The sole and infallible authority of Holy Scripture was the grand fundamental principle of the Reformation. The Bible was the potent instrumentality that transformed the face of Europe at the commencement of the sixteenth century, its glorious truths permeating the various ranks of society, and awakening those aspirations for liberty which, after an arduous and protracted struggle, were eventually realized. The clouds of ignorance and superstition in which the whole Continent was enveloped quickly dispersed before this light, and a thorough renovation—religious, political, and social—was effected in the various countries that opened their doors to receive this harbinger of prosperity and stability. God, speaking through His Word to the hearts and souls of men, aroused them to a sense of their abject condition and utter…