The reputation of the Society for teaching was great all over Germany.  Wherever a college was established by them, it immediately attracted students from all parts, and it was perhaps natural that other educational institutions should fear for their own existence.  But the pettiness and meanness with which this fear was expressed at Prague resulted for the Jesuits in a penury so abject, that for many months they had nothing to eat but bread and cheese, and nothing to drink but water from their own well.  For several days they were even prevented from going out for want of suitable garments.  Nevertheless, however much they might have to suffer in any one place, struggling through a painful existence to the end in view, the work of reform went steadily forward.

About this time, the cathedral at Regensburg was in need of a preacher; the Diet was about to assemble in that city, all the princes and electors of the empire were to take part in it, and the new sectaries were expected in great numbers, in order to wrench, if it might be, such concessions from the authorities as they had not yet been able to obtain.  The chapter therefore appealed to Father Canisius, and besought him to throw himself into this important breach.  Realising all that was at stake, he started at once for Regensburg.

His first appearance in the cathedral pulpit was a splendid testimony to the opinion in which he was held.  The vast building was filled with a brilliant throng, on the fringe of which the people hung in dense crowds overflowing into the streets.  In a letter to Father Lainez (who had succeeded St. Ignatius as General of the Society) in September 1556, Canisius describes his efforts as successful in supporting and strengthening the persecuted Catholics, but he goes on to say that the Lutheran representatives at the Diet let loose a string of calumnies against him, and did all they could to poison the minds of the weak and simple.  But for the States of the Empire they would have cast him out of the city as one so dangerous to the Protestant cause that they declared it would be wrecked altogether if Canisius continued to preach there.

However, continue he did during the whole of the sessions, save for a short interval of absence.  In this interval he visited Innsbruck, in which town a college of the Society was nearing completion; and Augsburg, whose bishop, his old friend the celebrated Otto Truchsess, desired to consult him on the affairs of his diocese.  There, overwhelmed with his almost superhuman labours, Canisius fell ill.  He desired to be taken to the college at Ingolstadt, and Cardinal Truchsess accompanied him thither, while the Duke of Bavaria sent him his physicians.  Thanks to their skill and to the enforced rest of his mental and physical powers, he soon recovered, and was able on the 1st December to return to his post at Regensburg.  On all the Sundays of Advent he preached at the cathedral, but as it could not contain the vast concourse of