Chapter XIX (1)

HISTORY OF THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE IN EUROPE, FROM 1600 TO 1650.

_Claim of Popes to temporal Power--Father Paul Sarpi--Gradual Decline of papal Power--Unpopularity of Jesuits--Controversy of Catholics and Protestants--Deference of some of the latter to Antiquity-- Wavering in Casaubon--Still more in Grotius--Calixtus--An opposite School of Theologians--Daillé--Chillingworth--Hales--Rise of the Arminian Controversy--Episcopius--Socinians--Question as to Rights of Magistrates in Religion--Writings of Grotius on this Subject-- Question of Religious Toleration--Taylor’s Liberty of Prophesying-- Theological Critics and Commentators--Sermons on Donne--and Taylor--Deistical Writers--English Translation of the Bible._

|Temporal supremacy of Rome.|

1. The claim of the Roman see to depose sovereigns was like the retractile claws of some animals, which would be liable to injury were they not usually sheathed. If the state of religion in England and France towards the latter part of the sixteenth century required the assertion of these pretended rights, it was not the policy of a court, guided as often by prudence as by zeal or pride, to keep them for ever before the eyes of the world. Clement VIII. wanted not these latter qualities, but they were restrained by the former; and the circumstances in which the new century opened, did not demand any open collision with the civil power. Henry IV. had been received back into the bosom of the church; he was now rather the ally, the favoured child of Rome, than the object of proscription. Elizabeth again was out of the reach of any enemy but death, and much was hoped from the hereditary disposition of her successor. The temporal supremacy would therefore have been left for obscure and unauthorised writers to vindicate, if an unforeseen circumstance had not called out again its most celebrated champions. After the detection of the gunpowder conspiracy, an oath of allegiance was imposed in England, containing a renunciation, in strong terms, of the tenet that princes excommunicated by the pope might be deposed or murdered by their subjects. None of the English catholics refused allegiance to James; and most of them probably would have felt little scruple at taking the entire oath, which their arch-priest, Blackwell, had approved. But the see of Rome interfered to censure those who took the oath; and a controversy singularly began with James himself in his “Apology for the Oath of Allegiance.” Bellarmin answered, in 1610, under the name of Matthew Tortus; and the duty of defending the royal author was devolved on one of our most learned divines, Lancelot Andrews, who gave to his reply the quaint title, Tortura Torti.[52] But this favourite tenet of the Vatican was as ill fitted to please the Gallican as the English church. Barclay, a lawyer of Scottish family, had long defended the rights of the crown of France against all opponents. His posthumous treatise on the temporal power of the pope with respect to sovereign princes was published at London in 1609. Bellarmin answered it next year in the ultra-montane spirit which he had always breathed; the parliament of Paris forbade the circulation of his reply.[53]

[52] Biogr. Britann. art. Andrews. Collier’s Ecclesiastical
History. Butler’s English Catholics, vol. i. Matthew Tortus was
the almoner of Bellarmin, whose name he thought fit to assume as
a very slight disguise.

[53] Il pretesto, says Father Paul of Bellarmin’s book, è di
scrivere contra Barclajo; ma il vero fine si vede esser per
ridurre il papa al colmo dell omnipotente. In questo libro non si
tratta altro, che il suddetto argumento, e più di venti cinque
volte è replicato, che quando il papa giudica un principe indegno
per sua colpa d’aver governo overo inetto, ò pur conosce, che per
il bene della chiesa sia cosa utile, lo può privare. Dice più
volte, che quando il papa comanda, che non sia ubbidito ad un
principe privato da lui, non si può dire, che comandi che
principe non sia ubbidito, ma che privata persona, perchè il
principe privato dal papa non è più principe. E passa tanto
inanzi, che viene à dire, il papa può disponere secondo che
giudica ispediente de’ tutti i beni di qual sivoglia Christiano,
ma tutto sarebbe niente, se solo dicesse che tale è la sua
opinione; dice, ch’è un articolo della fede catholica, ch’è
eretico, chi non sente così, e questo con tanta petulantia, che
non vi si può aggiungere. Lettere di Sarpi, 50.

|Contest with Venice.|

|Father Paul Sarpi.|

2. Paul V. was a pope imbued with the arrogant spirit of his predecessors, Paul IV. and Pius V.; no one was more prompt to exercise the despotism which the Jesuits were ready to maintain. After some minor disputes with the Italian states, he came, in 1605, to his famous conflict with the republic of Venice, on the very important question of the immunity of ecclesiastics from the civil tribunals. Though he did not absolve the subjects of Venice from their allegiance, he put the state under an interdict, forbidding the celebration of divine offices throughout its territory. The Venetian clergy, except the Jesuits and some other regulars, obeyed the senate rather than the pope. The whole is matter of known history. In the termination of this dispute, it has been doubted which party obtained the victory; but in the ultimate result and effect upon mankind, we cannot, it seems, well doubt that the see of Rome was the loser.[54] Nothing was more worthy of remark, especially in literary history, than the appearance of one great man, Fra Paolo Sarpi, the first who, in modern times and in a Catholic country, shook the fabric not only of papal despotism, but of ecclesiastical independence and power. For it is to be observed that in the Venetian business, the pope was contending for what were called the rights of the church, not for his own supremacy over it. Sarpi was a man of extraordinary genius, learning, and judgment: his physical and anatomical knowledge was such as to have caused at least several great discoveries to be assigned to him;[55] his reasoning was concise and cogent; his style perspicuous and animated. A treatise “Delle Materie Beneficiarie,” in other words, on the rights, revenues, and privileges, in secular matters, of the ecclesiastical order, is a model in its way. The history is so short and yet so sufficient, the sequence so natural and clear, the proofs so judiciously introduced, that it can never be read without delight and admiration of the author’s skill. And this is more striking to those who have toiled at the verbose books of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, where tedious quotations, accumulated, not selected, disguise the argument they are meant to confirm. Except the first book of Machiavel’s History of Florence, I do not remember any earlier summary of facts so lucid and pertinent to the object. That object was, with Father Paul, neither more nor less than to represent the wealth and power of the church as ill-gotten and excessive. The Treatise on Benefices led the way, or rather was the seed thrown into the ground that ultimately produced the many efforts both of the press and of public authority to break down ecclesiastical privileges.[56]

[54] Ranke is the best authority on this dispute, as he is on all
other matters relating to the papacy in this age, vol. ii., p.
324.

