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Show . HENRY VIM AND THE REFORMATION "Defense of the Seven Sacraments." by Henry VIII, re-edited with an introduction by Rev. Louis O'Donovan. S. T. L.; preceded by a preface by II ir-Eminence ir-Eminence James Cardinal Gibbous. Archbishop of Baltimore. From the publishing house of Denziger Brothers, Xew York and Chicago. Price $2. We very much regret that when Father O'Dono-vau O'Dono-vau gave us what Cardinal Gibbons terms "a rare, royal Catholic book." he did nor furnish for th" read ng public an introductorv chapter on the so- . eial, moral and religious state of England immediately immedi-ately preceding the so-called Information. That Jlcnry VIII entered the controversial tournament against Luther and unhorsed him does not concern con-cern us very much today. Tertullian. Uolinger. Do 1'Amenais and many other learned men did ilu. same in their day and died waring against the Church. We believe that at the time the English monarch wrote his thesis against Luther he was it heart a blackguard. It is contrary to the experience, experi-ence, of : human nature that any man descends in a short time from the heights of morality and do-, cency to the depths of brutality and lu-t. "Xemo repente fuit turpissimus" no man becomes all at once a scoundrel writes the heathen poet, and we arc inclined to agree with him. one man. -even though a tyrannical autocrat, auto-crat, could swing an entire kingdom with its people into the rankest form of heresy, unless benenth the surface there were conditions favorintr his ambi- I tion and his policy. Lord Macaulay, writing of the '"Reformation," observes: "A king whose character may be best described by saying he was despotism itself personified, unprincipled un-principled ministers, a rapacious aristocracy, a servile ser-vile parliament such were the instruments by which England was delivered from the yoke of Rome. The work which had been begun by Henry, the murderer of his wives, was continued by Somerset, Som-erset, the murderer of his brother, and completed by Elizabeth, the murderer of her guest." But apart from these atrocious characters and unscrupulous conspirators, political causes made the Reformation a possibility; and the Reformers, as they called themselves, were ready and facile tools in the hands of a tyrannical king and his predatory pred-atory 'nobles to make the movement at once disastrous disas-trous to religion and in itself complete. According to the System of the Catholic Church from the time of the Apostles to that of the Reformation Refor-mation two features were distinctly prominent. First, the Church was held to be the authoritative teacher of the truth, and again the Church dispensed dis-pensed the Sacraments by means of which its members mem-bers preserved their Union with Christ, the Head. In order to overthrow the Church it was necessary neces-sary to subvert its authority and to supply some new means other than Sacraments whereby the people peo-ple might be united to their Lord. This, with consummate con-summate and satanic skill, was effected by the Reformers Re-formers by opposing Holy Scripture to Ecclcsiasti-' cal Tradition and by inventing the doctrine of Justification Jus-tification by Faith only. The king and his pliant ministers perceived that, in a contest With Rome, an infallible basis for operations oper-ations was necessary to insure success. A position apparently, at least, as secure as that of the Catholics Cath-olics was an essential, if they hoped to triumph. The Catholics allowed , the authority of the IIolv Scriptures, whereas the Protestants disputed the authority of the Church. By assuming, first, that Scripture was opposed to tradition, and thereby appealing to Scripture against the Church, they succeeded in representing their cause as an appeal from the human to the Divine, from the infallibility infallibil-ity of the Bible to the presumed fallibility of the Pope. That there was a human element in Scripture, Scrip-ture, as there was a human element in Ecclesiastical Ecclesias-tical Tradition, was a fact evaded by the Reform- ers, wno reduced the several contributors to the Bible to mere formal instruments used by the Holy Spirit to convey His message to mankind. By placing the Church and the Bible in antagonism, the English Protestants dealt Christianity a severer blow than it had received fro mthe fury of heathen persecution and the insidiousness of former heresies. here-sies. Protestantism in its conflict with Rome east the whole burden of the proof of Christianity on the Scriptures" insisting on it so loudly and so long that the opinion became so thoroughly engrafted en-grafted on popular sentiment, that Christianity rested its claim on the Bible, unsupported by authority au-thority and explained by the individual. Again, the Reformers gave Justification by Faith a signification it had never before borne. At one fell swoop they abolished the sacramental system sys-tem and substituted for it a system of their own. opposing the method of sanctifying peculiar to St. Paul and the Faith of Christians. After a rest from the conflict of the Reformation and the heat of battle, the same causes which produced the revolt re-volt and irreligious upheaval began to operate once more. That Private Judgment which Protestantism .ailed to its aid in the day. of battle turned ro'Ja. and is now engaged in demolishing its ancient ally. After 300 years of repose, minds have reawakened reawak-ened to the momentous character of the struggle. The new elements and the yeast introduced at the Reformation have had time to work, the positions, carried have been cleared of the dust and smoke of battle, and the havoc wrought is being exposed. It has now become evident that Protestantism took its stand on ground logically untenable. The Bible, on which, unsubstantiated by authority. Protestantism Protest-antism took up its position, is a book composed of sixty-six compositions of various dates, by nearly forty different authors, written in two or three languages. These compositions are of varied character, historical. legislative, poetic and didatic. Why. it is now being asked by English thinkers, does our religion or Protestantism claim inspiration for only sixty-six books and not for seventy? Why does it accept as canonical certain books which criticism rejects i Why, for instance, does it acknowledge ac-knowledge the ''Epistle to the Hebrews" as divine-j divine-j ly inspired, and refuse to accept the "Epistle of Saint Clement;" On what authority does it claim inspiration for Solomon's "Canticle" and refuse it to the "Book of Wisdom;" Why does it quote the Epistles of Saint Paul as canonical and reject re-ject the Epistles of his fellow laborer. Saint Bar-naV'-; To these questions Protestantism has ab-j ab-j soil., iy no answer to make. I The fact is. the Protestantism of the Reforma- tion is dead. Early in the last century Charles Walmesley. the author of a curious life of Luther, limited the life of the Reformation to three centu-! centu-! ries and a half. In this country discussion on the irreligious Revolt of the Sixteenth Century has ceased to be an active factor in controversy.. It is coming to this that, between the positivism of the Catholic Church and the negation of the Supernatural, Super-natural, there will soon be no neutral territory. All the same. Father O'Donovan has given a very readable book, and the mechanical work done by the Benzigcrs is a credit to their firm |