Church History Part 4

1660-1688. Abandoning their revolutionary tendencies through dislike to Cromwell's violence, and giving up most of their fanatical extravagances, the Quakers became models of quiet, orderly living. Robert Barclay, by his "_Catechesis et Fidei Confessio_," of A.D. 1673, gave a sort of symbolic expression to their belief, and vindicated his doctrinal positions in his "_Theologiae vere Christianae Apologia_" of A.D. 1676. During this period many of them laid down their lives for their faith. On the other side of the sea they formed powerful settlements, distinguished for religious toleration and brotherly love. The chief promoter of this new departure was _William Penn_, A.D. 1644-1718, son of an English admiral, who, while a student at Oxford, was impressed by a Quaker's preaching, and led to attend the prayer and fellowship meetings of the Friends. In order to break his connexion with this party, his father sent him, in A.D. 1661, to travel in France and Italy. The frivolity of the French court failed to attract him, but for a long time he was spellbound by Amyrault's theological lectures at Saumur. On his return home, in A.D. 1664, he seemed to have completely come back to a worldly life, when once again he was arrested by a Quaker's preaching. In A.D. 1668 he formally joined the society. For a controversial tract, _The Sandy Foundation Shaken_, he was sent for six months to the Tower, where he composed the famous tract, _No Cross, no Crown_, and a treatise in his own vindication, "Innocency with her Open Face." His father, who, shortly before his death in A.D. 1670, was reconciled to his son, left him a yearly income of 1,500, with a claim on Government for 16,000. In spite of continued persecution and oppression he continued unweariedly to promote the cause of Quakerism by speech and pen. In A.D. 1677, in company with Fox and Barclay, he made a tour through Holland and Germany. In both countries he formed many friendships, but did not succeed in establishing any societies. His hopes now turned to North America, where Fox had already wrought with success during the times of sorest persecution, A.D. 1671, 1672, In lieu of his father's claim, he obtained from Government a large tract of land on the Delaware, with the right of colonizing and organizing it under English suzerainty. Twice he went out for this purpose himself, in A.D. 1682 and 1699, and formed the Quaker state of Pennsylvania, with Philadelphia as its capital. The first principle of its const.i.tution was universal religious toleration, even to Catholics.(38)

6. _The Quaker Const.i.tution_, as fixed in Penn's time, was strictly democratic and congregationalist, with complete exclusion of a clerical order. At their services any man or woman, if moved by the Spirit, might pray, teach, or exhort, or if no one felt so impelled they would sit on in silence. Their meeting-houses had not the form or fittings of churches, their devotional services had neither singing nor music. They repudiated water baptism, alike of infants and adults, and recognised only baptism of the Spirit. The Lord's supper, as a symbolical memorial, is no more needed by those who are born again. Monthly gatherings of all independent members, quarterly meetings of deputies of a circuit, and a yearly synod of representatives of all the circuits, administered or drew up the regulations for the several societies. _The Doctrinal Belief of the Quakers_ is completely dominated by its central dogma of the "inner light," which is identified with reason and conscience as the common heritage of mankind. Darkened and weakened by the fall, it is requickened in us by the Spirit of the glorified Christ, and possesses us as an inner spiritual Christ, an inner Word of G.o.d. The Bible is recognised as the outer word of G.o.d, but is useful only as a means of arousing the inner word. The Calvinistic doctrine of election is decidedly rejected, and also that of vicarious satisfaction. But also the doctrines of the fall, original sin, justification by faith, as well as that of the Trinity, are very much set aside in favour of an indefinite subjective theology of feeling. The operation of the Holy Spirit in man's redemption and salvation outside of Christendom is frankly admitted. On the other hand, the ethical-practical element, as shown in works of benevolence, in the battle for religious freedom, for the abolition of slavery, etc., is brought to the front. In regard to _life and manners_, the Quakers have distinguished themselves in all domestic, civil, industrial, and mercantile movements by quiet, peaceful industry, strict integrity, and simple habits, so that not only did they ama.s.s great wealth, but gained the confidence and respect of those around. They refused to take oaths or to serve as soldiers, or to engage in sports, or to indulge in any kind of luxury. In social intercourse they declined to acknowledge any t.i.tles of rank, would not bow or raise the hat to any, but addressed all by the simple "thou." Their men wore broad-brimmed hats, a plain, simple coat, without collar or b.u.t.tons, fastened by hooks. Their women wore a simple gray silk dress, with like coloured bonnet, without ribbon, flower, or feathers, and a plain shawl. Wearing mourning dress was regarded as a heathenish custom.(39)-Continuation, -- 211, 3.

7. _Labadie and the Labadists._-Jean de Labadie, the scion of an ancient n.o.ble family, born A.D. 1610, was educated in the Jesuit school at Bordeaux, entered the order, and became a priest, but was released from office at his own wish in A.D. 1639, on account of delicate health. Even in the Jesuit college the principles that manifested themselves in his later life began to take root in him. By Scripture study he was led to adopt almost Augustinian views of sin and grace, as well as the conviction of the need of a revival of the church after the apostolic pattern. This tendency was confirmed and deepened by the influence of Spanish Quietism, which even the Jesuits had favoured to some extent. In the interest of these views he wrought laboriously for eleven years as Catholic priest in Amiens, Paris, and other places, amid the increasing hostility of the Jesuits. Their persecution, together with a growing clearness in his Augustinian convictions, led him formally to go over to the Reformed church in A.D. 1650. He now laboured for seven years as Reformed pastor at Montauban. In A.D. 1657, owing to political suspicions against him spread by the Jesuits, he withdrew from Montauban, and, after two years' labour at Orange, settled at Geneva, where his preaching and household visitations bore abundant fruit. In A.D. 1666 he accepted a call to Middelburg, in Zealand. There he was almost as successful as he had been in Geneva; but there too it began to appear that in him there burned a fire strange to the Reformed church. The French Reformed synod took great offence at his refusal to sign the Belgic Confession. It was found that at many points he was not in sympathy with the church standards, that he had written in favour of chiliasm and the Apokatastasis, that in regard to the nature and idea of the church and its need of a reformation he was not in accord with the views of the Reformed church. The synod in 1668 suspended him from office, and, as he did not confess his errors, in the following year deposed him. Labadie then saw that what he regarded as his lifework, the restoration of the apostolic church, was as little attainable within the Reformed as within the Catholic church. He therefore organized his followers into a separate denomination, and was, together with them, banished by the magistrate. The neighbouring town of Veere received them gladly, but Middelburg now persuaded the Zealand council to issue a decree banishing them from that town also. The people of Veere were ready to defy this order, but Labadie thought it better to avoid the risk of a civil war by voluntary withdrawal; and so he went, in August, A.D. 1669, with about forty followers, to Amsterdam, where he laid the foundations of an apostolic church. This new society consisted of a sort of monastic household consisting only of the regenerate. They hired a commodious house, and from thence sent out spiritual workers as missionaries, to spread the principles of the "new church" throughout the land. Within a year they numbered 60,000 souls. They dispensed the sacrament according to the Reformed rite, and preached the gospel in conventicles. The most important gain to the party was the adhesion of Anna Maria von Schurman, born at Cologne A.D. 1607 of a Reformed family, but settled from A.D. 1623 with her mother in Utrecht, celebrated for her unexampled attainment in languages, science, and art. When in A.D. 1670, the government, urged by the synod, forbad attendance on the Labadists' preaching, the accomplished and pious Countess-palatine Elizabeth, sister of the elector-palatine, and abbess of the rich cloister of Herford, whose intimate friend Schurman had been for forty years, gave them an asylum in the capital of her little state.