[55] He was supposed to have discovered the valves of the veins,
the circulation of the blood, the expansion and contraction of
the pupil, the variation of the compass. A quo, says Baptista
Porta of Sarpi, aliqua didicisse non solum fateri non
erubescimus, sed gloriamur, cum eo doctiorem, subtiliorem,
quotquot adhuc videre contigerit, neminem cognovimus ad
encyclopædiam. Magia Naturalis, lib. vii., apud Ranke.

[56] A long analysis of the Treatise on Benefices will be found
in Dupin, who does not blame it very much. It is worth reading
through, and has been commended by many good judges of history.

|History of Council of Trent.|

3. The other works of Sarpi are numerous, but none require our present attention except the most celebrated, his History of the Council of Trent. The manuscript of this having been brought to London by Antonio de Dominis, was there published, in 1619, under the name of Pietro Soave Polano, the anagram of Paolo Sarpi Veneto. It was quickly translated into several languages, and became the textbook of protestantism on the subject. Many incorrectnesses have been pointed out by Pallavicini, who undertook the same task on the side of Rome; but the general credibility of Father Paul’s history has rather gained by the ordeal of hostile criticism. Dupin observes that the long list of errors imputed by Pallavicini, which are chiefly in dates and such trifling matters, make little or no difference as to the substance of Sarpi’s history; but that its author is more blamable for a malicious disposition to impute political motives to the members of the council, and idle reasonings which they did not employ.[57] Ranke, who has given this a more minute scrutiny than Dupin could have done, comes nearly to the same result. Sarpi is not a fair, but he is, for those times, a tolerably exact historian. His work exhibits the general excellences of his manner; freedom from redundancy, a clear, full, agreeable style; a choice of what is most pertinent and interesting in his materials. Much has been disputed about the religious tenets of Father Paul; it appears to me quite out of doubt, both by the tenor of his history, and still more unequivocally, if possible, by some of his letters, that he was entirely hostile to the church, in the usual sense, as well as to the court of Rome, sympathising in affection, and concurring generally in opinion, with the reformed denomination.[58] But as he continued in the exercise of his functions as a Servite monk, and has always passed at Venice more for a saint than a heretic, some of the Gallican writers have not scrupled to make use of his authority, and to extenuate his heterodoxy. There can be no question but that he inflicted a severe wound on the spiritual power.

[57] Hist. Eccles. Cent. 17.

[58] The proofs of this it would be endless to adduce from the
history: they strike the eye in every page, though it cannot be
expected that he should declare his way of thinking in express
terms. Even in his letters he does not this. They were printed,
with the date, at least, of Verona, in 1673. Sully’s fall he
laments, “having become partial to him on account of his firmness
in religion.” Lett. 53. Of the republic of the United Provinces
he says: La nascenza di quale si come Dio ha favorito con grazie
inestimabili, così pare che la malizia del diavolo oppugni con
tutte le arti. Lett. 23. After giving an account of one Marsilio,
who seems to have been a Protestant, he adds: Credo se non fosse
per ragion di stato, si trovarebbono diversi, che saltarebbono da
questo fosso di Roma nella cima dell riforma; ma chi teme una
cosa, chi un’altra. Dio però par che goda la più minima parte dei
pensieri umani. So ch’ ella mi intende senza passar più oltre.
Lett. 81., Feb., 1612. Sarpi speaks with great contempt of James
I., who was occupied like a pedant about Vorstius and such
matters. Se il re d’Inghilterra non fosse dottore, si potrebbe
sperare qualche bene, e sarebbe un gran principio, perchè Spagna
non si può vincere, se non levato il pretesto della religione, ne
questo si leverà se non introducendo i reformati nell’Italia. E
si il rè sapesse fare, sarebbe facile e in Torino, e quì. Lett.
88. He wrote, however, a remarkable letter to Casaubon, much
about this time, hinting at his wish to find an asylum in
England, and using rather too different language about the king:
In eo, rarum, cumulatæ virtutes principis ac viri. Regum idea
est, ad quam forte ante actis sæculis nemo formatus fuit. Si ego
ejus protectione dignus essem, nihil mihi deesse putarem ad
mortalis vitæ felicitatem. Tu, vir præstantissime, nihil te
dignius efficere potes, quam tanto principi mea studia
commendare. Casaubon, Epist. 811. For _mea_ in another edition is
read _tua_; but the former seems preferable. Casaubon replied,
that the king wished Paul to be a light to his own country; but
if anything should happen, he had written to his ambassador, ut
nulla in re tibi desit.

|Gallican liberties. Richer.|

4. That power, predominant as it seemed in the beginning of the seventeenth century, met with adversaries besides Sarpi. The French nation, and especially the parliament of Paris, had always vaunted what were called the liberties of the Gallican church; liberties, however, for which neither the church itself, nor the king, the two parties interested, were prone to display much regard. A certain canonist, Richer, published in 1611 a book on ecclesiastical and political power; in which he asserted the government of the church to be a monarchy tempered with aristocracy; that is, that the authority of the pope was limited in some respects by the rights of the bishop. Though this has since become a fundamental principle among the Cisalpine catholics, it did not suit the high notions of that age; and the bishops were content to sacrifice their rights by joining in the clamour of the papal party. A synod assembled by Cardinal du Perron, archbishop of Sens, condemned the book of Richer, who was harassed for the rest of his life by the persecution of those he had sought to defend against a servitude which they seemed to covet. His fame has risen in later times. Dupin concludes a careful analysis of Richer’s treatise with a noble panegyric on his character and style of writing.[59]

[59] Hist. Eccles. Cent. 17. l. ii. c. 7. Niceron, vol. xxvii.
The Biographie Universelle talks of the republican principles of
Richer: it must be in an ecclesiastical sense, for nothing in the
book, I think, relates to civil politics. Father Paul thought
Richer’s scheme might lead to something better, but did not
highly esteem it. Quella mistura del governo ecclesiastico di
monarchio e aristocrazia mi pare una composizione di oglio e
acqua, che non possono mai mischiarsi insieme. Lettere di Sarpi,
109. Richer entirely denies the infallibility of the pope in
matters of faith, and says there is no authority adduced for it
but that of the popes themselves. His work is written on the
principles of the Jansenizing Gallicans of the 18th century, and
probably goes farther than Bossuet, or any who wished to keep on
good terms with Rome would have openly approved. It is prolix,
extending to two volumes 4to. Some account of Richer will be
found in Histoire de la Mère et du Fils, ascribed to Mezeray, or
Richelieu.

