The _chambre ardente_,
the Edict of Chateaubriand (1551), the massacre of Amboise (1560), the
thirty years of intermittent civil war (1562-1592)--these were the events
of frightful significance that mark the development of religious conflict
in France. Compared with the tale of blood and confusion that has to be
told of Germany, France, England, and Spain, the history of the
Reformation in Scotland is a record of order and tranquillity.
What is thrust upon us by the narrative of events in Scotland is the
singular moderation alike of the representatives of the old and the new
religion. Heretics had been burned indeed, but the number was
inconsiderable compared with that of similar victims in other countries;
and, even in the day of their triumph, the Scottish Protestants, in
spite of the stern threat of their legislation, were guiltless of a
single execution on the ground of religion. What is still more striking
is, that difference of faith begot no fanatical hate among the mass of
the people. In France and Spain men forgot the ties of blood and country
in the blind fury of religious zeal, but in Scotland we do not find town
arrayed against town and neighbor denouncing neighbor on the ground of a
different faith. That this tolerance was not due to indifference the
religious history of Scotland abundantly proves.
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