now is to be found in the most extensive libraries. One book in particular, entitled "Of the benefits of the death of Christ," had this fate. It was written in Tuscan, was many times reprinted, and was eagerly read in every part of Italy. But the Inquisitors detected in it the Lutheran doctrine of justification by faith alone. They proscribed it: and it is now as utterly lost as the second decade of Livy.

which Cotta and Velleius talked of the oracle lect spirits. Whoever was suspected of heresy, of Delphi, or of the voice of Faunus in the whatever his rank, his learning, or his reputamountains. Their years glided by in a soft tion, was to purge himself to the satisfaction dream of sensual and intellectual voluptuous- of a severe and vigilant tribunal, or to die by ness. Choice cookery, delicious wines, lovely fire. Heretical books were sought out and women, hounds, falcons, horses, newly-disco- destroyed with the same unsparing rigour. vered manuscripts of the classics, sonnets and Works which were once in every house were burlesque romances in the sweetest Tuscan-so effectually suppressed that no copy of them just as licentious as a fine sense of the graceful would permit; plates from the hand of a Benvenuto, designs for palaces by Michel Angelo, frescoes by Raphael, busts, mosaics, and gems just dug up from among the ruins of ancient temples and villas;-these things were the delight and even the serious business of their lives. Letters and the fine arts undoubtedly owe much to this not inelegant sloth. But when the great stirring of the mind of Europe began when doctrine after doctrine was assailed-when nation after nation withdrew from communion with the successor of St. Peter, it was felt that the Church could not be safely confided to chiefs whose highest praise was, that they were good judges of Latin compositions, of paintings, and of statues, whose severest studies had a Pagan character, and who were suspected of laughing in secret at the sacraments which they administered, and of believing no more of the Gospel than of the Morgante Maggiore. Men of a very different class now rose to the direction of ecclesiastical affairs-men whose spirit resembled that of Dunstan and of Becket. The Roman Pontiffs exhibited in their own persons all the austerity of the early anchorites of Syria. Paul IV. brought to the Papal throne the same fervent zeal which had carried him into the Theatine convent. Pius V., under his gorgeous vestments, wore day and night the hair-shirt of a simple friar; walked barefoot in the streets at the head of processions; found, even in the midst of his most pressing avocations, time for pri- | vate prayer; often regretted that the public duties of his station were unfavourable to growth in holiness; and edified his flock by in-varia, the state of things was nearly the same. numerable instances of humility, charity, and The Protestants had a majority in the Assem forgiveness of personal injuries; while, at the bly of the States, and demanded from the duke same time, he upheld the authority of his see, concessions in favour of their religion, as the and the unadulterated doctrines of his church, price of their subsidies. In Transylvania, the with all the stubbornness and vehemence of house of Austria was unable to prevent the Hildebrand. Gregory XIII. exerted himself Diet from confiscating, by one sweeping denot only to imitate but to surpass Pius in the cree, the estates of the church. In Austria severe virtues of his sacred profession. As Proper it was generally said that only onewas the head, such were the members. The thirteenth part of the population could be change in the spirit of the Catholic world may counted on as good Catholics. In Belgium the be traced in every walk of literature and of art. adherents of the new opinions were reckoned It will be at once perceived by every person by hundreds of thousands. who compares the poem of Tasso with that of Ariosto, or the monuments of Sixtus V. with those of Leo X.

Thus, while the Protestant Reformation proceeded rapidly at one extremity of Europe, the Catholic revival went on as rapidly at the other. About half a century after the great separation, there were throughout the north, Protestant governments and Protestant nations. In the south were governments and nations actuated by the most intense zeal for the ancient church. Between these two hostile regions lay, geographically as well as morally, a great debatable land. In France, Belgium, Southern Germany, Hungary, and Poland, the contest was still undecided. The governments of those countries had not renounced their connection with Rome; but the Protestants were numerous, powerful, bold, and active. In France they formed a commonwealth within the realm, held fortresses, were able to bring great armies into the field, and had treated with their sovereign on terms of equality. In Poland, the king was still a Catholic; but the Protestants had the upper hand in the Diet, filled the chief offices in the administration, and, in the large towns, took possession of the parish churches. "It appeared," says the Papal nuncio, "that in Poland, Protestantism would completely supersede Catholicism." In Ba