|Perron.|

5. The strength of the ultra-montane party in the Gallican church was Perron, a man of great natural capacity, a prodigious memory, a vast knowledge of ecclesiastical and profane antiquity, a sharp wit, a pure and eloquent style, and such readiness in dispute, that few cared to engage him.[60] If he did not always reason justly, or upon consistent principles, these are rather failings in the eyes of lovers of truth, than of those, and they are the many, who sympathize with the dexterity and readiness of a partizan. He had been educated as a Protestant, but, like half the learned of that religion, went over from some motive or other to the victorious side. In the conference at Fontainebleau with Du Plessis Mornay, it has been mentioned already that he had a confessed advantage; but victory in debate follows the combatant rather than the cause. The supporters of Gallican liberties were discouraged during the life of this cardinal. He did not explicitly set himself against them, or deny, perhaps, the principles of the Council of Constance; but, by preventing any assertion of them, he prepared the way, as it was hoped at Rome, for a gradual recognition of the whole system of Bellarmin. Perron, however, was neither a Jesuit, nor very favourable to that order. Even so late as 1638, a collection of tracts by the learned brothers DuPuy, on the liberties of the church, was suppressed at the instance of the nuncio, on the pretext that it had been published without permission. It was reprinted some years afterwards, when the power of Rome had begun to decline.[61]

[60] Dupin.

[61] Dupin 1. iii. c. 1. Grot. Epist. 1105. Liber de libertatibus
ecclesiæ Gallicanæ ex actis desumptus publicis, quo regis
regnique jura contra molitiones pontificias defenduntur ipsius
regis jussu vendi est prohibitus. See also epist. 519.

|Decline of papal power.|

6. Notwithstanding the tone still held by the court of Rome and its numerous partisans, when provoked by any demonstration of resistance, they generally avoided aggressive proceedings, and kept in reserve the tenets which could not be pleasing to any civil government. We should doubtless find many assertions of the temporal authority of the pope by searching into obscure theology during this period; but after Bellarmin and Perron were withdrawn from the stage, no prominent champions of that cause stood forth; and it was one of which great talents and high station alone could overcome the intrinsic unpopularity. Slowly and silently, the power of Rome had much receded before the middle of the seventeenth century. Paul V. was the last of the imperious pontiffs who exacted obedience as sovereigns of Christendom. His successors have had recourse to gentler methods, to a paternal rather than regal authority; they have appealed to the moral sense, but have rarely or never alarmed the fears of their church. The long pontificate of Urban VIII. was a period of transition from strength to weakness. In his first years, this pope was not inactively occupied in the great cause of subduing the Protestant heresy. It has been lately brought to light, that soon after the accession of Charles I., he had formed a scheme, in conjunction with France and Spain, for conquering and partitioning the British islands: Ireland was to be annexed to the ecclesiastical state, and governed by a viceroy of the Holy See.[62] But he afterwards gave up these visionary projects, and limited his ambition to more practicable views of aggrandizement in Italy. It is certain that the temporal principality of the popes has often been a useful diversion for the rest of Europe: the duchy of Urbino was less in our notions of importance than Germany or Britain; but it was quite as capable of engrossing the thoughts and passions of a pope.

[62] Ranke, ii. 518. It is not at all probable that France and
Spain would have seriously coalesced for any object of this kind:
the spoil could not have been safely divided. But the scheme
serves to show the ambition, at that time, of the Roman See.

|Unpopularity of the Jesuits.|

7. The subsidence of catholic zeal before the middle of this age deserves especially to be noted at a time when, in various directions, that church is beginning to exalt her voice, if not to rear her head, and we are ostentatiously reminded of the sudden revival of her influence in the sixteenth century. It did undoubtedly then revive; but it is equally manifest that it receded once more. Among the leading causes of this decline in the influence, not only of what are called ultra-montane principles, but of the zeal and faith that had attended them, a change as visible, and almost as rapid as the reaction in favour of them which we have pointed out in the latter part of the sixteenth century, we must reckon the increasing prejudices against the Jesuit order. Their zeal, union, indefatigable devotion to the cause, had made them the most useful of allies, the most formidable of enemies; but in these very qualities were involved the seeds of public hatred and ultimate ruin. Obnoxious to Protestant states for their intrigues, to the lawyers, especially in France, for their bold theories of political power and encroaching spirit, to the Dominicans for the favour they had won, they had become, long before the close of this period, rather equivocal and dangerous supporters of the See of Rome.[63] Their fate, in countries where the temper of their order had displayed itself with less restraint, might have led reflecting men to anticipate the consequences of urging too far the patience of mankind by the ambition of an insulated order of priests. In the first part of this century the Jesuits possessed an extensive influence in Japan, and had re-united the kingdom of Abyssinia to the Roman church. In the course of a few years more, they were driven out from both; their intriguing ambition had excited an implacable animosity against the church to which they belonged.

[63] Clement VIII. was tired of the Jesuits, as we are told by
Perron, who did not much love them. Perroniana, pp. 286, 288.

|Richelieu’s care of Gallican liberties.|

8. Cardinal Richelieu, though himself a theological writer, took great care to maintain the liberties of the French crown and church. No extravagance of Hildebrandic principles would find countenance under his administration. Their partisans endeavoured sometimes to murmur against his ecclesiastical measures; it was darkly rumoured that he had a scheme of separating the Catholic church of France, something in the manner of Henry VIII., from the supremacy of Rome, though not from her creed; and one Hersent published, under the name of Optatus Gallus, a book so rapidly suppressed, as to be of the greatest rarity, the aim of which was to excite the public apprehension of this schism.[64] It was in defence of the Gallican liberties, so far as it was yet prudent to assert them, that De Marca was employed to write a treatise, De Concordaniâ Sacerdotii et Imperii. This book was censured at Rome; yet it does not by any means come up to the language afterwards usual in the Gallican church; it belongs to its own age, the transitional period in which Rome had just ceased to act, but not to speak as a mistress. De Marca was obliged to make some concessions before he could obtain the bulls for a bishopric. He rose however afterwards to the see of Paris. The first part of his work appeared in 1641, the second after the death of the author.

