While he was thus remonstrating against the holding of a General Synod, the Elector of the Palatinate, the Duke of Wuertemberg, and the Landgrave, insisted upon summoning one, and their envoys endeavored to secure the assent of the Elector Augustus to this plan. Melanchthon writes: "I do not know what good this plan will effect, while parties are so greatly opposed to each other." He was also greatly distressed at this time, on account of the persecutions endured by his friend HARDEBERG, in Bremen, because of the Lord's Supper. Hesshuss, expelled from Heidelberg, came to Bremen, but declared that he could not accept the situation offered to him, until Hardeberg would adopt different views. He proposed a discussion, against which Melanchthon remonstrated in the strongest terms. But when he found that it was nevertheless to take place, he resolved to go to Bremen himself, in order to assist his friend. But Hardeberg would not enter into the discussion, and was deposed in February, 1561. But Melanchthon did not live to see this. He saw heavy thunder-clouds rising around him on every side, animosities were becoming more and more bitter from day to day, and the inmost life of the Evangelical Church seemed to be destroyed. It is not at all to be wondered at, that he began to long more and more earnestly for the eternal world, surrounded as he was by such gloomy prospects. He therefore says, in a letter to Baumgaertner, of Nuremberg, a few weeks before his death: "I am consumed by my longing for the heavenly fatherland; and if I should be obliged to live much longer in this misery, I would wish to get farther away from this barbarity." This wish was soon to be gratified, and we are now approaching his departure; but will first of all briefly view his domestic life, and his manifold meritorious services. CHAPTER XXXV. HIS DOMESTIC LIFE. If we wish to become better acquainted with a great man like Melanchthon, we must follow him from his public into his domestic life. Here his inner life is revealed to the eyes of an observer.