also Valentine Weigel, minister of Tschopau in Meissen. For though he died in the preceding century, yet a great part of his writings were first published in this, and were attacked by great numbers. I regard him as by no means a corrupt man; but he also was injured by his attachment to the chemistry which at that time hovered about Germany, and by his dislike or neglect of the precepts of sound reason.2

40. It remains that we notice the chief persons among the Lutherans who felt themselves strong enough to re-model the whole system of theology, or to draw forth a new one from their own resources. At the head of the list stands Jacob Bohme, a shoemaker of Gorlitz, famous for his vast number of both friends and foes, and whom his patrons call the German Theosophist. Being naturally inclined to search after abstruse things, and having learned partly from certain books and partly from intercourse with some physicians (Tobias Kober, Balthazar Walther, and others), the doctrines of Robert Fludd and the Rosecrucians, which were then everywhere circulated and talked of, he discovered, by means of fire and with the aid of his imagination, a kind of theology which was more obscure than the numbers of Pythagoras or the characters of Heraclitus. Those who would commend the man for ingenuity, piety, veracity, and honesty, may do it without contradiction from us; but those who would

sons, or respected the soundness and cor- To the class of which we here treat, belongs rectness of certain teachers. Men who undertake to plead the cause of piety and holiness are often carried, by the fervour which actuates them, to some extravagance, and therefore do not always confine their statements to the rigid rules of theological accuracy as prescribed by learned divines; and they sometimes borrow the strong and splendid, yet figurative and often obscure, words and phrases of those who treat of the genuine worship of God and of practical duties, with good intentions indeed, yet in a rude and uncouth style. Hence scarcely any fall under the suspicion of despising and marring the truth more readily than these do. Many such examples occurred in this century, and particularly in the case of Stephen Prætorius, a preacher at Salswedel, and of that most excellent man, John Arndt. The former had published in the preceding century some tracts calculated to arouse the minds of men to solicitude about their salvation, and these were repeatedly republished in this century and commended by many; yet they were thought by others to abound in expressions and sentiments either directly false or calculated to lead to error. And there certainly are some unsuitable expressions in those tracts which might easily mislead the ignorant, and some also which indicate too great credulity. Yet whoever will read his works with an ingenuous mind will easily believe that the writer wrote nothing deceitfully or with an evil design. The cele-honour him with the title of a man taught brated work of Arndt on True Christianity, by God, or even of a sound and wise philothe perusal of which affords delight to so pher, must themselves lack knowledge; many persons even in our own times, was for he so confuses every subject with chetoo bitterly taxed by Lucas Osiander, mical metaphors and with such a profusion George Rost, and many others, among of obscure terms, that it would seem as if other faults, with being written in a style he aimed to produce jargon. The heat of that was debased by Weigelian, Paracelsic, his exuberant fancy, if I do not mistake, and the like phraseology. It is certain that led him to believe that divine grace opethis extraordinary man disliked the philo-rates by the same laws which prevail in the sophy which prevailed in the schools of that age, and on the other hand ascribed much I had almost said, too much-to the doctrines and pretentions of the chemists; and hence he sometimes used the language of those who tell us that fire throws light on both religion and nature. But he has been absolved from all great errors by the most respectable men, especially by Paul Egard, Daniel Dilger, Melchior Breler, John Gerhard, Dorschæus, and numerous others; and indeed he appears to have derived reputation and renown rather than disgrace from those numerous accusations.'

1 See Arnold's Kirchen-und Ketzerhist. part ii. book xvii. chap. vi. p. 940, &c.; Weismann's Historia Eccles. Sæculi xvii. p. 1174, 1189; Scharf's Supplementum Hist.

physical world, and that men's souls are purified from their pollution and vices in the same way in which metals are purged from dross. He formerly had, and he still has, a very great number of followers, among whom the most noted and famous in this century were John Lewis Gifttheil, John Angelus von Werdenhagen, Abraham von Franckenberg, Theodore von Tzetsch, Paul Felgenhauer, Quirinus Kuhlmann, John James Zimmermann, and others. Some of these were not altogether destitute of

litisque Arndiana, Wittemb. 1727, 8vo, and very many others.