[64] Biogr. Univ.--Grot. epist. 982, 1354. By some other letters
of Grotius, it appears that Richelieu tampered with those schemes
of reconciling the different religions which were then afloat,
and all which went on setting the Pope nearly aside. Ruarus
intimates the same. Epist. Ruar. p. 401.

|Controversy of Catholics and Protestants.|

|Increased respect for the fathers.|

9. In this most learned period, according to the sense in which the word was then taken, that Europe has ever seen, it was of course to be expected that the studious ecclesiastics of both the Romish and Protestant denomination would pour forth a prodigal erudition in their great controversy. It had always been the aim of the former to give an historical character to theological inquiry; it was their business to ascertain the faith of the Catholic church as a matter of fact, the single principle of its infallibility being assumed as the basis of all investigation. But their opponents, though less concerned in the issue of such questions, frequently thought themselves competent to dispute the field; and conversant as they were with ecclesiastical antiquity, found in its interminable records sufficient weapons to protract the war, though not to subdue the foe. Hence, partly in the last years of the sixteenth century, but incomparably more in the present, we find an essential change in the character of theological controversy. It became less reasoning, less scriptural, less general and popular, but far more patristic, that is, appealing to the testimonies of the fathers, and altogether more historical than before. Several consequences of material influence on religious opinion sprang naturally from this method of conducting the defence of Protestantism. One was that it contracted very greatly the circle of those who, upon any reasonable interpretation of the original principle of personal judgment, could exercise it for themselves; it became the privilege of the deeply learned alone. Another that, from the real obscurity and incoherence of ecclesiastical authorities, those who had penetrated farthest into that province of learning were least able to reconcile them; and however they might disguise it from the world, while the pen was in their hands, were themselves necessarily left, upon many points, in an embarrassing state of doubt and confusion. A third effect was, that upon these controversies of Catholic tradition, the church of Rome had very often the best of the argument; and this was occasionally displayed in those wrestling matches between religious disputants, which were held, publicly or privately, either with the vain hope of coming to an agreement, or to settle the faith of the hearers. And from the two last of these causes it arose, that many Protestants went over to the church of Rome, and that a new theological system was contrived to combine what had been deemed the incompatible tenets of those who had burst from each other with such violence in the preceding century.

|Especially in England. Laud.|

10. This retrocession, as it appeared, and as in spirit it was, towards the system abandoned in the first impetuosity of the Reformation, began in England about the conclusion of the sixteenth century. It was evidently connected with the high notions of ecclesiastical power, of an episcopacy by unbroken transmission from the apostles, of a pompous ritual, which the rulers of the Anglican church took up at that time in opposition to the puritans. It rapidly gained ground in the reign of James, and still more of his son. Andrews, a man far more learned in patristic theology than any of the Elizabethan bishops, or perhaps than any of his English contemporaries except Usher, was, if not the founder, the chief leader of this school. Laud became afterwards, from his political importance, its more conspicuous head; and from him it is sometimes styled. In his conference with the Jesuit Fisher, first published in 1624, and afterwards with many additions in 1639, we find an attempt not feeble, and we may believe, not feigned, to vindicate the Anglican Protestantism, such as he meant it to be, against the church of Rome, but with much deference to the name of Catholic, and the authority of the ancient fathers.[65] It is unnecessary to observe, that this was the prevalent language of the English church in that period of forty years, which was terminated by the civil war; and that it was accompanied by a marked enhancement of religious ceremonies, as well as by a considerable approximation to several doctrines and usages of the Romanists.

[65] Ce qu’il y a de particulier dans cette conférence, c’est
qu’on y cite beaucoup plus les pères de l’église, que n’ont
accoutumé de faire les Protestans de deça la mer. Comme l’église,
Anglicane a une vénération toute particulière pour l’antiquité,
c’est par là que les Catholiques Romains l’attaquent
ordinairement. Bibl. Univ. i. 336. Laud, as well as Andrews,
maintained “that the true and real body of Christ is in that
blessed sacrament.” Conference with Fisher, p. 299. (edit. 1639.)
And afterwards, “for the church of England, nothing is more plain
than that it believes and teaches the true and real presence of
Christ in the eucharist.” Nothing is more plain than the
contrary, as Hall, who belonged to a different school of
theology, though the friend of Laud, has in equivalent words
observed. Hall’s works (Pratt’s edition), vol. ix., p. 374.

|Defections to the Catholic church.|

11. The progress of the latter church for the first thirty years of the present century was as striking and uninterrupted as it had been in the final period of the sixteenth. Victory crowned its banners on every side. The signal defeats of the elector Palatine and the king of Denmark, the reduction of Rochelle, displayed an evident superiority in the ultimate argument to which the Protestants had been driven, and which silences every other; while a rigid system of exclusion from court favour and of civil discouragement, or even of banishment and suppression of public worship, as in the Austrian dominions, brought round the wavering and flexible to acquiesce with apparent willingness in a despotism they could neither resist nor escape. The nobility, both in France and Germany, who in the last age had been the first to embrace a new faith, became afterwards the first to desert it. Many also of the learned and able Protestants gave evidence of the jeopardy of that cause by their conversion. It is not, however, just to infer that they were merely influenced by this apprehension. Two other causes mainly operated; one, to which we have above alluded, the authority given to the traditions of the church, recorded by the writers called fathers, and with which it was found very difficult to reconcile all the protestant creed; another, the intolerance of the reformed churches, both Lutheran and Calvinistic, which gave as little latitude as that which they had quitted.

|Wavering of Casaubon.|

12. The defections, from whatever cause, are numerous in the seventeenth century. But two, more eminent than any who actually renounced the Protestant religion, must be owned to have given evident signs of wavering, Casaubon and Grotius. The proofs of this are not founded merely on anecdotes which might be disputed, but on their own language.[66] Casaubon was staggered by the study of the fathers, in which he discovered many things, especially as to the eucharist, which he could not in any manner reconcile with tenets of the French Hugonots.[67] Perron used to assail him with arguments he could not parry. If we may believe this cardinal, he was on the point of declaring publicly his conversion before he accepted the invitation of James I. to England; and even while in England he promoted the Catholic cause more than the world was aware.[68] This is more than we can readily believe, and we know that he was engaged both in maintaining the temporal rights of the crown against the school of Bellarmin, and in writing animadversions on the ecclesiastical annals of Baronius. But this opposition to the extreme line of the ultra-montanists might be well compatible with a tendency towards much that the reformers had denounced. It seemed in truth to disguise the corruptions of the Catholic church by rendering the controversy almost what we might call personal; as if Rome alone, either by usurping the headship of the church, which might or might not have bad consequences, or by its encroachments on the civil power which were only maintained by a party, were the sole object of that religious opposition, which had divided one half of Europe from the other. Yet if Casaubon, as he had much inclination to do, being on ill terms with some in England, and disliking the country,[69] had returned to France, it seems probable that he would not long have continued in what, according to the principles he had adopted, would appear a schismatical communion.

