without any difficulty, the work which
Henry VIII. had begun.
In some countries, as in Scotland, where
the government was weak, unpopular, and
not very firmly established, the reformation
was strong enough to overturn, not only the
church, but the state likewise, for attempting
to support the church.
Among the followers of the reformation,
dispersed in all the different countries of Europe,
there was no general tribunal, which,
like that of the court of Rome, or an œcumenical
council, could settle all disputes
among them, and, with irresistible authority,
prescribe to all of them the precise limits of
orthodoxy. When the followers of the reformation
in one country, therefore, happened
to differ from their brethren in another, as
they had no common judge to appeal to, the
dispute could never be decided; and many
such disputes arose among them. Those
concerning the government of the church, and
the right of conferring ecclesiastical benefices,
were perhaps the most interesting to the
peace and welfare of civil society. They
gave birth, accordingly, to the two principal
parties or sects among the followers of the
reformation, the Lutheran and Calvinistic
sects, the only sects among them, of which
the doctrine and discipline have ever yet been
established by law in any part of Europe.
The followers of Luther, together with
what is called the church of England, preserved
more or less of the episcopal government,
established subordination among the
clergy, gave the sovereign the disposal of all
the bishoprics, and other consistorial benefices
within his dominions, and thereby rendered
him the real head of the church; and
without depriving the bishop of the right of
collating to the smaller benefices within his
diocese, they, even to those benefices, not
only admitted, but favoured the right of presentation,
both in the sovereign and in all
other lay patrons. This system of church
government was, from the beginning, favourable
to peace and good order, and to
submission to the civil sovereign. It has
never, accordingly, been the occasion of any
tumult or civil commotion in any country in
which it has once been established. The
church of England, in particular, has always
valued herself, with great reason, upon the
unexceptionable loyalty of her principles.
Under such a government, the clergy naturally
endeavour to recommend themselves
to the sovereign, to the court, and to the
nobility and gentry of the country, by whose
influence they chiefly expect to obtain preferment.
They pay court to those patrons,
sometimes, no doubt, by the vilest flattery
and assentation; but frequently, too, by cultivating
all those arts which best deserve, and
which are therefore most likely to gain them,
the esteem of people of rank and fortune;
by their knowledge in all the different
branches of useful and ornamental learning,
by the decent liberality of their manners, by
the social good humour of their conversation,
and by their avowed contempt of those absurd
and hypocritical austerities which fanatics inculcate
and pretend to practise, in order to
draw upon themselves the veneration, and
upon the greater part of men of rank and
fortune, who avow that they do not practise
them, the abhorrence of the common people.
Such a clergy, however, while they pay their
court in this manner to the higher ranks of
life, are very apt to neglect altogether the
means of maintaining their influence and authority
with the lower. They are listened to,
esteemed, and respected by their superiors;
but before their inferiors they are frequently
incapable of defending, effectually, and to
the conviction of such hearers, their own sober
and moderate doctrines, against the most
ignorant enthusiast who chooses to attack
them.
The followers of Zuinglius, or more properly
those of Calvin, on the contrary, bestowed
upon the people of each parish, whenever
the church became vacant, the right of
electing their own pastor; and established,
at the same time, the most perfect equality
among the clergy. The former part of this
institution, as long as it remained in vigour,
seems to have been productive of nothing
but disorder and confusion, and to have tended
equally to corrupt the morals both of the
clergy and of the people. The latter part
seems never to have had any effects but what
were perfectly agreeable.
As long as the people of each parish preserved
the right of electing their own pastors,
they acted almost always under the influence
of the clergy, and generally of the most factious
and fanatical of the order. The clergy,
in order to preserve their influence in those
popular elections, became, or affected to become,
many of them, fanatics themselves,
encouraged fanaticism among the people, and
gave the preference almost always to the
most fanatical candidate. So small a matter
as the appointment of a parish priest, occasioned
almost always a violent contest, not
only in one parish, but in all the neighbouring
parishes who seldom failed to take part
in the quarrel. When the parish happened
to be situated in a great city, it divided all
the inhabitants into two parties; and when
that city happened, either to constitute itself
a little republic, or to be the head and capital
of a little republic, as in the case with many
of the considerable cities in Switzerland and
Holland, every paltry dispute of this kind,
over and above exasperating the animosity of
all their other factions, threatened to leave
behind it, both a new schism in the church,
and a new faction in the state. In those
small republics, therefore, the magistrate very