to retire. As for my wife, apart from her clothes and her ornaments, she does not possess more than four hundred pieces of gold in the world: and, for her ornaments, she so little esteems them, that she has never made any use of them since her marriage with me. The children indeed of her former marriage are rich; (may God give them grace to use their wealth aright!) and from them she receives thirty pieces of gold per annum : I have forborne to claim any further dowry, though I might have done it." pp. 493, 494.

In 1525, our Reformer had the satisfaction to see the sacrifice of the mass abolished at Zurich, and a translation of the Scriptures put into circulation in a considerable part of Switzerland. We give

Mr. Scott's account of the latter event:

"We may here notice an important measure, of which the first step was about this time taken, and which in Switzerland, as well as in Germany, produced the most powerful and permanent effects. I refer to the giving of the Scriptures to the people in the vulgar tongue. Luther had, in the year 1523, published the Pentateuch and the historical books of the Old Testa

ment, translated from the original Hebrew into the German language. The divines of Zuric now revised his translation, adapted it to the Swiss dialect of the German, and printed it in 1525. With the rest of the sacred writings they proceeded for themselves, and published the remainder of the Old Testament in 1529, and the whole together, revised, in 1531. Leo Jude and Caspar Megander had the principal share in the work: but Zwingle himself, and some others also bore a part in it. About the same time an Anabaptist teacher, a man of learning, published a translation of the Prophets from the original; and to the general fidelity of his version, the learned men of Zuric bore honourable testimony.-Luther's translation of the Old Testament was not completed till two years after that of the Swiss Reformers." pp. 521, 522.

About this period three events are noticed, which greatly contributed to retard the progress of the Swiss Reformation; namely, first the Rustic War, or rebellion of the peasants, which, though it raged in its full fury only in Germany, in some degree extended itself to Switzerland: secondly, the Sacramentarian controversy between Luther and Zuinglius, which still divides their respective followers. And, thirdly, the follies and crimes of the Ana

CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 336.

baptists; events which must have crushed the growth of any rising edifice which had not its foundation on the rock of the Scriptures. Some modern writers have endeavoured to cast a doubt over the extravagancies of the Anabaptists; but what will be thought of such a fact as that recorded upon unquestionable authority, of one of the sect having, in the presence of his father and family, demanded, in imitation of Abraham's intended sacrifice of his son, to take off the head of his brother, and of the brother consenting to the decapitation, with these words-" Father, thy will be

done ? "

The remainder of the volume is mainly occupied in tracing the progress of the Reformation, in the four cantons which chiefly favoured it; the opposition of the nine other cantons, and the political separation of these opposite bodies. But the account refers to topics, generally speaking, of too minute a character to allow of our following the steps of the author.

It seems a little premature, at so early a state of the Swiss Reformation, to enter upon any very extended general observations on the subject; but perhaps a few will be pardoned.

And, in the first place, it is essential that we should say something of the mode in which the author has discharged his duty to the public.

The characteristics of the work are honesty, piety, and sound sense. We observe no fact, with regard to which there is not an obvious endeavour to determine the real authority and value: no fair occasion is lost for introducing the observations which suggest themselves to an intelligent and religious mind. And, finally, no observation is made with which it would be easy in any person but a most violent popish partizan to quarrel. This volume has not the liveliness and vigour which characterise that part especially of the church history which is the work of the Dean of Carlisle : 5 G

but it is more carefully composed, and has a clearness and sobriety of style which peculiarly become the historian of the church of Christ. There is one point, with respect to which we are disposed to suggest a doubt; namely, whether the history is not too minutely detailed. No thing can be less interesting than the history of the squabbles of petty states, even in the best of causes; unless it is possible to connect with the details of these contests the biography of their leaders; and only then, if the narration extends to the history of their minds, as well as of their bodily movements. It is very natural that a writer deeply interested in his employment, and compelled to give much labour to the detection of the minutest particulars and the adjustment of the least important controversies, should attach undue importance to them. But the public are not unlikely to judge differently, and to wish rather for general results than the steps by which they have been perhaps tediously and laboriously accomplished. It is the earnest desire which we feel that the sale of Mr. Scott's volumes should bear some proportion to his labours, that especially prompts this observation. This is a busy age: every man is expected to read every book: life is short one great characteristic of the times is impatience; and therefore, although Brandt once found thousands of readers of his four folio volumes on the Reforma tion in the Low Countries, the Reformation itself, with Zuinglius at its head, could now scarcely make its way over such a barrier as a single volume of the same dimensions. Mr. Scott, however, may differ from us as to this point; and if he cannot consent to give a smaller sample of the large and rich harvest he has laid up in his granary, we earnestly hope the public will catch his spirit, and receive with avidity all he is laborious enough to present to them.

We must still detain our readers

while we say a few words on the subject of which this volume treats.

