‘HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION.” 187 
to say that his general views are accurate and sound, far above the 
standard of the times in which he lived,* and sometimes marked by 
comprehensive profoundness and originality ; that he is an honest 
reciter of facts, though with certain political and religious biasses,t 
that he has, for the most part, judiciously treated contemporaneous 
evidence, whenever it could be obtained, as deserving more atten- 
tion than non-contemporaneous ; and that, though his style makes 
but a distant approach to the perfection of historical composition, he 
has the talent of communicating his information with distinctness, 
perspicuity, and fulness, and occasionally of imparting his reflections 
with dignity and impressive eloquence. These are no ordinary 
merits ; and hence these volumes have been long regarded as a per- 
manent addition to the wealth of English literature. 
Now, whether the inveterate prejudices and opposition Burnett 
selle, tom. v, for the year 1687, p. 530, and the Acta Eruditorum, Leipsic, 
1687, p. 58-9. 
* We would refer for instance to his very sensible and liberal remarks on 
the statutes against usury, or lending money on interest, vol. ii, p.260. The 
authority of Aristotle, who loudly condemns usury on the principle that 
money is in its nature barren (vide Tva:zizu, A Z, p- 2-3.), or, as our Shaks- 
peare has it, “a breed of barren metal,” was implicitly bowed to by the 
fathers of the church, and echoed by all our learned ecclesiastics after the 
Reformation. Isaac Walton, the well-known biographer of Bishop Saunder- 
son, tells us that “the good bishop would not take money on interest, yet he 
would give £100. on condition of receiving £20. for seven years.” Admira- 
ble casuist as this prelate was, yet I think it would have puzzled him not a 
little if to his nine cases of conscience he had been required to add a tenth, 
which should point out in what the difference consisted between those two 
modes of procedure. In the epistles of Calvin there is an allusion to usury, 
which exhibits an uncommonly enlightened exemption from the prejudices 
of mankind on this much-disputed topic. The whole passage is too long to 
quote, but the following sentence will show that the Genevan reformer set 
at nought the decisions of the church against that practice. “Nunc igitur 
concludo, judicandum de Usuris esse, non ex particulari aliquo Scripture 
loco, sed tantum ex equitatis regula.”—Epistole, 
+ We are inclined to think that the following observation of the bishop, in his 
Reflections on the “ Ecclesiastical History” of Mons. Varillas, will be thought, 
by many of his critical readers, as applicable to the delineation of some of the 
most figuring personages in the History of the Reformation, as well as in the 
History of his Own Time. “ An historian who favours his own side is to be 
forgiven, though he puts a little too much life in his colours, when he sets 
out the best side of his party and the worst side of those from whom he dif. 
fers; and if he but slightly touches the failures of his friends, and severely 
aggravates those of the other side, though in this he departs from the laws of 
an exact historian, yet this vice is so natural that, though it lessen the credit 
of the writer, yet it doth not blacken him.” 
