Disclaimer and statement of intent: Unfortunately, the religious "scandal score" needs to be evened up now and then, and the lesser-known "skeletons in the closet" need to be rescued from obscurity, surveyed, and exposed. I take no pleasure in "dredging up" these unsavory occurrences, but it is necessary for honest, fair historical appraisal. Nor does this at all mean that I have forsaken ecumenism, nor that I wish to bash Protestants, nor that I deny corresponding Catholic shortcomings. Historical fact is historical fact, and most Protestants (and Catholics) are unaware of the following historical events and beliefs (while, on the other hand, one always hears about the embarrassing and scandalous Catholic stuff - and not often very accurately or fairly at that). If (as I suspect might often be the case) you the reader were shocked or surprised by the very title of this paper, this would be a case in point, and justification enough for my purposes of education. With that end and stated outlook in mind, I humbly offer this copiously-researched treatise, yet not without some remaining trepidation:

I. PROTESTANT INTOLERANCE: AN INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW
II. PROTESTANT DIVISIONS AND MUTUAL ANIMOSITIES
III. PLUNDER AS AN AGENT OF RELIGIOUS REVOLUTION
IV. SYSTEMATIC SUPPRESSION OF CATHOLICISM
V. VIOLENT RADICALISM AND THE PROTESTANT REVOLUTION
VI. DEATH AND TORTURE FOR CATHOLICS AND PROTESTANT DISSIDENTS
VII. PROTESTANT CENSORSHIP
VIII. AFTERWORD
BIBLIOGRAPHY
FOOTNOTES


EXPLANATION OF FOOTNOTING SYSTEM

Number of book in Bibliography (#3) followed by the page number of the citation.

Number of reference not found in Bibliography. Information on source and page number in Footnotes (number 18 in the Footnotes).

Number of book in Bibliography followed by the page number, plus an additional source (usually primary), listed in the Footnotes. The Footnotes (#4) will give the specific section and page numbers from the second source. This format is usually used when directly quoting Protestants such as Luther or Calvin, or the Church Fathers.

Number of book in Bibliography followed by the volume number (when the work is more than one volume), and the page number. An additional source may also be cited after a slash, as in Example No. 3.

Used only when a passage from a Bible translation other than KJV is cited. The "vs" stands for verse, (which can be found, of course, without a page number), in order to distinguish the reference number from a plain footnote citation (as in Example No. 2).

A. Johann von Dollinger

"Historically nothing is more incorrect than the assertion that the Reformation was a movement in favour of intellectual freedom. The exact contary is the truth. For themselves, it is true, Lutherans and Calvinists claimed liberty of conscience . . . but to grant it to others never occurred to them so long as they were the stronger side. The complete extirpation of the Catholic Church, and in fact of everything that stood in their way, was regarded by the reformers as something entirely natural." (51;v.6:268-9/1)

B. Preserved Smith (Secularist)

"If any one still harbors the traditional prejudice that the early Protestants were more liberal, he must be undeceived. Save for a few splendid sayings of Luther, confined to the early years when he was powerless, there is hardly anything to be found among the leading reformers in favor of freedom of conscience. As soon as they had the power to persecute they did." (115:177)

C. Hartmann Grisar

"At Zurich, Zwingli's State-Church grew up much as Luther's did . . . Oecolampadius at Basle and Zwingli's successor, Bullinger, were strong compulsionists. Calvin's name is even more closely bound up with the idea of religious absolutism, while the task of handing down to posterity his harsh doctrine of religious compulsion was undertaken by Beza in his notorious work, On the Duty of Civil Magistrates to Punish Heretics. The annals of the Established Church of England were likewise at the outset written in blood." (51;v.6:278)

D. Henry Hallam (P)

"The Reform was brought about by intemperate and calumnious abuse, by outrages of an excited populace or by the tyranny of princes . . . it instantly withdrew . . . liberty of judgment and devoted all who presumed to swerve from the line drawn by law to virulent obloquy, and sometimes to bonds and death. These reproaches, it may be a shame to us to own, can be uttered and cannot be refuted." (50:295-6/2)

E. Francois Guizot (P)

"The Reformation of the 16th century was not aware of the true principles of intellectual liberty . . . At the very moment it was demanding these rights for itself it was violating them towards others." (50:297/3)

F. William Lecky (P)

"What shall we say of a church . . . that had as yet no services to show, no claims upon the gratitude of mankind . . . which nevertheless suppressed by force a worship that multitudes deemed necessary to salvation? . . . So strong and so general was its intolerance that for some time it may, I believe, be truly said that there were more instances of partial toleration being advocated by Roman Catholics than by orthodox Protestants. " (50:298/4)

G. Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (P)

"The Reformers themselves . . . e.g., Luther, Beza, and especially Calvin, were as intolerant to dissentients as the Roman Catholic Church." (78:1383)

"Religious persecution usually continues till one of two causes rises to repress it. One is the sceptical notion that all religions are equally good or equally worthless; the other is an enlightened spirit of tolerance, exercised towards all varieties of sincere opinion . . . inspired by the conviction that it is useless to endeavor to compel belief in any form of religion whatsoever. Unhappily this enlightened, tolerant spirit is of slow growth, and never has been conspicuous in history, but if it be asserted that very few Catholics in the past have been inspired by it, the same thing can be said of Protestants.

"This fact is forgotten by Protestants. They read blood-curdling stories of the Inquisition and of atrocities committed by Catholics, but what does the average Protestant know of Protestant atrocities in the centuries succeeding the Reformation? Nothing, unless he makes a special study of the subject . . . Yet they are perfectly well known to every scholar . . . If I do not enumerate here the persecutions carried on by Catholics in the past, it is because it is not necessary in this book to do so. This volume is addressed especially to Protestants, and Catholic persecutions are to them sufficiently well known . . .

"Now granting for the sake of argument, that all that is usually said of Catholic persecutions is true, the fact remains that Protestants, as such, have no right to denounce them, as if such deeds were characteristic of Catholics only. People who live in glass houses should not throw stones . . .

"It is unquestionable . . . that the champions of Protestantism - Luther, Calvin, Beza, Knox, Cranmer and Ridley - advocated the right of the civil authorities to punish the `crime' of heresy . . . Rousseau says truly:

"`The Reformation was intolerant from its cradle, and its authors were universal persecutors' . . .

Auguste Comte also writes:

"`The intolerance of Protestantism was certainly not less tyrannical than that with which Catholicism is so much reproached.' (Philosophie Positive, vol.4, p.51).

"What makes, however, Protestant persecutions specially revolting is the fact that they were absolutely inconsistent with the primary doctrine of Protestantism - the right of private judgment in matters of religious belief! Nothing can be more illogical than at one moment to assert that one may interpret the Bible to suit himself, and at the next to torture and kill him for having done so!

"Nor should we ever forget that . . . the Protestants were the aggressors, the Catholics were the defenders. The Protestants were attempting to destroy the old, established Christian Church, which had existed 1500 years, and to replace it by something new, untried and revolutionary. The Catholics were upholding a Faith, hallowed by centuries of pious associations and sublime achievements; the Protestants, on the contrary, were fighting for a creed . . . which already was beginning to disintegrate into hostile sects, each of which, if it gained the upper hand, commenced to persecute the rest! . . . All religious persecution is bad; but in this case, of the two parties guilty of it, the Catholics certainly had the more defensible motives for their conduct.

"At all events, the argument that the persecutions for heresy, perpetrated by the Catholics, constitute a reason why one should not enter the Catholic Church, has not a particle more force than a similar argument would have against one's entering the Protestant Church. In both there have been those deserving of blame in this respect, and what applies to one applies also to the other." (92:204-5,209-l0)

A. Hartmann Grisar

"Luther's intolerance is very much at variance with the Protestant view still current to some extent in erudite circles, but more particularly in popular literature. Luther, for all the harshness of his disposition, is yet regarded as having in principle advocated leniency, as having been a champion of personal religious freedom . . . Below we shall, however, quote a series of statements from Protestant writers who have risen superior to such party prejudice:

B. Walther Kohler (P)

"In Luther's case it is impossible to speak of liberty of conscience or religious freedom . . . The death-penalty for heresy rested on the highest Lutheran authority . . . The views of the other reformers on the persecution and bringing to justice of heretics were merely the outgrowth of Luther's plan; they contributed nothing fresh." (5)

C. Karl Wappler (P)

"Even contempt of the outward Word, carelessness about going to church and contempt of Scripture - in this in-stance . . . the Bible as interpreted by Luther - was now regarded as `rank blasphemy,' which it was the duty of the authorities to punish as such. To such lengths had the vaunted freedom of the Gospel now gone." (6)

D. Johann Neander (P)

"[Luther's views] would justify all sorts of oppression on the part of the State, and all kinds of intellectual tyranny, and were in fact the same as those on which the Roman Emperors acted when they persecuted Christianity." (51;v.6: 266-8)

E. Adolf von Harnack (P)

"It is an altogether one-sided view, one, indeed, which willfully disregards the facts, to hail in Luther the man of the new age, the hero of enlightenment and the creator of the modern spirit. If we wish to contemplate such heroes we must turn to Erasmus [a Catholic] and his associates . . . In the periphery of his existence Luther was an Old Catholic, a medieval phenomenon." (85:193/7)

F. Dean William Inge (P)

"The Anglican Dean Inge, of St. Paul's Cathedral, London, did not hesitate to say . .

