Excerpt from The Church of England Before the Reformation Second, Because of the treatment of English Church history which has obtained currency during the past twenty or thirty years. It can also be safely asserted that a very large number of educated Churchmen have been led to accept the fallacy that the Church of England before the Reformation was quite distinct from Rome in doctrine and practice, and that we were practically in the same position before the Reformation as we are now. It is, of course, a difficult matter to over throw a popular idol; but I have no hesitation in saying that a closer investigation of the subject compels one to conclude that much of the current interpretation of Church history before the Reforma tion is a fond thing vainly invented. The continuity theory is a figment. It can only be maintained by an ignoring of the facts of history, and by the special pleading of an advocate who is determined to carry out his theory. Mr. Tomlinson, in his Legal History of Canon Stubbs, shows to what lengths a passion for historical continuity may carry even such an able historian as the present Bishop of Oxford. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.