History of the Catholic Church, vol 1 | Page 5

the Fathers, and with the authoritative
pronouncements of the Holy See, all of which were in direct
contradiction to his theories, that he felt himself obliged, reluctantly, to
abandon the principle of authority in favour of the principle of private
judgment. In truth it was the only possible way in which he could hope
to defend his novelties, and besides, it had the additional advantage of
catering for the rising spirit of individualism, which was so
characteristic of the age.
His second great innovation, so far as the divine constitution of the
Church was concerned, and the one which secured ultimately whatever
degree of success his revolution attained, was the theory of royal
supremacy, or the recognition of the temporal ruler as the source of
spiritual jurisdiction. But even this was more or less of an after-
thought. Keen student of contemporary politics that Luther was, he
perceived two great influences at work, one, patronised by the
sovereigns in favour of absolute rule, the other, supported by the
masses in favour of unrestricted liberty. He realised from the beginning
that it was only by combining his religious programme with one or
other of these two movements that he could have any hope of success.
At first, impressed by the strength of the popular party as manifested in

the net-work of secret societies then spread throughout Germany, and
by the revolutionary attitude of the landless nobles, who were prepared
to lead the peasants, he determined to raise the cry of civil and religious
liberty, and to rouse the masses against the princes and kings, as well as
against their bishops and the Pope. But soon the success of the German
princes in the Peasants' War made it clear to him that an alliance
between the religious and the social revolution was fraught with
dangerous consequences; and, at once, he went to the other extreme.
The gradual weakening of the Feudal System, which acted as a check
upon the authority of the rulers, and the awakening of the national
consciousness, prepared the way for the policy of centralisation. France,
which consisted formerly of a collection of almost independent
provinces, was welded together into one united kingdom; a similar
change took place in Spain after the union of Castile and Aragon and
the fall of the Moorish power at Granada. In England the disappearance
of the nobles in the Wars of the Roses led to the establishment of the
Tudor domination. As a result of this centralisation the Kings of France,
Spain, and England, and the sovereign princes of Germany received a
great increase of power, and resolved to make themselves absolute
masters in their own dominions.
Having abandoned the unfortunate peasants who had been led to
slaughter by his writings, Luther determined to make it clear that his
religious policy was in complete harmony with the political absolutism
aimed at by the temporal rulers. With this object in view he put forward
the principle of royal supremacy, according to which the king or prince
was to be recognised as the head of the church in his own territories,
and the source of all spiritual jurisdiction. By doing so he achieved two
very important results. He had at hand in the machinery of civil
government the nucleus of a new ecclesiastical organisation, the
shaping of which had been his greatest worry; and, besides, he won for
his new movement the sympathy and active support of the civil rulers,
to whom the thought of becoming complete masters of ecclesiastical
patronage and of the wealth of the Church opened up the most rosy
prospects. In Germany, in England, and in the northern countries of
Europe, it was the principle of royal supremacy that turned the scales
eventually in favour of the new religion, while, at the same time, it led
to the establishment of absolutism both in theory and practice. From the

recognition of the sovereign as supreme master both in Church and
State the theory of the divine rights of kings as understood in modern
times followed as a necessary corollary. There was no longer any
possibility of suggesting limitations or of countenancing rebellion. The
king, in his own territories, had succeeded to all the rights and
privileges which, according to the divine constitution of the Church,
belonged to the Pope.
Such a development in the Protestant countries could not fail to
produce its effects even on Catholic rulers who had remained loyal to
the Church. They began to aim at combining, as far as possible, the
Protestant theory of ecclesiastical government with obedience to the
Pope, by taking into their own hands the administration of
ecclesiastical affairs, by making the bishops and clergy state- officials,
and by leaving to the Pope only a primacy of honour. This policy,
known under the different names of Gallicanism