CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER X
CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.

containing that section.
The original book had many side-notes in its pages' left or right margin areas. Some of these sidenotes were at
the beginning of a paragraph, some were placed elsewhere alongside a paragraph, in relation to what the
sidenote referred to inside the paragraph. In this e-text, sidenotes that appeared at the beginning of a paragraph
in the original book are placed to precede their reference paragraph. All other sidenotes have been enclosed in
square brackets and placed into the paragraph near where they were in the original book.
The Age of the Reformation, by Preserved Smith 2
Some of the dates in this book are accompanied by a small dagger or sword symbol, signifying the person's
year of death. Since this symbol doesn't exist in the ASCII character set, I've substituted "d." for it.
Page numbers in this book are indicated by numbers enclosed in curly braces, e.g. {99}. They have been
located where page breaks occurred in the original book. This has been done only in the book's main chapters
(I-XIV), not its front matter. For its Bibliography and its Index, page numbers have been placed only at the
start of each of those two sections.
THE AGE OF THE REFORMATION
by
PRESERVED SMITH, Ph.D.
New York Henry Holt and Company
American Historical Series General Editor Charles H. Haskins Professor of History in Harvard University
Copyright, 1920 by Henry Holt and Company
VITÂ CARIORI FILIOLAE PRISCILLAE SACRUM
PREFACE
The excuse for writing another history of the Reformation is the need for putting that movement in its proper
relations to the economic and intellectual revolutions of the sixteenth century. The labor of love necessary for
the accomplishment of this task has employed most of my leisure for the last six years and has been my
companion through vicissitudes of sorrow and of joy. A large part of the pleasure derived from the task has
come from association with friends who have generously put their time and thought at my disposal. First of
all, Professor Charles H. Haskins, of Harvard, having read the whole in manuscript and in proof with care, has
thus given me the unstinted benefit of his deep learning, and of his ripe and sane judgment. Next to him the
book owes most to my kind friend, the Rev. Professor William Walker Rockwell, of Union Seminary, who
has added to the many other favors he has done me a careful revision of Chapters I to VIII, Chapter XIV, and

CONTENTS
PAGE
The Age of the Reformation, by Preserved Smith 4
CHAPTER I.
THE OLD AND THE NEW . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1. The World. Economic changes in the later Middle Ages. Rise of the bourgeoisie. Nationalism.
Individualism. Inventions. Printing. Exploration. Universities.
2. The Church. The papacy. The Councils of Constance and Basle. Savonarola.
3. Causes of the Reformation. Corruption of the church not a main cause. Condition of the church.
Indulgences. Growth of a new type of lay piety. Clash of the new spirit with old ideals.
4. The Mystics. The German Theology. Tauler. The Imitation of Christ.
5. The Pre-reformers. Waldenses. Occam. Wyclif. Huss.
6. Nationalizing the churches. The Ecclesia Anglicana. The Gallican Church. German church. The
Gravamina.
7. The Humanists. Valla. Pico della Mirandola. Lefèvre d'Étaples. Colet. Reuchlin. Epistolae Obscurorum
Virorum. Hutten. Erasmus.
CHAPTER I. 5
CHAPTER II.
GERMANY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
1. The Leader. Luther's early life. Justification by faith only. The Ninety-five Theses. The Leipzig Debate.
Revolutionary Pamphlets of 1520.
2. The Revolution. Condition of Germany. Maximilian I. Charles V. The bull Exsurge Domine burned by
Luther. Luther at Worms and in the Wartburg. Turmoil of the radicals. The Revolt of the Knights. Efforts at
Reform at the Diets of Nuremberg 1522-4. The Peasants' Revolt: economic causes, propaganda, course of the
war, suppression.
3. Formation of the Protestant Party. Defection of the radicals: the Anabaptists. Defection of the intellectuals:
Erasmus. The Sacramentarian Schism: Zwingli. Growth of the Lutheran party among the upper and middle
classes. Luther's ecclesiastical polity. Accession of many Free Cities, of Ernestine Saxony, Hesse, Prussia.
Balance of Power. The Recess of Spires 1529; the Protest.
4. Growth of Protestantism until the death of Luther. Diet of Augsburg 1530: the Confession. Accessions to

