The Reformation was the outcome of two forces, independent in origin, and never wholly in agreement: the Renaissance, and the desire for reform in dogma and practice. Of these, the first owes its birth to Italy. The Italians, despairing of political unity or stability, yet excelling other people in material prosperity and comfort, betook themselves to the study of the past for which their unbroken connection with the language and memories of Rome well fitted them. The movement, beginning in the earlier decades of the fifteenth century, had made rapid strides before it closed, and was many-sided. In art, it was marked by a return to the study of the antique; in literature, by a fresh taste for prose and poetry, founded on classic models; in scholarship, it was accompanied by the discovery of ancient manuscripts, and the revival of criticism; in philosophy, it led to a revival of the knowledge of Plato; in natural science, to a more critical inquiry into the nature of the earth and its relation to the system of the universe.
But the principles which underlay and actuated these different energies were the same. Mediæval thought had striven to sacrifice the individual. It had taught men to crucify the body with its fleshly lusts, to check the rebellious passion for independence and individuality. It had bidden men accept without question the authority of the Church, and of the temporal power. The new spirit revolted from all these doctrines. It preached the dignity of man, and of this life. It questioned the virtue of asceticism, and lusted after the world in thought and deed. It proclaimed the right of the individual to think, and feel, and shape his creed according to the dictates of reason. It inculcated the lessons of inquiry, of criticism, of naturalism. Thus a new paradise was opened to the imagination, and men rushed headlong into it with a pleasing sense of freedom. There was much that was valuable, and indeed necessary to progress, in this movement of emancipation. It led to more accurate observation, to more careful criticism, to greater regard for literature, and to the triumph of individualism. Nevertheless, it had its darker side. It was accompanied by much riot and licence. The sensuous delight in form and colour betrayed some into sensuality; the undue devotion to things of this world led to a mundane pagan spirit; criticism, to scepticism and infidelity. The atmosphere of the Renaissance was indeed inimical to that of the Christian life, yet, with a few exceptions, the Italians made no direct attack upon the Church. The literary men were well content to leave an institution alone, which was so closely wrapped up with their past traditions and with the general culture of the day, and which so conveniently patronised them, and even tolerated their satires, so long as they left her government and her dogmas alone. With the philosophers it was different. Yet even they assailed Christianity rather than the Church; and if Ficino tried to reconcile Christianity and Platonism, or Pomponazzi questioned the immortality of the soul, these scholars affected to distinguish between science and religion, and while they speculated as philosophers, professed to believe as Christians. Thus there is hardly any humanist of Italy, if we except Laurentius Valla, who attacked the claims of the Pope to interfere in temporal affairs, or the tradition that the Apostles' Creed was the work of the apostles; and even he, for the sake of papal protection, easily retracted his errors.