[Sidenote: March 6, 1530] Luther's advice asked and given to the effect that all rebellion or forcible resistance to the constituted authorities was wrong.

Passive resistance, the mere refusal to obey the command to persecute or to act, otherwise contrary to God's law, he thought was right but he discountenanced any other measures, even those taken in self-defence.
All Germans, said he, were the emperor's subjects, and the princes should not shield Luther from him, but leave their lands open to his officers to do what they pleased.

This position Luther abandoned a year later, when the jurists pointed out to him that the authority of the emperor was not despotic but was limited by law.
The Protest and Appeal of 1529 at last aroused Charles, slow as he was, to the great dangers to himself that lurked in the Protestant schism.
Having repulsed the Turk and having made peace with France and the pope he was at last in a position to address himself seriously to the religious problem.

Fully intending to settle the trouble once for all, he came to Germany and opened a Diet at Augsburg [Sidenote: June 20, 1530] to which were invited not only the representatives of the various states but a number of leading theologians, both Catholic and Lutheran, all except Luther himself, an outlaw by the Edict of Worms.
The first action taken was to ask the Lutherans to state their position and this was done in the famous Augsburg Confession, [Sidenote: June 25] read before the Diet by the Saxon Chancellor Brueck.

It had been drawn up by {117} Melanchthon in language as near as possible to that of the old church.