A History of the Reformation Volume I Part 19

The people of the town fraternised with the peasants, and the formidable "Evangelical Brotherhood" was either formed then or the roots of it were planted. The news spread fast, east and west. The peasants of the districts round about the Lake of Constance-in the Allgau, the Klettgau, the Hegau, and Villingen-rose in rebellion. The revolt spread northwards into Lower Swabia, and the peasants of Leiphen, led by Jacob Wehe, were joined by some of the troops of Truchsess, the general of the Swabian League. The peasants of Salzburg, Styria, and the Tyrol rose. These three eastern risings had most staying power in them. The Salzburg peasants besieged the Cardinal Archbishop in his castle; they were not reduced till the spring of 1526, and only after having extorted concessions from their over-lords. The Tyrolese peasants, under their wise leader, Michael Gaismeyer, shut up Archduke Ferdinand in Innsbruck, and in the end gained substantial concessions. The rising in Styria was a very strong one; it lasted till 1526, and was eventually put down by bringing Bohemian troops into the country. From Swabia the flames of insurrection spread into Franconia, where a portion of the insurgents were led by an escaped criminal, the notorious Jaklein Rohrbach. It was this band which perpetrated the wanton ma.s.sacre of Weinsberg, the one outstanding atrocity of the insurrection. The band and the deed were repudiated by the rest of the insurgents. Thomas Munzer, who, banished from Zwickau and then from Alstedt, had settled in Muhlhausen, his heart aflame with the wrongs of the commonalty, preached insurrection to the peasants in Thuringen. He issued fiery proclamations:

"Arise! Fight the battle of the Lord! On! On! On! The wicked tremble when they hear of you. On! On! On! Be pitiless although Esau gives you fair words (Gen. x.x.xiii.). Heed not the groans of the G.o.dless; they will beg, weep, and entreat you for pity like children. Show them no mercy, as G.o.d commanded to Moses (Deut.

vii.), and as He has revealed the same to us. Rouse up the towns and the villages; above all, rouse the miners.... On! On! On!

while the fire is burning let not the blood cool on your swords!

Smite pinke-pank on the anvil of Nimrod! Overturn their towers to the foundation: while one of them lives you will not be free from the fear of man. While they reign over you it is of no use to speak of the fear of G.o.d. On! while it is day! G.o.d is with you."

The words were meant to rouse the miners of Mansfeld. They failed in their original intention, but they sent bands of armed insurgents through Thuringen and the Harz, and within fourteen days about forty convents and monasteries were destroyed, and the inmates (many of them poor women with no homes to return to) were sent adrift.

The revolt spread like a conflagration, one province catching fire from another, until in the early spring months of 1525 almost all Germany was in uproar. The only districts which escaped were Bavaria in the south, Hesse, and the north and north-east provinces. The insurgents were not peasants only. The poorer population of many of the towns fraternised with the insurgents, and compelled the civic authorities to admit them within their walls.

-- 4. The Twelve Articles.

Statements of grievances were published which, naturally, bore a strong resemblance to those issued in the earlier social uprisings. The countrymen complained of the continuous appropriation of the woodlands by the proprietors, and that they were not allowed to fish in the streams or to kill game in their fields. They denounced the proprietors' practice of compelling his peasants to do all manner of unstipulated service for him without payment-to repair his roads, to a.s.sist at his hunts, to draw his fish-ponds. They said that their crops were ruined by game which they were not allowed to kill, and by hunters in pursuit of game; that the landlord led his streams across their meadow land, and deprived them of water for irrigation. They protested against arbitrary punishments, unknown to the old consuetudinary village law-courts (_Haingerichte_).

They formulated their demands for justice in various series of articles, all of which had common features, but contained some striking differences.

Some dwelt more on the grievances of the peasants, others voiced the demands of the working cla.s.ses of the towns, others again contained traces of the political aspirations of the more educated leaders of the movement.

