Meanwhile Luther was anxious to respond still further to the call of duty against the Turks. Their multitudinous hosts had advanced as far as Vienna, and had severely harassed that city, which, though defended with heroic valour, was but badly fortified. A general assault was made in force while Luther was on his homeward journey. The news stirred him to his inmost soul. He ascribed to it, and to their god, the devil, the violent temptations and anguish of soul from which he was then suffering again. Immediately after his return, he undertook to write a 'War sermon against the Turks.' On October 26 he received the tidings that they were compelled to retreat. This was a 'heavensent miracle' to him. But though his former exhortations and warnings had seemed to many exaggerated, he was right in perceiving that the danger was only averted. He published his sermon, a new edition of which had to be issued with the new year.

He saw in the Turks the fulfilment of the prophecy of Ezekiel and the Revelation of St. John about Gog and Magog, and therewith a judgment of God for the punishment of corrupt Christendom. But just as in his first pamphlet he had called on the authorities, in virtue of their appointment by God, to protect their own people against the enemy, so he now wished further to make all German Christians strong in conscience and full of courage, to take the field under their banner, according to God's command. He set before them the example of the 'beloved St. Maurice and his companions,' and of many other saints, who had served in arms their Emperor as knights or citizens. He would, if danger came in earnest, 'fain have, whoever could, defend themselves,—young and old, husband and wife, man-servant and maid-servant,' just as, according to ancient Roman writers, the German wives and maidens fought together with the men. He looked on no house as so mean that it might not do something to repel the foe. Was it not better to be slain at home, in obedience to God, than to be taken prisoners and dragged away like cattle to be sold? At the same time he exhorted and encouraged those whom this misfortune befell, that, as Jeremiah admonished the Jews in Babylon, they should be patient in prison, and cling firmly to the faith, and neither through their misery nor through the hypocritical worship of the Turks, allow themselves to be seduced into becoming renegades.

Such is what he preached to the people, while he had to complain in his letters to friends that 'the Emperor Charles threatens us even still more dreadfully than does the Turk; so that on both sides we have an Emperor as our enemy, an Eastern and a Western one.' And in those days also he expressed his opinion that those who confessed the gospel should keep their hands 'unsoiled by blood and crime' as regards their Emperor, and, even though his behaviour might be a 'very threat of the devil,' should keep steadfastly to their God, with prayer, supplication, and hope,—to that God Whose manifest help had hitherto been so abundantly vouchsafed to them.



CHAPTER V.

THE DIET OF AUGSBURG AND LUTHER AT COBURG, 1530.

A proclamation of the Emperor, convoking a new Diet at Augsburg for April 8, 1530, seemed now to indicate a more pacific demeanour. For in assigning to this Diet the task of consulting 'how best to deal with and determine the differences and division in the holy faith and the Christian religion,' it desired, for this object, that 'every man's opinions, thoughts, and notions should be heard in love and charity, and carefully weighed, and that men should thus be brought in common to Christian truth, and be reconciled.' The Emperor by no means meant, as might be inferred from this proclamation, that the two opposing parties should treat and arrange with each other on an equal footing; the rights of the Romish Church remained, as before, unalterably fixed. He only wished to avoid, if possible, the dangers of internal warfare. Even the Papal legate Campeggio, agreed that conciliatory measures might first be tried; the arrangements for the visitation of the Saxon Electorate were already construed at Rome, as indeed by many German Catholics, into a sign that people there were frightened at the so-called freedom of the gospel, and were inclined to return to the old system. But Luther at this moment displayed again the confidence which he always so gladly reposed in his Emperor. He announced on March 14 to Jonas, then absent on the business of the visitation: 'The Emperor Charles writes that he will come in person to Augsburg, to settle everything peaceably.' The Elector John immediately instructed his theologians to draw up for him articles in view of the proceedings at the Diet, embodying a statement of their own opinions. They were also required to hold themselves in readiness to accompany him on his journey to Augsburg. There was, however, no hurry about arriving there; for the Emperor came thither so slowly from Italy, that it was found impossible to meet on the day originally appointed.

On April 3 Luther, Melancthon, and Jonas went to the Elector at Torgau, in order to start with him from there. He took Spalatin also with him, and Agricola as preacher. The 10th, Palm Sunday, they spent at Weimar, where the prince wished to partake of the sacrament. At Coburg, where they arrived on the 15th, they expected to receive further news as to the day fixed for the actual opening of the Diet. Luther preached here on Easter Day, and on the following Monday and Thursday, upon the Easter texts and the grand acts of Redemption.

