the cause of religious truth, is the remaining principle which, in conjunction with those I have mentioned, will be found to have actuated mankind during the ages we are now to consider. As the principles before mentioned gave occasion to all that was dark and afflicting in the scene, so did the principle now mentioned give occasion to all that was bright, and cheering, and elevating to the soul; united, they may serve, when followed up through their remote as well as immediate effects, to explain, as I conceive, the events of the Reformation, and for some ages all the more important part of the history of Europe.

LECTURE X.

REFORMATION.

I ENDEAVOURED in my last lecture to describe the evils to which mankind would probably be exposed by any attempts to produce the reformation of religion, and the benefits by which such evils were likely to be overbalanced.

I must now consider how far, in point of fact, such evils and such benefits were really experienced.

And here it is necessary for me to remind you of one of the difficulties which I announced to you in my introductory lecture, as more particularly belonging to all lectures on history; the impossibility that a lecturer must find of presenting to his hearer all that has passed in review before his own mind, and the blank that must therefore be left, till the subsequent diligence of the student has furnished him with the same materials of judgment which the lecturer had before him. Thus, in the present instance, the opinions which were presented to your reflection, in the lecture of yesterday, were suggested by a vast assemblage of facts, an assemblage which in reality constitutes the history of the Reformation. How, then, are these to be presented to you? The history cannot be given here, nor any part of it: a few allusions and references are all the expedients I can have recourse to. These will at present convey to your minds little that can operate upon them in the way of evidence, but you must consider them as specimens of evidence; you must recollect that nothing more can be now attempted, and you must be contented with expecting to find, as you certainly will find hereafter, when you come to read the history for yourselves, that the general import of the facts has not been misrepresented, and

that the theories I have proposed might have been very amply illustrated, if the proper incidents and transactions could have been conveniently exhibited to your consideration.

Thus, first, with respect to the effects which I conceived could not but result from the natural intolerance of the human mind.

Of this the proof will hereafter appear to you but too complete. It will be even visible to a considerable degree in the lectures which I shall have next to deliver, on the religious wars; the wars that accompanied and followed the progress of the Reformation. But in the meantime, I can only refer you to the testimony of the historians who remark upon this particular point, while writing under the immediate impression of all the transactions which they have had occasion to relate.

I shall produce, as one of the most unobjectionable that can be mentioned, the judgment that has been delivered by Robertson.

"The Roman Catholics," says Robertson, "as their system. rested on the decisions of an infallible judge, never doubted that truth was on their side, and openly called on the civil power to repel the impious and heretical innovators, who had risen up against it. The Protestants, no less confident that their doctrine was well founded, required, with equal ardour, the princes of their party to check such as presumed to impugn or to oppose it. Luther, Calvin, Cranmer, Knox, the founders of the reformed churches in their respective countries, inflicted, as far as they had power and opportunity, the same punishments, which were denounced against their own disciples by the church of Rome, upon such as called in question any article of their creed. To their followers, and perhaps their opponents, it would have appeared a symptom of diffidence in the goodness of their cause, or an acknowledgment that it was not well founded, if they had not employed in its defence all those means which it was supposed truth had a right to employ."

This passage from Robertson I conceive to be, in the main, just, though I think Luther might have been favourably distinguished from Calvin and others. There are passages in his writings, with regard to the interference of the magistrate in religious concerns, that do him honour; but he was favourably situated, and lived not to see the temporal sword at his command. He was never tried.

The language of other historians is similar to that of Robertson, but in general more strong. I need not detain my hearers with detailing to them those passages in their account which must necessarily be met with in the course of any regular perusal of their narratives.

I shall, however, enumerate a few instances taken from different periods and different countries.

One of the most early and noted of the reformers was Huss. He was burnt to death by the Nominalists at the council of Constance. But it must be observed, that when he had been himself "dressed in a little brief authority," he had persecuted the Nominalists to the utmost of his power because he was himself a Realist. These terms are known to those who have engaged in metaphysical inquiries, and to those only; and if explained, would show, what need not be shown, that intolerance is never at a loss for materials.

By the execution of Huss and Jerome of Prague, the heroic Ziska had been driven into such paroxysms of indignation and gloom, that he was at last observed by Winceslaus, and encouraged to excite his countrymen to resist and punish these unprincipled persecutors and destroyers of their fellow

creatures.

But a few years afterwards we find from Mosheim that he himself fell upon the Beghards, a miserable sect of fanatics, putting some to the sword, and condemning the rest to the flames, because he gave full credit, probably without any proper examination, to the charges that had been brought against them of some immoral practices.

Yet must Ziska be considered as a hero, in the best sense

of the word, and memorable in history for virtue, as well as talents and intrepidity.

Calvin, too, must be thought a man of religion and goodness, according to his own melancholy notions of religion and goodness; yet could this celebrated reformer, as is well known, cause Servetus to be condemned to death for heresy; and because the unhappy man had reiterated his shrieks, when condemned, at the very idea of the fire in which he was to perish, Calvin could find, when writing in the retirement of his closet, a subject not only for his comment, but his censure and even his ridicule (at least his contempt), in these afflicting agonies of affrighted nature.

Francis I., who united all the softer virtues at least, to all the honourable and gallant feelings of a gentleman and a soldier, could, however, declare, in a public assembly (I quote the words of the historian), "that if one of his hands was infected with heresy, he would cut it off with the other, and would not spare even his own children, if found guilty of that crime;" and immediately after, six of his subjects, who had libelled the Roman church, were publicly burnt, with circumstances, say the historian, of the most shocking barbarity attending their execution.

Francis, it will be said, was no religionist; yet he lived upon the applause of men generous and intrepid like himself; he prided himself upon his sincerity, and what he said must have been the genuine effusion of his own mind, and equally the echo of the general sentiment.

Men like these may be thought warm and impetuous in their nature; but what are we to say of our own Sir Thomas More? What man so amiable in his manners, so invincible in his integrity, so gentle, so accomplished?

Yet does this man take his place among the persecutors who disgrace the pages of history. In Fox's Book of Martyrs he leads up the ranks, where Bonner and other dreadful men are afterwards so distinguished.

"As soon as More came into favour," says Burnet, in his