boasted when he left Berlin to attend the Diet at Augsburg, which was to
open September 1, 1547. After the Diet he bragged that in Augsburg he
had flung the windows wide open for the Gospel; that he had reformed the
Pope and made the Emperor a Lutheran, that a golden time had now
arrived, for the Gospel would be preached in all Europe; that he had not
only been present, but had presided at the drafting of the Interim; that
he had received 500 crowns from the Emperor and 500 from King Ferdinand,
etc. (Preger, _M. Flacius Illyricus,_ 1, 119.)

The document, prepared at the command of the Emperor, was called Interim
because its object was to regulate the church affairs until the
religious controversy would be finally settled by the Council of Trent,
to the resolutions of which the Lutherans were required to submit. It
was, however, essentially papal. For the time being, indeed, it
permitted Protestant clergymen to marry, and to celebrate the Lord's
Supper in both kinds, but demanded the immediate restoration of the
Romish customs and ceremonies, the acknowledgment of papal supremacy
_iure divino,_ as well as the jurisdiction of the bishops, and the
adoption of articles in which the doctrines were all explained in the
sense of the Catholic dogmas, and in which truth and falsehood, in
general, were badly mingled. Transubstantiation, the seven sacraments,
and other papal errors were reaffirmed, while Lutheran tenets, such as
the doctrine of justification by faith alone, were either denied or
omitted. And from the fact that this Interim was nevertheless condemned
by the Pope and the Romanists, who demanded an unqualified, blind, and
unconditional submission, the Lutherans could infer what they were to
expect after consenting to these interimistic provisions. The general
conviction among Catholics as well as Protestants was that the Interim
was but the first step to a complete return to Romanism. Indeed, soon
after its promulgation, the Catholic Electors of Mainz and Koeln
endeavored to rob the Lutherans also of the use of the cup and of the
marriage of the priests. The Elector of Mainz declared all such
marriages void and their children bastards. (Jaekel, 162.)

In the most important point, the doctrine of justification, the Augsburg
Interim not only omitted the _sola fide,_ but clearly taught that
justification embraces also renewal. When God justifies a man, the
Interim declared, He does not only absolve him from his guilt