Chapter Four
Illusion and Reality: Regensburg, 1541

The Choice of a Legate

The best-known and most fully documented episode of Contarini's life is that of his mission as papal legate to the religious colloquy of Catholics and Protestants at Regensburg in 1541, a role that has assured his inclusion in histories of the Reformation period and perpetuated his fame. His biographer Franz Dittrich, in fact, considered Regensburg to be the culmination of his subject's career and so devoted minute attention to it. Contarini has received almost uniformly favorable treatment as a champion of religious concord in a singularly contentious age and as a man of goodwill who refused to abandon the hope of unity among Christians. While no modern scholar has gone quite so far as to assert that "the work of concord . . . attempted at Regensburg . . . is one of the most decisive moments in the course of modern history,"^[1] the image of the idealistic legate bent on healing the scandalous division in the church is still virtually an icon. He has elicited much sympathy as a proponent of toleration and as a leading figure in the "party of the middle" during the confessional struggles of the sixteenth century.^[2]

[1] De Leva, "Concordia religiosa," 5.

[2] Friedrich Heer, Die dritte Kraft: der europäische Humanismus zwischen den Fronten des konfessionellen Zeitalters (Frankfurt: S. Fischer, 1959), offers one of the most explicit arguments for the strength of the "third force" of humanists who occupied a middle ground between doctrinaire Catholics and Protestants.

In reality, Contarini's legation is at most an instructive episode in the history of the German Reformation and of Charles V's reign. While it assumes a more central place when seen from the perspective of the papacy, the mission of Contarini did not significantly affect the diplomatic chess game between pope and emperor, or change the prevailing Roman attitude toward German Protestants. It did, however, serve as a catalyst for Contarini's ideas about the relation of Catholics and Protestants, and of individual Christians to religious authority. Another issue is whether the Roman "vote of no confidence in his conduct of affairs in Regensburg meant the defeat of his party in Italy, and with it the loss of any hope of Catholic ecumenical initiative for decades, if not centuries to come," as has been maintained.^[3] The examination of Contarini's part in the meeting at Regensburg should enable us to understand its importance for him personally, its effects on his supporters and sympathizers, and finally its influence on Rome's attitude toward the Protestants.

In the background to the colloquy of Regensburg was the dangerous buildup of tension between Catholics and Protestants in Germany after the Diet of Augsburg in 1530 and the continuing Turkish threat to Habsburg lands. Charles V, supported by Granvelle and Ferdinand of Austria, was hoping to end or at least mitigate the religious dissension in Germany in preparation for a campaign against the Turks that required the support of the Protestants. Thus he became the chief advocate of colloquies between theologians of the two confessions in 1539 and 1540. The idea was not new. In 1534 and 1539 colloquies were held in Leipzig,^[4] and in April of the latter year the German princes and estates agreed in the Frankfurter Anstand^[5] that a meeting without Roman participation should be held in the summer in Nuremberg. While that did not take place, another was called at Speyer in June 1540, transferred to nearby Hagenau because of an outbreak of the plague, then adjourned to Worms for the fall.^[6] When the meeting

[3] Peter Matheson, Cardinal Contarini at Regensburg (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), 153. Ludwig von Pastor, Die kirchlichen Reunionsbestrebungen während der Regierung Karls V . (Freiburg i.B., 1879), 270, also writes about the "sudden fall" of Contarini's "party of the middle" (Partei der Mitte ) after Regensburg.

[4] For discussions of the colloquies of the decade preceding Regensburg, see Marion Hollerbach, Das Religionsgespräh als Mittel der konfessionellen und politischen Auseinandersetzung im Deutschland des 16. Jahrhunderts (Frankfurt: Lang, 1982), 108-54; and Wilhelm H. Neuser, Die Vorbereitung der Religionsgespräche von Worms und Regensburg 1540/41 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1974), 9-24. Both contain references to the older literature.

[5] The text is in Neuser, Vorbereitung , 75-85.

[6] For a fuller discussion, see Jedin, Trient 1:301-2.

finally opened on 25 November, Melanchthon and Bucer as heads of the Protestant delegation faced the controversialists Eck and Gropper leading the Catholics.^[7] Almost at the last moment Tommaso Campeggio, bishop of Feltre, was sent by Pope Paul III as his representative, but he was given no real power to maneuver. An observer rather than an active participant, he was charged with ensuring that the meeting at Worms did not usurp the competence of a general council. Several theologians accompanied him as advisors, foremost among them the Italian Dominican Tommaso Badia and his Dutch confrere Albert Pighius.^[8] He was quite overshadowed, however, by Giovanni Morone, nuncio to King Ferdinand, whose experience in German affairs was greater and whose diplomatic ability surpassed Campeggio's. The tension between the two men emerges from their correspondence^[9] as well as from the letters of the officious Pier Paolo Vergerio, self-appointed expert on the religious situation in Germany.^[10]

After sharp differences of opinion arose concerning matters of procedure, and after several fruitless meetings were held in January 1541, the emperor adjourned the colloquy to Regensburg, where an imperial diet was to convene. But the official meetings at Worms were not the whole story. Secret talks between theologians of both sides resulted in a curious document, the so-called Regensburg Book, which was to serve as the basis for discussion at the upcoming colloquy. Its formulation of articles of faith avoided controversy as much as possible. The imperial secretary and chief counselor of Charles V, Granvelle, was solidly behind it and declared it to be the work of Flemish theologians, now deceased, but such a mystifying explanation of its authorship in the end satisfied nobody. For once Melanchthon and Eck were of one mind: the former disliked the book because of its vagueness, while the latter was conspicuously violent in his denunciation of it.^[11]

Actually, the Regensburg Book was the result of secret conferences between Catholic and Protestant theologians.^[12] Composed by Gropper, then secretary to the archbishop of Cologne, with additions and

[7] Ibid., 374-77.

[8] For a complete list of participants, see NB 6:100-102.

[9] See, for example, Campeggio's letter to Farnese, Worms, 15 Dec. 1540, in ibid., 69; or very clearly in Morone's to Cervini, 10 Jan. 1540, ibid., 121.

[10] For Vergerio's role in Worms, see Schutte, Pier Paolo Vergerio , 139-52.

[11] "... Haveva fatto l'Ecchio le furie contro quel libro vituperandolo infinitamente" (Contarini to Farnese, Regensburg, 28 Apr. 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 369.

[12] Hastings Eells, "The Origin of the Regensburg Book," Princeton Theological Reviews , 26 (1928): 358. More recent is Cornelis Augustijn, "De gesprekken tussen Bucer en Gropper tijdens het godsdienstgesprek te Worms in December 1540," Nederlands archief voor kerkgeschiedenis , n.s., 47 (1965-66): 208-230.

emendations by Bucer,^[13] it contained twenty,-three articles in two parts. The first section dealt with points of doctrine such as creation, free will, the causes of sin, original sin, and justification, while in the second questions of sacraments, church organization, and authority were discussed. The work has a tentative and hesitant tone; one is struck by its effort to remain within the ever-diminishing area of shared beliefs.^[14]

Charles V was determined to do everything in his power to ensure that the diet and colloquy at Regensburg would be more fruitful than their predecessors. Exasperated by the indifference of the Catholic princes to the Turkish menace and hampered by mistrust on the part of Protestant rulers who feared an emperor strengthened by a possible victory over the Turks, he was unable to come alone to the aid of his brother, Ferdinand. He therefore intended to lay before the diet the magnitude of the Turkish danger and ask for help. But first he wanted religious concord as a result of which the situation within Germany could be stabilized and the division of the country into two armed camps averted.^[15] His aims and priorities in 1540 were clear.

Pope Paul III on principle opposed religious colloquies in Germany. He feared, with good reason, that a national diet presided over by the emperor which might ratify agreements between German theologians would leave little room for guidance from Rome and raise the specter of a national church. As an all-German solution became conceivable, the pope stated repeatedly that only a general council of the church convoked by himself was competent to deal with the doctrinal issues raised by Luther.^[16] The papal nuncio Giovanni Morone, who was present in Hagenau and Worms, was of one mind with the pope on this matter and let it be known that he was not in favor of colloquies. In his dispatches he stressed that for the emperor political questions were paramount and that he thought Charles V would use a religious accord

[13] Cornelis Augustijn, "Die Religionsgesprache der vierziger Jahre," in Die Religionsgespräche der Reformationszeit , ed. Gerhard Muller (Gutersloh: Mohn, 1980), 46; and Eells, "Origin," 371.

[14] The text of the Regensburg Book is in Georg Pfeilschifter, ed., Acta Reformationis Catholicae Ecclesiam Germaniae concernentia saeculi XVI , vol. 6 (Regensburg: F. Pustet, 1974), 21-88. This supersedes the version in Philip Melanchthon, Opera , vol. 4 of Corpus Reformatorum , ed. Karl Gottlieb Bretschneider (Halle, 1837), 190-238.

[15] For a succinct summary of Charles V's religious policies in Germany, see Heinrich Lutz, Reformation und Gegenreformation , 2d ed. (Munich and Vienna: R. Oldenbourg, 1982), 146-49 and his bibliography; Jedin, Trient 1, bk. 2, chaps. 3-5 and bibliography; and Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , chaps. 1-3.

[16] For the pope's position, see Jedin, Trient 1, bk. 2, chaps. 6-7.

only to further his own purposes,^[17] which might be detrimental to the Catholic church.

It was against this background that Contarini was chosen as envoy. He has been singled out as a "commanding figure," the "public champion of Evangelism in Italy,"^[18] who was paradigmatic of a whole generation. These statements imply the existence of a movement, with Contarini as one of its leaders. The movement in question is Italian Evangelism, that vexingly elusive phenomenon of sixteenth-century religious history in the peninsula. At present there is no consensus concerning its definition, and the debate about its nature reflects divergent trends in Italian, European, and American scholarship of the last two generations.^[19] What in 1953 was a name for "the last Catholic reform movement before the Council of Trent and the first ecumenical movement after the schism of the Reformation"^[20] has by now become so complex that it is possible to wonder, as one historian has done, whether Evangelism might not be a mere historiographical construct.^[21] The usefulness of the term and its meaning need to be rethought if it is to be rescued from purely nominalistic involutions. To what extent was it a distinct movement with a religious and political program?

The evidence for Evangelism as a movement depends primarily on the writings of a small number of well-known figures, on their correspondence, and on statements made in inquisitorial proceedings. Conclusions have been drawn on the basis of selected passages from their letters, and their personal religious stance has been explained by citing their supposed membership in a movement. The attribution of ideas held by some individuals to their friends or correspondents raises serious methodological problems.^[22] Without resorting to fanciful interpretations of sources, we can start with the fact that a general religious

[17] Morone's dispatches have been published by Franz Dittrich, "Die Nuntiaturberichte Giovanni Morone's vom Reichstage zu Regensburg 1541," Historisches Jahrbuch der Gorresgesellschaft 4 (1883): 395-472, 618-73; and in NB , vols. 5-6.

[18] Philip McNair, Peter Martyr in Italy: An Anatomy of Apostasy (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967), 12.

[19] See Elisabeth G. Gleason, "On the Nature of Italian Evangelism: Scholarship, 1953-1978," Sixteenth Century Journal 9 (1978): 3-25.

[20] Eva-Maria Jung, "On the Nature of Evangelism in Sixteenth-Century Italy," Journal of the History of Ideas 14 (1953): 512.

[21] Susanna Peyronel Rambaldi, "Ancora sull'evangelismo italiano: categoria o invenzione storiografica?" Società e storia 5, no. 18 (1982): 935-67.

[22] Andrea Del Col's acute observations on this point are useful; see Rita Belladonna and Andrea Del Col, "Per una sistemazione critica dell'evangelismo italiano e di un'opera recente," Critica storica 17 (1980): 272.

outlook was shared by a specific group, the spirituali ,^[23] who on closer examination turn out to be few in number and for the most part associated in one way or another with either Contarini or Pole, especially during the latter's residence in Viterbo as papal governor between 1541 and 1545.

This outlook included but was not restricted to "the positive reaction of certain spiritually-minded Catholics to the crucial doctrine of justification by faith "^[24] as "discovered" by Luther or as formulated by others. While acceptance of justification by faith was characteristic of the spirituali , they differed concerning its implication. At one end of a continuum there were some who saw no basic conflict between this key theological belief and the teachings of the Catholic church, while on the other end we find men and a few women for whom irreconcilable differences with the old church were the inevitable result of adhering to sola fide as a central doctrine. Still, the term Evangelism to denote that which united them, their basic religious program, is useful and should be retained. It has become a convenient shorthand designation for a whole cluster of ideas and aspirations found in varying combinations in different people over most of the sixteenth century.^[25] Foremost was the focus on ethical and moral reform of the individual Christian who encountered God's word in the Bible, specifically the Gospels and Pauline epistles, and responded with faith and trust in the divine mercy through which man had been given the incalculable benefit of Christ's death on the cross. Beyond that Evangelism was certainly

[23] For the use of the term in contemporary sources, see Gigliola Fragnito, "Gli 'spirituali' e la fuga di Bernardino Ochino," Rivista storica italiana 84 (1972): 780-81 (reprinted in her Gasparo Contarini , 255-57); also Prosperi, Tra evangelismo e controriforma , 285-86, 314. The term is not easily defined; it referred to the juxtaposition of carnal and spiritual man, but could be used in an ideological and political sense as well. See also the letter of Marcantonio Flaminio to an unknown correspondent, 12 Sept. 1542, in Flaminio, Lettere , 130: ". . . Signor mio, risvegliamoci horamai, et consideriamo che siamo christiani, cioe figlioli di Dio et non servi del mondo, creature spirituali et non carnali; conserviamo dunque il nostro decoro, et come legitimi figlioli di Dio et superiori alla vilta della carne, habbiamo uno animo grande et generoso che resista valorosamente a tutti gli impeti del mondo, della morte, del demonio et dello inferno." See also the thoughtful observations concerning the term spirituali by William V. Hudon, Marcello Cervini and Ecclesiastical Government in Tridentine Italy (De Kalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 1992), 161-74.

[24] McNair, Peter Martyr , 8.

[25] Schutte, "The Lettere Volgari ," shows the persistence of Evangelism after 1542. John Martin, "Salvation and Society in Sixteenth-Century Venice: Popular Evangelism in a Renaissance City," Journal of Modern History 60 (1988): 205-33, shows that Evangelism was not restricted to the educated elite.

"dogmatically manifold,"^[26] while emphasizing the practice of Christian virtues and the imitatio Christi . It had a common doctrinal nucleus from which its adherents then fanned out in various directions. One meaning of the term, then, refers to the core of beliefs held by the spirituali .

Evangelism also refers to a movement, if this term is used with care. Criticism of ecclesiastical institutions and proposals for church reform had been persistent themes of Italian religious thought during the first three decades of the sixteenth century.^[27] Of the many plans and projects for the reform of abuses and church doctrines, only a small fraction surfaced at the Fifth Lateran Council. During the 1520s and 1530s we find individuals and groups in Rome, Venice, Verona, Mantua, and other places reading the Bible, the fathers, and also Protestant works and pondering the relation of sinful man to merciful God. But of a recognizable movement there is as yet no evidence. Only after Contarini was made cardinal in 1535, to be later joined by Sadoleto, Pole, Fregoso, Cortese, Badia, Morone, and even Bembo, was there a focus in Rome toward which reform-minded men and women could look with hope. In that sense it is true that "it is not possible to speak of Evangelism prior to the elevation of Contarini to the cardinalate and the appointment of the commission from which the consilium de emendanda originated."^[28]

The cluster of prelates who had produced the consilium was visible proof that aspirations for reform were no longer confined to scattered individuals or a few study circles, but that reform had become an issue at the very center of the Catholic church. When some of the most vocal advocates of reform were appointed to the commission of 1536, Evangelism assumed a more definite physiognomy. It now could be described as the shared outlook and aims of a small but conspicuous brotherhood of intellectuals, many of whom held high positions in the church. Besides their stress on the necessity of individual reform—the Pauline metanoia —most saw an urgent need for institutional reform and revitalization. An exception would be those who followed Juan de

[26] The phrase is Manfred Welti's: Kleine Geschichte der italienischen Reformation (Gütersloh: Mohn, 1985), 20.

[27] Gleason, "On the Nature of Italian Evangelism," 21-22.

[28] Massimo Firpo, "Juan de Valdés e l'evangelismo italiano: appunti e problemi di una ricerca in corso," Studi storici 26 (1985): 752 (reprinted with slight modifications in his Tra alumbrados e "spirituali": studi su Juan de Valdés e il valdesianesimo nella crisi religiosa del '500 italiano [Florence: Olschki, 1990], 127-53). Jedin, Trient 1:335, thinks that 1536 was an important date for the formation of a visible "firm center" of reform in Rome, although he defines Evangelism more broadly than does Firpo.

Valdés in having no special concern for the institutional church because they detached themselves from its external framework and ceremonies, which receded almost to the category of adiaphora .^[29]

Dividing Evangelism as a movement into "right" and "left" wings, meaning respectively the group interested primarily in institutional reform and the philo-Protestants, correctly points to its diversity but also introduces an inappropriate analogy with modern political parties.^[30] Similarly, proposing the existence of a "politics of Evangelism" suggests a cohesive group or party that planned its strategy with definite objectives.^[31] The movement was in fact never cohesive or strong enough to constitute a long-term successful pressure group in the curia. What gave it prominence in Rome in the late 1530s was the caliber of its members, who undoubtedly were among the most attractive, educated, and spiritual figures at the papal court and who had correspondents and friends in Italian cities ranging from Venice to Naples, especially during the years of Valdés's residence there. It is possible to speak of Evangelism as a "party of reform" for about half a dozen years after 1536, if that term is not given a rigid definition but is applied to a network of men and a few women held together by bonds of friendship, sympathy, mutual support, and, in some cases, notably those of spirituali cardinals and bishops, collaboration in attempts to reform the church.

In this brotherhood linked by ties of friendship and sympathy Contarini had a prominent place. Aleandro, in a letter of 1539, called him "one of the main supports of the Holy Church."^[32] Even allowing for some hyperbole, this sentiment was shared by others and was more than flattery. Pole saw in Contarini's elevation to the cardinalate the direct intervention of God finally coming to the rescue of his church; as he put it to Contarini, "You did not rise to this position by chance or through human favor, but because of the call of him whose bride is the church and who knew best which men's service she needed. He could not be ignorant of what you are able to shoulder."^[33] Letters from

[29] Firpo, "'Ioanne Valdesio è stato heretico pessimo': forme, esiti e metamorfosi dell' 'heresia' valdesiana," in Tra alumbrados , esp. 43-84.

[30] Welti, Kleine Geschichte , 16, 22.

[31] Paolo Simoncelli, Evangelismo italiano del Cinquecento: questione religiosa e nicodemismo politico (Rome: Istituto Storico Italiano per l'Età Moderna e Contemporanea, 1979), passim.

[32] "... Una delle principali columne di santa chicsa," Reg ., 378 (Appendix, no. 8).

[33] Reg ., 80 (no. 270); and Ep. Poli 1:428. A few months later, in April 1536, Pole in a letter to Alvise Priuli compared Charles V with Theodosius, and Contarini with St. Ambrose, for God had called Contarini like a new Ambrose to heal the church; see Reg ., 86 (no. 283); and Ep. Poli 1:451.

friends and acquaintances repeatedly expressed the hope that God would use Contarini for the purification and rebuilding of his church,^[34] or even as an instrument in a grand plan.^[35]

Untarred by deals or by jockeying for ecclesiastical position, power, and influence, Contarini in 1536 and the years that followed certainly was an encouragement to those who had almost despaired of reform in the church. In addition to his probity he brought to his high office a certain measure of detachment, and did not use his position as an excuse for immediate involvement in curial politics or the quest for benefices. Nino Sernini, agent of Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga in Rome and a keen observer of the papal court, reported to Mantua soon after Contarini's arrival the prevailing impression of the new cardinal as a man devoted to learning who was not interested in practical affairs^[36] — a first impression that was proved wrong quite soon by Contarini's participation in the various reform commissions, as we have seen.

One year after his appointment he was definitely perceived as the champion of reform among the cardinals. Though he was not the leader of any group in the usual sense of the word, he emerged as the most influential spokesman for reform, which pitted him against the majority of his colleagues in the Sacred College. As he encountered resistance and hostility he became more outspoken and political, and of course more conspicuous. The eyes of sympathizers and enemies alike were on him. While Contarini did not exactly hold the tiller like a pilot steering the church, this view of him became an important part of his image, especially among the spirituali .^[37]

Prelates who were concerned primarily with disciplinary reform of the church, but without advocating doctrinal changes, did not hold such a favorable view of Contarini. By 1541 these men included Mar-cello Cervini, tutor and advisor of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, the pope's grandson, and also Carafa. The latter, having parted company with Contarini over the reform of the dataria and poenitentiaria , displayed no sympathy for Contarini's irenic attitude or his endeavors on behalf of religious concord in Germany, and subsequently failed to

[34] See the letters in Reg ., 76-78 (nos. 255,256, 258, 260, 266).

[35] Marcantonio Flaminio to Contarini, in Flaminio, Lettere , 26-27 (letter 3): "Questo non resterò già di dire, che tutti gli homini da bene hanno fissi gli occhi della mente in quella [i.e. Your Excellency], perchè cognoscendo et affermando ognuno ch'el suo cardinalato non è proceduto da homini, ma da Dio, meritamente si crede che sua Maiestà voglia usarla per instrumento di qualche effetto novo et segnalato."

