flesh,' and constrained the British Parliament to 'proclaim liberty' to our poor African brethren " pp. 527, 528. "Again, the national religion raises the tone of public opinion. Wherever the Romans carried their victorious arms, they left the religion of the conquered pagan nations undisturbed, and contented themselves with making their enemies tributary to them. But whence this apparently tolerant forbearance? It arose entirely from this circumstance; that the idolatry of those whom they had subdued did not interfere with their It mattered not who were the gods of the countries they vanquished, provided they did not molest the Roman deities and worship. But very different was the conduct of these restless and ambitious people, when they became masters of Jerusalem. There the inhabitants were treated with every possible cruelty; there the temple was profaned, and laid in ruins; there the God of the Jews was insulted and blasphemed. Why? Because the worship of Jehovah allowed of no homage to any other deity; because an acknowledg

own.

ment of the God of the Jews must have

overthrown all the altars of the empire of the world.-Now this is precisely the case with Christianity. It strikes at the pride of man, and lays him in the dust. All the natural powers of his mind, therefore, are opposed to it. So that the establishment of it by law gives it a countenance, which at least obtains for it a hearing by thousands, who would otherwise think it an insult to their un

derstandings to be entreated to listen

to its melodious accents. Thus the rich and noble, thinking it no disgrace to attend on the worship of the state, are thereby brought under the sound of the Gospel, and made acquainted with those important truths of which they might otherwise never have heard." pp. 531,

532.

Having thus endeavoured to do justice to the respectable work of Mr. Custance, we trust we shall be pardoned if we touch upon a few topics connected with the Reformation, in general of great interest to ourselves, and to which the late aggressions of a pretty large class of writers have particularly directed our attention."

It might have been expected that the immeasurable benefits entailed upon society by the Refor

mation would have, in some measure, disposed every member of a Protestant community to judge with kindness the character and proceedings of the Reformers. It might have been thought that no man could survey the rapid progress of liberty, literature, and freedom of opinion, during the three last centuries, without doing homage to the individuals who, under God, imparted to all of them this new and mighty impulse. But the fact has been otherwise. The religious zeal of the Reformers has cancelled in some eyes all their other excellencies. And those who would have been canonized by some of these high priests of literature, as the reformers of letters and of national and political law, are depreciated or slandered as the credulous and bigoted constructors of formularies and creeds. Among the foremost in this host of assailants, is a certain celebrated Northern Journal. Its last Number contains an article of this kind, which it is not, however, our intention to examine. Happily the eyes of the public are now, generally speaking, opened on the religious character of that work. We shall, therefore, prefer noting down a few capital errors, or rather vices, in treating on the subject of the Reformation, which appear to prevail in modern writers, and especially among the soi-disant philosophical school on both sides of the Tweed.

In the first place, then, we observe a most unmanly desire to depreciate the motives of Luther, and to underrate his services to the great cause of the Reformation. Some of our readers, who are not extensively read in this controversy, may not be unwilling to inspect a brief collection of the imputations which have, at various times, been brought against the father of the Reformation. We give it as drawn up by a most accurate and impartial hand. Luther, then, has been

charged with having struggled for ten years with his conscience, and at last become an Atheist-with having frequently declared, that he would surrender his share in Paradise, if only he might live a hundred years delightfully in the world -with denying the immortality of the soul-with entertaining mean and carnal ideas about heavenwith having composed hymns in favour of drunkenness, to which vice he was greatly addicted-with having caused Amadis to be put into elegant French, in hopes of giving the people a distaste to the holy Scriptures-with not believing a word of what he preached-with having at his death desired to have Divine honours paid to his body. And that the scenes of his death might harmonize with those of his "Jife, it is added, that when his grave was examined, a few days after his decease, the body had vanished, and there issued from the tomb a sulphurous stench fatal to the bystanders. Now, we have inserted this catalogue to show the modern traducers of this great and good man, that if they need the raw material for slander, there exist, as yet, unwrought masses of it which may be wrought up into a vesture as black and flaming as those of the Inquisition itself. Let them only dig deep enough, and they will find poisons as deadly as they can wish, without the trouble of any original combinations. The only possible means by which it is attempted to justify any of these, or indeed most of the modern imputations upon Luther, is by extracts from a little work published by one of his extravagant admirers, called the "Colloquia Mensalia," or " Table Talk." Now, even if some of those best informed on the subject had not denied the authenticity of this work, ought the idle report of some absurd guest at a dinner table to be set against the deliberate statements, the principles, and life of the author himself? There is a single quotation, to which, if

indeed it is unknown to him, we should have been glad to call the attention of Professor Stewart, when deciding on the authority of the Colloquia Mensalia. "Impegit Luthero quod Jobi etiam libro Divinam authoritatem detraxerit,

