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VOL. III.
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MARTYROLOGIA ;
RECORDS OF RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION:
A NEW AND COMPREHENSIVE
BOOK OF MARTYRS,
OF ANCIENT AND MODERN TIMES.
THE ACTS AND MONUMENTS OF JOHN FOXE,
AND PARTLY FROM OTHER
GENUINE AND AUTHENTIC DOCUMENTS,
PRINTED AND IN MANUSCRIPT.
VOL. III.
LONDON : PUBLISHED BY JOHN MASON, 14, CITY-ROAD ;
SOLD AT 66, PATERNOSTER-ROW. 1851.
LONDON :
•PRINTED BY JAMES NICHOLS, HOXTON-SQTIARE.
CONTENTS.
( The names of martyrs, or the words indicating martyrdoms when the names are not given, are in italics. An asterisk * is placed before the numbers, in the margin of dates, which fall out of the regular order.)
CHAPTER I.
TIMES IMMEDIATELY PRECEDING THE REFORMATION.
A.D. Page.
Providential succession in the Church, of God 1
Wycliffe. Oxford and Bohemia 2
1390. BOHEMIA — Prayer in Vernacular Language, and Eucharist in both
kinds 2
1400 — 1411. John Huss and others in Prague — Beginning of the Reform- ation 3
1414,1415. Council of Constance — John Huss 8
1415. Jerome of Prague — Resistance to the Council in Bohemia 15
1417. Ziska and the Taborites — War begins 21
1420, 1421. Massacres of the Taborites — Archbishop of Prague forms a
Utraquist Consistory 23
1433. Council of Basil — Concession of Compactates to the Bohemians 26
1451. First settlement of " the Bohemian Brethren " at Lititz 27
Persecutions in Bohemia and Moravia 30
1467. First Synod of the Unitas Fratrum at Lhota 32
1480. Stephen, the last Waldensian Bishop, and many others 33
1481. Bohemian and Moravian Brethren migrate into Moldavia 34
*1416 — 1491. POLAND — Awakenings and Persecutions 34
1500. Spanish Convicts first Missionaries in Brazil 37
The Modern Inquisition 37
Invention of Printing , 43
Revival of Literature 45
Geographical Discoveries 47
Precursors of Evangelical Reformation 49
II.
EUROPE, TO THE CONFESSION OF AUGSBURG.
State of the See and Court of Rome 52
1 505. Martin Luther enters an Augustinian Monastery 53
1516. Ulric Zuinglius preaches in his Monastery 54
1517, 1518. Luther and Zuinglius resist the Sale of Indulgences 54
1520. Pope Leo X. excommunicates Luther 57
1521. Luther goes to Worms 61
Luther in the Wartburg 69
Jacob Spreng in BELGIUM v 77
1522. Luther changes the Baptismal Service 79
Persecution begins in HOLLAND, &c 80
1523—1532. Persecution in FRANCE 82
*1521. Diet of Nuremberg sends "Hundred Grievances" to the Pope 89
1524. The Nuncio at Ratisbon heads Papist Princes to enforce the Edict of
Worms .. .92
2032492
VI CONTENTS.
A.D. Page.
1524. Henry of Z-uiphen — Dithmarsch 93
Luther puts off the Cowl 97
1 525. Death of Frederic, Elector of Saxony— Peasant War 98
*1524. Image- worship abolished in Zurich 101
Three Zuinglians, Baden 103
1525. Mass abolished in Zurich 103
Anabaptists in Germany and Switzerland 105
Popish Reaction in BOHEMIA, and Martyrdoms 106
1527. The Germans sack Rome and imprison the Pope 109
1529. Flisted and Clarenbach, Cologne 112
*1525— 1527. Backer and Wendelmutha, the Hague 112
*1528, 1529. The Monk Henry and Zwott, Tournay and Mechlin 115
*1526. Conference at Baden against Zuinglius 115
*1527. George Carpenter and Leonard Keyser, BAVABIA 116
*1530. ITALY— Increase of Evangelical Doctrine 118
1529. The PROTEST at Spire 119
1530. The Confession of Augsburg 121
CHAPTER III.
ENGLAND, TO THE DEATH OF HENRY VIII., AND SCOTLAND.
1498. A Lollard, Canterbury; and another, Smithfield 124
1500. Bahram, Norfolk 124
1503. R. Smart, Salisbury 124
1506. William Tylesworth and others, Amersham — Roberta, Buckingham —
Penances 124
1 507. Tliomos Norria, Norwich — " Great Abjuration " 126
1508. Lawrence Ohest, Salisbury — A Woman, Chipping-Sudbury 126
1509. Henry VIII. begins to reign 127
1511. Congregation at Tenterden — W. Carter, A. OreviU, R. Harrison,
J. Brown, E. Walker 128
W. Sweeting and J. Brewster, Smithfield 129
1513. Disagreement between Parliament and Clergy 130
Henry VIII. in Arms for the Pope and Emperor 131
1514. Hun murdered in the Lollards' Tower 131
1517. J. Browne, Ashford 136
1518. T. M an and another, Smithfield — C. Shoemaker, Newbury 139
1519. Mrs. Smith, R. Hatchets, Archer, Hawkins, T. Bond, Wrigsham,
Laudsdale, Coventry 140
1521. R. Silkeb, Coventry 140
Wolsey persecutes — Henry styled " Defender of the Faith " 142
Longland, Bishop of Lincoln, makes Inquisition — T. Bernard, J. Morden, R. Rave, J. Scrivener, J. Norman, T. Holmes 143
1523. Embassy to Archduke Ferdinand of Austria 144
1524. Bull of Clement VII. to incite Persecution 144
Tyndale, and others, leave England 144
Clement VII. and Wolsey suppress Monasteries 145
Readers of Holy Scriptures in the Universities 146
1525. Wolsey discontented with the Court of Rome 147
Tyndale prints New Testament at Cologne 148
1526. First List of Prohibited Books in England 150
1527. Wolsey's Court of Inquisition 151
Affair of Divorce begins — Pope suppresses more Monasteries 1 53
*1407. James Resby, Glasgow 154
*1431. Paul Craw, St. Andrews 154
*1494. " The Lollards of Kyle " 154
1528. Patrick Hamilton, St. Andrews 154
1533. Henry Forrest, St. Andrews 157
CONTENTS. Vll
A.D. Page.
1534. Norman Ourley and David Straton, Holyrood 158
*1528. " The Supplication of Beggars " distributed at Westminster-Abbey ... 158
Sir Thomas More's " Poor Puling Souls " 160
Anne Boleyn favours the Reformation 161
*1529. Wolsey under Praemunire — Cranmer first known 162
Persecuting Proclamations of Henry VIII 163
Humphrey Mummuth imprisoned — released — knighted 164
*1530, 1531. Imprisonments — Abjurations — Deaths 164
Thomas Hitten, Maidstone 165
Thomas Benet, Exeter 166
Thomas Bilney, Norwich 169
Sir Thomas More hunts Heretics 175
Richard Bayfield, Smithfield 175
John Tewkesbury, Smithfield 177
John Randall, Cambridge 177
Fruitless Embassy to Rome 178
Henry VIII. Head of Church of England 178
Hugh Latimer preaches, and is persecuted 181
*1532. Robert King, Nicholas Marsh, Robert Gardner, Robert Debnam
burnt the "Rood of Dover-Court" 182
Thomas Harding, Chesham 183
James Bainham, Knight, Smithfield 184
John Bent, Devizes — Trapnel, Bradford 185
Body of William Tracey exhumed and burnt 185
*1533. John Frith &n& Andrew Hewet, Smithfield 186
*1534. Advancement of Cranmer — Separation from Rome 188
Popish Preachers — " Maid of Kent," &c., resist the King 191
Reforms and first Reforming Convocation 192
1536. Execution of Anne Boleyn 194
Further Reforms 195
Visitation of Monasteries, &c. — Rebellion in the North 196
*1534. Alexander Seyton escapes from Scotland 197
1538. John Lin, John Keiller, Friar Beveridge, Duncan Simpson, Robert
Forrester, Thomas Forrest, Edinburgh 199
1540. Persecuting Laws in Scotland 199
Hieronymus Russell, — Kennedy, Glasgow 200
Buchanan and Borthwike escape from Scotland 201
1 543. Scottish Parliament permits the Bible to be read 202
1545. William Anderson, Robert Lamb, James Ronald, James Hunter,
James Finlayson, Helen Stark, Perth 203
1546. George Wishart, St. Andrews 207
Cardinal Beaton murdered 210
*1538. John Lambert, Smithfield 211
Robert Pachington and others, London — Suffolk 213
*1539. The "Six Articles" against the Gospel 214
*1540. Lord Cromwell beheaded 215
Dr. Robert Barnes, Thomas Garret, and William Jerome, Smithfield 215
John Porter, Newgate 216
Thomas Bernard and James Morton, Lincoln 217
*1543. Greek-pronunciation Controversy 217
Quinby and others, Oxford 218
Anthony Peerson, Robert Testwood, Henry Filmer, Windsor 218
Plots and Conspiracies of Bishop Gardiner and others 219
Adam Damlip, Calais 1 220
*1544. —Dodd, Calais 223
*1545. — Saxy, London — A Gentleman and his Servant, Colchester — Roger
Clarke, Bury — Kerby, Ipswich 223
*1546. AnneAskew, Nicholas Belenian, John Adams, John Lacells, Smithfield 224 — Wriothesley, London 226
V1jj CONTENTS.
Page.
A.D. 907
*1 546. Cranmer and Queen Catharine Parr m danger " yu
1547. Henry VIII. dies
CHAPTER IV.
ENGLAND, TO THE ACCESSION OF ELIZABETH, AND SCOTLAND.
1547. Edward VI 9on
State of Scotland JJJ
1550. Adam Wallace, Edinburgh ^
*1549. Anabaptism in England ; Joan of Kent *°£
Troublous State of England £*°
1551. English Liturgy printed in Dublin ^
1553. Character of Edward VI.— His Death *&>
Mary I. — her Dissimulation **0
Restoration of Popery begins 242
Parliament and Convocation Popish again •«*•>
1554. Political and Religious Persecution— Spanish Marriage 247
Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer condemned at Oxford 250
Bishop Hooper and others refuse a Disputation at Cambridge 254
Mary marries with Philip II. of Spain 254
Reconciliation of England and Rome 2
1 555. A Congregation in London seized and imprisoned 258
Master John Rogers, the Marian Protomartyr, Smithfield 259
Laurence Saunders, Coventry 260
Bishop Hooper, Gloucester 264
Dr. Rowland Taylor, Hadleigh 269
Thomas Tomkins, Smithfield 275
William Hunter, Brentwood 276
Thomas Causton, Thomas Higbed, William Pygott, Stephen Knight,
John Laurence, Essex 277
Bishop Ferrar, Caermarthen 277
Rawlins White, Cardiff 278
Philip and Mary command the Justices to persecute 279
George Marsh, Chester 281
William Flower burnt, Westminster 281
John Cardmaker, John Warne, Smithfield — John Simson, Rochford
— John Ardeley, Rayleigh 283
Thomas Haukes, Coggeshall 283
Thomas Wats, Chelmsford — Nicholas Chamberlain, Colchester —
Thomas Osmond, Manningtree — William Bamford, Harwich 284
John Bradford, John Leaf, Smithfield 284
John Bland, a Priest, Nicholas Sheterdon, John Frankesh, Humphrey Middleton, Canterbury — Nicholas Hall, Rochester — Christopher
Wade, Margaret Policy, Dartford 287
Dirick Carver, Lewes — John Launder, Steyning — Thomas Iveson,
Chichester — John Aleworth, Reading 288
Popular Tumults take place, but are quelled '. 288
James Abbes, Bury St. Edmund's 289
John Denley, Robert Smith, Uxbridge 290
Elisabeth Warne, Stephen Harwood, Stratford-le-Bow — Thomas Fust, Ware — George King, Thomas Leyes, John Wade, William Andrew, London — William Coker, William Hopper, Henry Laurence, Richard Colliar, Richard Wright, William Stere, Can- terbury— William Hale, Barnet— George Tankerfield, Patrick
Packingham, St. Alban's 290
— Samuel, Ipswich— John Newman, Saffron Walden — Richard Hook, Chichester — William Allen, Walsingham — Roger Coo, Yoxford —
CONTENTS. IX
A.D. Page.
TJiomas Cob, Tbetford —Tliomas Hay ward, John Ooreway, Lich- field — George Calmer, Robert Streater, A nthony Burward, George
Brodbridge, James Tutty, Canterbury 291
Robert and John Glover, Cornelius Bungey, Lichfield 292
William Wolsey, Robert Pygott, Ely 293
Bishops Ridley and Latimer, Oxford 293
William Dighel, Banbury 299
Parliamentary Opposition to the Clergy — Death of Gardiner 299
John Webbe, George Roper, Gregory Parke, Canterbury — William
Wiseman, London — James Gore, Colchester 300
John Philpot, Knight, Smithfield 300
1556. Thomas Whittle, Bartlet Green, Thomas Brown, John Tudson, John
Went, Isabella Foster, Joan Warne, Smithfield — Agnes Snoth, Anne Albright, Joan Sole, Joan Catmer, John Lomas, Canter- bury— A gnes Potter, Joan Trunchfield, Ipswich 302
ArchbisJwp Cranmer, Oxford 302
John Spicer, William Coberley, John Maundrel, Salisbury — Robert Drakes, William Tyms, Richard and Thomas Spurge, George Ambrose, John Cavel, Smithfield — John Harpole, Joan Beach, Rochester — John Hullier, Cambridge — Christopher Lyster, John Mace, John Spencer, Richard Nichols, Simon Joyne, John Hamond, Colchester — Hugh Laverock, John Apprice, Stratford- le-Bow — Catherine Hut, Elisabeth Thackvel, Joan Horns, Smith- field — Thomas Croker, Thomas Drowry, Gloucester — Thomas Spicer, John Denny, Edmund Poole, Beccles— Thomas Harland, John Oswald, Thomas A vington, Thomas Read, Thomas Whood, Thomas Milles, Lewes— A Servant, Leicester — Henry Adding- ton, Laurence Parnam, Henry Wye, William Hallywel, Thomas Bowyer, George Searles, Edmund Hurst, Lyon Cawch, Ralph Jackson, John Derifall, John Routh, Elisabeth Pepper, Agnes George, Stratford-le-Bow — Roger Bernard, Adam Foster, Robert Lawson, Bury St. Edmund's — Julius Palmer, John Gwin, Thomas A skin, Newbury — Thomas Dungate, John Foreman, Mother Tree, Grinstead — John Hart, Thomas Ravensdale, two others, Mayfield— Edward Sharp, and a Carpenter, Bristol — A Shoe- maker, Northampton Hooke, Chester 306
Magistrates silently refuse to persecute 307
Inquisitorial Visitation at Cambridge 308
1557. John Philpot, Mattheio Bradbridge, Nicholas Final, William
Waterer, Thomas Stephens, Stephen. Kempe, William Hay. Thomas Hudson, William Lowick, William Prowling, Canter- bury, Wye, and Ashford — Thomas Loseby, Henry Ramsey, Thomas Thirtel, Margaret Hide, Agnes Stanley, Smithfield — Steplien Gratwick, William Morant, — King, Southwark — Richard Sharp, Thomas Benion, Thomas Hale, Bristol — Joan Bradbridge, Walter and Petronil Appleby, Wife of John Man- ning, Edmund and Catherine Allin, Elisabeth —, Maidstone — " Two Persons," Newington — John Fishcock, Nicholas White, Nicholas Pardue, Barbara Final, — Bradbridge, — Wilson, — Benden, Canterbury — Richard Woodman, George Stevens, W. Mainard, Alexander Hosman, Thomasin a Wood, Margery and James Moris, Dennis Burgis, — Ashdon, — Grove, Lewes — Simon Milkr, Elisabeth Cooper, Norwich — William Bongeor, William Purcas, Thomas - Benold, Agnes Silverside, Helen Ewring, Elisabeth Folkes, William, Alice, and Roue Mount, John Johnson, Colchester — George Eagles and his Sister, Frier, Rochester — Richard Crashfield, Norwich — Joyce Lewes, Lichfield — Ralph Allerton, James and Margery Austoo, Richard Roth, Islington — Agnes Bongeor, Margaret Thurston, Colchester— John VOL. III. b
: CONTENTS.
A.D.
Kurde, Northampton— John Noyes, Laxfield— Cicely Ormes, Norwich — John Foreman, Anne Try, Thomas Dougate, John Warner, Christian drover, Thomas Athoth, Thomas Avington, Dennis Burgis, Thomas Ravensdale, John MiUes, Nicholas Holden, John Hart, James and Margery Morice, John Oseward, Thomas Harland, John Ashedon, Colchester — Thomas Spur- dance, Bury — John Hallingdale, William Sparrow, Riclmrd
Gibson, John Bough, Margaret Hearing, Smithfield 309
1558. Calais lost 310
Cuthbert Symson, Hugh Foxe, John Devenish, Smithfield — William Nichol, Haverford-west — William Seaman, TJiomas Carman, Thomas Hudson, Norwich — William Harris, Richard Day, Christian George, Colchester — Matthew Wythers, T. Taylor, London — Henry Pond, Reinald Easttand, Robert Southam, Mat- thew Ricarby, John Floyd, John Holiday, Roger Holland, Smithfield — Robert Mills, Stephen Cotton, Robert Dynes, StepJien WigJit, John Slade, William Pikes, Brentford — Richard Yeoman, Norwich — John Alcoclc, Newgate — Thomas Benbridge, Win- chester— John Cooke, Robert Miles, Alexander Lane, James AsMey, Bury St. Edmund's — Edward Home, Newent — Alexander Gouch, Alice Driver, Ipswich Prest, Exeter — John Gome- ford, Christopher Brown, John Herst, Alice Snoth, Catherine
Knigltt, Canterbury 311
Mary dies of epidemic Fever 312
Queen Elizabeth is proclaimed — Cardinal Pole dies 312
CHAPTER V.
THE EMPIRE, THE NETHERLANDS, AND SPAIN.
1630. THE EMPIRE — Recess of Augsburg 313
League of Smalcald 315
1532. Pacification of Nuremberg 316
1535. Vergerio and Luther meet in Germany 317
A General Council again demanded 318
1541. Diet of Ratisbon 320
1542. Indiction of Council of Trent 320
1545. Council of Trent is begun 321
1546. Luther dies 321
Juan Diaz, Bavaria 321
Empercr and Pope in League 322
The Protestants in Arms 324
1547. The Elector of Saxony defeated 325
Popish League weakened — Council dispersed 325
1548. The Interim of Charles V.— It fails 326
1550. Charles V. erects an Inquisition in the Netherlands 327
1551. Council of Trent re-opened 327
Persecution at Augsburg, Memmingen. &c 328
Maurice of Saxony takes Augsburg— The Council is scattered 329
1552. Treaty of Passau 330
1555 — 1558. Charles V. gives the Netherlands and Spain to Philip —
Abdicates — Dies 332
1531. NETHERLANDS — Severe Edicts, &c 332
1532. Nine Men, Amsterdam 333
1533. Anabaptists murdered — Four Persons, Bois-le-duc 333
1534. William Wiggertson, Schagen Joost, Bois-le-duc — Isbrand Schol,
Brussels.... .. 333
CONTENTS. XI
A.D. Page.
1536. William Tyndale, Vilvoord 333
1539. Thirty-one English Refugees, Delft — General Persecution 335
1544. Placards — Inquisitions 336
1546 — 1549. Peter Brully, Tournay — Many in many Places 337
1550. Inquisitorial Edicts, &c 339
1 553. Walter Capel, Dixmuiden — Simon, Bergen-op-Zoom 341
1554. Galein de Mulere, Oudenarde 342
1555. Controversy at Louvain 343
Philip II. renews Persecution 344
1557. Robert Oguier, Wife, and two Sons, Lille 344
Charles Regius, Bruges — A ngel Mervla, Mons 345
Burnings — Revolt — Reformation — Confederacy 350
1565. The " Gueux," or Beggars — Demolition of Popish Mummeries — War . 358
1567. The Duke of Alva enters Brussels— 120,000 Persons flee the Country
— Carnage 361
Philip II. charged with murdering his Son, Don Carlos 363
1567 — 1576. Prince of Orange heads the Confederates — Alva beaten 363
1581. The States declare themselves Independent 365
1582. Prince of Orange assassinated 363
1530. SPAIN, &c.— Inquisition in Granada 367
1534. Inquisition in Lisbon 368
1541. Juan Valdes — Rodrigo de Valero 368
1544. Francisco San Roman, Yalladolid 370
1552. William Gardiner, Lisbon 372
1556. Bibles. Catechisms, &c., in Spain — Dr. Egidio in Valladolid 373
1 557. General Imprisonment in Seville and Valladolid 375
1559. Paul IV. gives a Bull to burn Lutherans — Auto de Fe in Valladolid . 376 Agustin Cazalla, Beatriz de Vibe.ro, Alonso Perez, Cristdbal de
Ocampo, Cristobal de Padilla, and seven others, Francisco de Vibero Cazalla, Antonio Herrezuelo 380
Auto in Seville — Juan Ponce de Leon, Juan Gonzalez, four Monks, Fernando de S. Juan, Cristobal Losada, Isabel de Baena, Maria de Virues, Maria Cornel, Maria Bohorques, and six others — Eighty Penitents— One Effigy 382
Another Auto at Valladolid — Carlo di Sesso, Pedro de Cazalla, Domingo de Rojas, Juan Sanchez, a Nun, and eight others 384
1560. Auto in Toledo, several ; and in Murcia, five Penitents 385
Auto in Seville — Julian Hernandez, Nicholas Burton, William
Brook, Barthelemi Fabianne, and ten others — Three Effigies —
Thirty-four Penitents 385
Mark Surges, Lisbon 387
1561 — 1565. Martyrs at Toledo, Seville, Logrono, Valladolid, Barcelona,
Zaragoza 388
1574. Martyrs in Mexico 388
1620 — *1714. William Lithgow, tortured in Malaga — Isaac Martin in
Granada 388
1659. William Lambert, Mexico 388
1805. Miguel Juan Antonio Solano, Zaragoza 388
1808. Spanish Inquisition abolished by Napoleon 388
1826. A Spanish Quaker, Valencia 389
CHAPTER VI.
FRANCE, TO THE DEATH OF C1IARLKS IX.
Comparative Advance of the Reformation in France 390
1534. " The Year of Placards " — Controversy and Persecution 391
1535. Francis I. bums BuH/n'U'nii Mi/mi. Nicolas Valeton, Jean de Bourg,
b 2
Xll CONTENTS.
A.I>. Page.
