venture into the cathedral,
probably from fear of his Majesty the Emperor, and whoever had
undertaken to lay hands upon the altar painting and the Madonna in our
chapel would have paid for it--I am not boasting--with his life. Though
'the beautiful Mary,' in her superabundant mercy, quietly endured the
affront offered, our Lord himself punished it, for he inspired the
illustrious Duke of Bavaria to issue an edict which forbids his subjects
to trade with Ratisbon. Whoever even enters the city must pay a heavy
fine. This set many people thinking. Ursel will tell you what sinful
prices we have paid since for butter and meat. Even the innocent are
obliged to buckle their belts tighter. Those who wished to escape
fasting are now compelled by poverty to practise abstinence. It is said
the Roman King Ferdinand is urging the revocation of the order. If I
were in his place, I would advise making it more stringent till the
rebels sweat blood and crept to the cross."

Then Blomberg bewailed the untimely leniency of the Emperor, for there
was not even any rumour of a serious assault upon the Turks. And yet,
if only he, Blomberg, was commissioned to raise an army of the cross,
Christianity would soon have rest from its mortal foe! But if it
should come to fighting--no matter whether against the infidels or the
heretics--in spite of Wawerl and his lame leg, he would take the field
again. No death could be more glorious than in battle against the
destroyer of souls. The scoundrels were flourishing like tares among the
wheat. At the last Reichstag the Electors of Brandenburg and Saxony,
as well as the Landgrave Philip of Hesse, brought their own preachers,
whose sermons turned many heads, even the pastor of St. Emmeran's,
Zollern, who was a child of Ratisbon. At Staufferhof Baron von Stauff,
formerly a man worthy of all honour, had opened his chapel of St. Ann to
all the citizens to permit them to participate in the Lutheran idolatry.
Two Protestant ministers, one of whom, Dr. Forster, Luther himself had
brought to Ratisbon, were liberally paid by the Council. Whether Wolf
believed it or not, Father Hamberger, whom he surely remembered as Prior
of the Minorites, and who at that time enjoyed universal esteem, had
taken a wife, and the rest of the monks had followed the iniquitous
example. Many other priests had married if it suited them, and, instead
of the cowl, wore secular garments. The instruction given in the school
of poets was pe