It was realized also (and it came to be realized with increasing clearness toward the end of the fifteenth century) that there were many grave evils and scandals in the Church, even in the highest quarters. The printing-press lent itself admirably to the dissemination of views on this matter: so that there gradually grew up a strong and widespread feeling of discontent. But despite considerable friction as to the limits of their respective functions, the Church and the State were so intimately allied in every country, and each realized so clearly its dependence on the other, that no movement of any magnitude against even the acknowledged evils had been able to gain ground. No man appeared who was able to conceive and execute a plan that could successfully effect reform. But such a man appeared in the year 1517, whose name was Martin Luther. He was a poor monk; but a knowledge of virtually all there was to know lived in his mind, coupled with imagination to conceive, constructiveness to plan, and courage to perform. In that fateful year, 1517, the Pope sent agents through the world to sell "indulgences," which remitted certain temporal punishments for sin, in return for gifts of money. The agent who was commissioned for Germany carried out his work with so little tact and moderation, that he made the granting of indulgences seem even a more scandalous procedure than it really was. Luther had been preaching the doctrine of a simple following of the teachings of the Savior, and deprecating a too close adherence to mere forms and ritual. He now seems to have conceived a clean-cut plan of effective action; for on the evening before the indulgences were to be offered on All Saints Day, in the Church of Wittemberg, Luther nails on the door his celebrated ninety-five theses against the sale. The printing-press reproduced copies of these in great numbers throughout Germany. A definite sentiment antagonistic to the indulgences developed rapidly, and a general movement toward the reform of the abuses in the Church took shape. Luther was threatened with excommunication by the Pope in 1520, but he burned a copy of the "papal bull" in a public place on December 10 of that year.