Leaders of the Reformation

The Reformation from popery in the sixteenth century was the greatest event, or series of events, that has occurred since the close of the canon of Scripture; and the men who are really entitled to be called the “Leaders of the Reformation” have a claim to more respect and gratitude than any other body of uninspired men that have ever influenced or adorned the church. The Reformation was closely connected in various ways with the different influences which about that period were affecting for good the general condition of Europe, and, in combination with them, it aided largely in introducing and establishing great improvements in all matters affecting literature, civilization, liberty, and social order.

The movement, however, was primarily and fundamentally a religious one, and all the most important questions that may be stated about its character and consequences, should be decided by tests and considerations properly applicable to the subject of true religion. The Reformers claimed to be regarded as being engaged in a religious work, which was in accordance with God’s revealed will, and fitted to promote the spiritual welfare of men; and we are at once entitled and bound to judge of them and their work, by investigating and ascertaining the validity of their claim. There are two leading aspects in which the Reformation, viewed as a whole, may be regarded; the one more external and negative, and the other more intrinsic and positive.

In the first aspect it was a great revolt against the see of Rome, and against the authority of the church and of churchmen in religious matters, combined with an assertion of the exclusive authority of the Bible, and of the right of all men to examine and interpret it for themselves.

In the second and more important and positive aspect, the Reformation was the proclamation and inculcation, upon the alleged authority of Scripture, of certain views in regard to the substance of Christianity and the way of salvation, and in regard to the organization and ordinances of the Christian church.

Many have approved and commended the Reformation, viewed merely as a repudiation of human authority in religion, and an assertion of the right of private judgment and of the exclusive supremacy of the Scriptures as the rule of faith, who have not concurred in the leading views of the Reformers in regard to Christian theology and church organization. In this sense, rationalists and latitudinarians have generally professed to adopt and act upon what they call the principles of the Reformation, while they reject all the leading doctrines of the Reformers. Men of this class usually attempt to pay off the Reformers with the credit of having emancipated mankind from ecclesiastical thralldom, established the right of private judgment, and done something to encourage the practice of free inquiry.

But while giving the Reformers credit for these things, they have often rejected the leading doctrines of the Reformation upon theological and ecclesiastical subjects, and have been in the habit of claiming to themselves the credit of having succeeded, by following out the principles of the Reformation, in educing, either from Scripture or from their own speculations, more accurate and enlightened doctrinal views than the Reformers ever attained to. There has been a great deal of this sort of thing put forth both by rationalists and latitudinarians who professed to admit the authority of the Christian revelation, and by infidels who denied it....

Dr. Campbell of Aberdeen, who was a very great pretender to candor, has, in the last of his lectures on ecclesiastical history, made it manifest that he considered the chief benefits which the Reformers had conferred upon the world to be the setting an example of free inquiry, and the exposing of church tyranny, superstitious and idolatrous practices, and clerical artifices, and that he despised all their zealous efforts and contendings in restoring the pure gospel of the grace of God, the true system of Christian theology, as conversant only, according to the common cant of latitudinarians, with metaphysical subtleties and scholastic jargon.

A somewhat different aspect of the matter has been presented by certain writers, who are not disposed to allow to the Reformers even the credit of having encouraged and promoted free inquiry. It has been alleged that there is little or nothing said in the writings of the Reformers about the right and duty of private judgment, and that the absence of this, combined with their strenuous and vehement opposition to what they reckoned error, proved that after all they were nothing better than narrow-minded bigots.

It must, however, we fear, be conceded to those who take this view: first, that the Reformers were not much in the habit of formally and elaborately discussing, as a distinct and independent topic, what has since been called the right and duty of private judgment; and, second, that they ever professed it to be their great object to find out the actual truth of God contained in His Word, that they were very confident that in regard to the main points of their teaching they had found the truth, and that they were very strenuous in urging that other men should receive it also upon God’s authority. And these facts are amply sufficient to secure for them, in certain quarters, the reputation of being narrowminded bigots.

The Reformers did not discuss at much length, or with any great formality, the subject of the right of private judgment as a general topic, but they understood and acted upon their right as rational and responsible beings to reject all mere human authority in religious matters, to try everything by the standard of God’s Word, and to judge for themselves, on their own responsibility, as to the meaning of its statements. And by following this course, by acting on this principle, by setting this example, they have conferred most important benefits upon the church and the world.

The fundamental position maintained by the Reformers was this, that the views which they had been led to form, as to what should be the doctrine, worship, and government, of the church of Christ, were right, and that the views of the church of Rome upon these points, as opposed to theirs, were wrong. This was the grand position they occupied, and they based their whole procedure upon the ground of the paramount claims of divine truth, its right as coming from God and being invested with His authority, to be listened to, to be obeyed, and to be propagated.

When the papists opposed them in the maintenance of this position, and appealed on their own behalf to tradition, to ecclesiastical authority, to the decisions of popes and councils, the Reformers in reply pushed all this aside, by asserting the supremacy of the written Word as the only standard of faith and practice, by denying the legitimacy of submitting to mere human authority in religious matters, and by maintaining that men are entitled and bound to judge for themselves, upon their own responsibility, as to what God in His Word has required them to believe and to do. They asserted these positions more or less fully as circumstances required, but still they regarded them as in some sense subsidiary and subordinate.

The primary question with them always was, What is the truth as to the way in which God ought to be worshipped, in which a sinner is saved, and in which the ordinances and arrangements of the church of Christ ought to be regulated? They were bent upon answering, and answering aright, this important question, and they brushed aside everything that stood in their way and obstructed their progress. There can be no doubt that the only satisfactory explanation of the conduct of the Reformers is that they regarded themselves as fighting for the cause of God.

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