The Reformation broke out during the prevalence of a great political crisis--namely, the contest between Francis I. and Charles V., between France and Spain. This contest commenced for the possession of Italy, was continued for that of the German empire, and finally raged for preponderance in Europe. It was the period in which the House of Austria rose to predominance. It was likewise at the time that England, under Henry VIII., interfered in continental politics with more regularity, consistency, and effect, than it had previously done. Viewing the course of events in the sixteenth century in France, we find it a prey to the great religious wars between the Protestants and Catholics, which became the means and the occasion of a new attempt on the part of the great lords to regain the power which was slipping from them, and to control royalty. This was the political meaning of our religious wars, of the league, of the struggle of the Guises against the Valois, which was terminated by the accession of Henry IV. In Spain, during the reign of Philip II., the rebellion of the United Provinces exploded. The Inquisition, under the name of the Duke of Alva, waged war against civil and religious liberty, under that of the Prince of Orange. Whilst liberty triumphed in Holland, through the perseverance and prudent measures of the Netherlander, it utterly perished in Spain itself, where absolute power, both lay and ecclesiastical, reigned supreme. In England occurred the reigns of Mary and Elizabeth; the war between Elizabeth, the head of Protestantism, and Philip II.; the advent of James Stuart to the throne of England; and the beginning of the great quarrel of royalty and the people. About the same period, new powers arose in the north. Sweden was reintegrated by Gustavus Vasa in 1523. Prussia was created by the secularising of the Teutonic order. [Footnote 17] The northern powers then took a place in European politics which they had not previously occupied, the importance of which was shortly to be evinced in the thirty years' war. [Footnote 17: Perhaps M. Guizot would have been a little more accurate if he had stated that the House of Brandenburg gained a large accession of territory, as Prussia was not, in fact, created until the second year of the eighteenth century, nor was that designation used in history until that period.] I return to France. There we have the reign of Louis XIII.; Cardinal Richelieu changing the internal administration of the country, entering into relations with Germany, and affording support to the Protestant party. In Germany occurred the struggle against the Turks during the latter part of the sixteenth century, and at the commencement of the seventeenth the thirty years' war, the greatest event in modern eastern Europe: then flourished Gustavus Adolphus, Wallenstein, Tilly, the Duke of Brunswick, and the Duke of Weimar, the greatest names that Germany has yet to boast of. {200}