Etienne de Laforge, — la Catelle, A ntoine Pottle, and twelve
otliers in Paris 392
Exiles — Laurent de la Croix, Paris — Marie Becauddle, Poitou — Jean Cornon, Mascon 394
1536. Martin Gonin, Grenoble 395
1539. Jerome Vindocin, Agen — Andre Berthelin, Nonnay 395
1540. Etienne Brun, Recorder — Claude le Peintre, Paris 396
1541. Aymon de la Joye, Agenais 396
1542. — Constantine, and three others, Rouen 396
1544. Pierre Bonpain, Paris 396
*1543. Part of a Congregation drowned, Metz — Guillaume Hudson, Blois ... 396
1545. Four thousand Waldenses in Merindol, &c., twenty- two Villages
destroyed, and seven hundred Men sent to the Galleys 397
1546. Fourteen at Meaux, and many Penitents 403
1547. franfois d'Augy, Toulouse— Jean Chapot — Seraphin, and four others,
Paris — Jean I'Anglais, Sens — Jean Brugtre, Issoire, and many
others 404
Francis I. dies, and Henry II. succeeds him 405
1549. Many burnt in Paris 406
1 551 — 1 553. Edict of Chateau-Briant and a general Persecution 407
1555. Reformed Church of Paris 407
1 557. Parliament of Paris rejects a Bull for Inquisition 408
Congregation of St. Jacques — Nicolas Clinet, Taurin Gravelle, La
Baronne de Graveron, and many others, in Paris 409
Gospel advances — A multitude of Martyrs — Psalmody 412
1558. High Personages promote the Reformation 412
1559. First Synod, Confession, and Constitution of the Reformed Churches . 415
Court of the " Mercuriale " — Members of it imprisoned 416
Death of Henry II., succeeded by Francis II 419
The Councillor Du Bourg, Paris — Horrible Persecutions 419
1560. The "Tumult of Amboise" — Slaughter of twelve hundred Men —
Castelnau and fifteen others beheaded, and Civil War begins 422
" The Cardinal's Mouse-Trap " to ensnare all the Reformed 427
The Prince de Condg in Prison — Navarre in peril 429
Death of Francis II., succeeded by Charles IX 431
1561. Persecution slightly checked — Priests pray Philip II. to help them ... 432
Mobs let loose on the Reformed in the Provinces 434
Colloquy of Poissy 435
1562. "Edict of January" for Toleration 438
Massacre of Vassy , 439
Conde heads the Reformed — Queen and Court flee — Sanguinary War. 442
1563. Pacificatory "Edict of Amboise" 445
1564. Pius IV. excommunicates Queen of Navarre 446
1568. Charles IX., Catherine, and Duke of Alva, contrive other Methods,
and agree to " the uneasy Peace " 447
Conde and Coligny occupy Rochelle 448
1569. Battle of Jarnac lost— Cond6 murdered — Defeat at Moncontour 450
1570. Treaty of St. Germain 451
Secret Conspiracy- — The Huguenots deluded ' 453
1572. Massacre of St. Bartholomew 457
Massacres in the Provinces 468
Joy in Rome 470
1574. Death of Charles IX. .. 471
CHAPTER VII. ITALY; TO THE LAST MASSACRE OF THE WALDKNSKS.
1530. State of Italy 473
1534. The Diike of Savoy sends Troops to murder the Waldenses.. 476
CONTENTS. xiii
A.B. Page.
1536. Bull of Paul III. against the Waldenses 476
Charles V. persecutes at Naples 477
1540. The Company of Jesus sanctioned at Rome 478
1542. Congregation of the Holy Office 479
1543. A Reformed Church in Pisa 479
1543 — 1545. Modena, Mantua, Ferrara 479
1546. Jayme Encinas, Rome — Fannio, Ferrara 480
Capo d'Istria, Pola, Florence 482
1547. Inquisition resisted at Naples 483
1548 — 1555. Persecution at Venice — Pomponio Algieri 486
1562 — 1567. Giidio Guirlanda, Antonio Ricetto, Francesco Sega, Fran- cesco Spinula, Baldo Lupetino, Venice 487
* 1550— 1569. The Milanese— Domenico — Galeazzo Trezio, some others 489
*1554. Francesco Oamba, Brescia 490
*1546 — 1555. The Locarno Emigration 493
*1553 — 1560. Rome — Giovanni Mollio, a Weaver, Giovanni Aloisio,
Lodovico Paschali 495
1563, 1564. Doings of the Cardinals-Inquisitors 497
1567. Pietro Carnesecchi, Rome 498
Many Martyrs in the Papal State 500
1 569. Francesco Cellario, Bartolommeo Bartoccio, Rome 500
1570. A onio Paleario, Rome 501
1581. Richard Atkins, Rome 505
*1566. Dr. Thomas Reynolds, Rome 507
1588. Sixtus V. institutes the fifteen Congregations of Cardinals 507
1595. An Englishman and a Silesiau burnt in Rome 507
1659. Catherine Evans and Sarah Cheevers imprisoned in Malta 508
1662. Daniel Baker at Gibraltar 513
*1555. Bartolommeo Ectore, Turin 515
*1557. Commissaries to the Waldenses of Piedmont — Geoffreddo Varaglia,
Turin — Nicholas Sartor is, Aosta 515
*1560. Waldenses of Calabria — Stefano Carlino, Pietro Marzone, another, Montalto — Bernardino Conte, a Pastor, Cosenza — Anotlier, Rome
— Imprisonments, Torments, Butcheries... 517
Waldenses of Piedmont — Marcellin, his wife Giovanna, Giovanni Cartignano, Carignano — Jean — , S. Germano — A Minister, Su.sa
— Military Invasion of the Valleys 518
*1561. A Capitulation never ratified 5-!l
*1565 — 1572. Renewed Persecution — Resistance — Orders of St. Maurice and
St. Lazarus 522
*1633. Persecution in Saluzzo 523
*1623 — 1655. Sebastiano Bassano, Turin — Gastaldo leads a Massacre 523
Jean Paillas, Paolo Clemente di Rossani, La Torre 528
Remonstrances of Protestant States — Mr. Morland sent to the Duke
of Savoy — Subscriptions in England for the Survivers 528
1663-1686. Persecution 532
1694. Partial Restoration 532
1848. Charles Albert gave Liberty of Worship — Wesleyan-Methodist Mission
in the Alps 532
CHAPTER VIII.
SLAVONIAN CHURCHES, AND HUNGARY.
1530. BOHEMIAN Brethren favoured by Ferdinand I 533
1532. George the Hermit imprisoned at Prague 533
1533. Bohemian Confession published at Wittemberg 533
1 538. Persecution in. Bohemia 5:j4
XIV CONTENTS.
A.D. Page.
1539. Catlierine Zalaszowska, Prague 534
1544. Churches closed — Imprisonments — Banishments 535
1 545—1 554. Gamrat, Primate of POLAND, a Fanatic— Exiles 535
1553 — 1570. " Agreement of Sendomir " 538
* 1533. NicJwlas —, Lublin 541
* 1551 — 1554. Secret Congregation in Poland — Czarnkowski, Bishop of Posen 541
1556. Lodovico Lippomano, first Nuncio 543
1563. RUSSIA— Tlwmas of Polozk, Polozk 545
1565 — 1574. Persecutions in Bohemia 546
Foreign Kings of Poland 546
1574 — 1581. Jesuits incite tumultuary Persecutions in Cracow and Vilna ... 551 1589—1593. The Legate Aldobrandino— Sixtus V.— The Jesuits and their
Mob 553
Martin — , Lublin 554
*1624. Twenty-seven Noblemen, some Ministers, a great Emigration, Bohemia 554
1 611. Francesco di Franco, Vilna 555
Jesuit Outrages — Baltliasar Crosnieviski, Martin Terttdlian, Vilna... 557
1618. Origin of the Thirty years' War 558
1621. Great Martyrdom at Prague — Joachim Andreas Schlik, Wenzel Bndowecz, Christopher Harant, Oaspar Kaplirz, Procopius Dworschezky, Lords of Rzcldowicz and Komarow, Czernin, Lords of Spiticz and Ruwenitz, Valentine Kochan, Tobias Steffck, Chris- toplier Kohr, — Schvbz, — Hostialek, — Kutnaiter, and seven
others, with Banishments and Confiscations 563
1 623. Evangelical Clergy driven out of the Kingdom 570
1 625. Matthaus Ulizky, Czaslau 571
* 1622. Jesuits seize the University of Prague — Books destroyed 572
* 1 623—1627. Edicts and Dragonnades 575
Lorenz Karlik, Kossenberg — John Burjan Kochowez, Raudnitz — Another, Leitomischl — A Clerk, Welhartiz, and many Confessors . 576
1629. — Balzer, Schlan 577
Forest-Congregations— Thirty-six thousand Families expatriated —
Bohemia ruined . . . .„ 578
1 631. Elector of Saxony in Prague — Lutheran Worship 579
1632 — 1652. Prague retaken — Jesuits return, Christians flee Peschek,
Hradek 580
*1773— 1781. Expulsion of Jesuits— "Toleration-Edict" of Joseph II 581
*1618— 1633. Persecutions in Poland 581
* 1604 — 1614. Kepressive Laws in HUNGARY, partially removed 582
*1616— 1672. Religious and Political Contentions .' 584
An Anathema 585
1672 — 1676. Abjurations — Three hundred Confessors imprisoned, exiled,
enslaved 588
"1670. Seizure of Churches in Zips 591
1675 — 1687. Successive Persecutions — Four Men, five, nine, Eperies 591
1705 — 1742. Various Condition of the Evangelicals 592
1743. Conversion-Societies — Conversion-Fund — Iniquitous Law 593
1763. Maria Theresa employs the Archbishop of Gran to enforce her Law . . . 593 1781. Toleration-Edict of Joseph II 594
CHAPTER IX.
AUSTRIA FROM 1558 TO 1837 FRANCE FROM 1587 TO REVOCATION OF
EDICT OF NAMES.
1558. AUSTRIA— Brief and partial Toleration 595
1559. Episcopal Visitation 595
1;}79. Persccuti'oii breaks out at Vienna 593
CONTKNTS. XV
A.D. Page.
1582 — 1588. States remonstrate, and, at length, revolt 597
1585 — 1 589. Ministers persecuted and banished 597
1590. Melchior Clesel, " Reformer-General," conducts a general Persecution. 598
1594—1 603. Civil War, provoked by Clesel and the Jesuits 600
1603 — 1609. Protestant Alliance of Heidelberg — Temporary Liberty of
Worship 601
1614. Protestants lose Aix-la-Chapelle and Miilheim (Diisseldorf) 601
1619. Ferdinand II. and Caraffa begin Anti-Eeformation 602
1624 — 1626. Persecution and Revolt in Bavaria 604
1627 — 1632. Extinction of Protestant Worship in Austria 605
1648. Peace of Westphalia— Momentary Liberty 607
1651. Compulsory " Reformation " renewed 607
1685, 1686. Teffereckenthal Emigrations 608
1729 — 1732. Von Firmian, Archbishop of Salzburg — Salzburg Emigration. . 608 1743. The " Rack-Tower " of Werfen — Inquisition — Banishment 612
*1733 — 1747. Dragonnades, Imprisonments, Exiles, many Deaths 612
1747. Jacob Schmidli, Sulzig, Switzerland 612
1782. Peregrination of Pius VI. to Vienna 613
1837. The Zillerthal Emigration 613
FRANCE — State of the Reformed after the Massacre of St. Bartholomew 618
1598. Edict of Nantes 622
1610. Henry IV. assassinated by Ravaillac — Persecution revives 623
1615. Romish Synod in Paris incites Louis XIII. to persecute 623
1617. Another Romish Synod in Paris demands Persecution 624
1619. Mass restored in Navarre 625
1 621, 1622. Crusade on the Reformed in all France 625
1 629. Rochelle taken by Louis XIII. — Cautionary Towns lost 628
Missionary Disputants 629
1643. Louis XIV.— He favours the Reformed at first 629
1656. Legal Persecution begins 629
1659. National Synods of the Reformed Churches suppressed — Notices of
the last Six Synods 630
1666. " Declaration of Fifty-nine Articles " nullifies the Edict of Nantes ... 636
Psalmody forbidden — Preachers silenced 636
Manifold Methods of Oppression and Perversion 637
1 668. " Chambers of the Edict " finally suppressed 638
1 679. " Chambres miparties " also suppressed 638
Dragonnades — The Dame Du Chail 639
1682. 1683. Ineffectual Efforts to recover Liberty of Worship 641
A most sanguinary Dragonnade — Many thousands horribly murdered 642
1683. Isaac Homel, Vivarais 643
Bishops and Ladies direct the atrocious Persecution — Churches closed 644
1684. 1685. A Succession of Royal Orders and of Inhumanities, preparatory
to the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes 646
1685. Edict of Revocation of the Edict of Nantes 650
Absolute Prohibition of the Reformed Religion enforced 652
Universal Inquisition — Jesuits assist Soldiers to torment the People... 653
1686. —Ouizard, Nerac 654
1687. Confessors imprisoned and sent to the Galleys and to the West Indies
as Slaves 655
1689. "Pastors of the Desert"— Many hundred* killed in the Desert- Congregations i 655
— Tommeiroles — Manuel, Nismes°— Meirieu and Salendre, Ledignan — Many othirs in many Places 656
DIRECTIONS TO THE BINDER,
VOL. I.
Facing Title-Page. Hebrew Children in the Furnace.
Page 104. Murder of the Innocents.
• 129. Stephen's Martyrdom.
• 1 65. Nero.
— 317. Ignatius.
- 385. Polycarp.
— 453. Irenaeus.
— 475. Cyprian.
VOL. II.
Facing Title-Page. Lord Cobham's Martyrdom.
Page 581. Wycliffe.
— 599. Burning-place in Smithfield.
— 601. John Badby's Martyrdom.
VOL. III.
Facing Title-Page. Auto de F6.
Page 3. Huss.
— 14. Huss's Martyrdom.
— 53. Luther.
— 54. Zuinglius.
— 98. Frederic of Saxony.
— 121. Melancthon.
— 163. Cranmer.
- 229. Edward VI.
— 283. John Cardmaker's and John Warne's Martyrdom.
— 284. Thomas Hawkes's Martyrdom.
— 293. Ridley's and Latimer's Martyrdom.
— 295. Latimer.
— 309. The Colchester Martyrs.
— 436. Beza.
— 456. Margaret of Navarre.
— 464. Coligny.
MARTYROLOGIA,
PROTESTANT MARTYRS.
CHAPTER I.
Providential Succession in the Church of God — John Huss — Jerome of Prague — The Hussites — The Bohemian Brethren and Unitus Fratrum — The Inquisition rein- forced— The Invention of Printing and Revival of Literature — Geographical Dis- coveries— Persons and Events precursory of Separation from Ike Papal Church.
THERE is a succession in the church of God. Not hereditary succession, for that was wrecked with the genealogies of the Hebrew people. Not official, because the givers and receivers of designation to the ministerial office may be destitute, and, for many ages, were generally destitute, of divine grace and sanction ; and as a succession of this kind does not appear in history, neither, as we think, was it promised by Christ, or contemplated by his Apostles. A just and scriptural regard to ecclesiastical order, and an original idea of pure discipline, imperceptibly degenerated into the notion of such a succes- sion. But in the church of God, — comprehending, under our description of a church, both Ministers and people, having evangelical doctrine, discipline, and worship, with holy living, — there is a providential suc- cession. Even in the darkest age there were living witnesses and confessors martyred for the faith of Christ. The practice of perse- cuting ripened into -system. An apparatus for the extirpation of heresy, according to ritual forms, under authoritative decrees, and by tribunals established in a fallen Church, was sufficient to attest, even had there not been' direct historical evidence, the presence of another set of persons in the world, — the persons who suffered persecution. But we possess their history, and, on examining it, find that many, if not most, of them held evangelical doctrines, and persevered in holy conduct. They, if no others, were the church of the living God. Their life was hid with Christ in God, and therefore could not be destroyed. The gates of hell could not prevail against them. They were found in every generation, and were perpetuated in spite of every human effort to destroy. As death for confessing Christ came to be the law of an antichristian hierarchy, and as civil statutes and inquisitorial canons multiplied and were enforced with increasing rigour, -the life of this body of confessors became more
VOL. III. B
2 CHAPTER I.
vigorous, and the interpositions of Divine Providence in behalf of this immortal cause more signal. " The blood of the martyrs was the seed of the church." And this is providential succession. Let us endea- vour to trace its continuity from the Lollards to the Protestants.
The civil and ecclesiastical authorities were united in England against Wycliffe and his followers, and the strength of Lollardism, as they called it, gradually declined until it was nearly extinct when Henry VIII. ascended the throne. But in eastern Europe relative positions were different. In the remote kingdom of Bohemia the more powerful nobility, supported by many of the people, for many years maintained a most arduous, but not unsuccessful, struggle with Romish ascendency. When Wycliffe was buried, his books condemned, and while the inquisitors of heresy were cleansing Oxford from his writings, and the high Clergy contriving how to make profession of his doctrine a capital offence in England, they could not suspect that stu- dents in Oxford were learning from those very books how to prepare Christendom for a general reformation, and that their own Queen was unconsciously opening the way for a successful mission of those youth to her own country. Yet so it was. Anne, sister of the Emperor Wen- ceslaus, King of Bohemia, " the good Queen Anne," read the Bible in German, Latin, and Bohemian, had heard from childhood doctrines opposed to those of Rome, lived under the influence of the truth she learned from the sacred volume, and was extolled for her veneration for the word of God even by the sanguinary Arundel, Archbishop of Canterbury. By her means England was in communication with Bohemia ; some Bohemians prosecuted their studies at Oxford, and some Englishmen went over to Bohemia. Jerome of Prague was an Oxford student, and on his return to that city took with him the works of Wycliffe. Peter Payne, an Englishman, and a Lollard too, went over to Prague, and took other copies. Perhaps he expected more religious liberty there : certainly he was zealous in propagating Wycliffe's doctrine, became a Minister in the national Church, asso- ciated with the seceders from Romanism, and remained in that connexion until old age. Others returned to Bohemia when their sojourn in England was completed ; and some went thither from time to time after the martyrdom of Sautre, to avoid a like fate, and found multitudes willing to receive them and profess their doctrine. For in that country worship had been solemnized in the vernacular language, and the sacrament of the eucharist administered in bread and wine, (" sub utraque specie," as they say, whence the term " utraquists,") from the introduction of Christianity, five hundred years before, and was formally allowed by Boniface IX., so late as the year 1 390. The arrogance of the Popes had always been resisted, and would have been still powerless, had not Italian and other foreign Priests supplanted natives in the parishes. The Bohemian patriot, therefore, gave ready hearing to the prayer offered in Sclavonic, and powerful nobles, actu- ated by a feeling of nationality, preserved primitive worship and maintained better preaching on their estates. The University, too, enjoyed a slight degree of independence ; and, profiting by the dis- tance of its head the Pope, often set at nought the pleasure of the
JOHN HUSS.
Bishops, and, when Wycliife's books were brought from England, freely 'wtfofl thprn. while some of his pieces were translated into Bohe-
-
<raes, bo i' and clasps of silver, and
• ["hen a(>
JOHN HtTSS. 3
Bishops, and, when Wycliffe's books were brought from England, freely admitted them, while some of his pieces were translated into Bohe- mian, and circulated among the people.
Just then (A.D. 1400) a young Priest,* of energetic eloquence, was invited to minister in the new church of Bethlehem in Prague, which had been founded by a Prior of the Teutonic Order, and a merchant of the city, for the sake of preserving worship in the language of the people, together with preaching, which was so generally neglected, that a sermon was seldom to be heard. This was John Huss. Jerome put Wycliffe' s books into his hands, and, as one already devoted to the instruction of the people by means of their own language, he trans- lated them into Bohemian. The translator imbibed the spirit of the author, enriched his discourses by an infusion of their contents, soon gained eminence as a Preacher, and acquired great influence over the public. For some years nothing occurred to interrupt his ministra- tions. He was Confessor to the Queen, was extensively learned for the age, and, far from being thought heretical, was appointed to preach (A.D. 1405) before a provincial Synod, with the Prelate at their head. But he openly commended Wycliffe, encouraged English refugees, and, with increasing knowledge, zeal, and eloquence, encroached so far on the patience of Sbinko, the Archbishop, and of the priesthood, that they made an attack on the writings of the Englishman, and thus opened a breach that Papal ingenuity could never close. Not the University of Prague, as some have written, but a select company of Priests, employed by the Bishop, condemned the works of Wycliffe ; and this being done, (May 24th, 1408,) Sbinko made, or pretended to make, an inquisition of his province, convened a Synod, (July 17th,) and there reported that he had found the province free from heresy. The favourable report was forwarded to Rome, to the credit, as the Archbishop might have thought, of his pastoral vigilance. But " heresy " could not be concealed ; and the very next year we find the Pope writing a letter to the Archbishop condemnatory of the followers of Wycliffe in Bohemia and Moravia. f Of all these Huss was the chief ; but the missive of an Antipope could not reach him, and, on the separation of the Germans, as foreigners, from the govern- ment of the University, his appointment by the Bohemians, who alone remained, to the dignity of Rector, enabled him to take the lead in efforts to restore the religious independence of his country.
Sbinko, on the other side, began the usual work of persecution. The German members of the University, before their departure, Jean Gerson, Chancellor of Paris, Andrew of Broda, a papistical Bohemian, and the ultramontane Clergy generally, had urged him to collect and burn the obnoxious books. By dint of active perquisition, many copies were taken from their owners, and twice did the Prelate commit the spoil to burning in his palace-yard. The- second time, not fewer than two hundred volumes, bound in wood, covered with rich stuffs, and heavy with bosses and clasps of silver, and even of gold, were heaped on the fire, the sumptuousness of the books showing how highly they must have been valued by persons in the highest circles of society.
* Then about twentyrseven years of age. f Raynaldus, an. 1409, num. 89.
B 2
CHAPTER I.
The University regarded this interference as an infringement on their authority, and appealed from the Prelate to the Pope, real or pre- tended,— for whether John XXIII. was Pope or not was then a question, — and His Holiness cited the zealous expurgator to answer for himself. Sbinko, however, made a private communication which fully satisfied the Papal court of his loyalty to them ; and his mes- sengers brought back a Bull condemning the books, requiring four persons who were accused of retaining copies, to give them up within six days, forbidding all Priests and Ecclesiastics to preach in particular places, in privileged chapels, (so including Bethlehem,) in cathedral and parochial churches, or in monasteries, under pain of deposi- tion, excommunication, imprisonment, and even severer punishment. Against this Bull, which would have silenced every voice, and obli- terated every sentence of religious truth, Huss appealed, as he had done before. In his church of Bethlehem, (June 25th, 1410) before seven witnesses, deputed by those of the nobility and University who adhered to him, and by the hand of a Notary Public, he represented to the Pope that the sentence empowering the Archbishop to act against the University was a breach of privilege : that Huss, and a multitude of other Preachers in Bohemia, Moravia, and other provinces, had been falsely charged with heresy, and that by means of a secret cabal in the court of Rome : that orders like those of John XXIII. and Sbinko were scandalous, contrary to common right and public good, and especially contrary to the Gospel, and therefore ought not to be obeyed : that Sbinko had already acknowledged Bohemia to be free from heresy : that even were it not so, the proceedings against Wycliffe's writings, having been taken on orders received from Alexander V., since deceased, were canonically null : that many of the books condemned were scientific treatises, and, as such, not susceptible of heresy : that the Pope's sentence to burn them was against the honour of the kingdom of Bohemia, the marquisate of Moravia, and the other provinces, as well as against the honour of the University, which had solemnly determined to appeal against the outrage committed by Sbinko on its liberties.