The history of the two succeeding genera tions is the history of the great struggle between Protestantism possessed of the north of But it was not on moral influence alone that Europe, and Catholicism possessed of the the Catholic Church relied. The civil sword south, for the doubtful territory which lay be in Spain and Italy was unsparingly employed tween. All the weapons of carnal and of spiin her support. The Inquisition was armed ritual warfare were employed. Both sides may with new powers and inspired with a new boast of great talents and of great virtues. energy. If Protestantism, or the semblance of Both have to blush for many follies and crimes. Protestantism, showed itself in any quarter, it At first, the chances seemed to be decidedly in was instantly met, not by petty, teasing perse- favour of Protestantism; but the victory recution, but by persecution of that sort which mained with the Church of Rome. On every bows down and crushes all but a very few se-point she was successful. If we overleap

another half century, we find her victorious Elector of Saxony-the natural head of the and dominant in France, Belgium, Bavaria, Protestant party in Germany-submitted to Bohemia, Austria, Poland, and Hungary. Nor become, at the most important crisis of the has Protestantism, in the course of two hun-struggle, a tool in the hands of the Papists. dred years, been able to reconquer any por- Among the Catholic sovereigns, on the other tion of what it then lost. hand, we find a religious zeal often amounting It is, moreover, not to be dissembled that this to fanaticism. Philip II. was a Papist in a wonderful triumph of the Papacy is to be very different sense from that in which Elizachiefly attributed, not to the force of arms, but beth was a Protestant. Maximilian of Bavato a great reflux in public opinion. During the ria, brought up under the teaching of the first half century after the commencement of Jesuits, was a fervent missionary wielding the the Reformation, the current of feeling, in the powers of a prince. The Emperor Ferdinand countries on this side of the Alps and of the II. deliberately put his throne to hazard over Pyrenees, ran impetuously towards the new and over again, rather than make the smallest doctrines. Then the tide turned, and rushed concession to the spirit of religious innovation. as fiercely in the opposite direction. Neither Sigismund of Sweden lost a crown which he during the one period, nor during the other, might have preserved if he would have redid much depend upon the event of battles or nounced the Catholic faith. In short, everysieges. The Protestant movement was hardly where on the Protestant side we see languor, checked for an instant by the defeat at Muhl-everywhere on the Catholic side we see ardour berg. The Catholic reaction went on at full and devotion. speed in spite of the destruction of the Armada. Not only was there, at this time, a much It is difficult to say whether the violence of the more intense zeal among the Catholics than first blow or of the recoil was the greater. among the Protestants; but the whole zeal of Fifty years after the Lutheran separation, Ca- the Catholics was directed against the Protestholicism could scarcely maintain itself on tants, while almost the whole zeal of the Prothe shores of the Mediterranean. A hundred testants was directed against each other. years after the separation, Protestantism could Within the Catholic Church there were no sescarcely maintain itself on the shores of the rious disputes on points of doctrine. The deBaltic. The causes of this memorable turn in cisions of the Council of Trent were received; human affairs well deserve to be investigated. and the Jansenian controversy nad not yet The contest between the two parties bore arisen. The whole force of Rome was, theresome resemblance to the fencing match in fore, effective for the purpose of carrying on Shakspeare "Laertes wounds Hamlet; then, the war against the Reformation. On the in scuffling, they change rapiers, and Hamlet other hand, the force which ought to have wounds Laertes." The war between Luther fought the battle of the Reformation was exand Leo was a war between firm faith and un-hausted in civil conflict. While Jesuit preachbelief, between zeal and apathy, between ers, Jesuit confessors, Jesuit teachers of youth, energy and indolence, between seriousness and overspread Europe, eager to expend every frivolity, between a pure morality and vice. faculty of their minds and every drop of their Very different was the war which degenerate blood in the cause of their church, Protestant Protestantism had to wage against regenerate doctors were confuting, and Protestant rulers Catholicism. To the debauchees, the poison- were punishing sectaries who were just as ers, the atheists, who had worn the tiara during good Protestants as themselves— the generation which preceded the Reformation, had succeeded Popes, who, in religious fervour and severe sanctity of manners, might bear a comparison with Cyprian or Ambrose. The order of Jesuits alone could show many men not inferior in sincerity, constancy, courage, and austerity of life, to the apostles of the Reformation.

