Note 30 — Chapter III

Mr. Russel, in his tour in Germany, speaking of the number of abbeys, monasteries, etc., has taken up the cause of these holy locusts, and contends, with all that ingenuity and talent which characterize his excellent work, that it is wrong to accuse the princes, or pious individuals who endowed them, of having been imprudently liberal to the church. "Thousands of acres were given, but they were acres of wood and water, utterly unproductive to the public, and which would probably have remained for centuries in the same wild state, if they had been the property of a quarrelsome baron, instead of belonging to the peaceful sons of the church. The monks, though idle themselves, were not encouragers of idleness in their subjects. Their leisure allowed them to instruct, and their love of gain led them to aid, their vassals in agricultural science, rude as it was, while, at the same time, the sacred character which they enjoyed, placed their peasantry beyond the reach of the oppressions practised by feudal nobles. It has long been a current proverb in Germany, 'Man lebt gut unter dem Krummstab [30a].' It is true that one is apt to feel provoked when he is told that these fruitful vallies and the pasture hills which rise along their sides, belong to a congregation of idle monks. But monks were the very men who made the vallies fruitful, and the hills useful. They received them covered with trees, and rocks—no very liberal boon [30b], and it was they who planted them with corn and stored them with sheep." This is all very true, as far as regards the benefits which mankind has eventually received from these establishments; for we have likewise to thank the cowl and crosier, for much if not all the valuable information respecting the days of our fathers and "the old time before them," which the chronicles, written and illuminated in abbey and convent, contain. But let the praise be given to that Providence, "from seeming evil still producing good," in whose hands these monks were the unconscious instruments of spreading that very light and information which it was their constant study and employment to extinguish and contract. The hypocrisy and cupidity of these self-elected saints are far less pardonable than the brutal ferocity of the barons, whose pitiable ignorance and superstition; the roots of the evil, they fostered for their own advantage. Instead of employing the influence which their superior education and sacred character gave them over the minds of these uncultivated men, in the truly Christian task of curbing their passions, enlightening their understandings, and bringing them to a sense of the folly and wickedness of their ways, they meanly exerted it for the purposes of self-aggrandizement, utterly careless of the pitiable state of destitution and degradation in which, by their rapacious demands and disgusting mummeries, they were daily sinking their poor, besotted, bigoted, but often truly noble benefactors. The knave who swindles a silly heir out of his property may wonderfully improve the estate and build an hospital with the money; but he is no less a knave because the poor and the sick are eventually gainers; nor is the folly of the unfortunate dupe an excuse, in the eye of honour and honesty, for his crime; which is, on the contrary, aggravated by the advantage taken of the victim's imbecility. Avarice and ambition, however, sowed the seeds of their own destruction. The Church of Rome might have flourished to this day, had not its grasping hand pressed so heavily upon its subjects, as at length to rouse them from their trance and open their eyes, not so much to its errors as to its wealth. Truly does Schiller remark, that "Had it not been closely backed with private advantages, and state interests, the arguments of theologians, and the voice of the people, would never have met with princes so willing to espouse their cause, nor the new doctrines have found so numerous, so brave, and so obstinate champions!"... "The desire of independence, the rich plunder of monastic institutions, gave charms to the Reformation in the eyes of princes, and strengthened not a little their inward conviction of its necessity."... "Without the imposition of the tenth and twentieth pennies, the See of Rome had never lost the United Netherlands." The question, "Why the Pope, who is richer than several Crœsus's, cannot build the Church of Saint Peter with his own money, but does it at the expense of the poor?" was more staggering than that of his infallibility. The sale of indulgences first induced men to inquire into the power of the Church to grant them. The heavy coffers of the abbots, and the glittering ornaments of their shrines and altars drew the swords of such adventurers as Christian, Duke of Brunswick, who issued a coinage composed of church-plate, and bearing the motto—"A friend to God and an enemy to the priesthood." "Woe unto them," says the inspired Isaiah, "that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth.

"Which justify the wicked for reward, and take away the righteousness of the righteous from him.

"Therefore is the anger of the Lord kindled against his people, and he stretched forth his hand against them, and hath smitten them, and the hills did tremble, and their carcases were torn in the midst of the streets. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still."

Such were the crimes of the Church of Rome; such has been its punishment, and "His anger," indeed, "is not turned away"—"His hand is stretched out still." Who can look upon its fallen state, and listen to the cry of its unfortunate remnant, without exclaiming in the words of Jeremiah, "How is she become as a widow; she that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces! How is she become tributary!"