Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/350

Rh 332 REFORMATION and through his friend's influence received in 1518 an invitation to settle in Zurich as the parish priest of the cathedral in that city. Here he at once began to discard the traditional mode of exposition which limited the preacher to certain prescribed sections of the Bible, and commenced instead a connected series of lectures on the New Testament. In the course of four years he thus completed a course of sermons on the whole of that portion of the Bible. This innovation, peculiar to the Reformed Church, was never adopted by Luther, although followed by most of the theologians of Switzerland and the upper Rhineland. It was in the year 1519 that Zwingli first became acquainted with Luther's early treatises ; but his own views appear to have been formed quite independently of these. Shortly after his arrival in Zurich the Fran- ciscan Bernardin Samson visited the city on a like mis- sion to that of Tetzel and encountered in Zwingli another Luther. The grossness of the system of indulgences was so ably exposed by Zwingli that he carried nearly all who heard him with him, and Samson was obliged to return to Italy before his mission was fully accomplished. Even Faber, afterwards the opponent of Zwingli, could not but express to the latter his satisfaction at the result. Gradu- ally the voice of the Reformer was heard uplifted against other mediaeval superstitions and especially against Mari- olatry ; his fame as a preacher rapidly spread, and he became known as one of the chief leaders of opinion in Zurich. The state of morality in the city was, however, exceedingly low, and he not only had to encounter con- siderable opposition but was repeatedly exposed to charges of heresy. Nevertheless the conviction which he produced among the more influential citizens of the truth of the tenets which he advocated was such that in the year 1520 an order was issued by the city council to the effect that all ministers should in future ground their discourses on the New Testament, " and prove their doctrine from the Bible alone, discarding all innovations and human inven- tions." While meeting with opposition in one direction, he was compelled himself to oppose the zeal of fanaticism in another. As at Wittenberg, an iconoclastic spirit had begun to manifest itself, and the question of the lawfulness of images in churches was warmly debated. In the months of January and October 1523 two conferences of the clergy and laity assembled in Zurich, in the course of which Zwingli put forth sixty-seven propositions, involving con- clusions adverse to the teaching and practice of the medi- aeval church. Among those who took part in the discus- sions were Faber, Meyer of Bern, Hofmeister, and Conrad Schmidt of Kiissnacht, Knight Commander of the Order of St John, a man of eminent character and ability. Schmidt endeavoured, although in a temperate and rational manner, to defend the custom of placing images in the churches, but after a warm discussion Zwingli ultimately decided for their abolition. In the yet more important discussion that followed, with respect to the true nature and significance of the mass, whether it was to be regarded as of the nature of a sacrifice or simply as a commemorative ordinance, he expressed himself in favour of the latter interpretation. The issues raised by the sixty-seven propositions extended considerably in their scope beyond all that Luther had as yet advanced ; and, as at Leipsic, it was soon discovered that the two contending parties were divided by an insuper- able difference with respect to the authority which they were disposed to accept as final, the one party grounding their arguments solely on the Scriptures, the other on the councils and the fathers. It may be noted, as an illustra- tion of the extremely low status of the inferior clergy of the country at this period, that, in replying to Zwingli's demand for an intelligent and systematic study of the Scriptures by all pastors, it was urged as an objection that many pastors might be unable to afford to purchase a copy of the Bible for their own use ! Another notable theory supported by Zwingli was that known at a later period as Erastianism, according to which the authorities of the church were to be held to be ultimately amenable to the jurisdic- tion of the civil power. At his instance the church at Zurich next proceeded to repudiate the control both of the bishop of Constance and of the papal nuncio, constituting itself (1524) a separate ecclesiastical body, the supreme authority over which was vested in the magistrates of the city. In the public services the Latin liturgy and the Gregorian chant were set aside for a German prayer-book and German singing. The rite of baptism was made more simple, the ceremony of exorcism on which the Lutheran Church continued long after to insist being altogether dis- carded. In the year 1525 Zwingli published a more sys- tematic exposition of his tenets in his best-known work, his Commentary on True and, False Religion, which he dedicated to Francis I. His conception of the sacraments and of original sin as here unfolded separates him still further from the doctrine of the mediaeval church, while in his remarkable catholicity of belief in regard to salva- tion he much resembles some of the early Greek fathers. Like Clement and Origen, he believed in the final happi- ness of the good and wise, including the good and wise of pagan antiquity ; nor did he hesitate to express his con- viction that Socrates was a better and wiser man than any Dominican or Franciscan of his own day. On the other hand, he upheld the doctrine of predestination in its most rigid form, that afterwards known as " supralapsarian " (see PREDESTINATION). In no country was the Reformation so closely associated ftefon with political feeling as in Switzerland ; and its upholders, **"? ir amid surrounding despotisms, were advocates of republican ^ institutions. Zwingli and his followers looked on with shame and sorrow as they saw their countrymen hastening to cross the Alps to become the mercenaries of the pope. With no less sense of humiliation did they regard the venal spirit of their public officials stooping to become the pensioners of the French court. The progress of these new opinions was, as is usually the case, much more rapid in the large towns than in the more rural and moun- tainous regions. At Bern they were ably upheld by Anshelm, the historiographer of the city, and by Sebastian Meyer, and Haller ; in the free city of Basel he had for his followers (Ecolampadius and William Farel; and already in 1527 Conrad Pellicanus, afterwards his zealous follower, had conceived that admiration of his character and tenets which was attended by such important results. Wyttenbach, Zwingli's former preceptor, sustained his teaching in Biel, Joachim von Watt in St Gall, Biirgli, Blasius, and Dorfmann among the Grisons. In the cantons of Schwyz, Uri, Unterwalden, Lucerne, and Zug, on the other hand, the new doctrines found strenuous opposition ; and the simple mountaineers listened with unfeigned sorrow and indignation when they heard that it was pro- posed to abolish pilgrimages, such as those to the field of Morgarten and the chapel of Tell, and to dispense with those priestly virtues of celibacy and fasting which so greatly enhanced their filial reverence for their village pastor. Another and yet more serious obstacle, which Cont threatened to place the whole movement in peril, was that presented by the differences of belief which now began to rise among the Protestants themselves. Foremost among these points of difference was that respecting the Eucharist, the theory which Zwingli maintained being assailed with peculiar acrimony and vehemence by Luther. Political feeling added not a little to the animosity of that attack. Difficult as it may seem to associate the efforts of one who did so much for intellectual freedom with tyranny and