"Cumque superba foret BABYLON spolianda tropæis, Bella geri placuit nullos habitura triumphos." In the Palatinate, a Calvinistic prince persecuted the Lutherans. In Saxony, a Lutheran persecuted the Calvinists. In Sweden every body who objected to any of the articles of the Confession of Augsburg was banished. In But while danger had thus called forth in Scotland, Melville was disputing with other the bosom of the Church of Rome many of the Protestants on questions of ecclesiastical go. highest qualities of the Reformers, the Reform-vernment. In England, the jails were filled ed Churches had contracted some of the corruptions which had been justly censured in the Church of Rome. They had become lukewarm and worldly. Their great old leaders had been borne to the grave, and had left no successors. Among the Protestant princes there was little or no hearty Protestant feeling. Elizabeth herself was a Protestant rather from policy than from firm conviction. James I., in order to effect his favourite object of marrying his son into one of the great continental houses, was ready to make immense concessions to Rome, and even to admit a modified primacy in the Pope. Henry IV. twice abjured the reformed doctrines from interested motives. The VOL. III-52

with men who, though zealous for the Refor mation, did not exactly agree with the court on all points of discipline and doctrine. Some were in ward for denying the tenet of reprobation; some for not wearing surplices. The Irish people might at that time have been, in all probability, reclaimed from Popery, at the expense of half the zeal and activity which Whitgift employed in oppressing Puritans, and Martin Marprelate in revning bishops.

As the Catholics in zeal and in union had a great advantage over the Protestants, so had they also an inhi.tely superior organization In truth, Protestanism, for aggressive purposes, had no organization at all. The Reformed

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gers. The rational course is to subjugate his will, without impairing his vigour-to teach him to obey the rein, and then to urge him to full speed. When once he knows his master, he is valuable in proportion to his strength and spirit. Just such has been the system of the Church of Rome with regard to enthusiasts. She knows that when religious feelings have obtained the complete empire of the mind, they impart a strange energy, that they raise men above the dominion of pain and pleasure, that obloquy becomes glory, that death itself is contemplated only as the beginning of a higher and happier life. She knows that a person in this state is no object of contempt. He may be vulgar, ignorant, visionary, extravagant; but he will do and suffer things which it is for her' interest that somebody should do and suffer, yet from which calm and sober-minded men' would shrink. She accordingly enlists him in her service, assigns to him some forlorn hope, in which intrepidity and impetuosity are more wanted than judgment and self-command, and sends him forth with her benedictions and her applause.

Churches were mere national Churches. The sumes the direction to herself. It would, be Church of England existed for England alone. absurd to run down a horse like a wolf. It' It was an institution as purely local as the would be still more absurd to let him run wild, Court of Common Pleas, and was utterly with-breaking fences and trampling down passenout any machinery for foreign operations. The Church of Scotland, in the same manner, existed for Scotland alone. The operations of the Catholic Church, on the other hand, took in the whole world. Nobody at Lambeth, or at Edinburgh, troubled himself about what was doing in Poland or Bavaria. But at Rome, Cracow and Munich were objects of as much interest as the purlieus of St. John Lateran. Our island, the head of the Protestant interest, did not send out a single missionary or a single instructor of youth to the scene of the great spiritual war. Not a single seminary was established here for the purpose of furnishing a supply of such persons to foreign countries. On the other hand, Germany, Hungary, and Poland were filled with able and active Catholic emissaries of Spanish or Italian birth; and colleges for the instruction of the northern youth were founded at Rome. The spiritual force of Protestantism was a mere local militia, which might be useful in case of an invasion, but could not be sent abroad, and could therefore make no conquests. Rome had such a local militia; but she had also a force disposable at a moment's notice for foreign service, however dangerous or disagreeable. If it was thought at head-quarters that a Jesuit at Palermo was qualified by his talents and character to withstand the Reformers in Lithuania, the order was instantly given and instantly obeyed. In a month, the faithful servant of the Church was preaching, catechising, confessing, beyond the Niemen.

