ABSTRACT
The religious struggles of the past had a profound effect on German history and helped to bring about the extraordinary territorial and social fragmentation of the Empire. The Age of Enlightenment often saw a watering-down of orthodox doctrines, and, indeed, religious faith was sometimes supplanted by philosophical views. Even in the early years of the Bund, political prejudices rooted in the diversity of religions had by no means vanished. Many Protestants in Prussia viewed Catholicism as an enemy of culture, freedom and the national movement, and not a few Catholics nursed considerable prejudices against the Protestants. Among the Romanticists there was a strong leaning towards Catholicism, which led to the conversion of Protestants such as Friedrich Schlegel. German Protestantism was split up, wherever the State did not intervene to prevent it, by the formation of sects, and the Enlightenment undermined religion far more in Protestant countries than in Catholic.
