In view however of the uncertainty still, at the end of 1551, attendant on the motives, the aims, and the capacity of Duke Maurice, the decision of the professedly enthusiastic protestants in England to stand aside is hardly a ground for reproach. Disaster had so often been escaped during recent years, through some lucky turn of events abroad supervening on the purely temporising policy of the Government, that they had good reason to hesitate about committing themselves to any irrevocable course; while personal intrigues and the strife of religious parties gave the individual leaders sufficient occupation. Possibly also the influence of the Swiss school, antagonistic as ever to the peculiar tenets of Lutheranism, was not altogether in favour of a too intimate association with German protestantism. [Sidenote: The Reformation;] We have remarked upon the increasing influence of this party in the Church; an influence which, as far as concerns the formularies of the Anglican body, was to reach its high-water mark in 1552 and 1553, in the revised prayer-book authorised by Parliament immediately after Somerset's death, and the "Forty-two Articles" promulgated about a year later. [Sidenote: Its Limits under Henry and under Somerset] In the reign of the late King, the Reformation which had taken place was almost entirely political and financial--in the constitution of the government of the ecclesiastical body, and the allocation of its endowments. The Sovereign had claimed and enforced his own supremacy, involving the repudiation of papal authority, the submission of the clergy to the Supreme Head, and the appropriation by the Crown of Monastic property. As a necessary corollary, the Crown had also taken upon itself to sanction formularies of belief and to regulate rites and ceremonies; but in doing so it had held by the accepted dogmas, suppressed little except obvious and admitted abuses, and affirmed no heresies. The Archbishop had been in favour of further innovations, but these had not been allowed. All, however, that Cranmer had then advocated, was adopted by Somerset's administration--the extended destruction of images, the liturgy in the vulgar tongue, the marriage of the clergy, the Communion in both kinds; the last being perhaps the most marked deviation from the established order. But though the new liturgy might be reconciled with acceptance of doctrines hitherto accounted heretical, it did not enjoin them; it was still reconcilable also with the _King's Book_. It had aimed, in short at the maximum of comprehension. The result was to include within the same pale the adherents of a very slightly modified Mass and the extremists of the Swiss school, for whom the Communion Service was purely and simply commemorative. [Sidenote: The extremists dissatisfied]