the writings of the New Testament and that
these writings were worthy of peculiar veneration. Perhaps this is
the main reason why the learning of antiquity was chiefly preserved in
monasteries and churches. There were ecclesiastics in all these
ages who were acquainted with the Scriptures in Latin, and this
acquaintance tended to preserve the knowledge of Jesus the Christ as
portrayed in the original gospel records. The history of that epoch
proves that there were men who loved the Lord more than priestly forms
and ceremonial observances. John Wyclif, Jerome of Prague, John Huss,
and others experienced that deeper longing for personal relationship
with Christ, and they proclaimed the gospel of Christ in a manner that
could not be understood by the hierarchy of their times.

[Sidenote: Classical learning]

Jesus was indeed the Christ of God. The light which shone forth from
his presence could not be totally obscured, and the moral power and
influence of his life and teaching could not be destroyed. The revival
of classical learning restored the Greek Testament to western Europe
and attracted the attention of students and learned men in all the
monasteries and universities. While the hierarchy insisted on the
exclusive right to interpret the Scriptures, the simple reading of
these wonderful records could not but create new conceptions of truth
which no clerical prohibition could banish. Life was springing up in
the midst of death.

[Sidenote: Love for truth]

The Reformation was the sincere effort of honest men to restore the
truth of primitive Christianity, that the world might again experience
the triumph of evangelical faith. To the everlasting credit of the
Continental reformers be it said that their motives were not selfish.
They sought not for themselves freedom of thought and speech nor
church power. Their immediate object was the restoration of the
gospel; all other results were but secondary. Nothing is more
certain than that at the first Luther had no idea of assailing the
organization of the papal church. Most of the reformers at the first
still believed most earnestly in the imperial government of the
universal church; and they relinquished this long-cherished ideal only
when driven by force of circumstances which were at first unseen and
unsuspected. Luther did not at first question the doctrine of the
supremacy of the pope; but when he found that the reigning pope could
not be reconciled with the princi