Protestantism and Catholicity compared in their effects on the civilization of Europe

by Jaime Luciano Balmes

The nations of Europe were not in their infancy, for they were surrounded by old institutions. Full of the recollections of ancient civilization, they preserved various remains of it. They were themselves produced by the mixture of a hundred nations, differing in laws, customs, and manners. They were not yet adult nations; as this denomination cannot be applied either to individuals or to society before they have reached a certain development, from which the nations of Europe were still far removed. It is very difficult to find a word to express this social state; it was neither a state of civilization, nor that of barbarism; for a number of laws and institutions existed there, which certainly did not deserve the epithet of barbarous. If we call these nations semi-barbarous, perhaps we shall approach the truth. Words are of little importance, if we have a clear idea of the things.

It cannot be denied that the European nations, owing to a long series of revolutions, and the extraordinary mixture of races, of ideas, and manners, of the conquerors with each other, and of the conquerors with the nations conquered, had a large portion of barbarism, and a fruitful germ of agitation and disorder. But the malignant influence of these elements was combated by the action of Christianity, which had obtained a decided preponderance over minds, and which, besides, was supported by powerful institutions. Christianity, to accomplish this difficult work, had the assistance of great material force. The Christian doctrines, which penetrated on all sides, tended, like a sweetening liquid, to soften and improve every thing; but, at every step, the mind comes into collision with the senses, morality with the passions, order with anarchy, charity with ferocity, and law with fact. Thence a struggle, which, although general to a certain extent in all times and countries, since it is founded on the nature of man, was then more rude, violent, and clamorous. The two most opposite principles, barbarism and Christianity, were then face to face in the same arena, with no one between them. Observe these nations with attention, read their history with reflection, and you will see that those two principles are constantly struggling, and constantly contending for influence and preponderance; thence the most strange situations, and the most singular contrasts. Study the character of the wars of that time, and you will hear the holiest maxims constantly proclaimed; legitimacy, law, reason, and justice are invoked; the tribunal of God is incessantly appealed to: this is the influence of Christianity. But, at the same time, you will be afflicted at the sight of numberless acts of violence, of cruelties, atrocities, pillages, rapines, murders, fires, and disasters without end: this is barbarism. If you look at the Crusades, you will observe that grand ideas, vast plans, noble inspirations, social and political views of the highest importance, fermented in men's heads; that all hearts overflowed with noble and generous feelings, and that a holy enthusiasm, transporting men out of themselves, rendered them capable of heroic actions: this is the influence of Christianity. But, if you examine the execution, you will see disorder, improvidence, want of discipline in the armies, injuries, and acts of violence; you will seek in vain for concert and harmony among those who take part in the gigantic and perilous enterprise: there is barbarism. Youths, thirsting for knowledge, crowd to the lectures of the famous masters, from the most distant countries; Italians, Germans, English, Spanish, and French are mingled and confounded around the chairs of Abelard, Peter Lombard, Albertus Magnus, and St. Thomas of Aquin; a powerful voice resounds in their ears, calling them to leave the shades of ignorance and raise themselves to the regions of science; the love of knowledge animates them; the longest journeys cannot stop them; the enthusiasm for illustrious masters is carried to an indescribable extent: behold the influence of Christianity; behold her constantly stirring and illuminating the mind of man, never allowing him to repose tranquilly in obscurity, and continually exciting him to new intellectual labors and researches after truth! But behold these same youths, who exhibit such noble dispositions, and inspire such legitimate and consoling hopes; are they not also those licentious, restless, and turbulent young men, giving way to the most deplorable acts of violence, continually fighting in the streets, and forming in the midst of great cities a small republic, an unruly democracy, where there is much difficulty in maintaining law and good order? Behold here barbarism!

It is good, it is perfectly conformable to the spirit of religion, that the guilty man who raises a repentant and humiliated heart to God, should manifest his feeling and the affliction of his soul by external acts; that he should labor to fortify his mind, and restrain his evil inclinations, by employing the rigors of gospel austerity against his flesh: all this is sovereignly reasonable, just, holy, and conformable to the maxims of the Christian religion, which thus ordains for the justification and sanctification of the sinner, to repair the injury done to the souls of others by the scandal of a bad life. But that penitents, half naked, should wander about loaded with chains, carrying horror and alarm everywhere, as happened at this time, when we see ecclesiastical authority compelled to repress the abuse: this marks the spirit of rudeness and ferocity which always accompany the state of barbarism. Nothing is more true, noble, and salutary for society, than to imagine God always ready to defend innocence, to protect it against injustice and calumny, and to raise it above humiliation and disgrace, by restoring to it, sooner or later, the purity and lustre of which they have attempted to deprive it. This supposition is an effect of faith in Providence—that faith emanating from Christian ideas, which represent to us God as embracing the whole world in his view, reaching with his penetrating eye the deepest recesses of the heart, and not even excluding the meanest of his creatures from his paternal love. But who does not perceive the infinite distance which separates this pure faith from the trials by fire, water, and single combat? Who does not here discover rudeness confounding all things—the spirit of violence laboring to subject every thing to a rigorous law—attempting, in some measure, to oblige God himself to comply with our wants and caprices, in order to interpose the testimony of his solemn miracles, whenever it suits our pleasure or convenience to find out the truth?