8. In Herford "the Hollanders" met with bitter opposition from the Lutheran clergy, the magistracy, and populace, and were treated by the mob with insult and scorn. They themselves also gave only too good occasion for ridicule. At a sacramental celebration, the aged Labadie and still older Schurman embraced and kissed each other and began to dance for joy.

In his sermons and writings Labadie set forth the Quietist doctrines of the limitation of Christ's life and sufferings in the mortification of the flesh, the duty of silent prayer, the sinking of the soul into the depths of the G.o.dhead, the community of goods, etc. Special offence was given by the private marriage of the three leaders, Labadie, Yvon, and Dulignon with young wealthy ladies of society, and their views of marriage among the regenerate as an inst.i.tution for raising up a pure seed free from original sin and brought forth without pain. The Elector of Brandenburg, hitherto favourable, as guardian of the seminary was obliged, in answer to the complaints of the Herford magistracy, to appoint a commission of inquiry. Labadie wrote a defence, which was published in Latin, Dutch, and German, in which he endeavoured to harmonize his mystical views with the doctrines of the Reformed church. But in A.D. 1671 the magistrates obtained a mandate from the imperial court at Spires, which threatened the abbess with the ban if she continued to harbour the sectaries. In A.D.

1672 Labadie settled in Altona, where he died in A.D. 1674. His followers, numbering 160, remained here undisturbed till the war between Denmark and Sweden broke out in A.D. 1675. They then retired to the castle of Waltha in West Friesland, the property of three sisters belonging to the party.

Schurman died in A.D. 1678, Dulignon in A.D. 1679, and Yvon, who now had sole charge, was obliged in A.D. 1688 to abolish the inst.i.tution of the community of goods, after a trial of eighteen years, being able to pay back much less than he had received. After his death in A.D. 1707 the community gradually fell off, and after the property had gone into other hands on the death of the last of the sisters in A.D. 1725, the society finally broke up.

9. During this age various _fanatical sects_ sprang up. In Thuringia, _Stiefel_ and his nephew _Meth_ caused much trouble to the Lutheran clergy in the beginning of the century by their fanatical enthusiasm, till convinced, after twenty years, of the errors of their ways. _Drabicius_, who had left the Bohemian Brethren owing to differences of belief, and then lived in Hungary as a weaver in poor circ.u.mstances, boasted in A.D.

1638 of having Divine revelations, prophesied the overthrow of the Austrian dynasty in A.D. 1657, the election of the French king as emperor, the speedy fall of the Papacy, and the final conversion of all heathens; but was put to death at Pressburg in A.D. 1671 as a traitor with cruel tortures. Even Comenius, the n.o.ble bishop of the Moravians, took the side of the prophets, and published his own and others' prophecies under the t.i.tle "_Lux in Tenebris_."-_Jane Leade_ of Norfolk, influenced by the writings of Bohme, had visions, in which the Divine Wisdom appeared to her as a virgin. She spread her Gnostic revelations in numerous tracts, founded in A.D. 1670 the Philadelphian Society in London, and died in A.D.

1704, at the age of eighty-one. The most important of her followers was _John Pordage_, preacher and physician, whose theological speculation closely resembles that of Jac. Bohme. To the Reformed church belonged also _Peter Poiret_ of Metz, pastor from A.D. 1664 in Heidelburg, and afterwards of a French congregation in the Palatine-Zweibrucken.

Influenced by the writings of Bourignon and Guyon, he resigned his pastorate, and accompanied the former in his wanderings in north-west Germany till his death in 1680. At Amsterdam in A.D. 1687 he wrote his mystical work, "_L'economie Divine_" in seven vols., which sets forth in the Cocceian method the mysticism and theosophy of Bourignon. He died at Rhynsburg in A.D. 1719.-From the Lutheran church proceeded Giftheil of Wurttemburg, Breckling of Holstein, and Kuhlmann, who went about denouncing the clergy, proclaiming fanatical views, and calling for impracticable reforms. Of much greater importance was _John George Gichtel_, an eccentric disciple of Jac. Bohme, who in A.D. 1665 lost his situation as law agent in his native town of Regensburg, his property, and civil rights, and suffered imprisonment and exile from the city for his fanatical ideas. He died in needy circ.u.mstances in Amsterdam in A.D. 1710.

He had revelations and visions, fought against the doctrine of justification, and denounced marriage as fornication which nullifies the spiritual marriage with the heavenly Sophia consummated in the new birth, etc. His followers called themselves Angelic Brethren, from Matthew xxii.

20, strove after angelic sinlessness by emanc.i.p.ation from all earthly l.u.s.ts, toils, and care, regarded themselves as a priesthood after the order of Melchizedec for propitiating the Divine wrath.-Continuation, -- 170.

