les; and as the young prince discovered a zeal for every kind of
literature, especially the theological, far beyond his tender years,
all men foresaw, in the course of his reign, the total abolition of the
Catholic faith in England; and they early began to declare themselves in
favor of those tenets, which were likely to become in the end entirely
prevalent. After Southampton's fall, few members of the council seemed
to retain any attachment to the Romish communion; and most of the
counsellors appeared even sanguine in forwarding the progress of the
reformation. The riches which most of them had acquired from the spoils
of the clergy, induced them to widen the breach between England and
Rome; and by establishing a contrariety of speculative tenets, as well
as of discipline and worship, to render a coalition with the mother
church altogether impracticable.[*] Their rapacity also, the chief
source of their reforming spirit, was excited by the prospect of
pillaging the secular, as they had already done the regular clergy; and
they knew that while any share of the old principles remained, or any
regard to the ecclesiastics, they could never hope to succeed in that
enterprise.

* Goodwin's Annals. Heylin.

The numerous and burdensome superstitions with which the Romish church
was loaded had thrown many of the reformers by the spirit of opposition,
into an enthusiastic strain of devotion; and all rites, ceremonies,
pomp, order, and exterior observances were zealously proscribed by them,
as hinderances to their spiritual contemplations, and obstructions to
their immediate converse with Heaven. Many circumstances concurred to
inflame this daring spirit; the novelty itself of their doctrines, the
triumph of making proselytes, the furious persecutions to which they
were exposed, their animosity against the ancient tenets and practices,
and the necessity of procuring the concurrence of the laity by
depressing the hierarchy, and by tendering to them the plunder of the
ecclesiastics. Wherever the reformation prevailed over the opposition
of civil authority, this genius of religion appeared in its full extent,
and was attended with consequences, which, though less durable, were,
for some time, not less dangerous than those which were connected
with the ancient superstition. But as the magistrate took the lead in
England, the transition was more gradual; much of the ancient religion
was still preserved, and a reasonable degree o