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The Great Controversy 1888
of the gospel, and up with the light of wax tapers, yea, at noonday;
down with Christ’s cross, up with the purgatory pick-purse; away with
clothing the naked, the poor, the impotent; up with the decking of
images and the gay garnishing of stones and stocks; down with God
and his most holy Word; up with traditions, human councils, and a
blinded pope. Oh that our prelates would be as diligent to sow the corn
of good doctrine as Satan is to sow cockle and darnel!”
The grand principle maintained by these reformers—the same that
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had been held by the Waldenses, by Wycliffe, by John Huss, by Luther,
Zwingle, and those who united with them—was the infallible authority
of the Holy Scriptures as a rule of faith and practice. They denied the
right of popes, councils, Fathers, and kings, to control the conscience
in matters of religion. The Bible was their authority, and by its teaching
they tested all doctrines and all claims.
Faith in God and his Word sustained these holy men as they yielded
up their lives at the stake. “Be of good comfort,” exclaimed Latimer to
his fellow-martyr as the flames were about to silence their voices, “we
shall this day light such a candle in England as, I trust, by God’s grace
shall never be put out.”
In Scotland the seeds of truth scattered by Columba and his co-
laborers had never been wholly destroyed. For hundreds of years
after the churches of England submitted to Rome, those of Scotland
maintained their freedom. In the twelfth century, however, popery
became established here, and in no country did it exercise a more
absolute sway. Nowhere was the darkness deeper. Still there came
rays of light to pierce the gloom, and give promise of the coming day.
The Lollards, coming from England with the Bible and the teachings
of Wycliffe, did much to preserve the knowledge of the gospel, and
every century had its witnesses and martyrs.
With the opening of the Great Reformation came the writings of
Luther, and then Tyndale’s English New Testament. Unnoticed by
the hierarchy, these messengers silently traversed the mountains and
valleys, kindling into new life the torch of truth so nearly extinguished
in Scotland, and undoing the work which Rome for four centuries of
oppression had done.
Then the blood of martyrs gave fresh impetus to the movement.
The papist leaders, suddenly awakening to the danger that threatened
their cause, brought to the stake some of the noblest and most hon-