[66] In his correspondence with Scaliger, no indications of any
vacillation as to religion appear. Of the unfortunate conference
between Du Plessis Mornay and Du Perron, in the presence of Henry
IV., where Casaubon himself had been one of the umpires, he
speaks with great regret, though with a full acknowledgment that
his champion had been worsted. Quod scribis de congressu Diomedis
cum Glauco, sic est omnino, ut tu judicas rectè. Vir optimus, si
eum sua prudentia orbi Gallico satis explorata non defecisset,
nunquam ejus certaminis aleam subiisset. After much more he
concludes: Equidem in lacrymas prope adducor, quoties subit animo
tristissima illius diei species, cum de ingenua nobilitate, de
excellenti ingenio, de ipsa denique veritate pompaticè adeo vidi
triumphatum. Epist. 214. (Oct., 1600.) See also a letter to
Heinsius on the same subject. Cassaub. Epist. 809. In a letter to
Perron himself, in 1604, he professed to adhere to Scripture
alone, against those who vetustatis auctoritatem pro ratione
obtendunt. Epist. 417. A change however came gradually over his
mind, and he grew fascinated by this very authority of antiquity.
In 1609 he had, by the king’s command, a conference on religion
with Du Perron, but very reluctantly, and, as his biographer
owns, quibusdam visus est quodammodo cespitasse. Casaubon was,
for several reasons, no match in such a disputation for Perron.
In the first place, he was poor and weak, and the other powerful,
which is a reason that might dispense with our giving any others;
but secondly, he had less learning in the fathers; and thirdly,
he was entangled by deference for these same fathers; finally, he
was not a man of as much acuteness and eloquence as his
antagonist. The issue of battle does not follow the better cause,
but the sharper sword, especially when there is so much
_ignoratio elenchi_ as in this case.

[67] Perron continued to persecute Casaubon with argument,
whenever he met him in the king’s library. Je vous confesse (the
latter told Wytenbogart) qu’il m’a donné beaucoup des scrupules
qui me restent, et auxquels je ne sais pas bien répondre ... il
me fache de rougir. L’escapade que je prens est que je n’y puis
répondre, mais que j’y penserai. Cassauboni Vita (ad edit.
Epistolarum, 1709.). And in writing to the same Wytenbogart,
Jan., 1610, we find similar signs of wavering. Me, ne quid
dissimulem, hæc tanta diversitas a fide veteris ecclesiæ non
parum turbat. Ne de aliis dicam, in re sacramentaria a majoribus
discessit Lutherus, a Luthero Zuinglius, ab utroque Calvinus, a
Calvino qui postea scripserunt. Nam constat mihi ac certissimum
est, doctrinam Calvini de sacra eucharistia longe aliam esse ab
ea quæ in libro observandi viri Molinæi nostri continetur, et quæ
vulgo in ecclesiis nostris auditur. Itaque Molinæum qui
oppugnant, Calvinum illi non minus objiciunt, quam aliquem è
veteribus ecclesiæ doctoribus. Si sic pergimus, quis tandem erit
exitus? Jam quod idem Molinæus, omnes veterum libros suæ doctrinæ
contrarios respuit, ut ὑποβολιμαιους [hypobolimaious], cui
mediocriter docto fidem faciet? Falsus illi Cyrillus,
Hierosolymorum episcopus; falsus Gregorius Nyssenus, falsus
Ambrosius, falsi omnes. Mihi liquet falli ipsum, et illa scripta
esse verissima, quæ ille pronuntiat ψευδεπιγραφα.
[pseudepigrapha]. Ep. 670. See also Epist. 1043, written from
Paris in the same year. He came now to England, and to his great
satisfaction found the church and its prelates exactly what he
would wish. Illud solatio mihi est, quod in hoc regno speciem
agnosco veteris ecclesiæ, quam ex patrum scriptis didici. Adde
quod episcopis ὁσημεραι συνδιαγω [hosêmerai syndiagô]
doctissimis, sapientissimis, ευσεβεστατοις [eusebestatois], et
quod novum mihi est, priscæ ecclesiæ amantissimis. (Lond., 1611.)
Ep. 703. His letters are full of similar language. See 743, 744,
772, &c. He combined this inordinate respect for authority with
its natural concomitant, a desire to restrain free inquiry.
Though his patristic lore should have made him not unfavourable
to the Arminians, he writes to Bertius, one of their number,
against the liberty of conscience they required. Illa quam passim
celebras, prophetandi libertas, bonis et piis hujus ecclesiæ
viris mirum in modum suspecta res est et odiosa. Nemo enim
dubitat de pietate Christiana actum esse inter vos, si quod
videris agere, illustrissimis ordinibus fuerit semel persuasum,
ut liberum unicuique esse velint, via regia relicta semitam ex
animi libidine sibi aliisque aperire. Atqui veritas, ut scis, in
omnibus rebus scientiis et disciplinis unica est, et το φωνειν
ταυτο [to phônein tauto] inter ecclesiæ veræ notas, fateantur
omnes, non est postrema. Ut nulli esse dubium possit, quin tot
πολυσχιδεις [polyschideis] semitæ totidem sint errorum
diverticula. Quod olim de politicis rebus prudentissimi
philosophorum dixerunt, id mihi videtur multo etiam magis in
ecclesiasticis locum habere, την αγαν ελευθεριαν εις δουλειαν εξ
αναγκης τελευτᾶν, [tên agan eleutherian eis douleian ex anagkês
teleutan], et πασαν τυραννιδα αναρχιας [pasan tyrannida
anarchias] esse κρειττην [kreittên] [sic!] et optabiliorem....
Ego qui inter pontificios diu sum in patria mea versatus, hoc
tibi possum affirmare, nulla re magis stabiliri την τυραννιδα
[tên tyrannida] του χξζ [tou chxz], quam dissentionibus nostris
et dissidiis.

