REFORMATION 



6530 



REFORMATION 



of necessity sought to establish its 

 own form of Church, whether the 

 Church so established remained a 

 part of the Roman organization or 

 not ; and each state claimed at its 

 own will to prohibit or concede a 

 limited toleration to other forms 

 of Church government, doctrines, 

 and observances. The broad line of 

 demarcation was that between the 

 states whioh in popular language 

 were described as Catholic and 

 Protestant, the states whose gov- 

 ernments continued to recognize, 

 and those which repudiated, the 

 authority of the Church of Rome. 



Revolt ol Luther and Wyclifle 



As the epoch of the Reformation 

 is said to open in 1517 with Luther's 

 decisive challenge to the papacy, 

 so it is to be reckoned as closing 

 with the dissolution, in 1563, of the 

 council of Trent, which definitively 

 established the limits of Roman 

 Catholicism. Luther was the 

 champion of revolt against the doc- 

 trinal authority of Rome, and his 

 distinction is that he was the first 

 to head a revolt which succeeded. 

 The seed which came to harvest in 

 the 16th century had been sown 

 in the 14th by John Wycliffe in 

 England. After Wycliffe's death 

 his doctrines were stringently sup- 

 pressed in England, though the 

 persistence of concealed Lollardy 

 kept the soil in some degree of 

 readiness for further develop- 

 ments. Moreover, the doctrines that 

 were taught at Oxford found their 

 way to the university of Prague, 

 where with some modification they 

 were adopted by John Hus (q.v.). 

 There were other universities be- 

 sides Prague where the teachings of 

 Hus were germinating a hundred 

 years after his death. 



The revolution which Luther 

 initiated followed varying lines of 

 development in the various coun- 

 tries of Europe during the 46 years 

 which we have called the epoch of 

 the Reformation. By the end of 

 that time Spam and Italy were 

 secured for the papacy ; England, 

 Scotland, and Scandinavia were 

 secured for Protestantism ; in 

 France it was still uncertain 

 whether Catholics aad Protestants 

 would settle down to mutual tol- 

 eration, the Huguenots being in a 

 minority, but still far too strong to 

 be easily crushed by force. The 

 crowd of German states were 

 severally recognized as Catholic or 

 Protestant, according to the pre- 

 dilections of their rulers ; even the 

 ecclesiastical principalities were 

 not all given to the Catholics. 



But in the main and speaking 

 roughly, Protestant states pre- 

 dominated in north Germany and 

 Catholic in the south. In Poland, 



Bohemia, and Hungary it was still 

 uncertain which of the creeds 

 would conquer in the end. The 

 Protestant folk of the northern 

 Netherlands were still under the 

 yoke of Spain. 



We may turn now to the 

 narrative, beginning with Germany, 

 where the gage of battle was de- 

 finitely flung down. 



In 1517 Pope Leo X, in want of 

 money, proposed to procure sup- 

 plies by the sale of indulgences 

 on a scale and at a price hitherto 

 without precedent. The sale of 

 indulgences was not a new thing ; 

 it had before been made the sub- 

 ject of protest, but the scruples of 

 princes had been quieted by a per- 

 centage of the profits. 



But Luther had come very 

 definitely to the conclusion that 

 neither priests nor popes could 

 grant pardons, the forgiveness of 

 sins being the function of God 

 alone. He posted on the church 

 door at Wittenberg a series of 

 theses denouncing the doctrine of 

 indulgences, and the Elector of 

 Saxony supported him by refusing 

 permission to the commissioners 

 for the sale of indulgences to enter 

 Saxony. Luther now set about 

 the hopeless task of fortifying his 

 position so as to make his argument 

 convincing to those who were 

 certain not to be convinced ; in so 

 doing, he found himself proving 

 to himself that reconciliation was 

 impossible, and in effect prepared 

 himself, not for the defence of a 

 particular thesis, but for open war. 



Position of the Protestants 

 At the diet of Worms he clearly 

 proclaimed the Protestant posi- 

 tion : that popes and councils may 

 err, but the truth which he found in 

 Scripture could not err, and by 

 that he would stand at all costs. 

 That declaration was in fact the 

 assertion of his own right and his 

 own duty to follow his own 

 judgement and to obey his own 

 conscience. If that was his right 

 and his duty, it follows that it is 

 no less the right and duty of every 

 individual. The logical conclusion 

 was universal toleration for all 

 opinions conscientiously held, but 

 Protestantism did not for genera- 

 tions to come rise to the fullness of 

 that conception. 



Germany was divided in opinion. 

 Personal interests, contempt for 

 the papacy, anti-clerical sentiment, 

 admiration for Luther's courage, 

 genuine moral and religious enthu- 

 siasm, all combined in varying 

 degrees to bring together a body of 

 support for Luther so powerful 

 that any attempt to crush it would 

 obviously have involved Germany 

 in civil war, of which no one could 

 have foretold the issue. The edict 



issued against him by the diet 

 became practically a dead letter. 

 A diet held at Spires in 1526 agreed 

 upon a compromise, which virtually 

 left each of the princes to settle 

 matters as he chose within his own 

 dominion ; when another diet there, 

 1529, cancelled the compromise 

 and resuscitated the edict of 

 Worms, the new edict was met by 

 the Lutherans with a defiant 

 protest which gave to them and to 

 the cause of the Reformation the 

 name of Protestant ; and this was 

 followed up by the issuing of the 

 formal confession of faith in 1530, 

 known as the Confession of 

 Augsburg (q.v.). But this was not 

 enough, and the princes who 

 adopted the Augsburg Confession 

 united themselves in the defensive 

 armed league of Schmalkalden. 



The Council of Trent 

 The predilections of Charles V 

 (q.v.) were antagonistic to Protes- 

 tantism as being subversive of 

 authority in general, and a 

 palpable obstacle to one of his 

 great political aims, the establish- 

 ment of the emperor's personal 

 authority in the empire as supreme. 

 But Charles could not afford to 

 plunge into a doubtful civil war, 

 and the years passed uneasily, with 

 civil war perpetually threatening. 

 The prevalent view, which every- 

 one professed more or less ardently 

 to support, was that the whole 

 question ought to be dealt with 

 and brought to a final settlement 

 by a general council of the Church. 

 But unfortunately every party 

 concerned wanted such a council 

 to be held under conditions which 

 would ensure that particular 

 party's own predominance therein, 

 and by no means under conditions 

 which promised the predominance 

 to someone else. Pending the 

 summoning of a council, a confer- 

 ence was held at Ratisbon between 

 representatives of the various 

 religious parties, in 1541, but no 

 basis of agreement was reached. 

 At last, under pressure from the 

 emperor, Pope Paul HI summoned 

 a council to be held at Trent in 

 1545, but the terms under which it 

 assembled made it a foregone con- 

 clusion that its decisions would be 

 wholly papalist ; practically Pro- 

 testants declined to recognize its 

 oecumenical character. Its decisive 

 activities were deferred till 1562. 



Meanwhile in Germany the 

 contest had reached a settlement 

 on its political side, for Luther 

 had done much to avert an armed 

 conflict. Almost immediately after 

 his death in 1546 Charles found an 

 opportunity for attacking and 

 crushing the league of Schmal- 

 kalden (q.v.). In 1547 his personal 

 relations with the pope were 



