The Digger Movement in the Days of the Commonwealth | Page 6

after

passage, Luther himself declared that the last state of things was worse
than the first; that vice of every kind had increased since the
Reformation; that the nobles were more greedy, the burghers more
avaricious, the peasants more brutal; that Christian charity and
liberality had almost ceased to flow; and that the authorised preachers
of religion were neither heeded, respected nor supported by the people:
all of which he characteristically attributed to the workings of the devil,
a personage who plays a most important part in Luther's theology and
view of life.
Thus, to judge by its immediate effects, the Reformation appears to
have been conducive neither to moral, to social, nor to political
progress. And yet to-day we know that the intellectual movement of
which it was the outcome contained within itself inspiring conceptions
of social justice, political equality, economic freedom, aye, even of
religious toleration and moral purity, unknown to any preceding age,
and the full fruits of which have yet to be harvested to elevate and to
bless mankind.
FOOTNOTES:
[4:1] Luther's Works, ed. Walch, viii. 2043: "Erklärung der Ep. an die
Galater." Quoted by Beard, The Reformation of the Sixteenth Century,
p. 163.
[7:1] See Thorold Rogers' Six Centuries of Work and Wages, p. 389.
[8:1] See Appendix A.
[10:1] Beard, _loc. cit._ p. 146.
CHAPTER II
THE REFORMATION IN ENGLAND
"It was in the name of faith and religious liberty that, in the sixteenth
century, commenced the movement which, from that epoch, suspended
at times but ever renewed, has been agitating and exciting the world.

The tempest rose first in the human soul: it struck the Church before it
reached the State."--GUIZOT.
In Germany, as we have seen, from a religious and popular, the
Reformation degenerated into a mere scholastic and political movement,
favourable to the pretensions of the ruling and privileged classes,
opposed to the aspirations of the industrial classes, and conducive
neither to moral, social, religious, nor political progress. In England, on
the other hand, it ran a very different course. From a merely political, it
gradually rose to the height of a truly religious and popular movement,
infusing new life into the nation and lifting it into the very forefront of
the van of progress, curbing the insolent pretensions of king, priest and
noble, purifying the minds of the people of time-honoured but
degrading conceptions of the functions of Church and of State,
inspiring and uplifting them with new conceptions of political freedom,
social justice, moral purity and religious toleration, which, despite
temporary periods of reaction, have never since entirely lost their sway
over the hearts nor their influence over the destinies of the British
nation.
For many centuries prior to the Reformation the English people had
been jealous and impatient of all ecclesiastical power, as of all foreign
interference in their national affairs, more especially of the claims and
pretensions of the Papacy. In England, as in Germany and even in
France, the idea of a National Church controlled and administered by
their own countrymen, and freed from the supremacy of the Church and
Court of Rome, was one familiar even to devout Catholics. Moreover,
the teachings of Wyclif had sunk deep into the hearts of the people, and
only awaited a favourable opportunity to yield their fruits: already in
the fourteenth they had paved the way for the Reformation of the
sixteenth century. Hence it was that when Henry the Eighth, from
purely personal and dynastic reasons, became involved in a quarrel
with the Pope, he found his subjects prepared for greater changes in
religious matters than any he contemplated or desired. However, by a
series of legislative enactments, the Church of England, in 1534, was
emancipated from the superiority of the Church of Rome; the papal
authority was wholly abolished within the realm; Henry was legally

recognised as the supreme head of the Church of England; the power of
the spiritual aristocracy was broken and the whole body of the clergy
humbled; the monasteries were suppressed; the great wealth and vast
territorial possessions of the Church became the prey of the Crown,
only to be dissipated in lavish grants to greedy courtiers: and thus the
foundations were laid for greater changes in both Church and State than
those who promoted such measures ever dreamed of.
From its inception the Church of England comprised two opposing and
apparently irreconcilable elements, namely, those whose sympathies
and leanings were toward the forms, dogmas and doctrines of Roman
Catholicism, and those whose sympathies and leanings were toward the
forms, dogmas and doctrines of the German and Swiss Reformers. Of
religious toleration both parties were probably equally intolerant. That
the State was directly concerned with the religious beliefs of the people,
hence was justified in enforcing conformity to the Church as by law
established, seems to