argumento è convivalibus ejus sermonibus deprompto, at ludicro plane et calumnioso; cum neque libri illius autor unquam fuerit Lutherus, neque eo vivente vel approbante editus sit." (Selden in Otiis. Theolog. p. 489.) But to pass, from the source of these charges, to the charges themselves: one of the most frequent imputations against Luther is that of intolerance-and intolerance not merely of temper (for there we should not feel disposed to enter the lists in defence of some of our Reformers) but of principle. The charge is, that he denied to all others that liberty of opinion which he claimed for himself. Now, if a foundation for this charge is sought in his conduct to the Anabaptists, let it be remembered, that he was, perhaps, the mildest of the more eminent Reformers towards that body; and, moreover, that in this particular case, religious and political opinions were so intimately blended that the blow aimed at the spirit of anarchy and bloodshed may be easily mistaken for an assault upon the freedom of religious belief. The Anabaptists were, in the strongest sense, revolutionists and anarchists: and neither church nor state, neither religion nor government, could have survived their final triumph. This, perhaps, is the strongest ground of attack upon the tolerance of Luther. And if nothing more decisive can be alleged against his conduct, surely it is but fair to take into consideration his sentiments on these points as expressed in his familiar letters. "I am backward," said be, to Lincus, who had questioned him on this point, (heresy,)" to pass a sentence of death, let the demerits be ever so apparent." On this

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ground I am decidedly against capital punishment in such cases, and think it enough that mischievous teachers of religion should be removed from their places.' The opinion of the Dean of Carlisle will not be deemed of slight value upon this question, and it is thus delivered. (Vol. V. p. 498, Hist. of Church.) "At the same time, he took occasion to reprobate the cruel sufferings inflicted on the poor wretches by the persecutions of the ecclesiastical rulers, insisting on that grand distinction, of which this reformer never lost sightthat errors in articles of faith were not to be suppressed or extirpated by fire or sword, but confuted by the word of God; and that recourse ought never to be had to capital punishment except in cases of sedition and tumult. The blindness and darkness in which men are often left are in themselves (said Luther) a sufficient punishment." (Com. de Luther, II. xl. 12.)

In endeavouring to ascertain the causes of enmity in a certain class of writers, we discover one point in his conduct, which may, perhaps, serve to irritate such of them as adhere to a peculiar school in politics, too much, to allow them impartially to survey his excellences; we mean, his spirit of nonresistance, except in the last extreme, to established authorities. No fact of the history of this great man places him, in our judgment, on a higher pedestal of glory, than his conduct in this respect upon a particular occasion. When the vehemence of the Landgrave had nearly borne' down the objections of John of Saxony to take arms against the head of the empire; when an army of twenty thousand men was raised to fight for the cause the reformer loved so dearly; when his affairs, without war, appeared to be almost desperate, and when many circumstances promised a successful war; Luther sacrificed at once his hopes, his desires, his anxiety for the Protestant cause, his interests with the CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 182.

Landgrave-to his love of peace, and loyalty, and good order. After urging many reasons why the elector should not take arms against the emperor, he heroically says, "I must repeat the protestation which I lately made before your highness at Altenburg, that we must quit this part of the country rather than be partakers of the infamy which will infallibly attach to your highness in the prosecution of unlawful hostilities." Such lang guage may be ungrateful to some ears; but it harmonizes with the voice of Scripture, and of true magnanimity. Luther disdained to be found, where no Christian was discovered in the first ages of the Gospel, in the ranks of rebellion against lawful authorities.

It is

On the whole, we have no hesitation in commending to our readers the example of one of the professed and most active enemies of Luther, in preference to that of some of his avowed friends. well known, that when the imperial army took possession of Wittenberg, the soldiery rushed forward, with the most indecent ardour, to tear up the grave of Luther and disperse his bones. The emperor checked them with these words, "I war not with the dead." Perhaps, at that period, that better light of religion had begun to communicate itself to the mind of this ambitious monarch, which at a later period mingled with the shades of his superstition, and shed a sort of milder lustre over the last days of his turbulent life. At all events, may our contemporaries also remember that men of candour and honour "war not with the dead." Let them reason from facts, and not on hypothesis-and where the act is good, impute no unworthy motive to the agent who is not himself in circumstances to repel the charge. But we must turn from this ample field, to notice a second transgression of many of the writers on the Reformation.

The error to which we allude 0

is that of ascribing the effects manifestly wrought by the Reformation to other causes. Nothing, for instance, is more common than the assertion, that without the Reformation, or any change originating in religious motives, the " progress of knowledge" would "necessarily" have produced some such revolution in the opinions and habits of mankind. Nor are statements of this kind confined to the open or even the disguised enemies of religion. They are found in the mouths of its avowed friends. Not merely sciolists in philosophy, but distinguished philosophers, have fallen into this error. How surprising is it, for instance, to find in the pages of such a writer as Mr. Dugald Stewart, the following statement! "The Protestant Reformation, which followed immediately after, was itself one of the natural consequences of the revival of letters, and of the invention of printing."

