Meanwhile the reformed doctrines had been spreading fast. Extending beyond the small circle of nobles, scholars, and church dignitaries, by whom they were first taught and defended, and making their way into the lower strata of society,[45] they had become more definite and radical. The uneducated shoe-maker or ploughman could not appreciate such nice distinctions as Margaret of Valois drew in her “Mass of Seven Points,” and would not have cared for such subtleties if he had understood them. These simple men heard the Bible read and explained to them, and the doctrines of Free Grace and of the Atonement sank straight into their hearts. There was very little but habit to keep the people faithful to the old Church. “They are more affected,” says Matthieu, unconsciously imitating Horace, “by example than by instruction, and estimate the truth of a doctrine by the purity of a man’s life.” Such an example was rarely found in the Catholic clergy. Another strong reforming agent was the misery of the times. With reference to Normandy, which was better off than many other provinces, a local historian writes: “The people were easily seduced; the dues and taxes were so excessive that in many villages there was no assessment. The _decimes_ were so high that the parish priests and their curates ran away for fear of being imprisoned, and ceased to perform divine service in many parishes near Caen.... Seeing this, the preachers from Geneva took possession of the churches and chapels.”[46] Yet great as had been the increase of numbers, the Reformed at this time could hardly have amounted to a hundredth part of the population; even in 1558 they were not estimated at more than 400,000. The cities along the course of the Rhone and those lying at the foot of the Alps were strongly Calvinistic, as was also Languedoc, where probably some relics of the old Albigensian spirit of revolt still lingered. In this province the Romish Church was especially hateful, as it had been enriched by the confiscated estates of the Albigensian nobles.[47] Anjou and Normandy were divided; Picardy felt the influence of Flanders, where the new doctrines were extending with civil liberty. Nearly all the rest of France was Catholic. The rural population was then, as now, under the influence of the clergy, as also were the inhabitants of the smaller country towns. These are usually a narrow-minded class, an almost inevitable consequence of their isolation, and the dull nature of their habits and occupations. In Paris, the mass of the population was Catholic, the dangerous classes being especially demonstrative in their orthodoxy. The progress of religious reform might have been more rapid but for certain peculiarities in the state of society, which made every innovation difficult. The guilds in the towns had their patron saints and annual festivals. If a man adopted the reformed faith, he must renounce these, and become a sort of outcast among his comrades, and perhaps