On Friday, the 22nd, the Elector received an intimation from the Emperor to appear at Augsburg at the end of the month. The next morning he set off at once with his companions. Luther, however, was to remain behind. The man on whom lay the ban of the Empire and Church could not possibly, however favourably inclined the Emperor might be towards him, have appeared before the Emperor, the Estates, and the delegates of the Pope; moreover, no safe-conduct would have availed him. Luther seems, nevertheless, to have been ingenuous enough to think the contrary. At least, he wrote to a friend that the Elector had bidden him remain at Coburg; why, he knew not. To another friend, however, he alleged as a reason, that his going would not have been safe. But his prince was anxious to keep him at any rate as close by as possible, at a safe place on the borders of his territory in the direction of Augsburg, so that he might be able to obtain advice from him in case of need. Moreover, he contemplated the possibility of his being summoned later on to Augsburg. A message from the one place to the other took, at that time, four days as a rule.

Accordingly, on the night of the 22nd, Luther was conveyed to the fortress overlooking the town of Coburg. This was the residence assigned to him.

His first day here passed by unoccupied. A box which he had brought, containing papers and other things, had not yet been delivered to him. He did not even see any governor of the castle. So he looked around him leisurely from the height, which offered a wide and varied prospect, and examined the apartments now opened for his use. The principal part of the castle, the so-called Prince's Building, had been assigned him, and he was given at once the keys of all the rooms it contained. The one which he chose as his sitting-room is still shown. He was told that over thirty people took their meals at the castle.

But his thoughts were still with his distant friends. He wrote that afternoon to Melancthon, Jonas, and Spalatin. 'Dearest Philip,' he begins to Melancthon, 'we have at last reached our Sinai, but we will make a Sion of this Sinai, and here will I build three tabernacles, one to the Psalms, one to the Prophets, and one to Asop.... It is a very attractive place, and just made for study; only your absence grieves me. My whole heart and soul are stirred and incensed against the Turks and Mahomet, when I see this intolerable raging of the devil. Therefore I shall pray and cry to God, nor rest until I know that my cry is heard in heaven. The sad condition of our German Empire distresses you more.' Then, after expressing a wish that the Lord might send his friend refreshing sleep, and free his heart from care, he told him about his residence at the castle, in the 'empire of the birds.' In his letters to Jonas and Spalatin he indulged in humorous descriptions of the cries of the ravens and jackdaws which he had heard since four o'clock in the morning. A whole troop, he said, of sophists and schoolmen were gathered around him. Here he had also his Diet, composed of very proud kings, dukes, and grandees, who busied themselves about the empire and sent out incessantly their mandates through the air. This year, he heard, they had arranged a crusade against the wheat, barley, and other kinds of corn, and these fathers of the Fatherland already hoped for grand victories and heroic deeds. This, said Luther, he wrote in fun, but in serious fun, to chase away if possible the heavy thoughts which crowded on his mind. A few days later he enlarged further on this sportive simile in a letter to his Wittenberg table-companions, i.e. the young men of the university who, according to custom, boarded with him. He was delighted to see how valiantly these knights of the Diet strutted about and wiped their bills, and he hoped they might some day or other be spitted on a hedge-stake. He fancied he could hear all the sophists and papists with their lovely voices around him, and he saw what a right useful folk they were, who ate up everything on the earth and 'whiled away the heavy time with chattering.' He was glad, however, to have heard the first nightingale, who did not often venture to come in April.

As companions he had his amanuensis, Veit Dietrich from Nuremberg, and his nephew Cyriac Kaufmann from Mansfeld, a young student. The former, born in 1506, had been at the university of Wittenberg since 1523; he soon became preacher in his native town, where he distinguished himself by his loyalty and courage. They were all hospitably entertained at the castle. Luther, in these comfortable quarters, let his beard grow again, as he had formerly done at the Wartburg.



