On the 27th of June the peace of Cadan put an end to all differences, and restored Wurtemberg to its national princes, with a voice in the council of the empire. If there had never been a war more energetically conducted, there had never been a peace so promptly concluded. The landgrave had displayed a spirit and talents which, men thought, might in future prove troublesome to the puissant Charles.[606] The emperor having received his lesson, the pope's turn came next. As the state of Wurtemberg had been wrested from the hands of Austria, the Church was to be saved from the clutches of the papacy. At the diet of Augsburg, in 1530, Duke Christopher had seen the landgrave, his relation and friend, come forward as the most intrepid champion of the Reformation. His generous heart had been won to a cause which included such a noble defender, and his desire was to see it triumph in Wurtemberg. On the other hand, King Ferdinand, when renouncing his authority over the duchy, desired at least to maintain that of the pope; and he therefore proposed to insert in the treaty of peace an article forbidding any change in religious matters. But the dukes, the landgrave, and the Elector of Saxony unanimously declared that the Gospel ought to have free course in the duchy, and the electoral chancellor wrote this word on the margin, by the side of the article proposed by the King of the Romans: _Rejected_.[607] 'You are in no respect bound as to the faith,' said the evangelical princes to Ulrich; while the papal nuncio Vergerio entreated King Ferdinand not to give way to the Lutherans. All the efforts of the Romish party were useless. The important victory of the landgrave (and of Francis I.) was about to open the gates of Wurtemberg to the Reformation, and consequently those of other Roman-catholic countries. Ulrich and Christopher, being quite as desirous of bringing souls to the knowledge of the Word of God as of replacing their subjects under the sceptre of the ancient house of Emeric,[608] set to work immediately. They invited to their states Ambrose Blaarer, the friend of Zwingle and Bucer, and Ehrard Schnepf, the friend of Luther, converted by his means at Heidelberg at the beginning of the Reformation.[609] Their labours and those of other servants of God spread the evangelical light over the country.[610] Nor was that all: if the defeat at Cappel had restored many cities to the Romish creed,[611] the victory of Laufen allowed many to come to the evangelical faith. Baden, Hanau, Augsburg, Pomerania, Mecklenburg, and other places began, advanced, or completed their reformation about this time. French money had never before returned such good interest. [Sidenote: A KINGLY PROJECT.]