Chapter II: Section I

_Statement of different and opposite opinions respecting the reformation—with brief remarks_.

The information, like the French revolution, seems to have been too much admired by its friends, and too much vilified by its enemies. The former, for the most part, perceive nothing in it but what is praise worthy and divine, and the latter nothing but what is detestable and devilish. The truth, probably, lies somewhere about midway between these two extremes, as is usual in most of the disputes that divide and agitate the world. The reformation had certainly some good points in it, as well as some very bad ones, that can never be too much reprobated and detested. Had they been all bad, its friends would have defended them, for they have actually and unblushingly defended its very worst points; {625a} and had they been all good, its enemies, on the other hand, would not fail to condemn them, for they have really done so with its very best parts, whose intrinsic or essential goodness and beneficial tendency are most obvious and demonstrable. {625b}

The friends of the reformation consider the original and chief actors in that great revolutionary work as excellent men, actuated by a right apostolical and christian spirit, with a view to the restoration of primitive christianity, and the promotion of the best interests of mankind. Their opponents, on the contrary, consider them in a very different light, and hold them up as persons of a disreputable character, who were actuated by very unworthy and base motives, from whose thoughts nothing could be further than the restoration of genuine christianity, or the promoting of real benevolence, philanthropy, or human happiness. It will not be safe to give implicit credit to either of these representations. There were, certainly, some good men concerned in the reformation, and there were also some very bad men concerned in it, whose misdeeds ought never to be palliated; and these were probably the most numerous and the most powerful, or the work, surely, would have been more worthy of our praise and admiration.

The reformation, in the judgment of its admirers, was eminently calculated to promote the cause of truth and virtue, and inculcate the practice of piety, morality, and all manner of good works. All this, however, is flatly contradicted by the champions of the opposite cause, who positively affirm that the doctrines of the reformers were, in the very nature of them, of an evil, immoral and impious tendency:—alluding to the grand Lutheran tenet of _justification_ by faith _without works_, {626a} and to the famous Calvinian notion of predestination, as extending to all the deeds of men, bad and good, or that all human actions, even the very worst, originate in the _Divine decrees_, or _will of God_. {626b} This opinion of the evil tendency of the reformation, or of the reformed doctrine, they represent as further corroborated and established by undeniable facts, and authentic historical evidence; or in other words, by its immediate effects, or the very first fruits it produced wherever it did prevail.

Those who advocate the cause of the reformers say that their labours were abundantly fruitful of good works, and that their doctrine produced the happiest effects wherever it was received. But their opponents flatly deny it, and positively assert that the very reverse was actually the case: and they support their assertion, not only by referring to those long and bloody wars which resulted from the reformation, but also to the express testimony of credible witnesses, who affirm, that vice and immorality greatly increased wherever protestantism became predominant. Nor is it a little remarkable that these same witnesses are, for the most part, some of the very chief reformers; so that their evidence comes with a force that cannot well be resisted. Some of them belonged to the continent, and others to this kingdom; but we shall in this place bring forward only the former, reserving the latter till we come to exhibit the rise and progress of the reformation in this country.

We shall begin with LUTHER, whose testimony on this occasion is very strong and remarkable.—“The world (says he) grows worse and worse. It is plain that men are much more covetous, malicious, and resentful, much more unruly, shameless, and full of vice, than they were in the time of popery.” {628a} “Formerly, when we were suduced by the pope, men willingly followed good works, but now all their study is to get every thing to themselves by exactions, pillage, theft, lying, usury.” {628b} “It is a wonderful thing, and full of scandal, that from the time that the pure doctrine was first called to light, the world should daily grow worse and worse.” {628c}—The testimony of BUCER, another celebrated reformer, is to the same effect. “The greater part of the people” (says he) “seem only to have embraced the gospel, in order to shake off the yoke of discipline, and the obligation of fasting, penance, &c., which lay upon them in the time of popery; and to live at their pleasure, enjoying their lust and lawless appetites without controul. They therefore lend a willing ear to the doctrine that we are _justified by faith alone_ and _not by good works_, having no relish for them.”—{628d} MUSCULUS also, another eminent reformer, is said to have borne much the same testimony. {628e}

CALVIN’S evidence in this case seems also to be equally forcible and decisive: “Of so many thousands (says he) seemingly eager in embracing the gospel, how few have since amended their lives? Nay, to what else does the greater part pretend, except by shaking off the heavy yoke of superstition to launch out more freely into every kind of lasciviousness?” {629a} Thus said Calvin. When the character of the reformation is duly and thoroughly considered, and especially that of Calvin’s own doctrine, it is no great wonder that such effects should follow. It would have been much more wonderful if they had not followed; at least, when we further consider the abominable conduct, the vile and bloody deeds that were sanctioned by the same reformer’s own example. Had he been a different sort of man, these unsightly fruits of his labours might have led him to doubt the soundness of his faith, or suspect that his creed did not altogether tally with the doctrine that is according to godliness. But from him it could not be expected.

Another testimony of no small weight in this case, and which must not be here omitted, is that of the celebrated ERASMUS, one of the greatest luminaries and most eminent characters of that age, who has been reckoned among the principal authors of the reformation as well as restorers of literature. Let us listen then to his evidence on this subject: “What an _evangelical_ generation is this? Nothing was ever seen more licentious and more seditious. Nothing is less _evangelical_ than these pretended _gospellers_. {629b} Take notice of this _evangelical_ people, and shew me an individual amongst them all who from being a drunkard has become sober, from being a libertine has become chaste. I, on the other hand, can shew you many who have become worse by the change. Those whom I once knew to have been chaste, sincere, and without fraud, I found, after they had embraced this sect, to be licentious in their conversation, gamblers, neglectful of prayer, passionate, vain, as spiteful as serpents, and lost to the feelings of human nature. I speak from experience.” {630}

Upon the whole, it seems impossible to evade the force of this evidence, or deny that vice and immorality increased where protestantism prevailed, and, consequently, that there must have been some radical and essential defect in that system from the very first: so that it must be the very height of folly, absurdity, and arrogance in our present pretended evangelical demagogues to attempt to hold it up to the people as a standard of unadulterated truth and model of christian perfection. It is remarkable enough that these good people, almost to a man, are very loud in their reprobation of the French revolution, although it might easily be proved that that same revolution was nearly, if not quite as honourable in its origin, and respectable in its progress as that which was excited and conducted by Martin Luther, John Calvin, and their coadjutors, and which they seem so much to admire, and so ready to commend and justify. While reprobating the Gallic revolution on account of the licentiousness and crimes it produced, they are not aware how much the protestant revolution is liable to the same imputation.