Tyndale's New Testament. Tracts. Anticlerical feeling. Divorce of Catharine of Aragon. The Submission of
the Clergy. The Reformation Parliament 1520-30. Act in Restraint of Appeals. Act of Succession. Act of
Supremacy. Cranmer. Execution of More. Thomas Cromwell. Dissolution of the monasteries. Union of
England and Wales. Alliance with the Schmalkaldic League. Articles of Faith. The Pilgrimage of Grace.
Catholic reaction. War. Bankruptcy.
2. The Reformation under Edward VI. Somerset Regent. Repeal of the treason and heresy laws. Rapid growth
of Protestant opinion. The Book of Common Prayer. Social disorders. Conspiracy of Northumberland and
Suffolk.
3. The Catholic reaction under Mary. Proclamation of Queen Jane. Accession and policy of Mary. Repeal of
Reforming Acts. Revival of Treason Laws. The Protestant Martyrs.
4. The Elizabethan Settlement 1558-88. Policy of Elizabeth. Respective numbers of Catholics and Protestants.
Conversion of the masses. The Thirty-nine Articles. The Church of England. Underhand war with Spain.
Rebellion of the Northern Earls. Execution of Mary Stuart. The Armada. The Puritans.
5. Ireland.
CHAPTER VI. 10
CHAPTER VII.
SCOTLAND . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350
Backward condition of Scotland. Relations with England. Cardinal Beaton. John Knox. Battle of Pinkie. Knox
in Scotland. The Common Band. Iconoclasm. Treaty of Edinburgh. The Religious Revolution. Confession of
Faith. Queen Mary's crimes and deposition. Results of the Reformation.
CHAPTER VII. 11
CHAPTER VIII.
THE COUNTER-REFORMATION . . . . . . . . . . 371
1. Italy. The pagan Renaissance; the Christian Renaissance. Sporadic Lutheranism.
2. The Papacy 1521-90. The Sack of Rome. Reforms.
3. The Council of Trent. First Period (1545-7). Second Period (1551-2). Third Period (1562-3). Results.
4. The Company of Jesus. New monastic orders. Loyola. The Spiritual Exercises. Rapid growth and successes
of the Jesuits. Their final failure.
5. The Inquisition and the Index. The medieval Inquisition. The Spanish Inquisition. The Roman Inquisition.
Censorship of the press. The Index of Prohibited Books.

Mornay, Bodin, Buchanan. Radicals: the Utopia.
4. Science. Inductive method. Mathematics. Zoölogy. Anatomy. Physics. Geography. Astronomy; Copernicus.
Reform of the calendar.
5. Philosophy. The Catholic and Protestant thinkers. Skeptics. Effect of the Copernican theory: Bruno.
CHAPTER XII. 16
CHAPTER XIII.
THE TEMPER OF THE TIMES . . . . . . . . . 641
1. Tolerance and Intolerance. Effect of the Renaissance and Reformation.
2. Witchcraft. Causes of the mania. Protests against it.
3. Education. Schools. Effect of the Reformation. Universities.
4. Art. The ideals expressed. Painting. Architecture. Music. Effect of the Reformation and
Counter-reformation.
5. Reading. Number of books. Typical themes. Greatness of the Sixteenth Century.
CHAPTER XIII. 17
CHAPTER XIV.
THE REFORMATION INTERPRETED . . . . . . . 699
1. The Religious and Political Interpretations. Burnet, Bossuet, Sleidan, Sarpi.
2. The Rationalist Critique. Montesquieu, Voltaire, Robertson, Hume, Gibbon, Goethe, Lessing.
3. The Liberal-Romantic Appreciation. Heine, Michelet, Froude, Hegel, Ranke, Buckle.
4. The Economic and Evolutionary Interpretations. Marx, Lamprecht, Berger, Weber, Nietzsche, Troeltsch,
Santayana, Harnack, Beard, Janssen, Pastor, Acton.
5. Concluding Estimate.
BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 751
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 819
{3}
THE AGE OF THE REFORMATION
CHAPTER XIV. 18
CHAPTER I
THE OLD AND THE NEW
SECTION 1. THE WORLD.

