to the pope, but a series of weaker princes succeeding, it was not until Henry VII. that the movement could be continued. In that country the immediately exciting causes were no doubt of a material kind, such as the alleged avarice and impurity of the clergy, the immense amount of money taken from the realm, the intrusion of foreign ecclesiastics. In the South of France and in Italy, where the intellectual condition was much more advanced, the movement was correspondingly of a more intellectual kind. To this difference between the north and the south must be referred not only the striking geographical distribution of belief which was soon apparent, but also the speedy and abrupt limitation of the Reformation, restrictedly so called. [Sidenote: The theory of supererogation,] In recent ages, under her financial pressure, Rome had asserted that the infinite merits of our Saviour, together with the good works of supererogation of many holy men, constituted, as it were, a fund from which might be discharged penalties of sins of every kind, for the dead as well as the living, and therefore available for those who had passed into Purgatory, as well as for us who remain. [Sidenote: and nature of indulgences.] This fund, committed to the care of St. Peter and his successors, may be disbursed, under the form of indulgences, by sale for money. A traffic in indulgences was thus carried on to a great extent through the medium of the monks, who received a commission upon the profits. Of course, it is plain that the religious conception of such a transaction is liable to adverse criticism--the bartering for money so holy a thing as the merit of our Redeemer. This was, however, only the ostensible explanation, which it was judged necessary to present to sincerely pious communities: behind it there lay the real reason, which was essentially of a political kind. It was absolutely necessary that papal Rome should control a revenue far beyond that arising in a strictly legitimate way. As all the world had been drained of money by the senate and Cæsars for the support of republican or imperial power, so too there was a need of a like supply for the use of the pontiffs. The collection of funds had often given rise to contentions between the ecclesiastical and temporal authorities, and in some of the more sturdy countries had been resolutely resisted. To collect a direct tax is often a troublesome affair; but such is human nature--a man from whom it might be difficult to extort the payment of an impost lawfully laid, will often cheerfully find means to purchase for himself indulgence for sin. In such a semi-barbarian but yet religious population as that with which the Church was dealing, it was quite clear that this manner of presenting things possessed singular advantages, an obvious equivalent being given for the money received. The indulgence implied not only a release from celestial, but also, in many cases, from civil penalties. It was an