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Protestantism in Poland and Bohemia - James Aitken Wylie

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itself than the citizens elected another from among<br />

themselves. The new council proceeded to<br />

complete the Reformation at a stroke. They<br />

suppressed the Roman Catholic worship, they<br />

closed the monastic establishments, they ordered<br />

that the convents <strong>and</strong> other ecclesiastical edifices<br />

should be converted <strong>in</strong>to schools <strong>and</strong> hospitals, <strong>and</strong><br />

declared the goods of the "Church" to be public<br />

property, but left them untouched.[6]<br />

This violence only threw back the movement;<br />

the majority of the <strong>in</strong>habitants were still of the old<br />

faith, <strong>and</strong> had a right to exercise its worship till,<br />

enlightened <strong>in</strong> a better way, they should be pleased<br />

voluntarily to ab<strong>and</strong>on it.<br />

The deposed councillors, seat<strong>in</strong>g themselves <strong>in</strong><br />

carriages hung <strong>in</strong> black, <strong>and</strong> encircl<strong>in</strong>g their heads<br />

with crape, set out to appear before the k<strong>in</strong>g. They<br />

implored him to <strong>in</strong>terpose his authority to save his<br />

city of Dantzic, which was on the po<strong>in</strong>t of be<strong>in</strong>g<br />

drowned <strong>in</strong> heresy, <strong>and</strong> re-establish the old order of<br />

th<strong>in</strong>gs. The k<strong>in</strong>g, <strong>in</strong> the ma<strong>in</strong> upright <strong>and</strong> tolerant,<br />

at first temporised. The members of council, by<br />

8

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