At the Imperial Assembly at Augsburg, in the year 1530, the Bishop
of Salzburg said unto me, "Four ways and means there are to make a
reconciliation or union between us and you Protestants. One is,
that ye yield unto us. To that you say you cannot. The second is,
that we yield unto you; but that we will not do. The third is, that
the one party, by force, should be compelled to yield to the other;
but thereupon a great combustion and tumult might be raised.
Therefore the fourth way or means were to be applauded and used,
namely, that now being here assembled together, the one party should
strive to thrust out the other, and that party which shall have the
advantage, and be the stronger, the same should put the other party
into a bag and expel them." Whereupon I, said Luther, answered him
and said, "This, indeed, were a very substantial course to settle
unity and peace, wonderful wisely considered of, found out and
expounded by such a holy and Christian-like Bishop as you are." And
thereupon I took letters out of my pocket, which shortly before I
had received from Rome, and gave the same to the Bishop to read,
which letter related a pretty passage that fell out there five weeks
before, between some Cardinals and the Pope's Fool, written as
followeth:-

The said Cardinals had been in serious consultation how, and by what
means, the Protestants in Germany might be convinced touching their
error, and suppressed; but they saw the difficulty of it, in that
the Protestants, in their books and writings, powerfully against the
Papists, cited the sacred Scripture, and especially they opposed and
withstood them with the doctrine of St. Paul, which were great
blocks in the Papists' way, insomuch that they found it a business
not so easily to be accomplished. Then said the Fool unto the
Cardinals, "I know how to give you herein an advice, whereby you