Thomas Boston
(1.) The gospel is a report from heaven of salvation for poor sinners, from sin and from the wrath of God. However dearly bought, it is yet freely made over to you in the word of promise, so that you may freely take possession of it. This report being brought to the sinner, faith trusts it as a true report, believing that God has said it; and the sinner trusts to it as good, laying his own salvation upon it. So the soul embraces the Saviour and the salvation brought to it in that report, as greedily as ever a drowning man would take hold of a rope let down to bring him out of the waters.
(2.) The gospel is the report of a crucified Christ made over to sinners, as the device of heaven for their salvation. It is proclaimed by the authority of heaven that Christ has died and by His death purchased life and salvation for lost children of Adam; and that they may have full and free access to Him.
1This quotation from Boston is taken with editing from Alexander Hall’s Treatise on the Faith and Influence of the Gospel.
Faith trusting this report as true and good, the soul concludes, The Saviour is mine. And the soul leans to Him for all the purchase of His death, for life and salvation to itself in particular.
(3.) The gospel is the report of a righteousness wherein guilty ones may stand before a holy God: “For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith”; and by faith one believes there is such a righteousness, that it is sufficient to cover him, and that it is held out to him to be trusted on for righteousness. And so the believer trusts it as his righteousness in the sight of God, disclaiming all other, and betaking himself to it alone.
(4.) The gospel is the report of pardon under the great seal of heaven, in Christ, to all who will take it through Him: “Be it known unto you . . . that through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and by Him all that believe are justified from all things”. This pardon is proclaimed openly by the authority of heaven, full and free, to all, without exception, of any of Adam’s lost race to whom the report comes. The soul by faith believes this to be true, and applies it to itself, saying, This pardon is for me; it is good and suitable to my case; I will therefore lean to this word of grace for my pardon, and come in, for this is the word of God, who cannot lie.
(5.) The gospel is the report of a physician that cures all the diseases of the soul infallibly and freely, and rejects no patient. The soul believes it, applies it to its own case and says, Then I will trust Him for removing the stony heart out of my flesh, for curing me of the evil of backsliding, the fever of raging corruption, the running issue of the predominant lust, and the universal leprosy of the corruption of my nature.
(6.) The gospel is the report of a feast for hungry souls, to which all are bid welcome, Christ Himself being the maker and the matter of it too. The soul, weary of the husks of created things and believing this report, accordingly falls a-feeding on Christ: His flesh, which is meat indeed, and His blood, which is drink indeed. The soul believes and applies to itself all that Christ was, did and suffered, as what the soul shall reap the benefit of – which is feeding by faith on a slain Saviour.
(7.) The gospel is the report of a treasure. In it are the precious promises, and within them is precious Christ with His merit, like the gold mentioned in Revelation 3:18: “I counsel thee to buy of Me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich”. The field it is hid in may be yours in possession; the gospel offers you the covenant as that field. Faith believes this report, and the soul lays hold on the covenant and trusts entirely to the treasure hidden there for the payment of all its debt, for its through-bearing during life, and through death, and for procuring it eternal happiness.
(8.) The gospel is the report of a victory won by Jesus Christ over sin,
Satan, death and the world. It is in favour of all that will join the glorious Conqueror. Faith believes this report, and the soul trusts to it for its victory over all these, as already-foiled enemies.
(9.) The gospel is the report of a peace, purchased by the blood of Christ for poor sinners and offered to them. Faith believes it; and trusting to it, the soul comes before God as a reconciled Father in Christ, brings in its supplications before the throne for the supply of its needs, and for believing communication to be opened between heaven and them, which was blocked up during the war that existed between them and God.
