MY FELLOW-CITIZEN OF THE WORLD, AND FELLOWTRAVELLER TO 'ALL PARTS OF THE WORLD,'

A COPY OF

THE ROMAN RENAISSANCE AND REFORMATION,

FOR THE PURPOSE OF

Supplementing our Conversations, and showing the various Racial elements,-Hebrew, Hellenic, and Roman,—which entered into the composition, and formed the heart and soul of British and European Civilisation, during the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire;'

AND OF

THE GENESIS AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE UNITED STATES, COMPARED WITH THE RISE AND PROGRESS OF BRITISH AND EUROPEAN CIVILISATION;

FOR THE PURPOSE OF

Exhibiting the historical and social relationship of
the Old and New World.

CHAPTER XII.

THE ROMAN RENAISSANCE AND REFORMATION.

Italia! too, Italia! looking on thee

Full flashes on the soul the light of ages,

Since the fierce Carthaginian almost won thee,
To the last halo of the Chiefs and Sages,
Who glorify thy consecrated pages;

Thou wert the throne and grave of empires; still,
The fount at which the panting mind assuages
Her thirst of knowledge, quaffing there her fill,
Flows from the source of Rome's imperial hill.

BYRON'S Childe Harold.

'Roman history,' says Niebuhr, 'can boast of the greatest characters, actions, and events; it contains. the complete development of the whole life of a nation, such as is not found in the life of any other people. In modern history, the English alone have passed through the same perfect career of development as the Romans, and, in a cosmopolitan point of view, the history of these nations must always be the most important.'

Such is the method of Comparative History inaugurated by Vico, adopted by Lessing, expounded by Niebuhr, Schlegel, and Hegel, and crystallised into an Exact Science by the united labours of Comte, Spencer, Schäffle, and Lilienfeld,—the Physiology, Genesis, and Evolution of the Social Organism.

Assuming, then, as we may safely do, that our

readers are familiar with the broad outlines of the Tribal, Feudal, and Imperial phases of the simultaneous and successive periods of Roman and British, as well as European history, our present object is to institute a comparison between the Augustan age of these social organisms, and illustrate the origin and development of the Literary Renaissance and Religious Reformation peculiar to ancient and

modern civilisation.

I. OF THE MODERN RENAISSANCE AND REFORMATION. Are all Papal and Protestant critics and historians united in their opinions regarding the origin and nature of the Reformation in the sixteenth century? Far from it. They are wide as the poles asunder. To the former it is rank and rampant heresy and heterodoxy, doomed to persecution, the flames, the rack, the stake, the Inquisition, and Civil War,-thoroughgoing political, religious, moral, and social declension and degeneration, according to Schlegel's interpretation of the last three centuries; while to the latter it is the righteous revolt against superannuated superstition, the divine mission of civil and religious liberty, the crowning glory of the martyr, the Huguenot, and the Covenanter; the unequivocal declaration of human individuality and independence, like the whole course of Humanity, from the freedom of the one to the freedom of the many, thoroughgoing political, religious, moral, and social regeneration and amelioration, according to Hegel.

Can we sist these Papal and Protestant apologists and advocates, however, it is asked, before any authoritative Judge and standard, for the purpose of obtaining a reliable verdict on the points in dispute? Undoubtedly. Before the bar of Public Opinion,— the recorded facts, final results, and statistics of the social struggle, waged during the course of the three last centuries, between the Civil and Religious defenders of the Old and New Faith of Modern Christendom; the irresistible evidence of the seals, trumpets, and vials; the open secrets, significant events, and penal sentences peculiar to our modern Social Revelation. Given our present standpoint with the political panorama of the last three centuries unfolded before our eyes, from the age of Leo X. and Luther to the age of Victoria, Dei gratia, Defensor Fidei, 'who wrought her people lasting good,'-say from A.D. 1492-1881=389 years ;—let us ask, What social forces combined in producing the heterogeneous and complicated elements of modern civilisation and culture? Must we ascribe them, as ecclesiastics generally do, simply and merely to the religious revolt against Romish superstition, headed by Martin Luther and Melanchthon in Germany, Calvin in France and Geneva, Zwingle in Switzerland, Knox in Scotland, and Cranmer, Latimer, and Ridley in England? and ignore the indefatigable labours of Socinus, Bruno, and Vanini in Italy? the demolition of Scholastic idols and Revival of Letters by Erasmus, Bacon, Descartes, and Leibnitz?