Almost all protest that they ask for nothing contrary to the requirements of just authority, whether civil or ecclesiastical, nor to the gospel of Christ. The peasants declared that each village community should be at liberty to choose its own pastor, and to dismiss him if he proved to be unsatisfactory; that while they were willing to pay the great t.i.thes (_i.e._ a tenth of the produce of the crops), the lesser t.i.thes (_i.e._ a tenth of the eggs, lambs, foals, etc.) should no longer be exacted; that these great t.i.thes should be reserved to pay the village priest's stipend, and that what remained over should go to support the poor; that, since G.o.d had made all men free, serfdom should be abolished; and that, while they were willing to obey lawful authority, peasants ought not to be called on to submit to the arbitrary commands of their landlords. They insisted that they had a right to fish in the streams (not in fish-ponds), to kill game and wild birds, for these were public property. They demanded that the woodlands, meadows, and ploughlands which had once belonged to the village community, but which had been appropriated by the landlords, should be restored. They insisted that arbitrary services of every kind should be abolished, and that whatever services, beyond the old feudal dues, were demanded, should be paid for in wages. They called for the abolition of the usage whereby the landlord was permitted, in the name of death-duty, to seize on the most valuable chattel of the deceased tenant; and for the creation of impartial courts of justice in the country districts. They concluded by asking that all their demands should be tested by the word of G.o.d, and that if any of them should be found to be opposed to its teaching, it should be rejected.(323)

The townspeople asked that all cla.s.s privileges should be abolished in civic and ecclesiastical appointments; that the administration of justice in the town's courts should be improved; that the local taxation should be readjusted; that all the inhabitants should be permitted to vote for the election of the councillors; and that better provision should be made for the care of the poor. Some of the more ambitious manifestoes contained demands for a thorough reconstruction of the entire administration of the Empire, on a scheme which involved the overthrow of all feudal courts of justice, and contemplated a series of imperial judicatories, rising from revived Communal Courts to a central Imperial Court of Appeal for the whole Empire. Some manifestoes demanded a unification of the coinage, weights, and measures throughout the Empire; a confiscation of ecclesiastical endowments for the purpose of lessening taxation, and for the redemption of feudal dues; a uniform rate of taxes and customs duties; restraint to be placed on the operations of the great capitalists; the regulation of commerce and trade by law; and the admission of representatives from all cla.s.ses in the community into the public administration. In every case the Emperor was regarded as the Lord Paramount. There were also declarations of the sovereignty of the people, made in such a way as to suggest that the writings of Marsilius of Padua had been studied by some of the leaders among the insurgents. The most famous of all these declarations was the Twelve Articles. The doc.u.ment was adopted by delegates from several of the insurrectionary bands, which met at Memmingen in Upper Swabia, to unite upon a common basis of action. If not actually drafted by Schappeler, a friend of Zwingli, the articles were probably inspired by him. These Twelve Articles gave something like unity to the movement; although it must be remembered that doc.u.ments bearing the t.i.tle do not always agree. The main thought with the peasant was to secure a fair share of the land, security of tenure, and diminution of feudal servitudes; and the idea of the artisan was to obtain full civic privileges and an adequate representation of his cla.s.s on the city council.

-- 5. The Suppression of the Revolt.

During the earlier months of 1525 the rising carried everything before it.

Many of the smaller towns made common cause with the peasants; indeed, it was feared that all the towns of Swabia might unite in supporting the movement. Prominent n.o.bles were forced to join the "Evangelical Brotherhood" which had been formally const.i.tuted at Memmingen (March 7th).

Princes, like the Cardinal Elector of Mainz and the Bishop of Wurzburg, had to come to terms with the insurgents. Germany had been denuded of soldiers, drafted to take part in the Italian wars of Charles V. The ruling powers engaged the insurgents in negotiations simply for the purpose of gaining time, as was afterwards seen. But the rising had no solidity in it, nor did it produce, save in the Tyrol, any leader capable of effectually controlling his followers and of giving practical result to their efforts. The insurgents became demoralised after their first successes, and the whole movement had begun to show signs of dissolution before the princes had recovered from their terror. Philip of Hesse aided the Elector of Saxony (John, for Frederick had died during the insurrection) to crush Munzer at Frankenhausen (May 15th, 1525), the town of Muhlhausen was taken, and deprived of its privileges as an imperial city, and the revolt was crushed in North Germany.

George Truchsess, the general of the Swabian League, his army strengthened by mercenaries returning to Germany after the battle of Pavia, mastered the bands in Swabia and in Franconia. The Elsa.s.s revolt was suppressed with great ferocity by Duke Anthony of Lorraine. None of the German princes showed any consideration or mercy to their revolting subjects save the old Elector Frederick and Philip of Hesse. The former, on his death-bed, besought his brother to deal leniently with the misguided people; Philip's peasantry had fewer matters to complain of than had those of any other province, the Landgrave discussed their grievances with them, and made concessions which effectually prevented any revolt. Everywhere else, save in the Tyrol, the revolt was crushed with merciless severity, and between 100,000 and 150,000 of the insurgents perished on the field or elsewhere. The insurrection maintained itself in the Tyrol, in Salzburg, and in Styria until the spring of 1526; in all other districts of Germany the insurgents were crushed before the close of 1525. No attempt was made to cure the ills which led to the rising. The oppression of the peasantry was intensified. The last vestiges of local self-government were destroyed, and the unfortunate people were doomed for generations to exist in the lowest degradation. The year 1525 was one of the saddest in the annals of the German Fatherland.

