The faith of our fathers - Carmel Apologetics

76 THE FAITH OP OUR FATHERS.More than half of Germany followed the new Gospelof Martin Luther. Switzerland submitted to thedoctrines of Zuinglius. The faith was lost in Swedenthrough the influence of its king, Gustavus Vasa.Denmark conformed to the new creed through theintrigues of King Christian II. Catholicity wasalso crushed out in Norway, England, and Scotland.Calvinism in the sixteenth century, and Voltaireismin the eighteenth, had gained such a foothold inFrance, that the faith of that glorious Catholicnation twice trembled in the balaree. Ireland alone,of all the nations of Northern Europe, remainedfaithful to the ancient Church.Let us now calmly survey the field after the din.and smoke of battle have passed away. Let usexamine the condition of the old Church, after having passed through those deadly conflicts. We seeher numerically stronger to-day than at any praviousperiod of her history. The losses she sustainedin the old world are more than compensated by heracquisitions in the new. She has already recovereda good portion of the ground wrested from her inthe sixteenth century. She numbers now about twohundred and twenty-five millions of adherents.She exists to-day not an effete institution, but in allthe integrity and fulness of life, with her organismunimpaired, more united, more compact, and morevigorous than ever she was before.The so-called Reformation of the sixteenth century bears many points of resemblance to the great