109, 2). — The veneration of the devout masses of the people, who pre-
ferred to confide their secret confessions to the itinerant monks, roused
against botl) orders the hatred of the secular clergy, the preference
shown them by the popes awakened the envy of the other orders, and
their success in scientific pursuits brought down upon them the ill-will
of the learned. Circumstances thus rendered it necessary for a long
time that the two orders should stand well together for united combat
and defence. But after all those hindrances had been successfully over-
come, the rivalry that had been suppressed owing to temporary com-
munity of interests broke out all the more bitterly in the endeavour to
secure world-wide influence, intensified by opposing philosophico-dog-
nialic theories (^ 113, 2), as well as by the difference in the interpretation
and explanation of the doctrine of poverty, in regard to which they strove
with one another in the most violent and passionate manner (§ 112, 2).
From having in their hands the administration of the Inquisition the
preaching order obtained an important advantage over the Minorites ;
while these, on the other hand, were far more popular among the common
people than the proud, ambitious Dominicans, who occupied themselves
with high civil and ecclesiastical politics as counsellors and confessors of
the princes and the nobles. — Continuation, .S 112, 4.
y. To each of the two mendicant orders there was at an early date
attached a female branch, which was furnished by the saint who founded
the original order with a rule adapting his order's ideal of poverty to the
female vocation, and therefore designated and regarded as his " second
order." — (1) The female conventual asylum, founded in a.d. 120r3 at
Prouille, may be considered the first cloister of Dominican nuns. The
principal cloister and another institution, however, was the convent of
Sail Sisto in Rome, given to St. Dominic for this puqjose by Honorius
III. In all parts of Christendom where the preaching order settled
there now appeared female cloisters under the supervision and jurisdic-
tion of its provincial superior, with seclusion, strict asceticism, passing
their time in contemplation, and conforming as closely as possible to
the mode of life and style of clothing prescribed for the male cloisters.
This institution was presided over by a prioress.— (2) The order of the
Nuns of St. Clara, as " the second order of St. Francis,'' was founded by
St. Clara of Assisi. Born of a distinguished family, endowed with great
physical beauty, and destined to an early marriage, in her eighteenth
year, in a.d. 1212, she was powerfully impressed by the teaching of St.
Francis, so that she resolved completely to abandon the world and its
vanities. She proved the earnestness of her resolve by obeying the try-
ing requirement of the saint to go through the streets of the city clad in
a penitent's cloak, begging alms for the poor. On Palm Sunday at the
Portiuncula chapel she took at the hand of her chosen spiritual father
the three vows. Her vounger sister Agnes, along with other maidens
462 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
followed her example. Francis assigned to this union of *' poor women "
as a conventual residence the church of St. Damiani restored by him,
from which they were sometimes called the Nuns of St. Damiani. When
in A.I). 1219 St. Francis undertook his journey to the east, he commended
them to the care of Cardinal Ugolino, who prescribed for them the rule of
the Benedictine nuns ; but after the saint's return they so incessantly en-
treated him to draw up a rule for themselves, that he at last, in a.d. 1224,
prepared one for them and obtained for it the approval of the pope.
Clara died in a.d. 1253, and was canonized by Innocent IV. in a.d. 1255.
Her order spread very widely in more than 2,000 cloisters, and can boast
not only of having received 150 daughters of kings and princes, but also
of having enriched heaven with an immense number of beatified and
canonized virgins.
[Insert following, ^dS^ ll^lntwccn^^ 98, G rmc? 98, 7, at p.lL]
11. Penitential Brotherhoods and Tertiaries of the Mendicant Orders. —
Carl Miiller was the first to throw light upon this obscure period in the
history of the Franciscans. The results of his investigations are essen-
tially the following : In consequence of the appearance of St. Francis
as a preacher of repentance and of the kingdom of God there arose a
religious movement which, not merely had as its result the securing of
numerous adherents to the association of Minor Brethren directed by
himself, as well as to the society of ^^ poor icomen " attaching itself to St.
Clara, but also awakened in many, who by marriage and family duties
were debarred from entering these orders, the desire to lead a life of
penitence and asceticism removed from the noisy turmoil of the world
in the quiet of their own homes while continuing their industrial
employments and the discharge of civil duties. As originating in the
movement inaugurated by St. Francis, these " i'Vaf /•<?;? pavuYc/ifiVc " de-
signated themselves " the third order of St. Francis,''^ and as such made
the claim that they should not be disturbed in their retired penitential
life to engage upon services for the State, military duty, and so forth.
In this way they frequently came into conflict with the civil courts.
