Temptations of Satan.

ble idolatry?.... You have had no knowledge of God, no true faith. You have been no better than a Turk."-" Convicted by the law of God," Luther says, "I confess before my adversary that I had sinned, and was condemned, like Judas; but I turn me to Christ, like Peter; I regard his infinite merit and mercy; and immediately he abrogates all my dreadful condemnation."-He treats at considerable length, and in general terms, of such temptations, in a strain which shews the purport of the whole passage. "The temptations of Satan are crafty, and well calculated to deceive. He lays hold of some truth which cannot be denied, and yet so turns it about and applies it that it might deceive the most wary. So the thought which seized the heart of Judas was true, I betrayed the innocent blood. Judas could not deny it: but the falsehood was in the inference, Therefore thou must despair of the mercy of God.' But the devil so pressed this false inference home upon Judas, that he could not stand against it, but sunk into despair."-Taking all this into view, the honest Seckendorf indignantly exclaims, "They therefore, who affirm that Luther acknowledged himself to have been convinced by the devil that the mass was no sacrifice, are guilty of a palpable and gross falsehood."-4. Once more; This whole statement assumes, that Luther had never denied the sacrifice of the mass till after the conflict referred to, which appears to have been not carlier than the month of May 1521. But this is quite contrary to fact, as Seckendorf demonstrates by quotations from his writings of a prior date. In this account both Basnage (who wrote in answer to

1 Seck. i. 166-169.

Bossuet,) and bishop Atterbury concur. Bayle, indeed, thinks the explanation of the language concerning Satan's addresses to Luther, as mere suggestions through the medium of his own thoughts, not satisfactory: but it seems to me that his objection arises merely from misapprehending other passages of Luther's upon similar subjects: and he admits that Seckendorf's tract (and Seckendorf proceeds entirely upon the ground here stated,) is "a solid answer to the abbot of Cordemoi."-There is the more need to expose this shameful and preposterous story against Luther, as I am informed that it has lately been served up in the shape of a small tract, to enlighten the lower classes of our population!

Bossuet's

A few more general remarks may here be Remarks on made on the celebrated work of Bossuet, to History of which we have had occasion repeatedly to ad- Variations. vert. It is indeed, in every sense of the word, a most imposing performance. Very confident, very elaborate, presenting the appearance of an intimate acquaintance with the writings and the whole history of the reformers, holding up a glaring picture suited to catch every eye, it is sure to carry along with it all whose prejudices previously incline them to the side of the question which the author advocates, and is well calculated to seduce even those whose prepossessions lie the contrary way, unless they be more than ordinarily wary. Yet, withal, I conceive it to be throughout completely fallacious; the work of one preeminently skilled "to make the worse appear the better reason." It is so with respect to the boasted unity and unvarying concord of the Romish church, which has been often exposed, and which seems very much to - consist in its members proclaiming, each one

for himself, I believe whatever holy church believes,' while they are avowing, perhaps, the most widely different sentiments. It is so in the representation which it makes of the doctrines of the same church. This also presents a notable instance of the uniformity that has prevailed in that communion: for it was not without great difficulty, and a delay of many years, that the bishop of Meaux could obtain any sanction of his exposition of the faith of the church, which was pronounced by the university of Louvain" scandalous and pernicious." I It is the same as it respects the doctrines of the reformers. Where these are undeniably good, the author represents them as stolen from the church of Rome: 2 where they cannot be so represented, he exaggerates the differences of the reformed churches one from another-often, for this purpose, citing the opinions of individuals as the tenets of public bodies.-The great internal counteraction to its poison, which the book carries with it, is to be found in its so much overdoing. Of this, as well as of the distrust with which its citations are to be received, we have had glaring proof in the instance which introduced these remarks. It may be illustrated also in the case of many important doctrines. Not only does the author insist upon it, that the real presence in the eucharist maintained by Luther was the same with that held by the church of Rome, but also that the Romish doctrine of merit was no other than that admitted by the reformers! Nay that Luther's doctrine of gratuitous justification did not differ from what the same church had always taught !!

1 Mosheim iv. 303,

304.

2 Above, pp. 322, 363.

The "protestant variation" on which he most of all insists is that concerning the sacrament -the worship of the church, according to him, "chiefly consisting in the sacrifice of the altar." The want of decision, and of uniformity of language, which may be traced on some other points, arose mainly from an anxious desire, on the part of the protestants, to conciliate, and for that purpose to come as near as they conscientiously could to that church, whose advocate thus turns this defect of firmness to their reproach.

The following passage well describes the system pursued throughout the "History of Variations," and the impression left by the work upon my mind. "The favourite system of aggression, which the Roman catholic writers, from the most ignorant bigot to the most powerful polemic, have adopted against the protestant faith, has been the crimination of the great leaders of the reformation in Germany, France, and England.... Where misrepresentation has failed, direct falsehoods have been advanced with an intrepidity, which the modern Romanist, in many instances, prudently and properly declines to exhibit.... The protestant who reads the foreign histories of our reformation, that of Davanzati, for instance, or even Bossuet, is at first absolutely bewildered by assertions, supported by no proof whatever, but advanced in a tone as peremptory as if they were truths of holy writ:' as he proceeds, however, he finds so many statements which he knows to be false, that he recovers from the temporary shock which his faith had sustained, and settles into a rooted and perpetual mistrust of such authorities for the future."-The writer here quoted goes on to observe, This mode of

controversy "is not merely inconclusive, but recoils with tremendous and destructive force upon those who employ it."1

It has struck me in reading the bishop of Meaux's work, that a writer equally able, equally unflinching, and, in particular, acting under the influence of a misguided conscience, would find little difficulty in composing much such a book, drawn from the New Testament itself, and directed against Christianity, as he has composed, professedly from the writings of the reformers, against the reformation. The xxiiid chapter of S. Matthew would be made to furnish specimens of the violent and unmeasured language in which the founder of the system indulged, even against characters the most venerable for rank and station. The answers, "It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs," and "Let the dead bury the dead: but go thou and preach the kingdom of God;" would be converted into proofs of insolence and imperiousness: while the sentences, "I am not come to send peace upon earth, but a sword:" "I am come to send fire on the earth, and what will I if it be already kindled;" would be considered as avowals, that the author of the doctrine cared not what consequences followed from his attempts to establish it. The epistles to the Galatians and the Corinthians would be eminently serviceable to the composer of such a work. They would detect the same disagreements occurring among some principal agents in the cause, 2 as are objected to the protestants; the same divisions and contentions among their converts; and abuses of sacred ordinances not less gross.

1 Quarterly Review, Dec. 1825, pp. 1-3. Gal. ii, 11–14.