Holy League

“ The example of Denmark, of Sweden, and of England showed that a Protestant king would impose his religion on the people. They preferred to fight for the principle that a people should impose its religion on the king. This consideration was the origin of the League, as a great confederation distinct from earlier and less important associations. It was constituted out of three distinct elements: first, Guise and his partisans, who had carried on the civil wars, and were the Catholic portion of the aristocracy ”

“ Its membership is open to “any society of whatever name connected with a Lutheran congregation or a Lutheran institution of learning.” According to the constitution its objects are “to encourage the formation of the young people’s societies in all Lutheran congregations in America, to urge their affiliation with their respective state or territorial leagues, and with this league to stimulate the various young people’s societies to greater Christian activity and to foster the spirit of loyalty to the church.” The league publishes a monthly paper, The Luther League Review, in Washington. ”

“ The union between the League and the Roman Catholic Church is as complete as the union between that Church and some societies started on a non-sectarian basis became during the rebellion of 1798; as we have seen, a bishop is one of the trustees, and other bishops are amongst the subscribers; the Sunday meetings of the various branches, at which boycotting and other measures of the kind are arranged, are usually presided over by the parish priests. On the other hand, few laymen, whatever their religion may be, who have any stake in the country, can be got to join the League ”

“ It seemed by no means impossible that Henry III. would reconcile himself with his heretic heir, and accept the offer made him. At once the apprehensions of the French Catholics, of the Guises, and of Philip were aroused, and the outcome was the Catholic League. Following the model of the Catholic Associations of 1576, the League was formed in Paris.The Catholic League. The city was divided into five districts: the president of each of these, assisted by an elective Council of Eleven, formed the famous Sixteen. ”

“ He further said that, in order to get the start of so formidable a league, he ought to form one himself, and become the head of it, as well to show his zeal for religion as to prevent the Catholics from uniting under any other leader. He then proposed to declare himself the head of a league, which should be joined by my brother, the princes, nobles, governors, and others holding offices under the Government. Thus was my brother reduced to the necessity of making his Majesty a tender of his services for the support and maintenance of the Catholic religion. ”

“ Although he now professed the same religion as the League, yet his aversion to the spirit which actuated that party, and to the maxims by which they were governed, was not lessened; the very name only of the League was sufficient to kindle his anger. The Catholic Leaguers, supposing that his abjuration authorized them to abolish in those cities which depended upon them the edicts that were favorable to the Huguenots, the King caused them to be restored ”

“ The decent members of the Liberal League, who formed it to express their convictions, and who withdrew and formed a rival League when they found that the old organization had gone over to the defense of indecency, who gave to the League all the character it had, and who had great hopes at one time of destroying the influence of the preachers of the Gospel of Christ, and thereby ridding our country of that terrible pest called the Bible, have given up their name. ”

“ Quite contrary to the usual rule, noble and peasant in general lived amicably together. The political freedom of the state was due rather to remarkable coalitions than to acts of war or insurrection. In the fourteenth century, when the bishops of Chur revealed a strong leaning towards Austria-Tyrol, the Gotteshausbund sprang into existence as a check on the alien tendencies of the prince-bishops. This league was formed in 1367 by the Domstift (chapter of clergy) , the nobles, and the common people. The bishops themselves ruled over people of three different nationalities. ”

“ The seat of war, at the opening of the apparently inevitable conflict between the Catholic League and the Protestant Union, would be those debateable duchies, those border provinces, the possession of which was of such vital importance to each of the great contending parties, and the populations of which, although much divided, were on the whole more inclined to the League than to the Union. ”

“ The Roman Catholic members of the league, among whom many were in their hearts still strongly inclined to the royal cause, and who had been drawn into a connection with the league by occasion and example, rather than from feeling and conviction, now heard to their astonishment propositions for establishing universal freedom of religion, and were not a little shocked to discover in how perilous an enterprise they had hastily implicated themselves. ”

“ I think, too, it justifies my reiterated assertion that the constitution of the League is so hopeless, so childish, so diplomatically conceived and useless, that nothing but reorganisation from the ground upward can give us a proper organ for the expression of the real need and desire for unity in the world. ”

“ The clergy entered the League in spite of themselves; the movement first showed itself with so much violence that had they left its exclusive direction in the hands of the politicians, they would have run the risk of compromising, at least for a time, all their popularity. But the Catholicism of many of the Irish-Americans, whose alliance they were forced to submit to, is so doubtful, that it is easy to foresee that the cause of religion will not gain anything from their triumph. I am quite convinced that the clergy will not long defer separating themselves from the League. ”

“ In August of that year, the first National Sunday-School Assembly was held at Chautauqua Lake, near Buffalo, New York. Many of the most earnest workers in the temperance Crusade, from different parts of the United States, and from the various denominations of Christians, were present, and the conviction was general that steps should at once be taken towards forming a National League, in order to make permanent the work that had already been done. After much deliberation, a committee of organization was appointed, consisting of a woman from each State. ”

“ We will, however, admit that all the Jesuits were not fanatic Leaguers; not because they disapproved of the League, but simply from good policy, or from interested motives. Auger, the king’s confessor, and who wished to be provincial, sided with his penitent; and the General Acquaviva, the ablest and most profound politician of his time, disapproved of the Society’s engaging so deeply with one party as to cause the ruin of the order if the other triumphed. ”

“ In this they are not mistaken, for at the congress at Würzburg, in 1864 the number of delegates amounted 7000. What a truly magnificent and inspiring spectacle must have been presented at the opening of this assembly, when those seven thousand Catholic men, one in faith, and united in charity, full of zeal and whole souled devotion to the holy church, assisted in a body at the grand solemn mass of the Holy Ghost, and implored on bended knees the benediction of God upon their future labors! ”

