Page:The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII.djvu/344

338 their faith in instructions dictated by holy prudence. Thus Christianity, which the Church had conveyed to Britain, and spread and defended there against rising heresy, after having been blotted out by the invasion of heathen races, was now by the care of Gregory happily restored.

Having resolved to address this letter to the English people, We recall at once these great and glorious events in the annals of the Church, which must surely be remembered by them in gratitude. Moreover, it is noteworthy that this love and solicitude of Gregory was inherited by the Pontiffs who succeeded him. This is shown by their constant interposition in providing worthy pastors and capable teachers in learning, both human and divine, by their helpful counsels, and by their affording in abundant measure whatever was necessary for establishing and developing that rising Church. And very soon was such care rewarded, for in no other case perhaps did the faith take root so quickly nor was so keen and intense a love manifested towards the See of Peter. That the English race was in those days devoted to this centre of Christian unity divinely constituted in the Roman Bishops, and that in the course of ages men of all ranks were bound to them by ties of loyalty, are facts too abundantly and plainly testified by the pages of history to admit of doubt or question.

But, in the storms which devasted Catholicity throughout Europe in the sixteenth century, England, too, received a grievous wound; for it was first unhappily