In that same letter to Melancthon, Luther mentioned several writings which he had in prospect. His chief work was a public 'Admonition to the Clergy assembled at the Diet at Augsburg.' He wished, as he said in the introduction, since he could not personally appear at the Diet, at least to be among them in writing with this his 'dumb and weak message;' which he had expressed, however, in the strongest and most forcible language at his command. As for his own cause, he declared that for it no Diet was necessary. It had been brought thus far by the true Helper and Adviser, and there it would remain. He reminded them once more of the chief scandals and iniquities against which he had been forced to contend; he warned them not to strain the strings too tightly, lest perhaps a new rebellion might arise; and he promised them that if only they would leave the gospel free, they should be left in undisturbed possession of their principalities, their privileges, and their property, which in fact was all they cared for. This tract was already printed in May.

He now took up in earnest the labours he had spoken of to Melancthon. His chief work was the continuation of his German Bible, namely the translation of the Prophets. He had long complained of the difficulties presented by these Books, and he now hoped to have the leisure they required. Such was his zeal that, when he came to Jeremiah, he looked forward to finishing all the Prophets by Whitsuntide, but he soon saw that this was impossible. He published the prophecy of Ezekiel about Gog and Magog by itself. His wish was to treat of various portions of the Psalms, his own constant book of comfort and prayer, for the benefit of his congregation; and he began, accordingly, with a Commentary on the 118th Psalm. He expounded to Dietrich whilst at Coburg the first twenty-five Psalms; and the transcript of his commentary on these, which Dietrich left behind him, was afterwards printed.

And to these works he wished to add the fables of Asop. His desire was to adapt them for youth and common men, that they should be of some profit to the Germans.' For among them, he said, were to be found, set forth in simple words, the most beautiful lessons and warnings, to show men how to live wisely and peacefully among bad people in the false and wicked world. Truth which none would endure, but which no man could do without, was clothed there in pleasing colours of fiction. For this work, however, Luther had very little time; we possess only thirteen fables of his version. He has rendered them in the simplest popular language, and expressed the morals in many appropriate German proverbs.

Luther thought at first that, with these occupations, he had better have remained at Wittenberg, where, as professor, he would have been of more service.

Soon his bodily sufferings—the singing and noise in the head, and the tendency to faintness,—began again to attack him; so that for several days he could neither read nor write, and for several weeks could not work continuously for any length of time. He did not know whether it was the effect of Coburg hospitality, or whether Satan was at fault. Dietrich thought his illness must be caused by Satan, since Luther had been particularly careful about his diet. He told also of a fiery, serpent-like apparition, which he and Luther had seen one evening in June at the foot of the Castle Hill. The same night Luther fainted away, and the next day was very ill; and this fact confirmed Dietrich in his belief.

On June 5 Luther received the news of the death of his aged father, who breathed his last at Mansfeld, on Sunday, May 29, after long suffering, and in the firm belief in the gospel preached by his son. Luther was deeply moved by this intelligence. He had never ceased to treat him with the same high filial veneration that had formerly prompted him to dedicate to his parent his treatise on Monastic Vows, and to invite him to the celebration of his marriage, made, as we have seen, in accordance with his father's wish. Since his marriage, indeed, his parents had come to visit him at Wittenberg; and the town accounts for 1527 contain an item of expense for a gallon of wine, given as a vin d'honneur to old Luther on that occasion. It was then that Cranach painted the portraits of Luther's parents which are now to be seen at the Wartburg. Luther had heard from his brother James in February 1530, that their father was dangerously ill. He sent a letter to him thereupon, on the 15th of that month, by the hands of his nephew Cyriac. He wrote: 'It would be a great joy to me if only you and my mother could come to us here. My Kate and all pray for it with tears. I should hope we would do our best to make you comfortable.' Meanwhile he prayed earnestly to his Heavenly Father to strengthen and enlighten with His Holy Spirit this father whom He had given him on earth. He would leave it in the hands of his dear Lord and Saviour whether they should meet one another again on earth or in heaven; 'for,' said he, 'we' doubt not but that we shall shortly see each other again in the presence of Christ, since the departure from this life is a far smaller matter with God, than if I were to come hither from you at Mansfeld, or you were to go to Mansfeld from me at Wittenberg.' After he had opened the letter with the news of his father's death, he said to Dietrich, 'So then, my father too is dead,' and then took his Psalter at once, and went to his room, to give vent to his tears. He expressed his grief and emotion the same day in a letter to Melancthon. Everything, he said, that he was or had, he had received through his Creator from this beloved father.

