VIII.

You see, then, my dearly beloved people, from the text of the Scripture I have quoted that, if the Catholic Church has been once the true Church, then she is still the true Church.  

You have also seen from what I have said that the Catholic Church is the institution of God, and not of man, and this is a fact, a fact of history, and no fact of history so well supported, so well proved, as that the Catholic Church is the first, the Church established by Jesus Christ. 

So, in like manner, it is an historical fact that all the Protestant churches are the institutions of man, every one of them.  And I will give you their dates, and the names of their founders or institutors. 

In the year 1520, 368 years ago, the first Protestant came into the world.  Before that one, there was not a Protestant in the world, not one on the face of the whole earth.  And that one, as all history tells us, was Martin Luther.  He was a Catholic priest, who fell away from the Church through pride, and married a nun.  He was excommunicated from the Church, cut off, banished, and made a new religion of his own.  

Before Martin Luther there was not a Protestant in the world.  He was the first to raise the standard of rebellion and revolt against the Church of God.  He said to his disciples that they should take the Bible for their guide, and they did so.  But they soon quarreled with him, Zuinglius, and a number of others, and every one of them started a new religion of his own.
 

After the disciples of Martin Luther came John Calvin, who in Geneva established the Presbyterian religion, and hence, almost all of those religions go by the name of their founder.  

I ask the Protestant, "Why are you a Lutheran, my friend?" 

"Well,"  says he, "because I believe in the doctrine of good Martin Luther." 

Hence, not of Christ, but of man, Martin Luther.  And what kind of a man was he?  A man who had broken the solemn oath he had made at the altar of God, at his ordination, ever to lead a pure, single, and virginal life.  He broke that solemn oath, and married a Sister Catherine, who had also taken the same oath of chastity and virtue.  And this is the first founder of Protestantism in the world.  The very name by which they are known tells you they came from Martin Luther.  

So the Presbyterians are sometimes called Calvinists because they come from, or profess to believe in, John Calvin.