Lausanne then sent another deputation, consisting of twelve persons of distinction. At Berne they were asked, ‘What is it that you want?’ ‘Two masses weekly,’ they replied, according to a Lausannese manuscript.[388] If the statement is true, the request was certainly very moderate for zealous Catholics. The concession was made to them, but it was coupled with the condition that they should provide ministers for all the churches that asked for them. At the same time they gave them to understand that it would be well to hold at Lausanne a great disputation on religion, in order to decide between Rome and Reform. That was a good deal to ask for the two masses which were granted them. The Bernese, indeed, were anxious that the Vaudois, whose country they had recently conquered, should attach themselves to the Reformation. It was no doubt partly from a regard to political interests that they wished this, but they did not overlook the interest of religion. Be that as it may, the reformation of religion in that country was a source of great prosperity both temporal and spiritual. The Pays de Vaud was to offer the stranger, at a later time, not only those beauties of nature which excite our admiration, but still more, numerous examples of sincere and vital piety, which is far sweeter and pleasanter than its lakes, and more sublime than its peaks and glaciers. The seed which was scattered at the epoch of the Reformation, in its valleys and on its mountains, was truly the Word of God; and one cannot but see there the fulfilment of that ancient oracle, _He that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap everlasting life_. The conversion of Yverdon had been somewhat checked by the siege which the town had sustained. The lords of Berne wished in general to employ, like Viret, evangelical means; to reveal to their new subjects the grosser superstitions under whose yoke they had been held, and to give them the knowledge of the truth. For that end they resolved to appoint first a public disputation such as had been held at Zurich, Berne, and Geneva. As soon as the report was circulated in the country that a great assembly for discussion on matters of faith was to be held at Lausanne, the priests and their friends were alarmed. The excitement extended to all the villages. The friends of the papacy expected to see black clouds gathering on the horizon, and a violent storm presently burst on the old ship which had carried their fathers, and make it founder, thus engulfing in the depths of the sea all the traditions of their doctrine and all the pomps of their worship. They determined to do everything in their power to oppose such an assembly, and they wrote to the bishop and to the council at Friburg, to the pope and to the emperor. [Sidenote: A DISPUTATION APPOINTED.]