In this, by appealing to superstition, he was somewhat successful.

He addressed the following circular letter to the German States: "A stone, weighing two hundred pounds, recently fell from heaven, near the army under my command in Upper Alsace, and I caused it, as a fatal warning from God to men, to be hung up in the neighboring church of Encisheim.

In vain I myself explained to all Christian kings the signification of this mysterious stone.

The Almighty punished the neglect of this warning with a dreadful scourge, from which thousands have suffered death, or pains worse than death.

But since this punishment of the abominable sins of men has produced no effect, God has imprinted in a miraculous manner the sign of the cross, and the instruments of our Lord's passion in dark and bloody colors, on the bodies and garments of thousands.