The Story of Europe

by Marshall, H. E.

  The Sale of Indulgences

  An Indulgence meant that by paying a sum of money a man could buy forgiveness of any sin he had committed. The selling of them was no new thing. It was closely connected with the practice of doing penance, many people preferring to pay money than do penance in other ways. But in early days no Indulgence had been given except upon the promise of repentance. By the end of the fifteenth century the sale of them had become a scandal. The most vile and wicked, who had neither the desire nor the intention of repentance, could buy them freely.

  When an Indulgence seller set forth upon his rounds he did so in splendour, with a gay train of followers. Coming to a city he entered it with pomp. The Bull declaring the Indulgence was carried on a cushion of cloth of gold or of crimson velvet. Priests swinging censers and carrying lighted candles and banners followed after, and thus to the sound of chants and songs, and the ringing of joy bells, the procession passed along the streets to the church.

  Here, before the altar, the vendor spread forth his wares, and declaring that the gates of heaven were open, invited the people to come and buy. When Leo X became pope he found his exchequer almost empty. He needed money sorely for his many projects, among them the building of St. Peter's at Rome. To get the money he fell back upon the fruitful expedient of selling Indulgences.

  Martin Luther

  The man who had charge of their sale in Germany was a Dominican monk named John Tetzel. He was vulgar and blasphemous. He cried his wares in the church like a cheap-jack in the market-place, making unseemly jokes by the way. This manner of selling Indulgences shocked many people who before had found no harm in the custom. Among these was the monk Martin Luther.

  Luther was the son of a poor miner, and his childhood had been one of bitter poverty. But poor although he was, Hans Luther had managed to send his son to school and afterwards to the university of Erfurt, at that time the most famous in Germany.

  His son repaid him by working hard, and it seemed as if he had a great career before him, when suddenly he threw all his brilliant prospects to the winds and became a monk. Martin took this step, he said, to save his soul. For he was one of those who had begun to think for themselves on matters of religion, and his thoughts had thrown him into an anguish of doubt. In time, however, he found some sort of peace, and when Tetzel came to Germany he was teacher of theology in the university of Wittenberg.

  For various reasons many of the rulers in Germany disliked the selling of Indulgences, and the Elector of Saxony had forbidden Tetzel to enter his dominions. But Tetzel would not willingly forgo the harvest of gold which might be gleaned from Saxony. So, without actually entering its borders he came as near to them as he could, and set up his booth in Magdeburg. And as he had foreseen, many people crossed the frontiers to buy Indulgences.

  At this Luther's heart was filled with sorrow and indignation. He could not but feel that these poor people were being deceived and exploited. At length he wrote out, in Latin, ninety-five theses, or articles, against the sale of Indulgences, and on November 1, 1517, he nailed them to the door of the castle church at Wittenberg. The chief idea in these theses was "that by true sorrow and repentance only, and not by payment of money, forgiveness of sins can be won."

  CHAPTER XLI

  Reformation Period: Germany

  WHEN Luther nailed his theses to the door of Wittenberg Church he had no idea of what a great thing he did. He had no idea that he had begun a vast world-shaking movement. He had merely, in the fashion of the day, invited any who liked to debate the matter in public with him. But soon all Germany rang with his challenge. For the theses said openly and clearly what many had thought in secret yet dared not give voice to. They were quickly translated into German and sown broadcast throughout the land. From Germany they spread all over Europe, until all Europe was filled with disputations.

  At first the pope thought little of the matter, and looked upon it as a mere monkish squabble. But soon he saw that it was more than that, and he issued a Bull of excommunication against Luther. By this time, however, Luther had become aware of what a great mass of opinion he had on his side. And instead of trembling at the pope's wrath, he publicly burned the Bull.

  Charles V

  Eighteen months before this the Emperor Maximilian had died, and after much intriguing his grandson Charles had been chosen emperor. As emperor his rule was so widespread that it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the future of the Reformation was in his hands. And so far as European history is concerned the chief point of interest in his reign is his attitude towards the movement.

  The very extent of Charles V's dominions saved the Reformation. For at the beginning of his reign as emperor, he was so much occupied with the complicated politics of his varied possessions, that he could not give his whole mind to the suppression of heresy in Germany.

  Not till eighteen months after his election as emperor, more than three years after Luther had nailed his theses to the door of the castle church at Wittenberg, did Charles pay his first visit to his German dominions. There in January 1521 he held his first Diet at Worms. And to this Diet Luther was summoned to answer for his heresy.

  During the three years which had passed since his first bold deed, Luther had become strengthened in his convictions. Now he refused to retract anything that he had said. So the Ban of the Empire was pronounced against him. Henceforth he might be hunted or slain like a beast of prey, and his books were ordered to be confiscated and burned.

  Excommunication and Ban alike fell harmless. Luther had now so many powerful friends that none dared to lay hands upon him, and his books were openly bought and sold in far greater numbers than before.