co-operative; the land belonged to the village and was apportioned out to each husbandman to till, or to all in
common for pasture. Manufacture and commerce were organized by the gild a society of equals, with the
same course of labor and the same reward for each, and with no distinction save that founded on
seniority apprentice, workman, master-workman. But {5} in the later Middle Ages, and more rapidly at their
close, this system broke down under the necessity for larger capital in production and the possibility of
supplying it by the increase of wealth and of banking technique that made possible investment, rapid turn-over
of capital, and corporate partnership. The increase of wealth and the changed mode of its production has been
in large part the cause of three developments which in their turn became causes of revolution: the rise of the
bourgeoisie, of nationalism, and of individualism.
[Sidenote: The bourgeoisie]
CHAPTER I 19
Just as the nobles were wearing away in civil strife and were seeing their castles shot to pieces by cannon, just
as the clergy were wasting in supine indolence and were riddled by the mockery of humanists, there arose a
new class, eager and able to take the helm of civilization, the moneyed men of city and of trade. Nouveaux
riches as they were, they had an appetite for pleasure and for ostentation unsurpassed by any, a love for the
world and an impatience of the meek and lowly church, with her ideal of poverty and of chastity. In their
luxurious and leisured homes they sheltered the arts that made life richer and the philosophy, or religion, that
gave them a good conscience in the work they loved. Both Renaissance and Reformation were dwellers in the
cities and in the marts of commerce.
[Sidenote: National states]
It was partly the rise of the third estate, but partly also cultural factors, such as the perfecting of the modern
tongues, that made the national state one of the characteristic products of modern times. Commerce needs
order and strong government; the men who paid the piper called the tune; police and professional soldiery
made the state, once so racked by feudal wars, peaceful at home and dreaded abroad. If the consequence of
this was an increase in royal power, the kings were among those who had greatness thrust upon them, rather
than achieving it for themselves. {6} They were but the symbols of the new, proudly conscious nation, and the
police commissioners of the large bankers and traders.
[Sidenote: Individualism]
The reaction of nascent capitalism on the individual was no less marked than on state and society, though it
was not the only cause of the new sense of personal worth. Just as the problems of science and of art became

states more than any of the renowned legislators of antiquity. The equally obscure inventor of mechanical
clocks a great improvement on the {8} older sand-glasses, water-glasses, and candles made possible a new
precision and regularity of daily life, an untold economy of time and effort.
[Sidenote: Printing]
But all other inventions yield to that of printing, the glory of John Gutenberg of Mayence, one of those poor
and in their own times obscure geniuses who carry out to fulfilment a great idea at much sacrifice to
themselves. The demand for books had been on the increase for a long time, and every effort was made to
reproduce them as rapidly and cheaply as possible by the hand of expert copyists, but the applications of this
method produced slight result. The introduction of paper, in place of the older vellum or parchment, furnished
one of the indispensable pre-requisites to the multiplication of cheap volumes. In the early fifteenth century,
the art of the wood-cutter and engraver had advanced sufficiently to allow some books to be printed in this
manner, i.e. from carved blocks. This was usually, or at first, done only with books in which a small amount
of text went with a large amount of illustration. There are extant, for example, six editions of the Biblia
Pauperum, stamped by this method. It was afterwards applied, chiefly in Holland, to a few other books for
which there was a large demand, the Latin grammar of Donatus, for example, and a guide-book to Rome
known as the Mirabilia Urbis Romae. But at best this method was extremely unsatisfactory; the blocks soon
wore out, the text was blurred and difficult to read, the initial expense was large.
The essential feature of Gutenberg's invention was therefore not, as the name implies, printing, or impression,
but typography, or the use of type. The printer first had a letter cut in hard metal, this was called the punch;
with it he stamped a mould known as the {9} matrix in which he was able to found a large number of exactly
identical types of metal, usually of lead.
These, set side by side in a case, for the first time made it possible satisfactorily to print at reasonable cost a
large number of copies of the same text, and, when that was done, the types could be taken apart and used for
another work.
The earliest surviving specimen of printing not counting a few undated letters of indulgence is a fragment
on the last judgment completed at Mayence before 1447. In 1450 Gutenberg made a partnership with the rich
goldsmith John Fust, and from their press issued, within the next five years, the famous Bible with 42 lines to
a page, and a Donatus (Latin grammar) of 32 lines. The printer of the Bible with 36 lines to a page, that is the
next oldest surviving monument, was apparently a helper of Gutenberg, who set up an independent press in
1454. Legible, clean-cut, comparatively cheap, these books demonstrated once for all the success of the new