The Peasants' War had a profound, lasting, and disastrous effect on the Reformation movement in Germany. It affected Luther personally, and that in a way which could not fail to react upon the cause which he conspicuously led. It checked the spread of the Reformation throughout the whole of Germany. It threw the guidance of the movement into the hands of the evangelical princes, and destroyed the hope that it might give birth to a reformed National German Church.

-- 6. Luther and the Peasants' War.

The effect of the rising upon Luther's own character and future conduct was too important for us to entirely pa.s.s over his personal relations to the peasants and their revolt. He was a peasant's son. "My father, my grandfather, my forebears, were all genuine peasants," he was accustomed to say. He had seen and pitied the oppression of the peasant cla.s.s, and had denounced it in his own trenchant fashion. He had reproved the greed of the landlords, when he said that if the peasant's land produced as many coins as ears of corn, the profit would go to the landlord only. He had publicly expressed his approval of many of the proposals in the Twelve Articles long before they had been formulated and adopted at Memmingen in March 1525, and had advocated a return to the old communal laws or usages of Germany. He formally declared his agreement with the substance of the Twelve Articles after they had become the "charter" of the revolt. But Luther, rightly or wrongly, held that no real good could come from armed insurrection. He believed with all the tenacity of his nature, that while there might be two roads to reform, the way of peace, and the way of war, the pathway of peace was the only one which would lead to lasting benefit.

After the storm burst he risked his life over and over again in visits he paid to the disaffected districts, to warn the people of the dangers they were running. After Munzer's attempt to rouse the miners of Mansfeld, and carry fire and sword into the district where his parents were living, Luther made one last attempt to bring the misguided people to a more reasonable course. He made a preaching tour through the disaffected districts. He went west from Eisleben to s...o...b..rg (April 21st, 1525); thence to Nordhausen, where Munzer's sympathisers rang the bells to drown his voice; south to Erfurt (April 28th); north again to the fertile valley of the Golden Aue and to Wallhausen (May 1st); south again to Weimar (May 3rd), where news reached him that his Elector was dying, and that he had expressed the wish to see him,-a message which reached him too late. It was on this journey, or shortly after his return to Wittenberg (May 6th), that Luther wrote his vehement tract, _Against the murdering, thieving hordes of Peasants_. He wrote it while his mind was full of Munzer's calls to slaughter, when the danger was at its height, with all the sights and sounds of destruction and turmoil in eye and ear, while it still hung in the balance whether the insurgent bands might not carry all before them.

In this terrible pamphlet Luther hounded on the princes to crush the rising. It is this pamphlet, all extenuating circ.u.mstances being taken into account, which must ever remain an ineffaceable stain on his n.o.ble life and career.(324)

As for himself, the Peasants' War imprinted in him a deep distrust of all who had any connection with the rising. He had not forgotten Carlstadt's action at Wittenberg in 1521-1522, and when Carlstadt was found attempting to preach the insurrection in Franconia and Swabia, Luther never forgave him. His deep-rooted and unquenchable suspicion of Zwingli may be traced back to his discovery that friends of the Zurich Reformer had been at Memmingen, had aided the revolutionary delegates to draft the Twelve Articles, and had induced them to shelter themselves under the shield of a religious Reformation. What is perhaps more important, the Peasants' War gave to Luther a deep and abiding distrust of the "common man" which was altogether lacking in the earlier stages of his career, which made him prevent every effort to give anything like a democratic ecclesiastical organisation to the Evangelical Church, and which led him to bind his Reformation in the chains of secular control to the extent of regarding the secular authority as possessing a quasi-episcopal function.(325) It is probably true that he saved the Reformation in Germany by cutting it loose from the revolutionary movement; but the wrench left marks on his own character as well as on that of the movement he headed. Luther's enemies were quick to make capital out of his relations with the peasants, and Einser compared him to Pilate, who washed his hands after betraying Jesus to the Jews.

