William Edward Collins

“ But, realising as they did that this had ever been the doctrine of the Church, they were not impelled, as he was, to deny the reality of free will, to depreciate the fruits of faith, or to eviscerate faith itself by reducing it to an act of intellectual assent, and divorcing it from Christian love which issues in action. "We obtain this blessing of complete and perpetual salvation," wrote Sadoleto to the citizens of Geneva, "by faith alone in God and in Jesus Christ. ”

“ Every society must possess certain principles or perform certain acts, and the state may make the profession of such principles unlawful, or impose a penalty upon the performance of such acts; and, moreover, every society is liable before the law as to the fulfilment of its obligations towards its members and the due administration of its property should it possess any. With all this establishment has nothing to do. It is not concerned with what pertains to the religious society qua society, or with what is common to all religious societies, but with what is exceptional. ”

“ Owing partly to difficulties in securing confirmation at Rome, partly to the exaggerated importance that was attached to their civil and constitutional functions, Bishops elect frequently remained unconsecrated for years, their spiritual functions being carried out by others. Naturally, abuses were far from uncommon amongst them, and there was not much love lost between them and the people at large. Indeed the success of the Reformation, both in Denmark and in Sweden, was largely due to the fact that it put an end to the power of the clergy and despoiled them of their possessions. ”

“ But in Rome he proved to be quite helpless. Satisfied with the scholastic theology in which he was so great an adept, he did not understand the questionings which were beginning to stir the minds of others. The Romans had no fellow-feeling for a man who never gave way to anger or to mirth, and to whom the treasures of sculpture in the Vatican were no more than "pagan idols." The scholar who had done so much to foster learning at Louvain was to them only a stranger who knew no Italian, though he spoke Latin very well " for a barbarian." ”

“ Many of the causes which led up to it were common to all Western Christendom; some, as for instance the demand for liberty of opinion and free enquiry, were even more characteristic of Italy than of Germany. Accordingly, vigorous attempts arose in many parts of southern Europe to bring about a reformation in the Church—attempts which were by no means a mere echo of the changes in the north. But they never obtained a really strong hold upon the affections of the common people, and never secured the friendship, or even the neutrality, of the civil power ”

“ When the Diet again met the Chancellor arose in Gustavus' name, reviewed the events of his reign, and urged the necessity for a larger revenue, plainly pointing to the ecclesiastical property as the only source from which it might be obtained. Brask replied on behalf of the Bishops, saying that they could not help the state of the kingdom; that they would do all in their power to put down abuses, but that, being directed by the Pope to defend their property, they could not do otherwise. This brought Gustavus himself to his feet. ”

“ For Prussia, see under that heading; it need only be added that self-government still tends to increase, but that the emperor William II. has exercised his office as summus episcopus more freely than most of his predecessors. In Spain the “Catholic, Apostolic and Roman” religion is that of the state, “the nation binds itself to maintain its worship and its ministers,” and the rites of any other religion are only permitted in private. The patriarch of the Indies and the archbishops are senators by right, and the king may nominate others from amongst the bishops ”

“ When I say faith alone, I do not mean, as those inventors of novelties do, a mere credulity and confidence in God, to the exclusion of love and other Christian virtues. This indeed is necessary, and forms the first access which we have to God ”

“ But the great revolt of the Ditmarsch peasants, ending in the destruction of the Danish army, with two Counts of Oldenburg and the flower of the Schleswig-Holstein nobility, in 1500, further weakened the Danish throne, and indirectly helped to break up the Union of Kalmar.
The general effect of the changes which had taken place in the Scandinavian kingdom since the twelfth century had been to strengthen the power of the nobles at the expense of the King and the bonder or free peasants. Neither in Denmark nor in Sweden was there a law of heredity ”

“ In tracing the course of the Reform movements of southern Europe we are dealing with forces which became more widely divergent as time went on. Men at first acted together who ultimately found themselves violently opposed to one another; principles were adduced on the same side which proved in time to be sharply contrasted. The old-standing desire to curb the power of the Curia and to vindicate the authority of General Councils over the whole Church joined hands in the earlier stages of the movement with the wider, yet more individualistic, aspirations of the Renaissance. ”

“ This was granted, in return for concessions to the nobles; as was also the claim that they should be supported in the exercise of Church discipline. But when they went on to protest against the propagation of the new doctrines and the protection of the preachers, Frederick replied that faith is free, and that each man must follow his conscience; that he was lord of men's bodies and of their goods, but not of their souls; and that every man must so fashion himself in religion as he will answer for it to God at the Last Day. ”

“ India is the only other part of the empire (outside Great Britain) in which there is to-day a religious establishment.
Disestablishment is in theory the annulling of establishment; but since an established Church is usually rich, disestablishment generally includes disendowment, even where there is no state endowment of religion. It is, in short, the abrogation of establishment, Disestablishment.coupled with such a confiscation of Church property as the state thinks good in the interests of the community. The disestablishment of the West Indian Church in 1868 has already been referred to ”

“ For years his dominions were torn asunder by civil war; and Christian was still recognised as the lawful King by the Pope, the Emperor, and the Lutherans. The new King owed everything to those who had elected him, and concession was naturally the order of the day. To Norway he granted that henceforward it should be a free elective monarchy, as Denmark and Sweden were. To the nobles he made even greater concessions than Christian II had made at his coronation, promising amongst other things that none but noble-born Danes should be appointed to bishoprics in future ”