10. _Russian Sects._-A vast number of sects sprang up within the Russian church, which are all included under the general name _Raskolniks_ or apostates. They fall into two great cla.s.ses in their distinctive character, diametrically opposed the one to the other. (1) The _Starowerzi_, or Old Believers. They originated in A.D. 1652, in consequence of the liturgical reform of the learned and powerful patriarch Nikon, which called forth the violent opposition of a large body of the peasantry, who loved the old forms. Besides stubborn adhesion to the old liturgy, they rejected all modern customs and luxuries, held it sinful to cut the beard, to smoke tobacco, to drink tea and coffee, etc. The Starowerzi, numbering some ten millions, are to this day distinguished by their pure and simple lives, and are split up into three parties: (i.) _Jedinowerzi_, who are nearest to the orthodox church, recognise its priesthood, and are different only in their religious ceremonies and the habits of their social life; (ii.) The _Starovbradzi_, who do not recognise the priesthood of the orthodox church; and (iii.) the _Bespopowtschini_, who have no priests, but only elders, and are split up into various smaller sects. Under the peasant Philip Pustosiwat, a party of Starowerzi, called from their leader Philippius, fled during the persecution of A.D. 1700 from the government of Olonez, and settled in Polish Lithuania and East Prussia, where to the number of 1,200 souls they live to this day in villages in the district of Gumbinnen, engaged in agricultural pursuits, and observing the rites of the old Russian church.-(2) At the very opposite pole from the Starowerzi stand the HERETICAL SECTS, which repudiate and condemn everything in the shape of external church organization, and manifest a tendency in some cases toward fanatical excess, and in other cases toward rationalistic spiritualism. As the sects showing the latter tendency did not make their appearance till the eighteenth century (-- 166, 2), we have here to do only with those of the former cla.s.s. The most important of these sects is that of the _Men of G.o.d_, or Spiritual Christians, who trace their origin from a peasant, Danila Filipow, of the province of Wladimir. In 1645, say they, the divine Father, seated on a cloud of flame, surrounded by angels, descended from heaven on Mount Gorodin in a chariot of fire, in order to restore true Christianity in its original purity and spirituality. For this purpose he incarnated himself in Filipow's pure body. He commanded his followers, who in large numbers, mainly drawn from the peasant cla.s.s, gathered around him, not to marry, and if already married to put away their wives, to abstain from all intoxicating drinks, to be present neither at marriages nor baptisms, but above all things to believe that there is no other G.o.d besides him. After some years he adopted as his son another peasant, Ivan Suslow, who was said to have been born of a woman a hundred years old, by communicating to him in his thirtieth year his own divine nature. Ivan, as a new Christ, sent out twelve apostles to spread his doctrine. The Czar Alexis put him and forty of his adherents into prison; but neither the knout nor the rack could wring from them the mysteries of their faith and worship. At last, on a Friday, the czar caused the new Christ to be crucified; but on the following Sunday he appeared risen again among his disciples. After some years the imprisoning, crucifying, and resurrection were repeated. Imprisoned a third time in 1672, he owed his liberation to an edict of grace on the occasion of the birth of the Prince Peter the Great. He now lived at Moscow along with the divine father Filipow, who had hitherto consulted his own safety by living in concealment in the enjoyment of the adoration of his followers unmolested for thirty years, supported by certain wealthy merchants. Filipow is said to have ascended up in the presence of many witnesses, in 1700, into the seventh and highest heaven, where he immediately seated himself on the throne as the "Lord of Hosts," and the Christ, Suslow, also returned thither in 1716, after both had reached the hundredth year of the human existence. As Suslow's successor appeared a new Christ in Prokopi Lupkin, and, after his death, in 1732, arose Andr. Petrow. The last Christ manifestation was revealed in the person of the unfortunate Czar Peter III., dethroned by his wife Catharine II. in 1762, who, living meanwhile in secret, shall soon return, to the terrible confusion of all unbelievers. With this the historical tradition of the earlier sect of the Men of G.o.d is brought to a close, and in the Skopsen, or Eunuchs, who also venerate the Czar Peter III. as the Christ that is to come again, a new development of the sect has arisen, carrying out its principles more and more fully (-- 210, 4).

Other branches of the same party, among which, as also among the Skopsen, the fanatical endeavour to mortify the flesh is carried to the most extravagant length, are the Morelschiki or Self-Flagellators, the Dumbies, who will not, even under the severest tortures, utter a sound, etc. The ever-increasing development of this sect-forming craze, which found its way into several monasteries and nunneries, led to repeated judicial investigations, the penitent being sentenced for their fault to confinement in remote convents, and the obdurate being visited with severe corporal punishments and even with death. The chief sources of information regarding the history, doctrine, and customs of the "Men of G.o.d" and the Skopsen are their own numerous spiritual songs, collected by Prof. Ivan Dobrotworski of Kasan, which were sung in their a.s.semblies for worship with musical accompaniment and solemn dances. On these occasions their prophets and prophetesses were wont to prophesy, and a kind of sacramental supper was celebrated with bread and water. The sacraments of the Lord's supper and baptism, as administered by the orthodox church, are repudiated and scorned, the latter as displaced by the only effectual baptism of the Spirit. They have, indeed, in order to avoid persecution, been obliged to take part in the services of the orthodox national church, and to confess to its priests, avoiding, however, all reference to the sect.(40)

-- 164. Philosophers and Freethinkers.(41)

The mediaeval scholastic philosophy had outlived itself, even in the pre-Reformation age; yet it maintained a lingering existence side by side with those new forms which the modern spirit in philosophy was preparing for itself. We hear an echo of the philosophical ferment of the sixteenth century in the Italian Dominican Campanella, and in the Englishman Bacon of Verulam we meet the pioneer of that modern philosophy which had its proper founder in Descartes. Spinoza, Locke, and Leibnitz were in succession the leaders of this philosophical development. Alongside of this philosophy, and deriving its weapons from it for attack upon theology and the church, a number of freethinkers also make their appearance.

These, like their more radical disciples in the following century, regarded Scripture as delusive, and nature and reason as alone trustworthy sources of religious knowledge.

1. _Philosophy._-_Campanella_ of Stilo in Calabria entered the Dominican order, but soon lost taste for Aristotelian philosophy and scholastic theology, and gave himself to the study of Plato, the Cabbala, astrology, magic, etc. Suspected of republican tendencies, the Spanish government put him in prison in A.D. 1599. Seven times was he put upon the rack for twenty-four hours, and then confined for twenty-seven years in close confinement. Finally, in A.D. 1626, Urban VIII. had him transferred to the prison of the papal Inquisition. He was set free in A.D. 1629, and received a papal pension; but further persecutions by the Spaniards obliged him to fly to his protector Richelieu in France, where in A.D.

1639 he died. He composed eighty-two treatises, mostly in prison, the most complete being "_Philosophia Rationalis_," in five vols. In his "_Atheismus Triumphatus_" he appears as an apologist of the Romish system, but so insufficiently, that many said _Atheismus Triumphans_ was the more fitting t.i.tle. His "_Monarchia Messiae_" too appeared, even to the Catholics, an abortive apology for the Papacy. In his "_Civitas Solis_,"

an imitation of the "Republic" of Plato, he proceeded upon communistic principles.-_Francis Bacon of Verulam_, long chancellor of England, died A.D. 1626, the great spiritual heir of his mediaeval namesake (-- 103, 8), was the first successful reformer of the plan of study followed by the schoolmen. With a prophet's marvellous grasp of mind he organized the whole range of science, and gave a forecast of its future development in his "_De Augmentis_" and "_Novum Organon_." He rigidly separated the domain of _knowledge_, as that of philosophy and nature, grasped only by experience, from the domain of _faith_, as that of theology and the church, reached only through revelation. Yet he maintained the position: _Philosophia obiter libata a Deo abducit, plene hausta ad Deum reducit_.