[36] "[Contarini] è tenuto più homo da studii che da negotii" (quoted by Solmi, "Fuga," 82).

[37] Ferrero and Müller (eds.), Carteggio delle lettere di Vittoria Colonna , 127 (letter 76).

support him in the college of cardinals. Much more serious, even sinister, was his early mistrust of spirituali like Pole, Morone, and the poet Marcantonio Flaminio, on whom he gathered incriminating evidence even before the reorganization of the Roman Inquisition in 1542.^[38] It is possible that Contarini, Fregoso, Badia, and Cortese, had they lived longer, would all have been treated like Morone, who was imprisoned in 1557 by the inquisition. In Carafa's view, spirituali were suspect of heresy precisely because of their uncertainty in doctrinal matters that he considered to be above discussion and of their willingness to entertain novel ideas. To him, they seemed like a cancer in the body of the church.^[39] Thus, already in the late 1530s one can discern an increasingly sharp difference in Rome between, on the one hand, a group that wanted institutional reform without any change in traditional Catholic teaching and, on the other, the spirituali , who looked to men like Contarini and Pole for inspiration in their search for a more vital, personal, and unconstricted Christianity, in addition to reform of the institutional church.^[40]

Did old curial hands, including Pope Paul III, perceive the spirituali as a "party"? A century ago the Italian scholar Giuseppe De Leva made the intriguing suggestion that the pope, prompted by Carafa and Aleandro, chose Contarini as legate to Regensburg in a deliberate attempt to disgrace him and his sympathizers, knowing that the mission was bound to fail.^[41] With Contarini discredited, the initiative for reform of the church could then be seized by the conservative narrow constructionists of institutional reform, and the plans of the spirituali shunted aside. More recently, the same hypothesis has been advanced at greater

[38] Massimo Firpo and Dario Marcatto, "Il primo processo inquisitoriale contro il cardinal Giovanni Morone (1552-1553)," Rivista storica italiana 93 (1981): 85-86 and passim. Carafa made friends of Contarini uneasy, even fearful, already in the 1530s, as can be seen, for example, in a letter of Cortese to Contarini of 22 June 1536, which mentions that Carafa had found Flaminio possessing or reading books by heretics without permission to do so; see Alessandro Pastore, Marcantonio Flaminio (Milan: Franco Angeli, 1981), 94. Cortese requested Contarini to obtain for him a license from Paul III to read books by Protestants, and was especially worried about Carafa's reaction unless he had permission. See also Gigliola Fragnito, "Il Cardinale Gregorio Cortese," Benedictina 30 (1983): 429. For a suspicion that Cortese was tainted with heresy, see Firpo and Marcatto, Processo 1:86.

[39] Firpo and Marcatto, "Primo processo," 138.

[40] For the contrast between concepts of reform held by the two groups, see Alberto Aubert, "Alle origini della Controriforma: studi e problemi su Paolo IV," Rivista di storia e letteratura religiosa 22 (1986): 315-21, 327-38.

[41] De Leva, Storia documentata 3:412. Capasso, Paolo III 2:144, takes issue with De Leva's view. Capasso regularly interprets the actions of Paul III favorably, and defends him against the imputation of double-dealing.

length by Paolo Simoncelli.^[42] In his view Roman diplomacy expertly used Contarini and the spirituali to keep face with Charles V by sending a legate he requested who was known for his conciliatory stance, since the emperor's top priority was accord with the Protestants. All the while the pope and his closest advisors sabotaged Habsburg religious policy, having no intention of allowing serious negotiations between the two religious groups in Germany. In sum, according to Simoncelli, they did all they could to undermine the emperor and his brother abroad and to remove the spirituali from a position of prestige at home.^[43] Contarini was used very cynically as protagonist of a religious policy that had no support at the Roman court, only to be "burned" and discarded when he proved no longer necessary for the diplomatic web spun by curial intransigents.^[44] In this interpretation, Contarini and his sympathizers were perceived by intransigents at the papal court as a coherent group and a party advocating what to their opponents were unacceptable positions. That they were consciously thrown to the wolves in a premeditated move by those who saw diversity within the church as a danger if not outright heresy proved how crucial it was for conservatives to isolate and weaken them.^[45]

This argument hinges on the supposed perception of the spirituali as a pressure group with a definite agenda, which was made ineffective through a Machiavellian strategy. But who could be considered their chief enemies in 1540, when Contarini was first appointed to his German legation, and in 1541, when he was finally sent? Carafa comes to mind immediately, but he was not yet an influential figure at the papal court. The second man mentioned by De Leva was Aleandro, who on close examination does not emerge as an intransigent curialist in 1540. While he may have been playing his own political game, he supported Contarini, at least in public. In a curious letter, Aleandro stated that as an expert on German affairs he was pressed strongly (combattuto ) by the pope and many others for forty days to accept the legation himself. After reporting that he refused on account of his age and ill health (about which he provided some graphic details), he continued: "Today I broke four or five hefty lances on behalf of the appointment of the cardinal [Contarini] who is most suited for the enterprise [in question]. I did it gladly, not only because of his virtues, but also to do

[42] Simoncelli, Evangelismo italiano , 227.

[43] Ibid., 236-37.

[44] Ibid., 239.

[45] See Aubert, "Alle origini," 325-26, for Carafa's view of diversity, and dissent.

honor to his fatherland, and on many [other] accounts."^[46] A month earlier, however, Cardinal Farnese had written from the imperial court quite plainly that Aleandro would not be accepted there if he were sent.^[47] One wonders whether the importuning that Aleandro describes corresponded to reality; Paul III trusted the opinions of his grandson and would hardly have insisted on a legate who was likely to be rejected by the emperor. In the same letter, Aleandro adds a puzzling note: "While [Contarini] was praised by all after being openly proposed by the pope, and the appointment was approved, yet in private, where deals are made, he was much attacked."^[48] Aleandro stressed that he came to Contarini's defense and that he was instrumental in swaying Paul III to appoint the Venetian cardinal as legate.

How truthful he was is difficult to determine without some corroborating evidence, of which we find just a bit in a letter sent seven months later to Aleandro by Contarini's close friend and confessor Tommaso Badia, then in Germany: "Among the consoling news I received from Rome, the most special was that I heard that the holy and affectionate friendship between Your Reverence and Card[inal] Cont[arini] not only continues but is growing daily. [It is] most useful to the Sacred College and edifying to Holy Church."^[49] Granted that this evidence is not conclusive, still, it militates against adding Aleandro to the opponents of Contarini in 1540, or to those who plotted to discredit him, unless Aleandro was entirely double-faced.

Carafa had no voice in the appointment of Contarini, and Aleandro was probably not among Contarini's enemies at that particular point. There remains Cardinal Marcello Cervini. His loyalty to the pope

[46] Aleandro to Leone Maffei, Rome, 21 May 1540, in NB 5:258-59.

[47] Farnese to Pope Paul III, Ghent, 26 Apr. 1540, in ibid., 201; see also 197.

[48] Ibid., 259. The Italian text is not clear, and admits of different interpretations: ". . . et sappi V.S. [Maffei] che, sì come da poi la aperta propositione di N.S. [Paul III, to appoint Contarini] fu da tutti molto laudato egli et approbata questa commissione, così in secreto, ove si danno li syroppi preparatorii, hebbe molto contrasto." I thank Professor Rita Belladonna for help with this passage. That Contarini had enemies also appears from a sentence in the dispatch of Marco Bracci, the Florentine agent in Rome, of 31 May 1540: "May God grant that he [Contarini] achieves something good and does not make an accord with the Lutherans, since he is a blood-brother of Lucifer" (quoted by Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste 5:272n.5. I wish to thank Professor Paolo Simoncelli for verifying this quotation in ASF, and informing me that Bracci gives no further explanation of his meaning.
It is likely that the opponents of Contarini belonged to the pro-French group in the curia and the college of cardinals, and therefore worked against religious concord in Germany, which would have strengthened the Habsburgs.

[49] Worms, 28 Dec. 1540, in NB 6:95; and Red ., 139 (no. 525).

earned him the trust of the Farnese family. In 1539 he accompanied Cardinal Farnese to Flanders, and subsequently he was appointed legate to the imperial court, where he resided from May to October 1540. A man of great religious seriousness, he had the reputation of being a supporter of reform in Carafa's sense rather than Contarini's. His former pupil Cardinal Farnese is reported to have characterized him as "more of a Theatine than Chieti [Carafa]."^[50] If that was the case, then his hesitations about a religious colloquy become comprehensible. He wanted to make sure that Contarini as legate would have no independence and that everything was remanded for decision to the pope and the college of cardinals, as he emphasized to the emperor.^[51]

Cervini in several letters reiterated that the pope must proceed with extreme caution in dealing with the emperor and the Protestants.^[52] There is nothing in his dispatches against Contarini personally, about whom he usually speaks in neutral tones. On several occasions he reports that Contarini is viewed favorably by Charles V and his advisors, for example on 10 August 1540: "If it seems [suitable] to His Holiness to send a legate to the colloquy, as it does to His Majesty, the Rev. Cardinal Contarini has already been designated [for the mission]. I see that he pleases everybody wonderfully well [mirabilmente ]. It would be well to send him soon, and with him persons who are learned in theology, especially in exegesis, in canon law and councils [of the church]."^[53] Cervini reports without disapproval Granvelle's statement that Charles V would like to see no fewer than three legates to the colloquy, and concludes: "with all [due] respect [I would like to] add that if in the meantime a real reform were undertaken, as I hope, we could expect greater results, since in truth we can defend anything better than our abuses."^[54]

These are hardly the sentiments of a mere conservative who did not want to rock the boat. Cervini was no sycophant, and at times he wrote things that were blunt indeed. His wish for reform of the church at this point was secondary to his main concern, which was to uphold the honor of the papacy and give firm support to the political aims of

[50] Quoted in NB 5:269n.1, from a letter of Leone Maffei to Cervini, Rome, 4 June 1540.

[51] Cervini to Cardinal Farnese, Bruges, 25 June 1540, in ibid., 313. For Cervini's negative view of religious colloquies, see esp. his letter to Farnese, Brussels, 5-6 Sept. 1540, in ibid., 389.

[52] Ibid., 315; also same to same, Bruges, 3-4 July 1540, ibid., 329.

[53] Same to same, from Leiden, in ibid., 367.

[54] Ibid.

Paul III. In a very real way Cervini was the mouthpiece of the pope and his grandson. He comes closer than anyone to "using" Contarini in the sense suggested by Simoncelli.^[55] Convinced that the religious colloquies favored by the emperor would have no results, he wanted to ensure that a good front would be put on Catholic participation in what he considered an essentially hopeless enterprise. He obviously was not interested in Contarini's success as such, and had no sympathy for a conciliatory approach to Protestants. The dispatches he sent back to Rome show his realization that the initiative in German affairs lay with the emperor and that the papacy had to respond to the policies proposed by the Habsburg brothers. Thus he encouraged the appointment of Contarini for weighty reasons, not just as an attempt to discredit him. In his opinion, such an appointment was the best response to the emperor's explicit wishes for a reasonable legate whom he could trust. Although Cervini himself did not trust Contarini fully, he realized the Venetian cardinal's usefulness for the pope, and he was unconcerned about Contarini's likely loss of prestige in discussions with the Protestants, which would probably prove unsuccessful.^[56] That he felt somewhat uneasy about Contarini, however, can be seen from his repeated urging of Cardinal Farnese to set strict limits within which the legate was to operate.^[57]

An early mention of Contarini as possible legate was actually made by Cardinal Farnese, and its context is clear. In a long letter to the pope dealing with political issues he expressed his concern about the effects that meetings between Protestants and Catholics might have on the interests of the papacy. Anticipating the possibility of sending a legate, Farnese urged Paul III to dispatch Contarini to his bishopric of Belluno, or Pole to Verona, "or others like them to similar places, who ostensibly are going on business of their own. Thus, having them close

[55] See esp. Simoncelli, Evangelismo italiano , 250-57.

[56] In a letter to Farnese, Brussels, 12 Sept. 1540, Cervini is quite explicit about the likely failure of religious colloquies, at the same time counseling the pope to send Contarini if a colloquy were to be held, "so that it could never be said that Your Holiness was the cause of any trouble." He thinks that a way of preventing the colloquy and the diet would be through the marriage of Vittoria Farnese, the pope's granddaughter and a member of the French house of Lorraine, presumable because a Franco-papal rapprochement would deflect the attention of Charles V from Germany; see NB 5:399. Cervini does no more than a strong supporter of the pope would have done by advising Paul III to send a man most acceptable to the emperor if a colloquy proved unavoidable. He showed no special interest in Contarini as an individual, he simply happened to be convenient at that moment. In that sense he, like all successful diplomats, was anxious to make use of whatever would be helpful in achieving his objectives.

[57] For example, in his letter from Utrecht, 14 Aug. 1540, in ibid., 369. See also Hudon, Marcello Cervini , 37-38.

to Germany, they would always be ready to go to the meeting in Speier [where the colloquy was to be held] when Your Holiness orders it."^[58] To make sure that there would be no delay, they should be provided beforehand with instructions and be prepared to set out immediately. To Cardinal Farnese's mind the interests of Rome had to be safeguarded by keeping close watch on the course of events in Germany and by making sure that papal representatives were present. Since Morone and Cervini were not trusted by the emperor and his brother because of their negative views of religious colloquies, he suggested other, more acceptable candidates. Soon afterward the papal nuncio Poggio wrote that the first secretary Granvelle, speaking for the emperor, had let it be known that Charles V would be pleased if Contarini were sent.^[59] By the end of April 1540, Contarini was repeatedly named by Cardinal Farnese as one of the most suitable potential legates from the perspective of the Habsburgs,^[60] while Charles V was reported to consider Contarini as his friend and a man of integrity.^[61] In addition, the Venetian cardinal was included among the handful of men at the Roman court acceptable to the Protestants.^[62]

The appointment of Contarini quite clearly came about in response to the reports of papal envoys regarding the emperor's wishes.^[63] The available evidence does not suggest the existence of a concerted plan

[58] Letter of 17 April 1540, ibid., 180.

[59] Poggio to Paul III, Ghent, 24-25 Apr. 1540, in ibid., 198.

[60] Farnese to Paul III, Ghent, 26 Apr. 1540, in ibid., 201; and 26 and 27 Apr., ibid., 205.

[61] Cervini to Farnese, Bruges, 25 June 1540, in ibid., 313. The emperor had singled out Contarini on a previous occasion, when they met in Bologna in 1530, treating him as a friend; see Albèri, Relazioni , 2d ser., 3:162.

[62] Bernardo Sanzio to Farnese, Worms, 15 Dec. 1540, mentions several other possible candidates for the office of legate; see NB 6:67. A week later, on 23 December, the nuncio Tommaso Campeggio reports that the Protestants have confidence in Contarini, Sadoleto, Pole, and Fregoso; ibid., 90.

[63] A. Farnese, in a letter to Poggio from Rome, 8 Jan. 1541 (BAV, Chigi L. III. 65, fols. 121v-122r), expresses this clearly: "Ma perchè, come per altre mie ho scritto a V.S., la fede che N. S ha nella prudentia et religione di S. M et il desiderio grande che la tiene di satisfarle, è stata quella sola cagione, che ha mosso S. S di mandare al Colloquio con speranza che tanto piu S. M debba esser pronta alla difesa della fede Chr et autorità della Sede Ap quanto S. B piu si sforzasse di contentaria. . . . La persona del legato sarà Mons mio R Contarino, il quale oltra allo havere quelle conditioni et di lettere et di prudentia che S. M ha detto ricercarsi in questo caso è stato ancora approvato da lei come amico et confidente." On 28 January, Farnese wrote again to Poggio: "Mons mio R Contareno questa mattina col nome di Dio è partito di Roma per il viaggio suo alla Dieta, alla quale N. S 10 ha deputato Legato. Il che S. S ha fatto con quella intentione et animo che ho scritto per le altre a V.S., cio è piu per satisfare al desiderio et iuditio di S. M Ces che per nessuna altra cagione" (ibid., fol. 137v). The first letter is summarized in NB 6:182-84, and the second on pp. 188-89.

to undercut the spirituali through Contarini's mission, or to discredit him and his friends. Contarini's prestige was certainly used in a calculated fashion, and arguably with callous disregard of his personal success or failure, to the advantage of the papacy. Cardinal Farnese, Cervini, Morone, even Aleandro realized that Contarini's reputation as a learned and good man interested in reform could serve the Catholic side well.^[64] But they thought of him first and foremost as a diplomat in the service of the papacy, not as a proponent of his own views in a religious colloquy. His personality, had earned him the emperor's good opinion, which was a decided advantage for Rome,^[65] as was the fact that he had become familiar with the German situation already during his residence at the imperial court and continued to be informed about it in his correspondence with Catholic scholars, especially Cochlaeus and Eck.^[66] All these reasons explain the choice of Contarini better than a hypothetical plot against him and his supporters.

The Chimera of Concord

Contarini did not approach his mission with starry-eyed idealism and optimism. He was, after all, a seasoned diplomat who knew how extremely difficult it was for third parties to navigate between the Scylla and Charibdis of the Habsburgs and the Valois and to face German Protestant princes and theologians. He announced his appointment as legate on 21 May 1540 to Cervini, Morone, and Sadoleto in almost identical letters, with however, small and telling differences. To the first he wrote that although the task he was undertaking surpassed the strength of his mind and body, he accepted it in obedience to the pope and in the hope of doing some good to the church.^[67] In informing Morone, he strikes a more personal note: "Recognizing that this charge is beyond my strength, I place my confidence in God's goodness, which will have to come to my aid, otherwise I shall be lost."^[68] To Sadoleto he adds that he accepted the lega-

[64] The puzzling remark in the dispatch of Marco Bracci, the Florentine envoy in Rome, of 31 May 1540, shows that some curialists thought Contarini too "soft" on Lutheranism; sec note 48 above.

[65] Farnese is quite unequivocal on this point in his letter to the nuncio Poggio, Rome, 28 Jan. 1541; see NB 6:189.

[66] See GC , 511-17, and the references there to the letters exchanged with them.

[67] Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):84.

[68] Ibid., 81; and Reg ., 125 (no. 470).

tion so that he might try to the best of his ability to do something for the honor of God during the last part of his life.^[69] These were no empty phrases, but the sentiments of a man who bore no illusions of the difficulties he would face yet who gladly undertook a task that no fallow cardinal envied him.^[70]

Contarini did not imagine a colloquy as a means of quickly healing the breach of religious unity, as can be seen from a letter to Cervini that he drafted on behalf of Cardinal Farnese in the spring or summer of 1540. He stressed that the pope did not think a colloquy likely to be useful to the church unless the Catholic participants and the two Habsburg rulers promised to submit everything to the Holy See for approval before entering into any agreements with the Protestants.^[72] Morone's dispatches had revealed to Contarini the extent of the problems he faced, as had letters from Tommaso Badia, who warned about the "obduracy" of the Protestants and expressed pessimism concerning the possibility of a genuine exchange of views with them.^[72]

Contarini knew well that as legate he could not be an independent agent and that his sphere of action would be strictly circumscribed. To Eck, who congratulated him on his legation, he wrote: "You have no reason to congratulate me. My task is very difficult, and it goes far beyond my powers. Nevertheless, as I underook it gladly, trusting in God's help, so I hope that with God's guidance some good will come of it."^[73] A few months previously, however, Contarini had written a more revealing letter to the same correspondent, emphasizing that "even in a desperate situation the Christian must not completely abandon hope, but hope against hope. . . . I believe that our task is to carry on the fight with benevolence and good deeds so that our adversaries will be ashamed, or at least should be ashamed because they are separating themselves from loving brothers."^[74] Although more than a decade separated these words from the conclusion of his Confutatio articulorum seu quaestionum Lutheranorum, we see here the same idea

[69] Reg ., 126 (no. 471); and Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):81.

[70] Report of the Ferrarese envoy to Rome, Ruggieri, 12 Jan. 1541, as quoted by Capasso, Paolo III 2:145n.2: "Viene notato che questo signore [Contarini] mostra di andare molto volontieri forse confidandosi per la bona mente che tiene di poter trovare qualche modo et forma a questa unione delle chiese . . . et non vi è alcun di questi Rev [cardinals] che ne gli habbia una invidia al mondo." Also Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste 5:840, no. 38.

[71] Reg ., 313 (Inedita, no. 48).

[72] To Contarini, Worms, 28 Dec. 1540, in Reg ., 138 (no. 524).

[73] Regensburg, 10 Apr. 1541, in Reg ., 316 (Inedita, no. 54).

[74] Rome, 6 Jan. 1541, in Reg ., 314-15 (Inedita, no. 51).

that if only the Catholics are sincere and loving, they will impress the Protestants. This attitude has been wrongly interpreted as showing Contarini's kindness as well as his wishful thinking and lack of a clear personal plan of action.^[75] Actually, as we have seen, he consistently held the view that human beings were rational creatures responsive to reason, argument, and example. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he did not see enemies in those who had different opinions from the ones he held, but quite literally brothers who were within the bounds of the Christian family.