The Pope answered this appeal by excommunicating Huss, (A.D. 1411,) and placing Prague under interdict until he should have left the city. Foreseeing that resistance would cause a tumult, he retired to hi* native town Hussinets, where he was hospitably entertained by a relative, Nicholas of Hussinets, lord of the place ; and, making a circuit of the neighbouring towns and villages, often preached in the open air to immense congregations, notwithstanding the excommunica- tion. At Hussinets he wrote a paper in the form of an appeal to God, the Pope having failed to do him justice, and justified that recourse by the example of Christ himself, followed by Chrysostom, Andrew, a former Archbishop of Bohemia, who died in exile, and Robert, Bishop of Lincoln, who had committed their causes to the Sovereign Judge of the universe. During this retreat he also wrote a defence of Wycliffe's books, in reply to Stokes, an Englishman, and maintained that even heretical writings should be read and refuted, but not burnt. Mean- while, the inhabitants of Prague entreated him to return, and Sbiuko
HUSS PREACHES AGAINST CRUSADES. 5
saw fit to go iuto Hungary, where he soon died. Some unfriendly historians have said that the Hussites poisoned him ; but this is one of those after-thoughts that serve to fill up narratives compiled to serve a purpose, and is triumphantly disproved by the evidence of the hostile, but contemporary, authority quoted by the Romish biographer himself.*
Huss returned to Prague, and was met by new personages, Legates from John XXIII., bearing two Bulls, one addressed to all Chris- tendom, and the other to the dioceses of Passau, Saltzburg, Prague, and Magdeburg, calling on all persons to unite in cursing Ladis- laus, King of Sicily, with whom John was at war, but likely to be beaten, and inviting them to a crusade against Ladislaus and his supporters. It did seem to the people of Prague that, for a Pope to excite Christians to murder one another merely on his own account, and to offer them plenary absolution and eternal life for such a service, was a scandalous and monstrous thing. Wenceslaus, the King, being an enemy of Ladislaus, was well pleased with the project of crusade, and the clerical partisans of the Pope gave their full support to the Preacher of indulgences. But Huss, who had studied the subject in Wycliffe's books, reproduced the arguments against crusades in public, and, from his pulpit in Bethlehem, exhorted the people not to waste their blood for the Pope, who ought not to seek defence for the Church in carnal weapons. The Legates summoned him to appear in their presence, and answer to the new Archbishop Albicus, whether he would obey the Pope and preach the crusade. He promptly appeared, and told them that he would most heartily obey the apostolic precepts. " You see, now, Sir Archbishop," said the Legates, " that he is willing to obey the Pope." For, in the style of the court of Rome, " papal " and " apostolical" are terms equivalent. Not so thought Huss. He told them plainly that between the commandments of Popes and those of Apostles there was the xttmost difference, and that he would rather be burnt than obey the former in violation of the latter. Being thus committed to the controversy, he determined to persevere, and forth- with caused the following programme to be affixed to the doors of all the churches and monasteries in Prague, with a challenge to all Doctors, Priests, Monks and Scholars, to come forward and dispute against the theses he had already published. The question was stated thus : — " According to the law of Jesus Christ, can Christians, with a good conscience, approve the crusade ordered by the Pope against Ladislaus and his accomplices ; and can such a crusade tend to the glory of God, to the salvation of Christian people, and to the welfare of the kingdom of Bohemia 1 " On the day appointed for the dis- putation all sorts of people crowded into the collegiate hall to hear or to take part. The Rector of the academy, alarmed at the concourse, and fearing tumult, exhorted the* people to retire. Speaking in Bohemian, he said, " I pray you, friends, withdraw for a little. This
CHAPTER I.
business does not concern you, and very few of you will understand us." But this exhortation only provoked to impatient curiosity, and caused sucli confusion that Huss was obliged to interfere ; and having allayed the uproar with difficulty, he suggested that those who could not understand their language, (Latin,) should withdraw. The dispu- tation began. A Doctor of canon law argued for the Pope. A Doctor in civil right contended that the Pope had violated the rights of the Emperor and Princes. When the contest had run high, an aged Doctor arose and remonstrated with Huss : "All the academy is astonished that you, young as you are,* should entertain such high designs. Do you think that you are wiser than all others ? Certainly there are men here far abler than you, but not one of them ventures on questions so subtle and profound. Consider the judgment of the Doctors and of all the academy, and you will see that your enterprise contains nothing but the seed of seditions and intestine wars. What ! would you oppose the Roman Pontiff? Go to Rome. Go, and tell him to his face what you say here ; for it is most unfair to trouble people who do not understand you, and know not how to answer. Besides, being Priest, as you are, whence have you your priesthood ? ' From the Bishop,' you will say ; but the Bishop, whence has he his ? From the Pope. So you must come to the Pope, who is your spiritual father, after all. Bad birds are they that forsake their own nest, and cursed was Ham who uncovered the nakedness of his father." The rude audience, who sided with Huss, answered the Doctor with a shout, and would have stoned him could they have torn up the pave- ment. They were again hushed into silence by the Preacher of Bethlehem. Then Jerome of Prague stood forth, and, rushing at that moment into the heat of a battle in which he soon should fall, made a long and very eloquent discourse, ending in these words : " Let them who are on our side follow us. John Huss and I will go to the palacef to expose the vanity of indulgences." This was received with a cry of, " Well said ! That is true." The two reformers, how- ever, yielding to the entreaty of some who feared greater tumult, separated. The students followed Jerome, as the more learned, and the people went with Huss to his church. Next day there was a great meeting of the people, who resolved to give no quarter to the Preachers of indulgences. A barbarian resolution, no doubt ; but we must bear in mind that what would be intolerable in the present state of society, and especially in England, was a matter of course in the fifteenth century. The Rector of the academy, fearing for his life, sent for Huss and Jerome, and implored them in the name of God and all saints to use their credit and influence with the people to prevent revolt and massacre. The Doctors joined their entreaties, and even tears were shed. They readily promised to do their best, yet main- taining their opposition to crusade and indulgences, and really succeeded in pacifying the people. But the Preachers, on the other side, observed no prudence. One Sunday, a Preacher of indulgences, not satisfied with recommending his wares, launched an invective against John Huss. A shoemaker in the congregation denied the
* Thirty-eight years of age. t Maison de Ville, "Court-house."
PREACHERS OF INDULGENCES AT PRAGUE. 7
calumny aloud. In another church an equally intemperate Preacher was interrupted by a man, who exclaimed that the Pope was Anti- christ, because he shed Christian blood. They were both Poles. A third, a Bohemian, contradicted a Friar during sermon in his monastery. The three were imprisoned. Huss, with a company of students, went to the palace to demand their release, which was promised ; but the promise was not fulfilled. The Senate secretly caused an executioner to behead them in the night within that build- ing, and the murder was discovered early in the morning by a stream of blood that ran out under the door. The people broke in, took away the bodies, and buried them with great solemnity. And Huss, notwithstanding the prohibition of the Senate, afterwards made refer- ence to the murder in his sermons, and continued to preach, in spite of excommunication, and the efforts of his enemies to put him to silence, and committed to writing refutations of the principal errors of Romanism. Not the least important of those productions was a defence of the articles of Wycliffe. Eight theologians, it is related, endeavoured to vanquish him in argument ; and he not only persisted in a literary contest, but challenged them all to meet him in an ordeal by fire. One had courage enough to accept the challenge ; but he replied that, after having been attacked by eight men, and defended himself singly, he expected them all to go into the fire as readily as they had got into the fight. That, however, was more than their courage or their prudence would dare to hazard ; and they set their hearts on bringing him, not to a fiery trial, but to a fiery death.* We must now follow him to Constance.^
* L'Enfant, " Histoire da Concile de Pise," gives a mass of copious and carefully- anthenticated information of Huss, especially relating to the years 1409, 1410, 1411, 1412. The English reader will find notices of this Reformer's earlier history in Foxe, but ill arranged ; and there are cursory sentences in most ecclesiastical histories. Fleury and his continuator give the facts, but distort them ; and the Romish Annalists, of course, treat him as a criminal. L'Enfant, who quotes at length from the original authorities, Cochloeus, /Eneas Silvius, the Bohemian historians, and the works of Huss, is by far the best narrator of these events that the author has yet seen.
t Observing by the way that, partly in consequence of an edict of pacification, given by the Princes and the King's Counsel, between the late Archbishop Sbinko, on the one part, and the Rector of the University and John Huss, on the other, Huss had a legal position secured to him at Prague, previously to his excommunication ; that even after- wards, the Papal sentence not being universally admitted, the King being favourable to Huss, a large number of Priests, known as Evangelical Clergy, and described as his Clergy, constituted a distinct and formidable party. When Conrad, Administrator of the archbishopric, (A.D. 1413,) called a provincial Council, Hnss assembled his Clergy also, and the two companies drew up opposite "counsels;" the one for the extirpation of heresy, and the other " for the honour of God and the free preaching of his Gospel ; to re-establish the renown of the kingdom of Bohemia, the marquisate of Moravia, the city and the university of Prague ; to restore peace and union between the Clergy and the Academy." The King then condescended to rescind the edict of pacification ; but the Hussite Clergy being far in the majority, the pulpits of Prague resounded with remonstrance ; and the controversy concerning the adverse claims of Papal authority, (for there were then three persons claiming the triple crown,) and of divine authority, occupied every mind ; and the higher Clergy could not subdue the disobedience of their Priests and the revolt of the people. Again the King endeavoured to satisfy both parties, by a measure of external reform, depriving notoriously wicked Priests of their tithes and other income. This gave a great advantage to the Hussites, end lowered the crest of their enemies. Conrad met this humiliation by laying an interdict on Prague. Huss retired again to Hussinets, or, rather, continued there, without visiting Fragile, .as he had been wont to do since his first retreat : but the pro-
8 CHAPTER I.
For healing the schism of the Papacy, which the Council of Pisa had ineffectually attempted, and also for the suppression of heresy in Bohemia, a Council was convened at Constance, a town on the border of the Grand Duchy of Baden, and on the lake of its own name. To heal the schism was the object contemplated by Sigismund, Emperor of Germany. To suppress heresy was that of John XXIII., Pope "concurrent," who summoned the Council, and went thither with trembling.* Mounted on horseback, and followed by a long train of Cardinals, Prelates, and courtiers, he entered the town (October 28th, 1414). A procession of Clergy, bearing relics of saints, real or artificial, met him on the way ; four chief Magistrates received him under a canopy of cloth of gold ; two Counts took the bridle ; and he, thus canopied and led, amidst a multitude of sight- seekers, went to the Episcopal palace, preceded by the host, carried on a cushion. There he reposed, and, with seeming promptitude, but meditated delay, convened, and then again prorogued, the dreaded Council. John Huss had been summoned to appear at that tribunal. Without delay he prepared for the journey, first asking ^for a hearing in a provincial Synod then assembled at Prague, but without obtaining one. He then affixed papers to the church and palace doors of the city, inviting his accusers to meet him at Con- stance, and to convict him, if they could, of heresy. Strange to tell, he received certificates of orthodoxy from Conrad, Adminis- trator of the archbishopric of Prague, and from Nicholas, Bishop of Nazareth, Inquisitor of Bohemia. From the King he obtained a safe-conduct to Constance. Thus furnished, he crossed the present kingdoms of Bavaria and Wurtemburg, at each town causing chal- lenges to his accusers to be posted in public places. At Nuremberg the announcement was as follows : — " Master John Huss is going to Constance, there to make declaration of the faith which he always held, which he still embraces, and which, by the grace of God, he will adhere to until death. Therefore, as he has given public notice, throughout the whole kingdom of Bohemia, that he was willing, before his departure, to give an account of his faith in a general Synod of the Archbishop of Prague, and to answer all things that might be laid to his charge, he gives the same notice to the imperial city of Nuremberg, that if any person has any error or heresy to reproach him with, he need only repair to the Council of Constance, because he is ready there to give an account of his faith." Yet, amidst this confidence, he secretly foreboded a cruel death, as appears
hibition to preach was evaded at Bethlehem, by the reading of his treatise on the Church ; a crude composition, as to theology, erroneous in many points, but in others calculated to keep the public mind awake to points at issue. Until his departure for Constance he indefatigably plied the pen. This note is accessary, to account for the interval not noticed in the text, because not affording material so appropriate to the design of this work. (" Concile de Pise," liv. viii.)
# Popes have not been the most fortunate riders, except on the necks of Princes. As John XXIII. was being jolted over an eminence of the Voralberg, his clumsy car, riage turned over with him. Stretched on the ground, he grumbled out a pettish jest, too coarse to be translated : " Jaceo hie in nomine diaboli." Soon afterwards, on get- ting the first view of Constance in the distance, he greeted the un welcome object with, " There is the ditch where they catch foxes." Which did he mean, Autipopes or here- tics ? (L'Enfant, Hist. Coun. Constance, English edit., i., 18.)
HTJSS AT CONSTANCE. 9
from letters written before setting out. His reception was everywhere respectful, and in some places cordial, even to enthusiasm. Attended by three Bohemian Lords, John of Chlum, Henry of Latzenbock, and Wenceslaus of Duba, to whose care the Emperor and the King had confided him, with their train, Huss entered Constance six days after the Pope, and was entertained at the house of a well-disposed widow. Next day two of them waited on the Pope, to announce the arrival of Huss, and inform him that he had received, while on his way, at Nuremberg, a safe-conduct from the Emperor, in addition to that given by the King of Bohemia. John protested that, even if Huss had killed his own brother, he would use all his power to prevent any injustice being done him while he should stay at Constance. The following day (November 4th) the Pope announced his arrival in. the consistory of Cardinals, and was so kind as to revoke the sentence of excommunication. After a general congregation,* this famous Council was opened with great solemnity and pomp, November 16th, 1414 ; and a contest began between the "concurrents," John XXIII. and Gregory XII., which it is beside our present purpose to narrate.f Two inveterate enemies of Huss were now arrived at Constance, Stephen Paletz, Professor of Theology at Prague, and Michael de Causis, a parish Priest of doubtful reputation. These men, after the fashion of their times, posted up bills, and distributed papers, in Con- stance, denouncing Huss as a heretic ; and the Pope, when appealed to for the protection he had promised, declared himself unable to afford it. They also complained that he celebrated mass daily, and conversed on religious subjects with undue freedom. Having thus marked their victim, the leading members of the Council assembled in congregation at the Pope's apartments, and sent two Bishops to call him into their presence. They delivered the summons with great courtesy, yet taking care to have a body of soldiers in the street ready to enforce it, if the Bohemians should resist ; and Huss, accom- panied by his faithful friend, John of Chlum, proceeded with the Bishops, to answer for himself. He denied the charge of heresy, and professed willingness to submit, if it could be proved that he was in any error. The Cardinals professed to be satisfied, and retired to dinner, but left him and his friend under arrest until their return, when they placed him in close custody, without any further ceremony. At first he was confined to a private house ; while Chlum laboured to obtain redress from the Pope, and demanded his liberty, according to the terms of the imperial safe-conduct. But it was determined to crush the Bohemian Preacher ; and therefore, at the end of a week, he was incarcerated in the Dominican monastery. The two perse- cutors presented a paper to the Pope, containing several articles of offensive doctrine ; — such as, that the eucharist should be adminis- tered in both kinds, and not by Priests living in mortal sin ; that the Church does not consist of the Clergy only, and that Church property may be confiscated to the state ; that endowments and Episcopacy
* A congregation is an assemblage of Ecclesiastics to prepare business for the Coun- cil at the ensuing session.
t The schism of the Papacy is described in the preceding volume, book v. chap. 5. VOL. III. C
10 CHAPTER I.
are unscriptural, sinful men incapable of holding the priestly office, and their acts of excommunication unworthy of respect. They also charged him with circulating the doctrines of Wycliffe, and with being followed by none but heretics. Hence they inferred that, if he were not put out of the way, he would do more harm to the Church than any other heretic had done from the days of Constantine ; and prayed that Commissioners might be appointed to examine the case. Meanwhile Huss fell sick, and was attended by the Pope's Physicians, sent, as it has been thought, to keep him alive, that he might not die a natural death. A Patriarch and two Bishops went to his prison, read the charges, and required him to answer. He pleaded sickness as a reason for indulgence, and desired that he might be allowed an advocate to plead his cause ; but they told him that the canon law prohibited espousing or pleading the cause of a person even suspected of heresy. Yet men who had been principally irritated by his preach- ing at Prague, were brought to Constance as witnesses against him ; and, while he languished in prison, no one was suffered to act on his behalf. Besides those deputies, a numeroxis commission of high dig- nitaries was appointed to examine and condemn his doctrine. Mean- while Chlum had written to the Emperor, who sent a peremptory requisition for the release of Huss, and ordered that, if necessary, the prison should be broken open. But the order was not executed. Sigismund himself came to the Council on Christmas-day ; but, dazzled by the splendour of the scene, and overcome by the arts of the Ecclesiastics, he gave up the man whom he was bound in honour to protect, and allowed the Council to do with him as they pleased ; being superior to himself, he said, in spirituals, and not bounden to keep faith with heretics ; personal liberty and life, in his estimation, being rightly abandoned to the guile of the Priest, rather than intrusted to the care of the Prince. Moreover, Sigismuud put off his imperial robe, and, in the simple habit of a Deacon, read the Gospel for the day,* at first mass ; which Gospel, remarkably enough, begins with these words : " At that time there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed ; " an evil augury for the Fathers of Constance. The intelligence of their perfidy reached Prague, and the Bohemian nobility wrote to Sigismund, desiring the liberation of Huss, and wrote again ; but he was deaf to all but those who taught him that he was not to keep faith with heretics. John XXIII., whom he had patronized, shamefully fled from Constance, disguised as a groom, to avoid the importunity of the Council, who wished to get rid of all three pretenders to the Pontificate ; and Huss was transferred, by the Bishop of Constance, to another place of durance, the castle of Gotleben, where he suffered extreme anxiety. Jerome, his friend, having promised that, if he should be ill treated at Constance, he would come thither to plead for him, fulfilled the promise, and, contrary to the entreaty of Huss, ventured to appear in Prague, (April 4th, 1415,) with only one companion; but, hearing that there was some design to deprive him also of liberty, withdrew to
* According to the order of the Missale Romanum, where the same Gospel stands for the first mass on Christmas-day.
HUSS AT CONSTANCE. 11
Uberlingen, and thence applied to the Emperor for a safe-conduct, which he obtained, after great difficulty ; but only to go to Constance, not to return to Bohemia : neither was the passport from the Emperor, but from the Council ; and was, in fact, an order to appear before them within a fortnight, with an express reservation in favour of the demands of "justice and the orthodox faith." It is not certain that he received a copy of that document, which, however, was published at Constance ; but, on some pretext, he was arrested, and brought in custody to the Council, laden with chains. After a tumultuary sentence of the congregation to which they carried him, he was thrown into prison, subjected to extremely cruel treatment, and remained in that condition until his death by fire, more than a year afterwards.
After Huss had lain in the fortress of Gotleben about two months, an assembly of nations * was held to consider his case, where the Bohemians, supported by Sigismund, at last succeeded in obtaining a reluctant promise that he should have a public hearing. But to avoid such a procedure, if possible, the Council appointed a deputation to visit him in prison, and endeavour to extort a re- tractation. Those visits were frequent, and the deputies employed the most insolent and threatening language, in order to overcome his constancy. "Michael de Causis," says Huss himself, in a letter describing one of those visits, " was there, holding a paper in his hand, and stirring up the Patriarch of Constantinople to oblige me to answer to every article. He is contriving fresh mischief every day. God has, for my sins, permitted him and Paletz to rise up against me. Michael examines all my letters and words, with the air of an inqui- sitor ; and Paletz has set down all the conversations we have had together for many years. The Patriarch says aloud that I have a great deal of money. An Archbishop said to me, in the hearing of all, that I had seventy thousand florins. 'Ha! ha!' said Paletz to me, 'what's become of that robe so lined with florins?' I have this day suffered great vexation." As if to avoid owning that their labour had been spent in vain, the Commissioners circulated a report that he was willing to submit to the judgment of the Council ; but, agreeably to his constant profession, both before and afterwards, and to his language in private correspondence, there is every reason to believe that he only expressed a willingness to yield when it should be proved that he was in error. Many errors, no doubt, were contained in his writings ; but they were chiefly errors of the Romish Church, points of agreement with his persecutors, not of difference. His faith in God stood unshaken.
From Gotleben he was taken to Constance again, with promise of a public hearing, and placed in the Franciscan monastery, where almost all the Cardinals, Prelates, and other Clergy assembled, for the examination of the articles extracted from his books ; and were proceeding to condemn him unheard, when a Hussite Notary, who was present, hurried away to inform his friends, Duba and
* The members of this Council were classified according to their countries. Those of the same nation sometimes sat separately ; at other times " the nations " met, as above, in a general assembly.
c 2
12 CHAPTER I.
Chlum, who instantly obtained from Sigismund an injunction to stay proceedings until further examination. He was then called into the assembly, (June 5th,) but treated with boisterous derision when he attempted to answer for himself. Again he was per- mitted to appear, the Emperor being present, at the desire of the Bohemians, to enforce order ; and the entire time of the session was that day spent in endeavouring to force on him heretical opinions that he had never entertained, and to prove him guilty of offences at Prague that he had not committed ; and, after ah1, the feeble Emperor gave him to understand that, notwithstanding the safe-conduct he had given him, he should abandon him to the decision of the Council, which would be assuredly fatal, unless he would submit. But to have submitted would have involved a retractation of propositions he had never maintained ; or of truths, in regard to the corruptions of the Clergy, and the exorbitant pretensions of the Popes, that he could not conscientiously deny ; and the Archbishop of Riga recon- ducted him to his cell in the monastery. A third public examination (June 8th) was conducted in a similar manner, and with the like result. New accusations were brought, menaces and entreaties were tried ; but he resisted all, and, attended by his noble friend, John of Chlum, and laden with irons, was carried back to prison. Thither a form of abjuration was sent him, which he might have signed, as the terms were general, and even the same as he had himself employed ; but he knew that by such an abjuration he would seem to have swerved from strict integrity, and therefore humbly, but steadfastly, refused. Efforts to subdue his constancy were incessantly repeated. The Council wished, at least, to humble him into the condition of a self- convicted penitent, while Sigismund faltered in giving up a man who had come to the Council under the faith of his own safe-conduct ; and, although he had said that he would readily bring the fire to burn him with his own hand, still hesitated. After some weeks had passed thus, the Archbishop of Riga came to the prison, (July 6th,) and required him to appear again before the Council. A Cardinal presided. The Emperor and all the Princes of the empire were there, with an immense multitude of spectators. As Huss reached the church- door they were singing mass, and he was made to wait on the outside until the mysteries were over, lest they should be profaned by the presence of a heretic. In the body of the church was a high table, on which were laid a suit of Priest's habits, and behind it a lofty stool, on which the obstinate Bohemian was to be seated. He took the seat, exposed to the gaze of the vast congregation, bowed his head, and offered silent prayer. As he thus cast himself into the hands of the Lord Jesus, supreme Judge, the Bishop of Lodi mounted the pulpit ; and, taking for his text the words of St. Paul, " That the body of sin might be destroyed," began with describing the evils of the schism of the Church by Antipopes ; advanced to those of heresy, as a consequence of schism ; and then, addressing the Emperor, and pointing to Huss, said, " Destroy heresies and errors, but chiefly that obstinate heretic" Sermon being ended, the Bishop of Concordia arose, and read a decree of the Council, commanding all present, even
HUSS MARTYRED. 13
Emperor, Kings, Cardinals, and Bishops, to keep perfect silence during the ceremony to follow, under penalty of imprisonment. Several articles, said to be taken from WycliftVs •writings, were then recited, and declared heretical ; and others, attributed to Huss, were treated in the same manner. He endeavoured to disclaim some of them, but was silenced ; and, neither being permitted to address his Judges nor the assembled multitude, fell on his knees, raised his hands towards heaven, and in a loud voice repeated his appeal to Jesus Christ, the sovereign Judge of all. The Council and the spec- tators were mute, in fear of the punishment denounced on any who should speak or break silence by any movement of hand or foot, a few, perhaps, excepted, who endeavoured to enforce the prohibition upon him. But he would not keep silence. He prayed fervently to Christ ; and then, standing up, briefly justified himself in answer to a reproach for having preached at Prague when under excommunica- tion, complained of the contempt and violence inflicted on his Proc- tors, whom he had sent to Rome to answer in his cause, and declared that he had freely come to that Council, because under the safe- conduct of the Emperor there present ; on whom, speaking thus, he fixed his eyes. Sigismund could not conceal a blush ; and the inci- dent was not forgotten when, a century afterwards, Luther stood before Charles V. at Worms. Solicited to give up Luther to the ven- geance of his enemies, Charles replied, " I do not care to blush with my predecessor, Sigisraund." The Proctor of the Council then called on the Bishop of Concordia, who read two sentences ; one condemn- ing the books of Huss to be burned, and the other himself to be degraded. A company of Bishops were appointed to carry the degra- dation into effect forthwith. He was, therefore, robed and unrobed, according to the form prescribed. Throughout the whole process he neither betrayed fear nor kept silence, but made every objectionable sentence, and each ceremonial act, a subject of observation. From degradation the Council proceeded to deliver him over to the secular arm, as his soul had been already, to use their words, " committed to the devils." Sigismund received him accordingly, as Advocate and Protector of the Church ; and commanded the Elector Palatine, as Vicar of the empire, to deliver him into the hands of justice. The Elector handed him over to the Magistrates of Constance ; and the city Sergeants and executioner were ready to do their work. With this began a new • ceremony. Four Sergeants placed him between them, and moved out of the church. The Princes of the empire fol- lowed, and after them a large body of armed men. The procession passed slowly through a dense mass of spectators, taking the episcopal palace in their way, that Huss might see there a bonfire of his books. He did see the fire, but could not forbear smiling at the impotence of a persecution that was wreaking, its vengeance on parchment and paper, after the truths thereon written had gone forth into the world. But, mindful of his nearness to the divine tribunal, he approached the place of execution with solemnity, knelt down, recited some passages from the penitential psalms, and said, " Lord Jesus, have mercy, on me ! into thy hands I commit my spirit."
