The Roman clergy, alarmed to see that the evangelical doctrine was invading Hungary, were determined to unite all the forces at their disposal, and give decisive battle to this enemy. It was on the slopes of the mountains, and particularly in the comitat of Zips, that the most fanatical and enraged priests were found. There also the doctrines of the Word of God had made the most real conquests. Bartfeld, Eperies, and Leutschau, the capital of the comitat of Zips, were towns filled with adherents of the Reformation. In the spring of 1543, all the priests of the comitat met together, and perceiving that all their efforts had been useless, and aware also that they had not strength to conquer by spiritual weapons, they resolved to have recourse to the power of the state. King Ferdinand was at this time at Nürnberg; and they drew up a petition and sent it to him there. They stated that notwithstanding all the pains which they took to maintain religion, his subjects were drawn away after what was worse. ‘For this reason,’ they said, ‘we request of you that no preacher should be settled in any place whatsoever without authorization of the Church. Do not allow any one to bring to your subjects this new gospel, which wherever it goes brings in its train divisions, sects, anger, debate, envy, ignorance, murders, and all the works of the flesh.’ It was just at this time that Charles the Fifth was attempting to conclude peace both with Francis I. and with Solyman, in order to give his undivided attention to the suppression of the Reformation. Ferdinand, whose intentions although more enlightened were not very decided, and who did not think that it was proper for him to act in a different way from his brother, issued (April 12) an ordinance by which he placed at the service of the clergy ‘all secular authority necessary for the upholding of the old and holy Catholic religion, the confession of the Roman faith, and the praiseworthy rites and customs which it enjoins.’[[585]] But this ordinance remained a dead letter. The king’s moderation was well known in Hungary; and people believed that if he had yielded to the clergy it was, in fact, only an apparent yielding, and that his threats were not to be followed by action. The depositaries of the temporal power, moreover, had no mind to use it in persecuting men who were examples to all. The pro-palatine Francis Reva therefore turned a deaf ear to it. The clergy, astonished and provoked at seeing their petitions and even the orders of the prince without effect, addressed to the king a second petition more pressing than the first. Ferdinand, who was then at Prague, signed (July 1) an order more severe addressed to the pro-palatine—‘I am astonished,’ said he, ‘that you did not strictly discharge your duty towards the heretics and their doctrine. I command you, upon pain of losing my royal favor, to punish every one who separates from the true and ancient Church of God, whatever may be his condition or his rank, and to make use for this purpose of all the penalties adapted to bring back into the sheepfold those who go astray.’[[586]] This order of Ferdinand, so far from terrifying the champions of the Gospel, increased their courage and their zeal. In the midst of tribulation they said—‘In all these things, we are more than conquerors through Christ who loved us.’ Even at Leutschau the evangelicals, far from drawing back, determined to go forward. They were still without pastors at the time their adversaries wished to put them to death; and they heroically resolved to appoint one. Ladislaus Poleiner, justice of the town, and founder of the Reformation there, began to seek in all directions after such a man as they wanted. Amongst the young Transylvanians who had been converted by the ministry of Honter was one named Bartholomew Bogner, distinguished for his faith, his knowledge, and his zeal. The courageous justice called him to Leutschau, and Bogner immediately applied himself to the work. He did this with the activity of a man whose natural powers are sanctified by the Divine Spirit. His ministry bore rich fruit. Not only did the word of God which he preached give to many a new birth unto eternal life, but after a few years all the ceremonies of the Romish worship were abolished in the very town in which the weapons had been fashioned which were to destroy the Reformation.[[587]]
Stephen Szegedin.
A similar work of regeneration was being accomplished in the south of Hungary, introducing there the Gospel and the spiritual faith of the Swiss divines. A young man, named Stephen Kiss, remarkable from childhood for his discretion and abilities, was born at Szegedin on the Theiss, north of Belgrade, in 1505. He studied at various schools in his own country, and afterwards at Cracow. Having been enlightened by the Gospel, he had come to Wittenberg in 1540, being then thirty-five years of age. Ere long he became not only the disciple and the guest, but also the assistant of Luther and Melanchthon. These two great doctors perceived in him the qualifications of a reformer; a lively piety which led him to seek in every thing the glory of God, a modest seriousness in his manners, his conversation, and his deportment; an accurate acquaintance with the Holy Scriptures, close application to work, remarkable skill in the administration of the Church, and a lively and powerful style in preaching the Gospel.[[588]] The Wittenberg reformers, struck with these gifts, were glad to employ him in the important and numerous affairs which they had on their hands.[[589]] He was usually called Szegedin, after his native town, according to a very common practice of the age.
On his return to his native land, Stephen settled at Jasnyad. Full of remembrances of Wittenberg, and a friend to theological studies, as he saw that the harvest was great but that the laborers were few, he founded in that town, in co-operation with a few friends of the Gospel, a school of theology of which he was the principal professor. He was at the same time both preacher and doctor. In his sermons he showed himself as a man of mind. He did not compose feeble homilies, nor confine himself to diluting his text and uttering pious sentiments. In all that he said there was a solid foundation of truth; in all his teaching there was admirable method, and he set forth the leading thought of his discourses with great clearness.[[590]] But at the same time his phrases were vigorous, he struck heavy blows, he roused conscience, he convinced sinners of their faults and their danger, and he so forcibly exhibited the love of God in Jesus Christ, that suffering souls threw themselves by faith into the merciful arms of the Saviour.[[591]] It was given to him to present the truth with such persuasive power that it left a deep impression on men’s minds. His contemporaries said that his memory and his discourses would survive for ages.[[592]]
His Writings.
