Page 3 - 08 Luther Before the Diet

should be furnished with a safe-conduct, so

that he might appear before a tribunal of

learned, pious, and impartial judges.”—

D'Aubigne, b. 6, ch. 11.

The attention of all parties was now directed

to the assembly of the German states which

convened at Worms soon after the accession

of Charles to the empire. There were

important political questions and interests to

be considered by this national council; for the

first time the princes of Germany were to

meet their youthful monarch in deliberative

assembly. From all parts of the fatherland

had come the dignitaries of church and state.

Secular lords, highborn, powerful, and

jealous of their hereditary rights; princely

ecclesiastics, flushed with their conscious

superiority in rank and power; courtly

knights and their armed retainers; and