19 Chapter 19.The Reformers Before the Reformation.A.D. 1400-1500.

Chapter 19. The Reformers Before the Reformation.

A.D. 1400-1500.

Whilst the Lollards were being persecuted in England, a revival work was springing up in another part of Europe, to which we would now draw the reader’s attention. This was in Bohemia; and the chief leader in the movement was the martyr-reformer, John Huss.

There is little doubt that the writings of Wickliffe kindled the first sparks of this revival; and the circumstances which led to it, on which, however, we can only linger for a moment, are thus given. The queen of Richard II. of England was a Bohemian princess, the sister of Wenceslaus, King of Bohemia. She was a woman of piety, and a student of the Scriptures; facts which may be learnt from the persecuting archbishop Arundel, who affirms that, "although she was a stranger, yet she constantly studied the four gospels in English, with the expositions of the doctors; and in the study of these, and the perusal of godly books, she was more diligent than the prelates themselves, although their office and calling required it." On the death of her husband she returned to Bohemia, taking with her the reformer’s works.

After this, a learned Bohemian of Prague, named Jerome, visited England, and became acquainted with several of the Lollards, whose teachings he imbibed. He afterwards returned to his own city, and taught the new doctrines with earnestness and success. At a still later period (A.D. 1404), two Englishmen of Canterbury visited Prague, and uttered antipapal sentiments. "They took up their abode in the suburbs of the Bohemian capital, in the house of one Luke Welensky, and, by his consent, painted on the walls of their room two pictures; one, the history of Christ’s passion, the other, the pomp of the papal court. The meaning of the pictorial antithesis was plain enough: people ran to see the rude drawings, and Huss (at that time a preacher at the Bethlehem chapel, and withal dean of the Philosophical faculty) referred to them in his sermons." From an early period Huss had shewn his sympathy with the Wickliffe movement. He was a man of profound learning, a clear thinker, and a skilful dialectician: in appearance the student rather than the priest, his figure being tall and spare, his cheeks pale, and his eyes grey and thoughtful. In manner he was dignified and grave; in morals austere and irreproachable. Like Wickliffe he always preached to the people in their native tongue, and like him was stern and emphatic in his exposure of prevailing abuses; but being a favourite at court, he was not at first molested. He cherished and revered the memory of the English reformer; and in his chapel of Bethlehem was frequently heard to pray that his soul might be with Wickliffe’s after its departure. The great schism in papal Christendom was still the topic of discussion when Huss was the preacher at Bethlehem Chapel and the popular rector of the University; and it was not likely he would let it pass without some words of censure. Yet his zeal on this subject did him but little harm, as the prohibitory decrees which were issued against him were disregarded by those who should have seen them carried out. It was circumstances of another kind, which made him a heretic in the sight of Rome, and one of too deep a dye for hope or pardon. In the year 1411 the pope of Rome, John XXIII., a man of dissolute life and military habits, proclaimed a crusade against Ladislaus, King of Naples, and offered the usual indulgences to all who joined the papal army. Huss was justly indignant that the cross of Christ should be degraded to such unchristian ends, and preached against the crusade. The people, inflamed by his eloquence, refused to listen to the papal missionaries, and interrupted their harangues by angry exclamations. This was a treatment to which they had not been accustomed, and to which they were not likely to submit in silence. To strike at the leader of the movement, however, would have been too perilous and precipitate a measure, nor would it have been wise, in the then agitated state of the people, to have taken public steps for their own protection. They therefore procured the secret arrest of three of the ringleaders, who, having been thrown into prison by order of the Senate, were hurriedly and privately executed. But the blood of the murdered men was seen oozing through the prison grating, and their fate was thus made known to their friends. This was the signal for a general rising, and the people rushed in a body to the town-house, which they took by storm. Breaking open the prison, they possessed themselves of the headless trunks of the victims, and bore them to a place of sepulture with martyr honours. Huss, meanwhile foreseeing the consequences to himself of this rash and lawless act, wisely withdrew from the city, and continued his preaching in places where he was more safe. A summons from the pope to answer for his conduct before the tribunal of the Vatican was disregarded, and for this was he excommunicated; but he went on preaching just the same, and the numbers of his converts and sympathisers increased daily.