Although in this direction powerfully supported by the papal curia, the
brotherhoods were just so much the less able to press their claim to
immunity in proportion as they spread and became more numerous
throughout the cities of Italy, and the greater the rush into their ranks
became from day to day from all classes, men and women, married and
unmarried. The right of spiritual direction and visitation of them was
assigned in a.d. 1234 by Gregory IX. to the bishops ; but in a.d. 1247
Innocent IV., at the request of the Minorites, issued an ordinance accord-
ing to which this right was to be given to them, but they were not able
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 463
in any case to carry it out. Not only the secular clergy were opposed,
but they were vigorously aided in their resistance by the Dominicans. — In
A.D. 1209, at the beginning of the Albigeusian crusade, St. Dominic had
founded, at Toulouse, an association of married men and women under
the name of IHilitia CJiristi, which, recognisable by the wearing of a
common style of dress, undertook to vindicate the faith of the church
against heretics, to restore again any goods that had wrongfully been
appropriated by them, to protect widows and orphans, etc. This Militia
migrated from France to Italy. Although originally founded for quite
different purposes than the Penitential brotherhoods, it had the same
privileges as these enjoyed conferred upon it by the popes, and assimi-
lated itself largely to these in respect of mode of life and ascetic practices,
and practically became amalgamated 'with them. But still the Peni-
tential brotherhoods]always formed a neutral territory, upon which, ac-
cording to circumstances, sometimes the secular clergy, and sometimes
one or other of the two mendicant orders, but much more frequently the
Minorite clergy, exercised visitation rights. The first attempt at effect-
ing a definite separation arose from the Dominicans, whose seventh
general, Murione de Zamorra, prescribed a rule to those Penitential
brotherhoods which were more closely related to his order. Upon their
adopting it they were loosed from the general society as " Fratres de
Pocnitentia " S. Dominici, and described as exclusively attached to the
preaching order. In a.d. 1288, however, Jerome of Arcoli, the former
general of the Franciscans, ascended the papal throne as Nicholas IV.,
and now used all means in his power to secure to his own order the
supremacy in every department. In the following year, a.d. 1289, he
issued the bill Supra montem, in which he prescribed (statuimus) a rule
of his own for all Penitential brotherhoods ; and then, since on this point,
out of regard for the powerful Dominican order, he did not venture to do
more than simply recommend, added the advice {consulimus), that the
visitation and instruction of these should be assigned to the Minorite
superiors, giving as a reason that all these institutions owed their origin
to St. Francis. Against both the prescription and the advice, however, the
bishops, as well in the interest of their own prerogatives as for the protec-
tion of their clergy, threatened in vocation and income, raised a vigorous
and persistent protest, which at last, however, succumbed before the
supreme power of the pope and the marked preference on the part of the
people for the clergy of the orders. Those brotherhoods which adopted
the rule thus obtruded on them stood now in the position of rivals,
alongside of those of St. Dominic, as " Fratres de pcenitentia " S. Irancisci.
The Dominican Penitentials afterwards adopted the name and character
of a " third order of St. Dominic " or " Tertiaries.'' In the Franciscan
legends, however, the rule drawn up by Nicholas IV. soon came to be
represented as the one prescribed to the Penitentials on their first appear-
4G4 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH CtERMAN EDITION.
ance in a.d. 1221 by St. Francis himself, only ratified anew by the pope,
and has been generally regarded as such down to our own day. — The rapid
growth in jDOwer and influence which the two older mendicant orders
owe to the Tertiary Societies, induced also the later mendicant orders to
produce an imitation of them within the range of their activity. Crossing
the Alps the Penitential brotherhoods found among these orders, on this
side, an open door, — the Franciscan brothers being especially numerous,
— and entered into peculiarly intimate relations with the Beghard
societies which had sprung up there, forming, like them, associations of
a monastic type.
[Substitute foUoicing, § 108, 10-16, in place of% 108, 10-12,
pp. 133-13G.]
10. The Waldensians. (1) Their Origin. — A citizen of Lyons, named
Valdez (Valdesius, Waldus, the Christian name of Peter, given to him
first 120 years later, is quite unsupported), who had become rich by the
practice of usury, an occupation condemned by the church, was about
A.D. 1173 deeply impressed by reading the legend of St. Alexius, and was
in his spiritual anxiety directed by a theologian to the words of Christ
to the rich youog ruler in Matthew xix. 21. Making over to his wife
only his landed property, and distributing all the rest of his possessions
among the poor, and then, for further instruction in regard to the imita-
tion of Christ required of him, having applied himself to the study of the
gospels, the Psalter, and other biblical books, and a selection of classical
passages translated for his use by two friendly priests out of the writings
of the Fathers into the Romance dialect, he founded in a.d. 1177, in
company with certain men and women, who were prepared like himself
to abandon the world and all its goods, a society for preaching the gospel
among the people. In accordance with the Lord's command to the
seventy disciples (Luke x. 1-4), they went forth two and two in apostolic
costume, in woollen penitential garments, without staff or scrip, their
feet protected with merely wooden sandals (mbatas, sabots), preaching
repentance, and proclaiming the gospel message of salvation throughout
the land, in order to bring back again among the people the Christian
life in its purity and simplicity. The Archbishop of Lyons prohibited
their preaching ; but they referred to Acts v. 29, and appealed, prayiug
for a confirmation of their association, to the Third Lateran Council
of A.D. 1179, under Alexander III., which, however, scornfully dismissed
their appeal. As they nevertheless still continued to preach. Pope Lucius
III., at the Council of Verona, in a.d. 1181, laid them under the ban.
They had hitherto no intention of offering any sort of opposition to
the doctrine, worship, or constitution of the Catholic church. Even the
Catholic authorities did not so much take offence at what they preached
ADDITIONS FHOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 465
but rather only at this, that they without ecclesiastical call and autho-
rity had assumed the function of preaching. Innocent III., also, ad-
mitted the imprudence of his predecessor, and favoured the plan of a
Waldensian who had left his brethren to transform the association of
the Pauperes da Lugduno into the monastic-like lay union of Pauperes
CatJioUci, to which in a.d. 120S he assigned the duties of preaching,
expounding Scripture, and holding meetings for edification under episco-
pal supervision. But this concession came too late. Since the church
had itself broken off the fetters w4iich had previously bound them to the
traditional faith of the Catholic church, the Leonists had gone too far
upon the path of evangelical freedom to be satisfied with any such terms.
Innocent now renewed the ban against them at the Fourth Lateran
Council of A.D. 1215. Of the later life and work of the founder we know
with certainty only this, that he made extensive journeys in the inte-
rests of his cause. Even during his lifetime (he died probably about
A.D. 1217) the members (socii) of the society {Societas Valdesiana)
founded by him had spread themselves in great numbers over the whole
of the south of France, the east of Spain, the north of Italy, and the
south of Germany, and had even crossed the Channel into England.