Szegedin was not only a great orator, he was also a learned theologian. An indefatigable worker, it was not easy to turn him aside from his studies. Work was to him not only a duty but a delight, the very joy of his life. He shut himself up in his study with the Holy Scriptures, read them, sounded their depths, and thoroughly fixed them in his mind. He brought no self-love to the study of them; nor did he even publish his own writings in his lifetime. They were published after his death by two of the most distinguished divines of the sixteenth century, Theodore Beza at Geneva and Grynaeus at Basel; and this fact is undoubtedly a proof of their excellence. He produced analytical works on the prophets David, Isaiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, and Jeremiah; and also on the Gospels of Matthew and John, the Acts, the epistles of Paul, and the Apocalypse. In addition to these expository works, Szegedin wrote some on doctrine, and particularly one entitled ‘Commonplaces of Sacred Theology, concerning God and concerning man.’ This was in imitation of his master Melanchthon. Deeply grieved to see the errors which afflicted his native land, he undertook to contend against them. He pursued them, armed with the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; and evangelical Hungary had no braver or more intrepid champion. He chiefly tried his strength with the Unitarians and the Papists. He composed a ‘Treatise on the Holy Trinity against the extravagances (deliramenta) appearing in some districts,’ directing his attacks equally against Arianism and Socinianism. The papal traditions he fought against in his ‘Mirror of the Roman Pontiffs, in which are concisely delineated their decrees opposed to the word of God, their lives and their monstrous excesses.’ There is also another work of his entitled—‘Entertaining Inquiries (Quæstiones jucundæ) concerning the papal traditions.’ His devotion to the truth and the force of his understanding shone out in all these works, and his contemporaries were proud of them. ‘This man,’ they used to say, ‘is indeed a theologian, and what is more, a true witness for Christ; a serious, steadfast, and most energetic defender of orthodox truth in countries infested, alas, with Arianism, Mohammedanism, and other sects, to say nothing of the papacy.’[[593]]
Szegedin’s intercourse with Melanchthon had prepared him to understand in respect to the Lord’s Supper, that it is the Spirit that quickeneth. He adhered to Calvin’s view. His writings, as we have mentioned, were published by the Swiss theologians; and we find his name inscribed as a member of the Reformed synod of Wardein. He brought over some of his fellow-countrymen to the same conviction. One of these, then very young, bore testimony to it about thirty or forty years later. ‘Szegedin,’ said Michael Paxi in 1575, ‘was the second of those teachers who, when I was still a youth, successfully corrected and completely suppressed in our land erroneous doctrines respecting the Supper.’[[594]] The first was undoubtedly Devay. Paxi was mistaken as to the victory of the doctrine taught by Calvin. It was not so complete as he states. A great many divines and faithful men held Luther’s view. It was justifiable indeed for Szegedin and his friends on the one side, and for the Lutherans on the other, to declare themselves decidedly for the doctrine which they esteemed true; but it was not so for them to deny that both deserved the reverence of Christians. The war which was carried on between these two churches was, perhaps, the greatest calamity which befell the Reformation.
Banishment Of Szegedin.
The activity of Stephen Szegedin, the decision of his faith, and the vigor with which he attacked the Romish errors drew upon him the hatred of papists and the insults of fanatics. In particular, the bishop, who was guardian of the young son of King Zapolya, was beside himself when the tidings were brought to him of the energetic efforts of this great champion of the Gospel. One day, the evangelical doctor having delivered a very powerful discourse, the prelate no longer restrained himself; and in the first burst of his wrath he sent for the captain of his body-guards—the bishop had his guards—and said to the man, whose name was Caspar Peruzitti—‘Go, give him a lesson that he may remember.’ The captain, a rough, impetuous fellow, went to the venerable doctor and, addressing him in a saucy tone, gave him several slaps on the face with the palm of his hand. Szegedin did not lose his self-command, but desired to clear himself of the wrongs which were alleged against him. The coarse soldier then knocked him down, and trampling on him in anger and rage gave him repeated sharp blows with his heavy boots armed with spurs. This was the method of confutation adopted by a Romish prelate in Hungary in the sixteenth century. There were confutations, we must say, of a more intellectual kind. The bishop did not stop here; he confiscated the doctor’s precious library, which was his chief earthly treasure and the quiver from which he drew his arrows. He then drove him from Jasnyad. God did not abandon him. Szegedin renounced himself, took up his cross, cried to God and besought Him to shed abroad His light. In the following year he was enabled to devote his talents and his faith to the cause of knowledge and the Gospel in the celebrated school of Jynla; and not long after he was called to be professor and preacher at Czegled, in the comitat of Pesth.[[595]]