NOTE I., page 11. — The following story of George Wishart, as told by John Knox, whose forerunner he was, is an equally striking instance of the “generous deed.” Wishart had, come to Dundee, which was being desolated by the Plague, that he might comfort and minister to the despairing and panic-stricken citizens. Taking his stand on the top of the East Gateway, or Cowgate Port, he used to preach to enormous crowds; the “sick,” or infected, taking their place outside, the “whole” inside the gate. “While he was spending his life,” says Knox, “to comfort the afflicted, the Devil ceased not to stir up his own son the Cardinal (Beaton) again, who corrupted by money a desperate priest, named Sir John Wigton, to slay the said Master George, who looked not to himself in all things so circumspectly as worldly men would have wished. And upon a day, the sermon ended and the people departing, no man suspecting danger, and therefore not heeding the said Master George, the priest that was corrupted stood waiting at the foot of the steps, his gown loose, and his whinger drawn into his hand under his gown, the said Master George. as that he was most Rharn of eye and judgment, marked him, and as he came near he said, ‘My friend, what would you do?’ and therewith he clapped his hand upon the priest’s hand, wherein the whinger was, and took it from him. The priest abashed, fell down at his feet, and openly confessed the verity, as it was. The noise rising and coming to the ears of the sick, they cried, Deliver the traitor to us, or else we will take him by force’; and so they burst in at the gate. But Master George took him in his arms, and said, ‘Whosoever troubles him shall trouble me; for he has hurt me in nothing, but has done great comfort both to you and to me, to wit, he has let us understand what we may fear in times to come. We will watch better.’ And so he appeased both the one part and the other, and saved the life of him that sought his.”
NOTE II, page 43. — It may be well to give, in an abridged form, the text of this truly epoch-making document. We quote it from D’Aubyne’s “History of the Reformation”: —
“Dear Lords, Cousins, Uncles, and Friends! Having repaired to this diet at the summons of his Majesty, and for the common good of the empire and of Christendom, we have heard and learned that the decisions of the last diet concerning our holy Christian faith are to be repealed, and that it is proposed to substitute for them certain restrictive and onerous resolutions.
“King Ferdinand and the other imperial commissaries, by affixing their seals to the last Recess of Spires, had promised, however, in the name of the emperor, to carry out sincerely and inviolably all that it contained, and to permit nothing that was contrary to it. In like manner, also, you and we, electors, princes, prelates, lords, and deputies of the empire, bound ourselves to maintain always and with our whole might every article of that decree.
“We cannot therefore consent to its repeal:—
“Firstly, because we believe that his Imperial Majesty (as well as you and we) is called to maintain firmly what has been unanimously and solemnly resolved.
“Secondly, because it concerns the glory of God and the salvation of our souls, and that in such matters we ought to have regard, above all, to the commandment of God, who is King of kings and Lord of lords; each of us rendering him account for himself, without caring the least in the world about majority or minority.
“We form no judgment on that which concerns you, most dear lords; and we are content to pray God daily that He will bring us all to unity of faith, in truth, charity, and holiness, through Jesus Christ, our Throne of Grace and our only Mediator.
“But in what concerns ourselves, adhesion to your resolution (and let every honest man be judge!) would be acting against our conscience, condemning a doctrine that we maintain to be Christian, and pronouncing that it ought to be abolished in our states, if we could do so without trouble.
“This would be to deny our Lord Jesus Christ, to reject His holy Word, and thus give Him just reason to deny us in turn before His Father, as He has threatened.
“What! We, ratify this edict! We, assert that when Almighty God calls a man to His knowledge, this man cannot however receive the knowledge of God! Oh! of what deadly backslidings should we not thus become the accomplices, not only among our own subjects, but also among yours!
“For this reason we reject the yoke that is imposed on us. And although it is universally known that in our states the holy Sacrament of the body and blood of our Lord is becomingly administered, we cannot adhere to what the edict proposes against the Sacramentarians, seeing that the imperial edict did not speak of them, that they have not been heard, and that we cannot resolve upon such important points before the next council.
“Moreover” — (and this is the essential part of the protest) — “the new edict declaring the ministers shall preach the Gospel, explaining it according to the writings accepted by the holy Christian Church, we think that, for this regulation to have any value, we should first agree on what is meant by the true and holy Church. Now, seeing that there is great diversity of opinion in this respect; that there is no sure doctrine but such as is conformable to the Word of God; that the Lord forbids the teaching of any other doctrine; that each text of the Holy Scriptures ought to be explained by other and clearer texts; that this holy book is in all things necessary for the Christian, easy of understanding, and calculated to scatter the darkness; we are resolved, with the grace of God, to maintain the pure and exclusive preaching of His holy Word, such as it is contained in the Biblical books of the Old and New Testament, without adding anything thereto that may be contrary to it. This Word is the only truth; it is the sure rule of all doctrine and of all life, and can never fail or deceive us. He who builds on this foundation shall stand against all the powers of hell, whilst all the human vanities that are set up against it shall fall before the face of God.
