No such dangerous enemy has ever attacked the church as that then issuing from her own bosom.

Neither the medieval heretics nor the modern philosophers have won from her in so short a time such masses of adherents.

Where Voltaire slew his thousands Luther slew his ten thousands, for Voltaire appealed only to the intellect, Luther appealed to the conscience.
[Sidenote: Decline of Protestantism] The extraordinary thing about the Protestant conquests was their sudden end.

Within less than fifty years the Scandinavian North, most of Germany including Austria, parts of Hungary, Poland, most of Switzerland, and Great Britain had declared for the "gospel." France was divided and apparently going the same road; even in Italy there were serious symptoms of disaffection.

That within a single generation the tide should be not only stopped but rolled back is one of the most dramatic changes of fortune in history.