'If we wish to find a scapegoat on whose shoulders we may lay the miseries which Germany has brought on the world, I am more and more convinced that the worst evil genius of that country, is not Hitler or Bismarck or Frederick the Great, but Martin Luther.'

And he gave as his reason that in Lutheranism:

'the Law of Nature, which ought to be the court of appeal against unjust authority, is identified with the existing order of society, to which absolute obedience is due.'" (84:382)

A. Will Durant (Secularist)

"Calvin was as thorough as any pope in rejecting individualism of belief; this greatest legislator of Protestantism completely repudiated that principle of private judgment with which the new religion had begun. He had seen the fragmentation of the Reformation into a hundred sects, and foresaw more; in Geneva he would have none of them." (122:473)

B. Georgia Harkness (P)

"There was little political liberty in Geneva under Calvin's regime, and still less of religious liberty. His practical influence was on the side of an autocratic state and complete conformity of the individual to the established powers." (123:222)

Bullinger was undoubtedly the most tolerant Protestant Founder:

"[He] avoided politics . . . sheltered fugitive Protestants, and dispensed charity to the needy of any creed . . . he approached a theory of general religious freedom." (122:413)

But even Bullinger favored Calvin's execution of Servetus and the burning of witches, as we shall see later.

The tradition of intolerance among Protestants did not soon die out. According to Protestant historian Owen Chadwick:

"The ablest defence of persecution during the 17th century came from the Scottish Presbyterian Samuel Rutherford (A Free Disputation Against Pretended Liberty Of Conscience, 1649)." (120:403)

John Milton and John Locke, otherwise relatively "enlightened" Protestants, argued for tolerance, but excluded Catholics - the former in his Areopagitica (1644), and the latter in his first Letter Concerning Toleration (1689). (78:1384)

One of the many tragi-comic ironies of the Protestant Revolution is the fact that even persecuted Protestants failed to see the light:

"Often the resistance to tyranny and the demand for religious freedom are combined, as in the Puritan revolution in England; and the victors, having achieved supremacy, then set up a new tyranny and a fresh intolerance." (123:222)

"Multitudes of Non-Conformists fled from Ireland and England to America; . . . What is amazing is the fact that, after such experiences, those fugitives did not learn the lesson of toleration, and did not grant to those who differed . . . freedom . . . When they found themselves in a position to persecute, they tried to outdo what they had endured . . . Among those whom they attacked was . . . the Society of Friends, otherwise known as Quakers." (92:207)

In Massachusetts, for successive convictions, a Quaker would suffer the loss of one ear and then the other, the boring of the tongue with a hot iron, and sometimes eventually death. In Boston three Quaker men and one woman were hanged. Baptist Roger Williams was banished from Massachusetts in 1635 and founded tolerant Rhode Island (92:208). To his credit, he remained tolerant, an exception to the rule, as was William Penn, who was persecuted by Protestants in England and founded the tolerant colony of Pennsylvania. Quakerism (Penn's faith) has an honorable record of tolerance since, like its predecessor Anabaptism, it is one of the most subjective and individualistic of Protestant sects, and eschews association with the "world" (governments, the military, etc.), whence lies the power necessary to persecute. Thus, Quakers were in the forefront of the abolition movement in America in the first half of the 19th century.

A. Patrick O'Hare

"Catholics . . . were the first in America to proclaim and to practice civil and religious liberty . . . The colony established by Lord Baltimore in Maryland granted civil and religious liberty to all who professed different beliefs . . . At that very time the Puritans of New England and the Episcopalians of Virginia were busily engaged in persecuting their brother Protestants for consciences' sakes and the former were . . . hanging `witches'." (50:300-01)

B. Martin Marty (P)

"Baltimore . . . welcomed, among other English people, even the Catholic-hating Puritans (8) . . . In January of 1691 . . . the new regime brought hard times for Catholics as the Protestants closed their church, forbade them to teach in public . . . but . . . the little outpost of practical Catholic tolerance had left its mark of promise on the land." (9)

C. John Tracy Ellis

"For the first time in history . . . all churches would be tolerated, and . . . none would be the agent of the government . . . Catholics and Protestants side by side on terms of equality and toleration unknown in the mother country . . . The effort proved vain; for . . . the Puritan element . . . October, 1654, repealed the Act of Toleration and outlawed the Catholics . . . condemning ten of them to death, four of whom were executed . . . From . . . 1718 down to the outbreak of the Revolution, the Catholics of Maryland were cut off from all participation in public life, to say nothing of the enactments against their religious services and . . . schools for Catholic instruction . . . During the half-century the Catholics had governed Maryland they had not been guilty of a single act of religious oppression." (10)

D. Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (P)

"In the 17th century the most notable instances of practical toleration were the colonies of Maryland, founded by Lord Baltimore in 1632 for persecuted Catholics, which offered asylum also to Protestants, and of Rhode Island, founded by Roger Williams." (78:1383)

Stories of Protestant intolerance in America prior to 1789 could be multiplied indefinitely. Jefferson and Madison, in pushing for complete religious freedom, were reacting primarily to these inter-Protestant wars for dominance, not the squabbles of post-Reformation Europe. Here we are concerned with the immediate era of the Protestant Revolution - roughly 1517 to 1600, so the above anecdotes will have to suffice as altogether typical examples.

"The principle which the Reformation had upheld in the youth of its rebellion - the right of private judgment - was as completely rejected by the Protestant leaders as by the Catholics . . . Toleration was now definitely less after the Reformation than before it." (122:456/11)

1. General Observations

Dissensions plagued Protestantism from the start, even though one would think that a religion stressing individualism and conscience would be free from such shortcomings and would promote mutual respect. The myth of Protestant magnanimity and peaceful coexistence (especially in its infancy) dies an unequivocal death as the facts are brought out:

A. Patrick O'Hare

"A volume might be filled with indubitable facts to prove the intolerant spirit of Luther and of the various sects which his rebellion originated. The quarrels, hostilities and jealousies that constantly arose among one and all made them a prey to the fiercest dissensions. They anathematized and persecuted each other . . . and indulged in the coarsest and vilest invective . . . The Lutherans . . . denounced and excluded the reformed Calvinists from salvation. The Calvinists roused up the people against the Lutherans . . . Zwingli complained of Luther's intolerance when he was the victim . . . but he and his followers threw the poor Anabaptists into the Lake of Zurich, enclosed in sacks." (50:293)

B. Calvin's Revealing Letter to Melanchthon

"It is indeed important that posterity should not know of our differences; for it is indescribably ridiculous that we, who are in opposition to the whole world, should be, at the very beginning of the Reformation, at issue among ourselves." (50:293)

Melanchthon replied:

"All the waters of the Elbe would not yield me tears sufficient to weep for the miseries caused by the Reformation." (92:88/12)

Note: I received the following challenge from a Protestant concerning the above exchange on a public Internet Catholic-dominated Bulletin Board (November 2000):

"Nathan" wrote:

I've come across this quote in various websites and online discussions . . . The quote, "It is indeed important that posterity should not know of our differences..." actually reads like this, “It is important that posterity should now know of our differences..." (Patrick F. O’Hare, The Facts About Luther {Rockford: Tan Books and Publishers, Inc.}, p. 293).

Also, that book doesn’t even give the source of that quote. Any explanations Dave? I suggest correcting it instead of continuing to cast Calvin in a deceitful light.

First of all, how do you know it is wrong, since you don't give us any primary source material (either you don't know, or foolishly refused to name it)? Perhaps your natural Protestant bias simply refuses to believe the sentiment as ostensibly written? Very curious . . .

I believe it is a typo in O'Hare's book. I had seen it somewhere else (possibly Johannes Janssen) and should have cited that source, as O'Hare indeed has an irritating tendency to not give primary source citations.