Although Contarini was appointed on 21 May 1540, his mission was delayed for eight months because of political and procedural issues,^[76] and the colloquy of Hagenau opened in June 1540 without a papal legate present. Morone defended the interests of the papacy with mixed success, since the German Catholics were disunited and he was not given their firm support. His situation was difficult as well as unpleasant, and his pleas for Contarini's arrival increased in urgency. What with the Venetian cardinal's delay and the calling of the colloquy to Worms, Morone became very pessimistic, predicting that the whole of Germany would become Protestant unless the pope acted decisively.^[77] He repeatedly transmitted requests from Granvelle for Contarini's presence.^[78] On 8 January 1541, Farnese informed the nuncio Poggio of the pope's decision to send a legate to Regensburg: "That legate will be my lord Contarini, who in addition to possessing the qualities of learning and prudence which His Majesty considers desirable for [someone entrusted with] this mission also has the approval of [the emperor] as a friend and confidant."^[79] Contarini was formally designated as legate two days later,^[80] and on 28 January he left Rome for the arduous trip across the Apennines and Alps in winter; as

[75] Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 50, maintains that "Contarini was perhaps clear enough about what he wanted to achieve. On the question of how it was to be achieved he was intolerably and inexcusably vague."

[76] See Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste 5:273-74, 277-78; GC , 523-25; and Reg ., 134 (no. 507).

[77] Morone to Farnese, Hagenau, 23 July 1540, in Franz Dittrich, Nuntiaturberichte Giovanni Morones vom deutschen Königshofe, 1539-1540 (Paderborn, 1892), 177.

[78] To Farnese, Worms, 10 Jan. 1541, in NB 6:119; or 18 Jan. 1541, ibid., 128.

[79] Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 649. See also note 63 above.

[80] ASVat, Arch. Consist., Acta Misc. 18 (1517-48), fol. 336v, records Contarini's appointment: "S.D.N. creavit in S.R.E. Legatum de latere Rm D. Gasparem Presb Cardinalem Contarenum in partibus Germaniae, et ad ea potissimum loca, ad quae eum declinare contigerit, cum facultatibus prout in literis continebatur."

Farnese repeated, he was sent "most of all in response to the wishes and judgment of His Imperial Majesty rather than for any other reason."^[81]

Contarini's written instruction, which reached him after his arrival in Trent, was drawn up by a committee composed of Cervini, Ghinucci, and Aleandro, then submitted to Farnese and the pope for the final wording. Aleandro considered himself an expert in German affairs and adopted a tone of condescension toward Contarini in the letter to Farnese that accompanied the draft of the instruction: "I am so bold as to say that, since through much experience in this matter I know German affairs very well, it has seemed [appropriate] to me to insert [into the instruction] certain specifics and suggestions for doing things which cannot be appreciated properly by those who are not as expert [as I], even though they excel in knowledge, intelligence, and good judgment."^[82] In the name of the committee he urged Farnese to be sure to remind Contarini to "[read and] reread the instruction carefully and to do what he is ordered in it, and if he has any objections, to put them in writing."^[83]

Contarini's instruction is of extraordinary importance for revealing how his mission appeared from the perspective of Paul III and his grandson.^[84] Absolutely nothing in its tone or substance hints at an interest in promoting or even countenancing genuine discussion of theological issues with the Protestants. The legate is not sent with authority to conclude anything, contrary to what the Habsburgs had hoped. The reasons for this circumstance are spelled out. First, it remained to be seen to what extent the Protestants, "who have departed from the bosom of the church," were still in accord with Catholics on such key doctrines as papal primacy, the sacraments of the church, and others

[81] See note 59 above. Contarini wrote from Bologna to Farnese about the bad roads, continuous snowfall, and the strain on men and horses; see ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fols. 5v-6r. See also the descriptions by Contarini's companions of the hardships en route in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):31n.44.

[82] Aleandro to Farnese, Rome, 15 Feb. 1541, in NB 7:3.

[83] Ibid., 4.

[84] The instruction, dated 28 January 1541 and signed by Farnese, reached him on 24 February. The original is in ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 21, fols. 5r-10r (hereafter cited as Instr .); it is printed in part in CT 12:192-93. The complete but frequently incorrect text (or one for which another version was the source) is in Ep. Poli 3:cclxxxvi-ccic, reprinted in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):112-22. Anton Pieper, Zur Entstehungsgeschichte der stän-digen Nuntiaturen (Freiburg i.B., 1894), 171-72, offers a very incomplete list of corrections of the text in Ep. Poli on the basis of the above manuscript; one suspects that he relied on the hasty collation of an assistant. Thus the manuscript remains the only reliable version of the document.

confirmed by Scripture and tradition. "From the very moment that there is disagreement on these issues, any attempt at agreement on other controverted matters would be bound to fail,"^[85] Contarini is told. Second, he cannot be sent as a plenipotentiary because the demands of the Protestants are not known. Finally, what can be guessed about these demands is such that not even the pope, if he were personally present in Regensburg, could grant them without consulting other nations lest he cause scandal or imperil souls.^[86]

These arguments demonstrate that in 1541 the break in Christian unity was regarded as a given at the highest levels of the Catholic church. The pope and his closest advisors on religious matters in Germany, far from searching for accommodations and compromises or showing openness to Protestant concerns, drew firm lines of defense behind which Contarini was instructed to remain. If taken literally, his instruction would have precluded any dialogue between representatives of the two confessions unless the Protestants accepted the Catholic positions on some of the most controverted issues.

The same mentality can be seen in the repeated references to heresy and heretics in the instruction. Contarini is to work for the convocation of a general council, "which has always been the specific and usual remedy of the church against heresy and schism."^[87] He must employ all his efforts to prevent a national council in Germany, where "the Lutherans could easily defend their heresies against the dogmas and glorious rituals of the Holy Catholic Church."^[88] The solution to the religious discord in Germany is simple: if the Germans really desire peace, they should strive to preserve the faith in the spiritual realm and justice in the temporal as regards the property of the church, and should submit those articles on which there is disagreement to the judgment of the pope, who as the good shepherd would find a way of settling the differences.^[89]

Paul III viewed the Protestants simply as heretics. If the role of peacemaker in Germany that he proposed for himself seems utterly unrealistic to us, we should nevertheless take it seriously as an indi-

[85] Instr ., fols. 5v-6r: "Primum quia videndum in primis est, an protestantes, et ii qui ab ecclesiae gremio defecerunt, in principiis nobiscum conveniant, cuiusmodi est huius sanctae Sedis primatus tanquam a Deo et Salvatore nostro institutus, sacrosanctae ecclesiae sacramenta, et alia quaedam, quae tum sacrarum litterarum autoritate, rum universalis ecclesiae perpetua observatione hactenus comprobata fuerunt, et tibi nora esse bene scimus. Quibus statim initio omissis, omnis super aliis controversiis concordia frustra tentaretur."

[86] Ibid., fol. 6r.

[87] Ibid., fol. 7r; and CT 12:192.

[88] Instr ., fol. 7v; and CT 12:193.

[89] Instr ., fol. 6r.

cation of his way of thinking, and also of his limited imagination. For him there was a clearly defined hierarchy in the religious universe, at the top of which stood the pope—that is, himself. In this hierarchy there was no place for heretics. He might extend his kindness to those who erred; but of a serious discussion with them there was no question. The only relation envisioned by him was a strictly vertical one. He could stoop toward the Protestants because of the duties imposed by his pastoral office to find lost sheep. Any arrangement that positioned the two sides as equals in a discussion, however, was precluded by the very definition of what heretics were thought to be in the church: the sowers of error and untruth. Paul III's view was like that of Gianpietro Carafa, who almost a decade before had written to Pope Clement VII on this subject in a similar vein, maintaining that heretics must be treated as heretics, and that gentleness toward them only increased their obduracy.^[90] Cutting the cord rather than building bridges to them would become the attitude of the Counter-Reformation church.

The pope and Cardinal Farnese, as well as the three drafters of the instruction, knew that Contarini thought otherwise and that he was no hard-liner. A hint of exasperation accompanies a telling passage of the instruction which betrays the worry that Contarini might be too accommodating to the Protestants. He is reminded of ideas he had previously expressed in conversation, that no concord could be achieved by sharp words or violent ways. What he was then told orally is now repeated in writing: Lutherans are extremely crafty, they have in the past twisted the words uttered by their opponents in good faith, and they will do so again. Contarini is enjoined quite emphatically to safeguard his dignity as papal legate first and foremost. Although he is of course an agent, he is also the pope's "deputy,"^[91] and his personal views are to be subordinated to those of the sovereign whom he represents. He is permitted to deal with the heretics (as they are flatly called) in a conciliatory manner, but warned to be on the alert to anything that might harm the Holy See.^[92]

Here we see a mistrust of Contarini's manner that reminds us of Cervini's letters from the imperial court to Farnese urging that Contarini be given explicit instructions for his mission from which he may not depart. The mind of the more conservative advisors of Paul III was

[90] "De Lutheranorum haeresi reprimenda et ecclesia reformanda ad Clementem VII [4. octobris 1532]," in CT 12:68; English translation in Gleason, Reform Thought , 59.

[91] William Roosen, "Early Modern Diplomatic Ceremonial: A Systems Approach," Journal of Modern History 52 (1980): 455, discusses the diplomat as "stand-in."

[92] Instr ., fol. 9v.

made up: they had no difficulties in drawing the sort of lines between truth and error, Catholicism and Protestantism, or obedience and rebellion over which Contarini hesitated and agonized. Quite simply, his view of Catholicism was not theirs.

A negative outlook can also be seen in the orders to Contarini on how to deal with the emperor. The legate is not to support Charles V's quest for peace in Germany if that means making any concession to Protestants. Should the emperor be inclined toward a truce with them, or toward affirming the decisions made in Nuremberg in 1532, Contarini is instructed to remind him of his duties as protector of the church. Over and over the same idea is repeated: only a general council is the proper body for the resolution of religious differences; no national assembly has any standing in the eyes of the pope.^[93] If any agreements contrary to the interests of the Holy See were to be made, Contarini is ordered to condemn and declare them void and to withdraw from the diet, without, however, leaving the imperial court before receiving further instructions.^[94] Nobody seems to have cared to imagine how extremely uncomfortable Contarini's position would have been in such a case.

This instruction proves beyond any doubt that the colloquy at Regensburg was not viewed either as an event of major importance by the pope and his curial advisors or as a real chance for solving the differences with the Protestants. The pope had to respond to the emperor's wishes or be accused of sabotaging religious peace in Germany. So he responded, without any expectation of substantive results, by sending an expert diplomat, a good and learned man who, as he well knew, would make a favorable impression on all he met or dealt with. But Paul III and his grandson also made sure that the legate's wings were clipped and that he had no freedom of movement. In fact, his chief purpose was unequivocally spelled out. Contarini was instructed to take a notary and witnesses to all his political or religious discussions, so that a documentary record might exist which would prove to posterity that the pope had made every effort in the cause of the faith, omitting no opportunity of working for the convening of a general council.^[95] In sum, Contarini was not to negotiate with the Protestants but instead was expected to speak for a pope who was anxious not

[93] Ibid., fol. 7r; and CT 12:192.

[94] Instr ., fol. 7v; and CT 12:193.

[95] Instr ., fol. 8r: "Et omnibus his per te sic dicendis, agendis et faciendis, notarium et testes adhibebis, prius secreto commonefactos, ut ea, quae in huiusmodi casibus dices et facies, et tibi respondebuntur, diligenter attendant, et observent, et notarius ipse in notam sumat, unde unum vel plura confici possit instrumentum, vel instrumenta, per quae perpetuis temporibus cognoscatur nos causae fidei nullo unquam tempore, nullisque modis defuisse."

to appear before the world as dragging his feet on the matter of the council but who resolutely rejected any purely German solution of the Protestant-Catholic split as unacceptable and harmful to the welfare of the universal church.

The literature on the colloquy of Regensburg is vast.^[96] The dramatic meeting captured the imagination of scholars especially in the nineteenth century and again in our own time, when ecumenical concerns have become important to almost all Christian denominations.^[97] But opinions on whether Regensburg was the last chance for religious concord differ considerably, as do assessments of the possibility of any substantive agreement in 1541.^[98] It is tempting to romanticize the situation and the participants, or to entertain "what if" scenarios. Even historians of the stature of Ranke and Pastor, for very different reasons,

[96] For a bibliography, see Karl Schottenloher, Bibliographie zur deutschen Geschichte im Zeitalter der Glaubensspaltung , 2d ed., vol. 3 (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1957), 22, nos. 28073-83. Paul Vetter, Die Religionsverhandlungen auf dem Reichstage zu Regensburg 1541 (Jena, 1889), despite its age, is still an excellent survey. Also still useful is Pastor, Die kirchlichen Reunionsbestrebungen . Among more recent works Pierre Fraenkel's Einigungsbestrebungen in der Reformationszeit (Mainz: Institut für Europläische Geschichte, 1965) is most helpful for a brief overview. See also Robert Stupperich, Der Humanismus und die Wiedervereinigung der Konfessionen (Leipzig: M. Heinsius Nachfolger, 1936); Walter Friedensburg, Kaiser Karl V. und Papst Paul III. (1534-1549 ) (Leipzig: M. Heinsius Nachfolger, 1932); August Korte, Die Konzilspolitik Karls V. in den Jahren 1538-1543 (Halle a.d.S.: E. Karras, 1905); Cardauns, Zur Geschichte der kirchlichen Unions- und Reformbestrebungen ; Cornelis Augustijn, De godsdienstgesprekken tussen rooms-katholieken en protestanten van 1538 tot 1541 (Haarlem: De Erven F. Bohn, 1967); Basil Hall, "The Colloquy Between Catholics and Protestants, 1539-41," Studies in Church History 7 (1971): 235-66; and Gerhard Müller, ed., Die Religionsgesprache der Reformationszeit (Gütersloh: Mohn, 1980). For a briefer survey, see Jedin, Trient 1:299-315.

[97] See, e.g., "U.S. Lutheran-Roman Catholic Dialogue: Justification by Faith," Origins: NC Documentary Service 13, no. 17 (6 October 1983); and H. George Anderson, T. Austin Murphy, and Joseph A. Burgess, eds., Justification by Faith , Lutherans and Catholics in Dialogue 7 (Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1985), 28-33, 200-217.

[98] Hubert Jedin, "An welchen Gegensätzen sind die vortridentinischen Religionsgespräche zwischen Katholiken und Protestanten gescheitert?" Theologie und Glaube 48 (1958): 50-55; Joseph Lortz, "Wert und Grenzen der katholischen Kontroverstheologie in der ersten Hälfte des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts," in Um Reform und Reformation , ed. A. Franzen (Münster i.W.: Aschendorff, 1968), 9-32; Karl-Heinz zur Mühlen, "Die Einigung über den Rechtfertigungsartikel auf dem Regensburger Religionsgespräch von 1541—eine verpasste Chance?," Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 76 (1979): 331-59; and Vinzenz Pfnür, "Die Einigung bei den Religionsgesprächen 1540/41: eine Täuschung?" in Müller (ed.), Religionsgespräiche , 55-88.

were strangely optimistic, indulging in what can only be called wishful thinking when they discussed the instruction for Contarini.^[99] They saw much greater possibilities of success than a careful reading of the document in fact warrants. It is important to remember that neither knew the original. Dittrich (who also did not) is somewhat more cautious in assessing the instruction, but in the end gives the pope the benefit of the doubt: "Whether Paul III was at all prepared to make concessions remains uncertain. Perhaps he wanted to leave it up to his legate to see how far he could get in his negotiations with the Protestants, but [the pope] reserved the final decision for himself."^[100] This is a frankly apologetic interpretation of the clear directives Contarini was given, and says more about Dittrich's willingness to shed the most favorable light on the motives of the pope than about the instruction. For Rome, the question was not at all whether a genuine meeting of minds would occur during the colloquy, since Rome's understanding of concord was entirely one-sided: it meant the return of the Protestants to the one fold and its one shepherd, period. But even from the curial perspective there was a kind of last-chance atmosphere about Regensburg. At one point, the instruction compares the colloquy to a sheet-anchor; should it fail, the pope would no longer be gentle with the heretics, but was resolved to become more severe.^[101]

Contarini and his small suite arrived just outside Regensburg on 11 March. No distinguished churchman accompanied the legate. While several high-ranking prelates had originally been proposed, and Contarini had his own candidates, the group with him in the end was made up mostly of younger men in sympathy with his views, who were to fulfill various secretarial duties.^[102] On 12 March, the legate was

[99] Leopold yon Ranke, Die römischen Päpste in den letzten vier Jahrhunderten , 9th ed. (Leipzig, 1889), 1:105, writes that "in the vague nature of the papal words there lay the possibility of success"; and Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste 5:300, echoes this opinion: "This indefinite wording was chosen on purpose: it left the cardinal a certain space for maneuvering, and opened the possibility of success."

[100] GC , 568.

[101] Instr ., fol. 9r: "Nam quum constans omnium iudicium sit, si Caesarea Maiestas ab isto conventu seu Dieta Imperialis (ad quam bene gerendae rei omnis spes velut ad sacram (ut aiunt) ancoram, remissa fuerat) in üs, quae ad religionem pertinent, vel re infecta, vel male gesta discesserit, totam religionera in Germania pessum ituram, non abs re facturi videamur, si post humanitatem et mansuetudinem, quibus in hac causa usi sumus, tandem in hoc postremo articulo autoritatem nobis a Domino traditam aliquanto severius exerceamus."

[102] He was accompanied by his secretary Lodovico Beccadelli; his vicar in Belluno, Girolamo Negri; and his friends Adamo Fumano, Trifone Benci, Vincenzo Parpaglia, and Filippo Gheri; see Gigliola Fragnito, Gasparo Contarini: un magistrato veneziano al servizio della cristianità (Florence: Olschki, 1988), 57. Contarini had invited his friend Gregorio Cortese and the poet Marcantonio Flaminio to accompany him, the first as theological advisor and the second as an outstanding Latinist. But Cortese excused himself on account of illness (see Gregorii Cortesii omnia 1:140), while Flaminio refused, ostensibly fearing for his life if he had to make such a journey in his poor state of health. His letters to Beccadelli and Contarini—in which he protests perhaps too strenuously— are in his Lettere , 96-100. Flaminio clearly did not want to go. Pastore, in ibid., 97n.1, gives a list of men originally proposed to go with Contarini. Eberhard Gothein, Ignatius von Loyola und die Gegenreformation (Halle, 1895), 287, maintains that Aleandro, "der alto Intrigant," suggested that the narrowly orthodox Pedro Ortiz, Charles V's ambassador to Rome, accompany Contarini as a sort of check.

received with great ceremony, and "it seem[ed] that everyone was very glad that he had come," as Francesco Contarini, the Venetian ambassador to King Ferdinand, reported to the Senate.^[103]

The dispatches of this distant relative of the legate are an important source for the diplomatic aspects of Contarini's mission. The ambassador saw the legate frequently, was acquainted with men in his suite, and reported a good deal of hearsay that helps us to recreate the atmosphere of the meeting. That the Catholic side in the colloquy was facing no easy task can be seen even in the left-handed compliment Francesco Contarini paid the Lutherans (or was he deliberately espousing the stance of a naive observer?) when he wrote:

His Holiness [the pope] is praised to the skies for having decided to send the Rev. Contarini here. As for myself, I believe and hold that which Holy Mother Church believes, and intend to die in this [belief]. Hearing the Rev. legate talk, I am extremely pleased, and it seems to me that there is no one who understands matters better than he does. However, when I then talk with Lutherans (since it is not possible to avoid being also with them), they present so many arguments with a flood of words that I must frankly confess to Your Excellencies that I do not know what to answer them, since that is not my profession.^[104]

If even a Venetian detached from the German religious situation felt the strength of the Lutheran cause, it is not difficult to imagine the depth of support for it held by the convinced Protestants whom Contarini was about to meet.

[103] Regensburg, 13 Mar. 1541, in VBM, MSS It., C1. VII, 802 (=8219), fol. 173v (cited hereafter as F. Contarini, Dispatches). Excerpts or summaries of many of his dispatches are in CSPV , vol. 5, and some are excerpted in Reg . They deserve to be read in full for the lively quality of the reporting. Mackensen, "The Diplomatic Role of Gasparo Contarini at the Colloquy of Ratisbon of 1541," Church History 27 (1958): 322, errs in thinking that Francesco Contarini was the legate's brother.

[104] F. Contarini, Dispatches, 26 Mar. 1541, fol. 176r; and, in a different translation, CSPV 5:94.

