hould be cautious in history of assuming _post hoc propter
hoc_. That there was nothing {135} necessarily blighting in
Protestantism is shown by the examples of England and Poland, where the
Reform was followed by the most brilliant literary age in the annals of
these peoples. [Sidenote: 16th century literature] The latter part of
the sixteenth century was also the great period of the literature of
Spain and Portugal, which remained Catholic, whereas Italy, equally
Catholic, notably declined in artistic production and somewhat also in
letters. The causes of the alterations, in various peoples, of periods
of productivity and of comparative sterility, are in part inscrutable.
In the present case, it seems that when a relaxation of intellectual
activity is visible, it was not due to any special quality in
Protestantism, but was rather caused by the heat of controversy.

SECTION 7. NOTE ON SCANDINAVIA, POLAND, AND HUNGARY

[Transcriber's note: The above section number is what appears in the
original book, but it is a case of misnumbering, and is actually the
chapter's sixth section.]

A few small countries bordering on the Empire, neither fully in the
central stream of European culture, nor wholly outside of it, may be
treated briefly. All of them were affected by the Protestant
revolution, the Teutonic peoples permanently, the others transiently.

Scandinavia looms large in the Middle Ages as the home of the teeming
multitudes of emigrants, Goths and Vandals, who swarmed over the Roman
Empire. Later waves from Denmark and the contiguous portion of Germany
flooded England first in the Anglo-Saxon conquest and then in the
Danish. The Normans, too, originally hailed from Scandinavia. But
though the sons of the North conquered and colonized so much of the
South, Scandinavia herself remained a small people, neither politically
nor intellectually of the first importance. The three kingdoms of
Denmark, Norway, and Sweden became one in 1397; and, after Sweden's
temporary separation from the other two, were again united. The
fifteenth century saw the {136} great aggrandizement of the power of
the prelates and of the larger nobles at the expense of the _boender_,
who, from a class of free and noble small proprietors degenerated not
only into peasants but often into serfs. [Sidenote: 1513] When
Christian II succeeded to the throne, it was as the papal champion.
His attempt to consolidate his power in Sweden by massa