“For these reasons, most dear lords, uncles, cousins and friends, we earnestly entreat you to weigh carefully our grievances and our motives. If you do not yield to our request, we PROTEST by these presents, before God, our only Creator, Preserver, Redeemer, and Saviour, and who will one day be our judge, as well as before all men and all creatures, that we, for us and for our people, neither consent nor adhere in any manner whatsoever to the proposed decree, in anything that is contrary to God, to His holy Word, to our right conscience, to the salvation of our own souls, and to the last decree of Spires.
“At the same time we are in expectation that his Imperial Majesty will behave towards us like a Christian prince who loves God above all things; and we declare ourselves ready to pay unto him, as well as unto you, gracious lords, all the affection and obedience that are our just and legitimate duty.”
Thus, in presence of the diet, spoke out those courageous men whom Christendom will henceforth denominate THE PROTESTANTS.
Nom III., page 76. — We cannot refrain from quoting in this connection the magnificent tribute paid to the English Bible by a person no less eminent than Cardinal Newman: “Who will not say that the uncommon beauty and marvelous English of the Protestant Bible is not one of the great strongholds of heresy in this country? It lives in the ear like a music that can never be forgotten, like the sound of church bells which the convert hardly knows how he can forego. Its felicities often seem to be almost things rather than words. It is part of the national mind and the anchor of national seriousness. The memory of the dead passes into it. The potent traditions of childhood are stereotyped in its verses. The power of all the griefs and trials of man is hidden beneath its words. It is the representative of his best moments, and all that has been about him of soft and gentle, and pure and penitent and good, speaks to him forever out of his English Bible.”
NOTE IV., page 89. — Read in this connection an extract from a letter of Sir James Stephen, author of “Essays in Ecclesiastical Biography.” “When I am told that Alexander VI., or Innocent III., or John XXIII. was the Vicar of Christ upon earth, I am constrained by the indestructible logic of my mind to disbelieve it, even though the chain which connected that opinion with inspired sentiments of Holy Writ was composed of what would seem links of adamant. So of the Christianity of the persecutors in France, Spain and Portugal, Italy, Southern Germany, or the Netherlands.... Did the priests or priestesses of Egypt, or Paphos, ever perpetrate such guilt? Did Domitian ever commit against the early Christians offenses to be compared with those which the see of Rome, and her ministers and agents, committed from age to age against those whom they regarded as erring Christians? The Catholic Church, you admit, has something about her which provokes the very utmost of abhorrence in some. What is that something? Is it not blood-guiltiness of a kind and of an amount, of which the records of the civilized world have no other example?”
There are other testimonies to the same effect which might well be quoted — but we forbear.
NOTE V., page 113. — This breach of faith would have been fully approved by the Pope, whose legate he was. “To keep faith with those who have not the faith is an offense against the faith” was the maxim of Innocent III.
NOTE VI., page 127. — Numberless instances of Roman Catholic intolerance and persecution, within living memory and even in our own day, could be given by those acquainted with the subject. In Ireland, for instance, such stories abound, and they are sometimes very touching and pathetic. But they do not fall within our province.
NOTE VII., page 174. — It was from the study of the Scriptures that these “watchers of the Dawn” drew the light that was their inspiration and their strength. In the words of Pastor Vincent Dusek, the Bohemian pastor quoted in the text (pp. 167:168, and 232): “The Bible seems nowhere else to have been such a mine of instruction — from which the nation not only derived knowledge of letters in general, but also spiritual wisdom in particular — as in Bohemia.” The Bible influenced directly and indirectly a vast portion of the Bohemian literature. It was the life study of Mathew of Janov, one of the forerunners of Hus. He writes of it thus: “I loved it since my youth, and called it my friend, my bride, yea, mother of beauteous delight, of learning, fear and holy hope. Wherever I moved, since my youth and till my high age, it did never forsake me, neither on my way, nor in my home, never when I was occupied, and never when I took to rest.” It is said that Anne of Bohemia, the sister of King Wenceslaus, when she came to England as the bride of our King Richard II., brought with her three things, hitherto unknown there and very valuable — a side-saddle, a box of pins, and a Bible in four languages! In return, the knights and nobles, who came with her from Bohemia, brought back to their own country the writings of Wickliffe. That Jerome of Prague brought them also, or brought more of them, is quite probable.
