CHAP. 13. MISSIONARY EFFORTS. 271 After his death, Matthew Ricci and a host of Jesuits, pressed into the regions of Siam, Tonkin, Cochin-China, and the vast empire itself. Ricci recommended himself to the emperor by his mathematical knowledge, and obtained patronage for his religion. Converts were multiplied, and the Catholic religion for a season prevailed to a great extent. The emperor built a magnificent church for the Jesuits within the imperial precincts. Others pushed their conquests into India. On the coast of Malabar, one missionary boasted of a thousand converts baptized in a single year. Others still more adventurous, penetrated into Japan, where they numbered, at one time, more than 600,000 Christians. In Abyssinia, also, they acquired an astonishing influence, which was retained for a season by the tortures of the inquisition. But in South America was their greatest success. The whole of that vast continent they brought under the dominion of the Pope. In Paraguay, where perhaps they did more good than any where else, 300,000 families were said to be taught by them agriculture and the arts; to be both civilized and Christianized. Their amazing efforts excited other monastic orders, the Dominicans, Franciscans, and Capuchins, who found that they were, for their supinenes, sinking in repute, to similar enterprises. They also induced the Popes, and others, to institute immense and splendid missionary establishments in Europe. In 1622, Pope Gregory XV. founded at Rome, the magnificent college, "De propaganda fide." Its object was the propagation of the Catholic religion in every quarter of the globe. Its riches were immense, and adequate to the greatest undertakings. By it a vast number of youth were educated, and sent to the pagan nations, feeble and worn out missionaries were supported, and books were published and dispersed beyond number. Its exploits are almost incredible. In 1627, another college was founded through the munificence of John Baptist Viles, a Spanish nobleman, for the education of missionaries. And in France was established in 1663, the Congregation of the priests of foreign missions, and the Parisian Seminary for the missions abroad. All these sent forth legions of Jesuits and friars, to all parts of the globe. But alas! while they put Protestant Christians to the blush, for their backwardness in Heathen missions, all their labours were to but little profit. Little or no instruction did these missionaries ever give, relating to the character and love of God, to sin and holiness, and the way of salvation by Jesus Christ. Their great object was to persuade the Heathen to receive and practise the religious ceremonies of the church of Rome; and this they did, to a great extent, by a compromising plan, in which they made it appear that there was no great difference between the Christian and Pagan systems. They taught the Chinese that the Christian religion came from Tien, the Chinese name for God, and that there was no great difference between the worship of the saints and the Virgin Mary, and the Chinese worship of their ancestors. Jesus Christ and Confucius were placed upon a level, and their religions were nearly amalgamated. The Hindoos were taught that Jesus Christ was a Brahmin, and that the Jesuits were Brahmins sent from a distant country to reform them. The Capuchin converts in Africa were suffered to retain the abominable superstitions of their ancestors. In South America the profligate and the worthless characters of the Spaniards and Portuguese, utterly forbade any good moral influence from their instructions. Yet among such a crowd of missionaries, some few, like Xavier, may have truly sought the salvation of souls, through whose labours and prayers, some may have been gathered into the spiritual kingdom of our Lord and Saviour. If so, it has given joy in heaven. While the Roman church was thus engaged in foreign missions, she was also deeply involved in almost uninterrupted cabals to crush the Protestants, and regain her former dominion in Europe. A few amicable conferences were first held; but her genius rather led her to violence and blood. She declared that the Protestants in Germany, had forfeited the privileges secured to them, in the peace of religion, by departing from the confession of Augsburg; and through the bigotted house of Austria, she made war upon them in 1618; overcame, and awfully oppressed them. The cries of the suffering affected every heart, but that of the bigot Ferdinand, who exclaimed, "I had rather see the kingdom a desert, than damned." Their cruel oppressions called forth the interposition of the noble Gustavus of Sweden. He appeared in Germany with a small army in 1629, and fell in the battle of Lutzen in 1632. But his generals persevered; till worn out with a thirty years' war, all parties agreed in the treaty of Westphalia in 1648, in which the Roman church confirmed anew to the Lutherans all their rights and privileges. This was the last open war which the church of Rome made upon the Protestants; but in every other possible way, by bribes, by the subtleties of controversy, by the axe and the fire, she continually harrassed the men of every country. In Hungary a violent persecution raged for ten years. In Poland, all who CHAP. 13. ST. BARTHOLOMEW'S DAY. 273 differed from the Pope, were treated as the offscouring of the earth, for more than a century. The Waldenses were ever the objects of persecution, and were hunted in their dens and caves, and native mountains, and put to the most cruel deaths. From Spain, a million of Moors or Saracens, descendants of the former conquerors of the country, a sober, industrious, wealthy people, nominally Christian, but strongly attached to Mahomet, were banished from the kingdom; and the church acquired immense possessions. An almost equal number of Jews were also driven out, whose estates too, were confiscated by the Roman church. The eyes of many in that hapless country, were opened upon the truth, by their connection with Germany during the reign of Charles V.; but they were silenced by racks, gibbets, and stakes. All the divines who accompanied Charles into his retirement, were immediately, upon his death, given over to the Inquisition, and committed to the flames; which gives reason to suppose that he died a Protestant. The Protestants in France, called Huguenots, probably from the word Puguon, a night walker, because, like the early Christians, they assembled privately in the evening; and who were very