Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1507-1521.djvu/479

 Germans, have won the Emperor for this course. This was even recommended by his Privy Council, who want to please both God and the world, and yet act so as to draw on them- selves the displeasure of both. They allege that this con- flagration will be more easily dealt with if the edicts of the Emperor are promulgated with the advice and consent of the princes. We pointed out the danger that the princes would have an opinion different from the Emperor's, whose hands would then be bound, and that it would be the safest thing simply to carry out by executive power the judgment given by the Pope in spiritual matters. The Emperor both could and should do that in the Empire, as he had already done in his hereditary lands, Burgundy and Flanders. The majority, almost the whole of the German Council agreed to this, but the Chancellor [Gattinara] replied that the Emperor would guard the freedom of his action; his Majesty wovdd simply, when I made my proposal in the name of the Pope, announce that he had already, on the mature advice of all his peoples, promulgated a decree against Luther and his books, which had already taken effect in his hereditary dominions and kingdoms, and would do so in the Empire when promulgated with the knowledge of the princes, but not by their advice and consent. The chancellor and all the privy councillors de- clared further that even if the princes raised obstacles the Emperor would none the less proceed in this manner. It has not, however, yet been done. For although on the same day on which I made my demand [February 13] the Em- peror announced his pleasure, and the day after at the as- sembly of the princes again expressed his will by one of his councillors, yet the princes debated a whole week so fiercely that the Electors of Saxony and Brandenburg would almost have come to blows, had not the Archbishop of Salzburg and others thrown themselves between. Such a thing has never happened from the beginning of the electorate till the pres- ent day. It conceals the danger of severe complication in itself and all are shocked at it.

The College of Electors in their own chamber were di- vided, as I am informed, so that the three archbishops and the Margrave of Brandenburg were of one opinion, which.

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