The state-churches of {47} northern Europe are but the logical development of previous separatist tendencies.
SECTION 7.

THE HUMANISTS But the preparation for the great revolt was no less thorough on the intellectual than it was on the religious and political sides.

The revival of interest in classical antiquity, aptly known as the Renaissance, brought with it a searching criticism of all medieval standards and, most of all, of medieval religion.

The Renaissance stands in the same relationship to the Reformation that the so-called "Enlightenment" stands to the French Revolution.

The humanists of the fifteenth century were the "philosophers" of the eighteenth.
The new spirit was born in Italy.