ffled, but otherwise contented to despise them, he
took up boldly the task which he had set himself.

'We kiss the old shoes of the saints,' he said, 'but we never read their
works.' He undertook the enormous labour of editing and translating
selections from the writings of the Fathers. The New Testament was as
little known as the lost books of Tacitus--all that the people knew of
the Gospels and the Epistles were the passages on which theologians had
built up the Catholic formulas. Erasmus published the text, and with it,
and to make it intelligible, a series of paraphrases, which rent away
the veil of traditional and dogmatic interpretation, and brought the
teaching of Christ and the Apostles into their natural relation with
reason and conscience.

In all this, although the monks might curse, he had countenance and
encouragement from the great ecclesiastics in all parts of Europe--and
it is highly curious to see the extreme freedom with which they allowed
him to propose to them his plans for a Reformation--we seem to be
listening to the wisest of modern broad Churchmen.

To one of his correspondents, an archbishop, he writes:--

'Let us have done with theological refinements. There is an excuse for
the Fathers, because the heretics forced them to define particular
points; but every definition is a misfortune, and for us to persevere in
the same way is sheer folly. Is no man to be admitted to grace who does
not know how the Father differs from the Son, and both from the Spirit?
or how the nativity of the Son differs from the procession of the
Spirit? Unless I forgive my brother his sins against me, God will not
forgive me my sins. Unless I have a pure heart--unless I put away envy,
hate, pride, avarice, lust, I shall not see God. But a man is not damned
because he cannot tell whether the Spirit has one principle or two. Has
he the fruits of the Spirit? That is the question. Is he patient, kind,
good, gentle, modest, temperate, chaste? Enquire if you will, but do not
define. True religion is peace, and we cannot have peace unless we leave
the conscience unshackled on obscure points on which certainty is
impossible. We hear now of questions being referred to the next
OEcumenical Council--better a great deal refer them to doomsday. Time
was, when a man's faith was looked for in his life, not in the Articles
which he professed. Necessity first brought Articles upon us, and ever
since, we have refined and refined till Ch