Contarini found the emperor in Regensburg waiting for German princes who were slow to come or to send their representatives. Contrary to his expectations, no theologians were present, and even in late March the fate of the colloquy was still uncertain.^[105] Among Catholics, the dukes of Bavaria led the opposition to the colloquy, while on the Protestant side the powerful elector of Saxony and his supporters considered the meeting pointless. For all his experience as a diplomat Contarini was still taken aback at the extent of disagreement on the Catholic side. The difference in outlook between the Bavarians, the duke of Brunswick, and the prince-bishop and cardinal of Mainz, on the one hand, and Charles V and Granvelle, on the other, was vast. The first group wanted war against the Protestants, whereas the emperor and his chancellor, unwilling to offend the Lutherans, strove for negotiations, discussions, and compromises. Contarini was drawn into the thick of their maneuvering and had to decide quickly on a strategy that would not alienate him from either camp.^[106] Realizing that the aims of these two Catholic groups were mutually exclusive, Contarini adopted a middle way between the bellicose Bavarians and the overly compliant Granvelle, and tried to pacify the dukes while preventing Granvelle from making concessions to the Lutherans. He expressed his dismay about the lack of unity among Catholics to Cardinal Farnese: "Consider and reflect, Your Reverence, with what sorts of minds we have to deal, and yet they are all Catholics! . . . Negotiating with such heads is truly most difficult; I have great need of God's help, and hope that he will not fail me."^[107]

An added hurdle lay in the French king's suspicious attitude toward Contarini.^[108] Francis I opposed anything that might strengthen the emperor, especially a religious peace in Germany. He did his best to

[105] Report of the Frankfurt ambassador Johann von Glauburg, 30 Mar. 1541, in Pastor, Die kirchlichen Reunionsbestrebungen , 231.

[106] For his and Morone's plan of dealing with the Bavarians and Granvelle, see Morone to Cardinal Farnese, Regensburg, 17 Mar. 1541, in Victor Schultze, "Aktenstücke zur deutschen Reformationsgeschichte," Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 3 (1878-79): 615-16. Dittrich, GC , 581, compares Contarini to the pilot of a ship steering carefully between two opposing dangers.

[107] Dispatch of 16 March 1541, in Victor Schultze, "Dreizehn Depeschen Contarini's aus Regensburg an den Cardinal Farnese (1541)," Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 3 (1878-79): 158. See also that of 30 March, 166.

[108] Francis I made known his view that Contarini was so much under Habsburg influence that he could serve the papacy but poorly; see GC , 589-90; and Mackensen, "Diplomatic Role," 321-24, for French efforts to hamper the legate. Capasso, Paolo III 2:150n.3, shows that Francis I was spreading rumors about Contarini even before any news of the legate's action could have reached him.

hamper the plans of Charles V, instructing his envoys to counteract efforts to solve the German religious crisis, since a disunited neighbor to the east suited him well.^[109] Apprehensive of concord, he cast aspersions on Contarini as a man too weak to stand up to the emperor and an inept emissary unable to defend properly the interests of the papacy. The legate, who was prepared for confronting the Protestants, thus realized even before the colloquy opened that some of his difficulties would come also from Catholics.

Contarini found himself in an extremely complex political situation.^[110] His extensive correspondence offers detailed and often vividly written testimony of how he regarded the various interest groups assembled in Regensburg.^[111] It is a rich and important source for understanding his thought and attitudes. He was guided by a steady stream of letters and instructions from Cardinal Farnese,^[112] which reveal the concerns of the pope, his grandson, and their advisors as the meeting progressed, enabling us to follow step by step the exchanges between them and the legate.

[109] Girolamo Dandino, Nuncio to France, to Contarini, Blois, 25 Mar. 1541, in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):128; and the same to Cardinal Farnese, Melun, 31 Dec. 1540, in CT 4:191-92, 193-94.

[110] Paolo Prodi rightly stressed that some of the recent works dealing with the colloquy of Regensburg do not sufficiently develop the influence of politics on events and decisions made there; see Prodi, "I colloqui di Ratisbona: l'azione e le idee di Gaspare Contarini (tavola rotonda)," in Cavazzana Romanelli (ed.), Gaspare Contarini e il suo tempo , 208.

[111] Ludwig von Pastor published Contarini's letters from Regensburg in "Die Correspondenz des Cardinals Contarini wahrend seiner deutschen Legation," both in Historisches Jahrbuch der Görresgesellschaft and separately under the same title in Münster i.W. (n.d.). While still important, this collection has to be used with caution, since it is based on imperfect copies in ASVat, Fondo Pio, 58 (old signature: Bibl. Pia, D-129). As Pastor later realized, the original register of Contarini's letters is in ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36. Dittrich used the same codex of the Fondo Pio (Reg ., 144n.1) and later saw the original register, which he cites under the old signature of Cod. 36 (Trid.). Victor Schultze found thirteen letters of Contarini's in the Neapolitan Archives; see his "Dreizehn Depeschen." Several letters were printed earlier: to Cardinal Farnese, 28 and 30 Apr. 1541, in Ep. Poli 3:ccliii-cclvi; and to various correspondents, in Monumenti Beccadelli 1, pt. 2. The latter group was reprinted by Theodor Brieger, "Zur Correspondenz Contarini's während seiner deutschen Legation: Mitteilungen aus Beccadelli's Monumenti," Zeitschrift fur Kirchengeschichte 3 (1878-79): 492-523. Capasso, Paolo III 2:148n.1, briefly discusses Contarini's correspondence.

[112] The originals, all signed by Farnese, are in ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20. Pastor found the codex after he had prepared Contarini's letters for publication, and therefore drew upon it only superficially. He intended to devote greater attention to it but did not bring the project to fruition; he used selections from the letters in his History of the Popes (see "Correspondenz," 334). Ludwig Cardauns used it for NB , vol. 7, excerpting letters of special interest for German affairs. Dittrich did not know the codex at the time he published Reg .

From the beginning of the correspondence it is obvious that Contarini had a different order of priorities for his mission than did Cardinal Farnese, speaking for Paul III. Nowhere can this be seen more clearly than in the matter of the pope's rebellious subject Ascanio Colonna. This affair, which has been given too little attention in the context of the Regensburg meeting,^[113] casts no favorable light on the pope as spiritual leader, for the documents show him behaving in this case like a purely temporal prince preoccupied with the challenge of a defiant subject whose power in the papal state he wanted to break. At the very time negotiations between Catholics and Protestants were about to begin, Colonna's insubordination was of far more immediate concern to the Farnese family than events in far-off Germany, and it continued to preoccupy them. Even Dittrich, always ready to attribute the best motives to Paul III, admitted that "the letters of Cardinal Farnese to him [Contarini] during the first period of his mission to Regensburg contain more about the Colonna affair than about negotiations for concord."^[114] These letters are not just footnotes to the meeting at Regensburg, but evidence of the relative weight given to events in the scheme of papal politics in 1541. From the perspective of Paul III and Cardinal Farnese, the Colonna affair was a major issue; from that of Contarini, however, it was but another difficulty to be dealt with in the pursuit of his chief objective.

Ascanio Colonna, member of the great Roman aristocratic family and holder of extensive possessions from the pope, was also one of the emperor's most Italian partisans.^[115] He had fought on the imperial side in the conflict between pope and emperor that culminated in the terrible sack of Rome in 1527. Trusted by Charles V, who rewarded him with income and office in the kingdom of Naples, Ascanio seemed to put the past behind him when Paul III was elected and proclaimed himself a loyal vassal of the pope, even acting as one of the bearers of the new pontiff's throne on the way to church. Paul III, too, wanted a fresh beginning in his relations with the powerful Colonna clan. On 3 November 1534, he issued a lengthy bull absolv-

[113] Dittrich chronicled it summarily (GC , 592-97), while Matheson devoted less than a page to it (Contarini at Regensburg , 74-75) and did not use Farnese's letters. Mackensen, "Diplomatic Role," ignored the episode altogether. Pastor, in Geschichte der Päipste , vol. 5, incorporated it into a chapter on the papal states and the rise of the Farnese family, treating the whole episode from the vantage point of the pope challenged by a disobedient vassal, and made no reference to Farnese's letters.

[114] GC , 593.

[115] Franca Petrucci, "Colonna, Ascanio," in DBI 27:271-75, gives an up-to-date sketch of his colorful life, with bibliography.

ing Ascanio and his followers from the excommunication imposed by Pope Clement VII and from all censures, penalties, confiscations of goods, or anathemas.^[116] This sweeping bull is impressive for the solemnity with which it stresses that the pope was not acting on a petition of Ascanio or anyone else but was proceeding freely, "de nostra mera liberalitate," in absolving Colonna from all condemnations and penalties—"[Te] absolvemus et totaliter liberamus ac penas ipsas tibi plenarie remittimus indulgemus et condonamus"—and in lifting the interdict on his territories. The kinds of crimes of which Ascanio was accused were enumerated: homicide, sacrilege, adultery, rape, arson, violence, treason, rebellion, and lèse-majesté—a lengthy catalogue that even in a violent age was unusual. Nevertheless, the pope confirmed Ascanio in possession of lands, towns, fortresses, and all rights that he held as vassal of the Holy See. Paul III at the beginning of his reign was clearly willing to go out of his way to restore order and peace in the lands of St. Peter, and to bind powerful nobles like Colonna to himself as their sovereign. The bull testifies how important these concerns were to him.

Despite this good start, frictions over taxation arose between the papal government and Ascanio as early as 1537; conflicts about other matters followed, until open defiance by the powerful noble made a serious clash likely.^[117] The immediate cause for the outbreak of hostilities was Ascanio's refusal to allow an increase of the papal salt tax in his lands. A short time before, the town of Perugia had resisted this increase and precipitated the so-called Salt War, a bitter conflict that the Perugini lost in 1540, resulting in a diminution of their rights of self-government.^[118] It is curious that Colonna persisted on the same path despite the events in Perugia. He may have placed exaggerated hopes in the support of Charles V, knowing him and the pope to be at odds and gambling that the emperor would side with his staunchest Roman partisan.^[119] The disproportion of the means for waging war between the pope and his vassal was so great that Colonna's motives called for

[116] The original is in Rome, Archivio Colonna, III BB. VII, no. 3. Its solemnity is underscored by the formal execution on parchment, the decorations, and the careful writing style. I would like to thank Donna Maria Giulia Gentile for obtaining permission for me to use this archive.

[117] Summaries of events leading to war are in Pastor, Geschichte der Papste 5: 237-39; and Capasso, Paolo III 2:184-90.

[118] Rita Chiacchella, "Per una reinterpretazione della 'guerra del sale' e della costruzione della Rocca Paolina a Perugia," Archirio storico italiano 145 (1987): 3-60.

[119] Colonna was reported to have boasted that he was waging this war in order to serve Charles V; see Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 619.

explanation. At the French court a plausible one was offered: it was assumed that Charles V had goaded Colonna into militancy for the purpose of creating difficulties for the pope, which in turn would make him grateful when help was offered and more amenable to imperial religious policy and political schemes.^[120] But Paul III this time proved entirely unwilling to bend to the pro-imperial Colonna.

In a curt papal brief of 25 February 1541, Ascanio Colonna was given three days to appear in person before Paul III.^[121] The instances of his defiance were listed, and he was threatened with confiscation of all lands, goods, privileges, and graces granted him previously, and with treatment as a rebel if he failed to obey the summons. When Ascanio ignored the writ armed conflict became inevitable, despite the efforts of his sister, the poet Vittoria Colonna,^[122] to bring about some sort of compromise, and despite the attempts of the viceroy of Naples, Pedro de Toledo, and the imperial ambassador in Rome, the marquis de Aguillar, to find a solution.

"Here they talk of nothing else but the contention between the pope and Lord Ascanio Colonna. It seems very inappropriate in these times and during the current negotiations to receive such news. His Majesty, as I heard, wrote to the one party as well as to the other, and made every effort to have them put down their arms," reported Francesco Contarini to the Senate on 18 March.^[123] The emperor was placed in the awkward position of having to dissociate himself publicly from the pope's disobedient vassal, whose loyalty to his own person he valued highly. But more unpleasant was the position of the legate who was charged with keeping Charles V informed of events in the Roman campagna . Time after time he was instructed by Cardinal Farnese to remind the emperor of his duties as protector of the church and defender of the Holy See, and he was sent detailed accounts of events so that the seriousness of Colonna's rebellion could be made manifest and the pope's severity justified.^[124]

[120] Giroloamo Dandino to Contarini, Blois, 25 Mar. 1541, in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):129.

[121] The original is in Rome, Archivio Colonna, III BB.XVI, no. 77 . Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste 5:239n.3, mentions its existence without giving details about its content.

[122] She was in touch with the emperor about this matter. Charles V paid her the dubious compliment that she was "too wise for a woman"; see Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, Regensburg, 20 Mar. 1541, in Schultze, "Dreizehn Depeschen," 163.

[123] F. Contarini, Dispatches, fol. 174v.

[124] Farnese to Contarini, 28 Feb. 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, dwells at great length on these themes. Farnese and the pope suspected that Colonna was acting with emperor's knowledge. They thought his behavior "tanto esorbitante, che pochi sono quelli che si possino persuadere che il S Ascanio si fosse mosso a fare uno atto cosìstrano senza qualche intentione più occulta" (fol. 28r). The same words are repeated in Farnese to Poggio, 29 Feb. 1541, BAV, Chigi L. III. 65, fol. 147r, which also gives a full account of the Colonna matter for transmission to the emperor.

In his first audience with the emperor, Contarini stated forcefully that he was appointed legate because of his overriding desire for Christian unity.^[125] Although he would have preferred to dwell on religious issues, he had to bring up the matter of Ascanio Colonna, only to be informed that a courier from the latter had already arrived with news for the emperor. Contarini tried to move the discussion to the more general topic of vassals who disobeyed their lords, hoping thereby to engage the emperor's sympathy. But Charles V became Ascanio's advocate and asked Contarini to transmit his request for a papal pardon. Contarini, on his own authority, then replied that he believed that "His Holiness, because of his respect for His Majesty, and provided that his honor was satisfied, would show clemency [to Colonna]."^[126] He evidently hoped that the quarrel would be settled so that he could devote himself to more important and central matters. However, neither party budged, despite some negotiations and attempts to avert war.^[127]

Paul III was most concerned with Ascanio's attack on his authority as ruler of the papal state. He addressed the emperor as one prince would another, in the confidence that they both spoke the same language in defense of their prerogatives and that Charles V would sympathize with a fellow ruler who was protecting his state from disorder. But the irony of the situation could hardly have escaped the emperor: the pope, using the language of traditional medieval political discourse, was asking Charles V for help against Charles's own partisan.

The actions of Paul III in regard to Colonna were, however, not motivated only by the need to defend the papal state. The decision to

[125] Contarini to Farnese, Regensburg, 13 Mar. 1541, in Schultze, "Dreizehn Depeschen," 153.

[126] Ibid., 154, and again, in almost the same words, 155.

[127] Farnese to Contarini, 7 Mar. 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fol. 38r-v. This letter gives very full details about Colonna's evasion of the pope's order to appear before him. Cardinal Farnese was especially anxious that Charles V be fully informed about the "insolentia così notoria" of Ascanio; he sent reports also to the nuncios to the emperor Poggio, who was recalled to Rome, and Morone, who was replacing him. In addition, Farnese included evidence of Ascanio's deeds and a document signed by Pope Clement VII and Charles V in which each party obliged himself not to shield the other's rebellious or criminal subjects (fol. 39v).

proceed to actual war, which began on 14 March,^[128] was a small part of a vastly more significant development, that is, the gradual reduction of the Roman nobility from the status of feudal lords to that of courtiers without independent political power.^[129] Their autonomy on their lands was whittled away until they were indistinguishable from the new courtly nobles in everything but their memories of past greatness. Paul III's near obsession with Ascanio Colonna's rebellion transcended the mere pique of the old pontiff, and can be read as a conscious step in the gradual process of centralization and administrative modernization of the papal state, in which the Farnese pope played an important part.

It was predictable that German princes and nobles, upon learning of the conflict, would side with Colonna. The Protestants used the war as yet another proof of the pope's worldliness and, like many Catholic princes present in Regensburg, identified with a fellow noble rather than with a ruler trying to reduce his vassal's power. Charles V was criticized for defending the pope's interests against his own loyal supporter,^[130] despite the emperor's ostensible evenhandedness. The accounts of the war brought by the special imperial emissary to Colonna, a Captain Maldonato, only heightened sympathy for Ascanio at the imperial court. "In truth, if the pope only knew how much harm he is doing to his side in the current negotiations, he would think twice before waging war in Italy as he does," was the pithy assessment of the Venetian ambassador, who thought that the pope's behavior would come home to roost when the question of papal power was considered in the colloquy. "[The pope] gives everyone cause to speak against him," was his conclusion.^[131]

Lively, at times impassioned, letters and a multitude of documents

[128] On 9 March the pope discussed preparations for war in consistory; see Farnese to Contarini, 11 Mar. 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fol. 55r. The pope's son, Pierluigi Farnese, left Rome with seven thousand troops on 14 March and on the following day attacked Marino, the first town of the Colonna; see same to same, 22 Mar. 1541, fol. 57r.

[129] Paolo Prodi, The Papal Prince (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 48-49, 72-73, sees this process as a consistent part of papal politics from Nicholas V to Paul III, and suggests that "its final drama was played out in the political waning of the Colonna family with the capture of the fortress of Palliano in 1542 [actually in 1541 ]" (49). Capasso, Paolo III 2:186, thinks that Ascanio Colonna's rebellion appeared to Paul III as an attempt by a feudal noble to assert autonomy against his lord, and as such had to be stopped.

[130] F. Contarini, Dispatches, 25 Apr. 1541, fol. 180r. Also CSPV 5:99-100; and Girolamo Negri to the Bishop of Corfu, Regensburg, 27 Apr. 1541, in Schultze, "Dreizehn Depeschen," 637.

[131] F. Contarini, Dispatches, 16 May 1541, fol. 183r.

enable us to follow the war against Colonna almost day by day. Not only were Contarini and Morone supplied with full details of the affair, but the pope asked the emperor to listen to their explanation of events "as if we ourselves were speaking to you."^[132] Whatever their own views on the matter, the two diplomats were ordered to be spokesmen and apologists for Farnese politics. Morone's defense of the pope's course of action was extremely skillful: he mustered strong arguments in its favor, and reported that the emperor had admitted Colonna's actions to be foolhardy and reckless.^[133] With great finesse and diplomatic ability Morone fastened on the weak points of Colonna's case in order to nudge Charles V toward supporting Paul III. To what extent his well-organized dispatches with their clear summaries of what was said impressed the pope, or whether the latter realized that Contarini was handling both religious and political affairs to the point of being overburdened, is impossible to determine. Rather suddenly, though, in a letter of 28 April, there is mention that the conduct of the Colonna affair had been entrusted to Morone.^[134]

Nonetheless, Contarini continued to receive information about the progress of the war, and was told that he and Morone should act together in keeping the emperor abreast of events.^[135] Thus the Colonna matter continued to occupy Contarini, who was by no means as unburdened of it as he had hoped to be. For two and a half months, until the Colonna town of Palliano surrendered on 10 May, and its fortress on the twenty-sixth, the war was a central concern to the Farnese pope, his son, and his grandson. After the papal victory the fortifications of the former Colonna towns of Marino, Rocca di Papa, and Palliano were razed, and Ascanio had to go into Neapolitan exile with his family and adherents.^[136] Patti III, refusing to grant pardon, proved that he was master in his own house; but his actions appeared far different in Germany than they did in Rome.

[132] Brief from Paul III to Charles V, I Mar. 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fol. 45r.

[133] To Farnese, 28 Apr. 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 447-49. This letter is a good example of Morone's eloquence and skill.

[134] Contarini to Farnese, ASVat, Arm. 20, vol. 36, fol. 76v, where Contarini thanks the pope "che mi habbi scaricato del negocio del S Ascanio et commessolo al Rev. Nuntio [Morone], il qual oltra le altre ragioni potendo più frequentare l'audientia di Cesare di quello che posso io, potrà etiam più facilmente expedirlo."

[135] Cardinal Farnese to Contarini, 12 May 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fol. 77r.

[136] Pastor, Geschichte der Papste 5:241-42. The victory was to be celebrated in the whole papal state, and the pope was extremely pleased about it; see Cardinal Farnese to the Duke of Castro, Rome, 11 May 1541, ASVat, Carte Farnesiane, vol. 2, fol. 143. Valuable materials for the course of the war are Giovanni Guidiccione's detailed reports in his Lettere 2:222-79.

Contarini and Morone were well aware of thc growing resentment caused by the pope's intransigence. The former constantly slid recommendations for pardon of the rebellious noble into his dispatches, whereas the latter could hardly have been more forceful in reporting the emperor's "bitterness of soul" on account of the sums of money Paul III had spent for the war, which "our Lord [the pope] as head of all Christians should have spent for the good of Christianity."^[137] The emperor was annoyed that he had received no papal aid for the defense of Hungary against the Turks, as also were the German princes. Morone bluntly counseled that the pope should send money for Hungary and make peace with Colonna in order to counteract the scandal caused by his course of action. The letter closed with a fervent appeal to Paul III to do the right thing by God, man, and posterity.^[138]

The two papal diplomats had not only to defend an unpopular cause, but also to deal with the marked sympathy for Ascanio Colonna among German princes. "It is impossible to put into words how much His Holiness is talked about by everyone because of the war he is waging in Italy," reported Francesco Contarini to the Venetian Senate.

It is generally thought that [the pope] does not care if he ruins the church if [only] he succeeds in aggrandizing his own family. I was recently told at a banquet of German princes by someone who is trustworthy that at the diet nothing else is discussed every day but this. The majority [of the princes] said that the Lord Ascanio should come here, and if the emperor does not want to help him, he will be assisted by others. [All this was said] with such coarse words, and such strong language was used against His Holiness, that I am ashamed to write it.^[139]

The Venetian ambassador correctly caught the mood of many princes who were present at Regensburg. The Protestants gloated, and many Catholics felt alienated from the head of the church, whom they saw behaving first and foremost as an Italian secular ruler. Their ill will toward the pope affected their attitude toward what he proposed through his legate. If Contarini was personally well liked, he still represented a power toward which the hostility in Germany was increasing, not least because of the war against Colonna.