Arnold treats largely of Weigel, yet as usual not impartially, in his Kirchen-und Ketzerhistorie, part ii. book xvii. chap. xvii. p. 1088.

modesty and good sense, but others were entirely beside themselves and excited the compassion of intelligent men; as, e.g. Kuhlmann, who was burned in Muscovy, A.D. 1684, and afterwards Gichtel; while not one of them managed their affairs so laudably or prudently, as to procure for the sect or its founders any degree of respect and commendation from persons of the slightest discernment.1

42. I would give a somewhat more distinet account of some who were not indeed so wholly beside themselves as to claim to be prophets of God, yet sadly deceived themselves and others by marvellous and strange opinions. Esaias Stiefel and Ezekiel Meth, both of Thuringia, not long after the commencement of the century, expressed themselves so unusually and so improperly that they were thought by 41. Next after Boehme it appears should many to arrogate to themselves divine be mentioned those whom disordered minds glory and majesty, to the great dishonour rendered so presumptuous, that they claimed of God and our Saviour. I can believe to be prophets divinely raised up and en- that though they greatly lacked sound dued with the power of foretelling future sense, yet they were not so far beside themevents. A large number of such persons selves, and that they only foolishly imitated existed in this age, and particularly during the lofty and swollen phraseology of the the times when the Austrians were contend- mystical writers. Thus they may serve as ing for supremacy against the Germans, examples to show how much cloudiness and the Swedes, and the French; for long ex-folly the constant reading of mystical perience shows, that there is never a greater number of diviners or prophets than when great revolutions seem about to take place, or when great and unexpected calamities Occur. The most noted of these were, Nicholas Drabiz, Christopher Kotter, and Christina Poniatowsky, who have found an eloquent patron in John Amos Comenius; also Joachim Greulich, Anna Vetteria, Eva Maria Frölich, George Reichard, and some others. But as no one of them was the cause of any great commotions, and as the progress of events very soon divested their predictions of all their authority, it is sufficient to have shown generally, that there were among the Lutherans of this century some disordered minds who affected the honours and the authority of ambassadors of heaven.2

I It is not necessary here to cite authorities, for the works of Boehme are in everybody's hands, and the books which confute him are nowhere scarce. What can be said in favour of the man and his followers may be seen in Arnold, who is always most full in extolling and lauding those whom others censure. Concerning Kuhlmann and his execution. see the Unschuldige Nachrichten, A.D. 1748, p. 905, and in many other places.-[Bohme however had the good fortune to meet, in our days, with a warm advocate and an industrious disciple in the late well-meaning but gloomy and visionary Mr. William Law, who was for many years preparing a new edition and translation of Bochme's works, which he left behind him ready for the press, and which have been published in two vols, 4to, since his death.-Mac. [See also the references in the

addition to Note 2, page 733, above.-R.

Arnold has done the world service by accurately collecting the visions and acts of these people, in the second and third parts of his Kirchen-und Ketzerhistorie. For now those who have occasion to investigate the subject have the ready means of ascertaining with certainty, what was in itself most probable beforehand, that what these persons deemed divine communications were the fictions of their own minds led away by their imaginations. There was an honest, illiterate man at Amsterdam, in the middle of the seventeenth century, Benedict Bahnsen of Holstein, who was so captivated with such writings and prophecies, that he carefully collected and published thein all. His Index Bibliotheca was printed after his death, Amsterd. 1670, 4to,

books may spread over uncultivated and feeble minds.3 Paul Nagel, a professor at Leipsic, who had some tincture of mathematical knowledge, conjectured from the indications of the stars future occurrences both in church and state; and among other things professed to be certain, from their indications, that a very holy and heavenly kingdom of Christ was to be set up on the earth.‘

43. Christian Hoburg of Lüneburg, a man of an unstable and restless spirit, under the assumed names of Elias Prætorius and Bernard Baumann, published a vast number of invectives against the whole Lutheran church, and thereby involved himself in various troubles. Yet for a long time, by dissimulation and deception, which he doubtless supposed to be lawful, he led the more charitable to regard him as less culpable than he actually was; and he was accounted an acrimonious assailant, not so much of religion itself as of the licentiousness and vices of those especially who ministered in holy things. At length however he rendered himself universally odious, and went over to the Mennonites. Very similar to him though superior in petulance and acrimony, was Frederick Breckling, who being rejected from the ministry which he first exercised in Holstein and afterwards at Zwoll in Holland, continued to extreme old

embracing a great number of chemical, fanatical, and prophetical writings.

See Thomasius, Historie der Weisheit und Narrheit, vol. i. part iii. p. 150; Arnold's Kirchen-und Ketzerhistorie, part fii. chap. iv. p. 32.

