Perpetually toying with the idea he yet allowed the pressure of his courtiers and the difficulties of the political situation--for France was opposed to the council as an imperial scheme--indefinitely to postpone the summons.
The more serious-minded Paul III found another lion in his path.

He for the first time really labored to summon the general synod, but he found that the Protestants had now changed their position and would no longer consent to recognize its authority under any conditions to which he could possibly assent.

Though {390} his nuncio Vergerio received in Germany and even in Wittenberg a cordial welcome, it was soon discovered that the ideas of the proper constitution of the council entertained by the two parties were irreconciliable.

Fundamentally each wanted a council in which its own predominance should be assured.
The Schmalkaldic princes, on the advice of their theologians, asked for a free German synod in which they should have a majority vote, and in this they were supported by Francis I and Henry VIII.

Naturally no pope could consent to any such measures; under these discouraging circumstances, the opening of the council was continually postponed, and in place of it the emperor held a series of religious colloquies that only served to make the differences of the two parties more prominent.
[Sidenote: Summons of Council, November 19, 1544] After several years of negotiation the path was made smooth and the bull _Laetare Hierusalem_ summoned a general synod to meet at Trent on March 15, 1545, and assigned it three tasks: (1) The pacification of religious disputes by doctrinal decisions; (2) the reform of ecclesiastical abuses; (3) the discussion of a crusade against the infidel.