The nomination
of Ferdinand as his successor we pronounce to be null and void. The
alleged ratification of the electors is a mockery, dishonored and
vitiated as it is by the votes of electors polluted with heresy. We
therefore command Ferdinand to relinquish all claim to the imperial
crown."
The irascible old pontiff, buried beneath the senseless pomps of the
Vatican, was not at all aware of the change which Protestant preaching
and writing had effected in the public mind of Germany. Italy was still
slumbering in the gloom of the dark ages; but light was beginning to
dawn upon the hills of the empire. One half of the population of the
German empire would rally only the more enthusiastically around
Ferdinand, if he would repel all papal assumptions with defiance and
contempt. Ferdinand was the wiser and the better informed man of the
two. He conducted with dignity and firmness which make us almost forget
his crimes. A diet was summoned, and it was quietly decreed that a
_papal coronation was no longer necessary_. That one short line was the
heaviest blow the papal throne had yet received. From it, it never
recovered and never can recover.
Paul IV. was astounded at such effrontery, and as soon as he had
recovered a little from his astonishment, alarmed in view of such a
declaration of independence, he took counsel of discretion, and
humiliating as it was, made advances for a reconciliation.
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