whelmed unawares by a superior force, and accordingly raised an army for their defence. While this terrible storm was rising, Luther, whose aversion to all methods of violence and force in matters of religion was well known, and who recommended prayer and patience as the only arms worthy of those who had the cause of genuine Christianity at heart, was removed by providence from this scene of tumult, and the approaching calamities that threatened his country. He died in peace, on the 18th of February, in the year 1546, at Aysleben, the place of his birth,

CHAPTER IV.

THE HISTORY OF THE REFORMATION, FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WAR OF SMALCALD TO THE FAMOUS PACIFICATION, COMMONLY CALLED THE PEACE OF RELIGION, CONCLUDED AT AUGSBURG.

The com

of the war

I. THE emperor and the pope had mutually resolved the destruction of all who should dare to oppose the counmencement cil of Trent. The meeting of that assembly was to of Smalcald. serve as a signal for their taking arms; and accordingly, its deliberations were scarcely begun, in the year 1546, when the protestants perceived undoubted marks of the approaching storm, and of a formidable union between the emperor and the pontiff to overwhelm and crush them by a sudden blow. There had been, it is true, a new conference this very year, at the diet of Ratisbon, between some eminent doctors of both parties, with a view to the accommodation of their religious differences; but it appeared sufficiently, both from the nature of this dispute, the manner it was carried on, and its issue and result, that the matters in debate would, sooner or later, be decided in the field of battle. In the mean time, the fathers, assembled in the council of Trent, promulgated their decrees; whilst the protestant princes in the diet of Ratisbon, protested against their authority, and were, in consequence of this, proscribed by the emperor, who raised an army to reduce them to obedience.

II. The elector of Saxony and the landgrave of Hesse led their forces into Bavaria against the emperor, The affairs of and cannonaded his camp at Ingolstadt with great

the protest

ants take a unfavourable

spirit. It was supposed that this would bring the two armies to a general action; but several cir- urn. cumstances prevented a battle, which was expected by the most of the confederates, and probably, would have been advantageous to their cause. Among these we may reckon principally, the perfidy of Maurice, duke of Saxony, who, seduced by the promises of the emperor on the one hand, and by his own ambition and avarice on the other, invaded the electoral dominions of his uncle, John Frederic, while that worthy prince was maintaining against the emperor the sacred cause of religion and liberty. Add to this the divisions that were fomented by the dissimulation of the emperor among the confederate princes; the failure of France in furnishing the subsidy that had been promised by its monarch; and other incidents of less moment. All these things so discouraged the heads of the protestant party, that their army was soon dispersed, and the elector of Saxony directed his march homeward. But he was pursued by the emperor, who made several forced marches, with a view to destroy his enemy, before he should have time to recover his vigour; in which design he was assisted by the ill-grounded security of the elector, and, as there is too much reason to think, by the treachery of his officers. The two armies drew up in order of battle near Muhlberg on the Elbe, on the 24th of April, 1547; and after a bloody action, that of the elector being inferior in numbers, was entirely defeated, and himself taken prisoner. Philip, landgrave of Hesse, the other chief of the protestants, was persuaded by the entreaties of his son-in-law Maurice, now declared elector of Saxony,' to throw himself upon the mercy of the emperor, and to implore his pardon. To this he consented, relying on the promise of Charles for cbtaining forgiveness, and being restored to liberty; but notwithstanding these expectations, he was unjustly detained prisoner by a scandalous violation of the most solemn convention. It is said that the emperor retracted his promise, and deluded this unhappy prince by the ambiguity of two German words, which resemble each other ; but this point

ix In the room of John Frederic, whom he had so basely betrayed.

y There is scarcely in history any instance of such a mean, perfidious, and despotic behaviour as that of the emperor to the landgrave in the case now before us, After having received in public the humble submissions of that unhappy prince, made upon his knees, and that in the most respectful and affecting terms, and after having set him at liberty by a solemn treaty, he had him arrested anew, without alleging any

temporary

the Interim.

of history has not been hitherto so far cleared up, as to enable us to judge with certainty concerning the confinement of this prince, and the real causes to which it was owing." II. This revolution seemed every way adapted to comThe famous plete the ruin of the protestant cause, and to crown dict called the efforts of the Roman pontiff with the most triumphant success. In the diet of Augsburg, which was assembled soon after, with an imperial army at hand to promote union and despatch, the emperor required of the protestants, that they would leave the decision of these religious contests to the wisdom of the council that was to meet at Trent. The greatest part of the members consented to this proposal; and among others, Maurice, the new elector of Saxony, who owed both his electorate and his dominions to the emperor, and who was ardently desirous of obtaining the liberty of his father-in-law, the landgrave of Hesse. This general submission to the will of the emperor did not, however, produce the fruits that were expected from such a solemn, and almost universal approbation of the council of Trent. A plague, which manifested itself, or was said so to do, in that city, engaged the greatest part of the assembled fathers to retire to Bologna, and thereby the council was, in effect, dissolved; nor could all the entreaties and remonstrances of the emperor prevail upon the pope to reassemble it again without delay. While things were in this situation, and the prospect of seeing a council assembled was cast at a distance, the emperor judged it necessary, during this interval, to fall upon some method of maintaining peace in religious matters, until the decision, so long expected, should be finally obtained. It was with this view that he ordered Julius Pflugius, bishop of Naumburg, Michael Sidonius, a creature of the pontiff, and John Agricola, a native of Aysleben, to draw up a Formulary, which might serve as a rule of faith and worship to both of the contending parties, until a council

reason, nay, any pretext, and kept him for several years in a close and severe confinement. When Maurice remonstrated to the emperor against this new imprisonment, the emperor answered, that he had never promised that the landgrave should not be imprisoned anew, but only that he should be exempted from perpetual imprisonment; and to support this assertion, he produced the treaty, in which his ministers, in order to clude the true meaning of the accommodation, had perfidiously foisted in ewiger gefangnis, which significs a perpetual prison, instead of einiger gefangnis, which means any priThis matter is however contested by some historians.