Meric Casaubon’s “Pietas contra Maledicos Patrii Nominis ac
Religionis Hostes,” is an elaborate vindication of his father
against all charges alleged by his adversaries. The only one that
presses is that of wavering in religion. And here Meric candidly
owns that his father had been shaken by Perron about 1610. (See
this tract subjoined to Almeloveen’s edition of the Epistles, p.
89.) But afterwards, by dint of theological study, he got rid of
the scruples the cardinal had infused into him, and became a
Protestant of the new Anglican school, admiring the first six
centuries, and especially the period after Constantine: Hoc
sæculum cum duobus sequentibus ακμη της εκκλησιας [akmê tês
ekklêsias], flos ipse ecclesiæ et ætas illius aurea queat
nuncupari. Prolegomena in Exercitationes in Baronium. His friend
Scaliger had very different notions of the fathers. The fathers,
says he, in his blunt way, are very ignorant, know nothing of
Hebrew, and teach us little in theology. Their interpretations of
scripture are strangely perverse. Even Polycarp, who was a
disciple of the apostles, is full of errors. It will not do to
say that, because they were near the apostolic age, they are
never wrong. Scaligerana Secunda. Le Clerc has some good remarks
on the deference shown by Casaubon to the language held by the
fathers about the eucharist, which shook his Protestantism. Bibl.
Choisie, xix. 230.

[68] Perroniana. Grot. Epist., pag. 939.

[69] Several of his letters attest his desire for returning. He
wrote to Thuanus imploring his recommendation to the queen
regent. But he had given much offence by writing against
Baronius, and had very little chance of an indemnity for his
prebend of Canterbury, if he had given that up on leaving
England. This country, however, though he sometimes calls it
μακαρων νησος [makarôn nêsos], did not suit his disposition. He
was never on good terms with Savile, the most presumptuous of the
learned, according to him, and most scornful, whom he accused of
setting on Montague to anticipate his animadversions on Baronius,
with some suspicion, on Casaubon’s part, of stealing from him.
Ep. 794, 848, 849. But he seems himself to have become generally
unpopular, if we may trust his own account. Ego mores Anglorum
non capio. Quoscunque habui notos priusquam huc venirem, jam ego
illis sum ignotus, verè peregrinus, barbarus; nemo illorum me vel
verbulo appellat; _appellatus silet_. Hoc quid sit, non scio.
Hic---- [Henricus Wotton] vir doctissimus ante annos viginti
mecum Genevæ vixit, et ex eo tempore literis amicitiam columius.
Postquam ego e Galliis, ille Venetiis huc convenimus, desii esse
illi notus; meæ quoque epistolæ responsum dedit nullum; an sit
daturus nescio. Ep. 841. It seems difficult to account for so
marked a treatment of Casaubon, except on the supposition that he
was thought to pursue a course unfavourable to the Protestant
interest. He charges the English with despising everyone but
themselves; and ascribes this to the vast wealth of their
universities; a very discreditable source of pride in our
ancestors, if so it were. But Casaubon’s philological and
critical skill passed for little in this country, where it was
not known enough to be envied. In mere ecclesiastical learning he
was behind some English scholars.

|And of Grotius.|

13. Grotius was from the time of his turning his mind to theology, almost as much influenced as Casaubon by primitive authority, and began, even in 1614, to commend the Anglican church for the respect it showed, very unlike the rest of the reformed, to that standard. But the ill-usage he sustained at the hands of those who boasted their independence of papal tyranny, the caresses of the Gallican clergy after he had fixed his residence at Paris, the growing dissensions and virulence of the Protestants, the choice that seemed alone to be left in their communion, between a fanatical anarchy, disintegrating everything like a church on the one hand, and a domination of bigoted and vulgar ecclesiastics on the other, made him gradually less and less averse to the comprehensive and majestic unity of the Catholic hierarchy, and more and more willing to concede some point of uncertain doctrine, or some form of ambiguous expressive. This is abundantly perceived, and has often been pointed out in his Annotations on the Consultation of Cassander,[70] written in 1641, in his Animadversion on Rivet, who had censured the former treatise as inclining to Popery, in the Votum pro Pace Ecclesiasticâ and in the Rivetiani Apologetici Discussio; all which are collected in the fourth volume of the theological works of Grotius. These treatises display an uniform and progressive tendency to defend the church of Rome in everything that can be reckoned essential to her creed; and, in fact, he will be found to go farther in this direction than Cassander.

