George Bancroft, History of the Colonization of the United States, Vol. 1, 17th edition.

[278] respecting the communion, and esteemed as a com-

Chap. VIII.}

memoration the rite which the Catholics reverenced as a sacrifice. Luther acknowledged princes as his protectors, and, in the ceremonies of worship, favored magnificence as an aid to devotion; Calvin was the guide of Swiss republics, and avoided, in their churches, all appeals to the senses as a crime against religion. Luther resisted the Roman church for its immorality: Calvin for its idolatry. Luther exposed the folly of superstition, ridiculed the hair-shirt and the scourge, the purchased indulgence, and the dearly-bought masses for the dead; Calvin shrunk from their criminality with impatient horror. Luther permitted the cross and the taper, pictures and images, as things of indifference; Calvin demanded a spiritual worship in its utmost purity.

The reign of Edward, giving safety to Protestants, soon brought to light that both sects of the reformed church existed in England. The one party, sustained by Cranmer, desired moderate reforms; the other, countenanced by the protector, were the implacable adversaries of the ceremonies of the Roman church It was still attempted to enforce¹ uniformity by men-

1549 and 1552.

aces of persecution; but the most offensive of the Roman doctrines were expunged from the liturgy. The tendency of the public mind favored a greater simplicity in the forms of devotion; the spirit of inquiry was active; not a rite of the established worship, not a point in church government, escaped unexamined, not a vestment nor a ceremony remained, of which the propriety had not been denied. The spirit of inquiry rebelled against prescription. A more complete