VII. tants. When they are thus woven, they are carried to the bodies of St. Peter and St. Paul, and, after some prayers said, are left there all night. Next day the sub-deacons receive them again, and decently lay them up, till some archbishop that needs one of them, or his proctor, (for they are seldom granted to any inferior prelates,) comes to demand one.-This is neither a curious nor a costly commodity, and yet the archbishops pay dear for it to the pope. Nor is any one allowed to use the pall of his predecessor, or, if translated to a new see, to retain his old one." -Well may Luther exclaim, "So well knows the pope how to sell his cloth!"1 Situation of I am not aware that any particular part of the the Protes- statement which I have copied from Dr. Robertson, concerning the affairs of the protestants at this period, can be charged with incorrectness; yet it must be confessed that the impression made by the whole, concerning their security, their power, and even their triumphant progress, differs materially from that derived from a more minute inspection of original documents. The truth is, they had all this time great difficulties to encounter, and great anxieties to endure and this was especially the case at the periods of the successive diets. Maimbourg charges them with fierceness and insolence; but Seckendorf observes that their real feelings were of a very different kind. At the time of the diet of Nuremberg, in 1543, in particular, he says, "So great was the accumulation of business, so many the machinations formed against the protestants, such their distrust and want of harmony among themselves, such their alarms and their mistakes, that it is wonderful 1 Sleid. 272-274. that their two leaders, the elector and the landgrave, could support the labours and cares which devolved upon them: " and he mentions "twelve large volumes of letters," which passed between the two princes in this one year, as still preserved, independently of those which related immediately to the acts of the diet or the confederation. They were exposed to every species of chicane in their intercourse with the emperor's ministers; at the same time that unbounded professions of confidence and friendship were employed to lull their suspicions to sleep, or to gain their concurrence in measures necessary to the emperor's present projects. Even in his concessions, Charles thought proper to adhere to the practice of which he had first given the example at Ratisbon, by not introducing them into the recesses of the diets, but appending them as declarations made by himself. In this form they had no legal authority; they were never acknowledged by the catholics as obligatory; and the Bavarian ambassador openly declared in the diet, that it were "better that universal ruin should ensue, or that they should submit to the tyranny of the Turks, than that they should acknowledge the imperial declaration to have the force of law."3 And, though the sentiment was couched in extravagant terms, it must be admitted to have been constitutionally correct. In like manner, though the emperor would for the time restrain the proceedings of the imperial chamber, and suspend its decrees; and though he even appointed a com -- 1 Seck. iii. 422. • Ib. 422, 426, 473-476. Charles even flattered the landgrave with the idea of making him his generalissimo against the king of France, or against the Turks. 423, 424. Sleid. 326. Seck. iii. 423, 474, 475. Also 416, 417. A. D. 1543. CHAP. VII. mission to investigate its conduct, and examine 1 Seck. iii. 420–422. See account of the martyrdom of Peter Bruley at Tournay, &c. Sleid. 341, 342. "The emperor had sent out most severe edicts against the Lutherans of the Lower Germany and the Netherlands, under his dominion, which were twice a year publicly read over in those places." 3 Seck, iii. 417. manifested by Luther and his friends under these circumstances. The citizens of Augsburg had extensive commercial dealings with Italy; and they had through that channel received intimations, how confidently a speedy suppression of Lutheranism, by the united efforts of the pope and the emperor, was now anticipated. They communicated their apprehensions to the elector, who laid the case before Luther and his colleagues. Their reply was: "We see that we can by no mere human prudence secure this great object—the preservation of pure and orthodox religion. Let us do, therefore, whatever we can towards it, that may be agreeable to the will of God; but let us never think that it is in our power to provide against all future dangers; and let us be careful to avoid all unlawful means of attempting it."—In the final clause they especially refer to a disposition intimated on the part of the Augsburgers, to refuse to have the next diet held in their city, if the emperor should require it.1 A. D. 1543. `possessed of One transaction of the emperor's, at the very Duke of time that he was courting the protestants, was Cleves dispersonally painful to the elector of Saxony, and Gueldres. at the same time pretty clearly spoke the real sentiments of its author. William, duke of Cleves, the elector's brother-in-law, had a dispute with the emperor respecting the duchy of Gueldres, of which the former held possession. He was well affected towards the reformation, and would gladly have availed himself of the assistance of the protestant confederates in support of his claim; but, as they declined to interfere in a dispute merely of a political nature, he sought protection in an alliance with the king of France. 1 Seck. iii. 497. CHAP. VII. 1543. The emperor, however, marched into his country, and compelled him to submit in the most abject manner, and the first article of the treaty August 24. which he made with him was, "That he should not depart from the religion of the catholic church; and, if he had made any alterations, should restore things again as they were before."1 The Pope's remon strance against Charles's indulgence. 1544. The proceedings of the late diets were in a high decree offensive to the court of Rome. The pope, considering both Charles's concessions to the protestants, and his consenting to call a council, and to admit of public disputations in Germany, with a view to determining the doctrines in controversy, as sacrilegious encroachments upon the prerogatives of the holy see, addressed to him "a remonstrance, rather than a letter, on this subject, written Aug. 23. in a style of such high authority, as discovered more of an intention to draw on a quarrel than of a desire to reclaim him." He tells him, that "in the discharge of his own duty, and in the love he bore to him, he could not dissemble his thoughts concerning his proceedings, which tended to the danger of his own soul, and the great disturbance of the church." "He had ever before his eyes," he says, "the example of Eli, the high priest, whom God severely punished for his too great indulgence to his sons;' the like to which might befal himself, if he suffered the emperor, first-born son " of the church, thus to go astray without admonition. It behoved the emperor to follow "the uniform practice of the church, and the custom of his forefathers," "the 1 Sleid. 315. Seck. iii. 259 (14). Robertson (iii. 251.) does not notice this article, which yet appears to have taken the lead in the treaty. |