He is the real author of empiricism in philosophy and the realistic methods of modern times. His public life, however, is clouded by thanklessness, want of character, and the taking of bribes. In A.D. 1621 he was convicted by his peers, deprived of his office, sentenced to imprisonment for life in the Tower, and to pay a fine of 40,000; but was pardoned by the king.(42)-The French Catholic _Descartes_ started not from experience, but from self-consciousness, with his "_Cogito, ergo sum_" as the only absolutely certain proposition. Beginning with doubt, he rose by pure thinking to the knowledge of the true and certain in things. The imperfection of the soul thus discovered suggests an absolutely perfect Being, to whose perfection the attribute of being belongs. This is the ontological proof for the being of G.o.d.-His philosophy was zealously taken up by French Jansenists and Oratorians and the Reformed theologians of Holland, while it was bitterly opposed by such Catholics as Huetius and such Reformed theologians as Voetius.(43)-_Spinoza_, an apostate Jew in Holland, died A.D. 1677, gained little influence over his own generation by his profound pantheistic philosophy, which has powerfully affected later ages. A violent controversy, however, was occasioned by his "_Tractatus Theologico-politicus_," in which he attacked the Christian doctrine of revelation and the authenticity of the O.T. books, especially the Pentateuch, and advocated absolute freedom of thought.(44)

2. _John Locke_, died A.D. 1704, with his sensationalism took up a position midway between Bacon's empiricism and Descartes' rationalism, on the one hand, and English deism and French materialism, on the other. His "Essay concerning Human Understanding" denies the existence of innate ideas, and seeks to show that all our notions are only products of outer or inner experience, of sensation or reflection. In this treatise, and still more distinctly in his tract, "The Reasonableness of Christianity,"

intended as an apology for Christianity, and even for biblical visions and miracles, as well as for the messianic character of Christ, he openly advocated pure Pelagianism that knows nothing of sin and atonement.(45)-_Leibnitz_, a Hanoverian statesman, who died A.D. 1716, introduced the new German philosophy in its first stage. The philosophy of Leibnitz is opposed at once to the theosophy of Paracelsus and Bohme and to the empiricism of Bacon and Locke, the pantheism of Spinoza, and the scepticism and manichaeism of Bayle. It is indeed a Christian philosophy not fully developed. But inasmuch as at the same time it adopted, improved upon, and carried out the rationalism of Descartes, it also paved the way for the later theological rationalism. The foundation of his philosophy is the theory of monads wrought out in his "_Theodicee_" against Bayle and in his "_Nouveaux Essais_," against Locke. In opposition to the atomic theory of the materialists, he regarded all phenomena in the world as eccentricities of so called monads, _i.e._ primary simple and indivisible substances, each of which is a miniature of the whole universe. Out of these monads that radiate out from G.o.d, the primary monad, the world is formed into a harmony once for all admired of G.o.d: the theory of pre-established harmony. This must be the best of worlds, otherwise it would not have been. In opposition to Bayle, who had argued in a manichaean fashion against G.o.d's goodness and wisdom from the existence of evil, Leibnitz seeks to show that this does not contradict the idea of the best of worlds, nor that of the Divine goodness and wisdom, since finity and imperfection belong to the very notion of creature, a metaphysical evil from which moral evil inevitably follows, yet not so as to destroy the pre-established harmony. Against Locke he maintains the doctrine of innate ideas, contests Clarke's theory of indeterminism, maintains the agreement of philosophy with revelation, which indeed is above but not contrary to reason, and hopes to prove his system by mathematical demonstration.(46)-Continuation, -- 171, 10.

3. _Freethinkers._-The tendency of the age to throw off all positive Christianity first showed itself openly in England as the final outcome of Levellerism (-- 162, 2). This movement has been styled naturalism, because it puts natural in place of revealed religion, and deism, because in place of the redeeming work of the triune G.o.d it admits only a general providence of the one G.o.d. On philosophic grounds the English deists affirmed the impossibility of revelation, inspiration, prophecy, and miracle, and on critical grounds rejected them from the Bible and history.

The simple religious system of deism embraced G.o.d, providence, freedom of the will, virtue, and the immortality of the soul. The Christian doctrines of the Trinity, original sin, satisfaction, justification, resurrection, etc., were regarded as absurd and irrational. Deism in England spread almost exclusively among upper-cla.s.s laymen; the people and clergy stood firmly to their positive beliefs. Theological controversial tracts were numerous, but their polemical force was in great measure lost by the lat.i.tudinarianism of their authors.-The princ.i.p.al English deists of the century were (1) _Edward Herbert of Cherbury_, A.D. 1581-1648, a n.o.bleman and statesman. He reduced all religion to five points: Faith in G.o.d, the duty of reverencing Him, especially by leading an upright life, atoning for sin by genuine repentance, recompense in the life eternal.-(2) _Thomas Hobbes_, A.D. 1588-1679, an acute philosophical and political writer, looked on Christianity as an oriental phantom, and of value only as a support of absolute monarchy and an antidote to revolution. The state of nature is a _bellum omnium contra omnes_; religion is the means of establishing order and civilization. The state should decide what religion is to prevail. Every one may indeed believe what he will, but in regard to churches and worship he must submit to the state as represented by the king. His chief work is "Leviathan; or, The Matter, Form, and Power of a Commonwealth, Ecclesiastical and Civil."-(3) _Charles Blount_, who died a suicide in A.D. 1693, a rabid opponent of all miracles as mere tricks of priests, wrote "Oracles of Reason," "_Religio Laici_," "Great is Diana of the Ephesians," that translated Philostratus' "Life of Apollonius of Tyana."-(4) _Thomas Browne_, A.D. 1635-1682, a physician, who in his "_Religio Medici_" sets forth a mystical supernaturalism, took up a purely deistic ground in his "Vulgar Errors," published three years later.-Among the opponents of deism in this age the most notable are Richard Baxter (-- 162, 3) and Ralph Cudworth, A.D. 1617-1688, a lat.i.tudinarian and Platonist, who sought to prove the leading Christian doctrines by the theory of innate ideas. He wrote "Intellectual System of the Universe" in A.D. 1678. The pious Irish scientist, Robert Boyle, founded in London, in A.D. 1691, a lectureship of 40 a year for eight discourses against deistic and atheistic unbelief.(47)-Continuation, -- 171, 1.

4. A tendency similar to that of the English deists was represented in Germany by _Matthias Knutzen_, who sought to found a freethinking sect.

The Christian "Coran" contains only lies; reason and conscience are the true Bible; there is no G.o.d, nor h.e.l.l nor heaven; priests and magistrates should be driven out of the world, etc. The senate of Jena University on investigation found that his pretension to 700 followers was a vain boast.-In France the brilliant and learned sceptic _Peter Bayle_, A.D.

1647-1706, was the apostle of a light-hearted unbelief. Though son of a Reformed pastor, the Jesuits got him over to the Romish church, but in a year and a half he apostatised again. He now studied the Cartesian philosophy, as Reformed professor at Sedan, vindicated Protestantism in several controversial tracts, and as refugee in Holland composed his famous "_Dictionnaire Historique et Critique_," in which he avoided indeed open rejection of the facts of revelation, but did much to unsettle by his easy treatment of them.-Continuation, -- 171, 3.

THIRD SECTION. CHURCH HISTORY OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.(48)

I. The Catholic Church in East and West.

-- 165. The Roman Catholic Church.

