He called himself Head of the Church in England; and though he believed
all the later errors, he allowed the Lessons to be read from a new
English translation of the Bible. He pretended to reform the convents,
some of which were in a very bad state, and had forgotten their rules;
but instead of setting them to rights, he seized their wealth, and
turned all the monks and nuns adrift.
The new notions were favoured by his break with the Pope. The whole
Western Church was in a ferment; the reformers were constantly writing
and preaching against the many errors of the Roman Church, and were
rejoicing over the real treasure of true faith they had found hidden
within her. Many other sincere and good men were shocked at such
disobedience to what they had once respected; and unhappily, almost all
the Italian clergy and cardinals were so food of the riches and power in
which they were maintained by misleading the people, that they dreaded
nothing so much as having them set right.
The Emperor, Charles V., strove hard to bring about a General Council of
the Church, as the only hope of making matters right, but he was much
hindered by his wars with the King of France, and by the double dealing
of the Pope; and in the meantime Luther and his friends drew up a
protest against the false doctrines of Rome, and were, for that reason,
called Protestants.
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