But events proved that despite outward appearances even the reign of Mary registered an advance of Protestantism. The new doctrines were zealously propagated by an ever-growing number of itinerant exhorters. The Spanish alliance was disastrous to English fortunes abroad and distasteful to all patriotic Englishmen at home. And finally, the violent means which the queen took to stamp out heresy gave her the unenviable surname of "Bloody" and reacted in the end in behalf of the views for which the victims sacrificed their lives. During her reign nearly three hundred reformers perished, many of them, including Archbishop Cranmer, by fire. The work of the queen was in vain. No heir was born to Philip and Mary, and the crown, therefore, passed to Elizabeth, the daughter of Anne Boleyn, a Protestant not so much from conviction as from circumstance.
[Sidenote: Definite Fashioning of Anglicanism: the Reign of Elizabeth]
It was in the reign of Elizabeth (1558-1603) that the Church of England assumed definitely the doctrines and practices which we now connect with the word "Anglicanism." By act of Parliament, the English Church was again separated from the papacy, and placed under royal authority, Elizabeth assuming the title of "supreme governor." The worship of the state church was to be in conformity with a slightly altered version of Cranmer's Book of Common Prayer. A uniform doctrine was likewise imposed by Parliament in the form of the Thirty-nine Articles, which set a distinctively Protestant mark upon the Anglican Church in its appeal to the Scriptures as the sole rule of faith, its insistence on justification by faith alone, its repudiation of the sacrifice of the Mass, and its definition of the Church. All the bishops who had been appointed under Mary, with one exception, refused to accept the changes, and were therefore deposed and imprisoned, but new bishops, Elizabeth's own appointees, were consecrated and the "succession of bishops" thereby maintained. Outwardly, the Church of England appeared to retain a corporate continuity throughout the sixteenth century; inwardly, a great revolution had changed it from Catholic to Protestant.
Harsh laws sought to oblige all Englishmen to conform to Elizabeth's religious settlement. Liberty of public worship was denied to any dissenter from Anglicanism. To be a "papist" or "hear Mass"—which were construed as the same thing—was punishable by death as high treason. A special ecclesiastical court—the Court of High Commission—was established under royal authority to search out heresy and to enforce uniformity; it served throughout Elizabeth's reign as a kind of Protestant Inquisition.
[Sidenote: English Dissent from Anglicanism]
While the large majority of the English nation gradually conformed to the official Anglican Church, a considerable number refused their allegiance. On one hand were the Roman Catholics, who still maintained the doctrine of papal supremacy and were usually derisively styled papists, and on the other hand were various Calvinistic sects, such as Presbyterians or Independents or Quakers, who went by the name of "Dissenters" or "Non-conformists." In the course of time, the number of Roman Catholics tended to diminish, largely because, for political reasons which have been indicated in the preceding chapter, Protestantism in England became almost synonymous with English patriotism. But despite drastic laws and dreadful persecutions, Roman Catholicism survived in England among a conspicuous group of people. On the other hand, the Calvinists tended somewhat to increase their numbers so that in the seventeenth century they were able to precipitate a great political and ecclesiastical conflict with Anglicanism.
THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION
We have now traced the origins of the Protestant Revolt against the Catholic Church, and have seen how, between 1520 and 1570, three major varieties of new theology—Lutheranism, Calvinism, and Anglicanism— appeared on the scene and divided among themselves the nations of northern Europe. The story of how, during that critical half-century, the other civilized nations retained their loyalty to the Catholic Church virtually as it had existed throughout the middle ages, remains to be told. The preservation of the papal monarchy and Catholic doctrine in southern Europe was due alike to religious and to political circumstances.
It must not be supposed that pious critics of ecclesiastical abuses were confined to countries which subsequently became Protestant. There were many sincere Catholics in Italy, Austria, France, and Spain who complained of the scandals and worldliness that afflicted the Church at the opening of the sixteenth century: they demanded sweeping reforms in discipline and a return of the clergy to a simple apostolic life. They believed, however, that whatever change was desirable could best be achieved by means of a reformation within the Catholic Church—that is, without disturbing the unity of its organization or denying the validity of its dogmas—while the critics of northern Europe, as we have seen, preferred to put their reforms into practice by means of a revolution—an out-and-out break with century-old traditions of Catholic Christianity. Even in northern Europe some of the foremost scholars of that period desired an intellectual reformation within Catholicism rather than a dogmatic rebellion against it: with Luther's defiance of papal authority, the great Erasmus had small sympathy, and Sir Thomas More, the eminent English humanist, sacrificed his life for his belief in the divine sanction of the papal power.
Thus, while the religious energy of northern Europe went into Protestantism of various kinds, that of southern Europe fashioned a reformation of the Catholic system. And this Catholic reformation, on its religious side, was brought to a successful issue by means of the improved conditions in the papal court, the labors of a great church council, and the activity of new monastic orders. A few words must be said about each one of these religious elements in the Catholic reformation.