It was indeed the fear of such a reaction that led Zwingli to make his Reformation as thorough as possible.
In this period it becomes impossible to separate Swiss politics from German. The restoration of Duke Ulrich of Württemberg (which Zurich was more disposed than Bern to help) was an unfailing subject of negotiation. With this Saul who, could he but be restored, seemed likely to be a Paul to the Reformation, Zwingli had a connexion of long standing; and through him he became friendly with that able politician, the Landgrave Philip of Hesse. Zwingli's Hessian correspondence in cipher begins with the second Diet of Speier, when the Landgrave (April 22, 1529) first wrote about the Marburg Conference, and it ends eleven days before Zwingli's death. The two correspondents formed vast schemes, for the Landgrave, like Zwingli himself, was no rigid conservative. As early as 1524 Zwingli had formed a plan for an extensive league; but the Anabaptist troubles led him to lay it aside. Now under the Landgrave's influence he returned to it. After the Conference the proposal of "a Christian agreement" came from Hesse; it aimed at securing mutual protection and converts to the Word of God; the Schmalkaldic League (April, 1531) owed something to this conception. But the idea of a league uniting Swiss and German Protestants failed through resistance from the Elector of Saxony, faithful to the Empire and firm in his Lutheran creed.
The reward Zwingli gained for deserting his old principle of keeping aloof from foreign complications was small; his widest plans miscarried. No greater success rewarded Bucer in his attempts at mediation between the Lutheran and Zwinglian camps. The creed of Strassburg, Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau, drawn up by Bucer and Capito, presented to the Emperor July 11, 1530, and known as the Tetrapolitana, was considered and rejected by Basel and Zurich at the Evangelic Diet of Basel, November 16, 1530. It affirmed that the true body and blood of Christ were given, truly to eat and drink, for the nourishment of souls; positively, it made as close an approach to the Lutheran view as was possible, while by omission of any statement as to the elements it avoided contradicting that view; in other articles the authority of the Scriptures, not mentioned in the Augsburg Confession, and the rejection of images are set forth. Zwingli's own Confession was embodied in the Fidel ratio ad Carolum Imperatorem presented to the Emperor (July 3, 1530). The earlier sections expounded the Nicene faith; the sixth section emphasized Wyclif's theory of the invisible Church composed of elect believers; the seventh and eighth asserted the Sacraments to be merely signs and affirmed Zwingli's teaching in terms likely to anger Catholics and Lutherans alike; later sections depreciated ceremonies, denounced images as unscriptural, magnified the office of preacher, and discussed the relations of Church and State at length. The Anabaptists were often incidentally condemned, and the assertion of his own views was clear