important from the material standpoint, was first felt in the widening of the imagination. Camoens wrote the
epic of Da Gama, More placed his Utopia in America, and Montaigne speculated on the curious customs of
the redskins. Ariosto wrote of the wonders of the new world in his poem, and Luther occasionally alluded to
them in his sermons.
[Sidenote: Universities]
If printing opened the broad road to popular education, other and more formal means to the same end were not
neglected. One of the great innovations of the Middle Ages was the university. These permanent corporations,
dedicated to the advancement of learning and the instruction of youth, first arose, early in the twelfth century,
at Salerno, at Bologna and at Paris. As off-shoots of these, or in imitation of them, many similar institutions
sprang up in every land of western Europe. The last half of the fifteenth century was especially rich in such
foundations. In Germany, from 1450 to 1517, no less than nine new academies were started: Greifswald 1456,
Freiburg in the Breisgau 1460, Basle 1460, Ingolstadt 1472, Trèves 1473, Mayence 1477, Tübingen 1477,
Wittenberg 1502, and Frankfort on the Oder 1506. Though generally founded by papal charter, and
maintaining a strong ecclesiastical flavor, these institutions were under the direction of the civil government.
In France three new universities opened their doors during the same period: Valence 1459, Nantes 1460,
Bourges 1464. These were all placed under the general supervision of the local bishops. The great university
of Paris was gradually changing its character. From the most cosmopolitan and international of bodies it was
fast becoming strongly nationalist, and was the chief center of an Erastian Gallicanism. Its {12} tremendous
weight cast against the Reformation was doubtless a chief reason for the failure of that movement in France.
Spain instituted seven new universities at this time: Barcelona 1450, Saragossa 1474, Palma 1483, Sigüenza
1489, Alcalá 1499, Valencia 1500, and Seville 1504. Italy and England remained content with the academies
they already had, but many of the smaller countries now started native universities. Thus Pressburg was
founded in Hungary in 1465, Upsala in Sweden in 1477, Copenhagen in 1478, Glasgow in 1450, and
Aberdeen in 1494. The number of students in each foundation fluctuated, but the total was steadily on the
increase.
CHAPTER I 22
Naturally, the expansion of the higher education brought with it an increase in the number and excellence of
the schools. Particularly notable is the work of the Brethren of the Common Life, who devoted themselves
almost exclusively to teaching boys. Some of their schools, as Deventer, attained a reputation like that of Eton
or Rugby today.

