od, of Trent closed its
sittings, and published its decrees to the whole of Christendom. But
these canons, far from accomplishing the object for which the synod was
originally convened, and satisfying the expectation of religious
parties, had rather widened the breach between them, and made the schism
irremediable and eternal.

The labors of the synod instead of purifying the Romish Church from its
corruptions had only reduced the latter to greater definiteness and
precision, and invested them with the sanction of authority. All the
subtilties of its teaching, all the arts and usurpations of the Roman
See, which had hitherto rested more on arbitrary usage, were now passed
into laws and raised into a system. The uses and abuses which during
the barbarous times of ignorance and superstition had crept into
Christianity were now declared essential parts of its worship, and
anathemas were denounced upon all who should dare to contradict the
dogmas or neglect the observances of the Romish communion. All were
anathematized who should either presume to doubt the miraculous power of
relics, and refuse to honor the bones of martyrs, or should be so bold
as to doubt the availing efficacy of the intercession of saints. The
power of granting indulgences, the first source of the defection from
the See of Rome, was now propounded in an irrefragable article of faith;
and the principle of monasticism sanctioned by an express decree of the
synod, which allowed males to take the vows at sixteen and females at
twelve. And while all the opinions of the Protestants were, without
exception, condemned, no indulgence was shown to their errors or
weaknesses, nor a single step taken to win them back by mildness to the
bosom of the mother church. Amongst the Protestants the wearisome
records of the subtle deliberations of the synod, and the absurdity of
its decisions, increased, if possible, the hearty contempt which they
had long entertained for popery, and laid open to their
controversialists new and hitherto unnoticed points of attack. It was
an ill-judged step to bring the mysteries of the church too close to the
glaring torch of reason, and to fight with syllogisms for the tenets of
a blind belief.

Moreover, the decrees of the Council of Trent were not satisfactory even
to all the powers in communion with Rome. France rejected them
entirely, both because she did not wish to displease the Huguenots, and
also because she was offended by the