- Argument1 of 2›
The invention of the printing press spread criticism of Catholicism
The dual forces of reforming protestant writers and humanist critics pushed many away from Catholicism. The invention of the printing press meant people could more easily read pamphlets which addressed the major problems with the Catholic church.
The argument
In the 1400s the first printing press was invented by Johann Gutenberg, and it would change the intellectual landscape of Europe forever. In 1476, Englishman William Caxton built his own, and popular books and pamphlets began to circulate. Early pamphlets by Christian humanists such as Erasmus began to criticise the church tentatively. The push for reform began to build. A wave of protestant writers joined humanists critics. By the 1500s, printing was well established. In Germany, Martin Luther, a Doctor of the Church and a charismatic speaker, wrote many tracts about the corruption of the church. He demonstrated that common Catholic practices and institutions had no basis in scripture, especially the sale of indulgences which funded elaborate building projects in Rome, including St Peter's Basilica. Many other thinkers would follow his lead, including John Calvin, and Ulrich Zwingli, and William Tyndale in England. Widespread pamphleteering from Humanists and Lutherans changed opinions on the ground across Europe. By the time Henry VIII was on the throne, criticism of the church was starting to grow. The Invention of the Printing Press spread ideas that challenged the Catholic Church.
Premises
Counter-arguments
It is debatable how far continental European ideas about Protestantism had reached England in this period. When Henry VIII began to close the monasteries, England faced a series of rebellions. Even amongst the educated nobility and those ablest to read Protestant pamphlets, there was popular dissent. The Pilgrimage of Grace in the North of England, which rose in protest against the Reformation was led by the Lawyer Robert Aske, and the local nobility. Henry VIII’s Reformation was not inspired by Protestant ideas at all. He needed a divorce and was fiercely autocratic by nature and did not want the church to control him. He never took any interest in the Reformation and continued to burn protestants as heretics until his death. It is unclear how many Protestant ideas had reached England at this time even among the wealthy and educated. Henry VIII had no interest in Protestantism at all.
Rejecting the premises
[Rejecting P1] Literacy was limited and printed matter circulated chiefly among clergy, lawyers and merchants, so publication in print does not establish that opinion "on the ground" had shifted. [Rejecting P2] Luther, Calvin and Zwingli wrote on the continent about continental grievances, and the traffic in indulgences was less prominent in England, so the premise assumes a transmission it does not demonstrate. [Rejecting P3] The events run against the claim. When Henry dissolved the monasteries the response included the Pilgrimage of Grace, a large rising in defence of the old religion led by gentry and lawyers — the literate class most exposed to reformist print — and Henry continued to have Protestants burned as heretics, which is hard to reconcile with a reformation driven by popular discontent.