The Reformation in Italy1
7. Further Persecution
After Ochino2 fled, those in Lucca who held the same views were in danger—among them Peter Martyr, who, as well as being prior of a monastery, was pastor of a Reformed congregation. Increasing persecution was making his position in Lucca untenable and he expected that he would be forbidden to preach, through the actions of the Pope or the city authorities or his monastic order. When Martyr wrote to his congregation in Lucca to explain why he had to flee, he acknowledged that they would find it difficult “to be deprived of that spiritual comfort which God sometime gave you by my sermons, lectures and conferences which I had with you”. He encouraged them with the thought that the Holy Spirit was able to give them greater strength than before, so that there would be no damage to their salvation. He told his people that he was grieved that he had ever obscured the truth; he was now recognising that he ought to have been more explicit in his past preaching. He stated that “these sermons, lectures and conferences could not endure any longer, unless they would either have darkened the truth, or have professed things which are plainly false”.3
He wrote to those who were aware of his previous “troubles wherewith my conscience was vexed, because of that state of life which I followed”. If he was to go on as before, he told them: “I should every day have winked at an innumerable sort of superstitions; I should not only myself have executed
1The final part of a Theological Conference paper, somewhat enlarged. The previous part, last month, spoke of a time of increasing persecution, under the Roman Inquisition. Page numbers in the text refer to Thomas M’Crie, History of the Progress and Suppression of the Reformation in Italy in the Sixteenth Century, Edinburgh and London, 1856.
2For Ochino, see last month’s article.
3Philip McNair, Peter Martyr in Italy, Oxford, 1967, p 263.
superstitious rites, but should also without all reason have required them of others: many things should I have done otherwise than I judged or taught.”4 Martyr’s conscience was now awake to the sinfulness of continuing in his present position, observing rites such as the mass, which he described as “superstitions” – rites that were, he now thoroughly recognised, altogether unscriptural. If he would continue any longer within the Roman system, he would not only be observing these rites himself but requiring those under him to carry them out also. A twentieth-century historian notes, “It was doubtless the celebration of the mass that tormented his conscience most. . . . Martyr, who was to become one of the foremost and most formidable champions of Reformed [teaching on the Lord’s Supper], was already in substantial agreement with Bullinger, Calvin and Zwingli.”5
Martyr rode quietly away from Lucca in 1542, bound for Switzerland. As he crossed the Alps, he prayed, “Since Thou, my Lord, hast dealt so mercifully with me, as Thou wouldest make me partaker of Thy truth and reveal unto me my Redeemer Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world, grant moreover, I beseech Thee, that this treasure of Thy holy gospel lately written in my heart, may with me be preserved, increase and bring forth fruit, in whatsoever sort it shall seem good unto Thee. And for my part, behold, I offer myself unto Thee, even as it shall seem good unto Thy will. . . .”6 Accompanied by some other fugitives, Martyr arrived, at the end of his long journey, in Zurich, where he received a warm welcome. Through Martin Bucer, the Reformer of Strasbourg, Martyr was given an academic appointment in that city. In 1547 he became Professor of Divinity in Oxford University but again had to flee when Queen Mary came to the throne. He died in 1562 in Zurich. The Protestant congregation in Lucca continued after Martyr left; it was protected by some influential men in the city, and numbers even increased for a time.
The Inquisition had originally been founded in the twelfth century. When the Pope became afraid that whole cities, such as Lucca, would leave the Roman Church – as Geneva, for instance, had done – he reconstituted the Roman Inquisition in 1542, with Caraffa, later to become pope Paul IV, as Inquisitor-General. That brutal institution was to try all cases of heresy, but it did not have that power in every country. M’Crie states that “Popish historians do more homage to truth than credit to their cause when they say that the erection of the Inquisition was the salvation of the Roman Catholic Church in Italy” (p 123). There could now be no hope that those accused of heresy would receive justice, and many Protestants fled. The Inquisition
4McNair, Peter Martyr in Italy, p 267.
5McNair, Peter Martyr in Italy, p 268.
6McNair, Peter Martyr in Italy, p 293.
filled their prisons with those who remained. In most of Italy, public profession of the Protestant religion was suppressed. Yet private meetings continued and the Inquisition spent 20 years seeking to rid the country of those who attended these meetings.
Faventino Fanino, a native of the papal states, was one of the first Italian martyrs. He profited from reading the Bible and other religious books translated into Italian. He then tried to teach his neighbours the truths of the gospel, but was imprisoned. He was released after his friends persuaded him to recant, but he became very distressed when he considered what he had done. But some time later, he tried more zealously to show his fellow countrymen their errors and pointed them to the way of salvation. He hoped that, when a few had been converted, they would teach others and he would move somewhere else. After evangelising in several places, he was again arrested and brought in chains to Ferrara. Not even his wife and sister could persuade him to recant a second time. He told them: “Let it suffice you that, for your sakes, I have once denied my Saviour. Had I then the knowledge which, by the grace of God, I have acquired since my fall, I would not have yielded to your entreaties” (p 167).