14 CHAPTER I.
Having expressed a desire to confess, a Priest came to him, and desired that he should first recant, as, according to canon law, a heretic can neither administer nor receive a sacrament. But that was to him impossible. Once more he called on the Saviour : " Lord Jesus, I humbly suffer this cruel death for thy sake ; and I pray thee to forgive all my enemies." He was then bound to the stake, with many marks of ignominy, which he meekly suffered ; and the wood was piled round him. At that moment the Elector Palatine and the Marshal of the empire came forward, and exhorted him to retract, and save his life. But he declared that what he had written and taught was only to rescue souls from the power of the devil, and deliver them from the tyranny of sin ; and that he was glad to seal his doctrine with his blood. The Elector withdrew, the wood was kindled, and John Huss, suffocated in the flames, quickly ceased to suffer.
They say that the Hussites gathered earth from the spot, and carried it to Prague ; and that a Cardinal, on the other hand, caused a dead mule to be buried there.* Those expressions of malice and venera- tion were equally trivial ; and whether or not this victim of Papistical hatred should be associated with martyrs to Gospel truth, is still a question. His doctrine, as his works show, was not in all points evan- gelical ; and he was rather eminent as an antagonist of ecclesiastical wickedness than as a preacher of saving truth. Heresy, indeed, is the name of every offence committed against Rome, and it was therefore applied to him ; but he faithfully acted up to what he knew, and chose to die rather than break the law of God. His real offences appear to have been these : Approving of the writings of Wycliffe, although he never adopted all Wycliffe's doctrine ; offending the Ger- mans in a quarrel between them and the Bohemians in the Univer- sity of Prague ; being a realist, whereas the Clergy at Constance were principally nominalists, and the Doctors of those philosophical sects hated each other with bitterest aversion. And it has been affirmed, that the higher Clergy, mortified at the effects of his preaching at Prague in promotion of the ancient usages of the Bohemian church, and to the discredit of the foreign Priests, employed bribery and intrigue to obtain the concurrence of those who might otherwise have exerted themselves to save his life ; while his firmness was regarded as obstinacy, and irritated even those who otherwise would have been willing to pronounce a milder sentence. f Yet the event of his death, and that of his friend Jerome, was so influential on the subsequent state of Europe, that a distinct narration of their sufferings could not be omitted.
We pause for a moment to mark an impression which con- stantly characterized the mind of Huss. He felt that he had still much to learn ; believed that Gospel truth would yet be better under- stood ; and, while in custody at Constance, writing to Prague, expressed a hope that, if spared to return home, he might be favoured with grace to attain to greater knowledge of the doctrine of Christ, in
* L'Enfant, Council of Constance, books i., ii., iii. t Mosheim, 'Eecles. History, cent, xv., part 2,
HUSS PREDICTED A REFORMATION. 15
order that he might destroy that of Antichrist. This idea possessed his mind, was produced in letters and in conversation, until his perse- cutors feared to leave him at large, lest he should commit further innovations, and, as a cherished hope that occupied the imagination, appeared to himself in dreams. One night, either at Constance or Gotleben, he dreamt that he was in his church of Bethlehem, painting on the wall a representation of Jesus Christ. While admiring the figure, some one came and defaced it ; but next day other painters came, far more skilful than he, and covered the walls with pictures of the Saviour, far surpassing his : a crowd of Bishops and Priests came in, and bade those also be defaced ; but the artists defied the Clerks, the people applauded, the paintings remained, and Christ was exhibited at Bethlehem in spite of them. During the last hours of his life, when appealing from the iniquitous sentence of the Council to that of Christ, he appears to have said many things under the influence of this hope. Those sentences were not prophetic, in the proper acceptation of the word, but, dictated by a strong persuasion that a reformation was at hand, were remembered by some who heard them, were repeated in Bohemia, and one was thought remarkable enough to be perpetuated on a medal struck to commemorate his martyrdom. The medal is, or was, in the cabinet of the King of Prussia, with a portrait of Huss on one side, his name, (Joa. Hus.,) and a legend on the margin, " Credo unam ecclesiam sanctam cato- licam," "I believe one holy catholic church;'* and on the reverse, Huss at the stake, with an inscription, " Jo. Hus. anno a Christo nato 1415 condemnatur," "John Huss is condemned in the year 1415 from the birth of Christ." And a legend, " Centum revolutis annis Deo respondebitis et mihi : " " When a hundred years are past, ye shall answer to God and to me." A hundred years afterwards, or little more, (A.D. 1517,) Luther appeared, like Huss, as the antagonist of Tetzel, a seller of indulgences ; and so striking is the coincidence, that some Romanists have disputed the authenticity of the medal with the same argument as that which Porphyry levelled at the book of Daniel : " It is so exactly true, that the prediction must have been written after the event." But numismatists allow that the medal is of the fifteenth century ; and, therefore, whenever struck, at what- ever time during the Hussite war, it was anterior to the event, and earlier than any indication of the rise of Luther.* From such facts as these our conclusion is, that Huss and his contemporaries did not regard their own affairs as distinct from a general renovation of the Church, nor their labours as independent of the agency of God.
We now return to Jerome. Five months had elapsed from the time of his arrest on the way towards Constance. During this period of sick- ness and imprisonment he had been subjected to several examinations and innumerable visits, for the sake ef extorting a confession of heresy, and gathering materials to justify a condemnatory sentence. The burning of his friend, too, whom he came at first to defend, was enough to convince him that his death was desired. Thus, when every
* L'Enfant, Council of Constance, i.. 446 — 449 ; Gerdesii Historia Refomnationis, i.. 51,52.
16 CHAPTER I.
thing conspired to overcome him, he was taken before a public con- gregation (Sept. llth) in St. Paul's church, and induced to sign a writing condemnatory of the forty-five articles of Wycliffe, and the thirty articles of Huss. But he added some limitations that spoiled the triumph of the fathers. Encouraged, however, by so great a con- cession, they redoubled their efforts to weary or frighten him into a retractation of whatever heterodoxy in religion or scholasticism had been laid to his charge ; and by the next session of the Council, (Sept. 23d,) a form of retractation was prepared. First, the Cardinal of Cambray, one of the Commissioners appointed to confer with him, read the document in full Council ; and then Jerome himself read it aloud, anathematizing all heresies, especially those of Wycliffe ; the doctrine which he had learned at Oxford, and sedulously promoted in Bohemia and in many other countries ; and that of his martyred friend, whose cause he had vowed never to desert. None of the usual terms of detestation were wanting, nor any profession of obedi- ence to the Church. But, after all, instead of receiving solemn abso- lution and reconciliation to the Church, he was remanded to prison, and merely allowed a little mitigation of severity, with permission to move about within the walls. And his worst forebodings were to be realized. Michael de Causis and Stephen Paletz, the two chief ene- mies of Huss, had been collecting new charges, and demanded, together with the Carmelites of Prague, that he should be tried again. The Cardinal Commissioners, who thought they had conducted the negotiation to a satisfactory issue, objected to the trial of one whom the Council had admitted to reconciliation ; but the accusers pressed for a second hearing ; some one remonstrated with them on their reluctance to try so notorious a disturber of the Church, and even uttered a suspicion that they had been bribed to intercede for him by the King of Bohemia, or by the Hussites. The Cardinals, indignant at the imputation of complicity with heretics, resigned their commission, and others were immediately appointed to act in their stead. Tn addition to mere dogmatizing, the Carmelites accused him of monstrous offences against God and man, outrages of humanity and decency, which, notwithstanding the length of time that had passed since the alleged perpetration of no less crimes than sacrilege, incest, and even murder, had not been thought of until then. But it was enough. The accusation was gravely admitted by the Council, and Jerome was again set before them (May 23d, 1416). But he seemed to be another man. Disgusted at their conduct, and repentant of his fall, he had refused to be examined on oath by the new Commission- ers ; and refused also to be sworn before the Council, unless they would previously allow him perfect liberty of speech. That was refused, and the matter adjourned to an early day, when he was brought to a congregation, and, still without submitting to be sworn, briefly denied the charges, recapitulated their proceedings towards him from the first, and closed by making public confession of his coward- ice. " Nothing," said he, " but the fear of punishment by fire made me consent basely, and against my conscience, to the condemnation of the doctrine of Wycliffe and John Huss." And he described his
JEROME OF PRAGUE IS BURNT. 17
recantation as the greatest crime he had ever been guilty of. Nothing therefore remained for his enemies to do but to condemn him to the stake. The sentence was read in the next session of the Council, (May 30th,) when the Bishop of Lodi, who had officiated in the same way at the degradation of Huss, preached a sermon. Jerome stood on a bench and made a speech that still remains as reported by Poggio of Florence, who acknowledged that all present were deeply affected by his resistless eloquence ; and it is certain that some, even then, compas- sionately entreated him to recant again. But he was not to be moved. The Patriarch of Constantinople read the sentence of " the sacred Synod," casting him out as a withered branch, a heretic relapsed, ex- communicated, and accursed. They forthwith delivered him to the secular power, with a charge that, whatever they might do with him, he should be treated with humanity, and not insulted. Being a layman, there was no ceremony of degradation ; a paper cap or mitre was put on his head, like that which Huss had worn, with devils painted on it ; the Sergeants laid hold on him, and led him away to the place of burning. He walked steadily, singing hymns as he went, and the Apostles' Creed. At the stake, he knelt down and made a long prayer, but in a low voice, and was then bound, and faggots heaped round him to the chin. While they were arranging the wood, he sang the Paschal hymn,
" Salve, festa dies toto venerabilis aevo,
Qua Deus iufernum vicit, et astra tenens."
" Hail ! happy day, and ever be adored, When hell was conquer'd by great heaven's Lord."
He told the people that as he had sung so he believed ; but that he suffered there because he would not consent to the counsel of the Priests who had condemned John Huss, an upright and holy man, a true Preacher of the law and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For about a quarter of an hour he struggled with the pain of martyrdom, pray- ing in Bohemian as long as he could articulate. JEneas Sylvius (afterwards Pope) wrote of these martyrs, that " they suffered death with very great constancy, and went to the fire as if it had been to a feast, without complaint. While the fire was kindling about them, they sang a hymn, which neither the flame nor the crackling of the burning faggots interrupted. We do not find that any of the philo- sophers suffered death with so much courage as theirs amidst the fire." * In the same session of this Council, when Jerome was con- demned, the notorious declaration was made, that faith is not to be kept with heretics ; f a doctrine which it is easy for Romanists to dis-
* L'Enfant, Council of Constance, books iii., iv.
t Such a declaration was, doubtless, made, and the understanding that faith was not to be kept with heretics, must have been general among the clerical part of the great assemblage at Constance, and acquiesced in by the laymen,~the Bohemians and Poles excepted. But the fathers were not so imprudent as to embody the principle of perfidy in so many written words. The decree relating to this subject is to be found in the printed Acts of the Council, and is thus literally translated : " The present holy Synod declares, that no safe-conduct whatsoever, granted by Emperor, Kings, and other secular Princes to heretics, or to persons under the infamy of heresy, thinking (that is, the grantors of safe-conduct thinking) to recall the same from their errors, by what- VOL. 111. D
IS CHAPTER I.
own, but which their Church has not yet relinquished. Their chief business, the healing of the schism, was completed in the enthrone- ment of Martin V. ; but the disastrous consequences of burning the two Bohemians extended through the century, yet attended with other results of a very different kind, of which the existence, at this day, of the United Brethren, or Moravians, is a triumphant evidence. As fcr Constance, it was ruined by the Council, and has not recovered to this day. The Hussite war, as it is called, and the rise of the Bohe- mian Brethren, are, therefore, the two great events that now demand attention.
Between the Bohemian nobles and others at Prague, representatives of Bohemia at Constance, and the Council, there had been much cor- respondence ; but their countrymen were sacrificed to sectarian malig- nity, in spite of every remonstrance. Passing by the laity as if they were not entitled to any consideration, the Council sent a letter to the Archbishop, Chapter, and Clergy of Prague, a few days after the execution of Huss, to inform them that, after long patience and innumerable efforts to retrieve him from the unutterable and detest- able heresy of Wycliffe, and hearing unexceptionable evidence that he had laboured to subvert the foundations of the Christian faith, and to engage the people in his damnable doctrine, they had been compelled to condemn him as a notorious heretic, degrade him from the priest- hood, and deliver him to the secular arm for final punishment. They then exhorted the Bohemians to be animated with the like zeal for the extirpation of heresy, and to excite their King to do the same ; but enjoined the Clergy to use all diligence in that holy work, under pain
of excommunication, deprivation of their benefices, and degradation.
0
ever obligation (quocunque vinculo) they may bind themselves, either can or ought to cause any prejudice to Catholic faith, or obstruction to ecclesiastical jurisdiction ; but that it is lawful, notwithstanding, to a competent and ecclesiastical Judge, to inquire concerning the errors of this kind of persons, and otherwise to proceed duly against them, and punish them, as far as justice shall require, (sztadebit,) if they pertinaciously refuse to retract their errors, even if, trusting in a safe-conduct, they come to the place of judgment, which otherwise they would not have done. (And the Synod declares that) neither does the (Prince) so promising, when they shall have done as is herein expressed, any longer remain under any obligation. Which statute, or ordinance, Lav- ing been read, the same statute was approved by the Lord Bishops in the name of the four nations, and by the most reverend father, the Lord Cardinal, Bishop of Ostia, in the name of the College of Cardinals, by the word Placet." (Binii Cone. Gen. et Provinc., torn, iii., pars 2 : Cone. Const. Sessio. XIX.) The truth is, that the Church ignores the authority of Princes to protect their subjects, or themselves either, from penalties inflicted by the ecclesiastical Judge. Not only does the decree mean that faith is not to be kept with heretics, but that it is to be withheld from them ; that the heretic, real or even reputed, is outlawed, ipso facto ; that when a man is harcseos imputatus, under the imputation of heresy, though that imputation be never so false and malicious, he is at once withdrawn from secular to ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Faith is not kept, because, in such cases, faith is out of the question. The decree is, in form, a simple assertion of ec- clesiastical superiority over all earthly tribunals ; but, in reality, is all that the most partial Protestant expositor could represent it to be. But we must not overlook an important fact, that the " Placet," or affirmative vote, was only given by Cardinals and Bishops ; and that the cowardice and perfidy of Sigismnnd towards John Huss did not suffice to raise this outrage on common justice and humanity by their hands, into an acknowledged precedent. At the diet of Worms, Charles V. refused to blush with hin predecessor, Sigis- mund, rightly considered the imperial sword to be better, in such a case, than the cro- zier, and protected Lnther, in spite of solicitations to give him up to the inquisitors of heresy. It is the pretension that shows the spirit of the Latin Church, whatever bv its power or its weakness.
REMONSTRANCE OF THE BOHEMIANS. 19
On hearing of this letter, about sixty chief persons, being the most powerful of the Bohemian nobility, and not fewer than four hundred others, assembled in the church of Bethlehem, (Sept. 5th, 1415,) decreed the honours of martyrdom to John Huss, and to his friend Jerome, whom they supposed to have been already executed. They unanimously gave the fathers of Constance the titles of murderers and hangmen, and declared their sentence to be nothing less than an insult to the Sovereign and to the nation of Bohemia. A letter, previously written, and therefore conveying their deliberate judgment, was read again, received their signatures, and was intrusted to a faithful messenger. They therein told the Council that the reverend master John Huss, Bachelor of Divinity and Preacher of the Gospel, had been condemned and put to a cruel death as a heretic, without having been convicted of any error or heresy, on the false accusation of his enemies, and those of the kingdom, by the instigation of traitors, and to the eternal scandal of Bohemia and Moravia. That this had been already said in a writing sent through Sigismund the Emperor, and successor to the throne of Bohemia, which writing, instead of being read in Council, was contemptuously burnt. They therefore protested, with heart and voice, that Huss was a most honest, just, and catholic man, long known and honoured by them, and his writings still held in high esteem. Not content with this, the Council, they complained, had proceeded against Jerome, and, probably, put him also to death ; and, as if those outrages were too little, had admitted slanderous accusations of heresy against the King and people. Therefore, by those presents, they solemnly made known, that whosoever had affirmed that heresy was propagated in Bohemia and Moravia, lied capitally, and was himself guilty of villany, treason, and heresy ; excepting, however, Sigismund, whom they believed to be innocent of calumniating them. They left the guilty to the judg- ment of God ; reserved the right of appeal to the Pope, when there should be a Pope over all the Church ; but prayed that effectual remedies might be applied to the evils of the kingdom, and declared themselves ready to sacrifice their lives in defence of the law of Christ, and of his faithful Preachers, who expounded that law with zeal, humility, and constancy, notwithstanding any human constitutions to the contrary. And they passed some resolutions in the same assem- blv, amounting to a withdrawal of their national Church from foreign jurisdiction, leaving the appointment of Pastors to the secular autho- rity, and the administration of orders and internal discipline to the Bohemian episcopate alone. A most important determination, indica- tive of the doctrine of episcopal independence ; a doctrine constantly repeated all over Popedom, and, ever since, threatening the disinte- gration of the Papal system.
On the receipt of the remopstrance, the fathers thought it desirable to appease the indignation of the writers, if that could be done by sparing Jerome, who was still languishing under dis- ease and anxiety in his prison, and therefore made extraordinary efforts to extort from him a recantation ; but, as we know, without ultimate success : . for the zealots, by intemperance, frustrated the
D 2
20 CHAPTER I.
endeavour of the more sagacious, whose prudence was only mo- mentary. The Council issued an edict, (Feb. 23d, 1416,) to be affixed to all the church-doors of Constance, reciting the proceedings of the heresiarchs, or ministers of damnation, as they chose to call them, who had set themselves up above the hierarchy of the Church militant, and were followed by increasing multitudes in Bohemia and Moravia. "Adding iniquity to iniquity," said they, "they write defamatory letters, sealed with their seals, in which they under- take the vindication and praise of John Huss, who was burnt by the just judgment of God and our sentence." They spurned the men who had presumed audaciously to address the sacred Coun- cil ; resolved to smother and crush the spreading doctrine ; declared all the signers of the letter, who were none other than the flower and strength of the Bohemian nobility, to be publicly defamed, and suspected of heresy ; and, as they could not be come at with safety in their dwellings, summoned them to appear before the high tribunal at Constance.
No more appears to have been done until four or five months afterwards, except deliberation in the congregations, until the edict was read in Council ; and the Patriarch of Constantinople, already honoured with the office of Inquisitor extraordinary, was appointed to examine any Hussites who might make their appear- ance, and report. But one only, and he a political conformist, was the trophy won by the perseverance of the sacred Synod. Henry of Latzenbock, a man distinguished in high office, and once a friend of Huss, abjured his doctrine ; but, unlike most rene- gades, was very lukewarm in the bad cause of persecution. They next wrote to Sigismund, soliciting his help to resist a persecution which, they said, the Catholic Church was suffering in Bohemia, where, in fact, the declamations of their adherent Clergy provoked reprisals from those who had seceded, and aroused the anger of a rude and often furious population. Wenceslaus, the King, was, no doubt, mortified at seeing the Council lay his kingdom under excommunica- tion, or a charge of prevailing heresy, which was almost equivalent with interdict, and perplexed at finding his brother Sigismund sub- servient to the Council. He could neither suppress the tumult, nor assume a position hostile to the Church.
But there were two nobles whose courage and patriotism urged them to head a revolt against the alien oppressors. One was Nicholas of Hussinetz, already mentioned as a relative and prote tor of Huss. The other was John of Trocznou, " the formidable Ziska."* He had served as a General in foreign war, received many wounds, and won the respect of his countrymen and the favour of his Sovereign. He despised the licentious priesthood ; and the dis- honour of a sister had deepened his contempt into hatred of the monastic orders. But Huss he had revered as the great Doctor and advocate of his country. Just after the intelligence of the death
* They who understand Bohemian say, that Ziska means " oiie-eyed," John of Trocznou having lost an eye in battle.
ZISKA AND HUSSINETZ. 21
of Huss had reached Prague, he was walking thoughtfully in the court-yard of the royal palace, absorbed in sad reflection on the wrongs inflicted on Bohemia. Wenceslaus was near, but unobserved, and, walking over to the veteran, pleasantly asked what he was think- ing about. " I was thinking," said he, " of the insult inflicted on Bohemia by the execution of John Huss." " Neither you nor I," said the King, " have power to help ourselves. But, if you know how to do it, take courage, and avenge your countrymen." No more \vas said ; but from that moment Ziska thought of nothing else. He retired from Prague, and, attended by Coranda, a zealous Preacher, laboured to instruct people in the doctrine of Huss. Hussinetz, unlike him, was dreaded by the King, and disliked Wenceslaus in return. Assembling a large body of men, he encamped on a hill near Prague, afterwards called Tabor, gathered multitudes of the citizens, and had the eucharist administered to them in both kinds, not so much in memory of the great sacrifice, as in token of opposi- tion to Rome, and defiance of the Council. In a short time, sur- rounded by forty thousand armed followers, he meditated insurrection, and proposed that another King should be elected, which would probably have been done, had not the Priest just mentioned, as the associate of Ziska, suggested, that as they had one who allowed them to do as they pleased, a change might be for the worse.
