THE LUTHERAN REFORMATION IN GERMANY. Luther's writings were read in cities, towns, and even villages; at night by the fireside the schoolmaster would often read them aloud to an attentive audience. Some of the hearers were affected by their perusal; they would take up the Bible to clear away their doubts, and were struck with surprise at the astonishing contrast between the christianity of the Bible and their own. After hesitating between Rome and Scripture, they soon took refuge with that living Word which shed so new and sweet a radiance on their hearts. While they were in this state, some evangelical preacher, probably a priest or a monk, would arrive. He spoke eloquently and with conviction; he announced that Christ had made full atonement for the sins of his people; he demonstrated by Holy Scripture the vanity of works and human penances. A terrible opposition would then break out; the clergy, and sometimes the magistrates, would strain every nerve to bring back the souls they were about to lose. But there was in the new preaching a harmony with Scripture and a hidden force that won all hearts, and subdued even the most rebellious. At the peril of their goods, and of their life if need be, they ranged themselves on the side of the Gospel, and forsook the lifeless and fanatical orators of the papacy. Sometimes the people, incensed at being so long misled, compelled them to retire; more frequently the priests, deserted by their flocks, without tithes or offerings, departed voluntarily and in sadness to seek a livelihood elsewhere. And while the supporters of the ancient hierarchy returned from these places sorrowful and dejected, and sometimes bidding farewell to their old flocks in the language of anathema, the people, transported with joy by peace and liberty, surrounded the new preachers with their applause, and, thirsting for the Word of God, carried them in triumph into the church and into the pulpit. A word of power, proceeding from God, was at that time regenerating society. The people, or their leaders, would frequently invite some man celebrated for his faith to come and enlighten them; and instantly, for love of the gospel, he abandoned his interests and his family, his country and friends. The persecution often compelled the partisans of the Reformation to leave their homes: they reached some spot where it was as yet unknown; here they would enter a house that offered an asylum to poor travellers: there they would speak of the gospel, read a chapter to the attentive hearers, and perhaps, at the request of their new THE LUTHERAN REFORMATION IN GERMANY. friends, obtained permission to preach once publicly in the church. Upon this a vast uproar would break out in the city, and the greatest exertions were ineffectual to quench it. If they could not preach in the church, they found some other spot. Every place became a temple. At Husum in Holstein, Hermann Tast, who was returning from Wittemberg, and against whom the clergy of the parish had closed the church doors, preached to an immense crowd in the cemetery, beneath the shade of two large trees, not far from the spot where, seven centuries before, Anschar had proclaimed the Gospel to the heathen. At Arnstadt, Gaspard Guttel, an Augustine monk, preached in the market-place. At Dantzic, the Gospel was announced on a little hill without the city. At Gosslar, a Wittemberg student taught the new doctrines in a meadow planted with lime-trees; whence the evangelical christians were denominated the Lime-tree Brethren. Men of the lowest station, and even the weaker sex, with the aid of God's Word, persuaded and led away men's hearts. Extraordinary works are the result of extraordinary times. At Ingolstadt, under the eyes of Dr. Eck, a young weaver read Luther's works to the assembled crowd. In this very city, the university having resolved to compel a disciple of Melancthon to retract, a woman, named Argula de Staufen, undertook his defence, and challenged the doctors to a public disputation. Women and children, artisans and soldiers, knew more of the Bible than the doctors of the schools or the priests of the altars. One day, a Franciscan going his rounds, stopped with the box in his hand begging alms at a blacksmith's forge in Nuremberg: Why," said the smith, "do you not gain your bread by the work of your hands?" At these words the sturdy monk threw away his staff, and seizing the hammer plied it vigorously on the anvil. The useless mendicant had become an honest workman. His box and frock were sent back to the monastery. 