Faced with your attempt to show that I and others are practicing deceit (interesting how you don't allow for a simple human error) with regard to Calvin, however, I did consult my book (which I obtained after writing this paper - in 1991): Selected Works of John Calvin: Tracts and Letters:  Letters, Part 2, 1545-1553, vol. 5 of 7; edited by Jules Bonnet, translated by David Constable; Grand Rapids: Baker Book House (a Protestant publisher), 1983, 454 pages; reproduction of Letters of John Calvin, vol. 2 (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1858).

The letter in question is numbered as CCCV (305) and was written to fellow "reformer" and Luther's right-hand man and successor Philip Melanchthon on 28 November 1552. It is found on pp. 375-381 of the above-named Protestant book: obviously an important and presumably trustworthy reference for Calvin's letters, unfettered by "Romanist deceitfulness" and jesuitical casuistry. The issue at hand was a disagreement about free will and limited atonement (Melanchthon had  - correctly - adopted what we now call the Arminian position). The letter reads in part (emphasis and italics added):

   ". . . But it greatly concerns us to cherish faithfully and constantly to the end the friendship which God has sanctified by the authority of his own name, seeing that herein is involved either great advantage or great loss even to the whole Church. For you see how the eyes of many are turned upon us, so that the wicked take occasion from our dissensions to speak evil, and the weak are only perplexed by our unintelligible disputations. Nor in truth, is it of little importance to prevent the suspicion of any difference having arisen between us from being handed down in any way to posterity; for it is worse than absurd that parties should be found disagreeing on the very principles, after we have been compelled to make our departure from the world. [ed: very well said!] I know and confess, moreover, that we occupy widely different positions; still, because I am not ignorant of the place in his theatre to which God has elevated me [Calvin was not known for his humility and modesty], there is no reason for my concealing that our friendship could not be interrupted without great injury to the Church . . .

   "And surely it is indicative of a marvellous and monstrous insensibility, that we so readily set at nought that sacred unanimity, by which we ought to be bringing back into the world the angels of heaven. Meanwhile, Satan is busy scattering here and there the seeds of discord, and our folly is made to supply much material. At length he has discovered fans of his own, for fanning into a flame the fires of discord. I shall refer to what happened to us in this Church, causing extreme pain to all the godly; and now a whole year has elapsed since we were engaged in these conflicts [that's nothing compared to the 483 years it has now gone on . . . ] . . ."

{pp. 376-377; the central quotation - bolded  above - is on both pages}

So much for the "deceitful" tendencies of us lowly papist apologists with regard to our presentation of John Calvin, the Unexcelled Theological Genius. All we have to do is let the man speak for himself, and observe the fruits in history of his heresies and schism.

C. Johannes Janssen

Janssen, author of a 16-volume history of Germany during "Reformation" times, claimed that:

"The Protestant sects derided each other in just as immoderate and undignified a way as they one and all derided the papacy . . . Cursing and blaspheming were as frequent as praying was rare." (111;v.16:4-5)

We will now examine some examples of this inter-Protestant invective:

"I will not read the works of these people, because they are out of the Church, and are not only damned themselves, but draw many miserable creatures after them." (113;v.1:466)

"Zwingli was an offspring of hell, an associate of Arius (13), a man who did not deserve to be prayed for . . ." (113;v.1:466)

"Zwingli was greedy of honour . . . he had learnt nothing from me . . . Oecolampadius thought himself too learned to listen to me or to learn from me." (51;v.4:309/14)

"Zwinglians . . . are fighting against God and the sacraments as the most inveterate enemies of the Divine Word." (111;v.5:220-21/15)

"Heretics who had broken away . . . ministers of Satan, against whom no exercise of severity, however great, would be excessive." (50:286)

"It would be better to announce eternal damnation than salvation after the style of Zwingli or Oecolampadius." (46:85)

Luther rejoiced at the news of Zwingli's death on the battlefield in 1531, and said that he had met "an assassin's end" (46:86). And when Zwingli's associate Oecolampadius shortly followed him to the grave, Luther concluded that "the devil's blows have killed him." (46:86)

"It is well that Zwingli . . . lies dead on the battlefield . . . Oh, what a triumph this is . . . How well God knows his business." (45:139)

"Zwingli is dead and damned, having desired like a thief and a rebel, to compel others to follow his error." (113; v.1:466)

The Lutherans proclaimed in full synod:

"The Zwinglians . . . we do not even grant to them a place in the church, far from recognizing as brethren, a set of people, whom we see agitated by the spirit of lying, and uttering blasphemies against the Son of Man." (113;v.1:466)

The Zwinglians believed that the Eucharist was wholly symbolic (probably the majority position of Protestants today). Hence, whoever believes the same would have had the foregoing said about them by Dr. Luther, who firmly held to Consubstantiation, i.e., the actual Body and Blood of Christ is present in the communion along with the bread and wine.

Zwingli, not to be outdone, returned the compliment:

"The devil has made himself master of Luther, to such a degree, as to make one believe he wishes to gain entire possession of him." (113;v.1:463)

"To see him in the midst of his followers, you would believe him to be possessed by a phalanx of devils." (113;v.1:464)

"We do you no injustice when we reproach and condemn you as a worse betrayer and denier of Christ than the ancient heretic Marcion (16)." (50:288)

Oecolampadius was also not without a retort:

"He is puffed up with pride and arrogance, and seduced by Satan." (113;v.1:463)

Zwingli's Church of Zurich wrote of Luther:

"He will not and can not associate himself with those who confess Christ . . . He wrote all his works by the impulse and the dictation of the devil." (113;v.1:464)

At least the insults exhibit some vehemence, perhaps revealing the felt importance of their object. Today, on the other hand, many Protestants are utterly indifferent towards Luther, as if their faith was a product solely of their own invention and ingenuity; oftentimes, such self-professed generic "Christians" eschew even the title of "Protestant."

"They think much of themselves, which, indeed, is the cause and wellspring of all heresies . . . Thus Zwingli and Bucer now put forward a new doctrine . . . So dangerous a thing is pride in the clergy." (51;v.6:283/17)

"A gossip . . . a miscreant through and through . . . I trust him not at all, for Paul says (18) `A man that is a heretic, after the first and second admonition, avoid.'" (51;v.6:289/19)

"Oecolampadius, Calvin . . . and the other heretics have in-deviled, through-deviled, over-deviled, corrupt hearts and lying mouths." (122:448/20)

"What to think of Luther I know not . . . with his firmness there is mixed up a good deal of obstinacy . . . Nothing can be safe as long as that rage for contention shall agitate us . . . Luther . . . will never be able to join along with us in . . . the pure truth of God. For he has sinned against it not only from vainglory . . . but also from ignorance and the grossest extravagance. For what absurdities he pawned upon us . . . when he said the bread is the very body! . . . a very foul error. What can I say of the partisans of that cause? Do they not romance more wildly than Marcion respecting the body of Christ? . . . Wherefore if you have an influence or authority over Martin, use it . . . that he himself submit to the truth which he is now manifestly attacking . . . Contrive that Luther . . . cease to bear himself so imperiously." (126:46-8/21)

"Luther had done nothing to any purpose . . . people ought not to let themselves be duped by following his steps and being half-papist; it is much better to build a church entirely afresh." (113;v.1:465)

"I am carefully on the watch that Lutheranism gain no ground, nor be introduced into France. The best means . . . for checking the evil would be that the confession written by me . . . should be published." (126:76/22)

Historian Philip Hughes tells us that Calvin "abhorred" Zwingli also. (45:229)

Calvin had some sort of friendship with Melanchthon (rare among differing Protestant leaders), but wrote harshly of him in letters to others:

"He openly opposes sound doctrine; or . . . cunningly, or at least, with but little manliness, disguises his own opinion . . . The inconstancy of Philip moves both my anger and detestation." (126:52,65/23)

The timid Melanchthon was "manly" enough, however, to launch at least one salvo against Zwingli:

"Zwingli says almost nothing about Christian sanctity. He simply follows the Pelagians, the Papists and the philosophers." (46:261)

Despite theological affinities, Bucer had quite a low opinion of Calvin:

"Calvin is a true mad dog. The man is wicked, and he judges of people according as he loves or hates them." (113;v.1:467)

"Heresiarchs . . . remain obdurate in their own conceit. They allow none to find fault with them and brook no opposition. This is the sin against the Holy Ghost for which there is no forgiveness." (51;v.6:282/24)

"Those are heretics and apostates who follow their own ideas rather than the common tradition of Christendom, who . . . out of pure wantonness, invent new ways and methods." (51;v.6:282-3/25)