  EUROPE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY

  Charles was a Catholic not from conviction but from heredity. The religious aspect of the Protestant revolt interested him not at all. The political aspect interested him much. He desired to make sure of the pope's help against his arch enemy Francis I in his Italian wars, and by condemning Luther he procured this help. But he also produced war in his German domains.

  For, condemned by the pope and the emperor although he might be, not only many of the German people but many of the German princes supported Luther. Had the emperor's interests been undivided he would have crushed these Protestant princes with an iron hand. But as it was he dared not. For he had two great enemies, the French and the Turks. The Turks were constantly threatening his Hapsburg possessions, the French were constantly opposing him in Italy. To keep these two enemies in check Charles had need of German help.

  Protestants

  So in spite of all efforts against it the heresy spread. At length, however, the Diet met at Spires, and passed a decree forbidding any change of religion, and commanding mass to be said in all churches. Against this decree the Protestant princes issued a protest. And from this all those who then, or later, broke away from the Church of Rome, received the name of Protestants.

  During all this time Charles had not again visited Germany, for the difficulties of his Spanish dominions kept him in Spain. But in 1530, finding himself at peace for the moment, he attended the Diet of Augsburg prepared to force his will upon the Protestants. The Protestant princes, however, refused to he coerced, and Melanethon, Luther's gentle and wise friend, drew up a Protestant Creed, and laid it before the Diet. From this it is called the Confession of Augsburg, and is still the accepted Creed of the Lutheran Church.

  The Protestant leaders now, too, fearing that Charles would try to enforce his will by arms, banded themselves into the Schmalkald League, and prepared to resist force by force. But for the time Charles forbore to coerce them. For the Turks besieged Vienna, and he had need of the support of the Protestant as well of the Catholic princes to guard his possessions. In order to gain this help he signed the religious Peace of Nuremberg. By this Protestants were granted full freedom to worship God as they would, until a General Council should be called to discuss and settle the matter.

  Then, having defeate
d the Turks, Charles once more left Germany, to turn his sword against his other great enemy, Francis I. Between 1521 and 1544 Charles fought at least four distinct wars against Francis I for the possession of Italy. Again and again Francis was defeated. He signed treaties and truces, and broke them; he was taken prisoner and released; and finally, to the horror of Europe, he allied himself with the infidel Turk against the emperor. But even this did not save him from defeat, and at length the long struggle came to an end in 1544 with the Treaty of Crespy. This treaty left Francis little better off as regards Italy than he had been at the beginning of his reign, it also bound him to aid in the suppression of heresy.

  The following year Charles signed a long truce with the Turks, and being thus free of his two chief enemies, he set out for Germany, determined to crush the Schmalkald League, and force all Germany to return to the old religion.

  In 1546 the Schmalkald War broke out. At first Charles was successful, and it seemed as if at last he would be able to enforce his will on Germany. He had gained his early successes by the help of Maurice, duke of Saxony. But in the hour of his triumph Maurice turned against him; the war ended in disaster for Charles, and he was obliged to give up his design of forcing all Germany to think alike on matters of religion.

  By the religious Peace of Augsburg in 1555 a religious toleration of a very limited kind was established. It gave to the ruler of each state power to decide what should be the religion of its people, and power to do as he liked with those who refused to conform to his religion. Thus the great revolt which had been awakened by the blows of Luther's hammer came to an end. The emperor and the pope had lost, and had been forced to give up their claim to be the keepers of the general conscience of mankind. But the people had not won. They had merely changed masters. Their princes were to be the keepers of their conscience, they were to be bishops as well as rulers. This was no real settlement. The strife was only ended for a time; later it was to break out more seriously than before.

  The Abdication of Charles V

  While the Peace of Augsburg was being concluded Charles V abdicated. He tried, but tried in vain, to make the electors choose his son Philip as emperor. They refused, and elected his brother Ferdinand instead. So to Philip Charles could only bequeath the Netherlands, the Italian provinces, and Spain, with all her vast possessions in America.

  That Charles was able to leave the Italian provinces and the Netherlands to Philip without question is a signal proof of the ascendency of Spain in Europe at this time. For Italy had always been looked upon as a part of the Empire. Throughout centuries streams of German blood had been shed to acquire and hold it. But Charles, disregarding the fact that he had made his conquests by German aid, claimed Italy by right of conquest, and not by right of the ancient imperial claim. And as a Spanish possession he left the country to his son Philip.

  The loss of Italy to the Empire was merely imaginary. It was, indeed, no real loss but a gain. A very real loss, and one which was to be felt in modern times, was the loss of the Netherlands. For centuries the northern part of the Netherlands, that part which is now Holland, had been included in the Empire. Now, by the will of Charles, it was severed from it without question or protest. And to this day the great German river, the Rhine, flows to the sea through a foreign country. Thus Charles V sowed the seeds of future warfare.

  CHAPTER XLII

  Reformation Period Switzerland and France

  VERY quickly the new religion spread to other lands. Yet, save that it was Luther who, with unconscious courage, first showed the way, the Reformation in other countries had little connection with that of Germany.