4 Arnold, ubi supra, part iii. chap. v. p. 53; Carolus, Memorabilia Eccles. Sæc. xvii. par. i. lib. iii. cap. iv p. 513.

5 Arnold, ubi supra, part iii. chap. xiii. p. 130; Carolus, ubi supra, tom. i. p. 1065; Hornbeck, Summa Controvers. p. 535; Möller, Cimbria Literata, tom, ii. p. 337, &c.

lived at the present day he would have appeared much less odious than he did in that age. For if we except his singular ideas concerning the Messiah, all the rest of his system would be highly approved by many at the present day, among the English, the Dutch, and other nations.

age in Holland connected with no religious | religious duties which God requires of him. sect. Several of his tracts aro extant To render these monstrous opinions more which, although they vehemently urge and defensible and specious, he audaciously recommend the cultivation of piety, and assailed and discarded all the books of the display implacable hatred against both vice New Testament. The few persons whom and the vicious, yet show the writer to have he brought over to his views were called been destitute of the primary virtues of a Semi-Judaizers.3 If this rash man had truly pious man-charity, wisdom, the love of truth, meekness, and patience.1 It is strange that such vehement and heated declaimers against the defects of the public religion and its ministers, as they profess to be more discerning than all others, should fail of discovering, what the most simple daily learn by common observation, that nothing is more odious and disgusting than an angry reformer, who is always laying about him with sword and dagger; and that they should not perceive that it is scarcely possible for any one successfully to cure in others the faults with which he is himself chargeable. The expectation of the millennial kingdom, which seldom exists in well-informed minds and which generally produces extravagant opinions, was embraced and propagated by George Lawrence Seidenbecher, a preacher in the Saxon region of Eichsfeld, and on this account he was deprived of his office.2

CHAPTER II.

HISTORY OF THE REFORMED CHURCH.

1. THE Reformed church, as has been already remarked, being united not so much by the bonds of a common faith and disci pline as by principles of moderation and candour, it will be proper to consider, first, whatever relates to this very extensive community as a whole, and then the events worthy of notice in the several Reformed countries. The principal enlargements of this community in the seventeenth century have already been mentioned in our account 44. We shall close the list of this sickly of the Hessian and Brandenburg commofamily (for it is not necessary to name a tions, in the chapter on the Lutheran church. great number, since they all pursued much We here add that John Adolphus, duke of the same course) with the most odious and Holstein, in the beginning of this century the worst of them all, Martin Seidelius, a also went over to the side of the Reformed, Silesian of Ohlau, who laboured to estab- and much hope was indulged that his sublish a sect in Poland and the neighbouring jects would be led gradually to follow his countries, near the close of the preceding example; but the prince dying in the year century and the commencement of this, but 1616, this hope was frustrated. Henry, whose extreme absurdities prevented his duke of Saxony, in the year 1688 at Desmeeting with success even among the Soci- sau exchanged the Lutheran religion in nians. This most daring of men supposed which he had been educated for that of the that God had indeed promised a Saviour or Reformed, at the instigation it is said of bis a Messiah to the Jewish nation, but that this wife." In the beginning of the century Messiah had never appeared nor ever would there were many in Denmark who secretly appear, because the Jews by their sins had leaned towards the doctrines of the Rerendered themselves unworthy of so great a formed, and especially in regard to the deliverer as this, promised of old to their doctrine of the Lord's Supper; and who had fathers; that of course Christ was erroneously regarded as the Messiah; that it was his only business and office to explain the law of nature, which had been greatly obscured by the fault of men; and therefore, that whoever shall obey this law as expounded by Jesus Christ will fulfil all the

1 Arnold treats of this man in his work so often cited, part iii. chap. xiii. p. 148, &c. and likewise gives us some of his tracts which abundantly show the extreme fertility of his genius, Ibid. p. 1110. A formal account of him is given by Müller, Cimbria Literata, tom. iii. p. 72, &c.

3 Sec Zeltner's Bistoria Crypto-Socinismi Altorfini, tom. i. p. 268, 335. [His Fundamenta Religionis Christiana and his Epistolae Tres ad Cætum Unitariorum, are to be found in the Bibliotheca Fratrum Unitariorum. -Schl. [A sect still exists in Russia holding much the same doctrines, and bearing the name of Seleznev tschini. See Pinkerton's Present State of the Greck Church, p. 273, compare p. 228.-Mur.

4 Möller's Introduct. ad Historiam Chersonesus Cimbrica, par. ii. p. 101, &c.; Pontoppidan's Annales Ecclesia Danica diplomatici, tom. iii. p. 691, &c.