Meanwhile, a council of prelates and others had been convened at Constance, an imperial city on the German side of the Alps, with the twofold purpose of healing the great schism, and of suppressing the heresies of Wickliffe; and in due course Huss received a summons to appear before it. We might fill several pages with accounts of the secret abominations and outspoken blasphemies of the members of this council, but the details are too revolting: we shall only refer to them because of their connection with John Huss, and their perfidious treatment of that truly noble man. When the Bohemian reformer had received his citation to appear at Constance, he did not hesitate to obey. He had declined to appear at Rome because he knew the faithlessness of the pope; but with the assembly at Constance the case was different. The prelates, in his idea, were the august representatives of that true church to which he belonged, and he knew that one of the purposes for which the council had been convened was identical with that which was often nearest his own heart when preaching. Yet though he had some confidence in placing himself in its power, he felt that a safe-conduct from the German emperor* might be a useful protection, and he procured one. To those unacquainted with the nature of a safe-conduct we may remark, that it was a passport granted by some person in authority, empowering the holder to go to and from a certain place without molestation. The wording of the Emperor Sigismund’s safe-conduct was as follows: "You shall let John Huss pass, stop, stay, and return freely without any hindrance whatever:" and with this in his possession the reformer started on his journey.

{*Sigismund.} And now mark the perfidy of Rome. No sooner had the reformer put his foot in Constance than he was seized and thrown into prison on a charge of heresy. That he held a safe-conduct from the emperor was well known to the council; but this was a difficulty easily removed, and they passed a decree that no faith should be kept with heretics. The people were amazed when they heard of the reformer’s arrest, and their indignant clamours reached the emperor from Bohemia. He had not yet arrived in Constance, and at first seemed disposed to side with the people in condemning the treachery of the council — he even talked of breaking open the prison in which the reformer was confined: but when he reached the city, the specious arguments of the priests overcame his sounder judgment, and he suffered them to do their will with the prisoner. The dungeon in which Huss had been confined was damp and fetid, and his food was stinted and unwholesome: by this treatment they thought to reduce his strength, and make him pliant in their hands. Their efforts were so far successful that the reformer became dangerously ill.

Early in June (A.D. 1415), and before he was thoroughly recovered, his public trial commenced; but though he was still so weak, he was forbidden to employ counsel, because, said his enemies, a heretic could not be defended. There were two charges preferred against him; the first, that of imbibing the doctrines of Wickliffe; the second, that of being "infected with the leprosy of the Vaudois." When called upon for his answer to the first charge he appealed to the authority of scripture, but his voice was immediately drowned in a tumult of scorn and derision. To attempt a defence under such circumstances was impossible; and when the next question was put he remained silent. Yet even this was made to militate against him, and his silence was received as a tacit acknowledgment of his guilt. When he again spoke his voice was again lost in the general uproar. At last the excitement became so great that it was found impossible to proceed with the trial; and the assembly was adjourned. On the second day the emperor appeared in person to preserve order; and on this occasion there seems to have been a greater show of decency, though the prelates failed to preserve their composure to the end. When, during the course of examination, Huss admitted that he had said that "Wickliffe was a true believer, that his soul was now in heaven, and that he could not wish his own soul more safe than Wickliffe’s," the holy fathers expressed their merriment in a burst of laughter. On the third day the trial was concluded, and Huss was remanded to prison pending the delivery of his sentence.

