The repentance of England requireth two things: First, the expulsion of all dregs of popery and the treading under foot of all glistering beauty of vain ceremonies. Next, no power or liberty must be permitted to any, of what estate, degree or authority they be, either to live without the yoke of discipline by God's word commanded, or to alter one jot in religion which from God's mouth thou hast received. If prince, king or emperor would enterprise to change or disannul the same, that he be the reputed enemy to God, while a prince who erects idolatry must be adjudged to death. --_John Knox_ [Illustration: John Knox] John Knox the Scotchman, Martin Luther the German, and John Calvin the Frenchman, were contemporaries. They constitute a trinity of strong men who profoundly influenced their times; and the epoch they made was so important that we call it "The Reformation." They form the undertow of that great tidal wave of reason and commonsense called the Italian Renaissance. And as the chief business of the Hahnemannian school of medicine was to dilute the dose of the Allopaths, and the Christian Scientists confirmed the homeopaths in a belief concerning the beauties of the blank tablet, so did Luther, Calvin and Knox neutralize the arrogance of Rome, and dilute the dose of despotism. Knox, Luther, and Calvin were hunted men. They lived stormy, tumultuous lives, torn by plot and counterplot. Very naturally, their religion is filled with fever and fear, and their God is jealous, revengeful, harsh, arbitrary, savage--a God of wrath. Only a bold man, rough and coarse, could have defied the reigning powers and done the work which Destiny had cut out for John Knox to do. His power lay in the hallucination that his utterances were the final expressions of truth. Had he known more he would have done less. Life is a sequence, and we are what we are because this man lived. To the memory of John Knox we acknowledge our obligation; but we realize that for us to accept and adopt the conclusions and ideals of one who lived in such tempestuous times is no honor to ourselves, nor to him. The Christian Church has preached five special phases of belief, as follows: First, Religion by Definition; Second, Religion by Submission; Third, Religion by Substitution; Fourth, Religion by Culture; Fifth, Religion by Service. All of these phases overlap, more or less, and the difference in sects consists simply in the amount of emphasis which is placed upon each or any particular phase. And this is largely a matter of temperament.