ey extended
the broad fringe of their order till the word clerk was construed to
mean any one who could write his name or read a sentence from a book. A
robber or a murderer at the assizes had but to show that he possessed
either of these qualifications, and he was allowed what was called
benefit of clergy. His case was transferred to the Bishops' Court, to an
easy judge, who allowed him at once to compound.

Such were the clergy in matters of this world. As religious instructors,
they appear in colours if possible less attractive.

Practical religion throughout Europe at the beginning of the sixteenth
century was a very simple affair. I am not going to speak of the
mysterious doctrines of the Catholic Church. The creed which it
professed in its schools and theological treatises was the same which it
professes now, and which it had professed at the time when it was most
powerful for good. I do not myself consider that the formulas in which
men express their belief are of much consequence. The question is rather
of the thing expressed; and so long as we find a living consciousness
that above the world and above human life there is a righteous God, who
will judge men according to their works, whether they say their prayers
in Latin or English, whether they call themselves Protestants or call
themselves Catholics, appears to me of quite secondary importance. But
at the time I speak of, that consciousness no longer existed. The
formulas and ceremonies were all in all; and of God it is hard to say
what conceptions men had formed, when they believed that a dead man's
relations could buy him out of purgatory--buy him out of purgatory,--for
this was the literal truth--by hiring priests to sing masses for his
soul.

Religion, in the minds of ordinary people, meant that the keys of the
other world were held by the clergy. If a man confessed regularly to his
priest, received the sacrament, and was absolved, then all was well with
him. His duties consisted in going to confession and to mass. If he
committed sins, he was prescribed penances, which could be commuted for
money. If he was sick or ill at ease in his mind, he was recommended a
pilgrimage--a pilgrimage to a shrine or a holy well, or to some
wonder-working image--where, for due consideration, his case would be
attended to. It was no use to go to a saint empty-handed. The rule of
the Church was, nothing for nothing. At a chapel in Saxony there was an
image of a Virgin an