The dignitaries of Rome were alarmed at this enthusiasm. At the diet of Nuremberg in 1524, Cardinal Campeggi exclaimed: ‘The Germans take up a new opinion quickly, but they soon abandon it; while the Italians obstinately persist in what they have once adopted.’[796] It was rather the contrary that was to take place. The Italians showed themselves still more prompt than the Germans: the number of Lutherans increased every day.[797] The converted catholics began by degrees to explain the Gospel and to refute the errors of the Roman Church in private houses: this was done even in the Papal States. Before long, several priests and monks were enlightened, and the Reformation took a new step: its principles were taught in the churches. Clement VII. felt great alarm, when all of a sudden the doctrine, attacked by him and his legates in distant countries, broke out all over his dear Italy and threatened the walls of the papacy. He uttered a cry of terror: ‘To our exceeding sorrow,’ he said, ‘Luther’s pestilential heresy has been spread among us, not only among the laity, but also among the priests and monks.[798] Heresy is increasing, and in every place the catholic faith has to suffer the cruellest assaults.’ The cry was useless. In that very year (1530) the New Testament was translated by Bruccioli, printed at Venice, and the much dreaded contagion thenceforward made still more rapid progress. [Sidenote: Rosselli To Melancthon.] It was in this latter city, on the hundred islets and amid the lagunes of the queen of the Adriatic, that the doctrine of the Gospel first raised its standard. There was no power in Europe more jealous of its independence and authority than Venice; the winged lion of St. Mark braved the priest of Rome; the senate rejected the Inquisition, practised freedom of inquiry, and did not license the pope’s edicts until after serious study and strict examination. Protestants were soon to be found at Venice who, strange to say, were more protestant than those of Augsburg. ‘I am delighted,’ said Luther, on the 7th of March, 1528, ‘to hear that they have received the Word of God at Venice.’[799] A report having got abroad that Melancthon appeared inclined, at the diet of 1530, to recognize the primacy of the Bishop of Rome, the new evangelicals of Venice were troubled and alarmed: one of them, Lucio Paolo Rosselli, although only a beginner in the Christian doctrine, determined to write, respectfully but frankly, to the illustrious doctor of Germany: ‘There are no books by any author,’ he said to Melancthon, ‘which please me more than those you have published. But if the reports which the papists circulate about you are true, the cause of the Gospel and those who, taught by the writings of yourself and Luther, have embraced it, are in great danger. All Italy awaits the result of your meeting at Augsburg.[800] O Melancthon! let neither threats, nor fears, nor prayers, nor promises make you desert the standard of Jesus Christ!