He kept up his intimacy with his friends at Wittenberg through his letters to his wife, and by a correspondence with his friend Jerome Weller, who had come to live in his house, and who assisted in the education of his son, little Hans. Weller, formerly a jurist, and already thirty years old, was then studying theology at Wittenberg. He suffered from low spirits, and Luther repeatedly sent him from Coburg comfort and good advice. The little Hans had now begun his lessons, and Weller praised him as a painstaking pupil. Luther's well-known letter to him was dated from Coburg, June 19. Written in the midst of the most serious studies and the most important events and reflections, it must on no account be omitted in a survey of Luther's life and character. It runs as follows:—

'Grace and peace in Christ, my dear little son. I am pleased to see that thou learnest thy lessons well, and prayest diligently. Do thus, my little son, and persevere; when I come home I will bring thee a fine "fairing." I know of a pretty garden where merry children run about that wear little golden coats, and gather nice apples and pears, and cherries, and plums under the trees, and sing and dance, and ride on pretty horses with gold bridles and silver saddles. I asked the man of the place, whose the garden was, and whose the children were. He said, "These are the children who pray and learn, and are good." Then I answered, "Dear sir, I also have a son who is called Hans Luther. May he not also come into this garden, and eat these nice pears and apples, and ride a little horse and play with these children?" The man said, "If he says his prayers, and learns, and is good, he too may come into the garden; and Lippus and Jost may come, [Footnote: Melancthon's son Philip, and Jonas's son Jodocus.] and when they all come back, they shall have pipes and drums and lutes and all sorts of stringed instruments, and they shall dance and shoot with little crossbows." Then he showed me a smooth lawn in the garden laid out for dancing, where hung pipes of pure gold, and drums and beautiful silver crossbows. But it was still early, and the children had not dined. So I could not wait for the dance, and said to the man, "Dear sir, I will go straight home and write all this to my dear little son Hans, that he may pray diligently and learn well and be good, and so come into this garden; but he has an aunt, Lene, [Footnote: Hans's great-aunt, Magdalen, mentioned in Part VI. Ch. vii.] whom he must bring with him." And the man answered, "So it shall be; go home and write as you say." Therefore, dear little son Hans, learn and pray with a good heart, and tell Lippus and Jost to do the same, and then you will all come to the beautiful garden together. Almighty God guard you. Give my love to aunt Lene, and give her a kiss for me. In the year 1530.—Your loving father, MARTIN LUTHER.'

The intercourse between Coburg and Augsburg was, as may be imagined, well kept up by letters and messengers.

But the crisis of importance arrived when now the great decision approached, or at least seemed to approach, for it was most unexpectedly delayed.

Though the Elector had entered Augsburg on May 2, the Emperor did not arrive there till June 15. He had stopped on the way at Innspruck, where Duke George and other princes hostile to the Reformation hastened to present themselves before him.

In the meanwhile, Melancthon worked with great industry and anxious labour at the Apology and Confession which the Elector of Saxony was to lay before the Diet. Luther warned him, by his own example, against ruining his head by immoderate exertion. He wrote to him on May 12: 'I command you and all your company, that they compel you, under pain of excommunication, to keep your poor body by rule and order, so that you may not kill yourself and imagine that you do so from obedience to God. We serve God also by taking holiday and resting; yes, indeed, in no other way better.' Melancthon had begun this work at Coburg, while there with Luther, and based his most important propositions of dogma on the articles which Luther had drawn up in the previous autumn at Schwabach. His chief efforts, however, in accordance with his own inclination and line of thought, were directed to representing the evangelical doctrines as agreeing with the traditional doctrines of the universal Christian Church; and the Protestant Reformation as simply the abolition of certain practical abuses. Never would Luther have consented to submit to the Diet, and the Papists and enemies of the gospel there present, a Confession which marked so faintly the gulf of difference between himself and them. Nevertheless he gladly approved of this composition of his peace-making friend, which was sent to him for his opinion by the Elector immediately on its completion, on May 11. His verdict was: 'I like it well enough, and see nothing to alter or improve; indeed, I could not do so if I would, for I cannot tread so softly and gently. May Christ, our Lord, help that it may bring forth much fruit, as we hope and pray it will.' He encouraged the Elector, in a letter full of tender words of comfort, to keep his heart firm and patient, even if he had to stay in a tedious place. He pointed out to him God's great token of His love, in granting so freely to him and to his people the word of grace, and especially in allowing the tender youth, the boys and girls who were his subjects, to grow up in his country as in a pleasant Paradise of God.