Grisar adds:

"In his frame of mind it became at last an impossibility for him to realise that his hostility and intolerance towards `heretics' within his fold could redound on himself." (51;v.6:283)

"We must needs decry the fanatics as damned . . . They actually dare to pick holes in our doctrine; ah, the scoundrelly rabble do a great injury to our Evangel." (51; v.6:289/26)

"I am on the heels of the Sacramentaries (27) and the Anabaptists; . . . I shall challenge them to fight; and I shall trample them all underfoot." (46:86)

A. Hilaire Belloc

"There came - round about 1536-40 - a change . . . The temptation to loot Church property and the habit of doing so had appeared and was growing; and this rapidly created a vested interest in promoting the change of religion. Those who attacked Catholic doctrine, as, for instance, in the matters of celibacy in the monastic orders . . . opened the door for the seizure of the enormous clerical endowments . . . by the Princes . . . The property of convents and monasteries passed wholesale to the looters over great areas of Christendom: Scandinavia, the British Isles, the Northern Netherlands, much of the Germanies and many of the Swiss Cantons. The endowments of hospitals, colleges, schools, guilds, were largely though not wholly seized . . . Such an economic change in so short a time our civilization had never seen . . . The new adventurers and the older gentry who had so suddenly enriched themselves, saw, in the return of Catholicism, peril to their immense new fortunes." (107:9-l0)

B. Will Durant

"The cities found Protestantism profitable . . . for a slight alteration in their theological garb they escaped from episcopal taxes and courts, and could appropriate pleasant parcels of ecclesiastical property . . . The princes . . . could be spiritual as well as temporal lords, and all the wealth of the Church could be theirs . . . The Lutheran princes suppressed all monasteries in their territory except a few whose inmates had embraced the Protestant faith." (122:438-9)

C. Henri Daniel-Rops

"Right from the beginning, Luther's spiritual revolt had let loose material greed. The German rulers, the Scandinavian monarchs and Henry VIII of England had all taken advantage of the break from papal tutelage to appropriate both the wealth and the control of their respective Churches." (46:309-10)

"They do not care in the least about religion; they are only anxious to get dominion into their hands, to be free from the control of bishops . . . Under cover of the Gospel, the princes were only intent on the plunder of the Churches." (122:438,440)

The Protestants had learned from the "Hussites", Bohemians who claimed to follow the heretic John Hus, whom Luther hailed as one of his forerunners. After Hus's execution in 1415, zealous ragtag armies:

"Passed up and down Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia . . . pillaging monasterles, massacring monks, and compelling the population to accept the Four Articles of Prague . . ." (122:169)

"The abbeys are as much your property as the game that runs on your lands. The monasteries . . . are dens of iniquity, which you must root out, if you would have God bless you." (50:295)

"In Sweden Gustavus Vasa deprived the Church of all its landed properties . . . The proportion of land held by the crown increased during his reign from 5.5% to 28%: that of the Church from 21% to nil." (121:191)

"The great Scottish nobles . . . supported the religious revolution because it gave them the power to loot the Church and the monarchy wholesale." (107:112)

Likewise, the English "Reformation" was perpetrated primarily by means of plunder at the highest levels of government.

The greatest scholar and man of letters in Europe at this time, Erasmus, who looked with some favor upon the "Reformation" initially, but came to despise it as he saw its fruits, wrote on May l0, 1521, just a few weeks after the Diet of Worms, about those who "covet the wealth of the churchmen." He goes on to say:

"This certainly is a fine turn of affairs, if property is wickedly taken away from priests so that soldiers may make use of it in worse fashion; and the latter squander their own wealth, and sometimes that of others, so that no one benefits." (117:l57)

Protestant leaders sought to exterminate Catholicism wherever possible, and exhibited very little tolerance and much philistine ignorance and hatred. Janssen tells us the views of some leading "reformers" on this score:

"Luther was content with the expulsion of the Catholics. Melanchthon was in favour of proceeding against them with corporal penalties . . . Zwingli held that, in case of need, the massacre of bishops and priests was a work commanded by God." (111;v.5:290)

Zwingli's Zurich was definitely not a haven of Christian freedom:

"The presence at sermons . . . was enjoined under pain of punishment; all teaching and church worship that deviated from the prescribed regulations was punishable. Even outside the district of Zurich the clergy were not allowed to read Mass or the laity to attend. And it was actually forbidden, `under pain of severe punishment, to keep pictures and images even in private houses' . . . The example of Zurich was followed by other Swiss Cantons." (111;v.5:134-5)

The Mass was abolished in Zurich in 1525 (121:117). How did Zwingli's ideas spread?:

"Their progress was marked by the destruction of churches and the burning of monasteries. The bishops of Constance, Basle, Lausanne and Geneva were forced to abandon their sees." (46:81-2)

William Farel, who preceded Calvin in Geneva, helped to abolish the Mass in August,1535, seize all the churches, and close its four monasteries and nunnery. (123:8)

"His sermons in St. Peter's were the occasion of riots; statues were smashed, pictures destroyed, and the treasures of the church, to the amount of 10,000 crowns, disappeared." (45:226-7)

"Martin Bucer . . . though anxious to be regarded as considerate and peaceable . . . advocated quite openly `the power of the authorities over consciences' .He never rested until, in 1537 . . . he brought about the entire suppression of the Mass at Augsburg. At his instigation, many fine paintings, monuments and ancient works of art in the churches were wantonly torn, broken and smashed. Whoever refused to submit and attend public worship was obliged within eight days to quit the city boundaries. Catholic citizens were forbidden under severe penalties to attend Catholic worship elsewhere . . . In other . . . cities Bucer acted with no less violence and intolerance, for instance, at Ulm, where he supported Oecolampadius . . . in 1531, and at Strasburg . . . Here, in 1529, after the Town-Council had prohibited Catholic worship, the Councillors were requested by the preachers to help fill the empty churches by issuing regulations prescribing attendance at the sermons." (51;v.6:277-8)

In 1529 the Council of Strassburg also ordered the breaking in pieces of all remaining altars, images and crosses, and several churches and convents were destroyed (111;v.5:143-4). Similar events transpired also in Frankfurt-am-Main (122:424). At a religious convention at Hamburg in April, 1535 the Lutheran towns of Lubeck, Bremen, Hamburg, Luneburg, Stralsund, Rostock and Wismar all voted to hang Anabaptists and flog Catholics and Zwinglians before banishing them (111;v.5:481). Luther's home territory of Saxony had instituted banishment for Catholics in 1527 (51;v.6:241-2).

"In 1522 a rabble forced its way into the church at Wittenberg, on the doors of which Luther had nailed his theses, destroyed all its altars and statues, and . . . drove out the clergy. In Rotenburg also, in 1525, the figure of Christ was decapitated . . . On the 9th of February, 1529, everything previously revered in the fine old cathedral of Basle, Switzerland, was destroyed . . . Such instances of brutality and fanaticism could be cited by scores." (92:94)

"[In] Constance, on March 10, 1528, the Catholic faith was altogether interdicted . . . by the Council . . . 'There are no rights whatever beyond those laid down in the Gospel as it is now understood' . . . Altars were smashed . . . organs were removed as being works of idolatry . . . church treasures were to be sent to the mint." (111;v.5:146)

In Scotland, John Knox and his ilk passed legislation in which:

"It was . . . forbidden to say Mass or to be present at Mass, with the punishment for a first offence of loss of all goods and a flogging; for the second offence, banishment; for the third, death." (45:300)

Knox, like virtually all the Protestant Founders, was persuaded "that all which our adversaries do is diabolical." He rejoiced in that "perfect hatred which the Holy Ghost engenders in the hearts of God's elect against the condemners of His holy statutes" (28). In conflict with these damned opponents (i.e., Catholics) all means were justified - lies, treachery (29), flexible contradictions of policy. (122:610/30)

Luther was at the forefront of this remarkable inquisition against Catholic practice:

"It is the duty of the authorities to resist and punish such public blasphemy." (51;v.6:240)

"If the preacher does not make men pious, the goods are no longer his." (51;v.6:244)

"Not only the spiritual but also the secular power must yield to the Evangel, whether cheerfully or otherwise." (51;v.6:245)

In his self-proclaimed righteous infallibility, Luther had decided by 1527 that:

"Men despise the Evangel and insist on being compelled by the law and the sword." (51;v.6:262/31)

"Even though they do not believe, they must nevertheless . . . be driven to the preaching, so that they may at least learn the outward work of obedience." (51;v.6:262/32)

"Although we neither can nor should force anyone into the faith, yet the masses must be held and driven to it in order that they may know what is right or wrong." (51;v.6:263/33)

"It is our custom to affright those who . . . fail to attend the preaching; and to threaten them with banishment and the law . . . In the event of their still proving contumacious, to excommunicate them . . . as if they were heathen." (51;v.6:263/34)

"Although excommunication in popedom has been shamefully abused . . . yet we must not suffer it to fall, but make right use of it, as Christ commanded." (122:424-5)

If I may be excused an irresistible pun at this point: "The Catholic Masses were forced out, while the Catholic masses were forced in" (to Protestant services)!