Throughout the trial there seems to have been one friend who clung to him, and that with an energy which belongs only to a very deep affection: this friend was a Bohemian knight, John of Chlum. He was with him on each occasion in court, and he attended him throughout his painful and tedious imprisonment; though not without considerable risk to his own person. "My dear master," he said when the third day of the trial was over, "I am unlettered, and consequently unfit to counsel one so enlightened as you. Nevertheless, if you are secretly conscious of any of those errors which have been publicly imputed to you, I do entreat you not to feel any shame in retracting it; but if on the contrary, you are convinced of your innocence, I am so far from advising you to say anything against your conscience, that I rather exhort you to endure every form of torture than to renounce anything which you hold to be true." Huss was deeply moved by the earnest and loving counsel of his friend, and told him with tears that God knew how willingly he would retract on oath any statement which he had made contrary to the holy scriptures. A month elapsed, and during that time the faithful knight seems to have been constantly with him proving himself a faithful disciple and true friend to the last. "Oh, what a comfort to me," said Huss, "to see that this nobleman did not disdain to stretch out his arm to a poor heretic in irons, whom all the world, as it were, had forsaken." On the 6th of July 1415, he stood before the council for the last time; and received his sentence. The sitting was held in the cathedral, and Huss was detained in the porch while mass was celebrated, as a heretic could not be permitted in the church during the ceremony. The bishop of Lodi preached the sermon, and chose for his text, "That the body of sin might be destroyed." His remarks were a fierce tirade against the heresies of Huss, who, he said, was "as bad as Arius and worse than Sabellius." The articles of accusation were then read, and sentence was pronounced. During the reading of the articles, Huss made several attempts to speak, but was prevented: and when he afterwards offered up a prayer for his enemies, and asked that God would forgive their injustice, his words were treated with derision. The martyr, strong in his integrity, then lifted up his hands and exclaimed, "Behold, most gracious Saviour, how the council condemns as an error what Thou hast prescribed and practised, when, overborne by enemies, Thou committedst Thy cause to God Thy Father, leaving us this example, that when we are oppressed we may have recourse to the judgment of God." The fervour of his eloquence had compelled attention, and during his few following remarks his enemies preserved an uneasy silence. Sigismund alone seemed undisturbed, but his discomfiture was only delayed. Suddenly lifting his eyes from the assembled prelates, Huss fixed them steadily on the emperor. "I came to this council," said he, in a firm, clear voice, "under the public faith of the emperor." Then a deep blush was seen to pass over the emperor’s face: and Huss had finished speaking.

He was now stripped of his priestly garments, and his head crowned with a paper mitre, on which were painted three devils. The sacramental cup, which had been meanwhile placed in his hands, was then taken from him with these words, "Accursed Judas, who, having forsaken the counsel of peace, art entered into that of the Jews, we take this holy cup from thee in which is the blood of Jesus Christ." "Nay," said Huss in a loud voice, "I trust, in the mercy of God, I shall drink of it this day in His kingdom." The bishops retorted, "We devote thy soul to the infernal demons." "And I," said Huss, "commit my spirit into Thy hands, O Lord Jesus Christ; unto Thee, I commend my soul which Thou hast redeemed."

Having been thus degraded from the priestly office, he was handed over to the emperor, as representing the secular power. "It is thy glorious office," said the bishop of Lodi, "to destroy heresies and schisms, especially this obstinate heretic;" and the emperor proceeded to his "glorious office" without delay. The place of martyrdom was not far distant, and thither Huss was immediately taken, under the escort of the elector Palatine and eight hundred horse. As he walked along his face shone with joy, and the people who lined the way were astonished at his pious ejaculations. "What this man has done," they said, "we know not; but we hear him offering up most excellent prayers to God." On arriving at the place of execution he was not allowed to address the people, but his prayer as he was being chained to the stake could not escape their ears. "Lord Jesus," he exclaimed, "I humbly suffer this cruel death for Thy sake, and I pray Thee to forgive all my enemies." At the last moment an attempt was made to induce him to sign a recantation, but in vain. "What I have written and taught," he said, "was in order to rescue souls from the power of the devil, and to deliver them from the tyranny of sin; and I do gladly seal what I have written and taught with my blood." The elector, who had exerted this last endeavour, now rode away from the spot, and the pile was lighted. But the martyr’s sufferings were speedily terminated; and while he was yet calling upon God, his head sank upon his breast, and he was suffocated in a rising cloud of smoke. Thus John Huss, having witnessed the good confession, obtained the martyr’s crown, and departed "to be with Christ, which is far better." His friend and fellow-labourer, Jerome of Prague, followed him in a little while. He was a man of greater learning, but not of greater endurance. Indeed, the tortures to which he was subjected during a barbarous imprisonment of nearly a year, so crushed his spirit that he was induced to sign a recantation. But the victory of his enemies did not last, and the Lord having graciously restored his soul, he quickly recanted his recantation. It is worthy of notice, that in spite of all the sufferings through which he passed at this time, his memory remained clear, and his intellect unimpaired, so that at his final trial (though he had been without books and paper, in a loathsome dungeon, for upwards of 340 days) his references to authorities, and frequent quotations were always prompt and correct; and his eloquence was such as to excite the admiration even of his enemies. "It was amazing," wrote the pope’s secretary Poggius, "to hear with what force of expression, fluency of language, and excellent reasoning, he answered his adversaries; nor was I less struck with the gracefulness of his manner, the dignity of his action, and the firmness and constancy of his whole behaviour. It grieved me to think so great a man was labouring under so atrocious an accusation. Whether this accusation be just or not, God knows: I make no inquiry into the merits of the case; I submit to those who know more of it than I do."

