And vainly, indeed, would men endeavour to explain this great movement by mere human circumstances. Men of letters, it is true, sharpened their wits and discharged their keen-pointed arrows against the pope and the monks; the shout of liberty, which Germany had so often raised against the tyranny of the Italians, again resounded in the castles and provinces; the people were delighted with the song of "the nightingale of Wittemberg," a herald of the spring that was everywhere bursting forth.[237] But it was not a mere outward movement, similar to that effected by a longing for earthly liberty, that was then accomplishing. Those who assert that the Reformation was brought about by bribing princes with the wealth of the convents,--the priests with permission to marry,--and the people with the prospect of freedom, are strangely mistaken in its nature. No doubt a useful employment of the funds that had hitherto supported the sloth of the monks; no doubt marriage and liberty, gifts that proceed direct from God, might have favoured the development of the Reformation; but the mainspring was not there. An interior revolution was then going on in the depths of the human heart. Christians were again learning to love, to pardon, to pray, to suffer, and even to die for a truth that offered no repose save in heaven. The Church was passing through a state of transformation. Christianity was bursting the bonds in which it had so long been confined, and returning in life and vigour into a world that had forgotten its ancient power. The hand that made the world was turned towards it again; and the Gospel, reappearing in the midst of the nations, accelerated its course, notwithstanding the violent and repeated efforts of priests and kings; like the ocean which, when the hand of God presses on its surface, rises calm and majestic along its shores, so that no human power is able to resist its progress. [237] Wittemberger Nachtigall, a poem by Hans Sachs, 1523. BOOK X. AGITATION, REVERSES, AND PROGRESS. 1522-1526. CHAPTER I. Political Element--Want of Enthusiasm at Rome--Siege of Pampeluna--Courage of Ignatius--Transition--Luther and Loyola--Visions--Two Principles. The Reformation, which at first had existed in the hearts of a few pious men, had entered into the worship and the life of the Church; it was natural that it would take a new step, and penetrate into civil relationships and the life of nations. Its progress was always from the interior to the exterior. We are about to see this great revolution taking possession of the political life of the world.