ho measures all things by the rule of the Gospel, will be
obliged to condemn them.

Any one, who derives his knowledge of the history of that period from
original sources, and has read the numerous bills of complaint, handed
in, even at the recesses of the general Diet, by the people of the
Common Territories, and the results of the investigations, which, in
most cases, proved them to be just and well-founded, can imagine the
indignation which Zwingli's view of the case called forth. But to an
honest will other means of redress stood open, before resort to such
extreme measures--to plans that would shake the Confederacy to its very
foundations. But indeed, it is almost certain, that these plans were
never formally laid before the authorities of Zurich and made the
subject of official deliberation. They may have been communications to
a narrow, confidential circle of friends, drawn up more as a frank
confession of his own political faith, than with any hope that their
complete execution was so easily possible in the coming age. Still,
they afford us the necessary key to a right understanding of the part
played by him in the affairs of the Confederacy, during the last two
years of his life, and hence we cannot omit here the main ideas. "In
ancient times," so he writes, "Zurich and Bern united as confederates
with the Four Forest Cantons, Luzern, Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden. The
power of both parties was then equal and they held faithfully together,
but the burden of the wars against their enemies on all sides was
great. The cities were the bulwarks; they had not the mountains, the
passes, for their defence. As their territory increased, the greater
injuries fell upon them and the greater costs. With fairness they could
have demanded a change in the relative proportion of right in the
federal councils. But Zurich and Bern were content with some
insignificant grants, respecting the division of booty according to the
number of soldiers, which the treaty of Stanz allowed them; and the
Cantons still kept twice as many votes as the cities, although the
latter, yea even sometimes one of them performed as much as all the
former put together. This produced arrogance among those who, in the
beginning, were modest. _They_ were the governors of the common
bailiwicks; _they_ acted often without consulting the cities. _They_
have strengthened themselves in our times by the admission of a fifth
canton. _They_ concoct everywhere their s