“ Although one of the noblest leaders of the Italian Reform was a Spaniard, the movement never obtained such a hold upon Spain as upon Italy: in part because measures of repression were more promptly and more thoroughly applied-in part, perhaps, because many of the practical abuses had already been abated or removed, while the doctrinal abusés which called forth the protest had not yet prevailed in Spain so largely as elsewhere. ”

“ Nor is it necessarily implied that establishment is a process completed once for all. Every law touching the Church slightly alters its conditions; everything that affects the relations of Church and state may be regarded as a measure of establishment or the reverse. ”

“ Under Gustavus' influence the mines of the north became vast sources of wealth; manufactures grew up everywhere, and commerce was fostered by treaties with England, France, Denmark, and Russia. Before his death, which took place on Michaelmas Day, 1560, he had raised Sweden to a condition of unexampled prosperity, and had prepared the way for the great epoch of the next century.
We now return to the Swedish Church. Although the Ordinances of Vesteräs had shorn it of its grandeur and delivered it into Gustavus' hands, they had not abolished its essential character. ”

“ Enzinas answered, reasonably enough, that there was no law in Flanders against translating the Bible, and that if it was wrong to consort with the German doctors, then the Emperor himself and many more were to blame. As to the book, he denied roundly that he had ever published anything but the New Testament, a denial which it is very hard to accept. Ultimately he was committed to prison in Brussels for his civil offence, and thus was saved, evidently by Soto's desire, from the tender mercies of the Spanish Inquisition. ”

“ The towns, smarting under the curtailment of their privileges at the hands of the lay nobles and of their religious liberties at those of the Bishops, began to look back longingly to the days of King Christian II, and soon broke out in revolt. The Burgomasters of Copenhagen and Malmö, who were at the head of the movement, made common cause with the democracy of Lübeck, whose forces took the field under Count Christopher of Oldenburg in order to place the imprisoned Christian II once more on the throne. ”

“ It centres round one great man, Juan de Valdés, whose position is thus described by Niccolo Balbini, minister of the congregation of Italian refugees at Geneva, in his life of Galeazzo Caracciolo: " There was at that time in Naples a Spanish gentleman, who having a certain knowledge of evangelical truth and above all of the doctrine of justification, had begun to draw to the new doctrines certain noble-born persons with whom he conversed, refuting the idea of justification by our own deserving, and of the merit of works, and exposing certain superstitions." ”

“ The result of these Ordinances was to give the King all the power that he could wish for over the Church. Dispirited and almost heartbroken, the aged Brask before long obtained permission to visit the island of Gottland, which was part of his diocese, crossed the Baltic, and joined Archbishop Magni at Danzig. None of his brethren dared to oppose Gustavus' will.
Nor was it only the ecclesiastical order that suffered. In Sweden, unlike Denmark, none but the King gained power through the Reformation. The Riksräd, once all-important, was now nothing more than a complaisant royal Council. ”

“ Nor was it difficult to do this; for his satirical writings against clerical abuses really did not apply to Spain. Elsewhere, all good men were agreed in corn-batting the evils against which he wrote. In Spain, the earnestness of his crusade was easily overlooked by those who had not lived abroad; on the other hand, nowhere was there so keen a scent for heresy. His liberal thought, and his ridicule of religious customs which, however liable to abuse, were in themselves capable of justification, seemed most dangerous to the orthodox Spanish mind ”

“ Christian had himself reconquered Norway for his father: at his own accession he found Sweden practically independent. On the death of the administrator Svante Sture in 1512 the Rigsraad had chosen the old Erik Trolle in his place and had decided in favour of union with Denmark. But a popular party led by Hemming Gadd, the Bishop of Linkœping, had risen against him and set up Sten Sture the younger in his stead; who, being a wise and statesmanlike leader, soon obtained the upper hand. ”

“ The brethren are, he says, in the sorest need, and cannot improve their state whilst the Signory allows them no liberty. They have no public churches; each is a church to himself. There are plenty of apostles, but none properly called; all is disorder, and false teachers abound. Nevertheless, they adhere to Luther in doctrine as against the Sacramentaries, and do not despair, since " God can raise up new Luthers amongst them.1" But their appeals were in vain; the Lutheran Princes had their hands full already, and the Swiss were not likely to help those who sided with Luther against them. ”

“ The Swedish Church was definitely committed to Lutheranism; the clergy continued to be an estate of the realm down to the middle of the nineteenth century; and separation from the national communion was so severely punished that until modern days organised dissent was practically unknown. The endeavours of Charles IX, the most learned of the royal brothers, to widen the doctrinal basis of the Swedish Church, were on the whole unsuccessful. But it was not only in Sweden that the mote had far-reaching consequences. ”

“ Venice was no doubt exceptional, and the state of feeling there was not that of Italy as a whole. Nevertheless, vigorous efforts after practical reform had begun in other parts of Italy long before this. Adrian of Utrecht, Bishop of Tortosa, the friend of Erasmus and the former tutor of Charles V, ascended the papal throne in 1522 with a firm resolve to set the Church in order, and to begin with his own household. In many ways he seemed well fitted for the task. A student of distinction, his uprightness, personal piety, and strictness of life were known to all men ”