-- 7. Germany divided into two separate Camps.

The insurrection, altogether apart from its personal effects on Luther, had a profound influence on the whole of the German Reformation. Some princes who had hitherto favoured the Romanist side were confirmed in their opposition; others who had hesitated, definitely abandoned the cause of Reform. For both, it seemed that a social revolution of a desperate kind lay behind the Protestant Reformation. Many an innocent preacher of the new faith perished in the disturbances-sought out and slain by the princes as an instigator of the rebellion. Duke Anthony of Lorraine, for example, in his suppression of the revolt in Elsa.s.s, made no concealment of his belief that evangelical preachers were the cause of the rising, and butchered them without mercy when he could discover them. The Curia found that the Peasants' War was an admirable text to preach from when they insisted that Luther was another Huss, and that the movement which he led was a revival of the ecclesiastical and social communism of the extreme Hussites (Taborites); that all who attacked the Church of Rome were engaged in attempting to destroy the bases of society. It was after the Peasants' War that the Roman Catholic League of princes grew strong in numbers and in cohesion.

The result of the war also showed that the one strong political element in Germany was the princedom. The _Reichsregiment_, which still preserved a precarious existence, had shown that it had no power to cope with the disturbances, and its attempts at mediation had been treated with contempt. From this year, 1525, the political destiny of the land was distinctly seen to be definitely shaping for territorial centralisation round the greater princes and n.o.bles. It was inevitable that the conservative religious Reformation should follow the lines of political growth, with the result that there could not be a National Evangelical Church of Germany. It could only find outcome in territorial Churches under the rule and protection of those princes who from motives of religion and conscience had adopted the principles which Luther preached.

The more radical religious movement broke up into fragments, and reappeared in the guise of the maligned and persecuted Anabaptists,-a name which embraced a very wide variety of religious opinions,-some of whom appropriated to themselves the aspirations of the social revolution which had been crushed by the princes. The conservative and Lutheran Reformation found its main elements of strength in the middle cla.s.ses of Germany; while the Anabaptists had their largest following among the artisans and working men of the towns.

The terrors of the time separated Germany into two hostile camps-the one accepting and the other rejecting the ecclesiastical Reformation, which ceased to be a national movement in any real sense of the word.

Chapter V. From The Diet Of Speyer, 1526, To The Religious Peace Of Augsburg, 1555.

-- 1. The Diet of Speyer, 1526.(326)

When Germany emerged from the social revolution in the end of 1525, it soon became apparent that the religious question remained unsettled, and was dividing the country into two parties whose differences had become visibly accentuated, and that both held as strongly as ever to their distinctive principles. Perhaps one of the reasons for the increased strain was the conduct of many of the Romanist princes in suppressing the rebellion. The victories of the Swabian League in South Germany were everywhere followed by religious persecution. Men were condemned to confiscation of goods or to death, not for rebellion, for they had never taken part in the rising, but for their confessed attachment to Lutheran teaching. The Lutheran preachers were special objects of attack. Aichili, who acted as a provost-marshal to the Swabian League, made himself conspicuous by plundering, mulcting, and putting them to death. It is said that he hung forty Lutheran pastors on the trees by the roadside in one small district. The Roman Catholic princes had banded themselves together for mutual defence as early as July 1525. The more influential members of this league were Duke George of Saxony, the Electors of Brandenburg and Mainz, and Duke Henry of Brunswick-Wolfenb.u.t.tel. Duke Henry was selected to inform the Emperor of what they had done, and to secure his sympathy and support. He told Charles V. that the league had been formed "against the Lutherans in case they should attempt by force or cunning to gain them over to their unbelief."

On the other hand, the Protestant princes had a mutual understanding-it does not seem to have been a definite league-to defend one another against any attack upon their faith. The leaders were John of Saxony, Philip of Hesse, Dukes Otto, Ernest, and Francis of Brunswick-Luneberg, and the Counts of Mansfeld. Philip of Hesse was the soul of the union. They could count on the support of many of the imperial cities, some of them, such as Nurnberg, being in districts where the country lying around was ruled by Romanist princes.

The Diet, which met at Augsburg in 1525, was very thinly attended, and both parties waited for the Diet which was to be held at Speyer in the following year.

