A Contrast: A Poem

CAUSES LEADING UP TO THE REFORMATION. 347

from without keeps a solid body intact, and compresses even a loose organism into compactness. As long as such a condition existed, the inner purity of the primitive church remained unsullied. But the time came when church and state were combined. The ruler of one became the head of the other, and spiritual affairs were so interwoven with politics that only the spirit of the latter remained. The truth had been given to the world, however, and it was not to be crushed out entirely. In glimpes it was revealed to those who sought it here and there. Such seekers were Wycliffe, Huss, Jerome, Savonarola, and Luther. The first four died for the principles they advocated, and their deaths were not in vain. Each effort paved the way and prepared for the next. The popes became arrogant and greedy for spiritual and temporal power, and made promises which fell to the ground. Idolatry crept in, in the form of image and relic worship. Then came the time when old fallacies were exploded, and the popes were proved fallible. Men had begun to think for themselves, and out of such thinking grew the Reformation.

A CONTRAST.

Unthinking, idle, vain and young, I talked and laughed, and danced and sung, And, proud of health, of freedom vain, Dreamed not of sorrow or of pain, Accounting, in my hours of glee, The world was only made for me.

But when the days of sorrow came. And sickness wrecked my languid frame; When folly's vain pursuits were o'er. And I could sing and dance no more. It then occurred how sad 't would be

Were this world only made for me. Princess Amelia.