numerous, suffered continual vexations from Francis I. before the reformatoin was established; though they found a warm friend in the queen of Navarre. His successor Henry II., or probably Nero II., had them tied to a stake on the day of his inauguration, and the flame kindled at the moment he passed by, that he might see them burn. Parliament decreed that it was lawful to kill them wherever they could be found Charles IX. as is if to signalize himself still more by his ferocity, resolved upon the extirpation of the whole from his dominions. At this time, A. D. 1571, they had 2,150 congregations, some of which, had not less than 10,000 members. Charles laid a snare for them, by offering his sister in marriage to a Huguenot, the prince of Navarre. All the heads of the Huguenots were assembled in Paris at the nuptials; when on the eve of St. Bartholomew's day, August 24th, 1572, at the ringing of a bell, the dreadful massacre commenced. Charles and his mother beheld it, with joy, from a window. The monster himself, fired upon the Huguenots, crying kill, kill! An unparalleled scene of horror ensued. The Catholics, like blood hounds, rushed upon the defenceless Huguenots. Above five hundred men of distinction, and about ten thousand of inferior order, that night slept in Paris, the sleep of death. A general destruction was immediately ordered throughout France; and a horrid carnage was soon witnessed at Rouen, Lyons, Orleans, and other cities. Sixty thousand perished, and solemn thanksgivings were rendered to God by the Catholics for the triumph, as they called it of the church militant. It was the horrid excess of religious bigotry-the awful triumph of the Man of Sin. As soon as possible, the Huguenots, under the prince of Conde, stood in their defence, and combatted their enemies with much success. But the most terrible scenes-murders, assassinations, massacres, and all the accompaniments of a religious war, were continually witnessed;-39 princes, 148 counts, 234 barons, 146,158 gentlemen, and 760,000 of the common people were in about thirty years destroyed, for adopting the reformed religion. In 1593, Henry IV. succeeded to the throne of France. He was a Huguenot. But not being able to obtain the throne, while he remained such, and imagining that if he should, his government would have no stable foundation disconnected with Rome, he made a solemn profession of Popery. But he fol lowed the feelings of his heart, in relation to the Huguenots, and, in the year 1598, published the EDICT OF NANTEZ, which gave them the rights and privileges of citizenship, assured to them the liberty of worshipping God according to the dictates of their own consciences, and certain lands to support their churches and garrisons. Henry soon felt the vengeance of the Papal arm; for he was assassinated in his chariot as he passed along the streets of Paris, by the fanatic Ravillac, A. D. 1610. Tolerated by the civil power, the Huguenots, for a season, flourished greatly. But they were ever at variance with the government, and Cardinal Richelieu, prime minister of Lewis XIII., early adopted, and long pursued this severe maxim; "That there could be no peace in France, until the Huguenots were totally suppressed.' Every method which had the least appearance of consistence with the edict of Nantez, was used for many years, to carry it into effect. The Huguenots were deprived of their wealth, and strong holds, and civil privileges —were courted and frowned upon, and driven from one extremity to another, until at length, finding all these measures ineffectual, the perfidious and impolitic Lewis XIV. revoked the edict of Nantez, and ordered all the reformed churches to embrace the Romish faith. Their case was now hopeless. Their churches were razed to the ground. They were insulted by a brutal soldiery, and massacred in crowds. And though soldiers were stationed on the frontiers to prevent their escape, yet above fifty thousand fled, and sought refuge in the various Protestant countries of Europe. Similar attempts to regain lost dominion, are seen in the history of the church of England. To this day they have not ceased where any prospect of success has been visible. These various efforts were not indeed in many countries unsuccessful. Vast foreign countries, and a great part of Europe, were held in iron bondage. A queen of Sweden, a king of Poland, a count Palatine, a duke of Brunswick, a marquis of Brandenburg, and many hundreds who had become Protestants, were brought back to the bosom of the church. And what the falling Pontiffs possessed, they retained as far as they dare, by all the tortures of the Inquisition. From France, this horrid tribunal was early effectually expelled. In Rome, it was lenient, lest it should drive strangers from the city. But in Spain, Portugal, and in Goa, it was a horrid power. In the united kingdoms of Castile and Arragon were, at one time, eighteen inquisitorial courts, having each its apostolical inquisitors, secretaries, sergeants, &c., and twenty thousand familiars or spies and informers, dispersed through the kingdom. Persons suspected of the slightest opposition to the Catholic church were demanded at midnight by the watch of the Inquisition, dragged before the tribunal, put to the torture, condemned on the slightest evidence, shut up for life in dungeons, or strangled and burnt to death. No husband, wife, or parent, dared refuse to give up the nearest relative. Wealth in a nobleman, and beauty in a female, were sure to attract the cupidity of these horrible harpies. Their friends might never inquire into their fate. The AUTO DE FE, or Act of faith, has exhibited the most shocking barbarities of civilized man. On a stage erected in the public market place in Madrid, the unhappy victims, having been put to the torture by infernal monks, have been tied to the stake and burned gradually to death. The kings of Spain have sat uncovered, lower than the inquisitors, and witnessed with approbation the awful spectacle. This horrid tribunal has almost destroyed that beautiful kingdom. All the fountains of social happiness have been broken The father has stood in fear of his own child. The sister of her brother. Both Spain and Portugal are sunk by it, in the grossest ignorance, and deepest wretchedness.* up. * Between the years 1452 and 1808, the whole number of victims to the inquisition on the peninsula, was as follows; Burnt, Died before execution, or escaped, 31,718 Punished by whipping, imprisonment, &c. 287,522 Total, 336,751 |