116 CnURCH UNITY 



church history has bequeathed us from 

 the seventeenth century. 



Hugo Grotius, a contemporary of Calix- 

 tus, was also enamoured of the idea of a 

 united Christendom. He differed from 

 Calixtus in this : that while Calixtus was 

 a stanch Protestant, and made his con- 

 cessions not toward Rome, but toward 

 Geneva, and contented himself with try- 

 ing to bring the Reformed and the Luther- 

 ans to a common understanding, Grotius 

 turned rather toward Rome, and advocated 

 a restored and purified Catholicism, as a 

 common solvent of all sects, and a large 

 fold for the peaceable meeting-place of all 

 Christians. This strange reversion on 

 Grotius's part to the Roman Church as 

 the hope of Christendom, may be explained 

 from two facts : (1) Grotius was an Ar- 

 minian. He was delighted to find, as he 

 thought, that the stern doctrines of Calvin 

 were absent from the ancient fathers, that 

 Jerome and Chrysostom and the Catholic 

 fathers knew nothing of these tenets. 

 This led him to a passionate rebound in 

 favor of antiquity. (2) The iron of the 

 Protestant intolerance had entered into his 

 own soul. After his escape from prison 



