ance of my children." He then finished his
game. But his wife and family could not look at his death so calmly; at
their entreaty he surrendered his electorate into the emperor's hands.
The other chief of the Protestant league, the Landgrave of Hesse, was
also forced to submit, and detained in captivity, contrary to the
pledged word of the emperor; who, fearless of any further resistance to
his supreme authority, convoked a diet at Augsburg in 1548. At that
assembly Maurice was invested with Saxony, and the emperor, in the vain
hope of enforcing a uniformity of religious practice, published by his
own authority a body of doctrine called the "Interim," to be in force
till a general council should be assembled. This necessarily was
unsatisfactory to both parties, but its observance was enforced by a
master with whom terror was the engine of obedience.

These measures, however, did not preserve tranquillity long in Germany.
Maurice of Saxony and the Elector of Brandenburg urged the deliverance
of the Landgrave of Hesse, as having made themselves sureties against
violence to his person. Charles answered by absolving them from their
pledges. The Protestants, of course, charged him as arrogating the same
spiritual authority with the popes. And Maurice, offended at the slight
put upon him, directed his artful policy to the humiliation of Charles.
He had compelled his subjects to conform to the Interim by the help of
the timid Melancthon, who was no longer supported by the firmness of
Luther. On the other hand, he had silenced the clamors of the more
sturdy by a public avowal of his zeal for the Reformation. In the
meantime the diet of Augsburg, completely at the emperor's devotion, had
named him general of the war against Magdeburg, which had been placed
under the ban of the empire for opposition to the Interim. He took that
Lutheran city, but by private assurances regained the good-will of the
inhabitants. He also engaged in a league with France, but still wore the
mask. He even deceived the able Granville, Bishop of Arras, afterward
cardinal, who boasted that "a drunken German could never impose on him;"
yet was he of all others most imposed on. At last, in 1552, Maurice
declared himself; and Henry II. of France published a manifesto,
assuming the title of "Protector of the liberties of Germany and its
captive princes." He began with the conquest of the three bishoprics of
Toul, Baden, and Metz. In conjunction with Maurice he