distinguished for his prowess against the bull and the boar. Yet, ere he had turned fifty, he was reduced to amuse himself by shooting crows and daws amongst the trees of his garden. The hand which had wielded the lance, and curbed the charger, was so enfeebled with gout, that it was sometimes unable to break the seal of a letter. Declining fortune combined with decaying health to maintain him in that general vexation of spirit which he shared with king Solomon. His later schemes of policy and conquest ended in nothing but disaster and disgrace. The Pope, the Turk, the King of France, and the Protestant princes of the Empire, were once more arrayed against the potentate, who, in the bright morning of his career, had imposed laws upon them all. The flight from Innsbruck avenged the cause which seemed lost at Muhlberg. The treaty of Passau, by placing the Lutheran religion amongst the recognized institutions of the Empire, overturned the entire fabric of the Emperor's policy, and destroyed his hopes of transmitting the imperial crown to his son. While the doctors of the Church assembled at Trent, in that council which had cost so much treasure and intrigue, continued their solemn quibblings, the Protestant faith was spreading it self even in the dominions of the orthodox house of Hapsburg. The finances both of Spain and the other dominions of Austria were in the utmost disorder; and the lord of Mexico and Peru had been forced to beg a loan from the Duke of Florence. It is no wonder, therefore, that Charles seized the first gleam of sunshine and returning calm to make for the long-desired haven of refuge; that he relieved his brow of its thorny crowns as soon as he had obtained an object dear to him as a father, a politician and a devotee, by placing his son Philip on the rival throne of the heretic Tudors. "His habits and turn of mind made a religious house the natural place of his retreat. Like a true Castillian,

his abdication. But the cloister, like the world, was not without its disappointments. He had escaped only from the pageantry of courts, not from the toil and excitement of public affairs. To Yuste he had come, seeking solitude and repose; but although his chamberlain complained bitterly that he had indeed found the one, his own long and labored despatches proved that he enHe began by atjoyed but little of the other. tempting to confine his attention to a few matters in which he was specially interested, and which he hoped ere long to bring to a happy termination; but the circle gradually widened, and at last his anxious eye learned once more to sweep the whole horizon of Spanish policy. From the war in Flanders he would turn to the diplomacy of Italy or Portugal; and his plans for replenishing the treasury at Valladolid, were followed by remarks on the garrisons in Africa, or the signal towers along the Spanish shore. He watched the course of the vessel of state with interest as keen as if the helm were still in his own hands; and the successes and the disasters of his son affected him as if they were his own. Unfortunately, in 1557 and 1558, the disasters greatly outnumbered and On one side of the outweighed the successes. account stood the brilliant but barren victory of St. Quentin, and the less signal but better employed victory of Gravelines; on the other, there were the bullion riots at Seville, the disgraceful treaty of Rome, the loss of Calais and of Thionville, the sack of Minorca, and the outburst of heresy. He might well dread the arrival of each courier; and the destruction of the army of Oran was announced in the despatches which lay unread on his table at the time of his death.

"In one point alone did Charles in the cell differ widely from Charles on the throne. In the world, fanaticism had not been one of his vices; he feared the keys no more than his cousin of England, and he confronted the successor of St. Peter no less boldly than he made head against the heir of St. Louis. While he held Clement the Seventh prisoner at Rome, he permitted at Madrid the mockery of masses for that pontiff's speedy de

rather as rebels than as heretics, and he frequently stayed the hands of the victorious zealots of the Church. At Wittenburgh he set a fine example of moderation, in forbidding the destruction of the tomb of Luther, saying that he contended with the living and not with the dead. To a Venetian envoy, accredited to him at Bruxelles, in the last year of his reign, he appeared free from all taint of polemical madness, and willing that subjects of theology should be discussed in his presence, with fair philosophical freedom.†

"But once within the walls of Yuste, he assumed all the passions, prejudices, and superstitions of a friar. Looking back on his past life, he thanked God for the evil that he had been permitted to do in the matter of religious persecution,

* Juncker: Vita Mart. Luteri, sm. 8vo. Francofurti: 1699, p. 219. Sleidan: De Statu relig. et reip., lib. xix., is cited as his authority. Relatione of Badovaro.

time and renounce their guilt: seeing that it | is probable that, being educated persons, whose heresy has been the result of inquiry, they will fall into it again. I will also sug gest to you whether, in order to deprive them of public sympathy, they may not be proceeded against for sedition or treason. Perhaps it may be well to refer you, as a precedent, to my conduct in the Low Countries. I proposed to check the heresies that were imported from Germany, England, and France, by introducing the Inquisition. I was opposed, and it ended by a decree that all persons, whatever their station, guilty of the opinions therein mentioned, should ipso facto, be burnt, and their properties confiscated; that spies should be appointed to discover the guilty and denounce them to the courts, in order that the obstinate might be burnt alive, and the repentant beheaded.† All which was done." (Ibid., p. 297.)

*

Vasquez replies by answering for the se verity of the Inquisition; and adds, that, as it is the cause of God, he hopes for divine as sistance. (Ibib., p. 304.)