They were named, in accordance with their fundamental principle, as
well as from the starting point of their apostolic mission, Pauperes de
Lugduno or Leonistce — ivova Lyons, also from the covering of their feet,
Sabatati ; but they styled themselves among one another fratres and
sorores, and their adherents among the people amici and amicce ; while
the Catholic polemical writers, who for a similar class among the Cathari
had employed the distinctive terms Perfecti and Credentes, made use of
these designations in treating of the Waldensians. The latter continue
" in the world," that is, in the exercise of their family duties, and the
discharge of civil obligations, and all the positions and entanglements
connected therewith ; while the former devoted themselves to a celibate
life, to absolute poverty, to incessant preaching from place to place, and
to unconditional refusal of all oathtaking, and a literal acceptance of all
the precepts of the Sermon on the Mount, involving the rejection of any
sort of fixed residence, and on the basis of Luke x. 7, 8, any handiwork
that would earn for them the necessaries of life. They had their own
ministri for the administration of the sacraments ; but these were
elected only ad tempus, namely once a year, simply for the discharge of
that duty. At the head of the whole community down to his death
stood the founder himself. He led the entire movement, received new
members into the societas, and chose and ordained the ministri. — The
two most important sources for the primitive history of the Waldensian
movement, mutually supplementing one another, are, the Chronicon
Laudunense of an unnamed canon of Laon in the Blon. Germ. Scrr. xxvi.
447, and the tract De Septcm Donis Sp'r. S. of the inquisitor Stephen de
30
466 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
Borbone, who died a.d. 12G1, which is given in full in de la Marche,
Anecdotes historiques, etc., Paris, 1877.
11. (2) Their Divisions. — One of the oldest, most important, and most
reliable sources of information regarding the affairs of the old Walden-
sians was first published ly Preger in 1875, in his Beitrage z. Gesch. d.
Waldensier im MA., namely, an epistle embodied by the " anonymous
writer of Passau " in his heretic catalogue, from the " Poor Men of Italy "
to their fellow believers in Germany, ad Leonistas in Alamannia, in
which they give a report of the proceedings at a convention held at
Bergamo in a.d. 1218, with the deputies fvom^^ the ultramontane,'^ that is,
the French, " Poor Men." On the basis of this communication Preger
has contested the view that the " Poor Men of Italy " were the Walden-
sians, and traces their origin rather to the working men's association
of the Ilnmiliati that had already sprung up in the eleventh century
(§ 98, 7), which having even before this, by adopting Arnoldist ideas,
become estranged from the Catholic church, came also into connection
with Valdez, appropriated many of his opinions, and then entered into
fraternal relations with the French Waldesians. This theory, as also
no less the explanations connected therewith of the constitutional and
doctrinal differences of the two parties, has been proved by Carl Miiller in
his Die Waldensier u. Hire eiiizelne Gruppen his Auf d, 14. Jhd. to be
in many particulars untenable, and he has shown that the "Waldensiau
origin of "the Poor Men of Lombardy," is witnessed to even by this
epistle. The results of his researches are in the main as follows : The
movement set on foot in a.d. 1177 by Valdez of Lyons in the direction
of an apostolic walk and conversation was transplanted at a very early
period into northern Italy, and found there a favourable reception,
especially in the ranks of the Humiliati. These, too, as well as Valdez,
in A.D. 1179, approached Alexander III. with the prayer to authorize
their entering on such a vocation, but were also ^immediately repulsed,
attached themselves then to the " Poor Men of Lyons," submitting to the
monarchical rule of their founder, and along with them, in a.d. 1181, fell
under the papal ban. Yet among the Lombards a strong craving after
greater independence and freedom soon found expression, which asserted
itself most decidedly in the claim to the right of their own independent
choice and ordination of lifelong organs of government for their society,
as well as for priestly services, which, however, Valdez, fearing a dissolu-
tion of the whole society from the granting of such partial independence,
answered with a decided refusal. With equal decision did he insist
upon the disbanding of those workmen's associations for common pro-
duction, which the Lombards, as formerly the Humiliati, formed from
the laymen belonging to them, and forbade them even engaging in any
handicraft which they had hitherto pursued alongside of their spiritual
■vocations, as inconsistent with the apostolic life according to the pre-
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GEEMAN EDITION. 467
scriptions of Christ in Luke x. Thus it came about, in consequence of
the unyielding temper of both parties, that there was a formal split ; for
the Lombards appointed their own independent prcepositus, who, just
like their ministri charged with the conduct of worship, held office for
life. In the course of the year the split widened through the adoption of
other divergences on the part of the Lombards. Yet after the death
of the founder, about a.d. 1217 they entered upon negotiations about
a reunion, which found a hearty response also among the French. By
means of epistolary explanations a basis for union in regard to those
questions which had occasioned the separation had already been attained
unto. The French granted to the Lombards independent election and
ordination of their ministers for church government and worship, and
allowed the appointment to be for life, while they also agi-eed to the
continuance of their workmen's associations. In May, a.d. 1218, six
brethren from the two parties were at Bergamo appointed to draw up
definite terms of peace, and to secure a verbal explanation of other less
important differences, which was also accomplished without difficult}'.
The whole peace negotiations, however, were ultimately shattered over
two questions, which first came to the front during the verbal explana-
tions : (i.) Over the question of the felicity of the deceased founder, which
the Lombards were disposed to affirm only conditionally, i.e. in case he
had been penitent before his death for the sins of which he had been
guilty through his intolerant treatment of them, while the French would
have it affirmed unconditionally ; and (ii.) over the controversy about the
validity of the dispensation of the sacrament of the altar by an unworthy
person. On both sides they were thoroughly agreed in saying that not
the priest, but the omniiDoteuce of God, changed bread and wine in the
Lord's Supper into the body and blood of Christ. But while the French
drew from this the conclusion that even an unworthy and wicked priest
could truly and effectually administer the sacrament, the Italians per-
sisted in the contrary opinion, and quoted Scripture and the writings of
the Fathers.to prove the correctness of their views.
