Cardinal Bembo saw at her castle at Mantua paintings of Erasmus and Luther.
[Sidenote: 1537] One of the courtly poets of Northern Italy, Francis Berni, bears witness to the good repute of the Protestants.

In his _Rifacimento_ of Boiardo's _Orlando Inamorato_, he wrote: "Some rascal hypocrites snarl between their teeth, 'Freethinker! Lutheran!' but Lutheran means, you know, good Christian." [Sidenote: Roman prelates affected by Luther] The most significant sign of the times, and the most ominous for the papacy, was that among those affected by the leaven of Lutheranism were many of the leading {377} luminaries in the bosom of the church.

That the Florentine chronicler Bartholomew Cerratani expressed his hope that Luther's distinguished morals, piety and learning should reform the curia was bad enough; that the papal nuncio Vergerio, after being sent on a mission to Wittenberg, should go over to the enemy, was worse; that cardinals like Contarini and Pole should preach justification by faith and concede much that the Protestants asked, was worst of all.
"No one now passes at Rome," wrote Peter Anthony Bandini about 1540, "as a cultivated man or a good courtier who does not harbor some heretical opinions." Paul Sarpi, the eminent historian of Trent, reports that Luther's arguments were held to be unanswerable at Rome, but that he was resisted in order that authority might be uphold.

For this statement he appeals to a diary of Francis Chieregato, an eminent ecclesiastic who died on December 6, 1539.

As the diary has not been found, Lord Acton rejects the assertion, believing that Sarpi's word cannot be taken unsupported.