Note 528 — Chapter XIV

F. Herrmann, p. 296. W. Vogt, “Die Vorgesch. des Bauernkrieges” (in “Schriften des Vereins für Reformationsgesch.,” 20, 1887), points to the general expectation prevailing, more particularly in the south-west of Germany, that a fundamental change in the existing state of things was imminent. “Every reform, however, even the most trifling, in the social sphere encroached upon the political and even the ecclesiastical domain, for the nobility and clergy, whose authority and possessions were the subject of discussion, were at the same time political and ecclesiastical factors.... All felt that in the last instance the appeal would be to force” (p. 142).