But the end is often long in coming; and these nobler principles are meanwhile not provided for us by the inductive philosophy.
Patriotism, for instance, of which we used to think something—a readiness to devote our energies while we live, to devote our lives, if nothing else will serve, to what we call our country—what are we to say of that?
I once asked a distinguished philosopher what he thought of patriotism. He said he thought it was a compound of vanity and superstition; a bad kind of prejudice, which would die out with the growth of reason. My friend believed in the progress of humanity—he could not narrow his sympathies to so small a thing as his own country. I could but say to myself, 'Thank God, then, we are not yet a nation of philosophers.'
A man who takes up with philosophy like that, may write fine books, and review articles and such like, but at the bottom of him he is a poor caitiff, and there is no more to be said about him.
So when the air is heavy with imposture, and men live only to make money, and the service of God is become a thing of words and ceremonies, and the kingdom of heaven is bought and sold, and all that is high and pure in man is smothered by corruption—fire of the same kind bursts out in higher natures with a fierceness which cannot be controlled; and, confident in truth and right, they call fearlessly on the seven thousand in Israel who have not bowed the knee to Baal to rise and stand by them.
They do not ask whether those whom they address have wide knowledge of history, or science, or philosophy; they ask rather that they shall be honest, that they shall be brave, that they shall be true to the common light which God has given to all His children. They know well that conscience is no exceptional privilege of the great or the cultivated, that to be generous and unselfish is no prerogative of rank or intellect.
Erasmus considered that, for the vulgar, a lie might be as good as truth, and often better. A lie, ascertained to be a lie, to Luther was deadly poison—poison to him, and poison to all who meddled with it. In his own genuine greatness, he was too humble to draw insolent distinctions in his own favour; or to believe that any one class on earth is of more importance than another in the eyes of the Great Maker of them all.
Well, then, you know what I mean by faith, and what I mean by intellect. It was not that Luther was without intellect. He was less subtle, less learned, than Erasmus; but in mother wit, in elasticity, in force, and imaginative power, he was as able a man as ever lived. Luther created the German language as an instrument of literature. His translation of the Bible is as rich and grand as our own, and his table talk as full of matter as Shakespeare's plays.
Again; you will mistake me if you think I represent Erasmus as a man without conscience, or belief in God and goodness. But in Luther that belief was a certainty; in Erasmus it was only a high probability—and the difference between the two is not merely great, it is infinite. In Luther, it was the root; in Erasmus, it was the flower. In Luther, it was the first principle of life; in Erasmus, it was an inference which might be taken away, and yet leave the world a very tolerable and habitable place after all.
You see the contrast in their early lives. You see Erasmus—light, bright, sarcastic, fond of pleasure, fond of society, fond of wine and kisses, and intellectual talk and polished company. You see Luther throwing himself into the cloister, that he might subdue his will to the will of God; prostrate in prayer, in nights of agony, and distracting his easy-going confessor with the exaggerated scruples of his conscience.
You see it in the effects of their teaching. You see Erasmus addressing himself with persuasive eloquence to kings, and popes, and prelates; and for answer, you see Pope Leo sending Tetzel over Germany with his carriage-load of indulgences. You see Erasmus's dearest friend, our own gifted admirable Sir Thomas More, taking his seat beside the bishops and sending poor Protestant artisans to the stake.
You see Luther, on the other side, standing out before the world, one lone man, with all authority against him—taking lies by the throat, and Europe thrilling at his words, and saying after him, 'The reign of Imposture shall end.'
Let us follow the course of Erasmus after the tempest had broken.
He knew Luther to be right. Luther had but said what Erasmus had been all his life convinced of, and Luther looked to see him come forward and take his place at his side. Had Erasmus done so, the course of things would have been far happier and better. His prodigious reputation would have given the Reformers the influence with the educated which they had won for themselves with the multitude, and the Pope would have been left without a friend to the north of the Alps. But there would have been some danger—danger to the leaders, if certainty of triumph to the cause—and Erasmus had no gift for martyrdom.
His first impulse was generous. He encouraged the elector, as we have seen, to protect Luther from the Pope. 'I looked on Luther,' he wrote to Duke George of Saxe, 'as a necessary evil in the corruption of the Church; a medicine, bitter and drastic, from which sounder health would follow.'
And again, more boldly: 'Luther has taken up the cause of honesty and good sense against abominations which are no longer tolerable. His enemies are men under whose worthlessness the Christian world has groaned too long.'
So to the heads of the Church he wrote, pressing them to be moderate and careful:—
'I neither approve Luther nor condemn him,' he said to the Archbishop of Mayence; 'if he is innocent, he ought not to be oppressed by the factions of the wicked; if he is in error, he should be answered, not destroyed. The theologians'—observe how true they remain to the universal type in all times and in all countries—'the theologians do not try to answer him. They do but raise an insane and senseless clamour, and shriek and curse. Heresy, heretic, heresiarch, schismatic, Antichrist—these are the words which are in the mouths of all of them; and, of course, they condemn without reading. I warned them what they were doing. I told them to scream less, and to think more. Luther's life they admit to be innocent and blameless. Such a tragedy I never saw. The most humane men are thirsting for his blood, and they would rather kill him than mend him. The Dominicans are the worst, and are more knaves than fools. In old times, even a heretic was quietly listened to. If he recanted, he was absolved; if he persisted, he was at worst excommunicated. Now they will have nothing but blood. Not to agree with them is heresy. To know Greek is heresy. To speak good Latin is heresy. Whatever they do not understand is heresy. Learning, they pretend, has given birth to Luther, though Luther has but little of it. Luther thinks more of the Gospel than of scholastic divinity, and that is his crime. This is plain at least, that the best men everywhere are those who are least offended with him.'
Even to Pope Leo, in the midst of his fury, Erasmus wrote bravely; separating himself from Luther, yet deprecating violence. 'Nothing,' he said, 'would so recommend the new teaching as the howling of fools:' while to a member of Charles's council he insisted that 'severity had been often tried in such cases and had always failed; unless Luther was encountered calmly and reasonably, a tremendous convulsion was inevitable.'
Wisely said all this, but it presumed that those whom he was addressing were reasonable men; and high officials, touched in their pride, are a class of persons of whom Solomon may have been thinking when he said, 'Let a bear robbed of her whelps meet a man rather than a fool in his folly.'
So to Luther, so to the people, Erasmus preached moderation. It was like preaching to the winds in a hurricane. The typhoon itself is not wilder than human creatures when once their passions are stirred. You cannot check them; but, if you are brave, you can guide them wisely. And this, Erasmus had not the heart to do.
He said at the beginning, 'I will not countenance revolt against authority. A bad government is better than none.' But he said at the same time, 'You bishops, cease to be corrupt: you popes and cardinals, reform your wicked courts: you monks, leave your scandalous lives, and obey the rules of your order, so you may recover the respect of mankind, and be obeyed and loved as before.'