Contarini conscientiously kept Cardinal Farnese informed about religious issues in his dispatches, only to receive in return detailed reports about fighting, sieges, or surrenders. During the first period of

[137] To Cardinal Farnese, 12 May 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 462.

[138] Ibid., 463.

[139] F. Contarini, Dispatches, 29 May 1541, fol. 184r.

Contarini's mission political concerns were uppermost in Farnese's letters.^[140] His father, Pierluigi, commander of the papal troops, could not prevent his soldiers from looting, raping, and committing brutalities against the civilian population in Colonna territory. Neither could he deter armed bands from the kingdom of Naples from coming to the support of Ascanio Colonna. Although the imperial ambassador to Rome stated that this was happening in contravention of the emperor's express orders, the pope was particularly upset by what he took to be interference in the internal affairs of his state, and instructed Contarini to protest to Charles V.

Contarini's situation was highly ironic. He had been fearless in his outburst before Clement VII in 1529, when he argued that it would be far better for Christianity and the church if the pope had no state.^[141] Now, as a cardinal of the Roman church, he had to justify the Colonna war. It would be easy to think him vacillating or worse, a "trimmer" who adjusted his sails to the prevailing wind. But a close reading of his dispatches shows that he was consistent in his views.

His strong sense of order and hierarchy, so marked in his career in the service of Venice, militated against his sympathy for Ascanio. Despite his friendship with and affection for Vittoria Colonna, Contarini could not in conscience defend the actions of her brother. His cardinalate had not changed the political views he had expressed in the treatise on the Venetian state of how society is best governed. As the lawful sovereign of a state, the pope in his eyes was justified in preserving order. Contarini the Venetian aristocrat would not take the part of someone who broke the compact between subject and ruler, of which he was especially conscious after the troubled period of the War of the League of Cambrai. Pietro Ghinucci, the Mantuan agent in Rome, accurately picked up the close and continuing identification of Contarini with Venice when he reported shortly before the legate left for Germany: "This lord [Contarini], as Your Grace knows better than I do, is considered wise, learned, and good, but he has the reputation of being too attached to his patria , and is held as such [too Venetian]."^[142]

[140] Of the thirty-three letters in ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, from Farnese to Contarini, eight include reports of the war against Colonna, while nine are written after the end of the diet and are brief instructions concerning the legate's return to Italy. Of the remaining sixteen, several deal with subjects other than the colloquy.

[141] VBM, MS It., Cl. VII, 1043 (=7616), fols. 150v-151r; also Reg ., 43-44 (no. 126).

[142] Ghinucci to Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga, Rome, 8 Jan. 1541, in Solmi, "Contarini alla Dieta di Ratisbona," 16. Beccadelli, "Vita," 56, mentions that Contarini remained in close contact with Venetian ambassadors in Rome, who confided their affairs to him, "believing him to be no less of a [Venetian] gentleman [zentilhuomo ] than a cardinal."

Despite his defense of political hierarchy, however, Contarini's impatience with the deflection of the pope's attention from the colloquy in Germany to a local war in the papal state is detectable. In a full account of the discussion he and Morone had with the emperor after the taking of Palliano became known, Contarini skillfully inserts criticism of the pope by putting it in the mouth of Charles V, who he reports was suspicious that the Colonna feudal holdings would be declared vacant and transferred to the Farnese. Contarini writes that he reiterated his confidence in the pope by saying to the emperor, "I do not doubt that he [Paul III] will use all [possible] clemency [toward Ascanio Colonna], because he who is magnanimous habitually does this, that is, he shows clemency and kindness toward those who humble themselves."^[143] The legate obviously wished that the pope would bring the war to an end by acting not like a secular prince but as the spiritual leader of Christianity, and by giving an example of Christian behavior. Yet Paul III turned a deaf ear to the emperor's appeals, and Colonna was never forgiven by the "papal prince," who made an example of his rebellious subject for the benefit of other nobles.^[144]

The clearest indication that Contarini had not changed his views on the nature of papal power is in another report of a conversation with the emperor, in the course of which the legate remarked:

Your Majesty went to Tunis [in 1535] at enormous cost for the sake of the temporal state of Christians, exposing your own life, yet the temporal state is not the substance of [our] faith. The martyrs lived at a time when Christians had no temporal state, but then the faith was most efficacious, having as its body and essence the articles [of faith, including transubstantiation]. . .. The temporal state, in comparison to them, is like clothing, accidental to the body.^[145]

These words are strikingly similar to those Contarini spoke to Clement VII when he stressed the spiritual nature of the papacy before the papal state came to exist. Now, though, as cardinal, he obeyed his lord notwithstanding his own views.

[143] To Farnese, 23 May 1541, ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 98v. An incorrect copy is in Reg ., 328-31.

[144] The strongest defense of Paul III's dealing with Colonna is in the letter of Cardinal Farnese to Morone, Rome, 29 May 1541, NB 7:57-59. Farnese demanded that Charles V punish Colonna, and adopted a remarkably censorious tone regarding the emperor throughout his letter.

[145] To Farnese, 15 May 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 389.

The Colonna affair called on Contarini's diplomatic skill for a purpose distinctly tangential to his mission, and embarrassed him by glaringly revealing the political aims of the Farnese family. He honored fully his obligations as legate to be the spokesman of Paul III, without, however, going along uncritically with what the pope wanted. For him personally, the Colonna war could hardly have occurred at a more inopportune time. Francesco Contarini summed up the situation at the end of the war: "Everyone has concluded that just as the emperor seeks in every possible way to make peace, to calm the [German] princes, and to support and defend the affairs of the pope, so His Holiness does everything to start a fire in Italy and to keep it going, [and to do] things that are not fitting for the vicar of Christ. And everyone speaks of these things publicly."^[146]

The one good result for Contarini was the growth of his friendship with Morone. The precocious nuncio, who was only thirty-two but already a seasoned diplomat when Contarini joined him in Regensburg, had been decidedly hostile to the idea of religious colloquies.^[147] Gradually, under the influence of the older man, Morone became more sensitive to the enormous complexities of the religious situation and modified his views. The story of the friendship between the two men still remains to be written.^[148] Their close collaboration and continuous exchange of information, especially about the Colonna war, cemented a friendship that flourished and deepened as long as Contarini lived.

Thus, between his arrival in Regensburg on 11 March and the opening of the diet on 5 April, Contarini was fully initiated into the diplomatic intricacies^[149] With which he would have to deal. "I see little good here in Germany, nor am I surprised that the people are in such confusion, given the conditions I see prevailing among their secular and ecclesiastical leaders and those of religious orders," he wrote to Farnese.^[150] The counselors of the Bavarian dukes annoyed him with their suspicions. He tried to pacify them with assurances that he would not cede an iota of the truth to the Protestants, and by going out of his

[146] F. Contarini, Dispatches, 23 May 1541, fol. 183v.

[147] To Farnese, Regensburg, 5 Feb. 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 435.

[148] Heinrich Lutz, "Kardinal Morone: Reform, Konzil und europäische Staatenwelt," Politik, Kultur und Religion im Werdeprozess der fruhen Neuzeit , ed. M. Csàky (Klagenfurt: Universitätsverlag Carinthia, 1983), 185-86.

[149] Mackensen, "Diplomatic Role," 316-26; and Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , chap. 6, give sketches of the diplomatic tangle into which Contarini entered.

[150] Dispatch of 30 March 1541, in Schultze, "Dreizehn Depeschen," 166.

way to try to charm them.^[151] Contarini's personality once again proved to be a major asset. The documents repeatedly mention the esteem in which he was held and his ability to win over men who initially were hostile to him.^[152]

Contarini had to be on his guard with Granvelle, who was most anxious to impress his and the emperor's point of view on the legate. Their first long interview is of particular significance for understanding Contarini's mind. Granvelle warned him that unless a solution were found at the diet, the Catholic religion would be ruined, since the license introduced by the Protestants attracted people to their teaching everywhere, even in Italy. Granvelle pressed him hard to support fully the emperor's religious policy of appeasement, arguing that otherwise all would be lost. The two men engaged in a discussion that perhaps more than any other indicates Contarini's attitude before the colloquy even began. To Granvelle's remark that Lutherans agreed about Christ's presence in the sacrament of the Eucharist but denied the transubstantiation of the bread, a matter that should be referred for decision to a future council, Contarini replied: "This article is essential and most certain, and a [future] council cannot determine anything to the contrary"; the Fourth Lateran Council, after all, had decreed it. He firmly believed that there were essential articles of faith, every word of which must be accepted, since they were proclaimed by the teaching authority of the church. At the same time, disputes about words must be avoided because they were fraught with danger for the church, as could be seen in the disagreement over the word filioque , which had resulted in the schism between Greek and Roman Christianity.^[153]

Contarini did not doubt the existence of clearly defined essential articles of faith, belief in which was necessary for salvation. He came to Regensburg firm in the conviction that central Christian doctrines were beyond discussion. Those he considered not essential were the

[151] Ibid., 164-65.

[152] Morone to Cardinal Farnese, 3 May 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 454: "La sodisfattione, qual si ha del R Legato, ogni hora cresce, et Mons di Granvella et gli altri Ministri dicono, ch'Iddio per sua bontà l'ha creato a questo effetto, perchè si porta con grandissima mansuetudine, prudentia et dottrina, nella quale (pace d'ognuno) è reputato avanzare tutti gl'altri, quali sono in questo luoco, di maniera che gli adversarii istessi cominciano non solo ad amarlo, ma ancora a reverirlo con grande honore di N.S. et de quella Santa Sede Apostolica."

[153] To Farnese, Regensburg, 18 Mar. 1541, in Schultze, "Dreizehn Depeschen," 159-60.

adiaphora ; these could be debated, and on them reasonable men could well differ. While similar to that of Erasmus,^[154] Contarini's distinction had a more profoundly subjective basis. At this stage, he did not yet realize the extent to which agreement on what constituted central articles of faith would in itself be a major problem. He assumed a broader area of consensus than existed in actuality, not because of some sort of naïveté or inexcusable vagueness,^[155] but because he belonged to the last generation whose intellectual and theological formation had occurred before the Reformation. It was still possible for Contarini to think of Lutherans as protesters who could be brought back to the one church from which they had temporarily dissociated themselves. The means for accomplishing this task were understanding and discussion of Lutheran grievances with kindness and patience on the part of Catholics,^[156] who, in turn, had to take reform of the church seriously.

An overwhelming mass of documents sheds detailed light on the events connected with the religious colloquy.^[157] Thanks to these abundant sources, it is possible to follow Contarini's mind closely. But actually understanding the legate's thinking is another matter. The most recent monograph on Regensburg hardly offers the reader much help by asserting that the "denizen of the modern theological world . . . is confronted with the almost total incomprehensibility of Contarini's language and thought-patterns . . . the code [of which], it appears, has yet to be cracked."^[158] The legate is seen by the author as an eclectic, with the clue to his theology lying "in the coexistence, in rather unstable equilibrium," of his "ecumenism, his Catholicism, and his Curialism,"^[159]

[154] Erasmus's position is expressed in his Inquisitio deride ; I have used the translation by Craig Thompson (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1950). Here Erasmus repeatedly reminds both Protestants and Catholics that they are in agreement on the most important articles of the faith. Luther and post-Tridentine Catholic teaching rejected the distinction between Fundamentalartikel and those that can be doubted or denied salva ride et salute ; see "Fundamentalartikel," Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche , vol. 4 (Freiburg i.B.: Herder, 1960), cols. 450-51.

[155] This is the accusation of Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 50.

[156] Jedin, Trient 1:154, points to the paradox that nothing promoted the split between the confessions as much as the illusion that it was not serious or that it did not exist.

[157] Prodi thinks it unlikely that significant new documents about the colloquy and diet will emerge: "We can only change the angle from which we take the shots, and of course the interpretation of the testimonies themselves" ("I colloqui di Ratisbona," 207).

[158] Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 173.

[159] Ibid., 178.

A different interpretation of Contarini's mind will be offered here. We see in Regensburg not the confusion of a well-meaning man face to face with hard facts, or his arcane thought pattern, but a critical stage in his intellectual and religious development. Contarini was a prelate of the pre-Tridentine Catholic church, which was much more open and doctrinally indeterminate compared with the church of the Counter-Reformation. Yet even in the Catholic church of 1541 ever clearer lines were being drawn as a result of continuous confrontation with Protestantism. At Regensburg, Contarini had to make choices for which he had not been prepared. Individualistic and emotional in his own spiritual life, which had justification by faith as its cornerstone, he was at the same time traditional in his views of ecclesiastical institutions, the structure of authority in the church, and the theology of the sacraments. Now he was forced to rethink the relation between his personal religious stance, church doctrine, and ecclesiology. He did arrive at a conclusion. But in his letters from Regensburg we see how difficult, painful, even bitter the process of human and religious maturation of a Catholic reformer of that time could be.

The religious colloquy of Regensburg opened on 28 April, and the discussions ended on 22 May. The emperor chose the six participating theologians: for the Protestants, Philip Melanchthon, Martin Bucer, and Johannes Pistorius; for the Catholics, Johannes Gropper, Julius Pflug, and Johann Eck. Granvelle and Count Frederick of the Palatinate were to preside, while six witnesses were to be present at all discussions.^[160] Except for Eck, championed by the Bavarian dukes, and Melanchthon, whose prestige among the Lutherans made his inclusion mandatory, the participants were men sympathetic to or even adherents of Erasmian humanism and genuinely interested in religious concord. Contarini as the representative of the pope was excluded from the talks, since they were not recognized as official in Rome. But Granvelle ordered the Catholic collocutors to consult Contarini every morning, with Badia and Morone also present, and to report to him again after the meetings. The basis for discussion at the colloquy was to be the Regensburg Book, equally disliked by Melanchthon and Eck. The former had called it "a hyena"—presumably because of the belief

[160] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, 28 Apr. 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 367-68. Augustijn, "Religionsgespräche der vierziger Jahre," 50, regards the colloquies of 1539-41 as "dominated by Erasmians," in the sense that these men sought to formulate the central religious doctrine of sola fide in such a way as to make it compatible with both Lutheran and Catholic understanding of Christianity.

that this animal can speak with a human voice and tempt people into sin^[161] —whereas the latter rejected it so vehemently that the legate had to put pressure on him to soften his stand.^[162] Contarini himself was not entirely comfortable with the text, to which he added more than twenty annotations; he realized that the document was an attempt to create a single, united German church, which in itself would be a danger to Rome.

We can well imagine the setting for the colloquy: the religious discussions were conducted at the same time that the disunited German princes and estates met in the diet, with Charles V and Granvelle desperately trying to forge some sort of agreement among the religious and political factions, to avert further conflict or even war, and to obtain aid against the Turks. All the while, intransigent Lutherans on the one side and their Catholic counterparts on the other were intent on sabotaging accord. That the theologians were not free agents in this tense atmosphere is obvious. The Protestants deferred to Melanchthon, who in turn deferred to the elector of Saxony and to Luther. Sick and under pressure from his prince, Melanchthon did not show his mild face this time. He attacked the Catholics as intending to cheat and harm the Protestants.^[163] Bucer vainly tried to exert his influence over the other two men on his side, only to be met with suspicion by Melanchthon. Among the Catholics, Eck was the dominant figure, and he openly supported the political aims of the bellicose Bavarian dukes.

Contarini's vicar Negri described the legate on the eve of the colloquy as instructing his troops like a good captain, and added: "He believes everything, hopes for everything, and sustains everything. His Reverence would gladly remain here for a long time in order to recover this poor lost people, if that were possible."^[164] But in his own letters Contarini does not seem quite so otherworldly. "If we cannot do anything good this time, that will be the end," he wrote to Cardinal Gonzaga.^[165] Therefore, he set out to make things work. As a seasoned diplomat, he cultivated both friend and foe. Eck was soon under his influence. When Sturm and later Bucer came to see him, he was so

[161] Bretschneider (ed.), Corpus Reformatorum 10, col. 576.

[162] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, 28 Apr. 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 369-70. According to Morone, Contarini succeeded even to the point of getting Eck to be gentle and change his mind on questions of philosophy and theology; see his letter to Cardinal Farnese, 28 Apr. 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 449.

[163] Vetter, Religionsverhandlungen , 73.

[164] Reg ., 172 (no. 687).

[165] Letter of 30 April 1541, Reg ., 175 (no. 696).

gentle and tactful that Bucer eventually judged him "much too learned and too pious for a cardinal, as well as too willing to reform the church."^[166] Contarini wanted to impress these men with only one objective in view: to soften the "harshness" of the Protestants and to induce them to return to the "fight way" of the Catholic church.^[167]

Already on the first day both sides agreed on the four initial articles of the Regensburg Book dealing with the condition of man and human nature before the fall, free will, the cause of sin, and original sin.^[168] The theologians then moved on to a discussion of the fifth article, on justification. Because the original wording pleased neither side, several alternative versions were drafted, only to be rejected one after the other.^[169] On 2 May, after four days of deliberations, a formula was worked out on the basis of article 5 to which both Catholic and Protestant collocutors assented.^[170]

At Regensburg the impossible seemed to have been achieved. Justification by faith was the articulus stantis et cadentis of the entire Protestant edifice, the doctrine by which it stood or with which it fell. If theologians agreed on that central article of faith, could there be a more auspicious beginning of the colloquy?

Article 5, "On man's justification,"^[171] was a curious theological compromise offering a theory that came to be called, not entirely accurately, double justification. It begins with the acknowledgment that all justification comes through Christ. But then, two quite different views demanded recognition. Justification is thought to begin when the sinner cooperates with the Holy Spirit, who moves his mind to repentance and to belief in the remission of sins for those who believe in Christ. The response is thus an act of the intellect and the will (the verb used is assentior ,^[172] to give one's assent), which leads to trusting faith that one will be forgiven. Through this faith the Christian receives the Holy Spirit, remission of sins, imputation of Christ's justice, and innumerable other gifts.

"The doctrine that the sinner is justified by living and efficacious

[166] Quoted in Augustijn, Godsdienstgesprekken , 78n.3.

[167] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, 3 May 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 373.

[168] Pfeilschifter (ed.), Acta Reformationis Catholicae , 6:24-30.

[169] Vetter, Religionsverhandlungen , 92-93.

[170] Contarini sent the agreed-upon article to Cardinal Farnese on 3 May 1541; see Pastor, "Correspondenz," 372.

[171] "De iustificatione hominis," in Pfeilschifter (ed.), Acta Reformationis Catholicae , 6:52-54. The first two drafts are on pp. 30-52.

[172] Cf. the famous Ignatian formula "sentire cum ecclesia," by which is meant not only to accept the formulations but to appropriate them inwardly.

faith is true and sound, for through it we become pleasing to God and accepted because of Christ," the article continues. This initial, or indwelling justice ( iustitia inhaerens ) is communicated by Christ. The believing soul, however, does not rely on it, but only on Christ's justice given to us freely, "without which there absolutely is not and cannot be justification." We are justified by faith in Christ whose justice is imputed to us, making us righteous before God. The second or imputed righteousness is clearly the more important and higher, the immeasurable gift of God to man, which in no way depends on human efforts. As to the justified Christian's good works, God rewards them if they are the fruit of faith. Thus good works are accommodated and made meaningful within the framework of justification by faith alone.^[173]

Both style and content make it obvious that article 5 was the work of a committee. The modern reader will search in vain for logical consistency, since the essence of the agreed-upon text was a compromise between two basically incompatible positions. In the progress toward the first, or indwelling, righteousness, intellect and will have a role; the sinner can choose to cooperate with the Holy Spirit or to reject his promptings. In the second there is no choice. It is one of the benefits of Christ, and nothing whatsoever that sinners do can make a difference; it depends totally on Christ as the giver of a free gift. This is hardly the theory of a double justification if that term is taken to mean the existence of two equal entities. "Two-stage justification" or "preliminary and complete justification" would be a clumsy but somewhat more accurate description of the theory put forth in article 5. Iustitia inhaerens and iustitia imputata are not equal in importance, for salvation really hinges on the second. The first concept was crucial to the Catholic collocutors, who were anxious to preserve the teaching that man cooperates with grace in the process of justification.^[174] The second, by incorporating the assertion that "only by faith in Christ are we justified or reputed just, that is accepted, not because of our own dignity or works," reassured the Protestants.

The relative importance of the prevenient motion of the Holy Spirit and the response of the human intellect and will is left unclear. More to the point, the article leaves the connection between indwelling and imputed justice unexplained. Thus it is uncertain whether and how the

[173] Pfeilschifter (ed.), Acta Reformationis Catholicae , 54.

[174] Dittrich, GC , 656, translates portions of article 5 too freely, obscuring some of its illogicalities.

two are causally or chronologically related. It is not surprising that later theologians found the article to be either basically Lutheran, basically Catholic, or a more or less muddled third thing, and that there is no agreement concerning the extent of its dependence on the discussion of double justification in Gropper's Enchiridion .^[175] There is no doubt, however, that the text of the article not only was determined by theological considerations but has a historical dimension as well. The unusual concatenation of especially irenic collocutors on both sides, together with the political urgency of accord that they felt, must not be forgotten in any examination of the words of the text. Historical circumstances go a long way toward explaining what is only too easily dismissed as a "mere compromise."^[176] It must be stressed that despite all its problems, article 5 was a noble attempt by a handful of men not merely to stem but to reverse the breakup of the one Christian church into mutually hostile faiths.

