The assembled clergy may be divided roughly into two parties: the reformers, and the conservative or ultramontane [Sidenote: Clerical parties.] party. The reformers were not in favour of any radical change in the Church. They were if anything more vehemently opposed than their antagonists to the doctrines of Wyclif and Hus. Such reform as they desired was aristocratic rather than democratic. They had no intention of weakening the authority of the Church; but within the Church they desired to remove gross abuses, and to strengthen the hierarchy as against the Papacy. Their chief contention was that a General Council has supreme authority, even over the Pope, and they wished such councils to meet at regular intervals. By this means papal absolutism would be limited by a sort of oligarchical parliament within the Church. The conservatives, on the other hand, consisting chiefly of the cardinals and Italian prelates, had no wish to alter a system under which they enjoyed material advantages. Their object, as it had been at Pisa, was to restore the union of the Church, but to defeat, or at any rate postpone, any schemes of reform. The Council was opened on November 5, but the meeting was only formal, and no real business was transacted for a month. Meanwhile Hus had been followed to Constance by the representatives of the orthodox party in Bohemia, who brought a formidable list of charges against the reformer. John XXIII. at once saw in this an opportunity for embroiling the Council with Sigismund. Adroitly keeping himself in the background, he allowed the cardinals to take the lead in the matter. They summoned Hus to appear before them, and in spite of his protest that he was only answerable to the whole Council, they committed [Sidenote: Hus imprisoned.] him to prison. The news that his safe-conduct had been so insultingly disregarded reached Sigismund as he was starting for Constance after the coronation ceremony at Aachen. He arrived on Christmas day, and at once demanded that Hus should be released. The Pope excused himself, and threw the blame on the cardinals. To the king’s right to protect his subject the cardinals opposed their duty to suppress heresy. In high dudgeon, Sigismund declared that he would leave the Council to its fate, and actually set out on his return journey. The Pope was jubilant at the success of his wiles. But Sigismund’s friends, and especially Frederick of Hohenzollern, urged him not to sacrifice the interests of Germany and of Christendom for the sake of a heretic. This advice, and the feeling that his personal reputation was staked on the success of the Council, triumphed. Sigismund returned to Constance, and Hus remained a prisoner. From this moment John XXIII. began to despair.