Calvinism a life-system - pagina 61

CALVINISM AND RELIGION. must tend

religion

all

may

he

utterance

clear

On

Himself,

upon unconscious

every appearance of an

hand,

other

the

by a

free, that

express that general religious

God

impression stamped, by nature.

make man

to

57

interposing priest or enchanter in the domain of religion

human

the

fetters

a chain which presses the

in

spirit,

more woefully the more the piety increases in fervour. the Church of Rome, even at the present day, the boiis cathoUques are most closely confined in the fetters Only the Roman- Catholic whose piety of the clerus. In

has

decreased,

secure for himself a partial

able to

is

by loosening more than halfway

liberty

the

which

tie

In the Lutheran churches

connects him with his church.

the clerical fetters are less confining, yet far from being

loosened,

And

entirely.

their stand in Calvinism,

only in churches which take

do we

find that spiritual inde-

pendence which enables the believer to oppose,

and

be,

for

if

God's sake, even the most powerful

need

office-

bearer in his church.

Only he who personally stands

before

God on

account, and enjoys -an uninter-

rupted

communion with God, can properly

glorious

own

his

wings

And

of liberty.

both

in

display the

Holland and

in France, in

England

result affords

most undeniable evidence of the

as well as in America, the historic fact that

despotism has found no more invincible antagonists, and liberty of conscience

no braver, no more resolute cham-

pions than the followers of Calvin. the

cause of this

phenomenon

lies

In the last analysis, in

the fact that the

effect of every clerical interposition invariably was, and

must it

be,

to

make

religion

with sacerdotal forms.

external

Only where

and to smother all

priestly inter-

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