Protestantism in Poland and Bohemia - James Aitken Wylie

nation. The oath was read and commented on, and
the senator who made the motion concluded his
speech in support of it by saying that if the bishops
kept their oath of spiritual obedience, they must
necessarily violate their vow of temporal
allegiance; and if they were faithful subjects of the
Pope, they must necessarily be traitors to their
king.[4] The motion was not carried, probably
because the vague hope of a more sweeping
measure of reform still kept possession of the
minds of men.
The next step of the Poles was in the direction
of realising that hope. A Diet met in 1563, and
passed a resolution that a General Synod, in which
all the religious bodies in Poland would be
represented, should be assembled. The Primate of
Poland, Archbishop Uchanski, who was known to
be secretly inclined toward the Reformed doctrines,
was favorable to the proposed Convocation. Had
such a Council been convened, it might, as matters
then stood, with the first nobles of the land, many
of the great cities, and a large portion of the nation,
all on the side of Protestantism, have had the most
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