formed part of the fundamental law of the land. He thus authorized the progress of Church reform beyond the very narrow limits which that instrument imposed. The real importance of this decree consisted in the implied sanction which it thus gave to the existence of the Lutheran Church and of the Unity of the Bohemian Brethren.
This concession did not insure religious tranquillity in Bohemia, particularly as Maximilian refused several other demands of the Estates. The incessant warfare with the Turks in Hungary obliged him continually to apply to the Estates for aid. The king, for this purpose, assembled a Diet at Prague in 1575. Matters affecting religion were again promptly brought forward by the Lutherans. It was their purpose to obtain the recognition in Bohemia of the so-called "Confession of Augsburg," in which the principal points of Luther's doctrine had been enumerated. This effort was opposed, not only by the Romanists, but also by the old-utraquists. One of the latter, John, Lord of Waldstein, the High Chamberlain, spoke strongly in favour of maintaining the old national (i. e. utraquist) Church, and opposed the acceptation of a "German religion." The Lutherans now entered into an alliance with the Bohemian Brethren; they presented to the king a joint profession of faith which is known as the "Confessio Bohemica." It was in most points identical with the "Confession of Augsburg," but differed from it in some important points. Among these was the doctrine concerning the sacrament of the holy communion: and on this point the Bohemian profession of faith coincided rather with the teaching of Calvin and the Bohemian Brethren than with that of Luther. The "Confessio Bohemica" contained twenty-five articles, and included proposals as to the organization of the utraquist Church. That Church had never recognized the authority of the Roman Catholic Archiepiscopate of Prague, an office reinstated by Ferdinand in 1561. It had, since the death of Archbishop John of Rokycan, been ruled by a Consistory, at the head of which was an "Administrator," who, together with the other members of the consistory, was nominated by the king. The new proposal maintained the system of government by a Consistory Council, but it contained the important provision that the "Administrator" and the other members should in future be appointed by the Estates.
