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74 POLITICAL CONSEQUENCESditary succession of the crown, and the maintenance of theLutheran religionas that of the state.POLAKD.THE difference between the language of Poland and that ofthe other countries of western Europe, appeared to offer anobstacle to the progressof the Reformation, which could noteasily be overcome. The Latin language, however, thenalmost universally adopted in writing,assisted the Reformation in this, as it did inmany other difficulties ; and, during the latter half ofthe fifteenth century, although somewhatlater than in the other countries which we have mentioned,the new doctrines made steady and even bold advances here.Besides the evangelical communion, another, viz. that of theSocinians, was formally established in Poland, which, although it proceeded from the former, was not acknowledgedby it,and was not openly tolerated even in Germany. Themajority of the nation thus separated itself, under the common title of Dissenters, from the ancient Church, which wasnot, however, thereby deprived of its political rights, in theundisputed possession and exercise of which it was allowedfor a considerable time to remain.We might perhaps expect to find, that the introductionof this new body of ideas had assisted the march of nationalimprovement, and that the rather, because the difference ofopinion between the Socinians and the other Protestants appeared to call for the exercise of faculties, which would naturally tend to the enlargement of the mind. But as thenew sects here neither were, nor had, in the beginning, anyoccasion to become, political parties, they were wanting inthat principle of activitywhich gave them life elsewhere :and the Reformation stood for nothing more in Poland, thana change of some few abstract doctrines, which might beamply debated upon without making the debaters eitherwiser or more enlightened. There was here therefore a totalabsence of that wholesome ferment which the Reformationcaused in other countries; and which, finally,after thegrosser parts had been worked off, produced an aggregateof pure truths and enlarged views* The great body of thepeople was thus much less enlightened by the Reformationia Poland than elsewhere ;and it was oh that account a