the Church was burdened and the poor oppressed for the sake of enriching the clergy.

The humor

of Erasmus.

These more serious writings were intermingled with humorous and satirical works in the vein of the "Praise of Folly." Among the latter were the "Colloquies," in which the idleness, illitous writings eracy, self-indulgence, and artificial and useless austerities of the religious were exhibited in a ridiculous light. There were also several successive editions of the "Adages," each larger than the former, and each containing some fresh attack on the abuses of the age. Erasmus would never write anything which would give aid or comfort to the defenders of what he termed the "Pharisaic kingdom." His comments on misgovernment in the Church, on the vices and oppressions of the clergy, from the pope downward, were the more effective because they were generally put in a humorous form. They all, as Coleridge has said, possess the peculiar merit that they can be translated into arguments. In his religious opinions Erasmus was broad and tolerant, His liberality. He would do away with the tyranny and avarice of the

court of Rome, but would leave the constitution of the Church undisturbed. He would have the creed very short, embodying only the "plain truths contained in Scripture." He left much room for individual judgment, and was for referring difficult questions, not to "the next general council "-about which men were always talking-but to the time when we see God face to face. His liking for religious liberty came partly from his personal kindliness and his liberal culture, and partly, perhaps, from the consciousness that without the practice of a pretty wide toleration by rulers in Church and State he would himself fare ill. He was early recognized by the more ardent adherents of the medieval system as one whose influence threatened to destroy their ascendency. They were no match for him in literary combat, but they could, despite his professions of orthodoxy, continually annoy him with imputations of heresy. Some of these, however, like the condemnation of the "Colloquies" by the University of Paris, tended only to diffuse his ideas still more widely.

The influence of Erasmus was not limited to his formal publications. He carried on a vast correspondence with eminent persons Extent of his ecclesiastics, statesmen, and scholars-who were his influence. friends and patrons. He rapidly became the foremost literary man of his time. In the extent of his influence, and in the deference paid him by the great, he has been approached by none, unless it be Voltaire, who, however different in important respects,

was like him in being a wit and iconoclast, and in the keen, critical character of his intellect. His fame depended in part on the uni versal use of Latin as the common language of educated men. Although he had lived in England and Italy, Erasmus was acquainted with neither Italian nor English. His Latin style did not possess the classical finish of many of the Humanists, who were horror stricken at the use of a word not found in Cicero, or, at least, not sanctioned by the best ancient authority. Latin was to him the language of every-day life, and into it his genius infused an unwonted vigor. He wrote hastily. "I precipitate," he says, “ rather than compose."

Erasmus had a far more important work to do than the writing of elegant Latin. It was his great purpose to deliver the minds of men from the bondage of superstition and dogmatism, to bring in the reign of culture and liberality, of a simpler and purer Christianity. The multitude of books and pamphlets which came from his pen, and were sent forth from Froben's press at Basel, contributed nct a little to the realizing of this purpose. They also did much to prepare the way for the religious revolution which broke out long before the work of Erasmus was over, and some of whose tendencies he could not but view with anxiety and repugnance. His relations to Luther and to the Protestant cause will be spoken of in the history of the next period.

THE MODERN ERA.

PERIOD VIII.

FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE REFORMATION TO THE PEACE OF WESTPHALIA (1517-1648).

THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF PROTESTANTISM: THE CONFLICT OF RELIGIOUS PARTIES.

CHAPTER I.

THE REFORMATION IN GERMANY, FROM THE POSTING OF LU. THER'S THESES TO THE DIET OF AUGSBURG (1517-1530).

The era of progress.

THE Reformation, like all other great social convulsions, was long in preparation. It was one part of that general progress, complex in its character, which marked the fifteenth century and the opening of the sixteenth as the period of transition from the Middle Ages to modern civilization. The glory of the Holy Empire had long since departed. The papacy, its counterpart in the medieval commonwealth, had sunk almost to the level of an Italian principality. In the meantime, all the nations of the West were becoming consolidated. A European state-system was growing up. It is a significant fact that in the fifteenth century resident embassies were established at the different courts. The invention of gunpowder revolutionized the art of war, making the serf in combat equal to the noble. While this invention thus enabled monarchs, by means of peasant armies, to destroy the remaining power of the feudal nobility, it also placed in the hands of the people an instrument wherewith to check the tyranny of kings. In this period, likewise, the masterpieces of ancient sculpture and the literary treasures of antiquity were brought forth from their tombs. The writings of Greek and Roman philosophers, orators, and poets, were diffused far and wide by the newly invented art of printing with