I introduce these contrasts here in order to awaken the recollections of those who have read history, and to enable me to establish, in a few words, the simple and general formula which sums up all those periods: "Barbarism tempered by religion; religion disfigured by barbarism."

In the study of history we constantly encounter a serious obstacle, which renders it always difficult, and sometimes impossible, to understand it perfectly. We make the mistake of referring every thing to ourselves, and to the objects which surround us—a mistake which is excusable, no doubt, since it has its root in our own nature, but against which we must be carefully on our guard, if we wish to avoid deplorable errors. We imagine the men of other times to be like ourselves; without thinking of it, we communicate to them our own ideas, manners, inclinations, and even temperaments; and, after having fashioned men who exist only in our own imaginations, we desire and demand that the real men should act in the same manner as these imaginary men; and at the slightest discord between the historical facts and our unreasonable suppositions, we cry out that it is strange and monstrous, taxing with being strange and monstrous what was perfectly regular and ordinary according to the epoch.

It is the same with respect to laws and institutions: when we do not find them according to the types which we have under our eyes, we declaim against the ignorance, iniquity, and cruelty of the men who have conceived and established them. If we wish to form an exact idea of an epoch, it is necessary to transport ourselves there—to make an effort of imagination, in order, as it were, to live and converse with its men; it is not enough to hear the recital of the events, it is necessary to witness them, to become one of the spectators, one of the actors, if possible; it is necessary to call forth generations from the tomb, and make them act under our eyes. I shall be told that this is very difficult. I grant it; but it is necessary, if we wish that our knowledge of history should be something more than a mere notion of names and dates. It is quite sure that we do not know an individual well, unless acquainted with his ideas, character, and conduct. It is the same with a society: if we are ignorant by what doctrines it was guided, what was its manner of considering and feeling things, we shall see the events only superficially—we shall know the words of the law, but we shall not penetrate its spirit or genius; when contemplating an institution, we shall see only the external frame-work, without reaching the mechanism, or guessing the moving machinery. If we attempt to avoid these defects, it is certain that the study of history becomes the most difficult of all; but this knowledge has been wanting for a long time. The secrets of man and the mysteries of society are, at the same time, the most important subject which can be proposed to the human mind, and the most arduous, the most difficult, and the least accessible to the generality of intellects.

The individual in the times to which we allude was not the individual of to-day; his ideas were very different, his manner of seeing and feeling was not ours, his soul was of quite another temper from our own; what is inconceivable to us, was perfectly natural to men of those times; they took pleasure in what is now repugnant to us.

At the beginning of the thirteenth century, Europe had already experienced the powerful shock of the Crusades; the sciences began to germinate; the spirit of commerce was in some degree developed; the taste for industry made itself felt; and the inclination of men to enter into communication with other men, and of nations to mingle with other nations, was every day extended and increased. The feudal system, already shaken, was about to fall to pieces; the power of the commonalty rapidly increased; the spirit of enfranchisement showed itself everywhere; in fine, owing to the almost complete abolition of slavery, and to the change effected by the Crusades in the condition of vassals and serfs, Europe was covered with a numerous population who knew not slavery, and who bore with difficulty the feudal yoke. Yet this population was still far from possessing all that is necessary to rise to the rank of free citizens. Modern democracy already offered itself to the view, with its great advantages, its numerous difficulties, its immense problems, which still embarrass and disconcert us, after so many centuries of trial and experience. The lords preserved in great measure their habits of barbarism and ferocity, by which they had been unfortunately distinguished at former periods; the royal power was far from having acquired that force and prestige necessary for ruling such opposite elements, and to raise itself in the midst of society as a symbol of respect for all interests—a centre of reunion for all forces, and a sublime personification of reason and justice.

In the same century, wars began to assume a character more popular, and consequently more vast and important; the agitations of the people began to wear the aspect of political commotions. Already we discover something more than the ambition of emperors attempting to impose their yoke on Italy; we have no longer petty kings who contend for a crown or a province, or counts or barons who, followed by their serfs, fight with each other or with the neighboring municipalities, covering the land with blood and rapine. We observe in the movements of that period something more important and alarming. Numerous nations arise and crowd around a banner on which, instead of the ensigns of a baron or of a monarch, appears the name of a system of doctrines. No doubt, the lords take part in the struggle, and their power raises them still far above the crowd which surrounds and follows them; but the cause in question is not that of these men; they are accounted something in the problems of the times; but mankind looks beyond the horizon of castles. This agitation and movement, produced by the appearance of new religious and social doctrines, is the announcement and the beginning of that chain of revolutions which Europe has to undergo.