[70] Casaubon himself hailed Grotius as in the right path. In
hodiernis contentionibus in negotio religionis et doctè et piè
judicat, et in veneratione antiquitatis cum iis sentit, qui
optimè sentiunt. Epist. 883. See also 772, which is addressed to
him. This high respect for the fathers and for the authority of
the primitive church grew strongly upon him, and the more because
he found they were hostile to the Calvinistic scheme. He was
quite delighted at finding Jerome and Chrysostom on his side.
Epist. 29. (1614). In the next year, writing to Vossius, he goes
a great length. Cæterum ego reformatarum ecclesiarum miseriam in
hoc maximè deploro, quod cum symbola condere catholicæ sit
ecclesiæ, ipsis inter se nunquam eam in rem convenire sit datum,
atque interim libelli apologetici ex re nata scripti ad
imperatorem, reges, principes, aut ut in concilio œcumenico
exhiberentur, trahi cœperint in usum longè alienum. Quid enim
magis est alienum ab unitate catholica quam quod diversis in
regionibus pastores diversa populo tradere coguntur? Quam mirata
fuisset hoc prodigium pia antiquitas! Sed hæc aliaque multa
mussitanda sunt nobis ob iniquitatem temporum. Epist. 66. He was
at this time, as he continued till near the end of his life, when
he moved on farther, highly partial to the Anglican church. He
was, however, too Erastian for the English bishops of the reign
of James, as appears by a letter addressed to him by Overall, who
objected to his giving, in his treatise De Imperio circa Sacra, a
definitive power in controversies of faith to the civil
magistrate, and to his putting episcopacy among non-essentials,
which the bishops held to be of divine right. Grotius adhered to
his opinion, that episcopacy was not commanded as a perpetual
institution, and thought, at that time, that there was no other
distinction between bishops and priests than of precedency.
Nusquam meminit, he says in one place, Clemens Romanus exsortis
illius episcoporum auctoritatis, quæ ecclesiæ consuetudine post
Marci mortem Alexandriæ, atque eo exemplo alibi, introduci cœpit,
sed planè ut Paulus Apostolus, ostendit ecclesias communi
presbyterorum, qui iidem omnes et episcopi ipsi Pauloque
dicuntur, consilio fuisse gubernatas. Even in his latter writings
he seems never to have embraced the notions of some Anglican
divines on this subject, but contents himself, in his remarks on
Cassander, who had said, singularly as it may be thought,
Convenit _inter omnes_ olim Apostolorum ætate inter episcopos et
presbyteros discrimen nullum fuisse, sed postmodum ordinis
servandi et schismatis evitandi causa episcopum presbyteris
fuisse præpositum, with observing, Episcopi sunt presbyterorum
principes; et ista προστασια [prostasia] (præsidentia) à Christo
præmonstrata est in Petro, ab Apostolis vero, ubicunque fieri
poterat, constituta, et a Spiritu Sancto comprobata in
Apocalypsi. Op. Theolog. iv. 579, 621.

But to return from this digression to the more immediate purpose.
Grotius for several years continued in this insulated state,
neither approving of the Reformation nor the church of Rome. He
wrote in 1622 to Episcopius against those whom he called
Cassandrians, Qui etiam plerosque Romanæ ecclesiæ errores
improbantibus auctores sunt, ne ab ejus communione discedant. Ep.
181. He was destined to become Cassandrian himself, or something
more. The infallibility of the church was still no doctrine of
his. At illa auctoritas ecclesiæ αναμαρτητου [anamartêtou], quam
ecclesiæ, et quidem suæ, Romanenses ascribunt, cum naturali
ratione non sit evidens, nam ipsi fatentur Judaicam ecclesiam id
privilegium non habuisse, sequitur ut adversus negantes probari
debeat ex sacris literis. Epist. secunda series, p. 761 (1620).
And again: Quæ scribit pater de restituendis rebus in eum statum,
qui ante concilium Tridentinum fuerat, esset quidem hoc
permultum; sed transubstantiatio et ei respondens adoratio pridem
Lateranensi concilio definita est, et invocatio peculiaris
sanctorum pridem in omnes liturgias recepta. P. 772 (1623).

Grotius passed most of his latter years at Paris, in the
honourable station of ambassador from the court of Sweden. He
seems to have thought it a matter of boast that he did not live
as a Protestant. See Ep. 196. The Hugonot ministers of Charenton
requested him to communicate with them, which he declined, p.
854, 856 (1635). He now was brooding over a scheme of union among
Protestants: the English and Swedish churches were to unite, and
to be followed by Denmark. Constituto semel aliquo tali
ecclesiarum corpore, spes est subinde alios atque alios se
aggregaturos. Est autem hæc res eo magis optanda protestantibus,
quod quotidie multi eos deserunt et se cœtibus Romanensium
addunt, non alia de causa, quam quod non unum est eorum corpus,
sed partes distractæ, greges segreges, propria cuique sua
sacrorum communio, ingens præterea maledidicendi certamen. Epist.
866 (1637). See also p. 827 (1630). He fancied that by such a
weight of authority, grounded on the ancient church, the exercise
of private judgment, on which he looked with horror, might be
overruled. Nisi interpretandi sacras literas, he writes to
Calixtus, libertatem cohibemus intra lineas eorum, quæ omnes illæ
non sanctitate minus quam primæva vetustate venerabiles ecclesiæ
ex ipsa prædicatione scripturis ubique consentiente hauserint,
diuque sub crucis maximè magisterio retinuerint, nisi deinde in
iis quæ liberam habuere disputationem fraterna lenitate ferre
alii alios discimus, quis erit litium sæpe in factiones, deinde
in bella erumpentium finis? Ep. 674 (Oct., 1636). Qui illam
optiman antiquitatem sequuntur ducem, quod te semper fecisse
memini, iis non eveniet, ut multum sibi ipsis sint discolores. In
Angliâ vides quam bene processerit dogmatum noxiorum repurgatio,
hac maximè de causa quod qui id sanctissimum negotium procurandum
suscepere nihil admiscuerunt novi, nihil sui, sed ad meliora
sæcula intentam habuere oculorum aciem. Ep. 966 (1688).

But he could not be long in perceiving that this union of
Protestant churches was impossible from the very independence of
their original constitution. He saw that there could be no
practicable reunion except with Rome itself, nor that, except on
an acknowledgment of her superiority. From the year 1640 his
letters are full of sanguine hopes that this delusive vision
would be realised. He still expected some concession on the other
side; but, as usual, would have lowered his terms according to
the pertinacity of his adversaries, if indeed they were still to
be called his adversaries. He now published his famous
annotations on Cassander, and the other tracts mentioned in the
text, to which they gave rise. In these he defends almost
everything we deem popery, such as transubstantiation (Opera
Theologica, iv. 619), stooping to all the nonsensical evasions of
a spiritual mutation of substance and the like; the authority of
the pope (p. 642), the celibacy of the clergy (p. 645), the
communion in one kind (ibid), and in fact is less of a Protestant
than Cassander. In his epistles he declares himself decidedly in
favour of purgatory, as at least a probable doctrine, p. 930. In
these writings he seems to have had the countenance of Richelieu.
Cardinalis quin ἑνωσεως [henôseôs] negotium in Gallia successurum
sit, dubitare se negat. Epist. sec. series, p. 912. Cardinalis
Ricelianus rem successuram putat. Ita certè loquitur multis.
Archiepiscopus Cantuariensis pœnas dat honestissimi consilii,
quod et aliis bonis sæpe evenit, p. 911. Grotius is now run away
with by vanity, and fancies all will go according to his wish,
showing much ignorance of the real state of things. He was left
by some from whom he had entertained hopes, and thought the Dutch
Arminians timid. Vossius ut video, præ metu, forte et ex Anglia
sic jussus, auxilium suum mihi subtrahit, p. 908. Salmasius adhuc
in consiliis fluctuat. Est in religionis rebus suæ parti
addictior quam putabatur. P. 912. De Episcopio doleo; est vir
magni ingenii et probus, sed nimium cupidus alendæ partis. But it
is probable that he had misinterpreted some language of these
great men, who contemplated with regret the course he was taking,
which could be no longer a secret. De Grotii ad papam defectione,
a French protestant of some eminence for learning writes, tanquam
re certa, quod fama istuc distulit, verum non est. Sed non sine
magno metu eum aliquid istiusmodi meditantem et conantem quotidie
inviti videmus. Inter protestantes cujuslibet ordinis nomen ejus
ascribi vetat, quod eos atrocius sugillavit in Appendice de
Antichristo, et Annotatis ad Cassandri consultationem. Sarravii
Epistolæ, p. 58 (1642). And again he expresses his strong
disapprobation of one of the later treatises. Verissimè dixit
ille qui primus dixit Grotium papissare. P. 196. See also pp. 31,
53.

