Moral, social, and political development was no less a gainer by the order that was established. At the first moment, no doubt, England presented the appearance of a vast chaos: but from that chaos there sprang a new world. Forces which had hitherto been lost in obscure cells, were employed for the good of society. The men who had been dwelling carelessly within or without the cloister walls, and had expended all their activity in listlessly giving or listlessly receiving alms, were violently shaken by the blows from the _Malleus monachorum_, the hammer of the monks: they aroused themselves, and made exertions which turned to the public good. Their children, and especially their grandchildren, became useful citizens. The third estate appeared. The population of the cloisters was transformed into an active and intelligent middle class. The very wealth, acquired, it is true, greedily by the nobility, secured them an independence, which enabled them to oppose a salutary counterpoise to the pretensions of the crown. The Upper House, where the ecclesiastical element had predominated, became essentially a lay house by the absence of the abbots and priors. A public grew up. A new life animated antique institutions that had remained almost useless. It was not, in truth, until later that mighty England, having become decidedly evangelical and constitutional, sat down victoriously on the two great ruins of feudalism and popery; but an important step was taken under Henry VIII. That great transformation extended its influence even beyond the shores of Great Britain. The blow aimed at the system of the Middle Ages re-echoed throughout Europe, and everywhere shook the artificial scaffolding. Spain and Italy alone remained almost motionless in the midst of their ancient darkness. The suppression of the monasteries, begun in 1535, was continued in 1538, and brought to a conclusion in 1539 by an Act of Parliament. [Sidenote: A PROPHECY.] A voice was heard from these ruined convents, exclaiming: 'Praise and thanksgiving to God! _For other foundation can no man lay than Jesus Christ._ Whoever believes that Jesus Christ is the _pacifier_ who turneth away from our heads the strokes of God's wrath,[221] lays the true foundation; and on that firm base he shall raise a better building than that which had the monks for its pillars!' This prophecy of Sir William Overbury's did not fail to be accomplished. [161] 'A Sir Loyne of beaf, so knighted by this king Henry.'—Fuller, p. 299. [162] 'Des Pabstes Leib plaget er, abes seine Seele stærkt er.'—Lutheri _Opp._ xxii. p. 1466. [163] 'Ecclesiam vitiorum vepribus purgare, et virtutum seminibus conserere.'—Collyer's _Records_, ii. p. 21. [164] 'For the benefit of a retired and contemplative disposition.'— _Ibid._ i. p. 102. [165] 'The monks coming out of the nunnery ... ran themselves into the net.'—Fuller, p. 317. [166] 'He intended to build many havens.'—Burnet, i. p. 181.