It was in the May of the year 1416 that Jerome was brought up for his final audience. He did not forget to reproach his adversaries with the fact, that he had been confined for over eleven months in prison, where he had been cramped with irons, poisoned with dirt and stench, and pinched with the want of necessaries. "And during this time," said he, "ye gave my enemies at all times a favourable hearing, but refused to hear me for a single hour." He then referred with shame to his retractation; and his sorrowful confession was in itself a testimony. "I confess and tremble when I think of it," he said, "that through fear of punishment by fire, I basely consented, against my conscience, to condemn the doctrine of Wickliffe and Huss. This sinful retractation I now fully retract, and am resolved to maintain the tenets of these men to death, believing them to be the true and pure doctrines of the gospel, even as their lives were blameless and holy." The Assembly behaved no better to their new victim than they had behaved to Huss; and their conduct is described by one of their own number as "unruly and indecent." Yet Jerome never lost his presence of mind, or suffered himself to be discomfited by their clamour and ridicule. He reminded them that his case was not an isolated one; that others, worthier than he, had been borne down by false witnesses and unjustly condemned. Joseph and Isaiah, Daniel and John the Baptist, yea, even his Divine Master, had been arraigned before councils, and suffered wrongfully at the hands of wicked men. "Ye have determined to condemn me unjustly," he cried, "but after my death I shall leave a sting in your consciences, and a worm that will never die. I appeal to the Sovereign Judge of all the earth, in whose presence ye must appear to answer me."

Language like this was more than sufficient to procure his speedy condemnation; but death had lost all terror for him now. When the trying moment drew near, his willingness to suffer was shewn by his cheerful countenance; and he went to the place of his martyrdom singing hymns of joy. In this he was like his friend and forerunner; and the simile did not escape the notice of a Roman Catholic historian (Aeneas Sylvius) who afterwards became pope.* "They went to the stake," says this writer, "as to a banquet: not a word fell from them which discovered the least timidity; they sung hymns in the flames, to the last gasp, without ceasing."

{*As Pius II.}

It is worthy of notice that John XXIII., the pope who summoned the council which condemned these noble martyrs, was afterwards deposed for his wickedness by the same council. This was the one worthy act they preformed, although, indeed, little credit is due to them, as the step was taken from interested motives. The martyrdom of Huss and Jerome, by which they hoped to purge Europe of the heresies of Wickliffe, not only left upon their consciences the awful reproach of a double murder, but, looked at from the side of Rome’s interests, was a fatal mistake. Instead of crushing by that means what they were pleased to call a seductive and scandalous heresy, they inflamed the minds of the Bohemian people, and produced a civil war. Even before the death of Jerome, several noblemen and other eminent persons in Bohemia had sent an indignant protest to the Council of Constance, in which they accused them of unrighteousness and cruelty, and expressed their determination to sacrifice their lives for the defence of the gospel of Christ, and of His faithful preachers. Their letter, however, had been contemptuously burnt by the assembled prelates; and the indifference of these holy fathers had been afterwards more insultingly shewn by the ruthless murder of their second victim. Their subsequent edicts of persecution did not help to soothe the popular mind, and when, in the year 1419, a Hussite minister was seized, and burnt, under circumstances of great cruelty,* the exasperated people flew to arms; and, headed by the king’s chamberlain, a one-eyed nobleman named Zisca, carried all before them.

