In Germany to the Leipsic Disputation - James Aitken Wylie

Elector Frederick of Saxony was especially meant.
It helped to augment the chagrin of the emperor,
that mainly through the influence of Frederick he
had been thwarted in carrying a project through the
Diet, on which he was much set as tending to the
aggrandizement of his dynasty — the election of
his grandson, the future Charles V., to succeed him
in the Empire. But if Frederick herein did the
emperor a disfavor, he won for himself greater
consideration at the court of the Pope, for there
were few things that Leo X. dreaded more than the
union of half the scepters of Europe in one hand.
Meanwhile the energetic letter of Maximilian was
not without effect, and it was resolved to lay
vigorous hold upon the Wittemberg movement. On
the 7th August, 1518, Luther was summoned to
answer at Rome, within sixty days, to the charges
preferred against him. To have gone to Rome
would have been to march into his grave. But the
peril of staying was scarcely less than the peril of
going. He would be condemned as contumacious,
and the Pope would follow up the
excommunication by striking him, if not with his
own hand, with that of the emperor. The powers of
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