Reflection

3950

Reformation

democracy. In the diplomatic sense of ad
referendum the institution prevailed in the
two Swiss confederations of the Grisons and
of the Valais. In the United States, about
1890, a great deal of popular interest in the
Swiss referendum developed. The introduc-
tion of this system was one of the demands
of the Farmers' Alliance, and later, of the
People's party. It was believed that in this
way it would be possible to remove legisla-
tion from the control of party politicians.
The principle of the referendum had, how-
ever, been employed at a much earlier time
in the form of submission of constitutions,
and amendments thereto, to popular vote.
The first case of a referendum of this kind
was in 1778, when the legislature of Massa-
chusetts submitted a constitution to the peo-
ple making a two-thirds majority necessary
for ratification. After 1840 the adoption of
a constitution by a new state, or of a new
constitution by an old one, was regularly car-
ded through by referendum, until 1890, when
Mississippi framed a new constitution which
was not submitted to the electors. The prece-
dent of Mississippi has since been followed,
and for the same reason, by several other
states of the South. In the amendment of
constitutions a wide field for the referendum
has been opened. In many states a tendency
has appeared for the legislature to reier to
the people for popular vote under the form
of constitutional amendments subjects on
wliich the legislature is quite competent to
enact laws. The referendum has frequently
been employed to secure the decision of the
people on statutes not cast in the form of
a constitutional amendment.

Reflection and Refraction of Light, be*
cause of their intimate connection, are best
treated together. When a ray of light falls
upon the boundary of two transparent media,
it is in general broken up into two rays. The
one is turned back into the original medium,
and is called the reflected ray. The other pro-
ceeds through the second medium usually
with a change of direction, and is called the
refracted ray. The laws of simple reflection
and refraction are made the basis of what
is known as geometrical optics, which in-
cludes the discussion of the properties of re-
flectors, mirrors, lenses, microscopes, and
telescopes. Newton's great discovery that the
refractive index of a substance is not the
same for the differently colored constituents
of white light is treated under DISPERSION,
COLOR, and SPECTRUM AND SPECTROSCOPE.

The simple laws of refraction hold for
homogeneous isotropic transparent bodies
like glass and water; but when the transpar-
ent substance is not isotropic, as is the case
with the most crystalline substances, there
is a second refracted ray, which does not in
general lie in the same plane with the inci-
dent ray and the normal. This so-called ex-
traordinary ray follows a different law of
refraction. The result is that, when the eye
looks through such a crystal in a suitable
direction, two distinct images of a single ob-
ject are seen. This is the phenomenon of
double refraction, and is especially character-
istic of the crystal Iceland spar. It is closely
associated with the phenomenon of polariza-
tion of light.

Reformation, the ecclesiastical revolution
in the i6th century by which a considerable
number of European states severed them-
selves from the Roman Catholic Church and
adopted some form of Protestant belief and
organization. At the beginning of the i$th
century U might have been possible to reform
the worst abuses of the church and yet re-
tain its unity and cohesion. By the begin-
ning of the 16th century this was no longer
possible; hence the most essential character-
istic of the Reformation. It was no longer
a constitutional movement for the enforce-
ment of stricter discipline or for the imposi-
tion of restraints upon what in the minds of
many had came to be looked upon as papal
despotism; it was a series of national or quasi-
national rebellions against an ecclesiastical
system which was ill suited to altered poli-
tical conditions. It was in Germany that
the first decisive blow was struck. Martin
Luther, the son of a miner, who had become
a monk, startled the world by publishing in
1517 the famous theses in which he attacked
the so-called sale of indulgences, and the
whole fabric of dogmatic teaching on which
the granting of indulgences is based. The
episode might have been of merely local
importance but for the attempt of the pa-
pacy to suppress one whose audacious views
were so radically opposed to the received
doctrines and practices. By 1520 the atten-
tion of Western Europe was concentrated
upon the quarrel between the papacy and
the monk of Wittenberg. When the Diet of
Spires sought to re-enact the edict of Worms,
the Lutheran princes made the famous 'pro-
test' which gave them a new and lasting
name. Their creed was enunciated in the
Confession of Augsburg (1330), and thev