Note 272 — Chapter VIII
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Charles the Fifth, who in his monastic seclusion at Yuste, might naturally have felt more scruples at a collision with Rome than when, in earlier days, he held the pope a prisoner in his capital, decidedly approved of his son's course. It was a war of necessity, he said, in a letter to Juan Vazquez de Molina, and Philip would stand acquitted of the consequences before God and man.
"Pues no se puede hazer otra cosa, y el Rey se ha justificado en tantas maneras cumpliendo con Dios y el mundo, por escusar los daños que dello se seguiran, forzado sera usar del ultimo remedio." Carta del Emperador á Juan Vazquez de Molina, 8 de Agosto, 1557, MS.