During the first half of the century the Roman hierarchy suffered severely at the hand of Catholic courts, while in the second half storms gathered from all sides, threatening its very existence. Portugal, France, Spain, and Italy rested not till they got the pope himself to strike the deathblow to the Jesuits, who had been his chief supporters indeed, but who had now become his masters. Soon after the German bishops threatened to free themselves and their people from Rome, and what reforms they could not effect by ecclesiastical measures the emperor undertook to effect by civil measures. Scarcely had this danger been overcome when the horrors of the French Revolution broke out, which sought, along with the Papacy, to overthrow Christianity as well. But, on the other hand, during the early decades of the century Catholicism had gained many victories in another way by the counter-reformation and conversions. Its foreign missions, however, begun with such promise of success, came to a sad end, and even the home missions faded away, in spite of the founding of various new orders. The Jansenist controversy in the beginning of the century entered on a new stage, the Catholic church being driven into open semi-Pelagianism, and Jansenism into fanatical excesses. The church theology sank very low, and the Catholic supporters of "_Illumination_"

far exceeded in number those who had fallen away to it from Protestantism.

1. _The Popes._-_Clement XI._, 1700-1721, protested in vain against the Elector Frederick III. of Brandenburg a.s.suming the crown as King Frederick I. of Prussia, on Jan. 18th, A.D. 1701. In the Spanish wars of succession he sought to remain neutral, but force of circ.u.mstances led him to take up a position adverse to German interests. The new German emperor, Joseph I., A.D. 1705-1711, scorned to seek confirmation from the pope, and Clement consequently had the usual prayer for the emperor omitted in the church services. The relations became yet more strained, owing to a dispute about the _jus primarum prec.u.m_, Joseph claiming the right to revenues of vacancies as the patron. In A.D. 1707, the pope had the joy of seeing the German army driven out, not only of northern Italy, but also of Naples by the French. Again they came into direct conflict over Parma and Piacenza, Clement claiming them as a papal, the emperor claiming them as an imperial, fief. No pope since the time of Louis the Bavarian had issued the ban against a German emperor, and Clement ventured not to do so now.

Refusing the invitation of Louis XIV. to go to Avignon, he was obliged either unconditionally to grant the German claims or to try the fortune of war. He chose the latter alternative. The miserable papal troops, however, were easily routed, and Clement was obliged, in A.D. 1708, to acknowledge the emperor's brother, the Grand-duke Charles, as king of Spain, and generally to yield to Joseph's very moderate demands. Clement was the author of the const.i.tution _Unigenitus_, which introduced the second stage in the history of Jansenism. After the short and peaceful pontificate of _Innocent XIII._ A.D. 1721-1724, came _Benedict XIII._, A.D. 1724-1730, a pious, well-meaning, narrow-minded man, ruled by a worthless favourite, Cardinal Coscia. He wished to canonize Gregory VII., in the fond hope of thereby securing new favour to his hierarchical views, but this was protested against by almost all the courts. All the greater was the number of monkish saints with which he enriched the heavenly firmament. He promised to all who on their death-bed should say, "Blessed be Jesus Christ," a 2,000 years' shortening of purgatorial pains. His successor _Clement XII._, A.D. 1730-1740, deprived the wretched Coscia of his offices, made him disgorge his robberies, imposed on him a severe fine and ten years' imprisonment, but afterwards resigned the management of everything to a greedy, grasping nephew. He was the first pope to condemn freemasonry, A.D. 1736. _Benedict XIV._, A.D. 1740-1758, one of the n.o.blest, most pious, learned, and liberal of the popes, zealous for the faith of his church, and yet patient with those who differed, moderate and wise in his political procedure, mild and just in his government, blameless in life. He had a special dislike of the Jesuits (-- 155, 12), and jestingly he declared, if, as the curialists a.s.sert, "all law and all truth" lie concealed in the shrine of his breast, he had not been able to find the key. He wrote largely on theology and canon law, founded seminaries for the training of the clergy, had many French and English works translated into Italian, and was a liberal patron of art. To check popular excesses he tried to reduce the number of festivals, but without success.-Continuation, in Paragraphs 9, 10, 13.

2. _Old and New Orders._-Among the old orders that of _Clugny_ had ama.s.sed enormous wealth, and attempts made by its abbots at reformation led only to endless quarrels and divisions. The abbots now squandered the revenues of their cloisters at court, and these inst.i.tutions were allowed to fall into disorder and decay. When, in A.D. 1790, all cloisters in France were suppressed, the city of Clugny bought the cloister and church for 4,000, and had them both pulled down.-The most important new orders were: (1) _The Mechitarist Congregation_, originated by Mechitar the Armenian, who, at Constantinople in A.D. 1701, founded a society for the religious and intellectual education of his countrymen; but when opposed by the Armenian patriarch, fled to the Morea and joined the United Armenians (-- 72, 2). In A.D. 1712 the pope confirmed the congregation, which, during the war with the Turks was transferred to Venice, and in A.D. 1717 settled on the island St. Lazaro. Its members spread Roman Catholic literature in Armenia and Armenian literature in the West. At a later time there was a famous Mechitarist college in Vienna, which did much by writing and publishing for the education of the Catholic youth.-(2) _Freres Ignorantins_, or Christian Brothers, founded in A.D. 1725 by De la Salle, canon of Rheims, for the instruction of children, wrought in the spirit of the Jesuits through France, Belgium, and North America. After the expulsion of the Jesuits from France in A.D. 1724, they took their place there till themselves driven out by the Revolution in A.D. 1790.(49)-(3) The _Liguorians or Redemptorists_, founded in A.D. 1732 by Liguori, an advocate, who became Bishop of Naples in A.D. 1762. He died in A.D. 1787 in his ninety-first year, was beatified by Pius VII. in A.D. 1816, and canonized by Gregory XVI. in A.D. 1839, and proclaimed _doctor ecclesiae_ by Pius IX. in A.D. 1871 as a zealous defender of the immaculate conception and papal infallibility. His devotional writings, which exalt Mary by superst.i.tious tales of miracles, were extremely popular in all Catholic countries. His new order was to minister to the poor. He declared the pope's will to be G.o.d's, and called for unquestioning obedience. Only after the founder's death did it spread beyond Italy.-Continuation, -- 186, 1.

3. _Foreign Missions._-In the accommodation controversy (-- 156, 12), the Dominicans prevailed in A.D. 1742; but the abolishing of native customs led to a sore persecution in China, from which only a few remnants of the church were saved. The Italian Jesuit Beschi, with linguistic talents of the highest order, sought in India to make use of the native literature for mission purposes and to place alongside of it a Christian literature.

Here the Capuchins opposed the Jesuits as successfully as the Dominicans had in China. These strifes and persecutions destroyed the missions.-The Jesuit state of Paraguay (-- 156, 10) was put an end to in A.D. 1750 by a compact between Portugal and Spain. The revolt of the Indians that followed, inspired and directed by the Jesuits, which kept the combined powers at bay for a whole year, was at last quelled, and the Jesuits expelled the country in A.D. 1758.-Continuation -- 186, 7.