Every eye is familiar with the statements of Protestants, as to the necessity of reform at the period when Zuinglius arose. But Papists at least seem to be less familiar with the language of one of the popes as to this point; and for the sake of any reader who may be unacquainted with the document, we will extract a part of it. "These troubles," said Pope Hadrian," are owing to the sins of men, and especially of the priests and prelates: even those who have sat in the holy chair have been guilty of many abominable actions; many abuses and indecencies have been committed in dispensing the spiritual and ecclesiastical ordinances; all things have been so changed for the worse, that the disease has extended itself from the pope to the meanest of the clergy."

Nor had Switzerland escaped the general corruption. Perhaps, indeed, she was quite as much infected, with less prospect, on account of her retired situation, of a remedy. There are a few particulars, as to the time and mode of cure, which it may be as well to notice.

In the first place, it is remarkable that the spirit of reform arose as soon in Switzerland as in any part of the world. Though less commercial, less intellectual, less visited by the cross lights which had begun to flash along the horizon of Europe, she nevertheless not only partook of the general illumination, but even outshone most of her contemporaries. Can any fact square worse than this with the theory which some self-called rationalists have endeavoured to sustain, that the Reformation was the natural and necessary result of the actual state of things; and that the change which bigots ascribe to an invisible agency, must be traced to the mere progress of literature and civilization? The truth is, that religious reformation, and advancement in letters and civilization, by no means proceeded in every case with corresponding

steps. The fine arts in Italy and France, for instance, seem for a considerable time to have supplied the last bulwarks of superstition; and one of the least refined nations of Europe, as in this instance, led the van of the battle of reform. Surely such a fact is decisive of the real influence to which this moral revolution is to be ascribed, and leads the mind at once to Him, as its author, by whom alone its triumph could have been accomplished.

Another striking circumstance which the Swiss Reformation forces upon our attention is, the harmony of opinion as to the great fundamentals of religion which prevailed even amongst those of the reformers who were least in communication with each other. It is not perhaps surprising that Luther should be found to a considerable degree united in opinion with Melancthon. Each may be conceived to have learned a part of his creed at his brother's mouth. Daily intercourse confessedly does much in rubbing off the angles and peculiarities of religious opinions. But what was the human process which assimilated the opinions of Luther and Zuinglius, long before each had heard of the works or doctrines of the other? How came the voice of Wickliffe in England, or Huss in Bohemia, to find its echo amidst the rocks and mountains of Zurich or Basle? What was the power which called into existence and vigorous operation such a body of men as Mirandula and Mantuanus in Italy; in France, Calvin, Almain, Major, Faber, and Budæus; in Germany, Luther, Bucer, Brandt, Castrick, Celtes, Melancthon; in Holland, Erasmus, with a whole train of bolder if not abler men; and in Switzerland, Zuinglius, Ecolampadius, Leo Jude, Bullenger, Capito, Pellican? Can it be doubted that one voice gave the word, one Almighty Spirit taught, guided, and in fact "bowed the hearts of all as

the heart of one man," into subjection to the authority of Scripture, and the high purposes of God. All drank at the same fountain--fed in the same pastures-and followed in the steps of the same Great and Good Shepherd. The Sylloge Confessionum, or collection of the creeds of the Protestant churches, exhibits a degree of concurrence in opinion which can alone proceed from Him who maketh men to be of one mind in an house! It is true that at a later period, a dispute arose between the Saxon and Swiss reformers, respecting the sacrament of the Lord's Supper; but the matter of astonishment is, that minds of so strong a cast-in a period of the most unusual excitement, and coming to a decision upon numerous questions, respecting some of which the premises are not so fully stated as to render only one conclusion possible-should find only one point of difference. What human being can form to himself a distinct conception of the manner in which the Saviour is even spiritually present to the soul of the be liever? and is it wonderful that questions in any way connected with such a truth should, in a moment of powerful excitation, "engender strife?" The sacramentarian controversy is no doubt the great blot of the Reformation; but considering the weakness and waywardness of our nature, we cannot be astonished that her fair countenance is stained with it.

The only remaining point to which we would direct the attention of our readers, is the remarkable fact that a church so scriptural in its creed as the early Helvetic communion, should so soon have lapsed into Arianism or Socinianism. There are several circumstances to which we are disposed to trace this apostacy; and to these we shall briefly refer-without, however, attaching too much weight to them.

In the first place, then, we are inclined to think that what we must term the Ultra Calvinism of the Swiss national creed may have, in

some degree, opened a way to this result. It is well known that the so-called higher doctrines which the Westminster divines endeavoured to graft upon the Articles of the Church of England were, in the main, branches from a Geneva stock. Our church refused the intended improvements; and, to us, it is clear that its more catholic spirit, its resistance to all language more precise or less liberal than that of Scripture, its charitable resolution to allow considerable latitude to men differing upon some points, which are not likely to be settled on this side of eternity, have largely, under God, contributed to its perpetuity. The tendency of ultra doctrines, as in the case before us, or of absurd doctrines, as in the case of Popery, is to reduce society into the two distinct classes of bigots and sceptics. Persons of one stamp of character, by a mighty gulp, receive all that is proposed to them, and, as with them, every doubt is a crime they are ordinarily disposed to extort, by main force, from others the assent they so lavishly bestow themselves. Another class, finding more pressed upon the understanding and conscience, than they are able to receive, rashly reject the good on account of the evil, and sink into infidelity. Geneva is not the only Protestant Church in which the operation of this principle may be traced. Such cases supply additional proofs that extremes meet; and that the road to truth, union, and happiness lies, not on the opposing hills, but in the low valley between them.