In England it not unfrequently happens that a tinker or coal-heaver hears a sermon, or falls in with a tract, which alarms him about the state of his soul. If he be a man of excitable nerves and strong imagination, he thinks himself given over to the Evil Power. He doubts whether he has not committed the unpardonable sin. He imputes every wild fancy that springs up in his mind to the whisper of a It is impossible to deny that the polity of the fiend. His sleep is broken by dreams of the Church of Rome is the very masterpiece of great judgment-seat, the open books, and the human wisdom. In truth, nothing but such a unquenchable fire. If, in order to escape from polity could, against such assaults, have borne these vexing thoughts, he flies to amusement up such doctrines. The experience of twelve or to licentious indulgence, the delusive relief hundred eventful years, the ingenuity and pa- only makes his misery darker and more hope tient care of forty generations of statesmen, less. At length a turn takes place. He is re. have improved it to such perfection, that conciled to his offended Maker. To borrow among the contrivances of political abilities it the fine imagery of one who had himself been occupies the highest place. The stronger our thus tried, he emerges from the Valley of the conviction that reason and Scripture were de- Shadow of Death, from the dark land of gins. cidedly on the side of Protestantism, the greater and snares, of quagmires and precipices, of is the reluctant admiration with which we re-evil spirits and ravenous beasts. gard that system of tactics against which rea-shine is on his path. He ascends the Deson and Scripture were arrayed in vain.

If we went at large into this most interesting subject, we should fill volumes. We will, therefore, at present advert to only one important part of the policy of the Church of Rome. She thoroughly understands, what no other Church has ever understood, how to deal with enthusiasts. In some sects-particularly in infant sects-enthusiasm is suffered to be rampant. In other sects-particularly in sects long established and richly endowed-it is regarded with aversion. The Catholic Church neither submits to enthusiasm nor proscribes it, but uses it. She considers it as a great moving force which in itself, like the muscular powers of a fine horse, is neither good nor evil, but which may be so directed as to proJuce great good or great evil; and she as

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lectable Mountains, and catches from their summit a distant view of the shining city which is the end of his pilgrimage. Then arises in his mind a natural, and surely not a censurable desire, to impart to others the thoughts of which his own heart is full-to warn the careless, to comfort those who are troubled in spirit. The impulse which urges him to devote his whole life to the teaching of religion, is a strong passion in the guise of a duty. He exhorts his neighbours; and if he be a man of strong parts, he often does so with great effect. He pleads as if he were pleading for his life, with tears and pathetic gestures, and burning words; and he soon finds with delight, not perhaps wholly unmixed with the alloy of human infirmity, that his rude eloquence rouses and melts hearers who sleep

very composedly while the rector preaches on | religion, the chance is, that though she may the apostolical succession. Zeal for God, love disapprove of no one doctrine or ceremony of for his fellow-creatures, pleasure in the exer- the Established Church, she will end by giving cise of his newly discovered powers, impel her name to a new sch.sm. If a pious and him to become a preacher. He has no quarrel benevolent woman enters the cells of a prison, with the establishment, no objection to its for- to pray with the most unhappy and degraded mularies, its government, or its vestments. of her own sex, she does so without any auHe would gladly be admitted among its hum- thority from the Church. No line of action is blest ministers. But, admitted or rejected, his traced out for her; and it is well if the Ordi vocation is determined. His orders have come nary does not complain of her intrusion, and down to him, not through a long and doubtful if the Bishop does not shake his head at such series of Arian and Papist bishops, but direct irregular benevolence. At Rome, the Countess from on high. His commission is the same of Huntingdon would have a place in the cathat on the Mountain of Ascension was given lendar as St. Selina, and Mrs. Fry would be. to the Eleven. Nor will he, for lack of human foundress and first Superior of the Blessed credentials, spare to deliver the glorious mes- Order of Sisters of the Jails. sage with which he is charged by the true He is Head of the Church. For a man thus minded, there is within the pale of the establishment no place. He has been at no college; he cannot construe a Greek author, nor write a Latin theme; and he is told that, if he remains in the communion of the Church, he must do so as a hearer, and that, if he is resolved to be a teacher, he must begin by being a schismatic. His choice is soon made. He harangues on Tower Hill or in Smithfield. A congregation is formed. A license is obtained. A plain brick building, with a desk and benches, is run up, and named Ebenezer or Bethel. In a few weeks the Church has lost forever a hundred families, not one of which entertained the least scruple about her articles, her liturgy, her goverment, or her ceremonies.