Fanino had many visitors in prison; many of them felt edified by his teaching and prayers. After visitors were barred from seeing him, he set himself to teach his fellow prisoners. Some of them acknowledged, after being released, that “they never knew what liberty and happiness were until they found them within the walls of a prison” (p 168). Fanino was then placed in solitary confinement; so he turned to writing letters and longer pieces and succeeded in sending them to his friends. In 1550 Pope Julius III ordered him to be put to death. He was strangled before being burnt and, so that no one would see his execution, it was all done in the early morning.
We have already met Aonio Paleario – not a cleric but an academic philosopher – when he was accused of heresy and acquitted.7 In 1566 he was Professor of Eloquence in Milan, his final position. At that time Pius V was elected as the next pope, and Paleario at once realised that he was in danger, as were all who were “not slavishly devoted to the Papal See”.8 One can see how dangerous Pius was from a decree which he issued giving inquisitors total protection from all opposition.
The decree begins: “Pius, a bishop, servant of servants to God of eternal memory. If to us belongs the daily care of protecting all the ministers of the church whom we have received from God, under our safe and secure patronage, with how much more anxiety ought we to guard those who are
7See page 330 in last month’s issue of The Free Presbyterian Magazine.
8M Young, The Life and Times of Aonio Paleario, vol 2, p 537.
employed in the Holy Office of the Inquisition, in searching out heretical depravity, and see that under the shield of the inviolable authority of this see, they are protected from all dangers in the execution of their ministry for the exaltation of the Catholic faith.” After 14 autocratic paragraphs intended to facilitate the persecution of those who truly believed Scripture teachings, Pius has the blasphemous nerve to conclude by expressing to the Most High his “desire that my ways may be directed to keep Thy statutes”. The words of the Saviour to Saul of Tarsus are appropriate here: “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?” (Acts 9:4).
One of Paleario’s correspondents in Basel was Mino Cirsa, who was so disturbed at the election of Pius V that he wrote a book in which he argues for the main doctrines taught by the Reformers: particularly (1) that the Pope is the Antichrist, (2) that the mass is greater idolatry than that of the heathen, (3) that man is justified by faith in Christ and not by his own works, (4) that purgatory is a papal invention, (5) that there are only two sacraments.
Paleario had for a long time prepared himself for a violent death; he looked forward to the blessedness of heaven. He was summoned to Rome, on a charge of heresy, around 1567 – because, it was alleged that he had published “a little book in which he artfully concealed the mortal poison of heresy” and had also “repeated the same things” in a speech to the rulers of the Republic of Sienna, in central Italy.9 The book in question was The Benefit of the Death of Christ, and what was claimed to be “the mortal poison of heresy” was no doubt the doctrine of justification by faith alone in Christ alone, not by works. He had written 25 years earlier that, in his book, he had “confirmed by most ancient and certain authorities, and declared . . . that all sin was cancelled and forgiven in those who turn to Christ crucified and with full faith in Him, and trust in His promises, confidently rest on One who cannot deceive”.10
This was still what he believed, but he seems also to have been charged with three other “errors”: (1) denial of purgatory, (2) disapproval of people being buried in churches, (3) despising all religious orders and their garments. A hostile witness claimed that “he fully approved of all the heretical doctrines written in various commentaries and that there was no error of Oecolampadius, Luther, Bucer, or other heretics which he had not embraced”. This witness concluded that Paleario’s own words, at his trial, “prove him to have been a thorough heretic and worthy of the severest punishment”.11
It was obvious to Paleario that the judges at his trial were determined to
9Young, Aonio Paleario, vol 2, p 556.
10Young, Aonio Paleario, vol 2, p 558.
11Young, Aonio Paleario, vol 2, p 559.
have him put to death. He is reported to have told them: “I am determined to follow the counsel of the blessed Apostle Peter, who said, ‘Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that [we] should follow His steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth: who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, He threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously'” (p 181). Paleario was condemned and, after spending three years in prison, was sentenced to be hanged and his body to be burnt. This sentence was carried out on 3 July 1570, when he was 69.