In 1642 Grotius had become wholly averse to the Reformation. He
thought it had done more harm than good, especially by the habit
of interpreting everything on the papal side for the worse. Malos
mores qui mansere corrigi æquum est. Sed an non hoc melius
successurum fuerit, si quisque semet repurgans pro repurgatione
aliorum preces ad Deum tulisset, et principes et episcopi
correctionem desiderantes, non rupta compage, per concilia
universalia in id laborassent. Dignum est de quo cogitetur, p.
938. Auratus, as he calls him, that is, D’Or, a sort of chaplain
to Grotius, became a Catholic about this time. The other only
says--Quod Auratus fecit, idem fecit antehac vir doctissimus
Petrus Pithæus; idem constituerat facere Casaubonus si in Gallia
mansisset, affirmavit enim id inter alios etiam Cordesio. p. 939.
Of Casaubon he says afterwards: Casaubonus multo saniores putabat
Catholicos Galliæ quam Carentonianos. Anglos autem episcopos
putabat a schismatis culpa posse absolvi, p. 940. Every
successive year saw him now draw nearer to Rome. Reperio autem
quicquid communiter ab ecclesia occidentali quæ Romanæ cohæret
recipitur, idem reperiri apud Patres veteres Græcos et Latinos,
quorum communionem retinendam esse vix quisquam neget. Si quid
præter hoc est, id ad liberas doctorum opinationes pertinet; in
quibus suum quis judicium sequi potest, et communionis jus non
amittere, p. 958. Episcopius was for limiting articles of faith
to the creed, but Grotius did not agree with this, and points out
that it would not preserve uniformity. Quam multa jam sunt de
sacramentis, de ecclesiarum regimine, in quibus, vel concordiæ
causa, certi aliquid observari debet. Alioqui compages ecclesiæ
tantopere nobis commendata retineri non potest, p. 941. It would
be endless to quote every passage tending to the same result.
Finally, in a letter to his brother in Holland, he expresses his
hope that Wytenbogart, the respectable patriarch of Arminianism,
would turn his attention to the means of restoring unity to the
church. Velim D. Wytenbogardum, ubi permiserit valetudo, nisi id
jam fecerit, scriptum aliquid facere de necessitate restituendæ
in ecclesia unitatis, et quibus modis id fieri possit. Multi pro
remedio monstrant, si necessaria a non necessariis separentur, in
non necessariis sive creditu sive factu relinquatur libertas. At
non minor est controversia, quæ sint necessaria, quam quæ sint
vera. Indicia, aiunt, sunt in scripturis. At certè etiam circa
illa loca variat interpretatio. Quare nondem video an quid sit
melius, quam ea quæ ad fidem et bona opera nos ducunt retinere,
ut sunt in ecclesia catholica; puto enim in iis esse quæ sunt
necessaria ad salutem. In cæteris ea quæ conciliorum auctoritate,
aut veturum consensu recepta sunt, interpretari eo modo quo
interpretati sunt, illi qui commodissimè sunt locuti, quales
semper aliqui in quaque materia facile reperientur. Si quis id a
se impetrare non possit, ut taceat, nec propter res de quibus
certus non est, sed opinationem tantum quandam habet turbet
unitatem ecclesiæ necessariam, quæ nisi retinetur ubi est, et
restituitur ubi non est, omnia ibunt in pejus, p. 960. (Nov.
1648.) Wytenbogard replied very well: Si ita se res habet, ut
indicia necessariorum et non necessariorum in scriptura reperiri
nequeant, sed quæri debeant in auctoritate conciliorum aut
veterum consensu, eo modo quo interpretati sunt illi, qui
commodissimè locuti sunt, prout Excellentia tua videtur
existimare, nescio an viginti quinque anni, etiamsi illi mihi
adhuc restarent, omnesque exigui ingenii corporisque mei vires in
mea essent potestate, sufficerent ut maturo cum judicio perlegam
et expendam omnia quæ eo pertinent. This letter is in the Epistolæ
præstantium et eruditorum virorum edited by Limborch in 1683, p.
826. And Grotius’s answer is in the same collection. It is that
of a man who throws off a mask he had reluctantly worn. There was
in fact no other means of repelling Wytenbogard’s just
observation on the moral impossibility of tracing for ourselves
the doctrine of the Catholic church as an historical inquiry.
Grotius refers him to a visible standard. Quare considerandum
est, an nonfacilius et æquius sit, quoniam doctrina de gratia, de
libero arbitrio, necessitate fidei bonorumque operum obtinuit in
ecclesia quæ pro se habet universale regimen et ordinem
successionis, privatos se in aliis accommodare, pacis causa, iis
quæ universaliter sunt recepta, sive ea aptissimis
explicationibus recipiendo, sive tacendo, quam corpus illud
catholicum ecclesiæ se in articulo tolerantiæ accommodare debere
uniuscujusque considerationibus et placitis. Exempli gratiâ:
Catholica ecclesia nemini præscribit ut precetur pro mortuis, aut
opem precum sanctorum vita hac defunctorum imploret: solummodo
requirit, ne quis morem adeo antiquum et generalem condemnet. The
church does, in fact, rather more than he insinuates, though less
than Protestants generally fancy.