On the day after accord was reached, Contarini wrote a report to Cardinal Farnese that reflected his joy: "Yesterday, praised be God, the Catholic and Protestant theologians came to a conclusion and concurred in the article on justification, faith, and works, in the concord and agreement which your Reverence will find enclosed. This [agreement] has been found to be Catholic and holy in my judgment and in that of Morone, Badia, Eck, Gropper, and Pflug."^[177] Contarini sent copies of the text to several of his friends in Italy, including Pole and Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga, asking for their opinion. When the latter's theological advisor expressed reservations about the article, Contarini composed an apologia for it in the Epistola de iustificatione of 25 May 1541, which is an elaboration of his own views that helps greatly in elucidating his mind.

Contarini's main concern in this apologia was to show that article 5 was not only consonant with Catholic teaching, but actually

[175] Walther von Loewenich, Duplex iustitia: Luthers Stellung zu einer Unionsformel des 16. Jahrhunderts (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner, 1972), 37-38.

[176] Prodi tightly insists that most discussions of the colloquy of Regensburg do not give adequate consideration to the political context in which it was held; see "I colloqui di Ratisbona," 208.

[177] Letter of 3 May 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 372; and of May 1541 (ibid.): "Hieri, dio laudato, questi theologi et Cattolici et Protestanti si risolsero et convennero nell'articolo de iustificatione, fide et operibus nella concordia et conventione che V. Sig. Rev vedra qui inclusa, la quale da me e dal Sig. Nuntio [Morone] e dal Padre Maestro [ Badia] e dall'Ecchio, Groppero et Fluch è stata veduta come cattolica et santa per quel giuditio che noi havemo."

"cattolichissimo."^[178] He may also have intended to defend the Catholic theology of salvation against Protestant charges of Pelagianism.^[179] Contarini expresses here some of the most characteristic ideas of the spirituali , in the fervent hope that the church will recognize them as her own doctrine and thus open the way for a reconciliation with the Protestants.

The Epistola proposes the same solution to the problem of justification as article 5 by arguing that the sinner becomes just through his own inherent justice and the imputed justice of Christ, freely granted by God to man. Unlike article 5, however, Contarini's tract uses the term duplex iustitia several times. Thus, "we attain double justice, the first which inheres in us, through which we begin to be just and become partakers of divine nature, and have charity poured into our hearts. The second, not inherent but given to us with Christ, I call the justice of Christ together with all his merits."^[180]

Although in the next sentence Contarini decides that "both are given us at the same time and we reach both through faith," they are clearly not equal. The efficient cause of the first is the Holy Spirit, who illuminates the intellect and moves the will to turn away from sin and toward God. Man therefore is free to cooperate with God. In his explanation of this process Contarini closely follows St. Thomas;^[181] however, when his own experience of sin and forgiveness enters, he writes in another key which is far less systematic.

There is more than a touch of impatience in Contarini's sidestepping of technical theological discussion on the priority of one form of justice over the other: "Which of the two by its nature is first [is a question] that belongs to scholastic disputations rather than to the realm of faith about which we are here concerned."^[182] He thinks that

[178] To Cardinal Farnese, 9 June 1541, in ibid., 478. See also Mackensen, "Contarini's Theological Role," 49.

[179] Jedin, Trient 1:309.

[180] CT 12:318, lines 34-37. I use this edition of the tract in preference to that in Hünermann's edition of the Gegenreformatorische Schriften because it is based on additional manuscript versions, especially one belonging to Aleandro (CT 12:314). But see Simoncelli, Evangelismo italiano , 187n.241, for an argument affirming the existence of the original.

[181] Ruckert, Theologische Entwicklung , 82; and Loewenich, Duplex iustitia , 42.

[182] CT 12:318, lines 38-39. Cardinal Seripando in his defense of the doctrine of double justification during the first session of the Council of Trent used a similar argument: "The doctrine of justification should be open, clear, and easy . . .so that those for whom Christ died might not be repelled from it by any difficulties. This teaching is not to be sought from the schools, in which thorny and quite difficult questions are treated, which are indeed useful for exercising talents and acquiring the wisdom of this world but are not so well-suited to knowing the wisdom hidden in mystery and instructing the people of Christ into justice." The translation is by James F. McCue, "Double Justification at the Council of Trent: Piety and Theology in Sixteenth-Century Roman Catholicism," in Piety, Politics, and Ethics: Reformation Studies in Honor of George Wolfgang Forell , ed. Carter Lindberg (Kirksville, Mo.: Sixteenth Century Journal Publishers, 1984), 41.

everything depends on faith, not on the construction of a logically rigorous and intellectually satisfying theory. By holding that faith is an act of the will, Contarini differs from later Tridentine doctrine, which defined faith as an act of the intellect consisting in the belief that God's revelation and promises are true.^[183] Like Luther, Contarini conceives of the essence of faith as trust and hope in God's mercy.^[184] In fact, he uses the Lutheran terms fiducia and assensus in describing that faith.

Christ's imputed justice is crucial for sinners. "I, for my part, consider it a pious and Christian opinion that we are to depend—depend, I mean, as on a sure foundation that will certainly sustain us—upon the justice that Christ has conferred on us, and not on any holiness and grace that inheres in us."^[185] This imputed justice is true and perfect, unlike our own imperfect inherent justice. In a short explanatory note to article 5 that he sent on 3 May to Cardinal Gonzaga and probably also to other friends in Italy,^[186] Contarini discusses the text of article 5: "The first section is that which says that we should not rely on the justice which is inherent in us, through which we are made just and do what is good, but that we must rely on the justice of Christ which is imputed to us because of Christ and the merits of Christ. By this latter we are justified before God, that is considered and reputed just. I think that this conclusion is most true, Catholic, and conducive to piety."^[187]

Good works play no part in our justification, which is due to faith alone.^[188] But unless the Christian progresses in holiness, he can lose both kinds of justice. Good works constitute evidence of such because true faith is active in love, not because the Christian expects them to be meritorious in the sight of God. They necessarily follow the sinner's

[183] H. J. Schroeder, O.P., trans. "Decree on Justification," chap. 6 in Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent (St. Louis: Herder, 1941 ), 32-33, 311; and Angelus Walz, O.P., "La giustificazione tridentina," Angelicurn 28 (1951 ): 129.

[184] Contarini, Gegenreformatorische Schriften , 26.

[185] CT 12:319, lines 29-31.

[186] Theodor Brieger, "Contarini's Begleitschreiben zu der Formula Concordiae de iustificatione," Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 5 ( 1882): 592.

[187] "Gasparis Contareni scheda minor de iustificatione," in CT 12:313, lines 26-30.

[188] Ibid., 27.

justification, but are in no way its cause. In that specific sense they are proof that man is justified. Contarini concludes his tract by asserting, "Those who say that we are justified through works are right; and those who say that we are not justified through works but through faith are also right."^[189]

It is easy to see why there is no agreement among interpreters of Contarini's ideas in the Epistola de iustificatione , who fall into three groups: those who think it basically Catholic; those who consider it an expression of Lutheran teaching about justification; and those who see it as a compromise between Catholic and Protestant theology.^[190] Most modern scholars belong to the last group maintaining that Contarini's Epistola was a theological hybrid,^[191] the roots of which are variously sought in Gropper's Enchiridion of 1536,^[192] the works of Pighius,^[193] or late medieval Pauline and Augustinian currents in Italian religious thought.^[194] In recent literature a sort of consensus has emerged to the effect that Contarini undoubtedly had goodwill and sympathy for Lutheran theology, but that he was too unsystematic, thus unable to give his opinions cogency and clarity or to organize them into a coherent theological argument.^[195]

If his theology is measured against the standard set by the works of St. Thomas or Luther, that charge is true, for Contarini was not a trained theologian. Jedin was the first rightly to emphasize the link between Contarini's early religious experience and the expression of his ideas on justification at Regensburg.^[196] To Contarini, thought and experience were inseparable, forming one whole that he sometimes

[189] Ibid., 322, lines 14-15.

[190] Hünermann lists the leading older scholars in each group in Contarini, Gegenreformatorische Schriften , xxi-xxii.

[191] Ricca, in Prodi, "I colloqui di Ratisbona," 227-29.

[192] Rückert, Theologische Entwicklung , 96-106, tries to account for both the similarities and differences in the theory of justification of the two men. Walter Lipgens, Kardinal Johannes Gropper (1503-1559) und die Anfänge der katholischen Reform in Deutschland (Münster i.W.: Aschendorff, 1951), 194, believes that Contarini's ideas are derived from Gropper.

[193] GC , 661-69.

[194] Ricca, in "I colloqui di Ratisbona," 229-31.

[195] Rückert, Theologische Entwicklung , 108, asserts that Contarini lacked ülan and the power of thinking systematically: "Was ihm fehlte, war Schwung und war systematische Kraft." This judgment is echoed in attenuated form by von Loewenich, Duplex iustitia , 47: "Als systematischer Theologe mag Contarini enttäuschen; als Mensch und Christ bleibt er uns ehrwürdig. Das religiöse Element war in ihm stärker als die theologische Gestaltungskraft."

[196] . Jedin, "Ein Turmerlebnis,"' 129-30. Mackensen, "Contarini's Theological Role," follows Jedin.

struggled to express in the technical language of theology, he had learned as a student. Yet beyond words was his absolute conviction that we are justified by faith in Christ, about which he had written eloquently in 1523^[197] and to which he clung unwaveringly thereafter. His experience, together with his knowledge of at least some of the writings by the northern reformers, made it impossible for him to remain content with a purely Thomistic explanation of the process of justification. He tried to break through the restrictive terminology of Scholasticism without having a new language in which to express himself. Thus his tract is at once traditional and objective in form and personal and subjective in content. He uses the familiar terms weighed down with accretions of meaning developed over the centuries. Nevertheless, he sometimes is able to invest those terms with his own spirituality and the living, ardent piety that he poured into the proverbial old wineskins where they could not be contained.

When subjected to analysis Contarini's treatise is bound to strike the reader as unclear.^[198] One reason is his inability to reconcile Thomistic and Lutheran theology.^[199] But another reason surfaces as well: Contarini's tendency to escape from verbal controversy into a religious feeling that to him is stronger than scholastic logic because based on the authenticity of his emotions.^[200] Already in his famous letter to Giustiniani of 24 April 1511 he had written in fervent tones about Christ as the head of those who want to unite themselves with him as his members.^[201] Later, the Pauline language of "putting on Christ," "dying with Christ," and "rising with Christ" becomes Contarini's. Especially clear expressions of his emotional bent are found in a letter to Pighius that repeatedly mentions our being "grafted into Christ," and that ends with this affirmation: "I flee all contentions more than

[197] To Giustiniani, in Jedin, "Contarini und Camaldoli," 67 (letter 30).

[198] Loewenich, Duplex iustitia , 46.

[199] Zur Mühlen, "Einigung," 350, discusses the tension between them which Contarini does not solve. Rückert, Theologische Entwicklung , 105, thinks that Contarini unsuccessfully tried to "give expression to ideas that were at home in Lutheranism and that were among its most important strengths, within [the structure of] Catholic dogma, which was shaped starting with entirely different foundations." Otto Hermann Pesch, Die Theologie der Rechtfertigung bei Martin Luther und Thomas von Aquin (Mainz: Matthias-Grünewald Verlag, 1967), argues for a basic agreement between the two positions. But reflecting on these issues four centuries later, in an atmosphere of ecumensim, is an entirely different matter from having to deal with them in the thick of things, as Contarini did.

[200] Rückert, Theologische Entwicklung , 88-90, first noticed Contarini's "Ansätze einer Christusmystik," citing some very brief passages in support.

[201] Jedin, "Contarini und Camaldoli," 14 (letter 2).

hell, especially those with friends."^[202] Contarini did not have the habits of mind or the ready language of the controversialist. He was at his best when discussing his ideas and feelings with like-minded men who did not require philosophical and theological precision in order to be persuaded. When pitted against the likes of Eck or Melanchthon in debate, he simply could not hold his own.

The Epistola de iustificatione should not, however, be read as if it proved Contarini's shortcomings as a systematic theologian. He shared the ideas of eminent Catholic theologians like Pighius and Gropper, who sought answers to the question of justification not so much in scholastic formulations but in the thought of St. Augustine. Gropper's Enchiridion , published in 1538, was enthusiastically received in Italy by men with considerable theological training, including Pole, Giberti, and Cortese.^[203] The general of the Augustinians, Cardinal Seripando, defended double justification at the Council of Trent, and had the support of several theologians.^[204] It would be a mistake to think that only the theologically inexpert were proponents of double justification.

Contarini's treatise should be read primarily as an important document in the history of pre-Tridentine Catholicism.^[205] With his concept of inherent justice Contarini argued for man's freedom of consent to divine grace, while his explanation of imputed justice affirmed the centrality of Christ's sacrifice for the believing Christian. He sensed the unresolved tension between the formality of theological discourse and the reality of Christian experience, and opened Catholic theology to the possibility of a less technical as well as more personal understanding of the teaching about justification.^[206] That teaching would be accessible to

[202] Reg ., 350 (Inedita, no. 88).

[203] Jedin, Trient 1:298. Also Cortese's letter to Contarini, San Benedetto, 4 July 1540, in Cortese, Gregorii Cortesii omnia 1:132.

[204] Besides McCue, "Double Justification," see also Stephan Ehses, "Johannes Groppers Rechtfertigungslehre auf dem Konzil von Trient," Römische Quartalschrift 20 (1906): 187; and P. Paz, "La doctrine de ta double justice au Concile de Trente," Ephemerides theologicae Lovanienses 30 (1954): 5- 53.

[205] In my judgment, McCue, "Double Justification," 39, offers the most sensible interpretation of this doctrine: "The doctrine of double justification is not so much an alternative theological proposal as it is a complaint about the way that theology as it had been practiced within the Latin church for four centuries was unable in principle to express some of the most obvious truths about the Christian life and experience."

[206] Calvin, who was at Regensburg together with the Strassburg delegation, and who was hostile to the colloquy from the beginning, wrote to Farel after the agreement on article 5: "You will marvel when you read the copy [of the article on justification] . . . that our adversaries have conceded so much. For they have committed themselves to the essentials of what is our true teaching. Nothing is to be found in it which does not stand in our writings. I know that you would prefer a more explicit exposition and in this you are at one with myself. But if you consider with what sort of men we have to deal, you will acknowledge that a great deal has been achieved" (in Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 109).

laymen, and only incidentally also very close to Protestant ideas simply because it was valid for all believers. Agreement on this doctrine he considered a major step toward the restoration of the seamless tunic of Christ, the unity of all Christians.

The day of 3 May 1541 was the highpoint of the Regensburg colloquy, a moment in which better relations between Catholics and Protestants seemed for a short while not merely conceivable but genuinely possible. A generation earlier, Luther's ninety-five theses had opened the ever-widening rift between the confessions. Now Contarini had high hopes that the colloquy would succeed in building a bridge between the two Christian camps, which for the first time since 1517 were drawing closer together rather than farther apart.

The End of a Dream

An ominous indication of what lay ahead came from the reactions of Melanchthon and Eck to article 5. The former called it "laboriously patched together" and accused the Catholics of having tried to use subterfuge to deceive the Protestants.^[207] . Eck, for his part, did not want to sign it until Granvelle urgently pressed him to do so.^[208] Despite misgivings, however, the talks continued while answers to reports sent to Rome and Wittenberg were awaited.

The debate proceeded to article 6, on the church and its authority in interpreting the Scriptures. From Contarini's account it appears that the collocutors circled around the topic like the proverbial cats around the hot porridge. The issue before them was whether councils can err. "In order not to delay the rest [of the articles] or to exasperate their [the Protestants'] minds further at this point, [article 6] remained unresolved and its discussion was deferred until the other matters are concluded," Contarini wrote to Cardinal Farnese.^[209] The colloquy

[207] Melanchthon's report to the Elector of Saxony, in Corpus Reformatorum 4:421.

[208] GC , 622. Morone reported on 3 May to Cardinal Farnese that Melanchthon and Eck were difficult; see Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morohe's," 453-54.

[209] Dispatch of 4 May 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 375.

touched on the next seven articles before beginning deliberations on the fourteenth, dealing with the sacrament of the Eucharist.

Soon serious disagreements surfaced. The very men whom Contarini had hoped to "induce to follow the right road" with divine help "and with reason and kindness"^[210] now resolutely rejected his insistence that the word transubstantiation be added to any discussion of the sacrament of the altar. Nineteen Protestant theologians held a meeting on 8 May; Calvin, who was among them, summarized their conclusion: "It was the opinion of all that transubstantiation was a fictitious thing, that reservation [of the host] was superstitious and its adoration idolatrous, or at least dangerous, since it is done without the word of God."^[211] Contarini drew a line between subjects that should and should not be discussed: "Our aim was to preserve truth and to agree in truth, which in this article was very clear, having been declared in the words of Christ and St. Paul, explained by all the ancient and modern doctors of the church, Greek as well as Latin, . . . and defined by a most famous council under Innocent III [the Fourth Lateran]."^[212] There was nothing more to add as far as he was concerned; the doctrine of transubstantiation was there for all to see. "We shall stand firm in the truth and see what God wishes to do" is the resigned ending of his report.

But Contarini's second thoughts are shown in another letter of the same date. He confessed that on further reflection it appeared that

this whole issue of the authority of councils is closely connected with the question of papal power in which there are strong disagreements among Catholic doctors. The entire University of Paris holds that a council is above the pope, while others hold the opposite view, namely that the pope is above the council,

[210] Dispatch of 3 May 1541, in ibid., 373.

[211] Joachim Mehlhausen, "Die Abendmahlsformel des Regensburger Buches," Studien zur Geschichte und Theologie der Reformation: Festschrift für Ernst Bizer , ed. Luise Abramowski and J. F. Gerhard Goeters (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1969), 193. For the discussions among Protestant theologians, see pp. 192-95. See also Pierre Fraenkel, "Les Protestants et le problème de la transubstantiation au Colloque de Ratisbonne: documents et arguments du 5 au 10 mai 1541," Oecumenica 3 (1968): 70 -115.

[212] To Cardinal Farnese, 9 May 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 377. I agree with Jedin, "An welchen Gegensätzen," 54, in thinking that for Contarini the main issue was not the the definition of the Eucharist or the wording of the decree as promulgated by the Fourth Lateran Council, but the principle of the church's magisterium : "Es handelt sich für ihn also nicht in erster Linie um den materiellen Inhalt der Lehre, sondern um das Formalprinzip, das kirchliche Lehramt." For the definition of the Fourth Lateran Council, see H. Denzinger, Enchiridion symbolorum , 33d ed. (Freiburg i.B.: Herder, 1965), no. 802.

which opinion in my judgment is more in conformance with the text of the gospel; nevertheless there is great controversy here.^[213]

Fearing that by an examination of these issues "we will enter into chaos from which only God knows how we can extricate ourselves," Contarini wanted the collocutors to proceed by confining themselves to general statements concerning this matter as well as that of papal authority. He offered "this good and true formula without any prejudice, which avoids all difficulty: . . . that Christ instituted the hierarchy of the church by putting bishops in their dioceses, [as wall as] archbishops, patriarchs, and primates, and above all of them, to preserve church unity, he constituted the Roman pontiff, giving him universal jurisdiction over the entire church, as can be clearly read in the gospel." The texts he adduced were Matthew 16:19, John 21:17, and Luke 22:32, without realizing how far apart Catholic and Protestant theologians were in their exegesis of these passages, which to him admitted of only one interpretation.

Contarini adopted the strategy of a practiced diplomat: he tried to postpone consideration of difficult topics by offering blandly formulated general statements on which both sides could agree for the time being. Clearly, he was hoping that agreement on a large enough number of articles might create a certain momentum that would enable the collocutors to tackle even the thorniest outstanding issues with goodwill toward each other. His chief contribution at this point lay not in some sort of fatuous optimism, but in the example he gave to the Catholic side by his willingness to see fellow Christians rather than enemies in the Lutherans.^[214]

The strategy of postponement did not work. Ironically, it was Contarini himself who moved against it in the course of discussions with Gropper and Pflug on 13 May. Perturbed by the omission of the word transubstantiation in the revision of article 14 by the two Catholic theologians, Contarini insisted that it be included. Moreover, his attitude toward Protestants began to change in an almost startling fashion.

I read the writing of the Protestants [their draft of article 14] by which it is manifest that they want to adhere to their erroneous idea that the substance of the bread remains in the Eucharist after consecration. So I told [Gropper and Pflug] that I clearly realized that we differed from them [the Protestants] concerning the meaning [of the Eucharist] while difficulties are made about

[213] To Cardinal Farnese, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 380.