4. _The Counter-Reformation_ (-- 153, 2).-Charles XII. of Sweden, in A.D.

1707, forced the Emperor Joseph I. to give the Protestants of _Silesia_ the benefits of the Westphalian Peace and to restore their churches. But in _Poland_ in A.D. 1717, the Protestants lost the right of building new churches, and in A.D. 1733 were declared disqualified for civil offices and places in the diet. In the Protestant city of Thorn the insolence of the Jesuits roused a rebellion which led to a fearful ma.s.sacre in A.D.

1724. The Dissenters sought and obtained protection in Russia from A.D.

1767, and the part.i.tion of Poland between Russia, Austria, and Prussia in A.D. 1772 secured for them religious toleration. In _Salzburg_ the archbishop, Count Firmian, attempted in A.D. 1729 a conversion of the evangelicals by force, who had, with intervals of persecution in the seventeenth century, been tolerated for forty years as quiet and inoffensive citizens. But in A.D. 1731 their elders swore on the host and consecrated salt (2 Chron. xiii. 5) to be true to their faith. This "covenant of salt" was interpreted as rebellion, and in spite of the intervention of the Protestant princes, all the evangelicals, in the severe winter of A.D. 1731, 1732, were driven, with inhuman cruelty, from hearth and home. About 20,000 of them found shelter in Prussian Lithuania; others emigrated to America. The pope praised highly "the n.o.ble"

archbishop, who otherwise distinguished himself only as a huntsman and a drinker, and by maintaining a mistress in princely splendour.

5. In _France_ the persecution of the Huguenots continued (-- 153, 4). The "pastors of the desert" performed their duties at the risk of their lives, and though many fell as martyrs, their places were quickly filled by others equally heroic. The first rank belongs to Anton Court, pastor at Nismes from A.D. 1715; he died at Lausanne A.D. 1760, where he had founded a theological seminary. He laboured unweariedly and successfully in gathering and organizing the scattered members of the Reformed church, and in overcoming fanaticism by imparting sound instruction. Paul Rabaut, his successor at Nismes, was from A.D. 1780 to 1785 the faithful and capable leader of the martyr church. The judicial murder of _Jean Calas_ at Toulouse in A.D. 1762 presents a hideous example of the fanaticism of Catholic France. One of his sons had hanged himself in a fit of pa.s.sion.

When the report spread that it was the act of his father, in order to prevent the contemplated conversion of his son, the Dominicans canonized the suicide as a martyr to the Catholic faith, roused the mob, and got the Toulouse parliament to put the unhappy father to the torture of the wheel.

The other sons were forced to abjure their faith, and the daughters were shut up in cloisters. Two years later Voltaire called attention to the atrocity, and so wrought on public opinion that on the revision of the proceedings by the Parisian parliament, the innocence of the ill-used family was clearly proved. Louis XV. paid them a sum of 30,000 livres; but the fanatical accusers, the false witnesses, and the corrupt judges were left unpunished. This incident improved the position of the Protestants, and in A.D. 1787 Louis XVI. issued the Edict of Versailles, by which not only complete religious freedom but even a legal civil existence was secured them, which was confirmed by a law of Napoleon in A.D. 1802.

6. _Conversions._-Pecuniary interests and prospect of marriage with a rich heiress led to the conversion, in A.D. 1712, of Charles Alexander while in the Austrian service; but when he became Duke of Wurttemburg he solemnly undertook to keep things as they were, and to set up no Catholic services in the country save in his own court chapel. Of other converts Winckelmann and s...o...b..rg are the most famous. While Winckelmann, the greatest of art critics, not a religious but an artistic ultramontane, was led in A.D.

1754 through religious indifference into the Romish church, the warm heart of Von s...o...b..rg was induced, mainly by the Catholic Princess Gallitzin (-- 172, 2) and a French emigrant, Madame Montague, to escape the chill of rationalism amid the incense fumes of the Catholic services.-Continuation, -- 175, 7.

7. _The Second Stage of Jansenism (_-- 157, 5_)._-_Pasquier Quesnel_, priest of the Oratory at Paris, suspected in 1675 of Gallicanism, because of notes in his edition of the works of Leo the Great, fled into the Netherlands, where he continued his notes on the N.T. Used and recommended by Noailles, Archbishop of Paris, and other French bishops, this "Jansenist" book was hated by the Jesuits and condemned by a brief of Clement XI. in A.D. 1708. The Jesuit confessor of Louis XIV., Le Tellier, selected 101 propositions from the book, and induced the king to urge their express condemnation by the pope. In the _Const.i.tution Unigenitus_ of A.D. 1713, Clement p.r.o.nounced these heretical, and the king required the expulsion from parliament and church of all who refused to adopt this bull, which caused a division of the French church into _Acceptants_ and _Appellants_. As many of the condemned propositions were quoted literally by Quesnel from Augustine and other Fathers, or were in exact agreement with biblical pa.s.sages, Noailles and his party called for an explanation.

Instead of this the pope threatened them with excommunication. In A.D.

1715 the king died, and under the Duke of Orleans' regency in A.D. 1717, four bishops, with solemn appeal to a general council, renounced the papal const.i.tution as irreconcilable with the Catholic faith. They were soon joined by the Sorbonne and the universities of Rheims and Nantes, Archbishop Noailles, and more than twenty bishops, all the congregations of St. Maur and the Oratorians with large numbers of the secular clergy and the monks, especially of the Lazarists, Dominicans, Cistercians, and Camaldulensians. The pope, after vainly calling them to obey, thundered the ban against the Appellants in A.D. 1718. But the parliament took the matter up, and soon the aspect of affairs was completely changed. The regent's favourite, Dubois, hoping to obtain a cardinal's hat, took the side of the Acceptants and carried the duke with him, who got the parliament in 1720 to acknowledge the bull, with express reservation, however, of the Gallican liberties, and began a persecution of the Appellants. Under Louis XV. the persecution became more severe, although in many ways moderated by the influence of his former tutor, Cardinal Fleury. Noailles, who died in 1729, was obliged in 1728 to submit unconditionally, and in A.D. 1730 the parliament formally ratified the bull. Amid daily increasing oppression, many of the more faithful Jansenists, mostly of the orders of St. Maur and the Oratory, fled to the Netherlands, where they gave way more and more to fanaticism. In 1727 a young Jansenist priest, Francis of Paris, died with the original text of the appeal in his hands. His adherents honoured him as a saint, and numerous reports of miracles, which had been wrought at his grave in Medardus churchyard at Paris, made this a daily place of pilgrimage to thousands of fanatics. The excited enthusiasts, who fell into convulsions, and uttered prophecies about the overthrow of church and state, grew in numbers and, with that mesmeric power which fanaticism has been found in all ages to possess powerfully influenced many who had been before careless and profane. One of these was the member of parliament De Montgeron, who, from being a frivolous scoffer, suddenly, in 1732, fell into violent convulsions, and in a three-volumed work, "_La Verite des Miracles Operes par l'Intercession de Francois de Paris_," 1737, came forward as a zealous apologist of the party. The government, indeed, in 1732 ordered the churchyard to be closed, but portions of earth from the grave of the saint continued to effect convulsions and miracles. Thousands of convulsionists throughout France were thrown into prison, and in 1752, Archbishop Beaumont of Paris, with many other bishops, refused the last sacrament to those who could not prove that they had accepted the const.i.tution. The grave of "St. Francis," however, was the grave of Jansenism, for fanatical excess contains the seeds of dissolution and every manifestation of it hastens the catastrophe. Yet remnants of the party lingered on in France till the outbreak of the Revolution, of which they had prophesied.

