Theories of the right to resist higher governmental authorities have commanded historians' attention for decades. This welcome addition to the literature that students can use presents the German and Latin texts of a significant text among those produced at the time of the Schmalcaldic War (1546–7) by the Wittenberg circle of reformers. Justus Menius, a trusted associate of Luther and Melanchthon and ecclesiastical superintendent in Eisenach and Gotha, composed a justification of armed resistance to Emperor Charles v by the evangelical princes, particularly Elector Johann Friedrich of Saxony and Landgrave Philip of Hesse, as the emperor resorted to a military solution to the ‘Lutheran’ problem in 1546. The expression of the right to resist formulated by those in the Wittenberg circle during the Schmalcaldic War and in the years immediately after the defeat of the evangelical party had wide-reaching impact, particularly through Theodore Beza's use of Wittenberg argumentation and its effect on Puritan resistance theory in seventeenth-century England. Schneider has skilfully edited the German original and the Latin translation by Johannes Marcellus, as they were revised by Philip Melanchthon when the war began to go badly for evangelical forces. A brief introduction in German sets the circumstances and issues of the time in context; brief biographies of Menius, Melanchthon and Marcellus describe the players well. The bibliography brings together the contemporary discussion of resistance theory in German and English. Annotations enhance the use of the effectively-edited texts of the German and Latin publications. A welcome addition to the material available for the use of students and scholars in the study of early modern political theory.