NOTE VIII., page 211. — The Rev. Charles S. Isaacson in his story of the English Cardinals, goes so far as to say that Hallam “almost alone among the Bishops, dissented from the condemnation of both Hus and Jerome.” He was one of the Bishops sent by Sigismond to Hus on the day before his death to endeavor to persuade him to retract. Later, during the examination of Jerome, when someone cried out, “To the fire with him” and the accused answered, “If my death is what you wish, God’s will be done!” Hallam mildly interposed, “ No, Jerome, it is not God’s will that any sinner should die, but that he should be converted, and live.”
NOTE IX., page 251. — We regret to state that in England, during the reign of Edward VI., Joan Bocher and another — a man named Paris — were also burned for Unitarianism.
NOTE X., page 252. — It may be worthwhile to let another Roman Catholic authority speak for his Faith and himself. In a pamphlet on “Liberty of Conscience,” published by the Catholic Truth Society, Monsignor Croke Robinson says: “ How could the Catholic State allow this so-called Liberty of Conscience? As well might you ask a person to allow poison to be introduced in his body. Do you say, What a cruel and bigoted thing for the Catholic Church and State to put down Heresy? We only ask you to allow the Catholic State the right no man will deny himself and his neighbor, to reject poison from his system.” And again: “If tomorrow the Spanish Government, as advised by the Catholic Church, were to see that a greater evil would ensue from granting religious liberty than from refusing it, then it would have a perfect right to refuse it. Of course the Protestant press would teem with charges of Intolerance, and we should reply, Toleration to Protestants is Intolerance to Catholics.”
To which reply the proper rejoinder would be: “Very well; then you force us Protestants no longer to tolerate you. Not from bigotry, not from inhumanity, but from the first law of life — the law of self-preservation.” Yet it is our glory that we need not, and do not, answer thus.
We are not driven to invert your own hateful maxim and say that “Toleration to Catholics is Intolerance to Protestants.” We hold the purer Creed, the higher Law, and we own the duties it imposes on us. We give you full Toleration, full civil and religious liberty. Nay, we are willing to do, and have often done, much more — if you are hungry we will feed you, if you are thirsty we will give you drink. But one thing, God helping us, we will not do. We will put no sword into your hands to slay us, since it is your avowed intention to do it if you can.
And to our fellow-Protestants we are bound to say: Let us walk in love, but let us also walk in wisdom. Let us beware — as in the sight of God — how we give power, political, moral or material, into hands pledged to use it against us and against those who hold our Faith.
NOTE XI., page 256. — It may be worthwhile to give in its entirety, this letter from the “Vicar of Christ”:—
“Very noble and well-beloved son, health and apostolical benediction. Having understood from several, and more especially from our beloved son Charles, Cardinal D’Armagnac, with what divine and very great affection thou dost defend the Catholic religion, and with what care and diligence thou dost strive to repress the vices of heretics, and to restore to its first state the observation of the Christian faith — works of a most true Christian and Catholic, and, without doubt, excellent gifts conferred by Heaven — we cannot and we ought not to neglect to return thanks to God who has on thee conferred so clear and sovereign an understanding, and rejoice with all our heart at thy great piety. More especially congratulating thee because that after having so happily fought under many virtuous kings and princes, and in so divers countries, thou art now called to maintain, with still greater glory, honor, and reputation, the war of the King of kings, Jesus Christ, and fight the fight of the Lord of Hosts. For this thou mayest assure thyself that His eternal favor will never fail thee, seeing that so gloriously and triumphantly thou defendest His good cause. We know well that thou hast no need of our exhortation to persevere in and pursue what thou hast so happily begun, but that thou hast laid the foundation of thy virtue on the holy and ardent affection that thou halt for the honor and glory of God. And our persuasion cannot more excite thee to virtuous and honorable deeds than the deeds themselves, so excellent and illustrious, recently done by thee in imitation of our most illustrious and beloved son, the King of Navarre (Anthony of Bourbon, the father of Henry IV.), and many other sovereigns and illustrious lords of France. And this is what we now signify to thee in order that if before we have much loved, esteemed, and praised you for your excellent and magnanimous courage, your Christian good-will and holy affection to God, we may further incite thee thereto; and we declare that for this cause thou shalt find us, with the aid of God, ready to do all things that shall be in our power.
“Given at Rome at St. Peter’s, under the ring of the Holy Fisherman. Of our Pontifical year the 3rd.”