d defeated and captured the Elector at Muhlberg, 24 April, 1547. Soon after this he imprisoned Philip of Hesse. (The charges of treachery brought against Charles on this account, are not well sustained.) Charles now believed the princes to be sufficiently humbled to permit him to reorganize the empire with their help at a Diet at Augsburg, as he had previously reorganized Spain and the Netherlands. The settlement of religious difficulties was to be the basis of this reconstruction. He insisted that the council was to have the final decision in matters of doctrine; but until this decision was pronounced he wished for peace and was willing to make certain concessions to the Protestants (the ). His sense of justice, however, reserved from these concessions both the retention of the ecclesiastical property seized by the Reformers and the temporary abrogation of episcopal authority in the reformed districts. In consequence of this resolution the Interim lost all its attraction for the Evangelical princes. In dealing with the political reconstruction of the empire, Charles was ready to recognize the condition of Germany so far as it was the result of historical development. He required the feudatories to promise obedience to the imperial power only in specific cases affecting the general welfare, to bind themselves by certain recognized formulae, and not to seek individual profit under pretext of the welfare of the empire. He therefore made here concessions like those already made to his Spanish subjectsnamely, a certain degree of autonomy to the several States, in return for their aid in the unquestioned necessities of the empire. No open opposition was made at the Diet, but nothing was done. The Catholics demanded that the Interim should apply to them also; that instrument now no longer made for harmony, and the Protestants resisted it more strenuously than before. On the other band, the German princes were as selfish and provincial as the ...
