John Knox and the Reformation. Lang Andrew

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СКАЧАТЬ to Mrs. Bowes from London in 1553, Knox mentions, as one of the sorrows of life, that “such as would most gladly remain together, for mutual comfort, cannot be suffered so to do. Since the first day that it pleased the providence of God to bring you and me in familiarity, I have always delighted in your company.” He then wanders into religious reflections, but we see that he liked Mrs. Bowes, and Marjorie Bowes too, no doubt: he is careful to style the elderly lady “Mother.” Knox’s letters to Mrs. Bowes show the patience and courtesy with which the Reformer could comfort and counsel a middle-aged lady in trouble about her innocent soul. As she recited her infirmities, he reminds her, he “started back, and that is my common consuetude when anything pierces or touches my heart. Call to your mind what I did standing at the cupboard at Alnwick; in very deed I thought that no creature had been tempted as I was” – not by the charms of Mrs. Bowes, of course: he found that Satan troubled the lady with “the very same words that he troubles me with.” Mrs. Bowes, in truth, with premature scepticism, was tempted to think that “the Scriptures of God are but a tale, and no credit to be given to them.” The Devil, she is reminded by Knox, has induced “some philosophers to affirm that the world never had a beginning,” which he refutes by showing that God predicted the pains of childbearing; and Mrs. Bowes, as the mother of twelve, knows how true this is.

      The circular argument may or may not have satisfied Mrs. Bowes. 48

      The young object of Knox’s passion, Marjorie Bowes, is only alluded to as “she whom God hath offered unto me, and commanded me to love as my own flesh,” – after her, Mrs. Bowes is the dearest of mankind to Knox. No mortal was ever more long-suffering with a spiritual hypochondriac, who avers that “the sins that reigned in Sodom and Gomore reign in me, and I have small power or none to resist!” Knox replies, with common sense, that Mrs. Bowes is obviously ignorant of the nature of these offences.

      Writing to his betrothed he says nothing personal: merely reiterates his lessons of comfort to her mother. Meanwhile the lovers were parted, Knox going abroad; and it is to be confessed that he was not eager to come back.

      CHAPTER V: EXILE: APPEALS FOR A PHINEHAS, AND A JEHU: 1554

      No change of circumstances could be much more bitter than that which exile brought to Knox. He had been a decently endowed official of State, engaged in bringing a reluctant country into the ecclesiastical fold which the State, for the hour, happened to prefer. His task had been grateful, and his congregations, at least at Berwick and Newcastle, had, as a rule, been heartily with him. Wherever he preached, affectionate women had welcomed him and hung upon his words. The King and his ministers had hearkened unto him – young Edward with approval, Northumberland with such emotions as we may imagine – while the Primate of England had challenged him to a competitive ordeal by fire, and had been defeated, apparently without recourse to the fire-test.

      But now all was changed; Knox was a lonely rover in a strange land, supported probably by collections made among his English friends, and by the hospitality of the learned. In his wanderings his heart burned within him many a time, and he abruptly departed from his theory of passive resistance. Now he eagerly desired to obtain, from Protestant doctors and pontiffs, support for the utterly opposite doctrine of armed resistance. Such support he did not get, or not in a satisfactory measure, so he commenced prophet on his own lines, and on his own responsibility.

      When Knox’s heart burned within him, he sometimes seized the pen and dashed off fiery tracts which occasionally caused inconvenience to the brethren, and trouble to himself in later years. In cooler moments, and when dubious or prosperous, he now and again displayed a calm opportunism much at odds with the inspirations of his grief and anger.

      After his flight to Dieppe in March 1554, Knox was engaged, then, with a problem of difficulty, one of the central problems of his career and of the distracted age. In modern phrase, he wished to know how far, and in what fashion, persons of one religion might resist another religion, imposed upon them by the State of which they were subjects. On this point we have now no doubt, but in the sixteenth century “Authority” was held sacred, and martyrdom, according to Calvin, was to be preferred to civil war. If men were Catholics, and if the State was Protestant, they were liable, later, under Knox, to fines, exile, and death; but power was not yet given to him. If they were Protestants under a Catholic ruler, or Puritans under Anglican authority, Knox himself had laid down the rule of their conduct in his letter to his Berwick congregation. 49 “Remembering always, beloved brethren, that due obedience be given to magistrates, rulers, and princes, without tumult, grudge, or sedition. For, howsoever wicked themselves be in life, or howsoever ungodly their precepts or commandments be, ye must obey them for conscience’ sake; except in chief points of religion, and then ye ought rather to obey God than man: not to pretend to defend God’s truth or religion, ye being subjects, by violence or sword, but patiently suffering what God shall please be laid upon you for constant confession of your faith and belief.” Man or angel who teaches contrary doctrine is corrupt of judgment, sent by God to blind the unworthy. And Knox proceeded to teach contrary doctrine!

      His truly Christian ideas are of date 1552, with occasional revivals as opportunity suggested. In exile he was now asking (1554), how was a Protestant minority or majority to oppose the old faith, backed by kings and princes, fire and sword? He answered the question in direct contradiction of his Berwick programme: he was now all for active resistance. Later, in addressing Mary of Guise, and on another occasion, he recurred to his Berwick theory, and he always found biblical texts to support his contradictory messages.

      At this moment resistance seemed hopeless enough. In England the Protestants of all shades were decidedly in a minority. They had no chance if they openly rose in arms; their only hope was in the death of Mary Tudor and the succession of Elizabeth – itself a poor hope in the eyes of Knox, who detested the idea of a female monarch. Might they “bow down in the House of Rimmon” by a feigned conformity? Knox, in a letter to the Faithful, printed in 1554, entirely rejected this compromise, to which Cecil stooped, thereby deserving hell, as the relentless Knox (who had fled) later assured him.

      In the end of March 1554, probably, Knox left Dieppe for Geneva, where he could consult Calvin, not yet secure in his despotism, though he had recently burned Servetus. Next he went to Zurich, and laid certain questions before Bullinger, who gave answers in writing as to Knox’s problems.

      Could a woman rule a kingdom by divine right, and transfer the same to her husband? – Mary Tudor to Philip of Spain, is, of course, to be understood. Bullinger replied that it was a hazardous thing for the godly to resist the laws of a country. Philip the eunuch, though converted, did not drive Queen Candace out of Ethiopia. If a tyrannous and ungodly Queen reign, godly persons “have example and consolation in the case of Athaliah.” The transfer of power to a husband is an affair of the laws of the country.

      Again, must a ruler who enforces “idolatry” be obeyed? May true believers, in command of garrisons, repel “this ungodly violence”? Bullinger answered, in effect, that “it is very difficult to pronounce upon every particular case.” He had not the details before him. In short, nothing definite was to be drawn out of Bullinger. 50

      Dr. M‘Crie observes, indeed, that Knox submitted to the learned of Switzerland “certain difficult questions, which were suggested by the present condition of affairs in England, and about which his mind had been greatly occupied. Their views with respect to these coinciding with his own, he was confirmed in the judgment which he had already formed for himself.” 51

      In fact, Knox himself merely says that he had “reasoned with” pastors and the learned; he does not say that they agreed with him, and they certainly did not. Despite the reserve of Bullinger and of Calvin, Knox was of his new opinions still. These divines never backed his views.

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