66

A still stronger light is thrown on the religious opinions of Charles by a conversation between him and some of the monks of Yuste, related by Martin de Angulo, the prior. "The heretics," he said, must be burnt -not to burn them would be to incur the sin which I incurred when I let Luther escape. I did not put him to death, because I would not violate the promise and the safe conduct which I had given to him. But I was wrong. I had no right to forgive a crime against God. It was my duty, without having any regard to my promise, to avenge the injury which his heresy had inflicted on God. I should probably have cut short its progress. It is very dangerous to talk with these heretics. They deceive you by their subtile studied reasonings. Therefore I never would enter into any discussion with them. When I was marching against the Landgrave and the Duke of Saxony, four of the Lutheran princes, speaking in the name of all, said to me, 'Sire, we have taken arms, not to make war against your Majesty, or to renounce our allegiance, but because you call us heretics, and we believe that we are none. We have our learned men, your Majesty has yours. Let the

ques

"Ipso facto fuesen quemados." Ipso facto, we suppose, means on summary conviction-a drumhead court-martial.

"Para que quemasen vivos a los pertinaces y a los que se reconciliasen les cortasen las cabezas."

tion be discussed in your presence, and we bind ourselves to abide by your decision.'

"I answered that I was not learned, but that the learned men might argue the matter among themselves, and that mine would report to me the result. Now, if I had acted otherwise, and these heretics had got any of their doctrine into my head, how could I have got it out? For this reason I never would hear them, though they promised, if I would do so, to join me with all their troops. Afterwards when I was flying before Maurice, with only six horsemen for my attendants, two princes of the Empire, speaking again in the name of all, implored me to hear them explain and defend their religious opinions, and no longer to treat them as heretics, promising on that condition to support me with all their forces, to drive the Turks from Hungary, and either to make me master of Constantinople, or to die in the attempt. I answered, that I would not buy, at that price, all Germany and France, and Spain and Italy: so I spurred my horse and left them."*

Charles was one of the ablest men of his age, indeed of any age. His powerful natural talents had been exercised and strengthened by the constant management of great affairs, and by constant intercourse with eminent men. Yet such are the strange delusions by which the most powerful intellects may be abused on matters of religion, that he believed that the adopting, after full conscientious inquiry, an erroneous doctrine, was an injury to God and to man, a crime and a sin; to be punished by a cruel death here, and by eternal misery hereafter. With a strange confusion of thought, he considered such errors voluntary, or he would not have punished them; and yet involuntary, or he would not have feared their being implanted in him by discussion.

That error may sometimes be voluntary must be admitted. The man who from carelessness or timidity neglects or refuses to ascertain the real grounds on which he believes and disbelieves; the Roman Catholic who, for fear of unsettling his mind, will not hear what the Protestant has to say, the Trinitarian who refuses to discuss his faith with the Socinian, is right or wrong only by accident. The errors of a man who rejects information are as voluntary as any other part of his conduct.

* Cited from Sandoval by M. Gachard, Bulletins de l'Academie Royale de Bruxelles, tom. xii. p. 251 1er partie.

But the error of those who have never had an opportunity of ascertaining the truth, and of those who, after patient and candid examination, have come to a wrong conclusion, depends no more on the will than the bitter taste of camomile or the hot taste of pepper. We might as usefully punish a man for being sea-sick as for being convinced.

Again, it must be admitted that error, though involuntary, may lead to sin. A man may sin from not knowing what is his duty, or from believing that his duty consists mainly in the performance of things really useless, or from believing that his duty consists in doing acts absolutely mischievous; in other words, he may sin through ignorance or through superstition. But in such cases the danger of the error arises from its practical nature. If error be merely speculative, if it relates, for instance, to the Procession of the Holy Spirit, the Pre-existence of the Father, or the Immaculate Conception, there seems to be no reasonable ground for imputing to it any guilt.

Now, purely speculative questions are precisely those which have been most furiously debated. They have created more hatred, more bloodshed, more wars, and more persecution than all practical questions put together. And for this reason, that practical questions generally admit of a decision. They are debated and disposed of. Speculative questions are eternal. Their premises are generally ambiguous, often unintelligible. The discussion resembles an argument between two deaf men, in which neither attaches any meaning to the words uttered by the other. What is the real difference between the Transubstantiation of the Roman Catholics and the Consubstantiation of Luther? The former believes that by consecration the substance of the bread and wine are changed into the substance of the body and blood of Christ. The latter affirmed that" The true body of Christ is present under the appearance of bread, and also his true blood under the appearance of wine. And that that body and blood are not spiritual and fictitious, but the true and natural body which was born of the most Holy Virgin, which same body and blood are now sitting at the right hand of the Majesty of God in that divine Person who is called Christ Jesus." "'*

Cited Waddington's History of the Reformation, vol. iii. p. 217.

And for the one or for the other of these opinions, each of them we venture to say devoid of meaning, thousands have thought it their duty to kill, and thousands have thought it their duty to die.