[214] Pfnür, "Einigung," 75, rightly calls attention to this important clement.

the words. I will never consent to what is an agreement only in appearance, or make the sense of the church ambiguous.^[215]

Contarini reiterated these words to Granvelle, who begged him not to disrupt the colloquy by his insistence on the term transubstantiation . But the legate stood his ground, telling Granvelle: "Now that I saw that the difference between us concerned the meaning and not the words, I will never depart one iota from Catholic truth, or place it in doubt behind a screen of words." In no case should the word transubstantiation be omitted, because if that were to happen, "we would do great harm to the truth and to ourselves. His Lordship [Granvelle] tried very hard to calm me by telling me of his hard work and the danger [in which the colloquy was]. I answered him that I sympathized with him, because he truly was making an all-out effort, but one cannot injure the truth."^[216]

As a result of Contarini's insistence, the word transubstantiation was added to the Catholic draft. Granvelle continued to mediate, and managed to get a statement from the Protestants that they were willing to postpone the discussion of transubstantiation until the end of the colloquy. But Contarini had come to see the futility of the strategy that he himself had recommended only a short time before. Postponing difficult issues could not mask the fact that the two sides had fundamentally different points of departure in their theology of the Eucharist. "I see the Protestants very obstinate and pertinacious, and have no hope, unless God performs a miracle, that concord among us will be achieved," he wrote to Cardinal Farnese. "I trust in God, and shall remain firm in the truth and proceed with God's help in such a way that the world will never be able to accuse the Apostolic See of disturbing concord and peace, [but will see it as] the preserver of Christian dogmas."^[217]

Contarini's stance hardened further when, on 14 May, the theologians began to discuss the sacrament of penance. Here the Protestants did not agree with the Catholics about the necessity of confessing mortal sins, even though they declared that confession was useful. At this point Contarini did not wait for more specific information; he began to suspect the Protestants of actively seeking words that could be interpreted in ambiguous ways. Fearing that the emperor was not well

[215] To Cardinal Farnese, 13 May 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 385, corrected by ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 89v.

[216] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 90r; Pastor, "Correspondenz," 385.

[217] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 90v; Pastor, "Corresondenz," 386.

informed and therefore might support "false concord," he requested an audience at which he arrived with a written memorial that underscored his oral presentation to Charles V. The report of this audience shows not only the profound and rapid changes in Contarini's view of the Protestants, but also the beginning of the emperor's changing attitude toward the papal legate.

Belief in three articles of faith was necessary for Christians, Contarini argued: the Trinity, the incarnation of the Divine Word, and the Eucharist. They were fundamental, and any agreement presupposed their acceptance by all parties. Contarini urged the emperor to use his authority over Protestant theologians and princes to make them declare their adherence to these fundamental articles. Here he thought like a Venetian and conceived of imperial power in Germany as similar to that of the government of Venice, which freely issued commands or prohibitions to its citizens. Charles V did not accept Contarini's advice, as the latter reports:

His Majesty heard me attentively, then answered that I did well to fulfill my duties because he himself was not a theologian. Therefore he had requested the pope to send someone here whom he could trust, as His Holiness then did. He added that Monsignor Granvelle had reported to him that the difference [between the theologians] lay in one word concerning the Eucharist, namely transubstantiation, and that the Protestants were willing to institute confession among their population because experience had shown them how useful and necessary it was for the maintenance of obedience and the prevention of many scandals. It seemed best to him to proceed and get from them the most that was possible, and then at the end to treat the articles where there were differences. The necessary provisions must be made, since breaking up the negotiations was easy and could always be done. And he went on at some length about such a break.^[218]

Charles V was obviously annoyed by Contarini's insistence and probably agreed with Granvelle's view, as reported by Morone, that "transubstantiation was a difficult matter that pertained only to the learned and did not touch the people, for whom it was enough to believe that the body of Christ was in the sacrament and that it should be adored, remaining there until it was received."^[219] But there was a veiled reproach in the emperor's words as well: he had trusted Contarini, and the legate was beginning to let him down. Yet for Contarini, there

[218] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, 15 May 1541, ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 92v; Pastor, "Correspondenz," 388-89.

[219] Morone to Cardinal Farnese, 29 May 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 471.

could be no change in the doctrinal foundation on which the structure of the church rested. He insisted on the word transubstantiation because he considered the question about the nature of the Eucharist to have been settled centuries before by a council with the authority to do so. He literally could not imagine how the Protestants could slight tradition, or how they could justify picking and choosing among conciliar decrees.

Contarini's suspicions of the Protestants were reinforced by the intransigence of Melanchthon,^[220] who was anxious to please both Luther and the elector of Saxony by not appearing to be "soft" on Catholicism. Even Granvelle became impatient with Melanchthon and the arguments he used to bolster the theological stance of the Protestants.^[221] The meetings of the collocutors continued until 22 May, but it was obvious to both sides that they were not moving toward agreement on the articles considered following the discussion of the Eucharist. On 31 May the Regensburg Book and separate articles drawn up by the Protestants were presented to the emperor, and the colloquy was formally over.

Contarini remained in Regensburg in the awkward position of a lame-duck legate until the end of the diet and the departure of the emperor for Italy on 29 July. The colloquy had concluded before the replies to the agreed-upon articles arrived from Wittenberg and Rome. Interestingly, Luther did not reject article 5 as such, but worried that it created wrong impressions and left the door open to further confusion.^[222] He thought that the necessary first step should have been a confession of guilt by the Catholics followed by the repudiation of the "abominations [Greuel]" concerning justification which their theologians had taught for centuries.^[223] In brief, he mistrusted their motives and saw them as deceivers bent on interpreting justification in a sense contrary to the truth of the gospel; he ultimately rejected the whole Regensburg Book as merely a new patch on an old cloak. Elector Johann Friedrich of Saxony was just as blunt. He wrote to Melanchthon

[220] Augustijn, Godsdienstgesprekken , 93-95, with full bibliographical references.

[221] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, 16 May 1541, ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fols. 93v-94r: "Mons di Granvela per quanto mi ha detto disse al Melantone: Io non sono theologo, male vostre ragioni et authorità mi pajono tanto frivole, che non mi movono un capello."

[222] Martin Luther, Werke, Briefwechsel , vol. 9 (Weimar: Hermann Bohlaus Nachfolger, 1941), 410 (no. 3617) and 436-45 (no. 3629).

[223] Pfnur, "Einigung," 67. For a summary of Luther's reaction to the colloquy, see pp. 64-68.

that "those who want accord, should seek accord with God and his word. . .. Let those who want to deal with patchwork be damned."^[224] Calvin, however, though little more than an observer in Regensburg, considered that the article contained the "essence of true doctrine."^[225]

On 29 May, two crucial documents were written. The first was Contarini's most personal letter yet to Cardinal Farnese; the other was Farnese's reply to the legate's report of 3 May concerning the agreement on article 5. Contarini's letter with suggestions about the course of action the papacy should take in Germany is the most revealing of all his dispatches. Here he spoke not ex officio, but as an anguished Christian. Farnese's letter was official and peremptory. When read successively, these two letters reveal the gulf that separated Contarini, the advocate of church reform, from Farnese and his curial advisors, practical bureaucrats whose priorities were the preservation of papal supremacy and victory over the Protestants.

Contarini expressed his deeply felt convictions in a passionate plea as the pope's good servant whose duty it is to give counsel. The Lutheran heresy, he warned, has taken root in the minds not only of Protestants, but of all the German people. Even if concord were to be achieved in this diet, only the foundations would have been laid of a structure that had yet to be built, namely a real reformation in Germany: "Just as it is impossible to live in a house which consists only of its foundation, so nothing will have been achieved if a serious reformation is not erected [on this foundation]."^[226] Because Protestantism was something new, and because people avidly hanker after novelty, the new confession was spreading rapidly, especially because it had removed a series of obligations such as confession, fasting, attendance at mass, or abstinence from meat. In order to counteract Protestantism in Germany, three things were necessary. First, no territory that was presently Catholic should be allowed to join the Protestant League of Schmalkalden. Rather, the Catholic League must be strengthened. Second, the German bishops must be exemplary in their own lives and, like the Protestants, must instruct their people by using good preachers

[224] Quoted in Augustijn, Godsdienstgesprekken , 115.

[225] Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia , vol. 11 (Braunschweig, 1872), 215 (no. 308). See also Wilhelm H. Neuser, "Calvins Beitrag zu den Religionsgesprächen yon Hagenau, Worms und Regensburg (1540/41)," in Abramowski and Goeters (eds.), Studien zur Geschichte und Theologie der Reformation , 235.

[226] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fols. 102v-103r. The first part of this letter is printed in Reg ., 333-334 (Inedita, no. 71), from an incorrect copy, while the second and longer, with many inaccuracies, is in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 474-76.

and teachers.^[227] "If only, God willing, certain Italians whom I know were familiar with the German language, I believe that they could bear much fruit!" he added.^[228]

Contarini suddenly reached back in memory to his student years in Padua, echoing his teacher Pomponazzi: "Today we are alive, and tomorrow dead. The life of man, let alone of the Christian, consists in doing one's duty . . .as if we did not expect any reward or punishment in the next life. Speaking like philosophers, we must perform our task and not fail to do our duty, as natural reason tells us and as every philosopher would say, basing this idea on principles of natural reason."^[229] How much more Christians should do! Like an Old Testament prophet, Contarini castigated the shortcomings of the Catholic prelates by citing Deuteronomy on the subject of the ungrateful, fattened, and bloated people that had forgotten God.^[230] The letter ends with his third recommendation: the pope should grant Germans the right to receive communion under both species. This would be a most useful concession bearing on a rite to which the German people attributed great importance, and for which there were precedents not only among the Greeks but in western Europe as well.

The letter from Rome arrived in Regensburg on 8 June. It was drafted by Cervini and signed by Cardinal Farnese.^[231] Despite its

[227] Contarini already reported that the archbishop of Mainz had praised the excellent Protestant schools in Germany: "Imperoche non essendo scuole appresso Cattolici, et all'incontro essendone buone et copiose appresso Protestanti, tutta la gioventù di Germania s'instituisce nelle scuole loro, et cosi dalli primi anni bevono il veleno" (to Cardinal Farnese, 4 June 1541, in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 336).

[228] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 103r. Cardauns (NB 7:xxiv) thinks that Contarini has the Jesuits in mind here, while Pastor ("Correspondenz," 475n.2) opts for members of the Oratory of Divine Love. The first hypothesis is unlikely; the second is based on the erroneous idea that Contarini was a member of the Oratory. Contarini was most likely thinking of outstanding preachers like Ochino whom he knew: On the ignorance of German among Italian prelates, see Barbara M. Hallman, "Practical Aspects of Roman Diplomacy in Germany, 1517-1541," Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 10 (1980): 193-206.

[229] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 102v.

[230] As he frequently does, Contarini cites from memory. Here he refers to the Song of Moses, specifically Deut. 32:15, 18.

[231] William V. Hudon, "Papal, Episcopal, and Secular Authority in the Work of Marcello Cervini," Cristianesimo nella storia 9 (1988): 498n.15, calls this document "a long reproof/instruction drafted by Cervini on behalf of Alessandro Farnese" and mentions that it "was actually signed by Niccolo Ardinghello on Farnese's behalf." Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 151, cites it as "Ardinghelli/Contarini." Both use the text in Ep. Poli 3:ccxxxi-ccxl (not ccxxx, as erroneously printed), which is headed "Niccolo Ardinghello a nome del Cardinal Farnese al Card. Contarini Legato in Germania." From this it might appear that the task of answering Contarini was left to a mere secretary. Actually, the original in ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fols. 83r-90v, makes no mention of Ardinghelli, Farnese's secretary, but is written in the first person and signed by Farnese like all the other letters.

convcntional epistolary style and polite phrases, it contained a stinging rebuke of the legate's ideas and actions.^[232] Contarini was told that the article on justification was not read in consistory, since the pope wanted only a few persons to see it. The legate was accused of failing to exercise proper care to keep proceedings at the colloquy secret. Paul III neither approved nor rejected article 5, as if it did not warrant further discussion. "I am notifying you," Farnese continued, "that all those who saw it are of the opinion that even supposing that its sense were Catholic, the words could have been clearer. Therefore [they think] that in this important article ambiguity and mere semblance of concord were not avoided, which Your Reverence so prudently rejected and abhorred in the two succeeding articles on the Eucharist and confession."^[233] Contarini was enjoined not to approve any article whatsoever, and warned against allowing himself to be carried away in the hope of achieving concord. Everything had to be expressed so clearly in the Catholic sense that even the malice of the adversaries would not be able to misinterpret it. Like a schoolboy, Contarini was instructed not to use ambiguous or novel words that could put clear matters in doubt, and above all not to concede anything to the Protestants.

Still sharper criticism followed. Contarini was taken to task for his dispatch of 9 May in which he had expressed his views of councils and stated that the hierarchy of the church had been instituted directly by Christ. He was reprimanded for both, and told that neither Paul III nor anyone else agreed with him; only the pope had the authority to convoke councils,^[234] and he alone as successor of St. Peter was given full power by God.^[235] The legate was informed that at the French court he was considered too obsequious to the emperor, and too cold in defense of the truth. Next, he was admonished to supervise his own household more closely, for its members were leaking information to Rome even before his official dispatches could be read in consistory.^[236] Contarini, the experienced diplomat and cardinal, was criticized and treated to elementary instructions regarding diplomatic practice.

[232] Vetter, Religionsverhandlungen , 164, rightly writes of the "beleidigende Verächtlichkeit" of this letter.

[233] ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fol. 83v. The text printed in Ep. Poli diverges markedly from the manuscript, which I cite. NB 7:20 offers only a very few corrections of the printed text.

[234] ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fol. 85v.

[235] Ibid., fol. 86v.

[236] Ibid., fol. 89r-v.

What had happened? If we examine the reactions of Luther and Cardinal Farnese closely, we notice some remarkable similarities. In both Wittenberg and Rome the main issue was not the accord itself, which had been reached regarding justification, but fear that the other side would misuse the words of article 5, interpreting them in the "wrong" sense. The image of the naive Contarini who could not deal with theological complexity simply is not borne out by the documents. He, along with the collocutors, had believed that the two sides could actually agree on one of the central Christian doctrines. Neither he nor the other theologians merely deceived themselves because of their supposed Erasmian bent into minimizing differences between Catholics and Lutherans, as has been argued,^[237] nor were they misled by fuzzy thinking and ill-founded optimism. Something tragic had occurred before the colloquy even opened that would have profound repercussions for the history of Christianity: polemics between the two confessions had reached a point where their leaders were no longer capable of giving the other side the benefit of the doubt.^[238] Passions and emotions shaped Catholic attitudes toward "heretics" as much as Protestant ones toward "servants of the Antichrist." After over twenty years of political and ideological conflict, Protestants and Catholics saw each other as enemies, not fellow Christians, and treated each other accordingly. Even apart from theological differences, a psychological wall had been erected between the two confessions. By 1541 it could no longer be breached or removed by six theologians, no matter how learned and full of goodwill, much less by one single papal legate. Neither side could envision making a fresh start at this point. Besides, the aims of the two sides had diverged completely. While Rome now wanted a council convoked by the pope as the best defensive measure against the onslaught of Protestant criticism, the Protestants were still hoping for a reform throughout all of Germany that would build a single Protestant church. The Protestants had succeeded in seizing the initiative, and Rome was deeply concerned.

[237] Stupperich, Humanismus und Wiedervereinigung , passim.

[238] Pfnür, "Einigung," esp. 68 and 75, stresses the importance that the "Verfeindung" of the other side had for both Catholics and Protestants. Augustijn, Godsdienstgesprekken , 102, points to the mutual mistrust of the two sides as an important clement in the religious colloquies. Peter Vogelsänger, "Ökumenismus im 16. Jahrhundert: zur Geschichte des Religionsgesprächs yon Regensburg 1541," in Unterwegs zur Einheit: Festschrift für Heinrich Stirnimann , ed. Johannes Brantschen and Pietro Selvatico (Freiburg, Switz., and Freiburg i.B.: Herder, 1980), 647, also discusses the deep-seated mistrust each side had for the other in 1541, and rejects the idea that the theologians hoping for union were naive.

On 8 June, when Cardinal Farnese's letter of 29 May arrived, Contarini was no longer thinking as he had been on 3 May, when he wrote his report about the agreement on article 5. The intervening month had forced him to make important choices and to formulate the reasons for his decisions. The debate about transubstantiation had pushed him into espousing a quite rigid definition of tradition, which he subsequently defended against all comers. But it would be a mistake to consider him as "retreating into curialism" and crumpling before the arrogance of Cardinal Farnese's letters. Rather, he evolved a coherent personal stance the elements of which formed a pattern that would become impossible after Trent.

In his crisp answer to Farnese's strictures, entirely different in tone from his emotional dispatch of 29 May, Contarini first of all reaffirmed a position he would hold and defend until the end of his life: that the agreed-upon article on justification correctly expressed Catholic teaching. Even if the article seemed somewhat obscure, Contarini insisted that its sense was "cattolichissimo" and that not a word in it was ambiguous.^[239] Though willing to change words that in Rome might be interpreted in any but a strictly Catholic sense, he unhesitatingly stood by article 5. The accusation against members of his household he dismissed in a sentence or two, proceeding to the more important matter of papal supremacy. Morone and he had not insisted on its discussion once the discord among the collocutors became obvious; however, Contarini intended to follow instructions and try to include a statement about it in the final document.^[240] Farnese's reproaches did not have "an almost traumatic effect" on Contarini, nor did he be-

[239] To Cardinal Farnese, June 9, ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 111r: "Quanto all'articulo de iustificatione, fide et operibus, portia essere che a qualch'uno havesse parso un poco oscuro, mail senso è cattolichissimo, ne vi è clausola overo parola ambigua, cioè che si possa tirare in senso erroneo."

[240] Ibid., fol. 112r: "Al Sig. Nuntio [Morone] pareva che non dovendossi fare accordo, minor contraditione che si havesse in quest'articolo de primatu fusse meglio et io sarei stato dell'istesso parere, quando non fussi stato altrimenti avertito, ma a me basta l'obedire." This sentence must be read in conjunction with the preceding folio, 111v, where Contarini clearly states that he did not have specific instructions concerning the discussion of papal supremacy that he could have given to the Catholic collocutors before the Regensburg Book was presented to Charles V. He tried to add a passage to the margin of the text, but Granvelle rejected this because it would seem like a falsification. Nevertheless, Contarini was to include an affirmation of papal supremacy in his presentation to the emperor and in the revision of the text on which several Catholic theologians were working. Hence I translate the quoted sentence as follows: "To the nuncio it seemed that, since there was to be no accord, the less disagreement there was on the article about papal primacy the better. I would have been of the same opinion if I had not been admonished otherwise, but for me it suffices to obey."

come merely "the submissive tool of papal diplomacy," as Matheson thinks.^[241]

This can best be seen in his acerbic reply to the French accusation relayed by Farnese that he was cold in defense of the truth. Treating the matter quite deliberately as an afterthought, as if it did not merit more than a passing reference, Contarini expressed his wish that he were indeed cold enough to stop the great conflagration that reached from northern Europe all the way to Italy: "Believe me, Your Reverence, there is no need to add heat, but to bring such cooling as can be brought!"^[242] In a clear dig at fanatical Catholics, whether in Rome or Germany, Contarini assured Farnese that those who opposed the Lutherans but were themselves ignorant about the articles on grace, free will, original sin, and faith and justification actually fortified the reputation of the Lutherans and thereby caused their errors to spread further.^[243] It is characteristic of Contarini that he continued to voice his personal opinions while acknowledging and accepting the duty of obedience he owed as papal legate.

In this attitude we see the second element of Contarini's stance: his acceptance of the church's authority, whether papal, episcopal, conciliar, or sacerdotal.^[244] He agreed with the Thomist conception of the church as the mystical body of Christ, but he also defended the necessity of Roman legal, constitutional, and administrative structures. With all its faults as an organization, the church for him was the means Christ had established to safeguard his message through the magisterium and to dispense grace to the Christian people through the sacraments. The tie that bound the individual member of the church to its hierarchy was obedience. For Contarini, the church was the visible, institutional ecclesia sacramentorum , not the ecclesia abscondira known only to God.

Contarini's ecclesiology was traditional. Nowhere in his writings is there evidence of disaffection from late medieval conceptions of the nature of the church.^[245] He had interiorized the respect for institutions

[241] Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 153. Vetter, Religionsverhandlungen , 201, thinks that Contarini gradually became "a tool of others, without a will of his own" ( ein willenloses Werkzeug anderer ).

[242] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 112v. He wrote on 12 June to the nuncio in France on the same subject in milder terms; see Monumenti Beccadelli 1 (2): 178.

[243] ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 111v.

[244] Klaus Ganzer, "Zum Kirchenverständnis Gasparo Contarinis," Würzburger Diözesangeschichtsblätter 35-36 (1974): esp. 249-57.

[245] The considerable differences among late medieval conceptions of the church are shown by Friedrich Merzbacher, "Wandlungen des Kirchenbegriffs im Spätmittelalter," Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte 39 (1953): 274-361. See also Jedin, "Die Entwicklung des Kirchenbegriffs im 16. Jahrhundert," in Kirche des Glaubens 2:7-16.

that his upbringing as a Venetian gentleman had instilled in him, and he firmly believed that institutions made human life civilized in the secular sphere while giving it direction and guidance in the religious. His commitment to upholding order in both spheres, together with his understanding of the role of a papal legate as quite literally that of an intermediary, led to Contarini's sometimes misunderstood phrase "to me it suffices to obey," meaning that he was willing to subordinate his own views to the decisions of the pope, once they were made. But while these decisions were being debated, the legate felt quite free to inform Paul III through Cardinal Farnose of his own opinions. For this reason his vivid letters still make good reading after almost half a millennium, and remain more accessible evidence of his thought than his formal and for the most part dry treatises.