“ Some of the Romanist leaders had long seen that the Huguenot enthusiasm and their organisation were enabling an actual minority to combat, on more than equal terms, a Romanist majority. Some of the provincial leaders had been able to inspire their followers with zeal, and to bind them together in an organisation by means of leagues. These provincial leagues suggested a universal organisation, which was fostered by Henry, Duke of Guise, and by Catherine de’ Medici. This was the first form of that celebrated League which gave twenty years’ life to the civil war in France. ”

“ This attitude of indifferentism naturally led to the exchange of fraternal delegates with the Reformed and other Churches. It resulted in a cooperation of the General Synod with the Federal Council, the Home Missions Council, the Foreign Mission Conference, the International Sunday-school Association, the Sunday-school Council of Evangelical Denominations, the Inter-Church Federation, the Y.M.C.A., the Y.W.C.A., the W.C.T.U., The Anti-Saloon League, etc. ”

“ A layman in receipt of tithes, an ecclesiastical form of revenue. The lay impropriator originated in grants of lands made by abbeys and other Church communities to powerful laymen, in exchange for their protection.
League.
The League, also called the Catholic League, was formed by the Guises in 1577, ostensibly to promote the ascendency of Catholicism, and to oppose the concessions granted to the Reformed Faith by Henri II of France. Secretly, however, it contemplated the deposition of the Valois dynasty, and the placing of a Guise on the throne. (See Joinville, Treaty of.) ”

“ It must be in the interest of the freedom of all."
"Yes; and for that reason eternal shame fastens upon the League!" exclaimed Serdan. "The Catholic League in France sought for Spanish support in order to exterminate the Protestants, and dethrone Henry IV, who, his vices and deplorable defects notwithstanding, at least represented the French nationality."
"While the League, the Catholic Union, on the contrary, represented the foreigner, the party of Rome, of Spain and of the Inquisition," added Salaun Lebrenn. ”

“ No, the Protestant League may consider itself to be an earnest and active body, but I can never look upon its efforts as anything but lukewarm, standing, as I do, with the light of other days around me. ”

“ I do not like their military organization, but I should have no more right to abuse it than the organization of some Protestant sects. That is a matter of government; all sects and all parties, Catholic and Protestant, have a right to choose their own government to carry out their ends, even as military generals have a right to organize their forces in their own way. The history of the Jesuits shows this,--that an organization of forces, or what we call discipline or government, is a great thing. A church without a government is a poor affair, so far as efficiency is concerned. ”

“ The formulation of doctrine should be its chief business. The old traditional doctrine of the Church must be laid down afresh so as to make all conciliation of the Protestants impossible. All discussion of the papal prerogatives must be avoided; and the reform of practical abuses must take quite a secondary place. Having enunciated the Church's doctrine, the Council might leave to the Holy Father the carrying out of such reforms as were necessary. The Council in fact was to be used as an agent of the Counter-Reformation and as another means to the defeat of Protestantism. ”

“ League, The, specially a coalition organised in 1576 by the Duke of Guise to suppress the Reformed religion in France by denying civil and religious liberty to the Huguenots, and specially to prevent the accession of Henry IV. as a Protestant to the throne. ”

“ With this view they recited and confirmed a decree of the council of Constance, wherein it was asserted, that every Synod, lawfully assembled in the Holy Spirit, constituting a general council, and representing the church militant, derives its authority immediately from Christ, to which authority all persons, of what state or dignity soever, not excepting the pope, are bound to pay obedience in matters pertaining to the faith, the extirpation of schism, and the general reformation of the church in its head and members. ”

“ Doctrinal decrees of the Congregations, which are not fully and formally confirmed by the Pope, are not infallible. They have, however, such a strong presumption in their favour that even internal submission is due to them, at least for the time being. The reason of this is plain. The Congregations are composed of experienced men of all schools and tendencies; they proceed with the greatest prudence and conscientiousness; they represent the tradition of the Roman Church which is especially protected by the Holy Ghost. We may add that their decrees have seldom needed reform. ”

“ The public exercise of religion was restored, and a treaty, termed the Concordat, was concluded with the Pope, by which the French Church was released from the supremacy hitherto claimed and exercised by the Holy See. A uniform code of laws, which recognised no adventitious distinctions, henceforth afforded equal protection to the whole community; office and power were fairly opened to the competition of merit, and the Legion of Honour was instituted for the reward of talent and worth in every class of life. ”

“ Any little bundle of human beings, however small, illiterate, and unimportant, provided only that it was a law unto itself and waved a flag about and insisted upon a cantankerous independence, was regarded as a possible unit by the pedants who devised the League. Any body of people, however numerous, intelligent, and significant in human affairs, provided it had grouped itself into any other larger political aggregation, ceased, on the other hand, to be anything but a merged participator in the League’s affairs. ”

“ All members of the League, whether noble or town, who came to terms were allowed to forbid the exercise of the Protestant religion within their jurisdiction, and what security had the Huguenots that one who could so lightly change his own religion would care or dare to protect that of others? ”

“ The distinctive Lutheran doctrines of the Lord's Supper, the person of Christ, Baptism, absolution, infant faith, the means of grace, the Sabbath, abstinence, separation of State and Church, etc., were all rejected and assailed by the most prominent leaders of the General Synod. And the unionistic spirit, with which also the most conservative within the General Synod were infected, paralyzed the courage of the men who, in a measure, saw and loved the light, and should have been bold in confessing the truth and uncompromising in defending it against the opposite errors. ”