ed no effectual resistance; though they had experienced
temporary checks, their progress had been on the whole resistless, and
wherever they had planted their feet they had established themselves
firmly. Originating as a small tribe on the shores of the Caspian, they
had spread over all Asia Minor, had crossed the Bosphorus, captured
Constantinople, and had brought all Greece under their sway. They were
still pressing on, flushed with victory. Christian Europe was trembling
before them. And now an army of three hundred thousand had crossed the
Danube, sweeping all opposition before them, and were spreading terror
and destruction through Hungary. The capture of that immense kingdom
seemed to leave all Europe defenseless.

The emperor and his Catholic friends were fearfully alarmed. Here was a
danger more to be dreaded than even the doctrines of Luther. All the
energies of Christendom were requisite to repel this invasion. The
emperor was compelled to appeal to the Protestant princes to cooeperate
in this great emergence. But they had more to fear from the fiery
persecution of the papal church than from the cimeter of the infidel,
and they refused any cooeperation with the emperor so long as the menaces
of the Augsburg decrees were suspended over them. The emperor wished the
Protestants to help him drive out the Turks, that then, relieved from
that danger, he might turn all his energies against the Protestants.

After various negotiations it was agreed, as a temporary arrangement,
that there should be a truce of the Catholic persecution until another
general council should be called, and that until then the Protestants
should be allowed freedom of conscience and of worship. The German
States now turned their whole force against the Turks. The Protestants
contributed to the war with energy which amazed the Catholics. They even
trebled the contingents which they had agreed to furnish, and marched to
the assault with the greatest intrepidity. The Turks were driven from
Hungary, and then the emperor, in violation of his pledge, recommenced
proceeding against the Protestants. But it was the worst moment the
infatuated emperor could have selected. The Protestants, already armed
and marshaled, were not at all disposed to lie down to be trodden upon
by their foes. They renewed their confederacy, drove the emperor's
Austrian troops out of the territories of Wirtemberg, which they had
seized, and restored the duchy to the Protestan