Far different is the policy of Rome. The ignorant enthusiast, whom the Anglican Church makes an enemy, and, whatever the learned and polite may think, a most dangerous enemy, the Catholic Church makes a champion. She bids him nurse his beard, covers him with a gown and hood of coarse dark stuff, ties a rope round his waist, and sends him forth to teach in her name. He costs her nothing. He takes not a ducat away from the revenues of her beneficed clergy. He lives by the alms of those who respect his spiritual character, and are grateful for his instructions. He preaches, not exactly in the style of Massillon, but in a way which moves the passions of uneducated hearers; and all his influence is employed to strengthen the Church of which he is a minister. To that Church he becomes as strongly attached as any of the cardinals, whose scarlet carriages and liveries crowd the entrance of the palace on the Quirinal. In this way the Church of Rome unites in herself all the strength of establishment and all the strength of dissent. With the utmost pomp of a dominant hierarchy above, she has all the energy of the voluntary system below. It would be easy to mention very recent instances in which the hearts of hundreds of thousands, estranged from her by the selfishness, sloth, and cowardice of the beneficed clergy, have been brought back by the zeal of the begging friars.

Even for female agency there is a place in her system. To devout women she assigns spiritual functions, dignities, and magistracies. In our country, if a noble lady is moved by more than ordinary zeal for the propagation of

Place Ignatius Loyola at Oxford. certain to become the head of a formidable se cession. Place John Wesley at Rome. He is certain to be the first General of a new society. devoted to the interests and honour of the, Church. Place St. Theresa in London. Her restless enthusiasm ferments into madness, not untinctured with craft. She becomes the prophetess, the mother of the faithful, holds dispu tations with the devil, issues sealed pardons to her adorers, and lies in of the Shiloh. Place Joanna Southcote at Rome. She founds an order of barefooted Carmelites, every one of whom is ready to suffer martyrdom for the Church;-a solemn service is consecrated to. her memory:-and her statue, placed over the holy water, strikes the eye of every stranger who enters St. Peter's.

We have dwelt long on this subject, because we believe, that of the many causes to which the Church of Rome owed her safety and her triumph at the close of the sixteenth century, the chief was the profound policy with which she used the fanaticism of such persons as St Ignatius and St. Theresa.

The Protestant party was now, indeed, vanquished and humbled. In France, so strong had been the Catholic reaction, that Henry IV. found it necessary to choose between his religion and his crown. In spite of his clear hereditary right, in spite of his eminent personal qualities, he saw that, unless he reconciled himself to the Church of Rome, he could not count on the fidelity even of those gallant gentlemen whose impetuous valour had turned the tide of battle at Ivry. In Belgium, Poland, and Southern Germany, Catholicism had ob tained a complete ascendant. The resistance of Bohemia was put down. The Palatinate was conquered. Upper and Lower Saxony were overflowed by Catholic invaders. The King of Denmark stood forth as the Protector of the Reformed Churches; he was defeated, driven out of the empire, and attacked in his own possessions. The armies of the house of Austria pressed on, subjugated Pomerania, and were stopped in their progress only by the ramparts of Stralsund.

And now again the tide turned. Two vio lent outbreaks of religious feeling in opposite directions had given a character to the history of a whole century. Protestantism had at firs driven back Catholicism to the Alps and the Pyrenees. Catholicism had rallied, and had

driven back Protestantism even to the German Ocean. Then the great southern reaction began to slacken, as the great northern movement had slackened before. The zeal of the Catholics became cool; their union was dissolved. The paroxysm of religious excitement was over on both sides. The one party had degenerated as far from the spirit of Loyola as the other from the spirit of Luther. During three generations, religion had been the mainspring of politics. The revolutions and civil wars of France, Scotland, Holland, Sweden, the long struggle between Philip and Elizabeth, the bloody competition for the Bohemian crown, all originated in theological disputes.

land and Protestant Holland joined with Catholic Savoy and Catholic Portugal, for the pur pose of transferring the crown of Spain from one bigoted Catholic to another.