unquestioned. Just a century after Innocent III, Boniface VIII [Sidenote: Boniface VIII 1294-1303] was
worsted in a quarrel with Philip IV of France, and his successor, Clement V, a Frenchman, by transferring the
papal capital to Avignon, virtually made the supreme pontiffs subordinate to the French government and thus
weakened their influence in the rest of Europe. This "Babylonian Captivity" [Sidenote: The Babylonian
Captivity 1309-76] was followed by a greater misfortune to the pontificate, the Great Schism, [Sidenote: The
Great Schism 1378-1417] for the effort to transfer the papacy back to Rome led to the election of two popes,
who, with their successors, respectively ruled and mutually anathematized each other from the two rival cities.
The difficulty of deciding which was the true successor of Peter was so great that not only were the kingdoms
of Europe divided in their allegiance, but doctors of the church and canonized saints could be found among
the supporters of either line. There can be no doubt that respect for the pontificate greatly suffered by the
schism, which was in some respects a direct preparation for the greater division brought about by the
CHAPTER I 23
Protestant secession.
[Sidenote: Councils Pisa, 1409, Constance, 1414-18]
The attempt to end the schism at the Council of Pisa resulted only in the election of a third pope. The situation
was finally dealt with by the Council of Constance which deposed two of the popes and secured the voluntary
abdication of the third. The synod further strengthened the church by executing the heretics Huss and Jerome
of Prague, and by passing decrees intended to put the government of the church in the hands of representative
assemblies. It asserted that it {15} had power directly from Christ, that it was supreme in matters of faith, and
in matters of discipline so far as they affected the schism, and that the pope could not dissolve it without its
own consent. By the decree Frequens it provided for the regular summoning of councils at short intervals.
Beyond this, other efforts to reform the morals of the clergy proved abortive, for after long discussion nothing
of importance was done.
For the next century the policy of the popes was determined by the wish to assert their superiority over the
councils. The Synod of Basle [Sidenote: Basle 1431-43] reiterated all the claims of Constance, and passed a
number of laws intended to diminish the papal authority and to deprive the pontiff of much of his ill-gotten
revenues annates, fees for investiture, and some other taxes. It was successful for a time because protected by
the governments of France and Germany, for, though dissolved by Pope Eugene IV in 1433, it refused to
listen to his command and finally extorted from him a bull ratifying the conciliar claims to supremacy.
In the end, however, the popes triumphed. The bull Execrabilis [Sidenote: 1458] denounced as a damnable

[Sidenote: Innocent VIII 1484-92]
The enormous bribes paid by Innocent VIII for his election were recouped by his sale of offices and spiritual
graces, and by taking a tribute from the Sultan, {17} in return for which he refused to proclaim a crusade. The
most important act of his pontificate was the publication of the bull against witchcraft.
[Sidenote: Alexander VI 1492-1503]
The name of Alexander VI has attained an evil eminence of infamy on account of his own crimes and vices
and those of his children, Caesar Borgia and Lucretia. One proof that the public conscience of Italy, instead of
being stupified by the orgy of wickedness at Rome was rather becoming aroused by it, is found in the
appearance, just at this time, of a number of preachers of repentance. These men, usually friars, started
"revivals" marked by the customary phenomena of sudden conversion, hysteria, and extreme austerity. The
greatest of them all was the Dominican Jerome Savonarola [Sidenote: Savonarola] who, though of mediocre
intellectual gifts, by the passionate fervor of his convictions, attained the position of a prophet at Florence. He
began preaching here in 1482, and so stirred his audiences that many wept and some were petrified with
horror. His credit was greatly raised by his prediction of the invasion of Charles VIII of France in 1494. He
succeeded in driving out the Medici and in introducing a new constitution of a democratic nature, which he
believed was directly sanctioned by God. He attacked the morals of the clergy and of the people and, besides
renovating his own order, suppressed not only public immorality but all forms of frivolity. The people burned
their cards, false hair, indecent pictures, and the like; many women left their husbands and entered the cloister;
gamblers were tortured and blasphemers had their tongues pierced. A police was instituted with power of
searching houses.
It was only the pope's fear of Charles VIII that prevented his dealing with this dangerous reformer, who now
began to attack the vices of the curia. In 1495, however, the friar was summoned to Rome, and {18} refused
to go; he was then forbidden to preach, and disobeyed. In Lent 1496 he proclaimed the duty of resisting the
pope when in error. In November a new brief proposed changes in the constitution of his order which would
bring him more directly under the power of Rome. Savonarola replied that he did not fear the
excommunication of the sinful church, which, when launched against him May 12, 1497, only made him more
defiant. Claiming to be commissioned directly from God, he appealed to the powers to summon a general
council against the pope.
At this juncture one of his opponents, a Franciscan, Francis da Puglia, proposed to him the ordeal by fire,
stating that though he expected to be burnt he was willing to take the risk for the sake of the faith. The