son.

z See a German work, entitled Beni Grosch Vertheidigung der Evangelischen Kirken gegen Gottfr. Arnold. p. 29.

should be summoned. As this was only a temporary appointment, and had not the force of a permanent or perpetual institution, the rule in question was called the Interim."

edict gave

IV. This temporary rule of faith and discipline, though it was extremely favourable to the interests and The troubles pretensions of the court of Rome, had yet the which this fate to which schemes of reconciliation are often rise. exposed: it pleased neither of the contending parties, but was equally offensive to the followers of Luther, and to the Roman pontiff. It was however promulgated with solemnity by the emperor, at the diet of Augsburg; and the elector of Mentz, without even deigning to ask the opinions of the assembled princes and states, rose with an air of authority, and, as if he had been commissioned to represent the whole diet, gave a formal and public approbation to this famous Interim." Thus were many princes of the empire, whose silence, though it proceeded from want of courage, was interpreted as the mark of a tacit consent, engaged against their will to receive this book, as a body of ecclesiastical law. The greatest part of those, who had the resolution to dispute the authority of this imperial creed, were obliged to submit to it by the force of arms; and, hence arose deplorable scenes of violence and bloodshed, which involved the empire in the greatest calamities.

Pa This project of Charles was formed partly to vent his resentment against the pope, and partly to answer other purposes of a more political kind. Be that as it may, the Formula ad Interim, or Temporary rule of faith and worship, here mentioned, contained all the essential doctrines of the church of Rome, though considerably softened and mitigated by the moderate, prudent, and artful terms in which they were expressed; terms quite different from those that were employed, before and after this period, by the council of Trent. There was even an affected ambiguity in many expressions, which rendered them susceptible of different senses, applicable to the sentiments of both communions, and therefore disagreeable to both. The Interim was composed with that fraudulent, specious, and seducing dexterity, that in aftertimes appeared in the deceitful Exposition of the Catholic Faith, by M. Bossuet, bishop of Meaux, and it was almost equally rejected by the protestants and Roman catholics. The cup was allowed, by this imperial creed, to the protestants in the administration of the Lord's supper, and priests and clerks were permitted by it to enter into the married state. These grants were, however, accompanied with the two following conditions; "1. That every one should be at liberty to use the cup, or to abstain from it, and to choose a state of marriage, or a state of celibacy, as he should judge most fitting. 2. That these grants should remain in force no longer than the happy period when a general council should terminate all religious differences." This second condition was adapted to produce the greatest disorder and confusion, in case the future council should think proper to enjoin celibacy on the clergy, and declare, as it did in effect, their marriage unchristian and unlawful.

a See Jo. Erdm. Bieckii Triplex Interim, published in 8vo. at Leipsic, in the year 1721. Luc. Osiander Centuria XVI. Histor. Eccles. lib. ii. cap. lxviii. p. 425. For an account of the authors and editions of the book called Interim, see Die Danische Biblioth. part v. p. 1, and part vi. p. 185.

Maurice, elector of Saxony, who for some time had held a neutral conduct, and neither declared himself for those who rejected, nor for those who had adopted the rule in question assembled, in the year 1548, the Saxon nobility and clergy, with Melancthon at the head of the latter, and in several conferences held at Leipsic and other places, took counsel concerning what was to be done in this critical affair. The deliberations, on this occasion, were long and tedious, and their result was ambiguous; for Melancthon, whose opinion was respected as a law by the reformed doctors, fearing the emperor on the one hand, and attentive to the sentiments of his sovereign on the other, pronounced a sort of a reconciling sentence, which he hoped would be offensive to no party. He gave it as his opinion, that the whole of the book called Interim could not, by any means, be adopted by the friends of the reformation; but he declared, at the same time, that he saw no reason why this book might not be approved, adopted, and received, as an authoritative rule, in things that did not relate to the essential points of religion, in things that might be considered as accessory or indifferent." This'decision, instead of pacifying matters, produced, on the contrary, new divisions, and formed a schism among the followers of Luther, of which farther mention shall be made hereafter, in the History of the Church established by that reformer. I shall only observe, that this schism placed the cause of the reformation in the most perilous and critical circumstances, and might have contributed either to ruin it entirely, or to retard considerably its progress, had the pope and the emperor been dexterous enough to make the proper use of these divisions, and to seize the favourable occasion that was presented to them, of turning the force of the protestants against themselves.

a council at

v. Amidst these contests Paul III. departed this life in The project of the year 1549, and was succeeded, the year folTrent renewed. lowing, by Julius III. who, yielding to the repeated and importunate solicitations of the emperor, consented to the assembling a council at Trent. Accordingly, in the diet of Augsburg, which was again held under

h By things indifferent, Melancthon understood particularly the rites and coremonies of the popish worship, which, superstitious as they were, that reformer, yielding to the softness and flexibility of his natural temper, treated with a singular and excessive indulgence upon this occasion.