CHAPTER XV.

THE RELATION OF PROTESTANTISM TO CULTURE AND CIVILIZATION.

In order to judge rightly of the tendencies of Protestantism in relation to culture and civilization, or to compare Protestantism, in this respect, with the Church of Rome, something more is requisite than a bare enumeration of historical facts. Facts in this case can form the basis of induction, only so far as they are fairly traceable to the intrinsic character of the respective systems. It is the genius of the systems respectively, as it has revealed itself in their actual operation, which we have to investigate.

Protestantism and the Church of Rome have stood face to face, now for more than three hundred years. We can look at the history and at the condition of the Protestant nations and of the Roman Catholic nations. The immediate impression made by a general comparison of this sort upon a candid observer is difficult to be resisted. What this impression is, may be stated in the language of two modern English historians, who at least are warped by no partisan attachment to the dogmatic system of the Protestant churches. Macaulay, while conceding that the Church of Rome conferred great benefits on society in the Middle Ages, by instructing the ignorant, by curbing the passions of tyrannical civil rulers, and by affording protection to their subjects, places in strong contrast the influence of the Church of Rome during the last three centuries, when she has been struggling to per

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petuate a sway which the developed intelligence of mankind had outgrown. "The loveliest and most fertile

provinces of Europe have, under her rule, been sunk in poverty, in political servitude, and in intellectual torpor, while Protestant countries, once proverbial for sterility and barbarism, have been turned by skill and industry into gardens, and can boast of a long list of heroes and statesmen, philosophers and poets. Whoever, knowing what Italy and Scotland naturally are, and what, four hundred years ago, they actually were, shall now compare the country round Rome with the country round Edinburgh, will be able to form some judgment as to the tendency of Papal domination. The descent of Spain, once the first among monarchies, to the lowest depths of degradation; the elevation of Holland, in spite of many natural disadvantages, to a position such as no commonwealth so small has ever reached, teach the same lesson. Whoever passes in Germany from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant principality, in Switzerland from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant canton, in Ireland from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant county, finds that he has passed from a lower to a higher grade of civilization. On the other side of the Atlantic the same law prevails. The Protestants of the United States have left far behind them the Roman Catholics of Mexico, Peru, and Brazil. The Roman Catholics of Lower Canada remain inert, while the whole continent round them is in a ferment with Protestant activity and enterprise. The French have doubtless shown an energy and an intelligence which, even when misdirected, have justly entitled them to be called a great people. But this apparent exception, when examined, will be found to confirm the rule; for in no country that is called Roman Catholic has the Roman Catholic Church during several generations, possessed so little authority as in France."1 Carlyle, in his quaint 1 History of England (Harpers' ed.), i. 45.

and vivid manner, thus writes of the peoples who threw off their allegiance to Rome, in contrast with those which rejected the Reformation: "Once risen into this divine white heat of temper, were it only for a season, and not again, the nation is thenceforth considerable through all its remaining history. What immensities of dross and cryptopoisonous matter will it not burn out of itself in that high temperature in the course of a few years! Witness Cromwell and his Puritans making England habitable, even under the Charles-Second terms, for a couple of centuries more. Nations are benefited, I believe, for ages, for being thrown once into divine white heat in this manner; and no nation that has not had such divine paroxysms at any time is apt to come to much." "Austria, Spain, Italy, France, Poland - the offer of the Reformation was made everywhere, and it is curious to see what has become of the nations that would not hear it. In all countries were some that accepted; but in many there were not enough, and the rest, slowly or swiftly, with fatal, difficult industry, contrived to burn them out. Austria was once full of Protestants, but the hide-bound Flemish-Spanish Kaiser-element presiding over it, obstinately for two centuries, kept saying, No; we, with our dull, obstinate, Cimburgis under-lip, and lazy eyes, with our ponderous Austrian depth of Habituality, and indolence of Intellect, we prefer steady darkness to uncertain new Light!' and all men may see where Austria now is. Spain still more; poor Spain going about at this time, making its pronunciamentos.' Italy too had its Protestants; but Italy killed them-managed to extinguish Protestantism. Italy put up with practical lies of all kinds, and, shrugging its shoulders, preferred going into Dillettantism and the Fine Arts. The Italians, instead of the sacred service of Fact and Performance, did Music, Painting, and the like, till even that has become impossible for them; and no noble nation, sunk from vir

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tue to virtù, ever offered such a spectacle before." "But sharpest-cut example is France, to which we constantly return for illustration. France, with its keen intellect, saw the truth, and saw the falsity, in those Protestant times, and, with its ardor of generous impulse, was prone enough to adopt the former. France was within a hair'sbreadth of becoming actually Protestant; but France saw good to massacre Protestantism, and end it in the night of St. Bartholomew, 1572." "The Genius of Fact and Veracity accordingly withdrew, was staved off, got kept away for two hundred years. But the Writ of Summons had been served; Heaven's messenger could not stay away forever; no, he returned duly, with accounts run up, on compound interest, to the actual hour, in 1792; and then, at last, there had to be a 'Protestantism,' and we know of what kind that was." 1

Exception may, perhaps, be taken to some particulars in the foregoing extract; but still the spectacle of the physical power, the industry and thrift, the intelligence, good government, and average morality of the Protestant nations, is in the highest degree significant and impressive.

The influence of Protestantism upon civil and religious liberty is one point of importance in the present inquiry. Since Protestantism involves an assertion of the rights of the individual in the most momentous of all concerns, we should expect that its effect would be generally favorable to liberty. In considering this question, it is proper to glance at the political consequences of the Reformation.2

The first period after the beginning of the Reformation (1517-1556) is marked by the rivalry of Francis I. and Charles V. Neither espoused the Protestant cause; but their mutual enmity left it room to exist and to de

1 Hist. of Frederick the Second (Harpers' ed.), i. 202 seq.

2 Heeren, Historical Treatises, Oxford, 1836. The chronological divisions of Heeren are followed above.

velop its strength. Notwithstanding the religious division, a new energy and vitality were infused into the constituent parts of the German Empire. The second period (1556-1603) is signalized by the revolt of the Netherlands. France, a kingdom divided against itself, was reduced for a time to a subordinate position. Spain and England were now the contending powers; the Protestant interest in Europe being led by Elizabeth, and the Catholic interest being marshaled under Philip II. Elizabeth herself was jealous of her prerogative and had no love for popular rights; but the Protestant party was, nevertheless, identified with the cause of liberty, and the Roman Catholic party with political absolutism. She was obliged, for her own safety, to give aid to the insurgents in the Netherlands and in Scotland. During her long reign, in England itself, under the inspiring influence of Protestantism, there was an agitation of constitutional questions, which augured well for the future. The great Protestant commercial Republic of Holland arose, as it were, out of the sea. In the third period (1603-1648) France, under Henry IV., for a while regains its natural position in Europe, but loses it by his untimely death. England, on the contrary, under the Stuarts, with their reactionary ecclesiasticism and subserviency to Spain, sacrifices in great part her political influence. It is the era of the Thirty Years' War; at first a civil war of Austria against Bohemia; then acquiring wider dimensions by the conquest of the Palatinate; and finally, upon the renewal of the contest between Spain and the Netherlands in 1621, interesting all Europe. The restored coöperation and religious sympathy of Austria and Spain, involved peril not only for Protestantism, but for the balance of power in Europe, which was now an object of pursuit. France, resuming its position under the guidance of Richelieu, joined hands with Sweden in lending support to the German Protestants. Sweden, by the part