They
believed, however, that whatever change was desirable could best be
achieved by means of a reformation within the Catholic Church--that is,
without disturbing the unity of its organization or denying the
validity of its dogmas--while the critics of northern Europe, as we
have seen, preferred to put their reforms into practice by means of a
revolution--an out-and-out break with century-old traditions of
Catholic Christianity. Even in northern Europe some of the foremost
scholars of that period desired an intellectual reformation within
Catholicism rather than a dogmatic rebellion against it: with Luther's
defiance of papal authority, the great Erasmus had small sympathy, and
Sir Thomas More, the eminent English humanist, sacrificed his life for
his belief in the divine sanction of the papal power.
Thus, while the religious energy of northern Europe went into
Protestantism of various kinds, that of southern Europe fashioned a
reformation of the Catholic system. And this Catholic reformation, on
its religious side, was brought to a successful issue by means of the
improved conditions in the papal court, the labors of a great church
council, and the activity of new monastic orders.
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