5 See Moebius, Selecte Disputat. Theolog. p. 1137. This prince published a Confession of his Faith, which being attacked by the Leipsic divines by public authority, Isaac de Beausobre, who was then pastor of the church of Magdeburg, composed a vindication of it, Défense de la Doctrine des Réformées, et en particulier de la Con

2 He is fully described by Verpoorten, in his Com-fession de Foy de S. A. Monseigneur le Duc Henry ment. de Vita et Institutis G. L. Seidenbecheri, Dantzic, 1739, 4to.

de Saxe, contre un Livre composé par la Faculté de Theologie de Leipsic, Magdeb. 1694, 8vo.

received their instruction from Nicholas | but the king's clemency and good pleasure." Hemming and other friends of Melancthon. Those who judge of this transaction by the But this class of persons lost all hope, principles of state policy deny that it was courage, and influence, after the year 1614, a violation of all justice and equity, because when John Canute, a bishop who had too such communities in the bosom of a kingopenly avowed his good-will towards Calvi-dom or state are pernicious and most nistic opinions, was deprived of his office. hazardous to the public peace and safety. It is well known moreover that the Reformed And if the French court had stopped here, religion was transplanted by the Dutch and and had left safe and inviolate to the Rethe English into Africa, Asia, and America; formed their liberties of conscience and and in various parts of those continents religion, purchased with so much blood and very flourishing Reformed churches were by such great achievements, perhaps the established; and among the Lutherans also, Reformed could and would have borne the in various places, liberty was granted to immense loss of their liberties and rights the French, German, and English Reformed with equanimity. freely to set up their worship.

3. But the French court was not content with this measure of success; having destroyed that species or form of civil polity which had been annexed to the Reformed church, and which afterwards was deemed adverse to the regal power, the court next attacked the church itself and its religion, contrary to the plighted faith of the kings. At first milder measures were resorted to, promises, caresses, conciliatory expositions of the doctrines most offensive to the Reformed, and similar measures, both with the chief men of the Reformed community and with the more learned and eminent of their ministers; and Richelieu especially spared neither pains nor artifices which he thought might have any influence to draw the Reformed insidiously into the Romish church. But as little or nothing was effected by all these measures, the Catholic bishops especially resorted to sophistry, persecution, the most unrighteous laws, and all the means which either blind passion or ingenious malice could invent, in order gradually to exhaust the people who were so hateful to them, and compel them against their choice reluctantly to join the standard of the Roman pontiff. Many, being overcome by their troubles and their grievous sufferings, yielded, others left the country, but the greatest part firmly persisted in the religion of their fathers.

2. Of all the public calamities which diminished the splendour and the prosperity of the Reformed community, the greatest and most lamentable was the subversion of the French church, renowned for so many distinguished men. From the time of Henry IV. the Reformed church in France constituted a kind of state or commonwealth within the commonwealth, being fortified by great privileges and rights and possessing among other things for its security towns and castles, and especially the very strong fortress of Rochelle, all which places were garrisoned with their own troops. This community was not always under leaders of sufficient foresight and attachment to the crown. Hence sometimes (for the truth should not be concealed), when civil wars or commotions broke out, this community took the side of those who were opposed to the king, engaged at times in enterprises which the king disliked, too openly sought alliance and friendship with the Dutch and the English, and undertook or aimed at other things inconsistent, apparently at least, with the public peace and the supreme authority of the king. Hence king Lewis XIII. from the year 1621, waged war with the Reformed party; and the prime minister of France, cardinal Richelieu, was persuaded that France would never be safe and enjoy peace until this community was prostrated, and deprived of its fortifications, castles, strong towns, and high privileges. Richelieu, after various conflicts and numerous efforts, at last obtained his object. For in the year 1628, after a long and difficult siege, he took Rochelle, the chief fortress of the Reformed community, and reduced it to subjection to the king; and this city being captured, the Reforined community in France was prostrate, and being deprived of its fortresses, could depend upon nothing XIII. tome iii. p. 676, &c. ; tome iv. p. 1, &c. and the

4. At length under Lewis XIV. after all artifices, snares, and projects had been exhausted in vain, the prelates of the Gallic church and the Jesuits, to whom the king was accustomed to listen, determined that this most resolute body of people must be extirpated by violence and war, and be crushed as it were by a single stroke. Overcome by their arguments and importu

2 See Le Clerc's Vie du Cardinal Richelieu, tome i. p. 69, 77, 177, 199, 269; Le Vassor's Histoire de Louis

subsequent volumes. Add the duke of Sully (a friend to Henry IV. himself one of the Reformed, but not dis1 Pontoppidan's Annales Eccles. Danica, tom. iii. posed to conceal the errors of his church), Mémoires, tome ili. iv. v.

p. 696, &c.