Melanchthon asked the state to compel the people to attend Protestant services (122:424). Later on, in Saxony (1623), even auricular confession and the Eucharist were made strictly obligatory by law, punishable by banishment. (51;v.6:264)

Calvin, in Geneva, took religious compulsion to an absurd degree which would make the most zealous Pharisee sick with envy. Suffice it to say that the reality of the Genevan "theocracy" is the farthest thing conceivable from the prevailing myth of Protestantism as the champion of the individual conscience against the vicious tyranny of Rome. The irony is all the more profound when we realize that Calvin was the most influential "reformer" and the "father," one could say, of all Protestant systematic theology and biblical commentary and exegesis.

"The Protestant states did not question that teachers of disapproved doctrines should be prevented from preaching. Nor did they question that the state should use laws to encourage churchgoing. In Anglican England and Lutheran Germany, Reformed Holland . . . the citizens were alike liable to penalties if they failed for no good reason to attend the worship of their parish churches." (120:398)

"The Pope and the Cardinals . . . since they are blasphemers, their tongues ought to be torn out through the back of their necks, and nailed to the gallows!" (92:94/35)

"It were better that every bishop were murdered . . . than that one soul should be destroyed . . . If they will not hear God's Word . . . what do they better deserve than a strong uprising which will sweep them from the earth? And we would smile did it happen. All who contribute body, goods . . . that the rule of the bishops may be destroyed are God's dear children and true Christians." (122:377/36)

Will Durant asserts:

"Luther . . . emitted an angry roar that was almost a tocsin of revolution" (122:377). These roars were numerous:

"If you understand the Gospel rightly, I beseech you not to believe that it can be carried on without tumult, scandal, sedition . . . The word of God is a sword, is war, is ruin, is scandal . . ." (109:41/37)

"If we punish thieves with the gallows . . . why do we not still more attack with every kind of weapon . . . these Cardinals, these Popes, and that whole abomination of the Romish Sodom . . . why do we not wash our hands in their blood?" (109:41/38)

"If I had all the Franciscan friars in one house, I would set fire to it . . . To the fire with them!" (51;v.6:247/39)

Jesuit Luther scholar Hartmann Grisar, exercising all charity and any benefit of the doubt possible in interpreting such statements as these, writes:

"No one . . . will be so foolish to believe that it was really his intention to kill the Catholic clergy and monks. His bloodthirsty demands were but the violent outbursts of his own deep inward intolerance." (51;v.6:247)

Let's hope Grisar is right, for Luther's sake. On the other hand, the rhetoric is very explicit and was circulated widely in all of Germany and elsewhere. At any rate, Luther should have known how people would react to such wild, reckless statements, and therefore largely bears responsibility for the Peasants' Revolt that broke out in Germany, not coincidentally, in 1525. This is frankly admitted by virtually all historians of the period, including fervent Protestants. Grisar agrees:

"But who was it who was responsible for having provoked the war? Occasional counsels to . . . self-restraint . . . were indeed given by Luther from time to time . . . but . . . they are drowned in the din of his controversial invective . . . If his reforms were rejected then it was to be wished that monasteries and foundations `were all reduced to one great heap of ashes' (40). 'A grand destruction of all the monasteries, etc., would be the best reformation.'" (51;v.6:248/41)

"It is a duty to suppress the Pope by force." (51;v.6:245/42)

"Some . . . will not treat our gospel rightly; but have we not gibbets, wheels, swords, and knives? Those who are obdurate can be brought to reason." (111;v.3:266/43)

"The spiritual powers . . . also the temporal ones, will have to succumb to the Gospel, either through love or through force, as is clearly proved by all Biblical history." (111;v.3:267/44)

Luther's friend, the minor "reformer" Wolfgang Capito, warned Luther on December 4, 1520 about his bone-chilling invective:

"You are frightening away from you your supporters by your constant reference to troops and arms. We can easily enough throw everything into confusion, but it will not be in our power, believe me, to restore things to peace and order." (111;v.3:136)

Capito was in this instance wise, almost a prophet, but unsuccessful at persuasion. After the Peasants' Revolt broke out, Luther advised the princes to kill the peasants in any fashion necessary, en masse, and the usual estimates are of 100,000 resultant deaths. This episode is widely acknowledged as a blot on Luther's career. Durant maintains:

"The peasants had a case against him. He had not only predicted social revolution, he had said he would not be displeased by it . . . even if men washed their hands in episcopal blood . . . He had made no protest against the secular appropriation of ecclesiastical property . . . The peasants felt that the new religion had sanctified their cause, had aroused them to hope and action, and had deserted them in the hour of decision . . . Many of them, or their children . . . returned to the Catholic fold." (122:394-5)

Zwingli, too, had marked militaristic tendencies:

"Zwingli had gone the length of declaring that the massacre of the bishops was necessary for the establishment of the pure Gospel . . . He wrote on May 4, 1528,

"'The bishops will not desist from their fraud . . . until a second Elijah appears to rain swords upon them . . . It is wiser to pluck out a blind eye than to let the whole body suffer corruption.'" (111;v.5:180/45)

Zwingli, the inveterate adulterer (who is he to talk about "corruption"?), was killed, along with 24 Zwinglian preachers, at the battle of Kappel, a few miles south of Zurich, on October 11, 1531, at which news Luther reacted with glee. This event, no doubt, helped to make Zwingli's successor, Bullinger, the most mild and moderate of all the founders of Protestantism.

Luther, hardened by the bitter pill of the Peasants' Revolt and his hand in it, sanctioned slavery, quoting the Old Testament:

"Sheep, cattle, men-servants were all possessions to be sold as it pleased their masters. It were a good thing were it still so. For else no man may compel nor tame the servile folk." (122:449/46)

Luther's successor Melanchthon followed him in upholding serfdom (122:457/47). Having seen the dreadful and tragic results of their own anarchical teachings, they became much more ruthless than that which they claimed to be "reforming." How strange and curious is religious corruption!

"There are others who teach in opposition to some recognised article of faith which is manifestly grounded on Scripture and is believed by good Christians all over the world, such as are taught to children in the Creed . . . Heretics of this sort must not be tolerated, but punished as open blasphemers . . . If anyone wishes to preach or to teach, let him make known the call or the command which impels him to do so, or else let him keep silence. If he will not keep quiet, then let the civil authorities command the scoundrel to his rightful master - namely, Master Hans [i.e., the hangman]." (111;v.10:222/48)

"That seditious articles of doctrine should be punished by the sword needed no further proof. For the rest, the Anabaptists hold tenets relating to infant baptism, original sin, and inspiration, which have no connection with the Word of God, and are indeed opposed to it . . . Secular authorities are also bound to restrain and punish avowedly false doctrine . . . For think what disaster would ensue if children were not baptized? . . . Besides this the Anabaptists separate themselves from the churches . . . and they set up a ministry and congregation of their own, which is also contrary to the command of God. From all this it becomes clear that the secular authorities are bound . . . to inflict corporal punishment on the offenders . . . Also when it is a case of only upholding some spiritual tenet, such as infant baptism, original sin, and unnecessary separation, then . . . we conclude that . . . the stubborn sectaries must be put to death." (111;v.10:222-3/49)

Bullinger saw the contradiction in Luther's appeal to tradition for punishment of heretics, and thought it was "truly laughable" that he should suddenly appeal to the fact,

"of the Church having so long held this . . . If Luther's argument, based on longstanding usage, be admitted . . . then the whole of Luther's own doctrine tumbles over, for his teaching is not that which the Roman Church has held for so long." (51;v.6:259/50)

Logical consistency was never one of Luther's strong points.