There never had been any doubt about the position and opinions of the Emperor on the religious question. He had stated them emphatically at the Diet of Worms. He had been educated in the beliefs of mediaeval Catholicism: he valued the ceremonies and usages of the mediaeval worship; he understood no other ecclesiastical polity; he believed that the Bishop of Rome was the head of the Church on earth; he had consistently persecuted Protestants in his hereditary dominions from the beginning; he desired the execution of the Edict of Worms against Luther. If he had remained in Germany, all his personal and official influence would have been thrown into the scale against the evangelical faith. Troubles in Spain, and the prosecution of the war against Francis of France had prevented his presence in Germany after his first brief visit. He had now conquered and taken Francis prisoner at the battle of Pavia. The terms of the Treaty of Madrid bound Francis to a.s.sist Charles in suppressing Lutheranism and other pernicious sects in Germany, and when it was signed the Emperor seemed free to crush the German Protestants. But his very success was against him; papal diplomacy wove another web around him; he was still unable to visit the Fatherland, and the religious question had to be discussed at Speyer in his absence.

When the Diet met, the national hostility to Rome showed no signs of abatement. The subject of German grievances against the Curia was again revived, and it was alleged that the chief causes of the Peasants' War were the merciless exactions of clerical landholders. Perhaps this opinion was justified by the fact that the condition of the peasantry on the lands of monasteries and of bishops was notoriously worse than that of those under secular proprietors; and that, while the clerical landholders had done little to subdue the rebels, they had been merciless after the insurgents had been subdued. There was truth enough in the charge to make it a sufficient answer to the accusation that the social revolution had been the outcome of Luther's teaching.

Ferdinand of Austria presided in his brother's absence, and, acting on the Emperor's instructions, he demanded the enforcement of the Edict of Worms and a decree of the Diet to forbid all innovations in worship and in doctrine. He promised that if these imperial demands were granted, the Emperor would induce the Pope to call a General Council for the definite settlement of the religious difficulties. But the Diet was not inclined to adopt the suggestions. The Emperor was at war with the Pope. Many of the clerical members felt themselves to be in a delicate position, and did not attend. The Lutheran sympathisers were in a majority, and the delegates from the cities insisted that it was impossible to enforce the Edict of Worms. The Committee of Princes(327) proposed to settle the religious question by a compromise which was almost wholly favourable to the Reformation. They suggested that the marriage of priests, giving the cup to the laity, the use of German as well as Latin in the baptismal and communion services, should be recognised; that all private Ma.s.ses should be abolished; that the number of ecclesiastical holy days should be largely reduced; and that in the exposition of Holy Writ the rule ought to be that scripture should be interpreted by scripture. After a good deal of fencing, the Diet finally resolved on a deliverance which provided that the word of G.o.d should be preached without disturbance, that indemnity should be granted for past offences against the Edict of Worms, and that, until the meeting of a General Council to be held in a German city, each State should so live as it hoped to answer for its conduct to G.o.d and to the Emperor.

The decision was a triumph for the territorial system as well as for the Reformation, and foreshadowed the permanent religious peace of Augsburg (1555). It is difficult to see how either Charles or Ferdinand could have accepted it. Their acquiescence was probably due to the fact that the Emperor was then at war with the Pope (the sack of Rome under the Constable Bourbon took place on May 6th, 1527), and that the threat of a German ecclesiastical revolt was a good weapon to use against His Holiness. Ferdinand was negotiating for election to the crowns of Hungary and Bohemia, and dared not offend his German subjects. Both brothers looked on any concessions to the German Lutherans as temporary compromises to be withdrawn as soon as they were able to enforce their own views.

The Protestant States and cities at once interpreted this decision of the Diet to mean that they had the legal right to organise territorial Churches and to introduce such changes into public worship as would bring it into harmony with their evangelical beliefs.(328) The latent evangelical feeling at once manifested itself. Almost all North Germany, except Brandenburg, Ducal Saxony, and Brunswick-Wolfenb.u.t.tel, became Lutheran within three years. Still it has to be noticed that the legal recognition was accorded to the secular authorities, and that a ruling prince, who had no very settled religious convictions, might change the religion of his princ.i.p.ality from political or selfish motives. It became evident in 1529 that political feeling or fear of the Emperor was much stronger than resolutions to support the evangelical Reformation.