News now reached them of the Emperor, that he blamed the Elector for the non-execution of the Edict of Worms, and forbade the clergymen whom the Protestant princes had brought to Augsburg, to preach there,—a prohibition against which even Luther admitted they were powerless. On the other side, Melancthon was particularly troubled and annoyed that the Landgrave Philip would not admit a repudiation of Zwingli's doctrine in the Confession, to which Melancthon attached the utmost importance, not only on account of the intrinsic objections to that doctrine, but chiefly in the interests of bringing about a reconciliation with the Catholics. He begged Luther, on May 22, to try and influence Philip by letter on this point.

Luther appears to have shown but little inclination to accede to the request. Melancthon, waiting for his assent, stopped writing to him. Meanwhile Luther's friends at Augsburg were looking with anxiety for the arrival and first appearance of the Emperor. Three whole weeks passed by before Luther again received a letter from them; it was just at this time that he was mourning the death of his father.

Luther was exceedingly indignant at this silence. On receiving another letter, on June 13, from Melancthon, who said he was impatiently waiting for the letter to the Landgrave, Luther sent back the messenger without an answer, and at first was unwilling even to read the letter. He did, however, now, what was asked of him. He earnestly but calmly entreated Philip not to espouse their opponents' doctrine of the Sacrament, or allow himself to be moved by their 'sweet good' words. And when now Melancthon, whom he had seriously frightened by his anger, grew restless and desponding and sleepless with increasing disquietude, through the difficulties at Augsburg, the threats of his embittered Catholic opponents, and the anxiety as to submitting the Confession to the Elector, and the consequences of so doing, and news also reached Luther of the troubles and distress of his other friends, he repeatedly sent to them at Augsburg fresh words of encouragement, comfort, and counsel, which remain to attest, more than anything else, the nobleness of his mind and character. He speaks, as from a height of confident, clear, and proud conviction, to those who are struggling in the whirl and vortex of earthly schemes and counsels. He has gained this height, and maintains it in the implicit faith with which he clings to the invisible God, as if he saw Him; and, raised above the world, he enjoys filial communion with his Heavenly Father.

In answering another anxious letter from Melancthon on the 27th, he reproved his friend for the cares which he allowed to consume him, and which were the result, he said, not of the magnitude of the task before him, but of his own want of faith. 'Let the matter be ever so great,' he said, 'great also is He who has begun and who conducts it; for it is not our work.... "Cast thy burthen upon the Lord; the Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon Him." Does He say that to the wind, or does He throw his words before animals?... It is your worldly wisdom that torments you, and not theology. As if you, with your useless cares, could accomplish anything. What more can the devil do than strangle us? I conjure you, who in all other matters are so ready to fight, to fight against yourself as your greatest enemy.'

Two days after, he had already another letter from his friend to answer. He saw from it, he said, the labour and trouble, the distress and tears of his friends. He received also the Confession, now completed, and had to give his opinion whether it would be possible to make still more concessions to the Romanists. Upon this point he wrote: 'Day and night I am occupied with it, I turn it over every way in my mind, I meditate and argue, and examine the Scriptures on the subject, and more and more convinced do I become of the truth of our doctrine, and more resolved never, if God will, to allow another letter to be torn from us, be the consequence what it may.' But he objected to the others speaking of 'following his authority;' the cause was theirs as much as his, and he himself would defend it, even if he stood alone. He then referred the anxious Melancthon again to that Faith which had certainly no place in his rhetoric or philosophy. For faith, he said, must recognise the Supernatural and the Invisible, and he who attempts to see and understand it receives only cares and tears for his reward, as Melancthon did now. 'The Lord said that He would dwell in the thick darkness,' 'and make darkness His secret place' (1 Kings viii. 12; Psalm xviii. 11). 'He who wishes, let him do differently; had Moses wished first to "understand" what the end of Pharaoh's army would be, then Israel would still be in Egypt. May the Lord increase faith in you and all of us; if we have that, what in all the world shall the devil do with us?'

