5.3.5. THE NEW FAITH SHATTERS THEM

THE CORE PROTESTANT BELIEF: INDIVIDUALS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR SALVATION

These famous studies explore how that belief and money-making coincide:

• It leads to a serious view of life and to the "Protestant ethic" of honesty, work and austerity. 

• Moral and intellectual rigor, Church corruption, political factors, regional traditions of heresy, local issues and pastors' personal impact let Protestantism cross class lines, but the emerging entrepreneurs dominate. Training, habit and self-interest predispose to accepting the new faith, in a way that is "sincere and based on calculation."

-- Citation: Balzac, The Calvinist Martyr

• Calvin says, "The rich are servants of the poor." But honesty, thrift and hard work are essential for launching a business, and material success becomes a sign of salvation. That poverty was due to laziness and hedonism and so a sign of damnation, follows.

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Sixteenth-century Protestants would have appreciated this couple, the opposite of the superhuman figures of antiquity and warriors that nobles adopt at time that capitalism expands and Protestants appear. 

American Gothic by Grant Wood, 1930 / zoom

• Effect on culture: Austerity encourages plowing gains back into business and favors arts of costless grandeur: 

• In England, the language of the King James Bible and the epic poetry of John Milton.

Zoom

• In France Protestant's sung psalms address God so powerfully and directly that Catherine de Medici and Charles IX attend services to listen.
  
  
  

Protestant museum / zoom

Family singing psalms

•  In New England, stark wooden churches:

Zoom

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• Effects the poor: 

• In England, destroying the 800 monasteries and convents sends monks, nuns and lepers into the streets to beg, and provokes the most important rebellion of the Tudor period (the Pilgrimage of Grace in 1636).

• In France, towns under Protestant control manage charity competently. But instead of the Church helping all in need, people with means investigate the miserable, then patronize them or refuse aid.

No reference / zoom

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• Effect on business: 

Many Protestants live beyond the city wall to pray as they wish  —  which frees craftspeople from guild restrictions. As well, they work during the numerous holidays, notably the approximately 50 saints' days. Combined with their work ethic, those factors make their excellent production less expensive than that of Catholics. 

They are formidable business rivals.

Of course they are hated.

Sixteenth-century engraving (detail), private collection

End of this section.

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Next section,

5.4. 

Absolute monarchy takes the reins