Soon after the Diet, Philip of Hesse committed a political blunder which, in the opinion of many of his evangelical friends, involved disloyalty to the Fatherland, made them chary of a.s.sociating themselves with him, and greatly weakened the Protestant party. For most of these North German princes, in spite of their clinging to the disruptive territorial principle, had a rugged conscientious patriotism which made them feel that no good German should seek the aid of France or make alliance with a Czech. Many of the Roman Catholic princes, irritated at the spread and organisation of Lutheranism which followed the decision of the Diet of 1526, had been persecuting by confiscation of goods and by death their Lutheran subjects. The Landgrave had married the daughter of Duke George of Saxony, and he knew that his father-in-law was continually uttering threats against the Elector of Saxony. Brooding over these things, Philip became gradually convinced that the Romanist princes were planning a deadly a.s.sault on the Lutherans, and that first the Elector and then he himself would be attacked and their territories part.i.tioned among the conquerors. He had no proof, but his suspicions were strong. Chance brought him in contact with Otto von Pack, the steward of the Chancery of Ducal Saxony, who, on being questioned, admitted that the suspicions of Philip were correct, and promised to procure a copy of the treaty. Pack was a scoundrel. No such treaty existed. He forged a doc.u.ment which he declared to be a copy of a genuine treaty, and got 4000 gulden for his pains. Philip took the forgery to the Elector of Saxony and to Luther, both of whom had no doubt of its genuine character. They both, however, refused to agree to Philip's plan of seeking a.s.sistance outside the Empire. The Landgrave believed the situation too dangerous to be faced pa.s.sively. He tried to secure the a.s.sistance of Francis of France and of Zapolya, the determined opponent of the House of Austria in Bohemia. It was not until he had fully committed himself that the discovery was made that the doc.u.ment he had trusted in was nothing but a forgery. His hasty action in appealing to France and Bohemia to interfere in the domestic concerns of the Empire was resented by his co-religionists. When the Diet met at Speyer, the Lutherans were divided and discredited. On the other hand, the Pope and the Emperor were no longer at war, and the clerical members flocked to the Diet in large numbers.

At this memorable Diet of Speyer (1529), a compact Roman Catholic majority faced a weak Lutheran minority. The Emperor, through his commissioners, declared at the outset that he abolished, "by his imperial and absolute authority (_Machtvollkommenheit_)," the clause in the ordinance of 1526 on which the Lutherans had relied when they founded their territorial Churches; it had been the cause, he said, "of much ill counsel and misunderstanding." The majority of the Diet upheld the Emperor's decision, and the practical effect of the ordinance which was voted was to rescind that of 1526. It declared that the German States which had accepted the Edict of Worms should continue to do so; which meant that there was to be no toleration for Lutherans in Romanist districts. It said that in districts which had departed from the Edict no further innovations were to be made, save that no one was to be prevented from hearing Ma.s.s; that sects which denied the sacrament of the true Body and Blood of Christ (Zwinglians) should no more be tolerated than Anabaptists. What was most important, it declared that no ecclesiastical body should be deprived of its authority or revenues. It was this last clause which destroyed all possibility of creating Lutheran Churches; for it meant that the mediaeval ecclesiastical rule was everywhere to be restored, and with it the right of bishops to deal with all preachers within their dioceses.

-- 2. The Protest.(329)

It was this ordinance which called forth the celebrated PROTEST, from which comes the name _Protestant_. The Protest was read in the Diet on the day (April 19th, 1529) when all concessions to the Lutherans had been refused. Ferdinand and the other imperial commissioners would not permit its publication in the "recess," and the protesters had a legal instrument drafted and published, in which they embodied the Protest, with all the necessary doc.u.ments annexed. The legal position taken was that the unanimous decision of one Diet (1526) could not be rescinded by a majority in a second Diet (1529). The Protesters declared that they meant to abide by the "recess" of 1526; that the "recess" of 1529 was not to be held binding on them, because they were not consenting parties. When forced to make their choice between obedience to G.o.d and obedience to the Emperor, they were compelled to choose the former; and they appealed, from the wrongs done to them at the Diet, to the Emperor, to the next free General Council of Holy Christendom, or to an ecclesiastical congress of the German nation. The doc.u.ment was signed by the Elector John of Saxony, Margrave George of Brandenburg, Dukes Ernest and Francis of Brunswick-Luneburg, Landgrave Philip of Hesse, and Prince Wolfgang of Anhalt. The fourteen cities which adhered were Stra.s.sburg, Nurnberg, Ulm, Constance, Lindau, Memmingen, Kempten, Nordlingen, Heilbronn, Reutlingen, Isny, St. Gallen, Wissenberg, and Windsheim. Many of these cities were Zwinglian rather than Lutheran; but all united in face of the common danger.