第45章 LETTER XXXVII(1)

LONDON,April 26,O.S.1748.

DEAR BOY:I am extremely pleased with your continuation of the history of the Reformation;which is one of those important eras that deserves your utmost attention,and of which you cannot be too minutely informed.You have,doubtless,considered the causes of that great event,and observed that disappointment and resentment had a much greater share in it,than a religious zeal or an abhorrence of the errors and abuses of popery.

Luther,an Augustine monk,enraged that his order,and consequently himself,had not the exclusive privilege of selling indulgences,but that the Dominicans were let into a share of that profitable but infamous trade,turns reformer,and exclaims against the abuses,the corruption,and the idolatry,of the church of Rome;which were certainly gross enough for him to have seen long before,but which he had at least acquiesced in,till what he called the rights,that is,the profit,of his order came to be touched.It is true,the church of Rome furnished him ample matter for complaint and reformation,and he laid hold of it ably.

This seems to me the true cause of that great and necessary,work;but whatever the cause was,the effect was good;and the Reformation spread itself by its own truth and fitness;was conscientiously received by great numbers in Germany,and other countries;and was soon afterward mixed up with the politics of princes;and,as it always happens in religious disputes,became the specious covering of injustice and ambition.

Under the pretense of crushing heresy,as it was called,the House of Austria meant to extend and establish its power in the empire;as,on the other hand,many Protestant princes,under the pretense of extirpating idolatry,or at least of securing toleration,meant only to enlarge their own dominions or privileges.These views respectively,among the chiefs on both sides,much more than true religious motives,continued what were called the religious wars in Germany,almost uninterruptedly,till the affairs of the two religions were finally settled by the treaty of Munster.