classes, in Poland found their chief support among the nobility.  Comparatively few of the people adhered to them.  There was a time, between 1550 and 1650, when half the senate,[19] and even more than half of the nobility, consisted of Lutherans and Calvinists.  In the year 1570, these two denominations, together with the Bohemian Brethren, formed a union of their churches by the treaty of Sendomir for external or political purposes.  In 1573, by another treaty known under the name of pax dissidentium, they were acknowledged by the state and the king, and all the rights of the Catholics were granted to the members of these three denominations, and also to the Greeks and Armenians.  The want, however, of an accurate determination of their mutual relation to each other, occasioned repeatedly in the course of the following century bloody dissensions.  The Protestants succeeded, nevertheless, in maintaining their rights, until the years 1717 and 1718, when their number having gradually yet considerably diminished, they were deprived of their suffrages in the diet.  Their adversaries went still further; and, after struggling against oppression of all sorts, the dissidents had at length, in 1736, to be contented with being acknowledged as tolerated sects.  After the accession of Stanislaus Poniatowsky to the throne in 1766, the dissidents attempted to regain their former rights.  In this they were supported by several Protestant powers; but more especially by Russia, who thus improved the opportunity of increasing its influence in Polish affairs.  In consequence of this powerful support, the laws directed against the dissidents were repealed; and in 1775 all their old privileges were restored to them, except the right of being eligible to the stations of ministers of state and senators.  In more recent times the Protestants have been admitted to all the rights of the Catholics; although the Roman Catholic is still the predominant religion of the kingdom of Poland.

We have permitted ourselves this digression, and anticipation of time; although we shall have an opportunity of again returning to this subject.  The influence of Protestantism on the literature of Poland cannot be denied; although its doctrines and their immediate consequence, the private examination and interpretation of the Scriptures, have occupied the minds and pens of the Poles less than those of any other nation among whom they have been received.  We now return to the sixteenth century.

The Polish language acquired during this period such a degree of refinement, that even on the revival of literature and taste in modern times, it was necessary to add nothing for its improvement; although the course of time naturally had occasioned some changes.  Several able men occupied themselves with its systematic culture by means of grammars and dictionaries.  Zaborowski, Statorius, and Januscowski wrote grammars; Macynski compiled the first dictionary.  The first