Carnal weapons were thus raised for the overthrow of Antichrist ; but being carnal, they were powerless for the higher service by which alone Antichrist can be overthrown. The party then raised, and afterwards largely multiplied, were the Taborites of the Hussite war. All over the kingdom the communion was celebrated in both kinds (March 17th, 1417). The University published their approbation of the practice ; and Peter of Wintzov, a Professor of Divinity, who had hitherto opposed Huss, now made a public profession of adherence to the doctrine. Wenceslaus shut himself up in a fortress, gave no one audience, and left Bohemia without an earthly governor. Lords followed the new worship ; Priests did the same ; and churches, with permission of the King, were taken into the exclusive pos- session of the Hussites, constituting a formal secession from Rome at that time unprecedented. The residuary Clergy were the minority. Their followers were few ; their churches few ; their revenue dimi- nished. Wenceslaus, who had been persuaded to return to his resi- dence at Prague, 'sanctioned all by feeble assent, but supported nothing. Law was set at nought by both parties. The cities were scenes of petty warfare, and the highways infested with robbers. Sigismund wrote a letter of expostulation and threatening, (Sept. 3d, 1417,) addressed to a town called Launy, where the defection appears to have been general ; but his language was too lofty, and aggravated the strife. He sent a general safe^conduct to those who had been cited to the Council ; but, even if they had been disposed to go, the decree cited on a former page must have deterred every one from going to Constance, where no faith was to be kept with heretics. And the Council displayed that impotence and blindness which so frequently, in their- acts, remind us of the infatuation of Ahithophel,
22 CHAPTER I.
by the enactment of a set of articles,* to the effect, that the timorous Wenceslaus should swear to protect the Church in its liberties and revenues ; that every Hussite should abjure, or suffer the utmost penalty, as if the majority of the Bohemians could be burnt ; that the Clergy should be reinstated, and the Church property restored ; that the University of Prague should be reformed, and all the Wycliflites, that is to say, almost every member, be turned out ; that the leading heretics should appear at Rome ; and that several other things, equally impossible, should be done. Martin V. — for by this time the Council had beaten off the Antipopes, except one, of whom death disembarrassed them, and created a Pontiff so designated — Martin V. followed this up by a Bull, too insignificant to be recited, and wrote a letter to the nobles, charged with the usual amount of threatening, (March, 1418,) and only remarkable for allegations, pro- bably true, that images were broken, trampled under foot, and burnt ; and that laymen intruded on the priestly office. One or two persons now again abjured Hussitism ; and in this terminates the sorry contest of, the Council of Constance with the insurgents of Bohemia (April 13th, 1418). f
About sixteen months after the dissolution of the Council, (April 22d, 1418,) the King of Bohemia died, and Sigismund, Emperor of Germany, succeeded to the throne. A few days (July 30th, 1419) before the death of the King, there was a great tumult at Prague. To counteract the proceedings of the City-Council, which was alto- gether Hussite, and had received his sanction, he foolishly created another Council, which was to supersede the old one. No measure could have been more certainly calculated to produce a civil war ; and if the King intended this, his intention was fully answered. The new Council imprisoned two Hussites. Ziska, it is said, assembled the people, walked in procession at their head, carrying the sacramental cup ; and, on arriving in front of the Council-house, demanded the liberation of some Hussite prisoners. The Council refused, and the mob broke in, and flung thirteen of the new Councillors out at the windows, who were caught on the points of lances^ and butchered on the spot. The death of the King, (August 16th,) smothered by his attendants, was the signal for a general insurrection. The monasteries were entered ; the churches not already occupied by the Hussites -were stripped of their idolatrous decorations ; and a zealous Priest dispensed bread and wine to the promiscuous mob, from a rude table in the open street. The wealthier citizens, dreading utter ruin, sent to Sigismund, now their Sovereign, for succour ; while Ziska called the neighbouring peasantry to arms, who flocked into the city, armed with flails and other rustic implements, and besieged the royal castle, whence, however, the widow-Queen had fled. Ziska was now at the head of the insurrection ; and the Taborites ranged Bohemia at pleasure. The chief men, Hussites though they were, could not restrain the fury of the armed population, and, therefore, sent a deputation to the Emperor, entreating him, as King of Bohe-
* Bioii, torn, iii., pars 2 ; Daraaat. Errorum Wicl. et Husz. t L'Eufant, Council of Constance, books iv., v.
THE TABOR1TES. 23
mia, to interpose for the pacification of the country, not to suppress the new worship, but to allow liberty to both parties. Sigismuml, with characteristic pride and indecision, kept them kneeling for a long time, and at last refused their proposals, which would have saved the bloodshed of a protracted war : he insulted all, both nobles and peasantry, and left things to take their course. Meanwhile, Hussites who crossed the frontiers were persecuted, and even burnt. Acts of that kind provoked horrible reprisals, in which Ziska was not guiltless ; and a warfare, barbarous as ever disgraced humanity, raged throughout the land. Nor was this all. The Hussites, with Ziska at their head, swore never to acknowledge Sigismund as King of Bohe- mia ; and, in order to abolish Monkery altogether, began to pull down the monasteries and commit other acts, which might have been rightly enough performed under legal or juridical sanction, but were utterly unjustifiable as the effect of tumultuary violence. Then Sigismund, instead of coming as an acknowledged and invited King, prepared to invade Bohemia as an enemy. The Queen's General, Schwamberg, sent to open the campaign, came up with Ziska at Pilsen, but was discomfited by a singular stratagem of that ingenious soldier. He directed the women of Pilsen to spread their gowns and veils on the ground ; the horses got their feet entangled, many of them fell, the cavalry were beaten, and, for a moment, Ziska was victorious. Sigismund then joined the Queen in Silesia ; and Bohemia was invaded with as complete strategy as the soldiers of those times could exhibit.*
Having marked the first stage of this war with sufficient distinct- ness to show that it was provoked by the murder of Huss and Jerome, and the insolence of the Council of Constance ; encouraged by the imbecility of Wenceslaus, who even gave the first hint to Ziska, and raised Hussitisra by sanctions, valid, although given with reluc- tance ; aggravated by the intemperance of the Popish Preachers, and by many acts of overt persecution ; and embittered by the contempt of Sigismund ; we must now pass over the details of the war, merely noticing the more characteristic incidents.
The Hussites were by no means alone in sacrilegious and profane excesses. To destroy an idol, certainly, is not sacrilege, or, if it were, the mawmets of Popery should have been receiving public veneration in our own country to the present hour. To administer the emblems of our Saviour's passion to ungodly multitudes, and that in the camp and in the street, during the heat of insurrection, is so nearly pro- fane, that we should revolt from participation in such a procedure ; but the error at Prague arose out of passing from a religious contro- versy into a political strife. Yet that was the prevailing error of Christendom from the days of Constantine, and is the constant error of Popery. It was forced on the* Bohemians by their oppressors. On the other side, nothing could be more wantonly extreme than the sacrilege of Papists. In the beginning of this war, (Dec. 26th, 1420,) an imperial Captain broke into the church of Kerczin during divine service, ordered some of the worshippers to be massacred, and others
*"Menzel, History of Germany, chap. 185,
24 CHAPTER I.
to be taken prisoners ; taking a chalice full of wine from the commu- nion-table, he drank health to his horse, and then, putting the sacred vessel to the brute's mouth, declared that his horse, too, was a utra- quist. A party of horse, belonging to Albert of Austria, in the service of Sigismund, seized a village Curate, with his Chaplain, three peasants, and four children, the eldest of whom was only eleven years old. The Priest had administered the sacrament in both kinds ; the others had partaken of it. The commanding officer sent them to the Bishop, who required the Curate to promise that he would never give his people the cup again ; and threatened him with flames if he would not submit. The good man quoted Scripture and the Missal in defence of that mode of administration, at which, in the Bishop's presence, a soldier struck him with his fist so violently, that his face was covered with blood ; and the Bishop, notwithstanding his doc- trine of priestly sanctity, kept the Priest and the others in custody, mocked them the whole night, and next morning, that being the Lord's day, took them to the stake, made the Priest sit there with the chil- dren tied on his knees, and burnt the entire company in one fire, look- ing on until the work was done. The murder of a man created in the image of God, the destruction of human life, sacred as it is, and guarded, from the creation of the world, by a distinct law of judicial retribution, may not be sacrilege in the estimation of those who say that they kill the body for the good of the soul ; but such persons can understand us when we speak of the barbarian Bishop who burned a Presbyter, not ceremonially degraded, and so committed sacrilege, his own Church being judge, and therefore should have incurred the guilt of heresy in her eyes.
" At Leitmeritz," says a German historian, " the Burgomaster Pichel, a cruel and deceitful man, seized in one night twenty-four respectable citizens, among whom was his own son-in-law, and threw them into a deep dungeon near St. Michael's gate. When they were half dead from cold and hunger, he, assisted by some of the imperial officers, had them taken out, under a guard, and pronounced upon them the sen- tence of death.* They were then chained upon waggons, and conveyed to the banks of the Elbe, to be thrown into the water. A multitude of people assembled, with the wives and children of the prisoners, making great lamentation. The Burgomaster's daughter came also. She was his only child, and with clasped hands threw herself at his feet, interceding for the life of her husband. But the father, harder than a stone, said, ' Spare your tears, you know not what you desire. Cannot you have a more worthy husband than he?' Finding her father thus inexorable, she arose, and said, 'Father, you shall not give me in marriage again!' Smiting her breast, and tearing her hair, she followed her husband with the rest. When the martyrs had arrived at the bank of the Elbe, they were thrown from the wag- gons ; and while the boats were preparing, they raised their voices, calling heaven and earth to witness that they were innocent ; then, bidding their wives and children and friends farewell, they exhorted
* We have already seen the municipal authorities at Prague exercising the exorbi- tant prerogative of pronouncing and inflicting capital punishment at their pleasure.
MASSACRES OF TABORITES. 25
them to constancy and zeal, and obedience to the word of God, rather than the commandments of man. Finally, they prayed for their enemies, and commended their souls to God. Their hands being bound to their feet, they were conveyed in boats to the middle of the river, and then thrown into the stream. The banks were lined with executioners, provided with pikes, who took care that none should escape ; for when any came floating near the shore, although half dead, they were stabbed, and forced back to the middle of the river. The Burgomaster's daughter, fixing her eyes upon her husband, sprang into the river, and, embracing him, strove hard to draw him from the water. But as it was too deep for her to get a firm footing, and she was unable to loosen his bands, they both sank. The following day they were found clasped in each other's arms, and were buried in one grave. This was done on the 30th of May, 1421." *
Perish the fairest works of human art ; let the fanes of saint- worship be all violated ; let the grandest fabrics of ecclesiastical anti- quity be demolished ; let every charm of ancient hierarchies die and be forgotten ; rather than that the fell demon of priestly hate should go to and fro in the world, to perpetrate sacrilege on every humane senti- ment and holy right ; to make Christianity herself suspected by the Heathen, in whose eyes her counterfeit is hateful. As for charging the Hussites with cruelty, and the Protestants with Vandalism, the reader of such horrible narratives as these must pass by the complaint as beneath ridicule.
In the same year, beside the massacre of multitudes by the sword of Sigismund, and burnings and drownings in all directions, several thousands of Taborites were thrown into the old mines of Kuttenberg. There were precipitated 1,700 into one pit, 1,308 into another, and 1,321 into another. They were prisoners of war, no doubt, of that holy warfare in which there is neither truce nor quarter. For two centuries a solemn yearly meeting was held on the ground, where a place of worship stood, in memory of the sad event. Some of the Romish nobles displayed their zeal by murdering whomsoever they could. We hear of two who, with a band of their men, set part of a town on fire, went into a church and killed a Minister as he was officiating at the Lord's table. A person who had been seen to turn his back on the host, was put into a barrel and burnt. A Utraquist Priest, who had succeeded in escaping into Moravia, was seized there, with another, and both of them, Martin Loquis and Procopius Jednook, were laden with irons and condemned to die ; then reprieved from death for a time by a Priest of the old communion, who hoped to extort a recantation from them ; but he, failing, cast them into a dungeon, where they were kept for two months, and tortured by the application of fire to their bodies, until their bowels burst out. They were then put into a barrel and burnt (August 21st, 1421).
Horrified at those barbarities, and convinced that his Church wa? hostile to Christianity, the Archbishop of Prague himself, Conrad of
* The Reformation and Anti-Reformation in Bohemia : from the German, vol. i., pp. 14 — 16. A work_bearing every mark of accuracy. VOL.. III. E
26 CHAPTER I.
Westphalia, although Primate of the kingdom, Prince of the empire, and Papal Legate, surrendered his dignities. Hazarding his life hy that act, he declared himself a Utraquist, offered himself as their chief, and asso- ciated some of their Ministers as administrators of a consistory, That consistory survived the persecution, and even received the sanction of Sigismund ; and the archiepiscopal see was vacated for one hundred and forty years. Conrad died in exile. One of those administrators, Zeliveus, perhaps improperly, busied himself in endeavouring to per- suade the people of Prague to change the Town Council, which was unfriendly to the Hussites. For this offence a full measure of ven- geance was dealt out. The Governor of the city decoyed him and twelve others into the town-hall, where they were instantly seized and beheaded. But, again, as once before, a stream of blood, overflowing the threshold, betrayed the deed ; the citizens burst the door, brought away the bodies for interment ; and Gaudentius, a Priest, laying the head of Zeliveus on a dish, carried it through the city, and called aloud for vengeance. The multitude, infuriated, plundered the Col- leges, and killed some of the Senators. But it is time to turn away from scenes like these. Let it, therefore, suffice to say, that the Hussites could nof be conquered by foreign military force or domestic persecution.
Although divided by a party-distinction that we must hasten to notice, they all united when expecting an attack from Sigismund ; and at last, a Council being assembled at Basil, (A.D. 1433,) it was found that the way of force being impracticable, that of concili- ation must be tried. Three hundred Bohemian delegates appeared at Basil ; and the Clerks, seeing that the Emperor himself was com- pelled to respect their valour, and unable to subdue their spirit, sub- mitted to sanction heresy, the heresy for which so many thousands had already been slaughtered, and accepted four articles, called com- pactates, as the terms of reconciliation with Bohemia, — terms, as those brave men said, which were either to be granted, or they would fight for them. They were these : 1. That the communion of the most divine eucharist, useful and salutary under both kinds, that is, of bread and wine, should be freely ministered by the Priests to all believers in Christ in Bohemia, Moravia, &c. 2. That all mortal sins, and especially public ones, should be restrained, corrected, and put away by those whom it concerned to do so, reasonably, and according to the law of God. 3. That the word of God should be freely and faith- fully preached by Ministers duly qualified. 4. That it is not lawful for the Clergy, under the law of grace, to have temporal dominion over worldly goods.* One of the Hussite Priests, Rokyzan, was called Archbishop of Prague. Legates from the Council went to Bohemia to tell them that they were again dear children of the Church, and to exhort both parties not to hinder or fight with one another. Rokyzan was, for a time, half melted by showers of Papal and imperial honour, and occasionally seemed to temporize ; but he continued to be a stern C&lixtine, went to the full extent of the compactates, and again promoted scriptural doctrine as far as he understood it. For a
* Binii, torn, iv., Cone. Basil. Appendix, p. 153.
THE BRETHREN OF BOHEMIA. 2?
time, too, Bohemia had some rest ; and at last the Hussites succeeded in placing one on the throne, (Podiebrad,) who protected them from persecution. The Latin Church, however, soon resumed its naturally hostile position. After Podiebrad had governed Bohemia well for twenty-seven years, the Council of Florence having revoked the concessions made at Basil, Pope Paul II. (very unlike the first Paul) anathematized him, and pretended to absolve his subjects from their allegiance, and many of the nobles and cities of Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia relapsed into Popery again. Bands of crusaders, fortified with the Pope's blessing, ravaged the country, and killed those defence- less heretics, whom a predecessor had called dear children of the Church. Their crusade was remarkably distinguished by child-murder, as if Divine Providence had suffered them to provide an historical monument of their own cowardice. They used to cut off infants' heads, pile them in heaps, and toss them as balls.*
This national testimony to a part of evangelical truth, and to the principle of religious liberty, was not lost on Europe, and no doubt pointed out to other states the way of religious independence in which they followed in the next century ; for Bohemian liberties were vindicated down to the days of Luther and Zuinglius. But the most satisfactory issue of this protracted struggle still appears in the Church of the United Brethren. Their predecessors were the Brethren of Bohemia. The Calixtines,f persecuted by the Papists, naturally began to think of some way of escape from Papal jurisdiction. The compactate articles had been granted by the Council of Basil ; and although those articles were still acted on, and the Archbishop Rokyzan was persecuted as a heretic, and Bohemia was anathematized and bleeding under a crusade, they had not utterly renounced the authority of the Church of Rome. It was obviously desirable to do so, and a Diet of the Calixtine states, assembled at Prague, (A.D. 1450,) attempted the first step of a secession by sending an embassage to Constantinople to seek ordination for their Ministers. Had not the Greek Church been falling, or had it been purer, such an alliance might have been effected. On the article of the cup, however, they were united ; in hatred or envy or fear of Romanism they agreed ; and the Calixtine envoys were received by the Greek Bishops with the utmost cordiality. But the Greeks were negotiating for union with Rome, Constantinople was trembling before the Turk, and the Hussite ambassadors had not long left the city of Constantine, when the Crescent supplanted the Cross under the dominion of Mahomet II.
Another way of escape was prepared for those who were willing to separate themselves from the world for Christ's sake. During the crusade just mentioned, while Legates from Rome were secretly, and but too successfully, endeavouring to beguile the more political and less earnest of the Calixtine Clergy.; and while these were diverging into two parties more distinctly hostile to each other, — the moderate Calixtines, and the fanatical Taborites ; a third party, not neutral, but
* The Reformation, &c., in Bohemia, chap. i. ; Clarke's Martyrology, chap. xxv. t From calix, " cup," or " chalice," those who contended for the iidiuiuistrutii.n i.i' the I'Ufharist iu both kinds, were called Calixtine f.
E 2
28 CHAPTER I.
more profoundly earnest than either of them, emerged out of the confusion. They did not fight for the cup : their first object was not ecclesiastical reform. They desired personal salvation, loathed party strife, repudiated sectarian badges, longed for peace, not reconciliation •with Pope or Patriarch, but peace with God. Some of them preached •with unwonted spirituality arid power, and their holy zeal was quick- ened as the horrors of the crusade multiplied. Several persons, actuated by this desire, conceived the idea of uniting themselves into a Christian fellowship, and petitioned Podiebrad, the moderate King of Bohemia, for permission to form a settlement remote from the scenes of controversy, that they might there dwell in Christian peace. The petition was favourably heard, and Podiebrad allowed them to oc- cupy a tract of laud in the lordship of Lititz in the mountain-country bordering on Silesia (A.D. 1451). This was the rallying-point for others of like mind, and (A.D. 1453) several pious nobles and learned men, quitting the tumult of the metropolis, joined them there. At first they attended the ministry established according to the Calixtine form ; and one of the Ministers, Bradacz, no longer timorously following the compactatea, gratified the settlers by abolishing many superstitious ceremonies, excluding unworthy communicants, and maintaining strict Christian discipline. His brethren, well-meaning men, it might be, but mere Calixtines, disapproved of his proceedings, and complained against him to the Consistory as an innovator. The Consistory forbade Bradacz to preach. He appealed to Rokyzan, as Archbishop, and to his suffragan, Lupacz. Rokyzan was not the man to peril himself by espousing a novel cause, and therefore gave no redress : but Lupacz advised him and his flock to prosecute their work with confidence and firmness ; to learn from obstacles thrown in their way that they should not expect help from others ; to form an ecclesiastical constitution of their own, following the primitive church, both in doctrine and discipline. He told them that they would inevitably exasperate the hatred of the Romanizing party and their chiefs ; but exhorted them to fulfil the will of God, and see to their own salvation, emulating the holiness, fidelity, and patience of the primitive confessors. Others gave them similar advice.
The advice was taken. Bradacz removed from his former church of Zamberg to Kunewalde, where the settlers were most numerous, and invited the more pious Calixtiue Clergy of the adjacent villages to meet him there for conference. Gregory, nephew of the Archbishop, was there, and long after proved his sincere devotion, by suffered persecution for the love of Christ. They agreed on fundamental principles of action,*
* Nearly three hundred years later, a Conference was holden in London by the Rev. John Wesley, who, like Bradacz, invited a few pious brethren to meet him, not to form a distinct ecclesiastical system, which was not as yet contemplated, although it really grew out of that Conference, but to consider " how to save their own souls, and thr-m that heard them." The one Holy Spirit, who work* all grace in all men, taught both those initiators of Christian churches the supremacy of truth over conscience. The latter asked this question: "Can a Christian submit any farther than this " (saving his conscience) " to any man, or number of men upon earth ? " The answer was : " It i* undeniable, he cannot ; either to Council, Bishop, or Convocation. And this is that grand principle of private judgment, on which all the Reformers proceeded : ' Every man must judge for himself; because every man rnxut give an account for himself to God.' " (Mi-
ORIGIN OF THE MORAVIAN CHURCH. 29
not gathered from human rules and traditions, but from the law of God. Like the first Christians, they took no private name, but, addressing each other as " brethren and sisters," they described their communion by the simple appellation of UNITAS FRATRUM, " Unity of Brethren ;" and themselves as FRATRES LEGIS CHRISTI, "Brethren of the Law of Christ." Perceiving that some persons misunderstood the distinction implied by the words " Legis Christi," they dropped them, and preferred to be only known as "Brethren." The law of Christ was to them, according to the doctrine of Wycliffe and HUBS, the New Testament, the only infallible rule for the guidance of Christians ; all regulations not enjoined by the word of God, or fairly deducible from it, being mere matters of expediency, and to be altered according to circumstances. They then elected three Elders for the general super- intendence of their concerns ; Gregory, Procopius, and Clenovius. They drew up a plan of strict discipline, to be administered without respect of persons, and resolved to suffer all for conscience' sake, not to use arms in defence of religion, but to seek protection from the violence of enemies in prayer to God, and in dispassionate remon- strance. This little society was indeed a new creation, and the deter- mination, so proper for a Christian church, to refrain from the use of arms, at once marked them as belonging to that King for whom his servants do not fight. And their avowal of strength in God was the beginning of the new kingdom of reformed and resuscitated Christianity that cometh not with observation. The more distant precursors of the Reformation of the sixteenth century deserve great honour ; but these pacific reformers, as a collective body, a nascent Church, are especially worthy of remembrance, and the Conference of Kunewalde will be gladly imitated by those men of God who do not strive, nor cry, nor lift up their voice in the street. The infant Church was instantly established, and rapidly enlarged by the addition of spiritually-minded persons. Other congregations were formed in Bohemia and Moravia, and joined the UNITY.
Their fundamental principles were soon tested by persecution. The lukewarm Calixtines, to whom the cup was more than He who gave it, joined the Papists, who could yield the cup to the layman on an emer- gency, but could never suffer the innovations of true piety. They were accused of being leagued with the Taborites, and of plotting sedition in their retreats. They were cited to appear, by deputies, at the Consistory of Prague. Rokyzan presided ; and he, although his nephew was one of their leaders, and although he had tacitly allowed, perhaps even approved of, their procedure, then censured them as imprudent and dangerous people. Podiebrad was reminded that at his coronation he had sworn to be willing and obedient to the Roman Catholic Church, and to the Popes, like other Catholic Christian Kings, and, in the unity of the orthodox faith, to protect and defend that faith with all his power ; and, God helping, to recall his people from all errors, sects, and heresies militating against that holy Roman Church, and to bring
nutes of the Methodist Conferences, vol. i., p. 4.) This is a first principle of true reform, where God and conscience are indeed the guides ; the first element of Methodistical p"l''y. und °f a free Christian communion.
30 CHAPTER I.
them back to the obedience, agreement, unity, and worship of the same Church, using all diligence to that end. Reminded of this oath, and intimidated by menaces implied, if not loudly uttered, he refused to protect the Brethren. They were immediately outlawed. In one moment they found themselves deprived of country and property, and exposed to the utmost peril. Most of their settlements were broken up. Even the sick and infirm were driven from their dwellings, and many of them perished with cold and hunger in the fields. Others were thrown into dungeons, starved, racked, quartered, or burnt alive. Their enemies hoped to rack them into confession of conspiracy or of some other crime ; for even those who could think it reasonable to fight or suffer for the cup, could not apprehend the possibility of any man's suffering for the sake of Christ alone.
