While,  in  consequence  of  the  pope's  consent,  they  announced  a  council
with  greater  certainty  than  before,  and  at  the  same  time  touched  upon
the  old  question — how  affairs  were  to  be  carried  on  in  the  interval — they
proposed  formally  to  revoke  the  article  of  the  Recess6  of  1526,  in  virtue
of  which  all  existing  innovations  were  recognised  and  admitted  ;  on  the
ground,  that  it  gave  occasion  to  "  much  ill  counsel  and  misunderstand-

1  The  printed  copy  of  the  extract  names  the  first,  the  MS.  copy,  the  twenty-
first.  "And  if  you  do  not  appear  within  ten  days  after  the  day  appointed,
our  envoys  and  commissaries  will,  notwithstanding,  discuss  and  determine
affairs  with  the  States  then  and  there  present,  in  all  respects  as  if  you  and  others
who  absented  yourselves  on  slight  and  frivolous  grounds,  had  been  present.
All  which  we  shall  attend  to  and  execute  with  firmness  and  vigour,  in  the  same
manner  as  if  all  the  States,  whether  present  or  absent,  had  agreed  to  them."

2  '*  I  am  afraid,"  writes  Jacob  Sturm  to  Peter  Blitz  in  the  middle  of  March,
"  from  what  I  see  of  the  persons  here,  there  will  not  be  much  to  be  obtained."—
"  In  summa,  Christus  est  denuo  in  manibus  Caiaphae  et  Pilati."  Jung,  Gesch.
des  Reichstags  zu  Speier,  Beil.  nr.  4.
3  Erasmi  Epistoke,  ii.  1220.
*  See  p.  233,  Translator's  note.
&  Absehied.     See  Author's  Preface,  Translator's  note.
Chap.  V.]  THE  EMPIRE,  1528,  1529  555

ing  -,"1  and  to  substitute  for  it  another  ordinance  of  a  directly  opposite
tendency,  in  favour  of  the  spiritual  authorities.
