The history of the popes, from the close of the middle ages : drawn ...

20
HISTORY OF THE POPES.
Aix on the 23rd of October, he swore to hold fast by the
Holy Catholic Faith as delivered to the Apostles, and to
show due submission and fidelity to the Pope and Holy
Roman See. A few days later the Archbishop of Mayence
read aloud a Papal Brief to the effect that the Pope had
given to the King, as formerly to Maximilian I., the title
of " Emperor-elect of the Romans."*
On the 14th of November Leo X. answered the letter of
Charles, written on the day of his coronation, by which he
notified that event :
" As there are two planets in heaven."
the Pope said, " the sun and the moon, which surpass in
brilliancy all the stars, so are there two great dignitaries on
earth, the Pope and the Emperor, to whom all other princes
are subject and owe obedience." The letter ended by an
exhortation to Charles to remain a loyal son of the Church.f
There seemed no doubt that Charles would fulfil his whole
duty as protector of the Church, as far as the Lutheran move-
ment was concerned. " The Emperor," Aleander reports
from Cologne at the beginning of November, " does not let
himself be led away by Hutten's anti-Roman agitation ;
he stands firm on our side." Aleander had nothing but
good to report about the Catholic zeal of the Archbishops
of Mayence, Treves, and Cologne. With his usual
optimism, he believed that he would even be able to come
round the Elector of Saxony.|
* Cf. Janssen-Pastor, II.i*, 148, 150.
t Bergenroth, II., n. 380. The Papal Brief paraphrases the
thoughts concerning the co-operation of the two supreme powers of
Christendom which are expressed in the credentials of Manuel (Lanz,
Mon. Habsburg, II., 177 seq^. The original letter of Charles V. to Leo
X. about his coronation is in the Vatican Archives, Arm., II., caps, i,
n. 59 (quoted in Reichstagsakten, II., 102).
461 ;
j See the Letter of Aleander, Nov. 6, 1520, in Reichstagsakten, II.,
see Vol. VII. of this work, p. 421.