The Brethren in Lititz, however, were less persecuted than others, and they sent messengers to travel over Bohemia and Moravia to seek out and comfort the sufferers. " On one of these visits Gregory came to Prague. A number of the Brethren were assembled in a house for the purpose of celebrating the Lord's supper. While thus engaged, a Magis- trate, who secretly favoured them, sent and advised them to separate. Gregory, considering it to be the duty of Christians not needlessly to expose themselves to danger, admonished the assembly to seek for safety in instant flight. (Matt. x. 23.) Others, however, were of a different opinion, and said, ' No ; he that believeth shall not make haste.* Let us take our meal in peace, and await the consequences.' Some young students, in particular, boasted that tortures and the stake were considered as trifles by them." f But their conversation was interrupted by the appearance of a Justice and a party of men sent to apprehend them. He, too, quoted Scripture : " It is writ- ten," said he, " that all that will live godly must suffer persecution ; therefore, follow me." They were taken away, and put to the torture. Most of the boasters denied their faith ; but Gregory was not intimi- dated. He fainted on the rack, they thought him dead ; and his uncle, Eokyzan, vanquished for the time, hasted to the prison, bent over the wounded, or, as it seemed, dead, body of the confessor, and exclaimed, weeping, " 0 my dear Gregory, would to God I were where thou now art ! " But Gregory revived, was set at liberty, and lived to advanced age, a laborious and venerated leader of the Unity of Brethren. Encouraged, by the momentary relenting of Rokyzan, to hope that he might yet befriend them, the Brethren reminded him that he had at first taught them from the writings of the Apostles and from examples of the primitive church, and then advised them to attend the ministry of Chelezitius, whose discourses had conveyed clearer instruction in Christian truth ; that in obeying the Gospel they had only acted on the responsibility he had himself so freely recognised ; and that their separation from other Hussites was not on account of any question of ceremonial or discipline, but because of the evil and corrupt doctrine retained among them. But the codrtier Priest could
* Isai. xx7iii. 16 : The Bohemian translation in, " He that beliereth does not flee." t History of the Protestant Church of the United Brethren. Ijy the Rev. John Holmes, vol. i., pp. 46,47.
DISCIPLINE OF THE UNITED BRETHREN. 31
not suffer affliction with the people of God. He shrank from the thought of infamy and suffering, and repelled their advances. With disappointment and indignation they closed the correspondence in a bitter sentence : " Thou art of the world, and wilt perish with the world."
This indiscretion was terribly repaid. The Archbishop, mortified at the reproof, meditated revenge, and easily obtained it in an edict from the King, ordaining that "those dangerous people should no longer be suffered to remain in Bohemia and Moravia." To how great lengths both Calixtines and Papists would have carried their violence, if un- checked, may easily be conjectured ; but God so overruled Rosenberg, Romish Bishop of Breslaw, that he interposed his influence in fear, rather than pity, for the protection of the former brethren of the angry Rokyzan. He represented to Podiebrad that the blood of mar- tyrs would but increase the number of heretics.* Their lives were spared ; but they were compelled to quit the country, and leave their possessions to be confiscated. " They sought an asylum in the moun- tains, the thickest forests, and the clifts and recesses of rocks, far removed from the society of other men. They kindled fires only in the night, lest their places of retreat should be discovered by the smoke. And, during the winter, when snow lay on the ground, they used the precaution, when going out, to walk one after the other, the last person dragging a bush after him to erase the marks of their feet." f By day their chief cares were for gathering rude sustenance, and to watch against surprise. By night they often congregated in caverns or in woods, and around their fires held spiritual converse, and poured out their joint complaint, through the Divine Comforter, before the mercy-seat of Christ ; outcasts, indeed, yet dwelling in the paradise of a good conscience. When for about three years (from 1461 to 1464) the Brethren had remained in the mountains, and the terror of persecution was somewhat abated, they began to consider how to preserve, by discipline, the purity of their brotherhood. It was evidently impossible for them to reform either Popery or Calix- tinism, and, for the preservation of the truth for which so many had surrendered property, country, and even life, it was necessary that they should follow the indications of Divine Providence, and constitute themselves a visible church, by assuming a form of disci- pline. A numerous assembly was therefore convened in the Riesen- Gebirge, a chain of hills between Bohemia and Silesia, and in the neighbourhood of Reichenau, where a few fundamental rules of conduct were unanimously adopted, and some principles of church government discussed. "Before all other things" they agreed to preserve to themselves the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ in purity, and to confirm it in righteousness which is of God, abiding together in love, and putting their trust in the living God, — manifesting that trust in word and deed. Faithfully assisting each other in love, with a blameless life, humility, submission, meekness, continence, and pati-
*. But couched the sentiment under a coarse comparison : '< Maggots breed in meat half roasted." — Cranz, History of the United Brethren, part ii., (ancient,) sect. 10. t Holmes, i., 49.
32 CHAPTER I.
ence, they were to give proof of faith, hope, and love. They bound themselves to mutual submission in obedience to the word of God, each receiving from the others instruction, warning, exhortation, and correction, thereby to keep the covenant already made with God through the Lord Jesus Christ in the Spirit. They agreed willingly to undertake and do, according to the measure of divine grace im- parted to each, whatever should be judged conducive to edification and improvement ; but especially to observe Christian obedience, even in the deepest poverty and want acknowledging one another. They were to submit to correction with godly fear, if overtaken in sin, and penitentially confess their guilt before God and man. They also declared with sorrow, that if any should be unfaithful, and refuse to keep the covenant made with God and his brethren, they " could not insure such an one of his salvation," * but should withdraw from him, and exclude him from their communion in divine service. Neither could a grievous heretic or sinner be re-admitted until he had given proof of entire amendment. The Priests and teachers, in particular, were to set a good example, in word and deed, that punishment and reproof might be avoided. f
That was, indeed, a lovely spectacle. A multitude of confessors, poor, out-cast, and hunted down, rallying around their spiritual Head, in the absence of earthly Pastors, a few only excepted, and even they, by being separated from the Church that had commissioned them, di- vested, in their own estimation, of all human authority to exercise their ministry. These people were entering on a new ecclesiastical career under the sole sanction of Him who had called them from darkness into light. For the present, however, they were content with the bond of brotherhood, and prayerfully awaited guidance for the estab- lishment of complete church order. Podiebrad, perhaps admiring their peaceable deportment, endeavoured to bring about a reconcilia- tion between them and the Calixtines (A.D. 1465). But the effort was unavailing, and only served to hasten his own ruin ; for the Popish Lords, incited by the court of Rome, revolted, and he was anathematized as a favourer of heretics, and deprived of his kingdom (A.D. 1467). Yet at this very time, the Brethren, inured to a state of excommunication, and indifferent to the quarrels of their persecutors, proceeded to complete their work. The order of divine service and of temporal government had been framed in successive Synods, and a few Waldensian refugees, already mingled with them, brought intelligence of that people who were dispersed and hidden in various parts of Europe. In the village of Lhota, and in the house of a person named Duchek, about seventy persons were assembled. Ministers, — yet no longer acknowledging the validity of their Romish or Calixtine ordination, — noblemen, scholars, citizens, and peasants, deputed from various parts of their own settle- ments, and by their brethren, congregated in distant places through- out Bohemia and Moravia, met to consider how to maintain a regular succession of spiritual teachers. After fasting, the Synod was opened with
* Meaning, of course, that they could not hold out to such an one any hope of eal- vatioii.
t The Reformation and Anti- Reformation in Bohemia, vol. i., chap. 1.
LAST WALDENSIAN BISHOP BURNT. 33
reading the holy Scriptures and with prayer. Deliberation followed ; and it was unanimously determined, according to advice long before given by Lupacz, to elect Ministers from among themselves. And following the example of the eleven who elected Matthias by lot, they, in like manner, committed the ultimate decision to the Lord. Twenty men were first nominated, as qualified by their divine knowledge and experimental piety, displayed in blameless conversation, to be Minis- ters of Christ. Out of these nine were chosen ; and of the nine they determined that three should be elected by lot. On nine slips of paper was written the word non (he is not) ; and on three others, precisely similar, the word est (he is). They then prayed that God would appoint them three, two, one, or none, to that office, caus- ing, if it so pleased him, that not even one should receive the affirm- ative lot. A little boy was called in to distribute the folded papers, promiscuously thrown together, to the nine persons. The surplus three that remained in his hand were NON ; and Matthias of Kuue- walde, Thomas of Prschelauz, and Elias of Krschenow, on opening their billets, found them inscribed with EST. The Brethren sang a hymn of praise, hailed them as chosen of God, promised them obedience, and gave them the kiss of peace. So ended the famous Synod of Lhota, and so began the humble hierarchy of the United Brethren.*
In another Synod, holden shortly afterwards, the question between Presbyterianism and Episcopacy was discussed : the decision was in favour of the latter, not as essential, but as expedient, in order to deprive their adversaries of a new pretext for hostility ; and as it was known that the Waldenses had still one Bishop surviving, named Stephen, three persons, formerly ordained as Priests, but otherwise approved, were sent into Austria to solicit consecration to the Episco- pate, which they received, returned to Bohemia, and consecrated the three Elders, already chosen by lot, with some others. From that time the church of the United Brethren, has been Episcopal. The lot, it may be observed, as in the apostolic church, was only resorted to on an extraordinary emergency, and did not come into general use until nearly three hundred years later. f
The example and influence of the Bohemians encouraged the Aus- trian Waldenses to throw off the disguise under which they had lain concealed ; their boldness attracted persecution ; and Stephen, the last surviving Bishop just mentioned, was burnt alive, with many others (A.D. 1480). This, however, led to a strengthening of the holy cause, now identified, almost alone, with the church of the United Brethren, whose numbers were suddenly increased by the accession of a multitude of Waldensian refugees. Rokyzan, enraged on hearing of Bishops in the wilds of the Kiesenberge, excited a renewed and sanguinary persecution against them, in which Michael, their first Bishop, was imprisoned until the death of Rokyzan, who departed this life in a state of horrible despair, as if God had ratified the hasty imprecation of the Brethren whom he had aban- doned ; and the Bohemian confessors again came forth from the rocks in \\luch,- for a second time, they had hidden themselves.
* Crauz, itt supra, fc.ei.-t. 11. t la the year 1741. Holmes, i., 12 £S.
\OL. III. 1
34 CHAPTER I.
They were then marked with the derisory appellation griibenheimer, " dwellers in pits." Harassed by a succession of persecutions, and at last expelled from the Bohemian and Moravian territories, they migrated into Moldavia (A.D. 1481). Some alternations of fortune are noted by the historians, but the records become increasingly obscure. A few incidents, however, suffice to show that their church flourished more and more. In the beginning of the sixteenth century they counted two hundred congregations in the very countries whence they had been expelled. They had the Bible in Bohemian, printed at Venice, when, as yet, but one other nation of Europe had used the press for the multiplication of copies of the vernacular Scriptures ; * and they had on record the conclusion of a Synod, (A.D. 1489,) that " if God should, anywhere in the world, awaken genuine Ministers and reformers of the church, they would make common cause with them." Occasion for such an evangelical alliance soon occurred, f
Bohemia was regarded at Rome as an infected district of Christen- dom, and all possible care was taken to prevent the spread of heretical contagion into other parts of the world. But as the expedients of quarantine, lazaretto, and cordon are insufficient to retard the inarch of pestilence, when it pleases God to scourge offending nations, so, when he sends forth his saving health, the barriers of intolerance cannot frustrate his work of mercy, which is as free as the wind of heaven. The Inquisition, now reorganized or reinforced every- where, was employed to check the progress of the Bohemian heresy, which, nevertheless, spread over the Continent.
Of Poland, only, we shall now speak in evidence of this fact, as there the effect of Wycliffe's doctrine was, after Bohemia, most con- spicuous. After the death of Huss and Jerome at Constance, and the consequent excitement in their native country, Synods were convoked in Cracow, (A.D. 1416 and 1423,) and strong resolutions taken against the Bohemian heresy, already apparent in the country. The Priests were commanded to imprison suspected persons. No Bohemian was to be allowed to teach in a Polish school, and, if possible, all inter- course between the two countries was to be prevented. No children •were to be sent thither for education. The books possessed by parish Priests were to be inspected, and as some of them were imbibing heretical doctrines by reading Wycliffe's works, the more literate and zealous of their brethren circulated manuscripts to counteract the mischief. That was fair. Not so a proclamation of the King (A.D. 1424) that confirmed the acts of the Synods, and declared heresy to be high treason. Political sanctions were appealed to on both sides ; the Bohemians offered their crown to a Polish Prince, the offer was accepted ; and while German warriors marched into Bohemia to fight for Sigismund and the Church, Poles invaded the country to fight under the sign of the cup, together with, the Hussites, and, in the battle of Aussig on the Elbe, they (A.D. 1426) won the day. But we rather stay to notice a contest with other weapons. Despite the
* A nide translation of the Vulgate into German was printed by Fust, in the year 1462. The Bohemian Bible was printed in Venice, in 1470. t Crauz, Ancient History of the Brethren, part ii., sect. 12—23.
FIVE PREACHERS BURNT IN POLAND. 35
inquisitorial restrictions, some Taborites from Prague go over to Cra- cow, (A.D. 1427,) and challenge the Romanists to public disputation. Attention is thereby drawn to the points in controversy, and after a few years, when interest in such matters has deepened in the bosoms of the people, a solemn disputation takes place in the capital of Poland. The Senate are assembled, and the King himself presides. To meet the sacerdotal advocates of Popery, we see Calixtines, Tabor- ites, and Orphans, Bohemian dissidents of every shade, united, and among them Peter Payne, our countryman.* The Conference lasted several days ; the language chiefly used was Polish ; and although a Romi'sh historian pronounces that the heretics were beaten, he gives no details of the Conference, and we are free to note that the men of Cracow must have heard earnest exposition of truths fatal to the credit of the dominant religion. Still the ruinous mixture of politics marred the work, and half justified the zeal of Inquisitors, whose efforts, however, were almost altogether frustrated. The laws of Poland had not been moulded at the pleasure of Ecclesiastics ; and the only act of burning was perpetrated (A.D. 1439) by a military Bishop who besieged a town with nine hundred horsemen, compelled the inhabitants to deliver up five Hussite Preachers, and cast them into the flames.
The reformed doctrine still found favour. Ten years after that burning at Zbonszyn, a Master of Arts in the University of Cracow expounded from his chair the works of WyclifFe. Others did the same. The Master wrote a hymn in honour of the English Confes- BOF. We are indebted to the pen of Count Valerian Krasinski for a translation, and find the opening stanza conveying a tribute of earnest praise to the first Reformer. " Ye Poles, Germans, and all nations ! WyclifFe speaks the truth ! Heathendom and Christendom had never a greater man than he, and never will have one." The last stanza is a prayer that soon was answered. " 0 Christ ! for the sake of thy wounds, send us such Priests as may guide us towards the truth, and may bury the Antichrist." The poet was driven from Cracow, but found refuge at the court of Boleslav V., Prince of Oppeln, in Silesia, himself a Hussite. And after another decade, an eminent Pole, John Ostrorog, submitted propositions to the national Diet (A.D. 1459) for the emancipation of Poland from the domination of Rome. He maintained that the King should not render obedience to the Pope, because he had no superior but God. He thought humility from a temporal Sovereign towards a Pope to be rather a sin than a virtue, and would have the Clergy to bear public burdens as well as others. He would rather leave the Clergy to an independent adminis- tration of their own affairs, without any interference of the civil power ; but as the Clergy were not yet spiritual, he deemed it neces- sary that the King should elect the best of them to high offices in the church. And it is an interesting fact, that while these advances towards reformation were taking place in Cracow, the Bohemian
* Peter Payne was a native of Lincolnshire. His birth-place is gaid to be Hough, a few miles from Grantham. His name is in the list of the Principals of Edmund Hall, Oxford, from 1410 to 1415.
F 2
30 CHAPTER I.
Brethren had a flourishing high-school at Goldberg in Silesia, fre- quented also by Polish students from the first families. And yet again, (A.D. 1469,) Casirair, King of Poland, having already refused the crown of Bohemia, offered to him by the Romish party on condi- tion of helping them to put down the Hussites, prohibited in his dominions the preaching of a crusade against them. At last, when printing was invented, the first printer in Cracow was found to be a Hussite (A.D. 1491) ; and before Luther was known in the world, from that press issued a treatise " concerning the true worship of God," and another " concerning the marriage of Priests." Another Polish author taught that the Gospel only ought to be believed, and human ordinances dispensed with.*
Before entering on the period of Protestant Reformation, we inquire whether there were yet to be found in the eastern world any witnesses for Christ, worthy to be regarded as successors of those who, in Ara- bia, Palestine, and Northern Africa, suffered true martyrdom. But we search in vain. The world retains what Tertullian called " hatred of the name ;" but Christianity in the Eastern churches is a name, and nothing more. In the beginning of the sixteenth century, Chris- tians, within the vast circle of Mohammedan dominion, were depressed beneath the view of history, except that now and then a scanty regis- ter or a popular tradition preserved mention of monasteries and churches invaded, spoiled, pulled down, or converted into mosques ; of Priests, Monks, and virgins insulted or put to death ; of entire populations compelled to abandon Christ for the false Prophet, or crowds of Nazareans seeking shelter among Pagans in the furthest regions of the Eastern hemisphere. In China, the first race of Chris- tians had become extinct ; but a few refugees from Tartar persecution were indistinctly reported to have succeeded in their place ; and in India, too, the vestiges of Nestorianism were but perceptible enough to show the Heathen that Christianity was no longer able to dispute pos- session even of a single village. In central Asia it had greater nume- rical strength, and could send a few Bishops to keep up the shadow of a church here and there, but nothing more. Yet even there, and to the shores of the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, mongrel sects, half pagan, marked the general absorption of Christianity. The Greek empire, too, was absorbed in Turkey ; and the Sultans of Constantino- ple seized the churches and abolished Christian worship wherever they had taken possession by the sword. To those who capitulated they allowed the forms of worship, but with every mark of .social degrada- tion. Except in those European states that had been a part of the Roman empire, or had been conquered from Paganism during the decline of the empire, and held fast by their spurious Christianity as part of a political or social system, the votaries of Islamism and Pagan idolatry possessed the world. The pontifical religion that had been paraded in Asia by Crusaders, and recommended to feeble Chris- tian or half-Christian sects by pompous embassies, was seen to be a failure, and in that failure, despite any subsequent appearances to the contrary, we have it demonstrated that Popery is devoid of the spirit-
* Krasinski, Reformation in Poland, vol. i., pp. 64 — 111.
THE MODERN INQTTISITION. 37
ual energy which can alone convert mankind. Nay, Popery gives way within its own domains before the religion of the martyrs ; the religion professed almost alone by the poor Bohemian Brethren, of whom the world is not worthy.
So far were the most zealous propagators of Christianity from understanding how the kingdom of Christ can be extended, that when a Lisbon ship touched on the newly discovered shore of Brazil on its way to India, (A.D. 1500,) having several Priests on board, the Cap- tain obtained the applause of the fathers by turning on shore two Spanish convicts who were under sentence of death for crimes com- mitted, but allowed to live, if they could, that they might learn the language of the savages, and help future Missionaries to propagate Christianity among them. Grave annalists record the fact with com- placency : * they say that one of the convicts died of grief ; and what- ever the other might have done, it is certain that Brazilian Christianity retains exact resemblance to its first apostle.
The great instrument for maintaining that sort of religion was " the Holy Inquisition ;" and as this establishment for torturing man- kind into submission was invested with new power, we must here mark its renovation, in order to understand the attitude assumed by Romanism in the time of Luther.
In the latter years of the fifteenth century, and before Luther was born, this institution was undergoing a remarkable revival. To com- prehend its position in relation to Europe in general, — it is too soon to speak of America and Asia, — we must briefly observe : First, That in England, the Netherlands, Portugal, Lombardy, Naples, and, gene- rally, in those parts of the north of Europe not in communion with the Greek Church, the Bishops performed the part of Inquisitors, aided by the civil power, the laws being, in various degrees, subser- vient to the pleasure of the Church. In those countries it was neces- sary for priestly zealots to exert themselves, in order to keep up a persecution ; and, even so, the Popes and Prelates conceived their interests to be imperfectly assured. Secondly, The Prince or the Re- public usually interfered to mitigate the horrors of the Inquisition where their courage, sagacity, or intelligence was insufficient to resist its establishment ; and, in some places, they succeeded in reducing it to an almost nominal existence. Thus, in Venice, the authorities of the Republic took part, it is true, in inquisitorial persecution ; but the Venetians were thereby saved from many of the worst practices of priestly Inquisitors. In some provinces of Germany and France, there were Inquisitors acting under Papal instructions, and supported by persecuting laws ; but from the acknowledged absence of heresy, or from general disaffection to the Papacy, they could seldom act. In Poland the Inquisition had become extinct. But, thirdly, In Central Italy and in the Spanish kingdoms of Aragon and Valencia, this hor- rible tribunal was newly organized, and received great additional force, about the middle of the fifteenth century, simultaneously with the recovery of the Papacy from its divisions, the better order that had been given to ecclesiastical business by the Councils of Constance and
* RaynalJus, an. 1500, nnm. 52.
38 CHAPTER I.
Basil, the revived spirit of Papal unity cherished in the Council of Ferrara and Florence, and the zeal rekindled by the events occur- ring in Bohemia. Alfonso V. of Aragon, a King devoted, politically, at least, to the Roman See, led the way in reviving the Inquisition within the Spanish dominions by confirming some obsolete or ficti- tious privileges to the Inquisitor of Sicily, then subject to the crown of Aragon (A.D. 1452).
In that act began the power of the Spanish Inquisition. Aragon, Castilla, and Leon were united under Ferdinand and Isabella. The Sicilian Inquisitor, Fra Filippo de' Barberi, mistrustful of the validity of the privilege confirmed by Alfonso, embarked for Spain, and pre- sented himself to Queen Isabella in Se villa, (A.D. 14/7,) to solicit a second confirmation of the grant. Her Majesty readily acceded to the request, and the Ecclesiastic lost no time in following Ferdinand, from whom, in Jerez de la Frontera, not far from Sevilla, he also received the desired ratification. This point being gained, the Sicilian Mis- sionary applied himself to a more arduous labour, by representing to the united Sovereigns of Spain the advantages that would result to them from the establishment of the Inquisition, especially in their dominions newly acquired from the Moors. The Prior of the Domi- nican convent in Sevilla descanted with extreme fervour on the neces- sity of such a measure, to prevent the numerous converts from Juda- ism, " new Christians," as they were called, from relapsing into their ancient unbelief. The Pope's Nuncio gave all the weight of his office to the proposal, enraptured, like a good Roman, at the opportunity of winning the applause of his master. The Dominican brought in tale after tale of Jews who had whipped crucifixes, crucified Christian children, and perpetrated every sort of sacrilege in contempt of Chris- tianity. If not quite unfounded, — since it is not improbable that Jews, while living under a Mohammedan government, may have both spoken and acted with contempt towards Christianity, and especially such a Christianity as was then prevalent, — those tales were monstrous exaggerations ; but bigotry and covetousness were to be satisfied ; the cupidity of Ferdinand was inflamed with the project ; and Isabella, believing in her conscience that such abominations ought not to be unpunished, yet shuddering at the prospect, gave consent. The Bishop of Osma, Queen's Orator, was commanded to solicit of the Pope a Bull for the establishment of the Inquisition in the kingdom of Castilla; and the parchment, heavy with lead, and heavier with curse and woe, was presented to the " Catholic Kings" after but a few months had passed away, and they were flattered with permission to elect men of their own choice, to be the first Inquisitors. The Queen's conscience again revolted at the thought of letting loose the hounds of the Holy Office on her people ; she suspended the execution of the Bull ; and having already caused the Archbishop of Sevilla, the Cardinal Mendoza, to write a catechism for the instruction of the " new Christians," the book was published, (A.D. 1478,) with a recommendation to Priests to explain the Christian doc- trine with frequency and clearness, and in private conversations with young converts. And her just principle of preferring moral means
VICTIMS OF THE SPANISH INQUISITION. 39
to violence, was yet more fully exemplified ; for when a Jew wrote a book against Christianity, she engaged her Confessor, Fray Fernando de Talavera, to write another in reply (A.D. 1481). She had also employed several Ecclesiastics to ascertain the effects of these gentle measures ; but their report was as unsatisfactory as might have been expected from such persons ; and, overcome by the importunity of the King and the Papists,* she yielded at last, after nearly two years' resistance, and concurred in the appointment of two Dominican Friars as first Inquisitors, to be assisted by an Assessor and a Fiscal (Sept. 17th, 1480). Torrents of blood beg'an to flow. To detail the proceedings of the Inquisitors would be tedious and sickening, and we shall have to refer to them again and again. We therefore only set down, in this place, a numerical summary of victims during a few years, by the Inquisitions of Sevilla, Cordova, &c.