12. (3) Attempts at Catholicizing. — On the origin, character, and task
of the Fauperes CathoUci referred to above, the epistles of Pope Innocent
III. regarding them afford us pretty accurate and detailed information.
The first impulse toward their formation was given by a disputation
with the French Waldensians held by Bishop Diego of Osma at Pamiers
in A.D. 1206, by means of which he succeeded, aided by the powerful
co-operation of his companion St. Dominie, in persuading a number of
the heretics to return to the obedience of the Catholic church. Among
those converted on that occasion was the Spaniard Durandus of Osca
(Huesca), who now laid before the pope the plan of forming from among
the converted "Waldensians a society of Catholic Poor Men under the
oversight of the bishops, which, by appropriating and carrying out all
4G8 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
the fundamental principles of the Walclensian sj'stem— apostolic poverty,
apostolic dress, apostolic life, and apostolic vocation, according to
Luke X. — would not only paralyse or outbid the ministry of the heretical
Poor Men among the people, but ^YOuld also open up the way for their
own return and attachment again to the church. The pope approved of
his plan, and confirmed the union founded by him in a.d. 1208. The
undertaking of Durandus seems to have been from the first not altogether
without success in the direction intended. At least we find that Bernard
Primus was encouraged one and a half years later to found a second
similar society on essentially the same basis, which Innocent III. ap-
proved and confirmed. This later association was distinguished from
the earlier only in this, that it allowed its members, besides their itinerant
preaching and pastoral work, to engage also in their own handicraft.
We are now led, by this difference, to the conclusion that, as the in-
stitution of Durandus issued from the bosom of the French Waldensians,
that of Bernard had its origin among the groups of the Poor Men of
Lombardy. This supposition is further confirmed when we observe that
the latter, in drawing up its Catholic confession of faith, expressly abjures
the formerly cherished conviction of the inefficacy of sacramental actions
performed by unworthy priests. But the reason why both these unions,
notwithstanding papal approval and support, failed to exert any per-
manent influence is to be sought pre-eminently in this, that, tainted
as their reputation was with the memory of their former heresy, they
were soon far outrun and overshadowed by the two great mendicant
orders, which wrought with ampler means and appliances in the same
direction.
13. (4) The French Societies. — What these found fault with in the
Catholic church was, not its dogmatics, to which, with the single excep-
tion of the doctrine of purgatory and all therewith connected, indulgence,
masses for souls, foundations, alms, and works of piety on behalf of the
dead, they firmly adhered ; nor yet its liturgical institutions, which,
with the exception of masses for souls, they left untouched ; nor yet its
hierarchical constitutions perse, for they transferred its leading principles
into their own organization : but it was simply this, that its clergy had
become guilty of the deadly sin of assuming and exercising the apostolic
prerogative without undertaking the obligations of apostolic poverty,
the apostolic life, and the apostolic vocation, which alone warranted such
assumption. But as they thus, nevertheless, firmly adhered to the
Catholic principle of the validity of a sacrament administered even by
an unworthy person, if only he had authority for doing so from the
church, they could allow themselves, and specially their lay adherents,
to take part in all Catholic services and acts of worship, without regard-
ing themselves or their followers as under obligation to yield obedience
to the pope and the bishops, or to recognise their spiritual jurisdiction,
ADDITIONS FRO^I THE TENTH GER^vlAN EDITION. 469
authority to inflict punishment, and right of arbitrary legislation in
regard to fasts, festivals, impediments to marriage, etc. — As to the
organization of the society, it is now perfectly clear that there was a
threefold division of offices : bishops, presbyters, and deacons. Recep-
tion into the Societas Fratnnii was consummated by the imparting of the
ordination of deacon. This, however, was preceded by a longer or shorter
novitiate, i.e. a period of trial and preparation for the apostolic vocation
of preaching. The entrance into this novitiate (conversio) required the
surrender of all property for the benefit of the poor, and on the part of
those already married the abandonment of every form of marital rela-
tionship; and on reception into the brotherhood the vow of obedience
to tbe superiors was exacted, as well as a vow of celibacy and chastity.
— To the bishop, who as such was also called minister and major or
majoralis, belonged the right to administer the sacraments of penance
and ordination, as well as the consecration of the eucharistic elements ;
he might preach wherever he chose, and he assigned to presbyters and
deacons their spheres of labour. The presbyters, in addition to preach-
ing, also heard confessions, imposed penance, and granted absolution,
but did not administer the punishments imposed, for this was the ex-
clusive function of the bishop. — The deacons were only to preach, but
not to hear confession, and their special duty consisted in collecting
contributions for the support of the brethren. That also women, on the
basis of Titus ii. 3, 4, were admitted into these societies is an undoubted
fact. Their position was essentially the same as that of the deacons;
but the number of preaching sisters continued always relatively small.
— After the death of the founder the society once a year chose from
among the existing bishops two rectores, who now together administered
that supreme government and high priesthood which had previously
been exercised by the founder alone. It was, however, by-and-by found
desirable to revert to the older monarchical constitution, but all through
the 13th century this office was held only by a yearly tenure. The
retiring bishops, however, received for life the rank and title of major.
