If in such cases it was the government which took the lead, in others the government undoubtedly compelled the people to continue Catholic even when there was a strongly Protestant public opinion.

Such was the case in Albertine Saxony,[1] whose ruler, Duke George, though an estimable man in many ways, was regarded by Luther as the instrument of Satan because he persecuted his Protestant subjects.

When he died, his brother, [Sidenote: April, 1539] the Protestant Henry the Pious, succeeded and introduced the Reform amid general acclamation.

Two years later this duke was followed by his son, the versatile but treacherous Maurice.

In the year 1539 a still greater acquisition came to the Schmalkaldic League in the conversion of Brandenburg and its Elector Joachim II.
[Sidenote: Philip of Hesse, 1504-67] Shortly afterwards the world was scandalized by the bigamy of Philip of Hesse.