He was the first to recover his calmness; he detested the emperor, but he humoured him. 'You well know, Sire,' he said, 'that the profit and honour accorded by the king to my family in accepting my alliance, are so great, that it belongs to him and not to me to propose conditions.'[382] He offered, however, to undertake that everything should remain in 'complete peace.' The emperor, a master in dissimulation, tried to conceal his vexation, but without success; this unlucky marriage baffled all his plans. Francis had been more cunning than himself.... Who would have thought it? The King of France had sacrificed the honour of his house, but he had conquered his rival. Confounded, annoyed, and dejected, Charles paced up and down with his long gloomy face, when an unexpected circumstance revived his hopes of completely embroiling the pope and the King of France. We have witnessed the conferences that took place between Clement and Charles on the subject of a general council. The emperor had asked for one in order 'to bring back the heretics to union with the holy faith, and he observed that if it were not called, it was to be feared that the heretics would unite with the Turks; that they would fancy themselves authorised to lay hands upon the property of the Church, and would succeed in living in that liberty which they called _evangelical_, but which,' added Charles, 'is rather _Mahometan_, and would cause the ruin of christendom.'[383] The pope, who thought much more of himself and of his family than of the Church, had rejected this demand. He had smiled at seeing the great potentate's zeal for the religious and evangelical question.... Clement never troubled himself about the Gospel: Machiavelli was the gospel of the Medici. They cherished it, and meditated on it day and night; they knew it by heart, and put it into admirable practice. Clement and Catherine were its most devoted followers and most illustrious heroes. [Sidenote: A LAY COUNCIL PROPOSED.]