in the Holy Roman Empire The heart of Guy Swanson's complex hypothesis in Religion and Regime,' as applied within the context of sixteenth-century Europe, is the systematic or, to employ a more common designation, the mathematical correlation of particular types of regimes and the societal acceptance or rejection of the Protestant Reformation. In proceeding beyond previous inquiries into the same relationship, Swanson attempts to test two major equations: (I) regimes which provide no legitimate role in gubernaculum for special interests, is for constituent bodies, . .. will be associated with the persistence of Catholicism; (2) regimes which, conversely, do provide such a place for constituent bodies ... will... be associated with the adoption of Protestantism. As a refinement of the latter, Swanson contends the greater the influence wielded by special interests within the government, the more likely the adoption of Calvinism over Lutheranism (or Anglicanism). Schematically, the differential societal response to the Reformation can be classified on a chart containing only one axis (or variable), being the governmental structure defined in terms of the relative role played by special interests in determining policy. In testing this hypothesis, two issues immediately come to the fore: (I) What precisely is the significance, whether overtly stated or not, of a statistical correlation-is it merely the statement of an observed covariation of two interdependent variables, or does it attempt to establish a causal nexus between them? (2) How adequate is the actual sample field in providing the raw data for testing the equations? Though the former is logically the overriding question, Swanson devotes precious little attention to it. On the one occasion when he faces the matter squarely, he disposes of it quickly and ends up begging the question. Is it possible, he asks, that the association drawn ... between changes in regime and changes in religion may be only associations; rather than political changes being a 'cause' of new religious