1481. Burnt alive in Sevilla, 2,000 ; burnt in effigy, 2,000 ; peni- tents, 17,000.
1482. Burnt alive, 88 ; burnt in effigy, 44 ; penitents, 625.
1483. About the same as in preceding years in Sevilla, and in Cor- dova ; in Jaen and Toledo, burnt alive, 688 ; burnt in effigy, 644 ; penitents, 5,725.
1484. About the same in Sevilla; and in the other places, burnt alive, 220 ; burnt in effigy, 110 ; penitents, 1,561.
1485. Sevilla, Cordova, &c., as the year preceding; and in Estre- madura, Valladolid, Calahorra, Murcia, Cuenca, Zaragoza, and Valen- cia, there were burnt alive, 620 ; burnt in effigy, 510 ; and penitents, 13,471.
1486. In Sevilla, Cordova, &c., as the year before. In the other places, burnt alive, 528 ; burnt in effigy, 264 ; penitents, 3,745.
1487. About the same as the year before. And in Barcelona and Majorca many more, making in all, burnt alive, 928 ; burnt in effigy, 664; and penitents, 7,145.
1488. In the thirteen Inquisitions, burnt alive, 616; burnt in effigy, 308 ; and penitents, 4,379.
1489. About the same as the preceding year.
1490. Burnt alive, 324; burnt in effigy, 112; and penitents, 4,369.
1491 to 1498, at about the same rate.
" Torquemada,' therefore, Inquisitor-General of Spain, during the eighteen years of his inquisitorial ministry, caused 10,220 victims to perish in the flames ; burnt the effigies of 6,860 who died in the Inquisition or fled under fear of persecution ; and 97,321 were punished w^ith infamy, confiscation of goods, perpetual imprisonment, or disqualification for office, under colour of penance ; so that not fewer than 114,401 families must- have been irrecoverably ruined." -f- And the most moderate calculation, gathered from the records of the Inquisition by the laborious Secretary, Llorente, up to the year 1523, when the fourth Inquisitor died, exhibits the fearful aggregate of 18,320 burnt alive, 9,660 in effigy, 206,526 penitents. Total
* As the Spaniards'designate the adherents of the Pope, or Ultrainontaaes. t Llorente, Inquisickm de Espafia, cup. viii., art. 4.
40 CHAPTER I.
number of sufferers, 234,506, under the first four Inquisitors- General.
But we cease from this wearisome statistic. It is confessedly im- perfect, and may be confidently regarded as beneath, far beneath, the truth ; for who can believe that, amidst such profligacy of life, every victim would be registered ? These figures are but a few of the rigid prints left by the hoof of the destroyer on a desolated realm. Ages will not wear them away ; and if all the remaining vestiges were tracked by the Christian philosopher, compared with contemporary monuments of persecution, and the whole estimated, arranged, and filled up according to the established analogies of history and nature, the result would be an image of bloodshed, terror, perfidy, sacrilege, with a cowardly, dark, heartless, and atrocious blasphemy, surpassing aught the world had ever witnessed. Simon de Montfort was humane, the Crusaders of Languedoc were brave Knights, in comparison with Torquemada and his familiars. But the Spanish Inquisition was the normal development of zealous and infuriated full-grown Romanism. It rises conspicuously in the eve of the bright age of Gospel renova- tion ; and leaving the reader to con the volumes of Limborch, Llorente, and others, who have drudged through their doleful records, \ve must mark a few details of that gigantic, but futile, undertaking for the extinction of human independence and of divine truth.
Torquemada enjoyed the infamous distinction of being the first Inquisitor-General of Spain. The primary object of Ferdinand was to confiscate as much property as possible, and chiefly to enrich him- self at the expense of the Jews. Torquemada justified his choice of him by boundless rapacity. Attended by Lawyers and Canonists, he established himself at Madrid, and there presided over the Royal Council of the Inquisition. The Council, with him, exercised final jurisdiction in all cases wherein the royal prerogative was concerned ; but in spirituals, that is to say, in inquisition for heresy and the con- sequent sentence, the General alone, as representing the Pope, was abso- lute. There \vere four subordinate tribunals in Sevilla, Cordova, Jaen, and Villareal, which last was afterwards transferred to Toledo. The con- fusion of temporal and spiritual attributes in the Inquisitors caused frequent disputes with the Sovereigns of Spain ; but as the Judges were invariably Ecclesiastics, the decision was always given in favour of the Church.
In an assembly of Inquisitors from the four provinces, united with those of the supreme Council, a code of laws was framed, under the name of Instructions, and afterwards enlarged by suc- cessive enactments. These instructions were to the following
O
effect: — 1. The institution of the Inquisition, according to the forms iu use at Sevilla, should be published in every town, notwithstanding any local privileges to the contrary. 2. An edict, read in every church, denounced canonical censures against Jews and others who had apostatized, unless they would lay information against themselves, and against all who obstructed the Holy Office. 3. Thirty days' time was given to heretics for informing against themselves. Within that time they might be indulged with a pecuniary penance ; beyond it
INQUISITORS' INSTRUCTIONS. 41
their property was to be all confiscated. 4. They were to make the con- fession in writing, before the Inquisitors, and in presence of a Notary, giving also the names of all their accomplices in heresy, and be ques- tioned and cross-questioned. 5. If any other human being had known of the heresy of the self-reported sinner, absolution could not be given in private, but before the public. (Many thousands appealed secretly to the Pope, and bought of him absolution after a general confession, in order to avoid the disgrace of open penance. This brought immense sums to his treasury.) 6. Persons reconciled by penance were to be for ever excluded from honourable employments, and forbidden to wear gold, silver, silk, or fine linen, that all the world might know the infamy they had incurred. (This sentence was also com- muted at cost of vast sums of money paid by rich offenders to the Pope. At last Ferdinand and Isabella remonstrated, the Pope cancelled his Bulls of rehabilitation, kept the money, and left the penitents to a second persecution and disgrace.) 7. Voluntary, or " spontaneous," penitents were, although reconciled, to pay a tax ever after for the defence of the holy Catholic faith. 8. The voluntary penitent who should have allowed the thirtieth day to pass, was to have all his property confiscated, notwithstanding his confession. 9. Minors and children might be indulged, on voluntary confession, with light pe- nance. Such light penance was wearing sackcloth openly for one or two years, and attending mass on all feast-days in that shameful sambenito, walking with it in procession, and whatever else the Inqui- sitor might command. 10. The voluntary penitent should be spoiled of everything he had received during the period of his heresy. Of dowry, for example, or of estates bequeathed. 11. An imprisoned heretic might be indulged with perpetual imprisonment instead of burning, if his repentance were sincere. 12. But at any time he might be declared a false penitent, and burnt. 13. So might any one who should be found to have concealed any thing in the " spontaneous" confession. 14. The penitent might be burnt if the witnesses in his case were not agreed. (So that any man might have another sacri- ficed to his private enmity.) 15. If proof were incomplete, the accused might be put to torture ; burnt, if he confessed, and afterwards con- firmed his confession ; tormented again, if he did not. (The repetition of torture was prohibited in a subsequent instruction ; but many Inqui- sitors repeated it, notwithstanding, and evaded the law by calling several applications one torture.) 16. The accused should never have a copy of the evidence given against them. 17. The Inquisitors should ascertain that witnesses were not disqualified. (An instruction that could seldom be fulfilled : for the subalterns, anxious to prove heresy, concealed all that would discredit the testimony of wretches suborned to deprive a rich man of .property and life.) 18. Two Inquisi- tors, or at least one, should be present during the infliction of torture. 19. A person cited to appear on a charge of heresy, and not appear- ing, should be deemed guilty, and burnt if he were caught. 20. The body of a deceased heretic might be exhumed and burnt, his property confiscated, and his family declared infamous. 21. All civil Magistrates should help the Inquisitors, or be themselves punished as heretics.
VOL. III. G
42 CHAPTER I.
22. The children under age of heretics punished, should be placed under good Catholic guardians, and maintained out of their parents' estate. (Llorente assures us that he had examined all the records of the Spanish Inquisition with minute care, but never found one instance of obedience to this instruction.) 23. A reconciled penitent could not receive property if it came to him from a person convicted of heresy. 24. The Christian slaves of a reconciled and absolved penitent were to be confiscated to the Crown, notwithstanding the absolution. 25. The Inquisitors and their servants were not to take presents. (Nor needed they, for they helped themselves.) 26. The Inquisitors were to live in peace together ; no one was to be greater than another, not even if he were a Bishop. (The intention of this instruction was, not to preserve harmony, but to deprive a Bishop- Inquisitor of his episcopal power, — to unify their interests and thereby increase their strength, for the sole purposes of the tribunal.) 27. They should keep their subalterns in order. 28. In any case not provided for in these Instructions, the Inquisitors should act on their own judgment.
It is notorious that the introduction of the Inquisition was every where regarded with abhorrence, and in some places provoked the people to insurrection. The high court of Council and the Instruc- tions gave it a new and more terrible character, even in Aragon, where it had previously existed ; and the first Inquisitor, under the new system, was murdered in Zaragoza before he could enter on his busi- ness. This man, Pedro Arbues de Epila, apprehensive of violence, and perhaps not very tranquil in his new office, having to attend matins,* covered himself with a coat of mail under his robes, and with a steel helmet under his cap, took a lantern in one hand, and a heavy club in the other, and walked from his house to the cathedral. He knelt close to one of the massive pillars, with the lantern on the pave- ment, and his right hand grasping the cudgel concealed between him- self and the pillar. The Canons were chanting the appointed hymns, and he seemed to be united in devotion. Two men knelt down near him, awaiting a moment for the fatal stroke. Knowing that persons in his position frequently carried mail under the soft robe, they aimed accordingly, and at the same instant one struck him on the left arm, and the other discharged a heavy blow on the back of his head, that laid him prostrate, and he died in a few hours (Sept. 15th, 1485). A contention the next day between the old Christians and the new was the consequence ; and similar murders and contentions marked the introduction of the new Inquisition in many parts of Europe. Peter was beatified, then canonized. The mass of Spaniards submit- ted, Jews and "new Christians" were the victims, the King and the Clergy shared the spoils, and the new functionaries everywhere dis- played their triumph with a more than priestly pomp. Torquemada appeared in public with a guard of two hundred foot-soldiers and fifty horse ; and the provincial Inquisitors were each attended by ten horse-
* Matins, originally a morning service, afterwards the nocturns, or vigils, -were so called because they began after eleven o'clock at night, to usher in the next day, or morning, after midnight.
INVENTION OF PRINTING. 43
men and forty foot. Thousands of private persons and a multitude of the nobility hastened to accept the office of familiars, or servants, of the Holy Office, exempted at the same time from secular burdens and from suspicion of heresy, invested with ecclesiastical privileges, and formed into a new and resistless army for the defence of Romish faith. Spain was rising, first, by the conquest of Granada at home, then by that of Mexico, and vast regions of South America, to the highest point of wealth and power. In Italy, too, and all over the European continent, the Church became more arrogant and sanguinary than she had dared to show herself since the great crusade against the Albigenses ; and this was the power that assailed the Lollards in England, the Brethren in Bohemia, and every human being who dared to breathe a sentence of religious, or even intel- lectual, truth.*
Just after persecution had raged most hotly in England and in Bohemia, and immediately before the establishment of the modern Inquisition in Spain, printing was invented. The birth of the new art was almost simultaneous with that deplorable event, and it is now almost superfluous to say that the press has overthrown the Inquisition, or to state the converse truth, that intellectual and religious liberty still advance together. In the year 1439, if not earlier, it would appear that John Guttenberg, a citizen of Mentz, was amusing himself in efforts to improve the art of engraving into a similar contrivance for the impression of words, so as to multiply copies of manuscript. By a remarkable coincidence, by accepting some suggestion that might have been incidentally made known to both, or by the common inspi- ration of the Spirit that giveth understanding, Laurence Coster, of Haerlem, the very year after (A.D. 1440) produced impressions from wooden blocks, each block, both at Mentz and Haerlem, contain- ing a paragraph, or a page. Guttenberg, associating Fust, a gold- smith, with himself, for the sake of obtaining more capital for prose- cuting the novel and expensive undertaking, laboured with great diligence and enthusiasm in the work ; and by their united effort, they succeeded in making movable metal type. The several stages of the invention, the prior or exclusive claims of the inventors, and the earliest productions of their presses, are covered in the obscurity incident to infant arts, and still exercise the diligence of bibliogra- phists. The details are almost concealed ; but one fact is certain, that during five or six years the art of printing rose into a state of perfec- tion that has never been excelled ; and that its inventors and others who became printers in the fifteenth century brought a force of enter- prise, self-denial, and learning to their work, that ranked them at once among the benefactors of mankind. They were a newly-created body of labourers for the amelioration of the condition of the world, who owed their origin to the gracious providence of God. One of the first great works was a Latin Bible in six hundred and thirty-seven leaves, printed at Mentz by Guttenberg and Fust (A.D. 1450 to 1455). One edition after another of the holy Scriptures rapidly followed in
* Limborch, Histoty of the Inquisition, vol. i., chap. 13 — 31 ; but especially Llorente, Hiotoria Critica de la Inquisicion de Espana, capitulos 5 — 7.
G 2
44 CHAPTER I.
Latin, and one or two vernacular versions ; and the magnificent Polyglot Bible of Aleala, while it gratified the vanity of the Cardinal Inquisitor Ximenez, was reluctantly suffered by the Pope to see the light, and gave the hint for more useful editions and more enlightened studies. The history of early editions is itself a science. In a few years every man who could print found abundant encouragement ; Germans and Frenchmen were welcomed at the chief cities of Europe ; and ere long even at Oxford, at that time overcast with shameful ignorance, a printer was at work (A.D. 14C8) on St. Jerome's exposition of the Apostles' Creed. Caxton soon followed ; and as books were then in use almost exclusively among the Clergy and the rich, and printed books were as yet costly, he was allowed to set up his press in a chapel of West- minster Abbey, perhaps in the scriptorium, or place where manuscripts were written, when a more bookish Abbot pleased to permit. Indeed it was the aim of all the early printers to imitate their best-written manuscripts.* As nothing unusual was done without the sanction of the civil and ecclesiastical authorities, those authorities soon gave con- currence, or pronounced disapprobation. Thus the University of Cologne, through their Rector, "admitted and approved" a book printed by Henry Quentel, then a young printer in that city (A.D. 14/9). And the same year the same University sanctioned the " famous work of the Old and New Testament," f printed by Conrad of Homborch. To approve presupposed right to disapprove and to condemn : such a pre- rogative had certainly been assumed more than two centuries before, over booksellers in Paris ; J it was soon exercised over printers ; and we find (A.D. 1480) four Clerics assuming the character of Censors, and prefixing their individual sanction to a book printed at Heidel- berg^ In England the Parliament gave permission (A.D. 1483) for printers and booksellers to come into England and exercise their trade ; || while the Archbishop of Mentz assumed control in the city most distinguished by the invention, and appointed a person to the new office of Censor (A.D. I486). ^[ The Roman Pontiff, who sel- dom hazards his credit by beginning even an evil work, crowned the gradual encroachment of the Clergy by a Bull, (A.D. 1501,) forbidding any book to be printed without licence of the Archbishops of Cologne, Mentz, Triers, and Magdeburg, or their Vicars-General. This was afterwards (A.D. 1515) confirmed and extended by the fifth Council of Lateran,** and we shall find that it was enforced with the utmost rigour.
* Ames, Typographical Antiquities, edited by Dibdin ; Preliminary Disquisition, and Life of Caxton.
" insigne Veteris Novique Testament! opus."
Hallatn, Middle Ages, chap, ix., part 2, — Revival of Ancient Learning, note.
§ Beckmann, History of Inventions, — book Censors.
|| Anno Primo Ric. III., c. 9. Afterwards repealed in 25th Hen. VTII,
If Beckmann, ut supra.
** The Council of Lateran merely heard and gave their placet to a document of the learned and refined Leo X., the patron of scholars, artists, poets, and wits. After acknowledging the benefits, and even the divine origin, of the art of printing, " either invented or improved " in those times, he makes the Council say, that "because tlio complaint of many has reached their hearing, and that of the Apostolic See, that some masters of the art of printing have presumed, in various parts of the world, to print and sell publicly Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and Chaldee books, translated into Latin, and even
REVIVAL OF LITERATURE. 45
Printing, as a mechanical invention, might have been of little use, but for its ready appropriation to the purposes of reviving literature. The importance of the revival of learning to the reformation of the Church and the renovation of Christianity, cannot be too highly appre- ciated : although space for an adequate notice of it cannot be afforded in these pages. Enough, however, may be said to enable the reader to discover the hand of God. Ever since the twelfth century there had been a slow, feeble, and often interrupted progress of learning. Paper had been carried from China to Tartary, perhaps thence to Arabia, and undoubtedly, by means of the Saracens, to Spain. The manufacture of that invaluable material could not have lingered long after its use. So early as the eighth century it was made at Samar- caud ; and manuscripts of the eleventh are said to be now preserved in the Escurial.* The labour of scribes was facilitated, and their work cheapened. A commercial motive gave impulse to the literary manufacture. The number of readers increased, and the increase of study was a consequence. A few translations of Latin works slightly enlarged the circle of knowledge, and interested others besides the Clergy in the pursuit, and even in the propagation, of knowledge. Collegiate libraries, and the collections of wealthy persons, became somewhat numerous ; although yet so small that we smile as we peruse their catalogues. Here and there, in a great city, a bookseller might be found. The multiplication of writings hitherto unheard of excited curiosity, and translations were called for. The new labour of translation required grammatical knowledge, and with the acquisi- tion grew a taste for the science. The grammarian acquired fame : his language, at least when written, excelled the common style, awakened admiration, was imitated, raised the standard of his vernacular ; and in Italy, especially, an enthusiastic collection of ancient Roman classics was accompanied by an almost idolatrous admiration of the language which had never died, and followed by successful efforts to elevate the daughter Italian by an infusion of the graces and the treasures of the parent Latin.
In Greece, as in Italy, the language of their fathers had been retained in liturgies, and its familiar use cherished in the court and higher circles of Constantinople. The veiled matrons, who shunned intercourse with any beyond their dwellings, scarcely understood the barbarian corruptions of speech employed by their husbands, who conversed out of doors with strangers from Asia and the North ; and thus, unconsciously to themselves, they preserved the venerable language of the New Testament, of Justin Martyr, Cyril,
into vulgar languages ; and that those books contain errors in faith, and doctrines con- trary and hurtful to the Christian religion, and even against the reputation of persons in high dignity, (dignitate fulgentium,) and injurious also to good morals ; the Council, echoing the Pope, therefore determines, that no book or writing shall he printed without a written licence under the hand of the Vicar-Apostolic, or Master of the Palace, if in ' the city,' (Rome,) or of the Bishop, if in any other diocese throughout the world." The penalty of disobedience was one hundred ducats to the fabric of St. Peter ; the printer not. to print anything for one year after the offence ; the books printed to be burnt ; the printer excommunicated, and burnt, also, if contumacious, ( — per otnnia juris remcdia castiffelur,) for a warning to others. (Binii, torn, iv., Cone. Lateranense, sess. x.) * Hallam, Middle Ages, chap, is., part 2,— " Invention of linen paper."
46 CHAPTER I.
Chrysostom, and other luminaries of a purer age. Then, in order to infuse this Christian element into the mass of Italian society, where conceptions of Christianity were rapidly exchanged for those of Pagan- ism, and at the same time to overthrow in judgment one great section of apostate Christendom, it pleased God to deliver Constantinople to the Turks. Already a few Greeks had taught in Italy ; a taste for Greek had been excited; and just then a multitude of refugees, proud of the majestic language of old Byzantium, came to satisfy the aspiration of enthusiastic students in Tuscany, Naples, and Rome, after the faculty of reading, and even speaking, Greek. At first it seemed as if even the paganizing tendencies of literature would be paramount. Lorenzo de' Medici, " the Magnificent," of Florence, gathered around him in his princely villa at Fiesole, artists, poets, grammarians, and philosophers, who devoted all their energies to the prosecution of one great object, — intellectual elevation, adorned with every possible elegance of number, form, and high conception. The Roman pantheon began to be re-occupied by its former tenants. The Apollo was more admired than the Christ ; amongst the devotees of Peter the votaries of Plato mingled ; and the image of the philoso- pher was honoured with burning lamps like the image of the Apostle. Architecture, which is at once the work and the expression of its age, became pagan : so did spectacles. Instead of the old legendary mysteries, or religious processions and plays, mythological processions and pagan recitations delighted the populace, the Princes, and the Priests of Italy. Popes Nicholas V. and Leo X., for example, patron- ized this fascinating pursuit after the reviving arts and languages of old Rome and Greece. The mania reached its highest point in the erection of St. Peter's church after a pagan type, and ended in bury- ing for ever, as we shall soon see, the boasted catholicity of Popery under the dome of that lofty structure. But the King of nations overruled this intellectual revolution to the production of a great spiritual change ; and amidst the relaxation of dogmatical severity, a few Italians arose who first began to reduce the speculations of Plato, the " atticizing Moses," (Mo>u'<r»jj 'ATTJXJ^COV,) and the abstractions of Aristotle, to trial, by the standard of revelation. They carried their zeal into the pulpits, and gained the attention of the people, while the word of God, without comment, and the writings of many of the Fathers, poured from the press, and gave a new turn to the thoughts of myriads. Even then it became evident to the more discerning, that the human mind was undergoing preparation for a better state, was passing into a new life.
A few sentences of Erasmus, proving that this was his expectation, may be taken as prefatory to the events of our next chapter. In a letter to his friend, Wolfgang Fabricius Capito, (A.D. 1516,) he says, that although he is fifty-one years of age, and therefore cannot expect or desire to live much longer, he would almost like to be young again, for no other reason than because a sort of golden age seems to be drawing near. The minds of Princes, he affirms, are divinely changed. Those whose power and courage are equal to any deeds of war, strangely study arts of peace, and patronize learning. Even the
GEOGRAPHICAL DISCOVERIES. 47
Pope, the Emperor, the Kings of France, England, and Spain, the Cardinal Ximenez, (although a relentless Inquisitor,) and many Bishops, are united in the patronage of learning : while a host of scholars emulate each other. Where letters were almost lost, as in Scotland, Ireland, and Denmark, they revive. Germany, France, and England begin to emulate Italy. Medicine, jurisprudence, and mathe- matics have now followers. He mourns, indeed, over the ignorance and bigotry of so many of the Clergy, who think that learning is wicked, or, through indolence, pretend to think so ; and he some- times fears lest the learned should renounce Christianity altogether. Yet, taking all things as they are, they promise him a happy event.* The happy event came, sui'passing the hope, and even the desire, of Erasmus.
