combatants, and the treaties of Münster and Osnabrück were thenceforward the basis of the Germanic constitution. FOOTNOTES: [368] The so-called 'Wahlcapitulation.' [369] The electors long refused to elect Charles, dreading his great hereditary power, and were at last induced to do so only by their overmastering fear of the Turks. [370] Nearly all the Hapsburgs seem to have wanted that sort of genial heartiness which, apt as it is to be stifled by education in the purple, has nevertheless been possessed by several other royal lines, greatly contributing to their vitality; as for instance by more than one prince of the houses of Brunswick and Hohenzollern. [371] See this brought out with great force in the very interesting work of Padre Tosti, _Prolegomeni alla Storia Universale della Chiesa_, from which I quote one passage, which bears directly on the matter in hand: 'Il grido della riforma clericale aveva un eco terribile in tutta la compagnia civile dei popoli: essa percuoteva le cime del laicale potere, e rimbalzava per tutta la gerarchia sociale. Se l'imperadore Sigismondo nel concilio di Costanza non avesse fiutate queste consequenze nella eresia di Hus e di Girolamo di Praga, forse non avrebbe con tanto zelo mandati alle fiamme que' novatori. Rotto da Lutero il vincolo di suggezione al Papa ed ai preti in fatti di religione, avvenne che anche quello che sommetteva il vassallo al barone, il barone al imperadore si allentasse. Il popolo con la Bibbia in mano era prete, vescovo, e papa; e se prima contristato della prepotenza di chi gli soprastava, ricorreva al successore di San Pietro, ora ricorreva a se stesso, avendogli commesse Fra Martino le chiavi del regno dei Cieli.'--vol. ii. pp. 398, 9. [372] It was not till the end of the eleventh century that transubstantiation was definitely established as a dogma. [373] See the passages quoted in note 113, p. 98; and note 132, p. 110. [374] Henry VIII of England when he rebelled against the Pope called himself King of Ireland (his predecessors had used only the title 'Dominus Hiberniæ') without asking the Emperor's permission, in order to shew that he repudiated the temporal as well as the spiritual dominion of Rome. So the Statute of Appeals is careful to deny and reject the authority of 'other foreign potentates,' meaning, no doubt, the Emperor as well as the Pope. [375] Matthias, brother of Rudolf II, reigned from 1612 till 1619. CHAPTER XIX. THE PEACE OF WESTPHALIA: LAST STAGE IN THE DECLINE OF THE EMPIRE.