{*His hands were bored through with a sword, and the holes were then threaded with a piece of rope, by which he was confined to the stake at which he suffered.} A large and well-trained army was brought against them by the emperor Sigismund, but it was scattered like chaff before the threshing-flails of the Bohemian peasants, who, in truth, had scarcely any other weapons with which to fight their battles. The pope’s legate, Cardinal Julian, was present at several of these encounters, and was amazed when he saw the flower of the emperor’s army — princes renowned for their bravery, and veterans of European fame — retreating in disorder before the uncouth weapons of a handful of peasants — nay — sometimes even flying when no man pursued, possessed by some unaccountable panic. On one of these occasions he burst into tears, and exclaimed, "Alas! it is not the enemy, but our sins which put us to flight!" Several popish writers have confessed their inability to account for the wonderful success of these Christian warriors, and one of them affirms, that the "Bohemians proved themselves a brave people; for though the emperor Sigismund led nearly half Europe in arms against them, he was not able to reduce them." Melanchthon, a reformer of the next century, ascribed their victories to miraculous agency, and believed that the angels of God accompanied them on their expeditions, and discomfited their enemies. On the death of Zisca in the year 1424, efforts were made to bring the war to a conclusion, and the Bohemians were invited to lay their ultimatum before a convocation at Basle. But the Hussites were not all so favourable to the proposed treaty; and as there had already been some grave differences of opinion among them, they separated into two parties. The one, demanding only that the cup should be restored to the laity, was easily cajoled into returning to the bosom of the church; and the pope promised to yield to the dissentients the point insisted upon: though, as soon as it was safe to do so, he violated his pledge. These were called the Calixtines, from the Greek kalyx, a cup. The other party, holding the doctrines of Huss in their entirety, refused to sign the compact, and were now exposed to persecution from their old friends in addition to that of Rome. They were known by the appellation of "Taborites," because they met for worship on a certain hill, which they called Mount Tabor. Meanwhile, an increased acquaintance with the word of God had taught the Taborites that their appeal to carnal weapons was contrary to the expressed mind and will of God; and when the persecution was revived, instead of returning to their threshing-flails and hoes, they appealed to no other weapon than "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." At length the severity of their sufferings excited the pity of the archbishop of Prague, who had formerly been a prominent Calixtine; and by his influence they were removed to the lordship of Lititz, on the confines of Moravia and Silesia; where for a time they were free from persecution, and were enabled to found a colony. Some of their brethren from the Calixtines now rejoined them, together with several citizens of Prague and not a few of the nobility: and to commemorate the re-union they took the name of Unitas Fratrum or the "United Brethren." This was in the year 1451.

