Report and Answer to the Bavarian-Anhalt Secret Chancellery

Report and Answer

...ought to. However, all the preceding is also nothing new among the Italian Princes, to look toward foreign Kingdoms; just as both the late Dukes of Ferrara and Parma sought the Polish Crown. In Italy, the Crown of Bohemia and the Crown of Hungary are generally held to be no less an elective kingdom original: pro regno electivo; a kingdom where the monarch is chosen by vote rather than simple inheritance than the Polish one. Furthermore, that there was thought of a march through Alsace and the conquest and occupation of certain places there is not strange to hear. For a commander as experienced as the aforementioned Duke [of Savoy] would, without doubt, not have wished to venture so far out of his own land without ensuring his retreat original: retraicte, so that in any event, he could return to his own ground and soil by means of the mentioned places. Just as can be seen below from the alliance of Elector Maurice of Saxony, that King Henry II of France, during his march into Germany, expressly stipulated the occupation of certain places—such as Cambrai, Metz, Toul, and Verdun—to ensure his retreat and his withdrawal.

As for what the compiler [of the opposing text] mixes in on pages 27, 28, and 29—claiming that the heads and Directors [of the Union] "played under the hat" original: vnter dem hütlein gespielet; a German idiom for acting in secret, colluding, or hiding one's true intentions with the United Estates and kept many things from them—the answer is this: by virtue of the Union's constitution, the Elector Palatine, as Director, was free to hear those matters which concerned the Union and the common cause original: communem causam, to conduct negotiations regarding them, and afterwards—at the proper time and as the occasion arises original: pro re nata—to report on them to the United Estates, either at a meeting of the Union or outside of it through envoys or letters.

In the same way, it is not to be doubted that the Elector of Mainz and the Duke of Bavaria, as the heads and directors of the Catholic League original: Catholischen bunts; the alliance of Catholic territories in the Holy Roman Empire, will have similar power to act at their discretion original: pro discretione in such cases, and are not bound to communicate every matter that reaches them immediately and without distinction original: indistinctè to all their confederates. The same principle applied to the Directorate of the Elector Palatine, in which His Electoral Grace conducted and behaved himself in such a way that the slightest complaint was never brought forward, as is acknowledged and notorious original: in confesso vnd notorium among all the United Estates and their counselors and servants. Thus, the compiler, with this supposed accusation of "playing under the hat," might well have stayed home and left the Elector Palatine unburdened and unaccused in this matter.

The Second Chapter.

That the Protestant Union is alleged to have held designs against His Imperial Majesty, as the head of the Holy Roman Empire, and to have conspired against the same.