Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/278

258 be freely represented and freely heard. Such a council the Popes had as loudly deprecated, and Charles, embarrassed on one side with the necessity of conciliating the Diet, on the other with his loyalty to Catholicism, had again and again declared that a council was chiefly valuable as a possibility—as a threat—as a cannon to be kept loaded—minatory, but never to be discharged. There were books enough, he said, to determine the Catholic doctrines, codes and law courts to enforce Catholic discipline. Fresh definitions and fresh polemical organizations would only sharpen the edge of the schism and bring about a violent collision. While the war continued the Popes consented readily to a delay, which was of most advantage to themselves. Without the united support of the two great Catholic monarchies they distrusted their powers of overbearing opposition. The peace of Crêpy had for the first time presented the conditions which the Court of Rome desired. Paul III., to lose no more time, sent Cardinal Farnese to the Emperor to entreat his consent. He could keep his promises to the Lutherans in the letter, if not in the spirit, by appointing for the place of assembly a city within the German frontier, where the Italian and Papal influences would, nevertheless, effectively predominate.

Charles, still anxious to put off an open rupture with Germany, hesitated. The Bishop of Arras replied for him, that if a council met, summoned by the Pope, the Protestants, assured of their intended condemnation,