8. _The Old Catholic Church in the Netherlands._-The first Jesuits appeared in Holland in A.D. 1592. The form of piety fostered by superior and inferior clergy in the Catholic church there, a heritage from the times of the Brethren of the Common Life (-- 112, 9), was directed to the deepening of Christian thought and feeling; and this, as well as the liberal att.i.tude of the Archbishop of Utrecht, awakened the bitter opposition of the Jesuits. At the head of the local clergy was Sasbold Vosmeer, vicar-general of the vacant archiepiscopal see of Utrecht. Most energetically he set himself to thwart the Jesuit machinations, which aimed at abolishing the Utrecht see and putting the church of Holland under the jurisdiction of the papal nuncio at Cologne. On the ground of suspicions of secret conspiracy Vosmeer was banished. But his successors refused to be overruled or set aside by the Jesuits. Meanwhile in France the first stage of the Jansenist controversy had been pa.s.sed through. The Dutch authorities had heartily welcomed the condemned book of their pious and learned countryman; but when the five propositions were denounced, they agreed in repudiating them, without, however, admitting that they had been taught in the sense objected to by Jansen. The Jesuits, therefore, charged them with the Jansenist heresy, and issued in A.D. 1697 an anonymous pamphlet full of lying insinuations about the origin and progress of Jansenism in Holland. Its beginning was traced back to a visit of Arnauld to Holland in A.D. 1681, and its effects were seen in the circulation of prayer-books, tracts, and sermons, urging diligent reading of Scripture, in the depreciation of the worship of Mary, of indulgences, of images of saints and relics, rosaries and scapularies (-- 188, 20), processions and fraternities, in the rigoristic strictness of the confessional, the use of the common language of the country in baptism, marriage, and extreme unction, etc. The archbishop of that time, Peter Codde, in order to isolate him, was decoyed to Rome, and there flattered with hypocritical pretensions of goodwill, while behind his back his deposition was carried out, and an apostolic vicar nominated for Utrecht in the person of his deadly foe Theodore de c.o.c.k. But the chapter refused him obedience, and the States of Holland forbad him to exercise any official function, and under threat of banishment of all Jesuits demanded the immediate return of the archbishop. Codde was now sent down with the papal blessing, but a formal decree of deposition followed him. Meanwhile the government p.r.o.nounced on his rival De c.o.c.k, who avoided a trial for high treason by flight, a sentence of perpetual exile. But Codde, though persistently recognised by his chapter as the rightful archbishop, withheld on conscientious grounds from discharging official duties down to his death in A.D. 1710. Amid these disputes the Utrecht see remained vacant for thirteen years. The flock were without a chief shepherd, the inferior clergy without direction and support, the people were wrought upon by Jesuit emissaries, and the vacant pastorates were filled by the nuncio of Cologne. Thus it came about that of the 300,000 Catholics remaining after the Reformation, only a few thousands continued faithful to the national party, while the rest became bitter and extreme ultramontanes, as the Catholic church of Holland still is. Finally, in A.D. 1723, the Utrecht chapter took courage and chose a new archbishop in the person of Cornelius Steenowen. Receiving no answer to their request for papal confirmation, the chapter, after waiting a year and a half, had him and also his three successors consecrated by a French missionary bishop, Varlet, who had been driven away by the Jesuits. But in order to prevent the threatened loss of legitimate consecration for future bishops after Varlet's death in A.D. 1742, a bishop elected at Utrecht was in that same year ordained to the chapter of Haarlem, and in A.D. 1758 the newly founded bishopric of Deventer was so supplied. All these, like all subsequent elections, were duly reported to Rome, and a strictly Catholic confession from electors and elected sent up; but each time, instead of confirmation, a frightful ban was thundered forth. This, however, did not deter the Dutch government from formally recognising the elections.-Meanwhile the second and last act of the Jansenist tragedy had been played in France. Many of the persecuted Appellants sought refuge in Holland, and the welcome accorded them seemed to justify the long cherished suspicion of Jansenism against the people of Utrecht. They repelled these charges, however, by condemning the five propositions and the heresies of Quesnel's book; but they expressly refused the bull of Alexander VII. and its doctrine of papal infallibility. This put a stop to all attempts at reconciliation. The church of Utrecht meanwhile prospered.

At a council held at Utrecht in A.D. 1765 it styled itself "The Old Roman Catholic Church of the Netherlands," acknowledged the pope, although under his anathema, as the visible head of the Christian church, accepted the Tridentine decrees as their creed, and sent this with all the acts of council to Rome as proof of their orthodoxy. The Jesuits did all in their power to overturn the formidable impression which this at first made there; and they were successful. Clement XIII. declared the council null, and those who took part in it hardened sons of Belial. But their church at this day contains, under one archbishop and two bishops, twenty-six congregations, numbering 6,000 souls.(50)-Continuation, -- 200, 3.

9. _Suppression of the Order of Jesuits, _A.D._ 1773._-The Jesuits had striven with growing eagerness and success after worldly power, and instead of absolute devotion to the interests of the papacy, their chief aim was now the erection of an independent political and hierarchical dominion. Their love of rule had sustained its first check in the overthrow of the Jesuit state of Paraguay; but they had secured a great part of the world's trade (-- 156, 13), and strove successfully to control European politics. The Jansenist controversy, however, had called forth against them much popular odium; Pascal had made them ridiculous to all men of culture, the other monkish orders were hostile to them, their success in trade roused the jealousy of other traders, and their interference in politics made enemies on every hand. The Portuguese government took the first decided step. A revolt in Paraguay and an attempt on the king's life were attributed to them and the minister Pombal, whose reforms they had opposed, had them banished from Portugal in A.D. 1759, and their goods confiscated. _Clement XIII._, A.D. 1758-1769, chosen by the Jesuits and under their influence, protected them by a bull; but Portugal refused to let the bull be proclaimed, led the papal nuncio over the frontier, broke off all relations with Rome, and sent whole shiploads of Jesuits to the pope. France followed Portugal's example when the general Ricci had answered the king's demand for a reform of his orders: _Sint ut sunt, aut non sint_. For the enormous financial failure of the Jesuit La Valette, the whole order was made responsible, and at last, in A.D. 1764, banished from France as dangerous to the state. Spain, Naples, and Parma, too, soon seized all the Jesuits and transported them beyond the frontiers. The new papal election on the death of Clement XIII.