That Contarini was not regarded as unconditionally submissive to Rome can be seen in Cardinal Farnese's dispatch of 14 June. On its surface, this is a straightforward set of instructions accompanying a letter of credit for fifty thousand scudi to be used for the Catholic League in Germany. But extraordinary care went into its composition, as shown by two drafts annotated by Cardinal Cervini that preceded the final version sent to the legate.^[246] Contarini is given detailed orders on how to explain the pope's mind to Charles V. The emperor and the German Catholic princes must be convinced that Paul III was willing to spend as much money as the league and the defense of true religion required, and even to lay down his own life if necessary. While he did not want to be either the initiator or a counselor of armed conflict, he went on record as fully supporting the actions of Charles V that benefited Catholicism.^[247]

[246] Two drafts (not three, as stated in Reg ., 199n.1) and the fair copy are in ASF, Carte Cerviniane, filza 3, nos. 25-27, fols. 48r-65v. Theodor Brieger, "Nic. Ardinghelli im Namen des Papsres an Contarini, Rom, 15. Juni 1541: die beiden ersten Entwürfe dieser Depesche, vom 10. Juni," Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 5 (1882): 595-604, compared the first and second drafts. The fair copy agrees with the version printed in Ep. Poli 3:ccxl (misnumbered ccxxx)-ccxlix, except for minor details and two matters of substance: the absence of the last three paragraphs, and the dating, which is "xiiii" in the manuscript but "XV" in the published text. This text is corrected in NB 7:20-22 on the basis of yet another draft found in Archivio di Stato, Naples, Carte Farnesiane, 700C. The copy actually sent to Contarini on 15 June and dated the previous day (ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fols. 96r-105r) is a copy of the fair copy now in Florence, mentioned above. An excerpt from the Vatican copy is printed in CT 4:194-96 (no. 150). I cite according to the printed version in Ep. Poli , as corrected from the Vatican copy.

[247] Ep. Poli 3:ccxliii.

There is no hint that Cardinal Farnese and his advisors even for a moment seriously discussed the merits of "the damned opinions" of the Protestants. Contarini was warned that there could be no toleration of the articles not agreed upon in the colloquy, because faith is indivisible and cannot be accepted piecemeal. Because concord was not achieved, toleration was not allowed, and war was difficult and dangerous, only one course of action remained: the convocation of a general council.^[248] Paul III instructed his legate to counteract demands for a German council in German lands that would deal with the issues Luther had raised. A valid council could only be universal and summoned by the pope. From this point on, Contarini had no more room to maneuver or negotiate. His orders were unequivocal, and as a practiced organization man he understood that fact clearly.

When compared with the drama of the colloquy and its culmination in the agreement on article 5, the two following months seem anticlimactic, especially the weeks after 21 June, when this last instruction arrived and effectively tied Contarini's hands. Even so, his letters from this period remain lively and important. The most interesting aspects of his correspondence during June and July 1541 are his steadfastness in defending his ideas about justification and his changing view of the religious and political situation in Germany.

Ludwig Cardauns, editor of the Nuntiaturberichte covering the period of the Diet of Regensburg, thinks that after the end of the colloquy Contarini had a complete change of heart of the sort that "disappointments cause in people of such disposition,"^[249] such that he not only despaired of Germany but also threw in the towel by drawing closer to the most outspoken enemies of religious concord, the dukes of Bavaria. In this interpretation, Contarini's personality explains the change from the irenic legate to the stern spokesman for papal political aims. For Matheson, Contarini abandoned the idea of reunion in the sense of a "return of the Protestants to the true Faith. Now . . . the keyword is consolidation, reform seen as a weapon against the Protestants." Because of his curialism, he went over to the Counter-Reformation, speaking the "language of Aleandro and Carafa in Rome, of Loyola's new movement, of St. Theresa in Spain."^[250]

In actuality, Contarini fully understood that his conciliatory approach

[248] Ibid., ccxlv.

[249] NB 7:XXII: "Der Ausgang hat in Contarini einen Gesinnungswechsel erzeugt, wie ihn Enttäuschungen bei Menschen von solcher Veranlagung hervorzurufen pflegen."

[250] Matheson, Contarini at Regensburg , 164.

to Protestants had not worked. Neither his personality nor his "curialism" explain the new tone in his letters, but the realism of a practiced diplomat does. After it became clear that concord could not be achieved, his first objective was to defend the papacy from accusations of having sabotaged the colloquy. The second was to encourage a defensive Catholic League. Since the dukes of Bavaria were its leaders, he obviously had to discuss the matter with them. Finally, he hoped to influence the emperor so as to prevent the acceptance of Granvelle's project of toleration. The latter proposed that the sixteen articles discussed by the collocutors should be accepted by both sides, and the others tolerated for the time being.^[251] Charles V was sufficiently annoyed by the lack of any solution to the German religious situation to seriously consider granting the Protestants provisional freedom to practice their religion,^[252] something the legate was instructed to prevent by insisting on the necessity of convoking a general council that would examine the issues raised by the Protestant reformers.

The pursuit of these three objectives was the major theme of his correspondence. The minor, but recurring and insistent, theme was something else: his continued defense of the formula on justification. If his tone concerning the Protestants became sharp, and if at times he even condemned their views, he never wavered in his certainty that the agreement on justification was in accordance with Catholic teaching.

Gradually his friends' reactions to the formula he had championed began to reach him. One of the first to write was Pole. While expressing his joy that concord had been achieved, he used rather noncommittal language that veiled his own views: "What I think about this you already know, and it is not necessary to say more about it."^[253] When read attentively, Pole's letter reveals his discomfort with the Regensburg formula, despite fulsome but very general praise. The reason for this ambiguous stance was twofold: Pole thought the formula not incontrovertibly scriptural and worried about being too closely associated with it.^[254] Contarini had counted on him and was let down when

[251] Augustijn, Godsdienstgesprekken , 113-14.

[252] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, Regensburg, 15 June 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 36, fol. 115v, which corrects Pastor, "Corresondenz," 483.

[253] Capranica, 17 May 1541, Ep. Poli 3:25. A month later Pole continued his cautious tone and expressed the wish that Contarini had faced a more aggressive adversary so that he would have been constrained to develop his ideas more fully, silencing those who opposed him. Pole in a tactful way in effect said that he, too, was not convinced of the scriptural basis of Contarini's arguments (ibid., 27).

[254] Fenlon, Heresy and Obedience , 56, 61.

Pole remained in Capranica, his summer residence, as the college of cardinals was about to discuss the agreement on justification.^[255] Pole had used poor health as a face-saving excuse for his absence. Instead of going himself, Pole sent his friend Alvise Priuli to Rome to sound out curial opinion about the concord reached in Regensburg.

Priuli contacted the most influential papal advisors, about whose judgment Pole was naturally anxious. The first was Carafa, who objected to the term inherent justice that had been used, considering it novel and likely to be deliberately misused by the heretics. The absence of the term merit troubled him as well. Priuli tried to the best of his ability to explain what he took to be Contarini's meaning, but the most he achieved was Carafa's admission that "good and Catholic sense" could be given to everything that had been agreed upon. Carafa warned, however, that the Protestants were certain to interpret the article on justification in a manner contrary to that of the Catholics.^[256] Cervini thought the same. Aleandro was radically skeptical about the whole matter, believing that even if accord were reached on all points, Germany would not be pacified merely because theologians had reached an agreement.^[257] Sadoleto, who was generally in sympathy with Contarini's ideas, eventually wrote from his residence in Carpentras to reject article 5 as too Lutheran and a distortion of Catholic doctrine.^[258] Only two prelates at the papal court took the legate's part: Bembo, who came to the aid of his countryman with more goodwill than theological acumen,^[259] and Fregoso, who defended Contarini strongly in consistory.^[260] But his voice was not decisive; he soon left

[255] To Bembo, Regensburg, 28 June 1541, Reg ., 341 (Inedita, no.78): "Desidereria che il R.mo Polo fusse in Roma a questi tempi et a questi manegi, in vero non poteva essere absente a tempo piu incomodo. Io lo haveria excitato a ritornare, si non havessi habuto rispecto al periculo della sanita sua."

[256] Priuli to Beccadelli, Rome, 20 May 1541, in Carlo Dionisotti, "Monumenti Beccadelli," in Miscellanea Pio Paschini , ed. A. Casamassa (Rome: Facultas Theologica Pontificii Athenaei Lateranensis, 1949), 2:266.

[257] Ibid., 268.

[258] Douglas, Sadoleto , 158-60; and Simoncelli, Evangelismo italiano , 109-11.

[259] Paolo Simoncelli, "Pietro Bembo e l'evangelismo italiano," Critica storica 15 (1978): 19-25; and idem, Evangelismo italiano , 112-13. Gigliola Fragnito, "Evangelismo e intransigenti nei difficili equilibri del pontificato farnesiano," Rivista di storia e letteratura religiosa 25 (1989): 46, argues that Bembo believed in justification by faith alone and was in full sympathy with Contarini.

[260] Bembo to Contarini, Rome, 27 May 1541, in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):169; and 13 July 1541, ibid., 183. Nino Sernini to Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga, Rome, I July 1541: "esso [ Fregoso] nel concistorio ha sempre favorite le cose fatte dal Contarino in la dieta di Ratisbona" (ASM, Carteggio Gonzaga, Esteri 1541). Possibly Fregoso had a low opinion of his fellow cardinals. Ochino, admittedly not a reliable source, years later reported Fregoso's statement that on the day before the matter was discussed in consistory, at least thirty of the fifty cardinals did not know what justification was, and the majority of the remaining twenty would regard anyone who defended the Regensburg formula as a heretic; see Reg ., 187 (no. 730).

Rome for his diocese of Gubbio, where he died on 22 July. As a result, Bembo remained the lone champion of Contarini's views on justification at the papal court.

By mid-July, though, these views really no longer mattered except as expressions of his individual belief. Although justification had not proved to be the basic issue at the colloquy after all, for Contarini personally it remained crucial, as can be seen by his repeated defense of article 5 even after Farnese's insulting letter of 29 May had reached him on 8 June. Although he participated in a new committee that the emperor appointed to go over the Regensburg Book once more and examine it from the Catholic perspective,^[261] Contarini had no second thoughts about the formula on justification. The most he admitted was that there was room for clarification and amplification of some passages of the Regensburg Book. In an unusual display of irritation with "learned men" in Rome who objected to the absence of the term merit in article 5, he attempted to explain to Cardinal Farnese the reasons for its omission. His theologically rather amateurish explanation hinges on the idea that if the word merit were introduced, the greatness of God's free gift of eternal life would be diminished. "Our sense and their [the Protestants'] sense is the same, but it did not seem to us necessary to force on them the term merit, so we left it out,"^[262] he wrote in the vain hope of silencing his critics.

In fact, he knew that they were becoming more insistent. Already on 27 May Bembo had informed him that his views on justification had been the cause of some disagreement among the cardinals, but that he should not worry about that. "You know the character of the senate [the college of cardinals] and the way people are: there are as many opinions as there are individuals. The one among them who was most in your debt was least willing to pay."^[263] Bembo did not want to

[261] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, Regensburg, 14 June 1541, ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fols. 113r-114r; and in part in Pastor, "Correspondenz," 481-82.

[262] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, Regensburg, 22 June 1541, in NB 7 : 13. This letter is missing from ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 36.

[263] Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):169: "Nosti enim vel morem Senatus, vel naturam hominum: Quot enim capita, tot sententiae. Qui omnium tibi plus debebat, ille minus tribuit."

make an issue of the fact that an important cardinal on whose help Contarini had relied (in all likelihood either Aleandro, Cervini, or Carafa) had turned against him. A week later he mentioned in passing that malicious comments were being made in Rome about Contarini but tried to downplay their importance.^[264] Shortly afterward Bembo comforted the legate by writing from Rome that he personally agreed with the article on justification but that "the matter has not been understood well by some people here."^[265]

Some curialists whom Contarini does not mention by name wrote to him and to members of his household that he and Badia were being blamed for exalting faith over works. Others wrote that even though true, the agreed-upon article 5 was nevertheless scandalous: if people did not consider good works meritorious, they would not perform them. "I was most amazed at this and cannot believe that there is any learned and serious man at the papal court who holds such views, but think it certain that they belong to persons who are not as well informed as they should be. If I thought otherwise, I would humbly and charitably show it in writing, so that it could be well considered what a great error this is"^[266] was Contarini's exasperated reply.

He defended his ideas not only against those who should have known better, but also against his most conspicuous critics such as Cardinals Laurerio and Aleandro. The first had tangled in consistory with Fregoso, to Contarini's obvious annoyance, who wondered whether the article on justification deserved all the attention Laurerio was lavishing on it. Contarini repeated the accusations that he and Badia, along with the emperor, had been too accommodating to the Protestants. The new tone in his letters shows that he was deeply wounded: "Now I am beginning to be a good Christian suffering in the troubles and dangers in which I have placed myself for the sake of religion, and I am certain that this foolish calumny will [ultimately] result in my good, so that I am cheerful about it," he wrote to Laurerio.^[267]

[264] Bembo to Contarini, June 4 1541, in ibid., 172: "Nostro Signor Dio che può il tutto, doni felice sucesso a V.S. R di quelle cose, che ella così prudentemente tratta anchora che quì non le manchino delle invidie."

[265] Letter of 11 June 1541, in ibid., 177.

[266] To Cardinal Farnese, 10 July 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 36, fol. 132r-v; correcting Pastor, "Correspondenz," 494.

[267] Regensburg, 22 July 1541, in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):185; and Reg ., 218 (no. 820). Dittrich wrongly identifies the recipient as Cervini.

A fuller defense of Contarini's actions is found in a carefully worded letter to an unnamed but clearly influential cardinal whom he suspected of originating the rumor in Rome that he, together with Badia and the emperor, had signed Lutheran articles. He reproached the cardinal in question for having discussed the term merit in consistory "as if it were an essential article of faith, like that on the Trinity, or something similar."^[268] Like the fighter on the front lines, he now speaks to those carping at him from the safety of Rome. Resigning himself to being misunderstood by people without direct experience of discussions with Lutherans, he explains that it was impossible to force them to use the terminology of scholastic philosophy. All the Catholic theologians had rightly agreed to omit the word merit in the interest of reaching agreement.

Then follows one of the most crucial passages in Contarini's correspondence of these last two months in Regensburg. Here he reveals that, far from retreating into intransigent curialism, as Matheson would have it, he still holds the same convictions he held at the beginning of his mission.

For myself . . . I am renouncing any reason I might have for thinking that God owes me anything, and the good things that he gives me I wish to acknowledge as coming from his loving kindness, mercy, and generosity rather than from anything he owes me or any obligation he has toward me. Moreover, what happens to love of neighbor at this important point." Let me assure Your Reverence that I am not interested in entering into a meaningless battle of words. Through such battles the Christian church is being radically damaged, and there is no one who feels compassion for her. Instead, the highest praise goes to him who knows how to invent some new cause of strife. God grant that we don't all too soon have cause to regret this; for my own eyes see clearly what those people there do not see. I may have said more than I ought to have, but the love of Christ forces me to do it, and Your Reverence will pardon me for it.^[269]

[268] To Cardinal N. N., 22 July 1541, in Monumenti Beccadelli 1(2):186. Morandi thinks that the cardinal is Aleandro, but this is not clear.

[269] Ibid., 188: "Io per me . . . rinuncio a quanta ragione potessi havere, che Dio mi fosse debitore, et tutto quello che mi darà di bene, voglio riconoscerlo dalla sua benignità, misericordia, et liberalità, et non da debito suo, et obbligo suo alcuno. In oltre dov'è la carità del prossimo in così importante occasione? V.S. R.ma si assicuri, che languemus circa inutilem pugnam verborum, et in questo mezzo per le nostre contentioni si ruina funditus la Cristianità, nè vi è chi gli abbia compassione, anzi quello è più laudato, il quale sa meglio ritrovare qualche modo, et qualche nuova causa di dissidio. Dio voglia, che non ce ne pentiamo presto; ben il veggio io coi miei occhi quello, che lì non si vede. Son trascorso più di quello che doveva, la carità di Cristo mi costringe, però V.S. R.ma mi perdoni."

A similarly critical tone is found in Contarini's letter to his brother-in-law Matteo Dandolo, Venetian ambassador to the French court. Considering himself no longer bound to keep matters secret, Contarini summarized his view of the colloquy and emphasized that he personally found nothing heretical in the Regensburg Book despite Eck's objections to it. Still, he did not want to approve it, because the Protestants accepted the book only in part and might interpret the rest in a sense contrary to truth. "Now concord is entirely out of the question . . . I now see clearly that the greatest good fortune which I had in the course of this legation was that no concord was achieved, because I would certainly have been stoned by various groups, and some would even have become heretics in order to make me appear to be one," was his exasperated conclusion. But far from feeling downcast, Contarini ended on a defiant note: "Be of good cheer, [for] more are with us than with them."^[270]

The dispatches from Cardinal Farnese that followed his letter of 15 June gave Contarini no guidance in religious questions and avoided discussion of the main issues for the ostensible reason that it would be far easier to deal with religious matters orally after the legate's return to Italy. But Farnese clearly stonewalled by not responding to Contarini's reports about the debates on justification: "it seems to His Holiness, because of the way things are going, the less said and written about [justification], the better."^[271] Instead, the legate's final instruction was to work toward Habsburg support for the convocation of a general council, and against the emperor's granting of any form of toleration to the Protestants.

As a result of this charge, the relations of legate and emperor grew cool. Granvelle had made no bones about his disappointment with the pope, Morone, and Contarini, accusing them of having done nothing to reform the Catholic clergy and bishops of Germany. The secretary was extremely distressed and bluntly declared that the Holy See was

[270] Regensburg, July 1541, in ibid., 203: "Hora la concordia è in tutto disperata . . . Ben veggo che oramai la maggiore ventura, che io habbia avuto in questa Legatione, è stata, che non si sia fatta la concordia, perchè certamente io sarìa stato da diverse bande lapidato, et qualch'uno si haverìa fatto eretico per farmi parere eretico. . .. State di buona voglia, plures sunt nobiscum quam cum illis. "

[271] Cardinal Farnese to Contarini, Rome, 7 July 1541, ASVat, Arm. 64, vol. 20, fols. 118r-120r; and NB 7:22-24.

tolerating appalling scandals.^[272] At the insistence of Granvelle, speaking for the emperor, on 7 July Contarini addressed the German bishops present in Regensburg concerning the necessity of reform.^[273] He admonished them to be true shepherds of their flock and to set examples of modesty, sobriety, and avoidance of ostentation in their households. They were told to counteract Protestant doctrines by choosing learned and honest preachers capable of instructing the people by word as well as example. However, these preachers do not bear much resemblance to the later Counter-Reformation militant defenders of Catholicism. Despite his recent experiences, Contarini repeated one of his favorite ideas by urging that they be neither contentious nor animated by hatred toward their adversaries, but capable of loving them and desiring their salvation. He stressed the importance of instructing youth, an area in which he thought Catholics lagged behind Protestants, and enjoined Catholics to found schools, especially for nobles, in order to counteract the successes of the Protestants. Here Contarini echoed what the archbishop of Mainz had told him a month earlier—that Protestant schools were good and numerous, whereas Catholics had none.^[274]

As with so much else he did in Regensburg, Contarini has been both praised and blamed for this last act. Jedin considered his address to the German bishops "replete with the ideas of Catholic reform," while in Augustijn's opinion Contarini's allocution was "nothing more than a funeral speech."^[275] Contarini's address was in fact so perfunctory that one must agree with Augustijn. The legate knew full well that he could make no difference at this point, but he did his duty in accordance with the emperor's wishes.

The Diet of Regensburg closed on 29 July amid disagreement over the wording of Charles V's final declaration.^[276] Contarini's last letters from this legation were written by a man who knew that he had lost a

[272] Morone to Cardinal Farnese, 21 June 1541, in Dittrich, "Nuntiaturberichte Morone's," 622.

[273] Pfeilschifter (ed.), Acta Reformationis Catholicae 4(2):5-7.

[274] Contarini to Cardinal Farnese, 4 June 1541, in Reg ., 336 (Inedita, no. 73), corrected by ASVat, Arm. 62, vol. 36, fol. 108v.

[275] Jedin, Trient 1:313; Cornelis Augustijn, "The Quest of Reformation: The Diet of Regensburg as a Turning-Point," paper presented at the the conference "The Reformation in Germany and Europe: Interpretations and Issues," Washington, D.C., 25 September 1990. I would like to thank Professor Augustijn for giving me a copy of his paper.

[276] GC , 767-70.

battle yet had not despaired. He continued to defend the article on justification and to condemn Protestant rejection of defined doctrines. There was, moreover, no bitterness in his reflections about the failure of the colloquy. Rather, such bitterness as he expressed was directed at people in the court of Rome who not only knew all too little about the German situation and about Lutheran as well as Catholic theology, but also lacked charity. His dream of religious concord was utterly shattered. Now he had to defend himself for having been its champion.