Now, although it is our intention, at no very distant period, to enter into an extended investigation of the highly important work from which this sentiment is quoted, we may, perhaps, be permitted to anticipate our future labours by asking, whether Mr. Stewart can really conceive that the Reformation is the natural offspring of the progress of human knowledge. These three propositions are perfectly obvious to ourselves;-that the Reformation was the work of religious principle-that nothing but religious principle was competent to effect a change as extensive as that accomplished by the Reformation-that the progress of the Reformation was not materially assisted by men of mere science or literature. Let us dwell for a moment on each of these points.

The first position-that the Reformation was the work of religious principle-appears to us to need little proof. We know that the most mercenary and even impure' motives have been imputed to the

chief authors of the Reformation. Mr. Hume, for instance, tells us, that the Austin friars had usually been employed in Saxony to preach indulgences, and, from this trust, had derived both profit and consideration; that Arcemboldi gave this occupation to the Dominicans; that Martin Luther, an Austin friar, resenting the affront put upon his order, began to preach against indulgences, &c.-But it is enough to reply, first, that the sale of indulgences had not been

usually" confined to the Austin friars, for, till the year 1229, the Dominicans had exclusively sold them; that for fifty years before Luther, only the name of one Austin friar occurs as a vender of them; that, moreover, the sale of them was become, at the opening of the 16th century, too odious and unpopular for Luther to covet such an employment for his order; that such motives were never imputed to Luther, even by his inveterate enemies, Cajetan, Emser Hogstrat, and Tetzel. Even this reply, however, is superfluous. Let any one seriously canvass the writings of the early Reformers, and they will at once perceive, that with them every other object was subordinate to religion; that literature and politics were mainly regarded in their bearing upon the interests of the Gospel; and that especially the grand fundamental doctrine of "justification by faith alone" was that around which they rallied-their "articulum stantes aut cadentis ecclesiæ❞—the truth, in whose cause they were prepared to live and to die. The Reformers were doubtless eminent scholarsLuther especially (for Melancthon adhered to the Peripatetic school) made the first formidable assault on the philosophy of the schools, and thus paved the way for the future triumphs of reason and truth in moral and metaphysical inquiries;-but it cannot be questioned that religion prompted them to act, as well as guided them in action;

that they followed not the dim and perishable light of human science, but the star which conducted them to the presence of their Saviour. The counsel of Luther to Spalatinus, when the latter desired his advice as to the best method of study, agrees with this statement. "Read" (said he)" certain parts of Jerome, Ambrose, Augustin;" but "always begin with serious prayer; for there is no interpreter of the Divine word but its own Author. Read the Bible, in order, from beginning to end."

But next let us turn to the second proposition-that nothing except religious principle could have accomplished the mighty changes effected by the Reformation. If any other principle would have been sufficiently strong, steady, and universal, what was that principle? Not the love of liberty, for the mere lovers of liberty sought it by a momentary burst of passion and tumult, and were heard of no more. Not the love of philosophy, for the self-called philosophers of those days were too busy with substances and accidents to think of reform. Not the love of letters, for the lovers of letters, with Erasmus at their head, preferred the repose or the laurels of the Vatican to the perils of the Protestant camp. And the fact is, that no other principle, but that which pursues its object in another state of being, could prepare men to sacrifice every thing in this. No principle, but that which is as intelligible and efficient with the low as the high, with the illiterate as the learned, was sufficiently vast, and vital, and energetic to quicken the whole mass of society, and to raise up, out of the dead stones of Popery, children of virtue and of truth. If historians and critics would, instead of speculating upon the character and views of the Reformers, study their spirit and genius in their own recorded sentiments, it would be seen, that religion, and religion alone, struck the rock, and poured

forth the streams of health and life upon the moral wilderness of European society.

But, once more, we have affirmed that men of mere science and literature cannot be considered as primary agents in this moral revolution. It cannot be questioned that the early works of Erasmus did much to expose the absurdities and corruptions of Popery. It was said, and justly said, that he laid the egg which Luther hatched. But let it be remembered, that no sooner had the incubation begun, than Erasmus repented of his temerity; and that his latter years were spent in cancelling his past benefits, in exposing the friends of the Reformation, in raking up every minute delinquency of his former associates, and displaying them to the world through the magnifying and distorting medium of satire and ridicule. Such was the nature of the service too commonly rendered by men of letters to the Reformation. They began by carrying a torch to detect the errors of Popery, and ended by thrusting it into the face of the Reformers. They loved reform while the reform was not to be extended to themselves. They promoted it while it promised them the patronage of the mighty. But when kings and popes erected their hostile banners, mere learning, like the Grecian orator, took refuge among the baggage wagons of the contending forces. Erasmus frequently sums up his reasons for not joining the Reformers with a sentence of this kind-" above all, I fear for learning." That fear, it is to be apprehended, swallowed up every higher principle.

But it is time that we should close this already extended article, by making a very few observations on a third point to which we have adverted; namely, that there is much disposition in a certain class of writers to undervalue the actual benefits of the Reformation. They admit, perhaps, that the Reforma