was a life and death question with the Jesuits, but courtly influences and fears of a schism prevailed. The pious and liberal Minorite Ganganelli mounted the papal throne as _Clement XIV._, A.D. 1769-1774. He began with sweeping administrative reforms, forbad the reading of the bull _In cna Domini_ (-- 117, 3), and, pressed by the Bourbon court, issued in A.D. 1773 the bull _Dominus ac Redemtor Noster_ suppressing the Jesuit order. The order numbered 22,600 members and the pope felt, in granting the bull, that he endangered his own life. Next year he died, not without suspicion of poisoning. All the Catholic courts, even Austria, put the decree in force. But the heretic Frederick II. tolerated the order for a long time in Silesia, and Catherine II. and Paul I. in their Polish provinces.-_Pius VI._, A.D. 1775-1799, in many respects the ant.i.thesis of his predecessor, was the secret friend of the exiled and imprisoned ex-Jesuits. After the outbreak of the French Revolution, a proposal was made at Rome, in A.D.

1792, for the formal restoration of the order, as a means of saving the seriously imperilled church, but it did not find sufficient encouragement.

10. _Anti-hierarchical Movements in Germany and Italy._-Even before Joseph II. could carry out his reforms in ecclesiastical polity, the n.o.ble elector _Maximilian Joseph III._, A.D. 1745-1777, with greater moderation but complete success, effected a similar reform in the Jesuit-overrun Bavaria. Himself a strict Catholic, he a.s.serted the supremacy of the state over a foreign hierarchy, and by reforming the churches, cloisters, and schools of his country he sought to improve their position. But under his successor, Charles Theodore, A.D. 1777-1799, everything was restored to its old condition.-Meanwhile a powerful voice was raised from the midst of the German prelates that aimed a direct blow at the hierarchical papal system. _Nicholas von Hontheim_, the suffragan Bishop of Treves, had under the name _Justinus Febronius_ published, in A.D. 1763, a treatise _De Statu Ecclesiae_, in which he maintained the supreme authority of general councils and the independence of bishops in opposition to the hierarchical pretensions of the popes. It was soon translated into German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. The book made a great impression, and Clement XIII. could do nothing against the bold defender of the liberties of the church. In A.D. 1778, indeed, Pius VI. had the poor satisfaction of extorting a recantation from the old man of seventy-seven years, but he lived to see yet more deadly storms burst upon the church. Urged by Charles Theodore, Elector of Bavaria, the pope, in A.D. 1785, had made Munich the residence of a nuncio. The episcopal electors of Mainz, Cologne, and Treves, and the Archbishop of Salzburg, seeing their archiepiscopal rights in danger, met in congress at Ems in A.D. 1786, and there, on the basis of the Febronian proofs, claimed, in the so called _Punctation of Ems_, practical independence of the pope and the restoration of an independent German national Catholic church. But the German bishops found it easier to obey the distant pope than the near archbishops. So they united their opposition with that of the pope, and the undertaking of the archbishops came to nothing.-More threatening still for the existence of the hierarchy was the reign of _Joseph II._ in Austria. German emperor from A.D. 1765, and co-regent with his mother Maria Theresa, he began, immediately on his succession to sole rule in A.D. 1780, a radical reform of the whole ecclesiastical inst.i.tutions throughout his hereditary possessions. In A.D. 1781 he issued his _Edict of Toleration_, by which, under various restrictions, the Protestants obtained civil rights and liberty of worship. Protestant places of worship were to have no bells or towers, were to pay stole dues to the Catholic priests, in mixed marriages the Catholic father had the right of educating all his children and the Catholic mother could claim the education at least of her daughters. By stopping all episcopal communications with the papal curia, and putting all papal bulls and ecclesiastical edicts under strict civil control, the Catholic church was emanc.i.p.ated from Roman influences, set under a native clergy, and made serviceable in the moral and religious training of the people, and all her inst.i.tutions that did not serve this end were abolished. Of the 2,000 cloisters, 606 succ.u.mbed before this decree, and those that remained were completely sundered from all connexion with Rome. In vain the bishops and Pius VI. protested. The pope even went to Vienna in A.D. 1782; but though received with great respect, he could make nothing of the emperor. Joseph's procedure had been somewhat hasty and inconsiderate, and a reaction set in, led by interested parties, on the emperor's early death in A.D. 1790.-The Grand-duke _Leopold of Tuscany_, Joseph's brother, with the aid of the pious Bishop Scipio von Ricci, inclined to Jansenism, sought also in a similar way to reform the church of his land at the Synod of Pistoia, in A.D. 1786. But here too at last the hierarchy prevailed.

11. _Theological Literature._-The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, A.D.

1685, gave the deathblow to the French Reformed theology, but it also robbed Catholic theology in _France_ of its spur and incentive. The Huguenot polemic against the papacy, and that of Jansenism against the semi-pelagianism of the Catholic church, were silenced; but now the most rabid naturalism, atheism, and materialism held the field and the church theology was so lethargic that it could not attempt any serious opposition. Yet even here some names are worthy of being recorded. Above all, _Bernard de Montfaucon_ of St. Maur, the ablest antiquarian of France, besides his cla.s.sical works, issued admirable editions of Athanasius, Chrysostom, Origen's "_Hexapla_," and the "_Collectio Nova Patrum_." _E. Renaudot_, a learned expert in the oriental languages, wrote several works in vindication of the "_Perpetuite de la Foi cath._," a history of the Jacobite patriarchs of Alexandria, etc., and compiled a "_Collectio liturgiarum Oriental_," in two vols. Of permanent worth is the "_Bibliotheca Sacra_" of the Oratorian _Le Long_, which forms an admirable literary-historical apparatus for the Bible. The learned Jesuit _Hardouin_, who p.r.o.nounced all Greek and Latin cla.s.sics, with few exceptions, to be monkish products of the thirteenth century, and denied the existence of all pre-Tridentine general councils, edited a careful collection of Acts of Councils in twelve vols. folio in Paris, 1715, and compiled an elaborate chronology of the Old Testament. His pupil, the Jesuit _Berruyer_, wrote a romancing "_Hist. du Peuple de Dieu_," which, though much criticised, was widely read. Incomparably more important was the Benedictine _Calmet_, died A.D. 1757, whose "_Dictionnaire de la Bible_" and "_Commentaire Litteral et Critique_" on the whole Bible are really most creditable for their time. And, finally, the Parisian professor of medicine, _Jean Astruc_, deserves to be named as the founder of the modern Pentateuch criticism, whose "_Conjectures sur les Memoires Originaux_," etc., appeared in Brussels A.D. 1753.-Within the limits of the French Revolution the n.o.ble theosophist _St. Martin_, died A.D. 1805, a warm admirer of Bohme, wrote his brilliant and profound treatises.