The geographical frontier between the two religions has continued to run almost precisely where it ran at the close of the Thirty Years' War; nor has Protestantism given any proofs of that "expansive power" which has been ascribed to it. But the Protestant boasts, and most justly, that wealth, civilization, and intelligence have increased far more on the northern than on the southern side of the boundary; that countries so little favoured by nature as Scotland and Prussia are now among the most flourishing and best governed portions of the world-while the marble palaces of Genoa are deserted-while banditti infest the beautiful shores of Campania-while the fertile sea-coast of the Pontifical State is abandoned to buffaloes and wild boars. It cannot be doubted, that since the sixteenth century, the

But a great change now took place. The contest which was raging in Germany lost its religious character. It was now, on the one side, less a contest for the spiritual ascendency of the Church of Rome than for the temporal ascendency of the house of Austria. On the other, it was less a contest for the reformed doctrine than for national independence. Go-Protestant nations-fair allowance being made vernments began to form themselves into new for physical disadvantages-have made decombinations, in which community of political cidedly greater progress than their neighbours. interest was far more regarded than communi- The progress made by those nations in which ty of religious belief. Even at Rome the pro- Protestantism, though not finally successful, yet gress of the Catholic arms was observed with maintained a long struggle, and left permanent very mixed feelings. The Supreme Pontiff traces, kas generally been considerable. But was a sovereign prince of the second rank, and when we come to the Catholic Land, to the was anxious about the balance of power, as part of Europe in which the first spark of rewell as about the propagation of truth. It was formation was trodden out as soon as it appear known that he dreaded the rise of a universal ed, and from which proceeded the impulse monarchy even more than he desired the pros- which drove Protestantism back, we find, at perity of the Universal Church. At length a best, a very slow progress, and on the whole a great event announced to the world that the retrogression. Compare Denmark and Por war of sects had ceased, and that the war of tugal. When Luther began to preach, the states had succeeded. A coalition, including superiority of the Portuguese was unquestionCalvinists, Lutherans, and Catholics, was able. At present the superiority of the Danes formed against the house of Austria. At the is no less so. Compare Edinburgh and Flohead of that coalition were the first statesman rence. Edinburgh has owed less to climate, and first warrior of the age; the former a to soil, and to the fostering care of rulers, than prince of the Catholic Church, distinguished any capital, Protestant or Catholic. In all by the vigour and success with which he had these respects, Florence has been singularly put down the Huguenots-the latter a Protestant happy. Yet whoever knows what Florence king, who owed his throne to the revolution and Edinburgh were in the generation precaused by hatred of Popery. The alliance of ceding the Reformation, and what they are Richelieu and Gustavus marks the time at now, will acknowledge that some great cause which the great religious struggle terminated. has, during the last three centuries, operated The war which followed was a war for the to raise one part of the European family, and equilibrium of Europe. When, at length, the to depress the other. Compare the history of peace of Westphalia was concluded, it appear- England and that of Spain during the last cened that the Church of Rome remained in full tury. In arms, arts, sciences, letters, compossession of a vast dominion, which in the merce, agriculture, the contrast is most strik middle of the preceding century she seemed ing. The distinction is not confined to this to be on the point of losing. No part of Eu-side of the Atlantic. The colonies planted by rope remained Protestant, except that part England in America have immeasurably outwhich had become thoroughly Protestant be-grown in power those planted by Spain. Yet fore the generation which heard Luther preach had passed away.

we have no reason to believe that, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, the Castilian Since that time there has been no religious was in any respect inferior to the Englishman. war between Catholics and Protestants as such. Our firm belief is, that the North owes its In the time of Cromwell, Protestant England great civilization and prosperity chiefly to the was united with Catholic France, then govern-moral effect of the Protestant Reformation; ed by a priest. against Catholic Spain. William the Third, the eminently Protestant hero, was at the head of a coalition which included many Catholic powers, and which was secretly fa- About a hundred years after the final settlevoured even by Rome, against the Catholic ment of the boundary line between Protestan!Louis In the time of Anne, Protestant Eng-ism and Catholicism, began to appear the

and that the decay of the Southern countries of Europe is to be mainly ascribed to the great Catholic revival.