780/1552 The only country which Protestantism gained after 1560 was the Dutch Republic. Large parts of Germany and Poland were won back to the church, and Catholicism made safe in all the Latin countries. More extraordinary than the rapid growth of her empire was the conquest of Europe by her ideals. The character of the Counter-reformation was determined by her genius. It was not, as it started to be in Italy, a more or less inwardly Christianized Renaissance. |