The position of Germany called for an emperor who, by his known energies,
could give weight to his resolves; and the hereditary dominions of Rodolph,
considerable as they were, were at present in a situation to occasion
the greatest embarrassment to the governors.

The Austrian princes, it is true were Roman Catholics, and in addition
to that, the supporters of Popery, but their countries were far from being so.
The reformed opinions had penetrated even these, and favoured by
Ferdinand's necessities and Maximilian's mildness, had met with
a rapid success. The Austrian provinces exhibited in miniature
what Germany did on a larger scale. The great nobles and the ritter class
or knights were chiefly evangelical, and in the cities the Protestants had
a decided preponderance. If they succeeded in bringing a few of their party
into the country, they contrived imperceptibly to fill all places of trust
and the magistracy with their own adherents, and to exclude the Catholics.
Against the numerous order of the nobles and knights,
and the deputies from the towns, the voice of a few prelates was powerless;
and the unseemly ridicule and offensive contempt of the former soon drove them
entirely from the provincial diets. Thus the whole of the Austrian Diet had
imperceptibly become Protestant, and the Reformation was making rapid strides
towards its public recognition. The prince was dependent on the Estates,
who had it in their power to grant or refuse supplies. Accordingly,
they availed themselves of the financial necessities of Ferdinand and his son
to extort one religious concession after another. To the nobles and knights,
Maximilian at last conceded the free exercise of their religion,
but only within their own territories and castles. The intemperate enthusiasm
of the Protestant preachers overstepped the boundaries which prudence
had prescribed. In defiance of the express prohibition, several of them
ventured to preach publicly, not only in the towns, but in Vienna itself,
and the people flocked in crowds to this new doctrine,