  In Switzerland the Reformation was led by Ulrich Zwingli. At this time the position of Switzerland was different from that of any other country in Europe. It had wrung itself free from the Empire and from the house of Austria, but it had not yet become a consolidated nation. Each of the thirteen cantons of which it was now composed had its own government, these governments varying considerably one from the other. There was thus not even the shadow of a central government, such as Germany had through the emperor, or Italy through the pope. They had not even a common language.

  But in fact Switzerland was far more united than either Germany or Italy. Each canton was independent, yet each was a member of a federal league. They used a common flag, a white cross on a red ground, and a common motto, "Each for all, and all for each."

  Since their war of independence the Swiss had had few wars of their own. Yet in nearly all the wars of Europe the Swiss took part, even at times a decisive part. For since their victorious struggle the Swiss had earned the reputation of being the best foot soldiers in Europe. And when by degrees paid soldiery took the place of feudal armies, warring kings and princes were eager to hire Swiss soldiery to fight for them. The sense of nationality was still feeble; one nation had as yet little sense of another nation's rights. It shocked none to find the men who had won their own liberty selling their swords and fighting a tyrant's battles.

  The pope was one of the chief hirers of Swiss soldiery, and besides fighting in his army they formed his bodyguard, so that intercourse between Rome and Switzerland was constant. But this intercourse was purely commercial, and so far as religion was concerned Switzerland was singularly free from papal interference.

  The Swiss Reformation began in the canton of Zurich, and soon spread to Berne. It began as in Germany with an attack on the sale of Indulgences. But although the movement spread rapidly, many in the Forest Cantons clung to the Romish faith. Soon the controversy between the two parties became so bitter that it led to civil war.

  In 1531 the battle of Kappel was fought, in which the Protestants were defeated and Zwingli himself killed. After this a treaty was drawn up between the cantons, which left each free to settle its own religious matters.

  John Calvin

  Now that Zwingli was dead John Calvin became the leader of the Reformation in Switzerland, and Geneva took the place of Zurich as the centre of the movement. Calvin was a young Frenchman who had become a Protestant, and had been forced to flee from France to escape persecution. After Luther he was the greatest of the reformers, and his influence was far more wide reaching. The French Protestants and the English Puritans alike looked to him as their guide. John Knox was his follower, and taught his doctrine to the Scottish people, and the Pilgrim Fathers carried it across the Atlantic to the New World.

  Calvin was himself a scholar, and he gathered many other scholars to Geneva, making it the stronghold of Protestantism and the centre of its teaching. It was from Geneva that the first trained teachers and pastors went forth to teach and preach the new faith. But the doctrine they taught was cold and narrow. For Calvin, although a learned man, was harsh and severe. He had none of the human kindliness of Luther, nor the open-mindedness of Zwingli.

  Persecution of Protestants in France

  In France the new religion met with terrible opposition. Yet there it was never a national movement, the Protestants always representing a minority, although a strong one. One reason for this was that the movement was not so much with them a political revolt against secular interference by the Pope as it was with other peoples. For ever since the "Babylonish Captivity," when the popes had been more or less subject to the French king, France had been more free than other nations from papal interference, and the headship of the French Church had belonged more to the French king than to the pope. So it came about that not being a national movement, in time opposition and persecution were able practically to wipe out the Protestants of France.

  By the Treaty of Crespy Francis I had bound himself to crush heresy within his dominions. Far less than Charles V had he himself any religious convictions, and was personally inclined to tolerance. But his complicated alliances drove him into many inconsistencies. So while he had not hesitated to ally himself with the Protestant princes of Germany against his enemy Charles, and even with the infidel Turk, to ingratiate himself with the pope he entered upon a cruel persecution of
the Protestants of Provence.

  These unoffending, devout, and loyal people were denounced as heretics and barbarously slaughtered. Neither age nor sex was respected, and three thousand men, women, and children were put to death. Others were sent to the galleys, and their villages laid in ruins.

  In 1547 Francis died. Throughout his reign he had been stable in one thing—in his hatred of the house of Austria. In that he had shown wisdom. For the menace of Austria was a menace to all Europe, and not to France alone. In combating the desire for world dominion Francis had, in a sense, fought for Europe. He left France, moreover, actually increased in territory, stronger and more compact than before. He left her also more beautiful and advanced in culture. For he was the patron of both artists and men of letters, and many of the splendid castles which are still the glory of the Loire valley date from his reign.

  Francis was succeeded by his son Henry II. He was a mediocre and feeble prince, and allowed himself to be guided by ambitious counsellors, chief among them the Guises.

  Before long he was in league once more with the Protestant princes of Germany against his father's old enemy Charles. But now fortune had forsaken Charles, and from the walls of Metz he retired beaten.

  During this reign the Reformation made great progress in France. Men high in office, and even princes of the royal blood, joined the movement. Growing bolder in consequence, many who formerly had only worshipped in secret openly confessed their adherence to the new faith, and in 1555 the first Protestant church was established in Paris.

  Henry looked upon the spread of the new faith with fear and anger, and once more persecutions began. But these persecutions only made the Protestants cling more firmly to their faith.