But even over the rector stood tbe commune or congregatio ; i.e. the
general chapter assembled once or twice in the year, in which the
brethren of all the three orders had a seat and vote. The obligation
to wear the apostolic dress, persistence in which would have in a
very short time thrown all the brethren into the Moloch arms of the
Inquisition, was abandoned soon after the erection of that tribunal in
A.D. 1232. — The lay adherents attracted by the preaching and pastoral
activity of the bretluren, the so-called Amici, Fautores, Receptatores,
were not organized as exclusive and independent communities, because
their continued participation in the services and sacraments of the
Catholic church was regarded as permissible. On the other hand, they
maintained, as far as possible, regular intercourse with the brethren,
470 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
who in various styles of dress visited them secretly, precached to them,
exhorted and instructed them, prayed with them and said grace at their
tables, heard their confessions, imposed penances and granted absolution,
uttering the formula of absolution, however, not in the language of an
absolute judicial proclamation, but as a supplication and fervent desire.
The Amici were allowed to make their Easter confession and observance
of the Supper at the Catholic service. The brethren had of course also
an independent celebration of the Lord's Supper, which occurred only
once a year, on Maundy Thursday, but was confined as a rule to the
brothers and sisters there assembled. The profound acquaintance with
Holy Scripture, especially the New Testament, not only among the
preaching "brothers," but also among their "friends," many of whom
knew by heart a large portion of the New Testament, was the subject
of general remark and the occasion of astonishment. Besides Holy
Scripture, the selection of patristic passages used by Valdez and the
Moralla of Gregory the Great were in high repute as means of instruc-
tion and edification. — The systematic efforts put forth from a.d. 1232
for the uprooting and extirpa-ting of heresy wrought effectually among
the French Waldensian "brethren" and "friends." The remnants
of them that survived the persecution were driven farther and farther
into the remotest valleys of the western and eastern spurs of the Cottiau
Alps, into Dauphine and Provence on the French side, and into Piedmont
on the Italian side. — The most important sources are: Adv. Valdens.
sectam, of Bernard Abbot of Fonscalidus, who died in a.d. 1193 ; Doc-
trina de Moda Frocedeudi a Hcerct. of the Inquisition at Carcassone
and Toulouse of A. r>. 1280 ; the consultatio of Arch. Peter Amelius of
Narbonne and the jDrovincial synods held under him in a.d. 1213,
1214 ; and the recently published Practica InqiiisitiGn. of the inquisitor
Bernard Guidonis of a.d. 1321.— Continuation, § 119, 9a, in Appendix.
14. A rej)resentation of the origin and character of the old Waldensian
movement completely different from that given in the sources mentioned
and used in the preceding sections, especially in reference to the French
societies, has been current since the middle of the IGth century in the
modern Waldensian tradition, and by means of falsified or misunderstood
documents has been repeated by most Protestant historians down to
and including U . Hahn. The investigations of Dieckhoff and Herzog
first demolished for ever those fabulous creations of Waldensian mytho-
logy, though more recent Waldensian writers, e.g. Hudry-Menos, but
not Comba, seek still tenaciously to assert their truth. According to
these traditions, long before the days of Waldus of Lyons there were
Waldensian, i.e. Vallensian communities in the valleys of Piedmont,
the " Israel -of the Alps," the bearers of j)ure gospel truth, whose origin
was to be traced back at least to Claudius of Turin, while others fondly
carried it back to the Apostle Paul, who on liis journey to Spain (Rom. xv.
ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 471
24) may have also visited the Piedmontese valleys. It was to them that
Peter of Lyons owed his spiritual awakening and his surname of Waldus,
i.r. the ^Yaldensian. For proof of this assertion we are referred to a
pretty copious manuscript literature said to be old "Waldensian, written
in a peculiar Romance dialect, deposited in the libraries of Geneva,
Dublin, Cambridge, Ziirich, Grenoble, and Paris. Upon close and un-
prejudiced examination of these literar.y pieces, of which the oldest
portion cannot possibly claim an earlier date than the beginning of the
14th century, it has become quite apparent that these, in so far as they
are not fabrications or interpolations, do not afford the least grounds for
justifying those Waldensian fantasies. This view is further corroborated
by the fact, that the most careful and thorough investigator in this
department, Carl Miiller, confidently maintains the conviction and shows
the basis on which it rests, " that the whole so-called Waldensian
literature of the pre-Hussite period has been without exception derived
from Catholic and not from Waldensian sources." The falsifications in
this reputed old Waldensian group of writings referred to, by means of
interpolation, omission, and alteration in the tracts belonging to that
collection, as well as the forging of new writings, and that simply for
the purpose of vindicating for their society the mythical fame of a
primitive, indejDendent, and ever pure evangelical church, first found
place after the Protestantizing of the Romance or Piedmontese Wal-
densians, and were thereafter successfully turned to account bona or
viala fide by their historians, Perrin, Leger, Muston, Monastier, etc.
In the Nohla laiczon { = lectio), e.g. a religious doctrinal poem, in the
statement of vv. G, 7, that since the origin of the New Testament
writings 1,400 years had passed (mil e 4 cent anz) the figure 4 was
erased, so that it might appear to be an ascertained fact that in a.d. 1100,
seventy years before the appearance of Waldus, there were already
Waldensian communities in existence. But when, in a.d. 1862, the
Morland manuscripts, which had been lost for 200 years, were again dis-
covered in Cambridge library, there was found among them a copy of
the Nohla laiczon, in which before the word cent an erasure was ob-
servable, in which the outlines of the loop of the Arabic numeral 4 were
still clearly discernible. In another piece contained in this collection
the passage referred to was quoted as "mil e CCCC anz." Hussite
writings translated from the Bohemian were also pahned off as genuine
Waldensian works of the earlier centuries, and were in addition provided
with the corresponding date. A manuscript of the New Testament at
Zurich was assigned to the 12th century ; but en more careful scrutiny
it was shown that the writer must have had before him the Greek
Testament of Erasmus. But the most glaring case of falsification
is seen in the "Waldensian Confession of Faith," first adduced by
Perrin as evidence of the faith of the old Waldensians, to which a later
472 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
band had ascribed as the date of its composition the year 1120. It
copies almost word for word the utterances of Bucer as given in Morel's
report of his negotiations with that divine and CEcolampadius. In this
way a new stamp has been put upon the doctrinal articles of the old
"Waldensians.
