of
religious error, and in directing it against the Church which they
themselves had abandoned, they introduced a purely subjective test, and
a purely revolutionary system. It is on this account that the _tu
quoque_, or retaliatory argument, is inadmissible between Catholics and
Protestants. Catholic intolerance is handed down from an age when unity
subsisted, and when its preservation, being essential for that of
society, became a necessity of State as well as a result of
circumstances. Protestant intolerance, on the contrary was the peculiar
fruit of a dogmatic system in contradiction with the facts and
principles on which the intolerance actually existing among Catholics
was founded. Spanish intolerance has been infinitely more sanguinary
than Swedish; but in Spain, independently of the interests of religion,
there were strong political and social reasons to justify persecution
without seeking any theory to prop it up; whilst in Sweden all those
practical considerations have either been wanting, or have been opposed
to persecution, which has consequently had no justification except the
theory of the Reformation. The only instance in which the Protestant
theory has been adopted by Catholics is the revocation of the Edict of
Nantes.

Towards the end of his life, Melanchthon, having ceased to be a strict
Lutheran, receded somewhat from his former uncompromising position, and
was adverse to a strict scrutiny into minor theological differences. He
drew a distinction between errors that required punishment and
variations that were not of practical importance.[244] The English
Calvinists who took refuge in Germany in the reign of Mary Tudor were
ungraciously received by those who were stricter Lutherans than
Melanchthon. He was consulted concerning the course to be adopted
towards the refugees, and he recommended toleration. But both at Wesel
and at Frankfort his advice was, to his great disgust, overruled.[245]

The severities of the Protestants were chiefly provoked by the
Anabaptists, who denied the lawfulness of civil government, and strove
to realise the kingdom of God on earth by absorbing the State in the
Church.[246] None protested more loudly than they against the Lutheran
intolerance, or suffered from it more severely. But while denying the
spiritual authority of the State, they claimed for their religious
community a still more absolute right of punishing error by death.
Though they sacrificed government to re