Gondar - Phi Kappa Psi

He received the sacraments weekly, and twice a week in the Advent
season and during Lent. Whenever possible he took part in public devotions,
processions, and the pilgrimages; thus in 1585 he went on a pilgrimage to Loreto
and Rome. His court was jestingly called a monastery, and his capital the
German Rome. He founded several Jesuit monasteries, in particular that of St.
Michael at Munich, and contributed to the missions in China and Japan.
He did everything possible in Bavaria and the German Empire to further
the Catholic Counter-Reformation, and laboured to prevent the spread of
Protestantism. Thus it was largely through his efforts that the Archbishopric of
Cologne did not become Protestant, due mainly to the vigorous support he gave
his brother Ernst, who had been elected archbishop against Gebhard Truchsess.
On the other hand, the manner in which he bestowed benefices upon
members of his family makes an unpleasant impression at the present day,
though, at that time, this was not considered so unseemly. In the end his brother
Ernest had, besides other benefices, five dioceses, and Wilhelm's son Ferdinand
was bishop of an equal number; another son intended for the clerical life, Philip,
was made Bishop of Ratisbon in 1595 and cardinal in 1596, but died in 1598.
Wilhelm had his eldest son Maximilian educated with much care, and in 1597 he
resigned the government to Maximilian and led a retired life, devoted to works of
piety, asceticism, and charity, and also to the placid enjoyment of his collections
of works of art and curiosities.
The house of Wittelsbach in the years before William the Vth reign was
allegedly governed by a series of “compacts”. In spite of the decree of 1506
William IV was compelled in 1516, after a violent quarrel, to grant a share in the
government to his brother Louis X, an arrangement which lasted until the death
of Louis in 1545.
William followed the traditional Wittelsbach policy of opposition to the
Habsburgs until in 1534 he made a treaty at Linz with Ferdinand, king of Hungary
and Bohemia. This link strengthened in 1546, when the emperor Charles V
obtained the help of the duke during the war of the league of Schmalkalden by
promising him in certain eventualities the succession to the Bohemian throne,
and the electoral dignity enjoyed by the count palatine of the Rhine.
William also did much at a critical period to secure Bavaria for
Catholicism. The reformed doctrines had made considerable progress in the
duchy when the duke obtained from the pope extensive rights over the bishoprics
and monasteries, and took measures to repress the reformers, many of whom
were banished; while the Jesuits, whom he invited into the duchy in 1541, made
the university of Ingolstadt their headquarters for Germany. William, whose death
occurred in March 1550, was succeeded by his son Albert V, who had married a
daughter of Ferdinand of Habsburg, afterwards the emperor Ferdinand I. Early in
his reign Albert made some concessions to the reformers, who were still strong in
Bavaria; but about 1563 he changed his attitude, favoured the decrees of the