Grisar states:

"That . . . every follower of his Evangel, were bound to regard all opinions which diverged from his own as godless heresies . . . he had never doubted from the moment he had discovered his new Evangel." (51;v.6:238)

"Melanchthon accepted the chairmanship of the secular inquisition that suppressed the Anabaptists in Germany with imprisonment or death. 'Why should we pity such men more than God does?' he asked, for he was convinced that God had destined all Anabaptists to hell." (122:423)

"A regular inquisition was set up in Saxony, with Melanchthon on the bench, and under it many persons were punished, some with death, some with life imprisonment, and some with exile." (115:177)

"Even though the Anabaptists do not advocate anything seditious or openly blasphemous" it was, in his opinion, "the duty of the authorities to put them to death." (51;v.6:250/51)

At the end of 1530, Melanchthon drafted a memorandum in which he defended a regular system of coercion by the sword (i.e., death for Anabaptists). Luther signed it with the words, "It pleases me," and added:

"Though it may appear cruel to punish them by the sword, yet it is even more cruel of them . . . not to teach any certain doctrine - to persecute the true doctrine . . ." (51;v.6:251)

Protestant theologian Hunzinger concludes that:

"Melanchthon was wont to lose no time in having recourse to fire and sword. This forms a dark blot on his life. Many a man fell victim to his memorandum." (51;v.6:270/52)

In 1530 Melanchthon recommended death for rejection of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, but changed his mind on this very doctrine later in his life! (122:424)

"Young Bible students he once mentored were now advocating more radical reform . . . refusing to have their babies baptized, citing his own earlier ideas . . . In January, 1525, Zwingli agreed that they deserved capital punishment . . . for tearing the fabric of a seamless Christian society." (53)

Zwingli's Zurich mercilessly persecuted the Anabaptists:

"The persecution of the Anabaptists began in Zurich . . . The penalties enjoined by the Town Council of Zurich were 'drowning, burning, or beheading,' according as it seemed advisable . . . 'It is our will,' the Council proclaimed, 'that wherever they be found, whether singly or in companies, they shall be drowned to death, and that none of them shall be spared.'" (111;v.5:l53-7)

In his Dialogues of 1535, Bucer called on governments to exterminate by fire and sword all professing a false religion, and even their wives, children and cattle. (111;v.5:367-8,290-1)

"His conviction . . . harked back to the darkest practices of the Inquisition . . . Every heretic was to be put to death, and cities predominantly heretical were to be smitten with the sword and utterly destroyed:

"'To the carnal man this may appear a . . . severe judgment . . . Yet we find no exception, but all are appointed to the cruel death. But in such cases God wills that all . . . desist from reasoning when commandment is given to execute his judgments.'" (122:614/54)

"Elizabeth . . . is on record for the burning of two Dutch Anabaptists in 1575 . . . Henry VIII . . . had a score of them burned on one day in 1535." (45:143)

Six Carthusian monks, a Bridgettine monk, and the Bishop of Rochester, St. John Fisher, were hanged or beheaded (the Bishop), some being disemboweled and drawn and quartered, in May and June, 1535, all for denying that Henry VIII was the Supreme Head on earth of the Church of England. (45:181-2)

Hugh Latimer, an English "reformer", had, remarks Will Durant, "tarnished his eloquent career by approving the burning of Anabaptists and obstinate Franciscans under Henry VIII." (122:597)

Queen Elizabeth, writes Philip Hughes:

" . . . enacted a definition of heresy that made life safe for all who believed in the Trinity and the Incarnation. But the statute left intact that heresy was, by common law, an offense punishable by death. An English Servetus could have been burned under Elizabeth, and, in fact, in 1589 she burned an Arian." (45:274)

It wasn't until 1679 that capital punishment for heresy was abolished in England, by an act of Parliament of Charles II. (45:274)

John Stoddard gives an account of Henry VIII, who founded Anglicanism:

" . . . the murderer of two wives . . . and the executioner of many of the noblest Englishmen of the time, who had the conscience and the courage to oppose him. Among these were the venerable Bishop Fisher . . . and Sir Thomas More, one of the most distinguished men of his century . . .

"When Henry began his persecution, there were about 1,000 Dominican monks in Ireland, only four of whom survived when Elizabeth came to the throne thirty years later . . .

"Executions speedily began . . . At one time, . . . about 800 a year (55). Hallam [a Protestant] . . . says (56) that the revolting tortures and executions of Jesuit priests in the reign of Elizabeth were characterised by a 'savageness and bigotry, which I am very sure no scribe of the Inquisition could have surpassed' . . . The details of these atrocities . . . would form very unpleasant reading for Protestants, accustomed as they are to think that all religious persecution has been done by Catholics. As Newman says:

"'It is pleasanter (for them) to declaim against persecution, and to call the Inquisition a hell, than to consider their own devices and the work of their own hands.'" (92:131-2,135)

Stoddard chronicles further persecution in England - of the Dissenters. Under Elizabeth, Presbyterians, for example, were "branded, . . . imprisoned, banished, mutilated and even put to death. A few Anabaptists and Unitarians were burned alive." (92:205)

Anglican Bishops were silent accomplices and witnesses of much torture. (92:205-6)

"The proximate cause of that great revolution, which cost James (57) his crown, was the publication by the King of an edict of religious toleration! . . . The first and only time the Church of England has made war on the Crown, was when the Crown had declared its intention of tolerating . . . the rival religions of the country!" (58)

In Ireland, Bishops were executed by the English in 1578 (two), 1585 and 1611. In 1652 "an attempt was made to exterminate the entire Irish Catholic priesthood . . .

"An Act signed by the Commissioners for the Parliament of England decreed that every Romish priest . . . should be . . . hanged . . . beheaded . . . quartered, his bowels drawn out and burned, and his head fixed on a pole in some public place . . . Finally, scarcely a Catholic prelate was left on the whole island." (92:206)

"Dissenters in Ireland . . . also endured apalling miseries . . . Instances are recorded of Dissenters whose fingers were wrenched asunder, whose bodies were seared with red-hot irons, and whose legs were broken . . . Their wives were also whipped in public." (92:207)

A. General

"In the preface to the Institutes he admitted the right of the government to put heretics to death . . . He thought that Christians should hate the enemies of God . . . Those who defended heretics . . . should be equally punished." (115:178)

During Calvin's reign in Geneva, between 1542 and 1546, "58 persons were put to death for heresy." (122:473)

"While he did not directly recommend the use of the death penalty for blasphemy, he defended its use among the Jews." (123:102)

In defense of stoning false prophets, Calvin observes:

"The father should not spare his son . . . nor the husband his own wife. If he has some friend who is as dear to him as his own life, let him put him to death." (123:107/59)

He talks of the execution of Catholics, but, like Luther, did not readily attempt to act on his rhetoric:

"Persons who persist in the superstitions of the Roman Antichrist . . . deserve to be repressed by the sword." (123:96/60)

B. James Gruet

In January, 1547 in Calvin's Geneva, one James Gruet, a kind of free-thinker of dubious morals, was alleged to have posted a note which implied that Calvin should leave the city:

"He was at once arrested and a house to house search made for his accomplices. This method failed to reveal anything except that Gruet had written on one of Calvin's tracts the words 'all rubbish.' The judges put him to the rack twice a day, morning and evening, for a whole month . . . He was sentenced to death for blasphemy and beheaded on July 26, 1547 . . . Evangelical freedom had now arrived at the point where its champions took a man's life . . . merely for writing a lampoon!" (114:176/61)

Durant gives further detail:

"Half dead, he was tied to a stake, his feet were nailed to it, and his head was cut off." (122:479)

C. Comparet Brothers

In May 1555, a drunken riot occurred, precipitated by a group which objected to the excess of foreign refugees in Geneva. Dissidents of Calvin were termed "Libertines."

"The brothers Comparet, two humble boatmen, were executed and pieces of their dismembered bodies nailed on the city gates." (46:192)

"The Comparet brothers, with Calvin's approval, were tortured . . . Under the rack they said the riot had . . . been premeditated, but denied this again before their execution. A number, including Francois Berthelier, were beheaded . . . Several others were banished, and the wives of the condemned were likewise driven from the city." (123:48)

"All the other leaders of the party took flight and were sentenced to death in their absence." (46:192)

D. Michael Servetus

The most infamous execution in Geneva was that of Michael Servetus, a Spanish physician who denied the Trinity, and was a sort of Gnostic pantheist. He had met Calvin, and the latter declared on February 13, 1547 in a letter to Farel:

"If he comes, provided my authority prevails I will not suffer him to return home alive." (46:186)

"With Calvin's knowledge and probably at his instigation, . . . William Trie, of Geneva, denounced Servetus to the Catholic Inquisition at Vienne and forwarded the material sent by the heretic to Calvin." (114:177)

Daniel-Rops says of this episode, that "Protestant historians refer to it with embarrassment." (46:187)

"The fact cannot be dodged that Calvin delivered Servetus to the Inquisition,and then tried either by a lie or a subterfuge to cover his part in the matter." (123:42)

"Upon arriving at Geneva on August 13, 1553, he was detected almost immediately . . . through Calvin's instigation he was arrested and put in prison. Calvin . . . hoped for his execution." (123:42)

"On August 20 he wrote to Farel:

" 'I hope that Servetus will be condemned to death, but I should like him to be spared the worst part of the punishment,' meaning the fire." (46:190)

This is the most that can be said about Calvin's "mercy" in this case.

