left him totally without help. So much the more rapid was the progress
of the newly-chosen elector, whom his Bavarian relations and the Spaniards
from the Netherlands supported with the utmost vigour. The troops of Gebhard,
left by their master without pay, abandoned one place after another
to the enemy; by whom others were compelled to surrender.
In his Westphalian territories, Gebhard held out for some time longer,
till here, too, he was at last obliged to yield to superior force.
After several vain attempts in Holland and England to obtain means
for his restoration, he retired into the Chapter of Strasburg, and died dean
of that cathedral; the first sacrifice to the Ecclesiastical Reservation,
or rather to the want of harmony among the German Protestants.

To this dispute in Cologne was soon added another in Strasburg.
Several Protestant canons of Cologne, who had been included in
the same papal ban with the elector, had taken refuge within this bishopric,
where they likewise held prebends. As the Roman Catholic canons of Strasburg
hesitated to allow them, as being under the ban, the enjoyment
of their prebends, they took violent possession of their benefices,
and the support of a powerful Protestant party among the citizens
soon gave them the preponderance in the chapter. The other canons thereupon
retired to Alsace-Saverne, where, under the protection of the bishop,
they established themselves as the only lawful chapter,
and denounced that which remained in Strasburg as illegal. The latter,
in the meantime, had so strengthened themselves by the reception
of several Protestant colleagues of high rank, that they could venture,
upon the death of the bishop, to nominate a new Protestant bishop
in the person of John George of Brandenburg. The Roman Catholic canons,
far from allowing this election, nominated the Bishop of Metz,
a prince of Lorraine, to that dignity, who announced his promotion
by immediately commencing hostilities against the territories of Strasburg.