at once for persecution.  One of them, a Carmelite friar, was summoned before the Cardinal Governor of Bologna, and threatened with death;[266] and a certain Father Omnibow, a Venetian who had been in active co-operation with Dr. Croke, wrote himself to Henry, informing him in a very graphic manner of the treatment to which, by some treachery, he had been exposed.  Croke and Omnibow were sitting one morning in the latter’s cell, “when there entered upon them the emperor’s great ambassador, accompanied with many gentlemen of Spain, and demanded of the Father how he durst be so bold to take upon him to intermeddle in so great and weighty a matter, the which did not only lessen and enervate the pope’s authority, but was noyful and odious to all Realms Christened."[267] Omnibow being a man of some influence in Venice, the ambassador warned him on peril of his life to deal no further with such things:  there was not the slightest chance that the King of England could obtain a decision in his favour, because the question had been placed in the hands of six cardinals who were all devoted to the emperor:  the pope, it was sternly added, had been made aware of his conduct, and was exceedingly displeased, and the general[268] of his order had at the same time issued an injunction, warning all members to desist at their peril from intercourse with the English agents.  The Spanish party held themselves justified in resorting to intimidation to defend themselves against English money; the English may have excused their use of money as a defence against Spanish intimidation; and each probably had recourse to their several methods prior to experience of the proceedings of their adversaries, from a certain expectation of what those proceedings would be.  Substantially, the opposite manoeuvres neutralised each other, and in Catholic countries, opinions on the real point at issue seem to have been equally balanced.  The Lutheran divines, from their old suspicion of Henry, were more decided in their opposition to him.  “The Italian Protestants,” wrote Croke to the king, “be utterly against your Highness in this cause, and have letted as much as with their power and malice they could or might."[269] In Germany Dr. Bames and Cranmer found the same experience.  Luther himself had not forgotten his early passage at arms with the English Defender of the Faith, and was coldly hostile; the German theologians, although they expressed themselves with reserve and caution, saw no reason to court the anger of Charles by meddling in a quarrel in which they had no interest; they revenged the studied slight which had been passed by Henry on themselves, with a pardonable indifference to the English ecclesiastical revolt.