They no longer had a coherence that could support and explain material, political realities, nor did they retain much spiritual purchase on men's lives once Protestant solafidian theology altered the fear of Hell and largely eliminated the penitential mentality of Langland's more medieval Catholic world.
They no longer had a coherence that could support and explain material, political realities as, say, Machiavelli could to the official and often real shock and dismay of the pious. Nor did they retain much spiritual purchase on men's lives once Protestant solafidian theology altered the fear of Hell and largely eliminated the penitential mentality of Langland's more medieval Catholic world.