15. (5) The Lombard-German Branch.— In regard to the Lombards
themselves, since the epistle of Bergamo we have only scanty reports,
and these are found in the treatise of Monata, of 1240, Adv. Catharos d
Valdenses, and in the Sunwia de Catharis et Leonistis of the Dominican
inquisitor Bainerius Sacchoni, of 1250. We have ampler accounts, how-
ever, from their German mission-field, which had already extended so
far as to stretch from the Rhine provinces into Austria. From the time
of the unsuccessful endeavours at Bergamo to effect a union between the
two principal groups, there was, so far as we are aware, no further inter-
course between the two. On the other hand, the German Waldensians
during the 13th and 14th centuries maintained a pretty regular com-
munication with their Italian brethren. — In general, too, the Lombards
continued, along with their German offspring, to hold firmly by the fun-
damental tenets of the primitive Waldensian faith. Their preaching
brothers and sisters were also called in Germany Meister [magistri) and
Mehterinnen, the men also Apostles and Twelve- Aponles^ or, since also
there, next to preaching, they had as their most essential and important
spiritual function the administration of the sacrament of penance, Beicli-
tiger (bUiter), confessors. The view that had been already so vigorously
maintained at Bergamo, that a priest guilty of mortal sin, and such in
their eyes were all Catholic priests, could not efficaciously administer
any sacrament, led them naturally to assume a much freer attitude toward
the Catholic church, which summed itself up in the radical principle, that
everything connected with that church which cannot be shown from the
New Testament to have been expressly taught and enjoined by Christ or
His apostles, is to be set aside as an uuevangelical human addition. This
position however was insisted upon by them less in criticism and con-
futation of the church doctrine than in opposition to the practices of the
church as a whole. In consequence of this criticism, they, transcend-
ing far the mere negations of the French, rejected not only all church
festivals, beyond the simple Sunday festival, not only all processions and
pilgrimages, all ceremonies, candles, incense, holy water, images, litur-
gical dress and cloths, all consecrations and blessing of churches, bells,
burying grounds, candles, ashes, palms, robes, salt, water, etc., but also
the centre and climax of all Catholic worship, the mass ; not only of
purgatory and everything in church practice that had sprung from it,
not only ban and interdict, but also invocation of saints, image and relic
worship, etc. Yet all the masters did not go equally far in this negative
direction. Especially during the second half of the 13th century a
ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 473
remarkable reaction set in against the severity and exclusiveness of that
negation, because increasing persecution obliged them to withdraw into
secrec}' as much as possible with their confession and their specifically
Waldensian forms of worship, or to suspend their services altogether, and
indeed, to save themselves from the suspicion of heresy, to allow to
themselves and their lay adherents liberty to engage in the services of
the Catholic church, and to submit to the indispensable demands of the
church, such as the attendance at mass, making confession, and taking
the communion at Easter. They held indeed firmly by the principle,
Quod saccrdos in mortall peccato sacramention non possit conjicere, but
they comforted themselves by the assurance already expressed at Ber-
gamo, that the Lord Himself directly gives to the worthy communicant
who, in case of need, receives the sacrament from the hand of an un-
worthy priest, what by him cannot be communicated, for the transub-
stantiation is effected not in maim indlgne conficientis, but in ore digne
sumentis. Thus during the times of oppression they kept their own ob-
servance of the supper quite in abeyance, the dispensation of which was
not among them, as among the French, restricted to the masters; but on
this account they laid all the greater weight on the necessity of confession
to their own clergy as those who could alone give absolution. Also the
prohibition of all oaths as well as bloodsheddiug, therefore also of military
service, and the acceptance of magisterial and judicial offices, was strictly
adhered to. — A peculiar adaptation of the Roman Catholic tradition of
the baptism and donation of Constantine, which seems to have found no
acceptance among the French, became a favourite legend among all the
Lombard and German Waldensians. According to it the ancient church
had existed for three hundred years in apostolic humility, simplicity, and
poverty. But when the Roman bishop Sylvester was endowed by the
emperor Constantine the Great with such superabundance of worldly
might, riches, and honour, the period of general decline from the apo-
stolic pattern set in. Only one of his fellow clergy protested, and was,
when all enticements and threatenings proved of no avail, driven away
along with his adherents. The latter increased and spread by-and-by
over the earth. After a violent persecution, which had almost cut off all
of them, Peter Waldus made his appearance with his companion, John
of Lyons, as the restorer of the apostolic life and calling, etc. To this
there was subsequently attached another legend. The brethren had pre-
viously based their right to discharge all priestly functions with the
greatest confidence simply on their apostolic life, and so they could not
conceal from themselves at a later period tbe fact that the want of
continued apostolic succession, on which the Catholic church rested the
claims of their priests, would place the Waldensian masters very much
in the shade as compared with the Catholics. They began, therefore,
not only to claim that their founder Waldus had been previously a
474 ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GEKMAN EDITION.
Eoman jDresbyter, but also to devise the fable of a bishop or even a
cardinal of the Eomish church, through whose favour that defect had
been overcome.— Coutinuation, § ll'j, 9, Appendix.
