the kingdom; it was certainly better to praise God
in a language that everybody understood than in Latin, which no one
understood. "I wonder much," he said in closing, "that the Dalesmen
trouble themselves concerning matters of which they have no knowledge.
It would be wiser to leave the discussion of these things to priests and
scholars.... I do not believe, however, that these complaints are made
of your own free will, but rather at the instigation of certain priests
and monks, whose desire is to keep the truth unknown." This sentence
with which he closed contains the pith of the entire letter. The monarch
felt that in the coming contest the opposing parties were to be the
Church and State. He endeavored, therefore, by every means to win the
Dalesmen to his side. Letters were despatched to Dalarne from various
portions of the realm, to instruct the peasants that if they persisted
in their opposition to Gustavus, they would have to fight alone. The
Dalesmen, however, were no more influenced by threats than by
persuasion. They stood firm in their determination; and when the diet
assembled on the 24th of June, no delegates from Dalarne appeared.[154]

The Diet of Vesteras is the bulwark of the Swedish Reformation. It is
the first embodiment in the Swedish law of the reforms of Martin Luther.
Gustavus had been making ready for this diet ever since the day of his
election, and at last the opportunity was ripe. One by one the prelates
that were hostile to his views had been removed; and Brask, the only man
of strength that still held out against him, was tottering to the grave.
His enemies abroad had been by this time silenced, and except in the
little province of Dalarne, Sweden was at peace. It was this revolt
among the Dalesmen that served as a pretext for the diet. Gustavus was
too shrewd a politician to make an open avowal of his aim. He announced
that the purpose of the diet was to quell the constant riots in the
realm, and hinted with mock innocence that he wished also to end the
dissension that had arisen in matters of the Church. Among the persons
who answered to the summons we find the names of four bishops, including
Brask, together with representatives from Upsala and all the other
Chapters excepting Abo. Beside these, there were present one hundred and
forty-four of the nobility (of whom sixteen were Cabinet members),
thirty-two burghers, one hundred and five peasants, and fourteen
delegates from the mining dist