THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
Evangelical and the Humanistic. The old Evangelical spirit (represented by the Waldenses [q.v.], Peter of Chelcic, and the Bohemian Brethren [q.v.], in the Middle Ages, and by the Anabaptists and the Society of Friends in more recent times) made a sharp distinction between the Old
2. The Testament and the New Testament, Evangelical making the latter alone an authorita-
Spirit, tive guide in doctrine and polity and Especially laying chief stress on the very words in England, and acts of Christ. Most of them assumed an attitude of passive resistance toward civil governments, denying the possibility of a Christian state (if all were Christians there would be no need of civil government), and rejecting magistracy, oaths, warfare, and capital punishment as inconsistent with the spirit of Christianity and with the precepts and example of Christ and the apostles. To use coercion in connection with religion seemed to them monstrous. Interpreting the Sermon on the Mount literally they thought it wrong to resist evil or to defend themselves. Only when fired by chiliastic enthusiasm and convinced that it was the divine will that they should smite the ungodly and become instruments for the establishment of the kingdom of Christ on earth (see Taborites; Muenzer, Thomas; Fifth Monarchy Men) did they trust in the arm of flesh. This quietistic form of Christianity, while it produced the noblest examples of self-sacrificing devotion and of evangelistic zeal, was too much out of accord with the life and thought of the times to exert a strong influence in favor of religious liberty; though the Mennonites in the Netherlands became numerous and wealthy enough to gain the cooperation of the government in efforts to secure toleration for the persecuted in other lands. It was only when the old Evangelical type of New-Testament Christianity became blended with Calvinistic Puritanism that it was able powerfully to influence the Christian world in favor of liberty of conscience. Robert Browne (q.v.) reached the conviction, probably under Mennonite influence (1580-84), that civil magistrates ought not to punish religious delinquencies or in any way to interfere with the rights of conscience. His immediate Separatist followers failed to grasp the principle and he himself soon abandoned it. About 1609 a party of English Separatists led by John Smyth, exiled in Holland, reached antipedobaptist convictions and at the same time adopted the old Evangelical principle of separation of Church and State and liberty of conscience in the most absolute sense (see Baptists, I., §§ 1-4). A portion of the company under the leadership of Helwys and Murton returned to England (1611 or 1612) and members of this Arminian antipedobaptist party addressed to the government and published a series of pleas for absolute liberty of conscience (1614, 1615, 1620) that influenced wide circles of readers (see Baptists, § 9; cf. Tracts on Liberty of Conscience, Hanserd Knollys Society, London, 1846). The triumph of the Independents (Baptist and Congregational) first over established episcopacy and then over Presbyterianism, which sought to become the established Church and purposed the suppression of all forms of dis-
sent, led to a measure of religious equality under Cromwell (1649, sqq.) for such Congregationalists, Baptists, and Presbyterians as were friendly to the government and of suitable education and character, all alike being admitted to endowed pastorates when invited by the parishioners; but there was no thought of tolerating Roman Catholics, High-church Episcopalians, or Unitarians. Toleration of Evangelical dissent has prevailed in England from 1689 and dissenters' disabilities have been gradually diminished; but even now the free Churches of England are struggling valiantly for religious equality which means the disestablishment and the disendowment of the established Church.
In America the early British colonies were formed on an antitolerationist basis, the Calvinistic theocratic idea prevailing in Massachusetts and Connecticut and- the Anglican establishment taking control in Virginia and other Southern colonies and in New York after it was taken from 3. In the Dutch (see United States of
America. America, Religious History of). Roger Williams (q.v.; also Baptists, II., §§ 1-2), having been banished from Massachusetts, established a small colony at Providence on the basis of liberty of conscience (1636) and, in cooperation with John Clarke (q.v.; also Baptists, II., §3), the larger colony subsequently known as Rhode Island (1647) . The publication of the pleas for liberty of conscience by Williams and Clarke, and their association in England with the leading statesmen of the Cromwellian time no doubt greatly influenced opinion there. In Maryland Lord Baltimore, the proprietor, tolerated and encouraged a body of Puritans who had been driven from Virginia on account of their non-conformity (1643). In Virginia the Baptists, supported to some extent by Presbyterians and freethinkers (Jefferson, Madison, and others), waged an uncompromising warfare against the established Church (1776-99) and succeeded in securing its disestablishment and disendowment, and absolute religious equality (see Baptists, II., § 6). They were also influential in securing the insertion of the clause in the Constitution of the United States that guarantees religious liberty. The triumph of religious liberty in Virginia and the provision for it in the national Constitution led to the removal of all restrictions to the free exercise of religion in Connecticut (1820) and in Massachusetts (1833). The successful experiment of religious liberty on so large a scale soon made its influence felt throughout the Christian world. American influence was a factor in the French Revolution. After the abolition of Christianity by the Terrorists, Napoleon put Roman Catholicism, Lutheranism, Calvinism, and other recognized forms of religion upon the same basis of state support and state control in France, the Netherlands, and other parts of his empire. Complete religious liberty has recently come about in France through the separation of Church and State (see France).
Side by side with the influence of the old Evangelical New-Testament Christianity, the advance of liberal thought under the influence of Humanism has wrought for freedom of thought and liberty of conscience. Skeptical minds not only demand toleration