A second cause to which the decay of the Swiss churches may be traced, is the want of a full and complete scriptural liturgy. Every body of clergy is apt to catch the spirit of its own peculiar age, and to be led by it through every variety of bye-path, fen, dike, and marsh, according to the impulse of this mere will-o'-the-wisp. Under such circumstances, immeasureable is the

advantage to the clergy of feeling themselves perpetually recalled by a scriptural liturgy from the region of imagination, into that of plain scriptural truth. It is curious to observe the manner in which certain bodies of men, in our own church, have at times shot into this or that extravagance; sometimes into the polar region of latitudinarianism, and then into the hotter one of superstition-sometimes freezing with the Pelagian-sometimes "wallowing' with the Antinomian-sometimes soaring with the enthusiast, and at others grovelling with the unbeliever. After perhaps a short period of vagrancy, some mysterious influence appears to draw them back, and they settle down into orthodox churchmen. The truth is, that the doctrines of the church, and especially those doctrines as they are expanded and exhibited in an extensive liturgy, are a hook in the nose of these theological wanderers. All men, more or less, feel their influence; and in the end many obey it. Half a dozen incipient heresies may be crushed in a morning service-a rising doubt may be extinguished a fancy quashed-a folly exposed-and the half-fledged error falls to the ground. This protection the scanty liturgy of the Helvetic churches most imperfectly supplied. Such a safeguard is, perhaps, the main cause, under God, of the green old age,' and perpetuity of the Church of England.

Finally, the Church of Geneva has laboured under the singular calamity of standing on the borders of the most picturesque lake, and amidst some of the noblest mountains, in the world: the effect of this peculiar location having been to draw within its territories some of the most mischievous spirits by which the soil of a country could be occupied. Voltaire, Gibbon, and Rousseau, all pitched their tents in a country whose loveliness was to be its worst enemy; for where could such men establish themselves without

carrying a peculiar curse along with them? In a short period, all the streams of national and domestic welfare were tainted at their source; and paralysis and death followed. The room of Voltaire is still preserved in the state in which he left it-the chair, the table, the sopha, in the places they occupied during his life-time. To a serious mind, that room is like the den of a defunct monster, or the empty crater of some extinguished volcano ;would that it were extinguished! The circulation of Gibbon's celebrated book has indeed been limited by the nature of the subject. The works of Rousseau have passed chiefly into the hands of persons of too insipid a cast either to receive deep impressions, or to communicate them-into the hands of moon-stricken sonneteers, or puling sentimentalists. But the wretched works of Voltaire have wide circulation. They embrace every possible topic; there is philosophy for the serious, stories for the idle, satire for the malignant, merriment for the gay; poetry, romance, tragedy, and comedy, for valetudinarians and boarding schools: every vile passion finds its appropriate fuel in a convenient spot; each man discovers the subject he prefers adulterated to the taste of his fallen nature; the food of all minds is handed to us with precisely the ingredient infused which converts it into poison. It is impossible to conceive the energy with which this high priest of evil applied himself to the diabolical task of doing mischief. If physics are his subject, the main object of the argument is to read a lecture upon Atheism. Into his edition of Pascal's Thoughts he introduced a neutralising essay to prove the mortality of the soul. In short, like the Harpies of the Roman poet, he destroys what he can, and pollutes what he cannot destroy. Such a man is no insignificant enemy, even when the virus of his writings is attenuated by being expanded over mighty con

tinents. But when it is concentrated in one narrow district, as in Switzerland, the mischief is incalculable.

But we must stop. For ourselves, we always find a visit to the period of the Reformation both delightful and profitable. It shews us almost the best days of the Christian commonwealth. It assists to do that which Machiavelli prescribes to all who would be wise or greatto lead us back to "first principles." It enables us to contrast what we are with what we have been; to measure the amount of our advancement or retrogradation in morals and religion; and to ascertain whether the march of reason' means the same thing with the march of truth, holiness, the love of God, and of each other. The days of the Reformation have this, among other singularities, that strong passions led to scarcely a single excess; that the intenseness of feeling seemed to quicken without perverting the intellectual powers: that men continued to reason calmly while they acted enthusiastically. In our own days the union of such qualities is exceedingly rare. Energy of character seems chiefly to develop itself in new follies and heresies. Some of the most vigorous minds appear to consume their powers in wrangling with the more moderate, in blowing theological bubbles, in propagating extravagancies, in rushing into those scenes and subjects where angels fear to tread,' in neglecting what is past and present to speculate what is to come, in passing by the nature of the being they can understand to give utterance to conjectures on the nature of Him whom "no man hath seen or can see." Tacitus describes the ancient Britons as rising from sleep only to gamble or fight. The mantle of our ancestors seems to have fallen upon some of their descendants; for when they rise from sleep it is mainly to contend, or to put to hazard the fundamental verities of the Gospel of Christ.