Before he was led out to be executed, Paleario wrote to his wife and to his two sons. In his letter to his wife he wrote, “I would not wish that you should receive sorrow from my pleasure [dying and going to heaven], nor ill from my good. The hour is now come when I must pass from this life to my Lord and Father and God. I depart as joyfully as if I were going to the nuptials of the Son of the great King, which I have always prayed my Lord to grant me, through His goodness and infinite mercy. Wherefore, my dearest wife, comfort yourself with the will of God and with my resignation,12 and attend to the desponding family which still survive, training them up and preserving them in the fear of God, and being to them both father and mother” (p 252). M’Crie’s verdict on Paleario was: “When we take into consideration his talents, his zeal, the utility of his writings, and the sufferings which he endured, Paleario must be viewed as one of the greatest ornaments of the Reformed cause in Italy” (p 182).
Others too were put to death at this time, during the storm of persecution unleashed by Pius V. Among them was Bartolommeo Bartoccio, the final witness for the truth that we will consider. He was born into a wealthy family and was introduced to Reformed doctrine while a soldier. After returning home, he was zealous in passing on scriptural truth, and several of his relations were converted. He became seriously ill and refused to have a priest come and hear him confess his sins. He also resisted all the arguments put forward by the local bishop, who was attempting to bring him back to the Romanism that he had turned his back on.
Bartoccio was accordingly summoned, along with his companions, before the Governor. Though he had not fully recovered from his illness, he got up through the night and succeeded in climbing over the city wall, with the help of a pike, and was able to escape to Venice. He moved on to Geneva, where he married and became a manufacturer of silk. But in 1567 he visited Genoa on business and there he was discovered and arrested. He was then sent on to Rome and, after almost two years’ imprisonment, he was sentenced to be burnt alive. The cruel sentence was carried out, but Bartoccio did not flinch.
12That is, he was resigned to God’s will in what was going to happen.
As the flames enveloped his body, he was heard to cry, “Victory, victory”.
Conclusion.13 However extensive the range of the Italian Reformation may have been, its failure was tragic. But it may be explained to a considerable extent. Among the various states that comprised sixteenth-century Italy, only the Republic of Venice had sufficient courage to resist the interference of the papacy in its internal affairs, but even she succumbed to the threats of the papal court and the terrors of the Inquisition. John Stoughton, a church historian, writes, “The Holy Office [the Inquisition], equipped with extraordinary powers by successive popes, proved a tremendous engine of persecution, and before it one individual after another quailed. Some . . . bravely stood the fire, but large numbers recanted and others, warned or discouraged by their example, feared to enlist in the ranks of [the Reformed]. Persecution in Italy, as in Spain, carried out with relentless fury, did its work with frightful success. The unity of purpose and effort in the proceedings of the Holy Inquisition throughout Italy was a chief factor in the repression of Italian Reform.”14
Stoughton points to the eloquence of Ochino and Peter Martyr but feels that their sermons and their writings affected only the upper classes and the intellectuals – that, unlike Martin Luther, Hugh Latimer and John Knox, they did not really reach those whom one might call ordinary people. Stoughton also refers to personal defects in these and other Italian preachers, which hindered the success of the Reformation, but one must be careful to remember that God’s human instruments are always human, with all their natural frailties and remaining corruption. A further point, which may be related to the fact that Italy was then made up of a multitude of separate states, is that the Reformed movement in Italy lacked structure. Besides, most of those who were leaders in the movement remained within the Church of Rome, unless they fled from Italy. Yet we must stress the terrible severity of the persecution waged by the Vatican and its more ardent local followers, but especially the Inquisition. The result of this persecution was to eliminate the Reformation from Italy.
We have, in this conclusion, glanced only at the human factors involved, but we must remember that, in God’s holy providence, it was not His purpose to bring about a thorough reformation in that country. But He was able to do so. Let us pray for a lasting reformation of the professing Christian Church in all parts of the world in our time, and that the gospel would spread everywhere and be so blessed by the Holy Spirit that the whole earth would be filled with God’s glory!
13Much of it is based on the first part of John Stoughton’s conclusion in his Footprints of the Italian Reformers, London, pp 295ff. The prefatory note to his book is dated 1881.
14Footprints of the Italian Reformers, p 297.