It is a grave error to attribute, as some have done, to the Protestant pastors of Scotland an incomprehensible domination, ‘an authority nowise inferior to that which they had exercised as Catholic priests,’ and to represent them as ‘the most effectual obstacle to popular progress.’[372] Nothing has in fact been less like the haughty Catholic prelates of St. Andrews, Glasgow, and other dioceses, than a Scottish minister. The Reformation gave to Scotland not only Christian truth, but religious and political liberty besides. There, as everywhere, it took from the priesthood its magic and its supremacy, which had been its two main attributes in the Middle Ages. The ministers, whom it substituted for the priests, having no longer the marvellous power of transforming a bit of bread into God the Creator,—these disciples of Jesus, no longer seated on the despotic throne of the confessional to give pardon for sins, became simple heralds of the divine Word. This holy Word has its place in every family and reigns supreme in the Church. Thus, ministers have ceased to be masters and have become servants. The real offence of these Scottish pastors, in the sight of their detractors, is that they have always been a great obstacle, not to the progress of the people and of civilization, as some have said, but to the progress of unbelief and materialism. Now these mischievous doctrines are mortal enemies to the freedom and prosperity of nations.
BOOK XI.
CALVIN, AND THE PRINCIPLES OF HIS REFORM.
CHAPTER I.
CALVIN AT GENEVA AND IN THE PAYS DE VAUD.
(1536.)
For years, and even for centuries, persistent and perilous endeavors had been made at Geneva for a firm establishment of freedom. We have already described some of the impressive scenes which marked the successful close of these efforts at the beginning of the sixteenth century, the noble principles and the mighty words of the energetic laborers in this great enterprise.[373] It would certainly be going too far to consider their labors and the truths which they announced as the source whence our modern liberties have sprung. But it is impossible to study the events of that epoch without emotion, or without recognizing aspirations, principles, sacrifices, and actions worthy of admiration, which were in fact the first great burst of light, the first noteworthy manifestation of the politics and the virtues which must determine the existence and make the prosperity of nations.[374]
That small town was, however, to give to the world a higher lesson still. It was to do for religion what it had first done for politics, and to render to faith the service which it had rendered to freedom. These two achievements are closely related to each other; and it is one of the characteristics of this history, that while it attributes transcendent importance to Christian truth and life, it recognizes at the same time all that is great and salutary in freedom. If the author, as some have thought, had erred in assigning too high a place to the heroic struggles to which Geneva owed her independence, he would assuredly regret that he had not more skilfully handled the pen of the historian for the purpose of immortalizing the great men and the heroic actions of which the smallest and humblest of states afforded the spectacle. But he would count himself fortunate if he should, nevertheless, have contributed to bring into clear light the great maxim, that political freedom and Christian truth must advance hand in hand for the salvation of nations and the salvation of souls. Of course, a blind demagogy, the formidable rock of our age, is at once contrary to freedom and hostile to religion.
Geneva was fitted by various concurring conditions to play a part from which the small extent of her territory seemed inevitably to shut her out. Situated as this town was between Italy, France, and Germany, its position formed the central point of the three great nations who were distinguished in the first half of the sixteenth century for their new or newly awakened love of letters, philosophy, and the arts. On several occasions Frenchmen, Italians, and Germans came in large numbers to settle at Geneva. By the reception of these three diverse elements into her bosom she seemed to be called to blend them with each other and to harmonize their opposing qualities. If any spark from the evangelical fire which was then kindled should chance to escape from either of those countries and to fall on the materials thus prepared at the foot of the Alps, it might kindle a great fire, and might make Geneva a hearth from which light, radiating far and wide, should contribute to scatter the humiliating darkness which Rome and those princes whose power was at her service then made to weigh heavily on the nations.