"On October 26, the Council ordered that he be burned alive on the following day . . . That he desired Servetus' death . . . is clear." (123:44)

"Calvin's observations on this appalling death make horrifying reading: . . .

"'He showed the dumb stupidity of a beast . . . He went on bellowing . . . in the Spanish fashion: "Misericordias!" . . .'" (46:190-91)

Henry Hallam, the Protestant historian, gave the following opinion:

"Servetus, in fact, was burned not so much for his heresies, as for personal offense he had several years before given to Calvin . . . which seems to have exasperated the great reformer's temper, so as to make him resolve on what he afterwards executed . . . Thus, in the second period of the Reformation, those ominous symptoms which had appeared in its earliest stage, disunion, virulence, bigotry, intolerance, . . . grew more inveterate and incurable." (62)

" 'Servetus's death, for which Calvin bears much of the responsibility,' writes Wendel, 'marked the reformer with a bloody stigma which nothing has been able to efface.'" (46:191)

This stigma, however, is shared by many other "reformers", who commended this atrocious vendetta:

"Melanchthon, in a letter to Calvin and Bullinger, gave 'thanks to the Son of God' . . . and called the burning 'a pious and memorable example to all posterity.' Bucer declared from his pulpit in Strasbourg that Servetus had deserved to be disemboweled and torn to pieces. Bullinger, generally humane, agreed that civil magistrates must punish blasphemy with death." (122:484)

In 1554 Calvin wrote the treatise Against the Errors of Servetus, in which he tried to justify his cruel action:

"Many people have accused me of such ferocious cruelty that (they allege) I would like to kill again the man I have destroyed. Not only am I indifferent to their comments, but I rejoice in the fact that they spit in my face." (46:191)

This was Calvin's attitude towards the punishment and execution of heretics. In what way, I submit, is he morally any better than those who committed atrocities by means of the Inquisition?

As to the myth that torture was a tactic solely of Catholics, Janssen quotes a Protestant eyewitness to the contrary:

"The Protestant theologian Meyfart . . . described the tortures which he had personally witnessed . . . 'The subtle Spaniard and the wily Italian have a horror of these bestialities and brutalities, and at Rome it is not customary to subject a murderer . . . an incestuous person, or an adulterer to torture for the space of more than an hour'; but in Germany . . . torture is kept up for a whole day, for a day and a night, for two days . . . even also for four days . . . after which it begins again . . . 'There are stories extant so horrible and revolting that no true man can hear of them without a shudder.'" (111;v.16:516-18,521)

He gives also another typical instance of the treatment of Anabaptists:

"At Augsburg, in the first half of the year 1528, about 170 Anabaptists of both sexes were either imprisoned or expelled by order of the new-religionist Town Council. Some were . . . burnt through the cheeks with hot irons; many were beheaded; some had their tongues cut out." (111;v.5:160)

Persecution, including death penalties for heresy, is not just a Catholic failing. It is clearly also a Protestant one, and a general "blind spot" of the Middle Ages, much like abortion is in our own supposedly "enlightened" age. Furthermore, it is an outright lie to assert that Protestantism in its initial appearance, advocated tolerance. The evidence thus far presented refutes this notion beyond any reasonable doubt.

The early Protestants were not the champions of free speech and freedom of the press, either, as we are led to believe, any more than they were for freedom of religion or assembly - not by a long shot. Suppression of the Mass and forced Church attendance by civil law are examples of this intolerance of freedom of thought and action, which we previously examined. Neither was Catholic and sectarian literature to be suffered:

"With isolated exceptions . . . we find everywhere the opinions which are exactly in harmony wlth those of the territorial prince of the day, striving their utmost to suppress all differing views. The theory of the absolute Church authority of the secular powers was in itself enough to make a system of tolerance impossible on the Protestant side...From the very first religious life among the Protestants was influenced by the hopeless contradiction that on the one hand Luther imposed it as a sacred duty on every individual, in all matters of faith, to set aside every authority, above all that of the Church, and to follow only his own judgment, while on the other hand the reformed theologians gave the secular princes power over the religion of their land and subjects . . . 'Luther never attempted to solve this contradiction. In practice he was content that the princes should have supreme control over religion, doctrine and Church, and that it was their right and their duty to suppress every religious creed which differed from their own.' (64)" (111;v.14:230-31)

"The Corpus doctrinae of Melanchthon had passed muster for a long time in Saxony, but on the occasion of the crypto-Calvinistic controversies the Elector Augustus forbade the work being printed . . .; the press control, which Melanchthon had advocated against others, now hit him himself." (111;v.14:506)

"In the Protestant towns numbers of preachers bestirred themselves zealously with the help of the municipal authorities to suppress the writings of all opposing parties. 'When first Luther began to write books, it was said,' so Frederick Staphylus recalled to mind (1560), 'that it would be contrary to Christian freedom if the Christian folk and the common people were not allowed to read all sorts of books. Now, however . . . the Lutherans themselves are . . . forbidding the purchase and reading of the books of their opponents, and of apostate members and sects.'" (111;v.14:506-7)

"The Protestant princes . . . loved and encouraged the censorship because, with its help, they could suppress the well-merited complaint against their robbery of Church property, or other self-interested deeds, or even criminal acts." (111;v.14:507)

"Violation of the orders of the censorship was everywhere to be severely punished." (111;v.14:234)

Janssen writes of a hypocritical instance of Luther's censorship (1529):

"Luther . . . set his pen in motion concerning this Catholic translation of the Bible. 'The freedom of the Word,' which he claimed for himself, was not to be accorded to his opponent Emser . . . When . . . he learnt that Emser's translation . . . was to be printed . . . at Rostock, he not only appealed himself to his follower, Duke Henry of Mecklenburg, with the request that 'for the glory of the evangel of Christ and the salvation of all souls' he would put a stop to this printing, but he also worked on the councillors of the Elector of Saxony to support his action. He denied the right and the power of the Catholic authorities to inhibit his books; on the other hand he invoked the arm of the secular authorities against all writings that were displeasing to him." (111;v.14:503-4)

"When the controversy on the Lord's Supper was started at Wittenberg, the utmost precautions were taken to suppress the writings of the Swiss Reformed theologians and of the German preachers who shared the latter's views. At the instigation of Luther and Melanchthon there was issued, in 1528, by the Elector John of Saxony, an edict to the following effect:

" 'Books and pamphlets (of the Anabaptists, Sacramentarians, etc.) must not be allowed to be bought or sold or read . . . also those who are aware of such breaches of the orders laid down herein, and do not give information, shall be punished by loss of life and property.'" (111;v.14:232-3/65)

"Melanchthon demanded in the most severe and comprehensive manner the censure and suppression of all books that were hindering to Lutheran teaching (66). The writings of Zwingli and the Zwinglians were placed formally on the Index at Wittenberg." (111;v.14:504)

"Moreover, antagonism had also grown up among the Protestant universities, and one reproached the other with being the fosterer and begetter of false doctrine . . . Wittenberg itself, but lately regarded as the birthplace of a new revelation and of the newly awakened Church of Christ, in 1567 was declared to be a 'stinking cesspool of the devil.'" (111;v.14:231-2)

"At Strassburg Catholic writings were suppressed as early as 1524 . . . The Council at Frankfort-on-the-Main exercised . . . strict censorship . . . At Rostock, in 1532, the printer of the Brethren of the Common Life was sent to prison, because he had used his printing press to the disadvantage of Protestantism." (111;v.14:502)

"Wherever the prince, according to old Byzantine fashion, thought himself a theologian, he managed the censorship in person." (111;v.14:233)

Instances could, of course, be multiplied, but the above examples suffice to illustrate the general Protestant hostility to a free press.

