Page images
PDF
EPUB

CONTENTS.

Necessary to consider facts in connection with principles
General comparison of Catholic and Protestant nations

[merged small][ocr errors]

What Protestantism did for liberty in Europe
In the United States

Protestants have been guilty of persecution

This admitted to be inconsistent with their principles
Roman Catholics, how far responsible now for persecution
Influence of the Reformation on literature and science
The complaints of Erasmus

[ocr errors]

Effect of the extinction of Protestantism in Spain

Loss of intellectual freedom and activity

Effect of the extinction of Protestantism in Italy
Decline of literature and art

Persecution of Galileo

[ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

Intellectual effect of the reading of the Bible in Protestant coun-

[merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors]

Influence of the Reformation on English Literature
Religious tone of Elizabethan writers

[ocr errors]

Effect of the Reformation on the German intellect
Its intellectual effect in Holland and Scotland
Influence of the Reformation on Philosophy
The Reformers' opinion of Aristotle

[ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

The Cartesian method in contrast with the Mediæval
Personal history and relations of Des Cartes (1596-1650)
His system condemned by the Sorbonne

[ocr errors]

Influence of the Reformation on other sciences
Protestantism and the Fine Arts

Comparison of the German and the Latin nations.

[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

Neander on the origin and types of Rationalism

Multiplying of Protestant sects

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]

THE REFORMATION.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION: THE GENERAL CHARACTER OF THE REFORMATION.

THE four most prominent events of modern history are the invasion of the barbarians, which blended the German and Roman elements of civilization, and subjected the new nations to the influence of Christianity; the crusades, which broke up the stagnation of European society, and by inflicting a blow upon the feudal system opened a path for the centralization of the nations and governments of Europe; the Reformation, in which religion was purified and the human mind emancipated from sacerdotal authority; and the French Revolution, a tremendous struggle for political equality. The Reformation, like these other great social convulsions, was long in preparation. Of the French Revolution, the last upon the list of historical epochs of capital importance, De Tocqueville observes: "It was least of all a fortuitous event. It is true that it took the world by surprise; and yet it was only the completion of travail most prolonged, the sudden and violent termination of a work on which ten generations had been laboring."1 The method of Providence in history is never magical. In proportion to the magnitude of the catastrophe are the length of time and the variety of agencies which are employed in pro1 Ancien Régime et la Révolution (7th ed., 1866), p. 31.

« PreviousContinue »