lefield against skilled and armed
men of war. Each revolt terminated in the butchery of the
unhappy rebels.

The Peasants' War has acquired special notoriety because of
its connection with the Reformation. The people rose in the
name of religion, and, as their ignorance and ferocity led
them into hideous excesses of revenge upon their oppressors,
the new religion was blamed for all the evil thus done in
its name. This revolt, because of the fear and disgust it
roused, became the most severe set-back Protestantism
received in all its struggle with the more ancient and
conservative Church.

The following account of the outbreak and its consequences
is by a standard Protestant historian, president of the
College of Geneva, a student who can see justice on both
sides of the great controversy.

A political ferment, very different from that produced by the Gospel,
had long been at work in the empire. The people, bowed down by civil and
ecclesiastical oppression, bound in many countries to the seigniorial
estates, and transferred from hand to hand along with them, threatened
to rise with fury and at last to break their chains. This agitation had
showed itself long before the Reformation by many symptoms, and even
then the religious element was blended with the political; in the
sixteenth century it was impossible to separate these two principles, so
closely associated in the existence of nations. In Holland, at the close
of the preceding century, the peasants had revolted, placing on their
banners, by way of arms, a loaf and a cheese, the two great blessings of
these poor people. The "Alliance of the Shoes" had shown itself in the
neighborhood of Spires in 1502. In 1513 it appeared again in Breisgau,
being encouraged by the priests. In 1514 Wuertemberg had seen the
"League of Poor Conrad," whose aim was to maintain by rebellion "the
right of God." In 1515 Carinthia and Hungary had been the theatres of
terrible agitations. These seditions had been quenched in torrents of
blood, but no relief had been accorded to the people. A political
reform, therefore, was not less necessary than a religious reform. The
people were entitled to this; but we must acknowledge that they were not
ripe for its enjoyment.

Since the commencement of the Reformation, these popular disturbances
had not been renewed; men's minds were occupied by other thoughts.
Luther, wh