"Persecution is the deadly original sin of the Reformed churches, that which cools every honest man's zeal for their cause in proportion as his reading becomes extensive." (50:297/67)

"Protestant intolerance, despotism in an upstart sect, infallibility claimed by guides who acknowledge that they had passed the greater part of their lives in error . . . these things could not long be borne . . . It required no great sagacity to perceive the inconsistency and dishonesty of men who, dissenting from almost all Christendom, would suffer none to dissent from themselves, who demanded freedom of conscience, yet refused to grant it . . . who urged reason against the authority of one opponent, and authority against the reason of another." (50:297-8/68)

4. Keating, Karl, Catholicism and Fundamentalism, San Francisco: Ignatius, 1988.

45. Hughes, Philip, A Popular History of the Reformation, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Image, 1957.

46. Daniel-Rops, Henri, The Protestant Reformation, vol.2, tr. Audrey Butler, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Image, 1961.

50. O'Hare, Patrick F., The Facts About Luther, Rockford, IL: TAN Books, rev. ed., 1987 (orig. Cincinnati, 1916).

51. Grisar, Hartmann, Luther, tr. E.M. Lamond, ed. Luigi Cappadelta, 6 vols., London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., 1917.

78. Cross, F.L. & E.A. Livingstone, eds., The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2nd ed., 1983. *

84. Rumble, Leslie & Charles M. Carty, That Catholic Church, St. Paul, MN: Radio Replies Press, 1954.

85. Conway, Bertrand L., The Question Box, NY: Paulist Press, 1929.

92. Stoddard, John L., Rebuilding a Lost Faith, NY: P.J. Kenedy & Sons, 1922.

107. Belloc, Hilaire, Characters of the Reformation, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Image, 1958.

109. O'Connor, Henry, Luther's Own Statements, NY: Benziger Bros., 3rd ed., 1884.

111. Janssen, Johannes, History of the German People From the Close of the Middle Ages, 16 vols., tr. A.M. Christie, St. Louis: B. Herder, 1910 (orig. 1891).

113. Spalding, Martin J. {Archbishop of Baltimore}, The History of the Protestant Reformation, 2 vols., Baltimore: John Murphy, 1876.

114. Huizinga, Johan, Erasmus and the Age of Reformation, tr. F. Hopman, NY: Harper & Bros., 1957 (orig. 1924).*

115. Smith, Preserved, The Social Background of the Reformation, NY: Collier Books, 1962 {2nd part of author's The Age of the Reformation, NY: 1920}. *

117. Erasmus, Desiderius, Christian Humanism and the Reformation, {selections from Erasmus}, ed. & tr. John C. Olin, NY: Harper & Row, 1965 (orig. 1515-34).

120. Chadwick, Owen, The Reformation, NY: Penguin, rev. ed., 1972. *

121. Dickens, A.G., Reformation and Society in 16th-Century Europe, London: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1966. *

122. Durant, Will, The Reformation, {vol. 6 of 10-vol. The Story of Civilization, 1967}, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1957. *

123. Harkness, Georgia, John Calvin: The Man and His Ethics, NY: Abingdon Press, NY, 1931. *

126. Dillenberger, John, ed., John Calvin: Selections From His Writings, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Anchor, 1971.*

1. Dollinger, Johann von, Kirche und Kirchen, 1861, p.68.
2. Hallam, Henry, Introduction to the History of Literature, NY: 1880, v.1, p.200, sec. 34.
3. Guizot, Francois, General History of Civilization in Europe, Paris: 1828 / English ed. 1837, pp.261-2.
4. Lecky, William, History of Rationalism, London: 1870 ed., v.1, p.51.
5. Kohler, Walther, Reformation und Ketzerprozess, 1901, pp.29 ff.
6. Wappler, Karl, Die Inquisition, 1908, pp.69 ff.
7. Rumscheidt, Martin, ed., Adolf von Harnack: Liberal Theology at its Height, London: Collins, 1989, p.251 (from History of Dogma, 1890).
8. E.g., he allowed several hundred Puritans, unwelcome in Episcopalian Virginia, to enter Maryland in 1648 (see Ellis, #10 below, p.37).
9. Marty, Martin, Pilgrims in Their Own Land: 500 Years of Religion in America, NY: Penguin, 1984, pp.83,85-6.
10. Ellis, John Tracy, American Catholicism, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Image, 1956, pp.36,38-9.
11. Durant is referring here to the year 1555, the time of the Diet of Augsburg.
12. Melanchthon, Philip, Epistles, Book 4, Ep. 100.
13. Arius: a 4th century heretic who denied that Christ was fully God, saying He was created.
14. In Table Talk (1540).
15. De Wette, M., Luther's Letters, Berlin: 1828, v.3, pp.454-6.
16. Marcion: a 2nd century heretic who accepted as Scripture only ten epistles of St. Paul, and parts of Luke; he denied the humanity and sufferings of Christ.
17. Werke (Luther's Works), Weimar ed., 1883, v.38, pp.177f.
18. Titus 3:10.
19. Luther, Martin, Table Talk, ed. Mathesius / Kroker, pp.154, 253.
20. Werke, Halle ed., 1753 (ed. J.G. Walch), v.20, p.223.
21. Letter to Martin Bucer, January 12, 1538.
22. Letter to Heinrich Bullinger, July 2, 1563.
23. Letters to John Sleidan, August 27, 1554, and to Bullinger, February 23, 1558.
24. Werke, Weimar, 19, pp.609 ff.
25. Ibid., 7, p.394.
26. Werke, Erlangen ed., 1868, 61, pp.8 ff.
27. "Sacramentarians": Those who deny the Real Presence in the Eucharist (e.g., Zwingli).
28. Knox, John, History of the Reformation in Scotland, NY: 1950, Introduction, p.73.
29. Ibid., v.1, p.194 and note 2.
30. Ibid., Introduction, p.44. See also Edwin Muir, John Knox, London: 1920, pp.67,300.
31. Werke, Erl., v.3, p.39 / Letter to Georg Spalatin.
32. In 1529.
33. Werke, Weimar, 30, 1, p.349 / Preface to Smaller Catechism (1531).
34. Enders, L. Briefwechsel (Luther's Correspondence), Frankfurt, 9, p.365 / Letter to Leonard Beyer (1533).
35. Against the Papacy of Rome, Founded by the Devil (1545). One of Luther's most vile and colorful tracts.
36. Werke, Weimar, v.28, pp.142-201 / Against the Falsely Called Spiritual Order of the Pope and the Bishops (July, 1522). Luther at the height of his revolutionary invective.
37. De Wette, Ibid., (#15), v.1, p.417 / Letter to Spalatin, February, 1520.
38. Werke, Erl., v.2, p.107 / On the Pope as an Infallible Teacher (1520).
39. Luther, Table Talk, (Mathesius, ed.), p.180 / Summer, 1540.
40. Ibid., v.3, p.46.
41. Ibid.
42. Enders, Ibid., (#34), v.4, p.298.
43. In 1522.
44. Letter to the Elector of Saxony, 1522.
45. Zwingli's Works, v.7, pp.174-84.
46. Werke, Weimar, v.15, p.276 / Belfort Bax, The Peasants' War in Germany, London: 1899, p.352.
47. See Janssen (111;v.4:362-3) / J.W. Allen, History of Political Thought in the 16th Century, London: 1951, p.33 (a Protestant work).
48. Werke, Erl. Ausgabe, Bd. 39, pp.250-58 / Commentary on 82nd Psalm (1530) / cf. Durant (122:423), Grisar (51;v.6: 26-7).
49. Pamphlet of 1536.
50. Letter to Albert Margrave of Brandenburg.
51. Bretschneider, ed., Corpus Reformation, Halle: 1846, 2, pp.17 ff. / February, 1530.
52. Hunzinger, August W., Die Theol. der Gegenwart, 1909, 3,3, p.49.
53. Ruth, John L., "America's Anabaptists: Who They Are," Christianity Today, October 22, 1990, p.26 / cf. Dickens (121:117); Lucas (118:511).
54. In Muir, Ibid., (#30), p.142.
55. In roughly the last half of the 16th century.
56. Hallam, Henry, Constitutional History of England, v.1, p.146.
57. James II, King of England from 1685-88 (a Catholic).
58. Buckle, Henry T., History of Civilization in England, NY: 1913, v.1, p.308.
59. Calvin, John, Opera (Works), v.27, p.251 / Sermon on Deuteronomy 13:6-11.
60. Letter to Duke of Somerset, October 22, 1548.
61. Cf. Daniel-Rops (46:82-3) and Spalding (113;v.1:384).
62. Hallam, Ibid., (#2), v.1, p.280.
63. ---------
64. Dollinger, Ibid., (#1), pp.52 ff.
65. Bretschneider, Ibid., (#51), v.4, p.549.
66. See also Durant (122:424).
67. Hallam, Ibid., (#56), p.63.
68. Macaulay, Thomas Babington, Essays (Hampden).