WRITTEN between 1824and 1827 by an English Protestant A History of the Protestant Reformation in England and Ireland has been reprinted many times by Catholic publishers because it gives the true and usually untold story of the Protestant Revolt in England during the 16th century revealing its disastrous consequences in the lives of the people William Cobbett the author of this book is unabashedly pro Catholic in this writing showing that England was far better off before the Protestant Reformation of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I than she was afterwards For example during Catholic times there was greater prosperity no penury no poor laws almost no crime no income tax and a greater national military strength Whereas with the Reformation came the destruction of the monasteries the driving of countless thousands of tenant farmers from the lands they had formerly rented virtually in perpetuity and at cheap rents from the Catholic monasteries the creation of a vast num