ABSTRACT
The reluctance of the higher clergy to take part in the Pilgrimage was due to the principles in which they had been brought up. The points enumerated were the sources of the Pilgrims’ two great errors, over-confidence in themselves and over-trust in the King. They were over-confident because they had been taught that the Church was irresistible. Many influences united to bring about Cromwell’s fall and the religious reaction at the end of the reign. Among these influences should probably be reckoned the numerical strength of the religious conservatives revealed by the Pilgrimage. A. F. Henry’s death the moderate reaction was swept away by violent religious changes, which oscillated from extreme to extreme. The only effect of the Pilgrimage disappeared, and from that day to this the movement has been regarded as a picturesque episode having no real bearing on national history.