IG. (G) Relations between the Waldeiisians and Older and Contemporary
Sects.— Owing to the extraordinarily lively and zealous propagandist
activity of the sects at the time of the origin and early development of
the ^Yaldensian movement, there can scarcely be a doubt that the latter,
after it had freed itself from all obligation of obedience to the pope and
bishops, and had been driven out by them, must at various points have
come into close relations with the other sects which, like it, had risen in
rebellion against the papacy and the hierarchy, and like it had been per-
secuted by these. The numerous sect of the Cathari holds a conspicuous
position in this connection. That Waldus and his companious must
have decidedly repudiated the dualistic principles which all these other-
wise greatly diverging Catharist sects had in common is indeed quite
self-evident ; but this by no means prevented them from recognising and
appropriating such particular institutions, forms of organization or
modes of worship, peculiar moral requirements, etc., practised by them
as might seem fitted to further their own ends. And that this actually
was done, many noticeable points of agreement between the two plainly
indicate. Thus on both sides we find a similar division of members, the
Perfccti and Credentes corresponding to the Fratres and Amid, and the
kind of spiritual care which the former took of the latter, the grace at
table said by the itinerant preachers, the importance attached to the
possession and use of bread that had been blessed by the brethren, the
frequent use by both of the Lord's Prayer, the rejection of purgatory and
everything connected therewith, also the prohibition of swearing and of
military service, the refusal of the magisterial jus glaclii, etc. On the
other hand, however, it is more than probable that at last the remnants
of the Cathari which escaped the Inquisition in great part had found
refuge among the Waldensians in the valleys of the Cottian Alps, and
there became assimilated and amalgamated with them (§ 119, 9a, Ap-
pendix).— Further, the assumption that the Lombard Waldensians had
first reached the principle by which they are distinguished from their
French brethren, about the incapacity of unworthy priests for dispensing
the sacraments, from outside influences, perhaps from the Arnoldists, is
raised almost to a certainty by the statement made by their deputies
at Bergamo in a.d. 1218, that they had even themselves in earlier times
held the opposite view. — Even the pantheistic tendency of an Amalrich
and the Brethren of the New Spirit may have found entrance among the
German Waldensians, and have there given origin to the sect of the
Ortlibarians.
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GEEMAN EDITION. 475
[Substitute for § 119. 9, at j). 214, the foUowlng two
sections.]
9. The Waldensians. — (1) The mnge of the missionary enterprise of
the Lombard-German Waldensians was widely extended during the 14th
century. At the close of that period it stretched " from western Swit-
zerland across the southern borders of the empire, from the upper and
middle Ehine along the Main and through Franconia into Thuringia,
from Bohemia up to Brandenburg and Pomerania, and with its last
advances reached to Prussia, Poland, Silesia, Hungary, Transylvania,
and Galicia." The anonymous writer of Passau, about a.d. 1260 or
1316, reports from his awn knowledge of numerous •' Leonists," who in
forty-two communities, with a bishop at Einzinspach, in the diocese of
Passau, were in his time the subject of iniquisitorial interference, and in
theory and practice bore all the characteristic marks of the Lombard
Leonists. The same applies to the Austrian \Yaldensians, of whose
persecution in a.d. 1391 we have an account by Peter of Pilichdorf. We
may also with equal confidence pronounce the Winkelers, so called from
holding their services in secret corners, who about this time appeared in
Bavaria, Franconia, Swabia, and the Ehine Provinces, to be "Walden-
sians of the same Lombard type. Their confessors, ^Yinkelers in the
narrower sense, were itinerant, celibate, and without fixed abode, carry-
ing on missionary work, and administering the sacrament of penance to
their adherents. Although, in order to avoid the attentions of the Inqui-
sition, they took part in the Catholic services, and in case of need
confessed to Catholic priests, they were nevertheless traced about a.d.
1400 to Strassburg. Thirty-two of them were thrown into prison, and
induced under torture to confess. The Dominicans insisted that they
should be immediately burned, but the council was satisfied with ban-
ishing them from the city. At a later period the Hussites obtained an
influence over them. One of their most notable apostles at this time
was Fr. Eeiser of Swabia. In his travels he went to Bohemia, attached
himself to the Hussites there, received from them priestly ordination,
and in a.d. 1433 accompanied their representatives to the Basel Council.
Then Procopius procured him a call to a pastorate in the little Bohemian
town of Landscron, which, however, he soon abandoned. Encouraged
by the reformatory tendency of the council, he now remained for a long
time in Basel, then conducted missionary work in Germany, at first ou
his own account, afterwards at the head of a Taborite mission of twelve
agents, in which position he styled himself Fridericus Dei gratia Epi-
scojnis fidelium in Romana ccclesia Comtantini donationem spernentium.
At last, in a.d. 1457, he went to Strassburg, with the intention of there
ending his days in peace. But soon after his arrival he was appre-
hended, and in a.d, 1458, along with his faithful follower, Anna Weiler,
47G ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
put to death at the stake.— On the WalJensians in German Switzerland,
and the Inqui^jition's oft repeated interference] with them, Ochseubein
gives a full report, drawn from orginal documents, specially full in regard
to the great Inquisition trial at Freiburg, in a.d. 1430, consisting of
ninety-nine wearisome and detailed examinations. Subsequently ter-
rible persecutions, aiming at their extermination, became still more
frequent in Switzerland. Also the Swiss Waldensians already bore un-
mistakable marks of having been influenced by the Hussites. Finally,
Watteubach has made interesting communications regarding the Wal-
densians in Pomerania and Brandenburg, based upon a manuscript once
in the possession of Flacius, but afterwards supposed to have been lost,
discovered again in the Wulfenbiittel library in a.d. 188i, though in a very
defective form, which contains the orginal reports of -143 prosecutions
for heresy in Pomerania, Brandenburg, and Thuringia. By far the
greatest number of these trials were conducted between a.d. 1373 and
1394, by the Coelestine provincial Peter, appointed inquisitor by the pope.
