ble, and those who could not read Latin could not read
anything." Exactly. And now, to prove the wide diffusion of
Bible-knowledge in their Church before Luther, these Catholic writers
should give us some exact data as to the extent of the Latin scholarship
in that age. Fact is, the Latin tongue acted as a lock upon the
Scriptures to the common people. Hence arose the desire to have the
Bible translated into the vernacular of various European countries.

This desire Rome sought to suppress with brutal rigor. The bloody
persecutions of the Waldensians in France, which almost resulted in the
extirpation of these peaceful mountain people, of the followers of
Wyclif in England, whose remains Rome had exhumed after his death and
burned, of the Hussites in Bohemia, were all aimed at translations of
the Bible into the languages which the common people understood.

In July, 1199, Pope Innocent III issued a breve, occasioned by the
report that parts of the Bible were found in French translation in the
diocese of Metz. The breve praises in a general way the zeal for
Bible-study, but applies to all who are not officially appointed to
engage in such study the prohibition in Ex. 19, 12. 13, not to touch the
holy mountain of the Law.

During the reign of his successor, Honorius III, in 1220, laymen in
Germany were forbidden to read the Bible.

Under Gregory IX the same prohibition was issued, in 1229, to laymen in
Great Britain.

In the same year the crusades against the Albigenses were concluded, and
the Council of Toulouse issued a severe order, making it a grave offense
for a layman to possess a Bible.

In 1234, the Synod of Tarragona demanded the immediate surrender of all
translations of the Bible for the purpose of having them burned.

In 1246, the Synod of Baziers issued a prohibition forbidding laymen to
possess any theological books whatsoever, and even enjoining the clergy
from owning any theological books written in the vernacular.

Eleven years after Luther's death, in 1557, Pope Paul IV published the
Roman Index of Forbidden Books, and, with certain exceptions, prohibited
laymen from reading the Bible.

Not until the reign of King Edward VI was the "Act inhibiting the
reading of the Old and New Testament in English tongue, and the
printing, selling, giving, or delivering of any such other books or
writings as are therein mentioned and condemned" (namely, in 34 Hen.
VIII. Cap. 1) abrogated.

The Council of Tre