66 The printing-press, that powerful machine discovered in the fifteenth century, came to the support of all these exertions, and its terrible missiles were continually battering the walls of the enemy. The impulse which the Reformation gave to popular literature in Germany was immense. Whilst in the year 1513 only thirty-five publications had appeared, we find in 1523, four hundred and ninety-eight. And where were all these published? For the most part at Wittemberg. And who were their authors? Generally Luther and his friends. THE LUTHERAN REFORMATION IN GERMANY. What Luther and his friends composed, others circulated. Monks, convinced of the unlawfulness of monastic obligations, desirous of exchanging a long life of slothfulness for one of active exertion, but too ignorant to proclaim-the Word of God, travelled through the provinces, visiting hamlets and cottages, where they sold the books of Luther and his friends. Germany soon swarmed with these bold colporteurs. Printers and booksellers eagerly welcomed every writing in defence of the Reformation; but they rejected the books of the opposite party, as generally full of ignorance and barbarism. If any one of them ventured to sell a book in favour of the papacy, and offered it for sale in the fairs at Frankfort or elsewhere, merchants, purchasers, and men of letters overwhelmed him with ridicule and sarcasm. It was in vain that the emperor and princes had published severe edicts against the writings of the reformers. As soon as an inquisitorial visit was to be paid, the dealers, who had received secret intimation, concealed the books that it was intended to proscribe; and the multitude, ever eager for what is prohibited, immediately bought them up, and read them with the greater avidity. It was not only in Germany that such scenes were passing; Luther's writings were translated into French, Spanish, English, and Italian, and circulated among these nations. The foregoing extracts are from Merle D'Aubigne. The Reformation in England commenced rather later, but the feeling of the English when once roused was very strong against popery, especially when the King of Spain, under the patronage of the Pope, attempted the invasion and subjugation of England by his Great Armada in the reign of Elizabeth, as will be seen by the following verses, which were composed at that time and sung by the people. The last is rather coarse, but it is expressive of the resolution of our forefathers. FROM our base invaders; From wicked men's device; O God arise and help us, And crush our enemies. Sink deep their potent navies; For Jesus Christ his sake! Though cruel Spain and Rome We will perish for our home. For Pope, nor Book, nor Bell; POETRY. Poetry. BABEL BUILDERS. BY MRS. JAMES GRAY. IT rose amidst the spacious plain, Beneath it, like a billowy main, From which the fabric took its birth. The gazer's upward glancing eye Its roofless height seem'd blent, How swell'd the builders' hearts with pride To see that tower of might "We will not ask for wings," they cried, "Towards heaven to take our flight: Some stories more, a little time, By our own tower its walls we'll climb." Vain hope! vain boast! the lightning came, Are not there builders even now And bitter must the anguish be When that dread hour shall come- ANECDOTES AND SELECTIONS. Anecdotes and Selections. GENEROSITY IN HUMBLE LIFE.-An Executor, of humble appearance and manners, called to ask me to receive a legacy of £5 for our Branch Bible Society, and £6 5s. for the Church Missionary Society; adding that they were devised by his brother, who had lived the greater part of his life as servant with a respectable farmer in the neighbourhood. Does not this afford an important lesson to a class of persons who seem, in these days of dress and show, often to forget how much lies within their power, not only to provide for the day when "the grasshopper becomes a burden," but to aid the cause of religion and of benevolence too; for this friend informed me that four poor brothers and sisters had legacies of about £100 each, under this will, realized by his, the deceased's, own industry and frugality. Very shortly after, a note was put into my hands, which described the pleasure of the writer at the gratifying report of the Society's labours and successes given at our anniversary meeting, and, in a few words of postscript, "I send you my mite to add to the collection." That mite was a half-sovereign: the writer was a chimney-sweeper. How JESUS CHRIST SAVES.-Jesus is the Saviour, or the reconciler of men to God, in the body of his flesh, through death. This is he whose business in coming from heaven to earth was to save his people from their sins. Now, as was said, to know how he doth this, is that which is needful to be inquired into: for some say he doth it one way, some he doth it another. 1. Some say he doth it by giving us precepts and laws to keep, that we might be justified thereby. 2. Some say that he doth it by setting himself as a pattern for us to follow him. 3. Some again hold, that he doth it by our following the light within us. But thou must take heed of all these, for he justifies us by none of these means; I say, he justifieth us not, either by giving laws unto us, or by becoming our example, or by our following the light within us; but by his blood shed for us. His blood is not laws, nor patterns, nor fancies, but a price, a redeeming price. He justifies us, by bestowing upon us, not by expecting from us. He justifies us freely by his grace, not by our works. In a word, thou must be well grounded in the knowledge of what Christ is, and how men are justified by him, or thou wilt not come unto God by him. Bunyan. CHRIST'S WILLINGNESS TO SAVE.-As thou must know him, and how men are justified by him, so thou must know the readiness that is in him to receive them that come unto God by him. Suppose his merits were ever so efficacious, yet if it could be proved, that there is a loathness in him that these merits should be be |