We have said that Charles was a man of extraordinary ability. He was also a man of extraordinary piety. Immersed as he was in politics and in wars, ruling and even administering great and dissimilar kingdoms, surrounded by enemies both foreign and domestic, managing the home affairs and the foreign affairs of Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and Italy, providing and then commanding their armies and their fleets, his principal business, the matter which engrossed the most of his attention, was the working out his own salvation. And he believed the first requisite to salvation to be a correct faith. Such, however, was his conduct as to involve him in errors, the public mischief of which can not be exaggerated, or, if there be any guilt in error, the private guilt. In the first place, his errors belonged to the class which we have termed voluntary. They were the result of his obstinate determination not to inquire. If on a march he had been told, "Your maps are false, your guides are ignorant or treacherous, if you advance in this direction you will destroy your army. Here are the proofs;" would he have refused to look at the evidence, burnt alive the informants, and continued his course?

In the second place, his errors led him not merely to reliance on useless observances and charms, but to ferocious cruelties, and, what was much worse, because much more permanent, than any death or torture inflicted on individuals, to measures which have kept in darkness and semi-barbarism one of the most energetic races, and perhapt the finest country, in Europe.

This is not the place to discuss Charles's chances of happiness in another world. We have to do only with his reputation in this. And we must say that, judging by the event, estimating him by the influence which his conduct has had over the subsequent fortunes of Europe, and indeed of America, we allot to him a conspicuous station among the enemies of mankind. He might have done more good, and he actually did more harm, than any sovereign that has reigned. since Charlemagne,

WE, who can recall the consulship of Plancus, and quite respectable old - fogeyfied times, remember amongst other, amusements which we had as children the pictures at which we were permitted to look. There was Boydell's Shakspeare, black and ghastly gallery of murky Opies, glum Northcotes, straddling Fuselis! there were Lear, Oberon, Hamlet, with starting muscles, rolling eyeballs, and long pointing quivering fingers; there was little Prince Arthur (Northcote) crying, in white satin, and bidding good Hubert not put out his eyes; there was Hubert crying; there was little Rutland being run through the poor little body by bloody Clifford; there was Cardinal Beaufort (Reynolds) gnashing his teeth, and grinning and howling demoniacally on his deathbed (a picture frightful to the present day); there was Lady Hamilton (Romney) waving a torch, and dancing before a black background,-a melancholy museum indeed. Smirke's delightful Seven Ages only fitfully relieved its general gloom. We did not like to inspect it unless the elders were present, and plenty of lights and company were in the room.

Cheerful relatives used to treat us to Miss Linwood's. Let the children of the present generation thank their stars that tragedy is put out of their way. Miss Linwood's was worsted work. Your grandmother or grandaunts took you there, and said the pictures were admirable. You saw "the Woodman" in worsted, with his axe and dog, trampling through the snow; the snow bitter cold to look at, the woodman's pipe wonderful; a gloomy piece, that made you shudder. There were large dingy pictures of woollen martyrs, and scowling warriors with limbs strongly knitted; there was especially, at the end of a black passage, a den of lions, that would frighten any boy not born in Africa, or Exeter Change, and accustomed to them.

Another exhibition used to be West's Gallery, where the pleasing figures of Lazarus

* Pictures of Life and Character. By John Leech.

London. 1854.

The

in his grave-clothes, and Death on the pale horse, used to impress us children. tombs of Westminster Abbey, the vaults at St. Paul's, the men in armor at the Tower, frowning ferociously out of their helmets, and wielding their dreadful swords; that superhuman Queen Elizabeth at the end of the room, a livid sovereign with glass eyes, a ruff, and a dirty satin petticoat, riding a horse covered with steel: who does not remember these sights in London in the consulship of Plancus ? and the waxwork in Fleet Street, not like that of Madame Tussaud's, whose chamber of death is gay and brilliant, but a nice old gloomy waxwork, full of murderers; and as a chief attraction, the dead Baby and the Princess Charlotte lying in state.

Our story books had no pictures in them for the most part. Frank (dear old Frank!) had none; nor the Parent's Assistant; nor the Evenings at Home; nor our copy of the Ami des enfans: there were a few just at the end of the Spelling Book, besides the allegory at the beginning, of Education leading up Youth to the temple of Industry, where Dr. Dilworth and Professor Walkinghame stood with crowns of laurel; there were, we say, just a few pictures at the end of the Spelling Book, little oval gray woodcuts of Bewick's, mostly of the Wolf and the Lamb, the Dog and the Shadow, and Brown, Jones, and Robinson with long ringlets and little tights; but for pictures, so to speak, what had we? The rough old woodblocks in the old harlequin-backed fairy-books had served hundred of years; before our Plancus, in the time of Priscus Plancus-in Queen Anne's time, who knows? We were flogged at school; we were fifty boys in our boarding-house, and had to wash in a leaden trough, under a cistern, with lumps of fat yellow soap floating about in the ice and water. Are our sons ever flogged? Have they not dressingrooms, hair-oil, hip baths, and Baden towels? And what picture books the young villains have! What have these children done that they should be so much happier than we were?

We had the Arabian Nights and Walter