to a young bride."

The German empire was then divided into ten districts, or circles, as
they were then called, each of which was responsible for the maintenance
of peace among its own members. These districts were, Austria, Burgundy,
the Upper Rhine, the Lower Rhine, Franconia, Bavaria, Suabia,
Westphalia, Upper Saxony and Lower Saxony. The affairs of each district
were to be regulated by a court of a few nobles, called a diet. The
emperor devoted especial attention to the improvement of his own estate
of Austria, which he subdivided into two districts, and these into still
smaller districts. Over all, for the settlement of all important points
of dispute, he established a tribunal called the Aulic Council, which
subsequently exerted a powerful influence over the affairs of Austria.

One more final effort Maximilian made to rouse Germany to combine to
drive the Turks out of Europe. Though the benighted masses looked up
with much reverence to the pontiff, the princes and the nobles regarded
him only as a _power_, wielding, in addition to the military arm, the
potent energies of superstition. A diet was convened. The pope's legate
appeared, and sustained the eloquent appeal of the emperor with the
paternal commands of the holy father. But the press was now becoming a
power in Europe, diffusing intelligence and giving freedom to thought
and expression. The diet, after listening patiently to the arguments of
the emperor and the requests of the pontiff, dryly replied--

"We think that Christianity has more to fear from the pope than from the
Turks. Much as we may dread the ravages of the infidel, they can hardly
drain Christendom more effectually than it is now drained by the
exactions of the Church."

It was at Augsburg in July, 1518, that the diet ventured thus boldly to
speak. This was one year after Luther had nailed upon the church door in
Wittemberg, his ninety-five propositions, which had roused all Germany
to scrutinize the abominable corruptions of the papal church. This bold
language of the diet, influenced by the still bolder language of the
intrepid monk, alarmed Leo X., and on the 7th of August he issued his
summons commanding Luther to repair to Rome to answer for heresy.
Maximilian, who had been foiled in his own attempt to attain the chair
of St. Peter, who had seen so much of the infamous career of Julius and
Alexander, as to lose all his reverence for the sacred character of the
popes, and who regarde