When, in 1528, the false reports were circulated, of which we hear in the history of the Pack negotiation, to wit, that the Catholic Princes of the Empire were on the point of falling upon the Protesters, Luther sent a letter to Johann, his Elector, regarding the question of law. What was to be done if the Catholic powers, without the authorisation of the Emperor, attacked the Lutheran party? Luther’s verdict was that such an act on the part of “scoundrel-princes” must be resisted by force of arms “as a real revolt and conspiracy against the Empire and His Imperial Majesty,” but that “to take the offensive and anticipate such an action on the part of the Princes was in no wise to be counselled.”[126] On this occasion he manifested serious apprehension of the mischief which might be caused by a precipitate armed attack on the part of his princely patrons. It was a very different matter to look forward to a mere possibility of war and to find himself directly confronted with an outbreak of hostilities. “May God preserve us from such a horror! This would indeed be to fish with a draw-net and to take might for right. No greater blame could attach to the Evangel, for this would be no Peasant Rising but a Rising of the Princes, which would destroy Germany utterly to the joy of Satan.”[127] The above memorandum had dealt with the question of an attack by the Princes of the Empire. But what was to be done if the Emperor himself intervened? The Lutheran Princes and Estates were anxious to exercise the utmost caution and restraint with regard to the Emperor personally, and in this Luther agreed with them. At Spires, in 1526, they had decided to behave “in such a way as to be able to answer for it before God and the Emperor,” which, however, did not prevent them from establishing the “evangelical” worship in contravention of the decrees of Worms. It was hoped that the Emperor, hampered by his foreign policy, would not take up arms. When, accordingly, the protesting Princes, at the time of the Pack business, commenced warlike preparations against the Catholic party in the Empire, they solemnly declared at Rotach, in June, 1528, that they “excepted” the Emperor. In the same way they desired that their action at Spires in 1529, where they “protested” against the Emperor, should be looked upon as an appeal to the Emperor “better instructed.” When the Emperor, on account of the protest, began to take a serious view of the matter, any scruples which the sovereigns of Hesse and the Saxon Electorate may have felt concerning the employment of armed resistance against him soon evaporated. In Saxony it was held that a closer alliance of the Princes favourable to the innovations ought not to be “shorn of its meaning and value” by this “exemption of the Emperor”; the exemption, it was argued, was only of the person of the Emperor, not of his mandataries. A Saxon memorandum at the end of July, 1529, practically made an end of the exemption; “resistance,