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76 POLITICAL CONSEQUENCESthem, in the cries of the victim which they offered up inPrague as a sacrifice to their unhallowed policy.The reader will rather turn his eyesin sorrow from thatdesolating scene, and let them rest upon the cheeringprospect which is presented by the restoration, even thoughpartial, of this shattered state, and its establishment under abetter constitution.THE OTHEE COUNTRIES OP EUROPE.THE countries which we have hitherto mentioned completethe sphere over which the revolution of the sixteenth century extended its influence. Bursting forth in Germany,the central point of Europe,it shook all around it with theviolence of an earthquake. Still, however, there were countries in this quarter of the world in which its impulse couldnot be felt ;and it is the more interesting to examine these,because the Reformation, if not positively important, wasnegatively so to several of them."While Russia, for the reasons which we have stated above,was uninfluenced by it in the east of Europe, Spain andPortugal were equally so in the west, and Italy in the south.The geographical situation of these countries will not afforda sufficient explanation of this phenomenon ; mountains andplains are no barriers to the progress of opinion.It is true, the strict vigilance of the Spanish governmentmade it difficult for the new doctrines to gain admittancethere ;but in Italy the Inquisition held out no such terrorsva&ia Spain and; who, moreover, will, in these days, doubtthat all the bulwarks of spiritual and worldly policy are toofeeble to restrain the current of ideas ? The causes of it liedeeper^ and can only be explained by the individual characters' of these nations. The old religion was one evidentlydesigned father for the feelings than the reason of its followers ; the new, while it rested every thing upon a change indoctrinal points, and withdrew all that might affect thesenses from its form of worship, appealed for its influence tothe uDdevqEanding, and despoiled both fancy and feelingalmost wholly of their idols. It was suited to the North, butnot to the Sotth. The calm and investigating spirit of thqUerman nations found in it the nourishment which it repaired and sought for; and hence the geographical limit*