Scarcely, however, had they been settled in their new quarters a twelvemonth, when they were again harassed by the merciless agents of Rome. A baseless charge of sedition was made the ground of this new persecution, and all the patience and all the faith of the Moravian Brethren was now called into practice. The cruelty of the inquisitors was worthy of their office; and hundreds of the guiltless and unresisting Moravians were seized by their orders and thrust into prison. Some were starved to death, others were racked, others mutilated, others burnt at the stake; while those who managed to escape, were forced to take up their abode in caverns and forests, where their food was the game they procured by hunting, and the wild berries which the bushes afforded. When they left their hidings they went in single file, each treading in the steps of the other, and the last carrying a branch with which to obliterate the marks of their feet; and thus they secured themselves against detection. When night came on they kindled their fires, which they dared not do in the day-time lest the rising smoke should betray them, and by the flickering glare of these midnight fires they held their pious meetings, and read their Bibles together. In the year 1470 they completed a translation of the Bible in the Bohemian language; and as printing from metal blocks had now come into general use on the Continent, through the efforts of the celebrated John Guttenberg, it was not long before the translation had gone through several editions. Thus one thing was helping on another, and, in spite of the efforts of Rome to mar and hinder, the way was being prepared for the approaching Reformation. Of the three remaining links, which connect the chain of testimony with the period above referred to, we cannot speak at any length. The first of these was Jerome Savonarola, a Dominican monk, and the son of a physician at Ferrara. In early life he believed himself to be the subject of heavenly visions; by which he was led to enter the convent of Bologna, where his fastings and mortifications attracted the notice of his superiors. He was afterwards removed to St. Mark’s convent at Florence; and here he rose to the dignity of prior; in which capacity he endeavoured to restore, as nearly as possible, the primitive simplicity of the monastic life. But it was his fame as a preacher of reform outside his convent, which made him a marked man at Rome his unsparing denunciations of the pope; his attacks on the vices of the clergy; his passionate laments over the spiritual deadness of the times. "The church," he said, "had once her golden priests and wooden chalices; but now the chalices are gold and the priests wooden; for the outward splendour of religion has been hurtful to spirituality." The pope tried to silence the great preacher by the offer of a cardinal’s hat, but a cardinal’s hat had no attractions for Savonarola. He received the offer with indignation, and declared that the only red hat which he coveted was one that should be dyed with the blood of martyrdom. At length he was seized and thrown into prison. Here he improved his time by reflection and prayer, and wrote a spiritual meditation on Psalm xxxi., in which he described the inward wrestlings of the converted man. After being cruelly tortured by order of the Inquisition, the order for his condemnation was signed by the same pope who would have made him a cardinal, and he was burnt at the stake in the year 1499. The second of the three connecting links was John of Wesalia, a famous doctor of divinity of Erfurt. This devoted man was much harassed in his old age by the popish inquisitors, who confined his weak limbs in iron fetters, and subjected him to many indignities. He taught that salvation was by grace alone, that pilgrimages, fasts, extreme unction, etc., were of no profit to the soul, and that the word of God is the only authority, in all matters of faith. Some of his opinions he was at length induced to withdraw; but the retractation had no effect in curbing the resentment of his enemies, and after languishing in prison a few months longer, he was mercifully released by death (A.D. 1479). The third link was John Wesselus or Wessel, a friend of John of Wesalia, and sometimes mistaken for his friend. He was born at Groningen in Holland, about the year 1419, and obtained a European celebrity. Though he was unquestionably the greatest theologian of his age, he was never ordained, and hence was never associated with any ecclesiastical body. It was not an uncommon practice in his day to adopt the clerical character in order to evade persecution; and this explains a remark he once made, that "he was not afraid of the gallows and therefore had no need of the tonsure." When his friend Rovere, general of the Franciscans, was raised to the papal throne, the newly-elected pope asked him, was there any request he would like to make of him. "Yes," said Wessel, "I beg you to give me out of the Vatican library a Greek and Hebrew Bible." "You shall have those," was the reply, "but, foolish man, why do you not ask for a bishopric or something of that sort?" "For the best of reasons," said Wessel, "because I do not want such things."

Such was the spirit of the man who was to carry on the line of testimony — that "silver line of grace" as another has called it — which we have traced from the era of the apostles, and to connect it with the line of testimony which runs through the period of the Reformation. He does not seem to have been much persecuted in his life-time, although the whole tenor of his teaching was opposed to the ways and maxims of Rome. Luther, in the next century, expressed his surprise that the writings of Wessel should be so little known, adding that "the reason might be that he lived without blood and contention," for that was the only point of difference between them. He spoke of him as "a man of admirable genius and uncommonly large mind," who was evidently taught of God, and "did not receive his doctrines from men." "If I had read his works before," said Luther, "my enemies might have supposed that I learnt everything from Wesselus, such a perfect coincidence there is in our opinions. . . . . It is now impossible for me to doubt whether I am right in the points which I have inculcated, when I see so entire an agreement in sentiment, and almost the same words used by this eminent person, who lived in a different age, in a distant country, and in circumstances very unlike my own."

Wesselus died full of honours in his seventieth year, acknowledging with his latest breath the intense satisfaction of his soul in the fact, that "all he knew was Jesus Christ and Him crucified." This was in the year 1489. Luther was then a lad six years of age. Thus the line of testimony was connected with the period of the great Reformation, and the chain of witnesses, thus far, had been preserved without a break.