Together with the increased activity and better education of the European mind, the age before us was distinguished from all others by an enlargement of the field of human action, and eventually, of evangelical benevolence. Flavio Gioia, a citizen of Amalfi, in Naples, of whose station in society history is silent, had discovered the use of the magnet in navigation (A.D. 1302) ; but the timorous sailors of the Mediterranean ventured not, for at least half a century, to explore any unknown sea, or voluntarily quit sight of land, except when certain of the neighbouring shore whither their course would lead them. The Canary Isles were added to the known world, pro- bably by the drifting of some vessel under stress of weather ; and Clement VI., acting as God's vicegerent, erected them into a kingdom (A.D. 1344), and bestowed them on a Spaniard. On the north-western coast of Africa, a bold headland, called Cape Non, in latitude 28° 41', was the last point of land to which the European sailor would ven- ture, until the Portuguese added a short line of coast, extending to Cape Bojador (A.D. 1412). This trifling prolongation of the accus- tomed voyages led to new adventure, which was rewarded by the dis- covery (A.D. 1420) and colonization of Madeira. Beyond Cape Bojador the enterprising mariners astonished Portugal by venturing southward to Cape Verd, and braving a region which the ancients had pronounced to be uninhabitable, because of excessive heat. The super- stitious clamoured against those undertakings as a warring against nature ; but Eugene IV. conferred on Prince Henry of Portugal au- thority to persevere, and made him a donation of all the lands he might discover. Maritime discovery, and the multiplication of books by printing, then wrought a combined influence on the sedentary and the active ; and while the Inquisition was about to be reorganized, the Divine Head of the church was preparing a new world of refuge for his persecuted children. That portion of the map was rapidly com- pleted by inserting all the African-islands ; the compass being at last trusted in voyages of discovery. After the death of Prince Henry, enterprise languished, until, under the authority of a new Sovereign,
* " Omnia mihi pollicentur reru felicissime successuram." Erasmi Epist. apud Ger- desium, Evang. Renovat., torn. i.,p. (20) ; Gerdes, in the work now cited, torn, i., sec. J5 — 11 ; Hallam, chap, ix., part 2 ; Gibbon, Decline, &c., chap. Ixvi. ; Mo.sheim, cent, xv., part ii., chap. 1 ; Roscoe, Life of Leo X., chaps, ii., xii., xv.
48 CHAPTER I.
John II., Portuguese sailors dared beyond the equinoctial, and saw the constellations of the southern hemisphere (A.D. 1484). The iti- neraries of missionary and commercial travellers, who had gone over- laud to India, and visited the shores of the Red Sea, were then com- pared with conjectures of ancient geographers, and with the constantly enlarging space of observation. Merchants longed for a passage to India around the southern extremity of Africa, if such were to be found; and when a Commander, Diaz, (A.D. I486,) returned with the intelligence of a " Stormy Cape," beyond which navigation was im- practicable, John II. named it rather " the Cape of Good Hope." Yet he faltered between the purposes of royal ambition and the jealous hostility of Venice, then mistress of oriental commerce, scarcely hazarding war for the sake of further discoveries which that Republic was anxious to prevent. Colon, or Columbus, as he is usually called, drew general attention, in that period of indecision, by proposals to leave the region contested by Venice, and seek for India by sailing westward, until, as the spherical figure of the earth led him to expect, he should reach that continent. After almost unparalleled discourage- ment and perseverance, although Ferdinand of Spain and other Sovereigns had refused him any help, he again applied to Isabella, immediately after the conquest of Granada, and found her so elated with victory, as to be willing to give him three small and scarcely sea- worthy vessels. With these he left Palos, a small seaport of Andalu- cia, on Friday, August 3d, 1492, after having gone to mass with his officers and crews in solemn procession. At sunrise they hoisted sail, and, followed by the cheers, the blessings, and the prayers of the people, steered for the Canaries, and thence westward, whither no voyager had ever gone before. For thirty-six days he pursued his undeviating course, watching every floating weed or stick, marking the changes of the tropic sky, and the flight of birds ; and at length, surrounded by faint-hearted and desperate Spaniards who medi- tated mutiny, and had even determined to throw him overboard, that they might endeavour to sail back again, he implored them to persevere for three days more, confident that by that time they would see the shore whence came straggling land-birds and floated leaves. On the evening of October 1 2th, he commanded the sails to be furled, lest they should run on shore in the night, and prayers to be offered up for success. Strict watch was kept. As the trade-wind wafted them gently forward, he thought he could see a distant light, but named it not, lest it should be only a meteor. But about two hours after midnight, from the Pinta, one of the vessels which always kept ahead, a shout was heard, Tierra ! tierra ! tierra ! " Land ! land ! land !" It was the New World. Soon as the day dawned, an island was seen over the bows. They hoisted sail, the three crews raised their voices in a rude Te Deum, and, as the sun arose, they were land- ing with hoisted flags and martial music. In honour of the Saviour, he called the land San Salvador ; and with religious and military cere- monial took possession of it for the crown of Castilla and Leon.* The Pope afterwards yave the Western Hemisphere to Spain, reserving
* Robertson, History of America, books i., ii.
PEDRO DE OSMA JOHN OP WESSALIA WESSELTJS. 49
the new lands in the Eastern to Portugal. The honours lavished on Columbus, and the desertion and ingratitude that followed, give a mournfully instructive finish to his history ; but our only business is to mark one of the great events of the fifteenth century, as insepa- rably connected with all that follows. The modern Inquisition, print- ing, geographical discoveries, the conquest of the Spanish Moors, the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, and the African slave-trade, begun soon after the discovery of Guinea,* — which, however, we cannot stay to narrate, — constitute a secular boundary, so to speak, separating all that shall follow from all that has preceded.
Here, as on some Alpine height, where the traveller gains his first prospect of a new country, we take our stand, 'and, for a moment, observe a few of the more eminent personages whom God honoured to be pioneers in that warfare wherein so many fell, victims of persecu- tion, and martyrs of Christ.
" Some new opinions on the matter of religion were current in Castilla," says Mariana, the historian of Spain. In the University of Salamanca a Professor of Theology taught the " new opinions ;" and, after they had made considerable progress, published a book to promote them more effectually. They were not the Judaism then so zealously persecuted by the Inquisitors, but the very truths that now distinguish Protestantism. He boldly maintained that mortal sin could only be effaced on condition of repentance, the keys of the Church being powerless ; that auricular confession was not divinely instituted ; and that evil thoughts must be put away with abhorrence, rather than related to a Priest. Retribution, he said, should be pre- ferred to penance, which is not ordained in Scripture ; the Pope has no power to remit the pains of purgatory, nor to overrule the Church by granting dispensations ; and the Church may err in its decisions. The Archbishop of Toledo, by command of the Pope, convened an assembly of " many learned persons" at Alcala, who spent many days before they could agree to counsel the condemnation of his writings. Carillo, the Archbishop, alone condemned them ; and Pope Xystus IV. prudently concealed the alleged errors from the knowledge of his Church in general, by declaring in his Bull of condemnation, that they were too numerous to be mentioned (A.D. 1479). The book was burnt, but they did not burn^the author, who is said to have retracted. f
While Pedro de Osma was teaching thus from his chair at Sala- manca, an aged German Professor of Theology at Worms, John of Wessalia, instructed his students in the very doctrines held by the Waldenses, and was put to silence in a similar manner by the Arch- bishop of Mentz and the Inquisitors, who are acknowledged, by Romish historians, to have treated him with unjustifiable violence. £ And, the same year, a shepherd (or neatherd) was burnt alive in Franconia by the Bishop of Wurtzburg, for holding similar opi- nions^ More eminent than his contemporaries at Salamanca and at
* Continuation de 1'Histoire Ecclesiastique de M. 1'Abbe Fleuiy, cxxv., 14. + Favre, Histoire Ecclesiastique, cxv., 2, 3 ; Mariana, Historia de Espafia, libiv xxiv., cap. 19.
t Favre, cxv., 4 ; Foxe, Acts and Monuments, book vi., an. 1479. § Ibid. VOL. III. H
50 CHAPTER I.
Worms, was Wesselus, also Professor of Theology in the University of Groningen.* At the Council of Basil, and during extensive travels, he had won the admiration of the learned and the patronage of the Pope, from whom, however, he would accept no larger gift than a Hebrew Bible from the library of the Vatican. His learning and eloquence procured him the appellation of Lux Mundi, " Light of the World ;" and although he heard of the persecution suffered by John of Wessalia, he continued to teach doctrines at Groningen that were equally consistent with the Gospel, and opposed to Popery ; but with the influence of superior learning and, apparently, more decided piety. When a young student, attracted by his fame, had travelled a great distance to solicit his advice, and received it, he addressed him with great earnestness, in such words as these : " Young man ! thou wilt live to see the day when the doctrine of Thomas, Bonaventura, and other modern and contentious theologians of the same sort, will be rejected by all true Christian divines." After exhorting him to prefer the old writers to the new, and especially to the schoolmen, he proceeded to say, that in a short time " those cowled, black and white irrefragable Doctors would be brought down to their right place." Then, aiming at the conscience of the youth, he added, "Whoever reads the holy Scriptures, and does not daily grow viler and viler in his own esteem, who does not abhor and humble himself more and more, not only reads them in vain, but to his peril." The youth returned home, and lived to see the prediction fulfilled, and to pro- fit by the good advice. Wesselus, wonderfully protected from perse- cution, died in the Lord (A.D. 1490). After suffering such conflicts as often prove the faith of dying saints, he exclaimed, in the hearing of friends who surrounded his bed, " I thank my God that I am permitted to overcome these temptations. I know nothing but Christ and him crucified." With these words on his lips he expired, and death scarcely disturbed the smile that had lit up the countenance of the triumphant saint. f Luther afterwards wrote a preface to some part of his works, which are honoured with a first-class place in the Expurgatory Index of the Church of Bome.J Many traces of his teaching yet remain in the history of Groningen ; and it can scarcely be doubted, that to the seeds of evangelical truth sown in those two universities of Germany is chiefly to be attributed the harvest gathered in that country at the Lutheran Reformation.
There was also a precursor of that great event in Italy. In the choir of the Dominican convent of Brescia, during the celebration of worship, some words of a Psalm chanted were applied with great power to the mind of a young Monk. Girolamo Savonarola then took for his perpetual prayer a petition of the Psalmist : " Thou art good, and doest good : teach me thy statutes." Believing that the Holy Spirit of God would enlighten the mind of every sincere and faithful inquirer,
* Often confounded with John of Wessalia.
t Gerdesii Hist. Evang. Renov., torn, i., p. 43.
t " Wesselns Gansfortius, sen Basilius Groningensis, Rhetor, Poeta, Philos., Medic., Th. Lutb., i. cl.," is the note of the Index Expurgatorius, which calls him a Lutheran theologian. A Lutheran, be it ehserved, when Luther was unborn !
GIROLAMO SAVONAROLA. 51
and already oppressed with grief because of the prevailing wickedness of Italy and corruption of the Church, he sought for consolation in the Bible. Already versed in the rival systems of Plato and Aristotle, and instructed beyond most of his contemporaries in the original lan- guages of the sacred text, he brought to the investigation philosophy, literature, fervent piety, pure love of country, and an imagination, that, even in Italy, could scarcely be equalled. While occupied in biblical study he was removed to Florence, where he acquired unpre- cedented eminence as a Preacher, rose to be Superior of his con- vent, obtained Papal sanction for an enterprise of monastic reform, and was reputed by the Florentines to be a Prophet. He exerted so great an influence over that city, that Lorenzo de' Medici, although in the height of his glory, regarded him with fear and jealousy, as well as reverence ; the Magistrates did nothing without his approbation ; and when a French invasion threatened Italy, he was sent as Ambas- sador, to dissuade Charles VIII. from attacking Florence. The hostile King felt that the hooded Ambassador was armed with a superhuman power, and showed him greater deference than he had rendered to any other person. Savonarola taught that the Bible was the only source of true doctrine. He inveighed against the sins of Pope, Cardinals, Clergy, Monks, Princes, and people. While he foretold the falling of the " scourge of God " on Italy, thousands of hearers trembled ; and even those who came to write down his sermons dropped their pens, unable to proceed for weeping. All the people said that he was a Prophet. He disclaimed the title ; but confidently declared that, by the help of the Holy Spirit, he had attained to a clearer understanding of the inspired prophecies ; and taught that any other true Christian might attain to an equal power of discernment by faith and prayer. Often, after predicting the judgments of God on sinners, he would foretell a happy age to follow, and exclaim, with rapture : " Italy shall be renewed !" Incapable of dissimulation, he braved visible danger, rather than keep back the counsel of God ; and the court of Rome managed, by a succession of intrigues, to surround him with jealous "tyrants" and exasperated factious. His destroyers challenged him to a fiery ordeal, and prepared huge piles of wood, with bags of gunpowder, within which his antagonists, of course, refused to enter, and so did he. He was then accused of imposture, dragged from his monastery, and, with two brethren, imprisoned, tortured, and tortured again ; but the Inquisitors could only extort prayers from his lips. From the prison he was led to the scaifold, and there degraded from the priesthood. " I separate thee," said the savage Bishop, "from the Church militant and triumphant." "Nay," replied Savo- narola, " from the Church militant, if you please, but not from the triumphant" The Prelate looked abashed ; but the executioners relieved his embarrassment by seizing on the victim. The martyr and his fellows were hung, and then burnt. Their ashes were thrown into the Arno, as those of Wycliffe had been thrown into the Swift ; but the Florentines long kept the anniversary of his death ; and at this day his name" is cherished in Italy as if it were sacred. His words, too, have passed into a proverb ; and the oppressed Tuscan
ii 2
52 CHAPTER II.
repeats confidently his reiterated prediction, Italia rcnovabitur, " Italy shall be renewed." When Savonarola was martyred, (A.D. 1498,) the schoolboy, Martin Luther, was singing for bread in the streets of Eise- nach ; and the youth of Germany, Italy, and Spain went on learning the sentences of Wesselus, Pedro de Osma, and the reputed Prophet of Ferrara,* whose name was heard all over Europe, and whose writings were even translated into Arabic, and read at Constantinople.
CHAPTER II.
Martin Luther — Spread of evangelical Doctrine, and Conflict of the Reformers with tfa Church of Rome — Confession of Augsburg.
IGNORANCE, cupidity, and profligacy characterized the Clergy in all parts of the world ; but especially at Rome and on the Papal throne. Princes demanded, and people clamoured for, reform. The Clergy sometimes acknowledged that a reformation ought to be attempted, and confessed that, through the opposition of a Papist fac- tion, headed by the Popes, the efforts of Councils to repair a ruinous fabric of discipline had hitherto been frustrated. Alexander VI., during whose pontificate Savonarola and his companions were mar- tyred at Florence, was a monster of obscenity. His sayings and doings are too grossly bad to be related ; and to disown the man while yet they owned the Pontiff, was the constrained, yet worthless, tribute to decency rendered by his surviving brethren. The con- clave, shut up for the election of a successor, professed to bind them- selves by oath, — but oaths cannot bind a conclave, — that whosoever of them might be elected Pope, he should convene a General Council within two years, for the reformation of the Church. The new Pope died almost as soon as crowned. The next in succession, Julius II., was "rather a servant of Mars than of Christ ; and publicly boasted that he had made treaties with barbarian Germans, French, and Spaniards, merely for the sake of cheating them, so that, with great reason, the entire Church of France, represented in Convocation at Tours, (A.D. 1510,) said, that the plenitude of Papal power should be called fulness of tempest, and a diabolic word. The Emperor Maximilian, too, openly called Julius a drunken wretch." 'f It was therefore no longer expected that the Church, with such a headship, would reform herself.
Meanwhile, the Head of the true church undertook the work. Martin Luther, son of a proprietor of two smelting-furnaces, and Magistrate in the town of Mansfeld in Saxony, yet of narrow income, after having studied with exemplary diligence in the schools of Mag- deburg, Eisenach, and Erfurt, and graduated as Master of Arts, was
* He waa usually called Fra Girolama di Ferrara. This notice of him is the recol- lection of a careful reading of several of his works, aud those of his biographers, in Italian, French, and German.
t Gerdesii Uistoria livangelii Renovati, torn, i., p. 28.
Jlhrttn
a uurttr) U.L uome, except a Klautus.
t " Codicem sacrum" corio rubro tectum." Seckendorff, pars i., p. 21. t " ad Biblia." Ibid., p. 19.
MARTIN LUTHER. 53
devoting himself to the study of law. This young man, then about twenty years of age, was awakened to a conviction of sin by grief for the violent death of a friend, and by terror in a thunder-storm. .Reli- gion, it was fancied, could not be enjoyed in the world, and therefore the penitent dedicated himself to God, after the fashion of those times, by hiding himself in a monastery, contrary to the wishes of his father ; but so much the more acceptably to the Auguatinians, who, like all other Monks, deemed such acts of filial disobedience honourable to themselves. Although Luther loved and reverenced his parents, he thought that by rending every tie of natural affection, he should offer a yet more worthy sacrifice to God. This volume might be filled with even a compendiated history of the eventful career on which he now entered (Nov. 10th, 1505) ; but by a hurried sketch the reader would be defrauded of details that are essential to the history of such a man. We will, therefore, only note the succession of a few princi- pal events, and proceed at once to describe the persecution that ensued on the reformation that soon began, by means of Luther and others. We have seen that the way was already open, that the precursors of reformation had multiplied, and that a desire and expectation of some great change was already general. Luther advanced rapidly. Ordained Priest in 1507, he discharged the duties of the priesthood with great seriousness and humility, and soon rose to the chair of divinity at Wittemberg (A.D. 1508). As the apparent casualty of a thunder-storm drove him to the cowl, so another accident, so trifling that it might scarcely have been marked at the moment of its occurrence, imparted a new character to his theology. According to custom, as it would seem, he had left all his books at home, except a Plautus * and a Virgil, and betook himself, for means of study, to the library of the monastery. Among other books he found a Bible in manuscript,-|' bound in red leather, and, glancing over the pages, dis- covered many passages that are not in the Breviary and Missal. It became his favourite book. He studied it with the commentary of Lyra, yet gave incomparably greater heed to the sacred text than to that imperfect interpretation ; and often spent whole days in ponder- ing single passages. The new study was hallowed by fervent prayer, as all study ought to be : God was his own interpreter, and soon made the great doctrines of the Gospel plain. Every conversation, every incident, multiplied the doubts of Luther as to his Church, and increased his confidence towards God. In that state of mind he was, when appointed to teach theology in the newly-founded University of Wittemberg ; and as an unusual knowledge of holy Scripture was very apparent in his sermons, and generally appreciated, he was appointed to lecture on the Bible. $ That he might know Rome, it pleased God to direct that he should go thither. Some monasteries of his order had differed with their General, and as the interference of the Pope was thought necessary to finish the quarrel, they deputed
* Savonarola, who, like Luther, became a Monk contrary to his father's wishes, left his library at home, except a Plautus.
t " Codicem sacrnnr corio rahro tectum." Seckendorff, pars i., p- 21. \ « a<i Biblia." Ibid., p. 19.
54 CHAPTER II.
Luther to represent their case to Julius. He went to the city, saw the monster Pope, witnessed utter irreligion and most offensive levity and profaneness in all the Ecclesiastics of every sort, both in public and in private, and conceived a salutary abhorrence of that spiritual Baby- lon (A.D. 1510 or 1512). Filled with disgust, Luther turned his back on Rome, and was meditating on the image of Antichrist that he had seen so unexpectedly, when Julius died, and Giovanni de' Medici caught the triple crown. Through the immense influence of his father, Lorenzo the Magnificent, the person whose patronage Savonarola had nobly refused at Florence, Giovanni was made Abbot and Archbishop at seven years of age, and Cardinal at thirteen. Cradled in regal wealth, brought up amidst the excessive refinements of his father's court, as it might, in truth, be called, and depending for happiness on the gratification of most expensive tastes and the indulgence of a pas- sion for display that the ordinary revenue of the pontificate could not satisfy, he soon foresaw embarrassment. Lorenzo Pucci, one of his own Cardinals, suggested, that he should have recourse to a sale of indulgences,* an old expedient ; and that as Julius had begun the erection of St. Peter's, the expense of that building might be assigned as the object to which the money would be appropriated. Leo took the hint, and appointed salesmen ajl over Europe.
Albert, Archbishop of Mentz and Magdeburg, appointed to trans- act the business in Germany, thought proper to employ a Dominican Inquisitor, named John Tetzel, to travel over the country with the papers. Tetzel was experienced in the trade, and therefore likely to make it pay. But Tetzel over-acted his part, by excessive greedi- ness and effrontery disgusted all but the most ignorant, and soon pro- voked general opposition, as many Preachers of crusades, Inquisitors of heretics, and vendors of indulgences had done before. In Germany Luther stood ready to lead the opposition. f
Resistance awaited the publication of indulgences in Switzerland. In the monastery of Einsiedlen, a place visited by pilgrims, an en- lightened Priest began, (A.D. 1516,) just as Leo was preparing the scheme for replenishing his treasury, to preach to the crowds of devotees against their folly in coming so far for absolution. Although called thither in order to add to the popularity of the place, he declaimed against the very offerings on which he was to have sub- sisted, and, growing daily in religious knowledge and simplicity, added to the experience of many years spent in public life, and to the acquire- ments of a liberal education, the higher excellence of a daily improv- ing piety. This was Ulric Zuiuglius, undergoing preparation, under the guidance of the same admirable Providence that had been direct- ing Luther, to warn the Swiss against the imposture of Samson, a Milanese Monk, who came across the Alps (A.D. 1518) to sell indul- gences. Both Samson and Tetzel taught that as soon as the money was paid down for their papers, the buyers were restored to bap- tismal innocence, — for people were said to be regenerated in bap- tism. These two men were equally devoid of shame, and greedy of
* Thnani Historia, lib. i., sec. 8.
t Seckendorff, Historia Lutheranismi, pars i., pp. 11 — 23.
54 CHAPTER II.
TJLRIC ZUINGLIUS. 55
gold. Each of them collected large sums of money ; but when the deluded buyers saw much of it wasted in taverns, and much again applied to private purposes in Rome instead of the erection of St. Peter's church, they readily heard the doctrine of Luther, Zuinglius, and many others, who taught that there is no merit in any beside Jesus Christ.
Wittemberg and Zurich thenceforth became the metropoles, and Germany and Switzerland the theatres, of a reformed Christianity. Let the reader turn to any of the ecclesiastical histories, and he will see how boldly Luther resisted the emissaries from Rome, publishing theses, disputing against indulgences, gradually casting off submission to the Pope, and at last burning his Bull of excommunication at Wit- temberg. The fanaticism of the German Anabaptists, the revolt of the peasants, religious war, and the perplexity of Emperor, Electors, and Popes, supply the history of the former part of the sixteenth cen- tury. Out of this voluminous history we must now gather informa- tion of the methods resorted to by the Church of Rome to suppress the truth, and we shall hear the testimony of a noble army of martyrs who maintained it unto death.
Leo X. received intelligence of the proceedings of Luther. He was told that the Doctor had preached against the whole scheme of raising cash by indulgences for sin, and advised the people of Wittemberg to do works meet for repentance, rather than purchase exemption with money, forsaking the cross of Christ ; and to bestow their charities first in feeding and clothing the poor, rather than in building and adorning temples. And he had even affirmed, that the promises of indulgence were false, and the practice neither supported by any precept or counsel of the word of God, nor of any benefit in this world or the world to come. But it was represented, at the same time, that Luther had been actuated by jealousy, because Tetzel, a Domi- nican, was employed instead of an Augustinian, as on some former occasions. The suspicion was strengthened by the fact, that Staupitz, his Vicar-General, supported him. The affair was become formidable, for he had affixed ninety-five propositions, or theses, to the church- doors, inviting disputation, and appealing to the holy Scriptures, Fathers, Canons, and decrees of the Church for decision ; but rejecting all opinions of Schoolmen and Canonists. Close on the reports of Tetzel, the Legate- and others, came letters from Luther himself, to show that his proceedings were consistent with his liberty of discus- sion as a Doctor, and by no means contrary to his obedience to the Pppe. As for Leo, he both thought and said that it was a mere monastic quarrel between the two sects of Dominic and Augustine, and that Luther was a clever man, leaving the contending parties to fight Aeir battle without his interference. But many weeks had not elapsed when it became evident that the dispute had awakened a spirit of inquiry that might issue unfavourably to the interests of Roman- ism. First, Eck, Silvestro Prierio, and Hochstraten, clamoured ; and the Emperor himself was appealed to. The University of Wittemberg, on the other handy and Frederic, Elector of Saxony, were on the side