From A.D. 1383 Stettin was the centre of his inquisitorial activity, and
on the conclusion of his work he could boast that during the last two
years he had converted to the Catholic faith more than 1,000 Walden-
sians. The victims of the Inquisition belonged almost exclusively to
the peasant and artisan classes. Their objectionable doctrines and
opinions are essentially almost the same as those of their ancestors
of the 13th century. Although equally with their predecessors they
abhorred the practice of the Catholic church, and declared all swearing
and slaughter to be mortal sin, they yet in great part, and as it seems
even without the application of torture, were persuaded to abjure their
heresy, and incurred nothing more than a light penance. They did this,
perhaps, only in the hope that their indulgent confessors would absolve
them from their sin. The last protocols bring us down to a.d. 1458.
Since a great number of these heretics were found again in Brandenburg,
the elector caused one of their most distinguished leaders, the tailor
Matthew Hagen, and three of his disciples to be taken prisoners to
Berlin, and commissioned the Bishop of Brandenburg to investigate the
case ; but owing to his sickness this duty devolved upon John Canne-
mann, professor and doctor of theology. The elector was himself
present at the trial. The investigation showed that the Waldensians
of Brandenburg had evidently been influenced in their opinions by the
Bohemian Taborites, and that they were constantly in close communion
with them, and Hagen confessed that he had been there ordained by Fr.
llyss or Reiser to the clerical office. When Hagen persistently refused
to retract, he was delivered over to the civil authorities for punishment,
and was by them executed, probably at the stake. His three companions
abjured their heresy, and on submitting to church discipline and wearing
clothes marked with the sign of the cross, were pardoned, Canucmann
ADDITIONS FEOM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION. 477
then proceeded to Angermiinde, where in the city and surrounding
country crowds of such heretics resided ; and there he succeeded without
great difficulty in bringing them to abjure their errors and accept the
Catholic confession. — The Waldensiaus in Bohemia and Moravia quite
voluntarily amalgamated with the " United Brethren " there. The rem-
nants of the German and Swiss Waldensians may have attached them-
selves to the Reformation of the 16th century, but probably for the most
part to the Protestant sects of that age, some joining Schwenkfeld, and
still more going with the Anabaptists, to whom they were essentially
much more closely related than to Luther or Zwingli. — As to the ulti-
mate fate of the Lombard Waldensians themselves, we know nothing.
Probably many of them sought escape from the persecutions which
raged against them among the French Waldensians in the valleys of
Piedmont.
9a. — (2) The remnants of the French "Waldensians and their lay adhe-
rents down to the beginning of the lith century had for the most part set-
tled in the remote and little cultivated valleys on both sides of the Cottian
Alps. This settlement, which bore the character of an assembly as well
as that of an isolation, now rendered indispensable the organization of
an independent congregational order, such as had never been attempted
before. In the arrangements of this community, not only was the ques-
tion of clerical rank simplified by the combination of the order of bishop
or majoralis with that of the presbyter, to which combined office was given
the honourable designation of " harhe,'" uncle, and instead of the hitherto
annual tenure of this office was introduced a life tenure, but also to the
laity was assigned a share in the church government at their synod
meetings. A bull of John XXII., of a.d. 1332, informs us that then in the
Piedmontese valleys /fa creverinit et multipUcati sunt haretki, jprcecipue
de secta Waldensiuni, quod frequenter congregationes per modum capituli
facere inibi prcBsumpserunt, in quibus aliquando 500 Valdenses fuerunt
insimul congregati; yet certainly not merely clergy, as among the earher
congregations on the yearly tenure. The great, yea, extraordinarily great,
number of the Waldensians in the Piedmontese valleys is proved by this,
that from thence, since a.d. 1310, flourishing colonies of Waldensians
were transplanted into Calabria and Apulia with the connivance of the
larger proprietors in those parts. Those who had settled on the western
side, in tbe province of Dauphine, succumbed completely in a.d. 1545 to
the oft repeated persecutions. The colonies of southern Italy, however,
seem long to have led a quiet and little disturbed life under the protec-
tion of the territorial princes, until their adoption of Protestant views
called down upon them the attention of the Inquisition, aud led to their
utter extermination in a.d. 1561. On the other hand, the Waldensians
of Piedmont, in spite of continuous oppression and frequently renewed
perseeution, maintained their existence down to the present day. When
478 ADDITIONS FROM THE TENTH GERMAN EDITION.
iu tbe beginning of the loth century their residence came nnder the sway
of the Duke of Savoy, the persecutions began, and lasted down to a.d.
1477, when a crusade for their extermination was summoned by Innocent
VIII., which ended in the utter rout of the crusading army by Savoy
and France. They had now a long period of repose, till their adoption
of Protestant views in the IGth century anew awakened against them the
horrors of persecution. In this time of rest brotherly intercourse was
cultivated between the Waldensian groups and the Bohemian Brethren,
who had hitherto maintained relations only with the German Walden-
fcians. This movement orginated with the Bohemians. Even at an
earlier date, these, inspired by the wish to seek abroad what they could
not obtain at home, namely, communion with a church free from
Romish corruptions, had made a voyage of discovery in the east, which
yielded no result. Now, in a.d. 1497, they determined to make another
similar search, under the leadership of Luke of Prague, in the primitive
haunts of the Waldensiaus in France and Italy. The deputies went
forth, beginning with the south of France, and the remnants of the
Frerch communities in their settlements among the Piedmontese Alps.
More detailed reports of their intercourse with these no longer exist, but
it cannot be doubted that there was a mutual interchange of religious
writings. It is a question therefore that has been much discussed as to
which party was the chief gainer by this interchange. But it can now be
no longer questioned that the Waldensians, as those who were far less
advanced in the direction of the evangelical reformation, learnt much
from the Bohemians, and by transferring it into their own literature,
secured it as their permanent property.
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