He hastened to send off this letter, and wrote more again on the same subject the next day, June 30, to Jonas, who had informed him of Melancthon's afflictions and of the fierce hatred of their Catholic opponents; also to Spalatin, Agricola, and Brenz, and to the young Duke John Frederick. He sought to calm the latter about the 'poisonous, wicked talons' of his nearest blood-relations, especially the Duke George. He entreated all those theological friends to bring a wholesome influence to bear on their companion Melancthon, and for each of them he had particular words of affection. Melancthon, he wrote, must be dissuaded from wishing to direct the world and thus crucifying himself. The news that 'the princes and nations rage against the Lord's anointed,' he accepted as a good sign; for the Psalmist's words that immediately follow (Ps. ii. 4) were: 'He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision.' He did not understand how men could be troubled since God still lives: 'He who has created me will be father to my son and husband to my wife; He will guide the community and be preacher to the congregation better than I can myself.' His letter to Melancthon shows in an interesting manner the contrast between himself and his friend with regard to cares and temptations. 'In private contests which concern one's own self, I am the weaker, you the stronger combatant; but in public ones, it is just the reverse (if, indeed, any contest can be called private which is waged between me and Satan); for you take but small account of your life, while you tremble for the public cause; whereas I am easy and hopeful about the latter, knowing as I do for certain that it is just and true, and the cause of God Himself, which has no consciousness of sin to make it blanch, as I must about myself. Hence, in the latter case, I am as a careless spectator.' Moreover he felt himself just now less visited by his old spiritual temptations, although the devil still made his body weary.

How Luther used to converse with God as his Father and Friend, Melancthon learned that day from Dietrich. The latter heard him pray aloud: 'I know that Thou art our Father and our God.... The danger is Thine as well as ours; the whole cause is Thine, we have put our hands to it because we were obliged to; do Thou protect it.' Luther daily devoted at least three hours to prayer. He liked all his family to do the same. He wrote home to his wife thus: 'Pray with confidence, for all is well arranged, and God will aid us.' Two years later he said in a sermon about the fulfilment of prayer: 'I have tried it, and many people with me, especially when the devil wanted to devour us at the Diet at Augsburg, and everything looked black, and people were so excited that everyone expected things would go to ruin, as some had defiantly threatened, and already knives were drawn and guns were loaded; but God, in answer to our prayers, so helped us, that those bawlers, with their clamour and menaces, were put thoroughly to shame, and a favourable peace and a good year granted to us.'

Just about this time, as Jonas announced to Luther, Duke John Frederick had the arms of the Reformer cut in stone for a signet ring, and Luther was requested, through his friend Spengler of Nuremberg, to explain their meaning. They were peculiarly appropriate to the times. Luther, as long ago, to our knowledge, as the year 1517, instead of his father's arms, which were a crossbow with two roses, had taken as his own one rose, having in its centre a heart with a cross upon it. This, he now explained, should be a black cross on a red heart; for, in order to be saved, it is necessary to believe with our whole heart in our crucified Lord, and the cross, though bringing pain and self-mortification, does not corrupt the nature, but rather keeps the heart alive. The heart should be placed in a white rose, to show that faith gives joy, comfort, and peace, and because white is the colour of the spirits and angels, and the joy is not an earthly joy. The rose itself should be set in an azure field; just as this joy is already the beginning of heavenly joy and set in heavenly hope, and outside, round the field, there should be a golden ring, because heavenly happiness was eternal and precious above all possessions.



Shortly after this, Luther received the great news that the summary of belief of German Protestants, or Augsburg Confession, had been submitted on June 25 to the Emperor and the Estates, in the German language. The Emperor, only the day before, had been anxious that it should not be read aloud, but only received in writing. Publicly, and in clear and solemn tones, the Saxon chancellor read the statement of that evangelical faith, which, only nine years before, at Worms, Luther had been required to retract. Luther was highly rejoiced. He saw fulfilled the words of the Psalmist, 'I will speak of Thy testimonies also before kings,' and he felt sure that the remainder of the verse, 'and will not be ashamed' (Ps. cxix. 46), would likewise be accomplished. He wrote to his Elector, saying it was, forsooth, a clever trick of their enemies to seal the lips of the princes' preachers at Augsburg. The consequence was, that the Elector and the other nobles 'now preached freely under the very noses of his Imperial Majesty and the whole Empire, who were obliged to hear them, and could not offer any opposition.' How sorry he felt not to have been present there himself! But he rejoiced to have seen the day when such men stood up in such an assembly, and so bravely bore witness to the truth of Christ.

Tidings also now arrived of a certain clemency and generosity even on the part of the Emperor, and of the peaceful disposition of some of the princes, such as Duke Henry of Brunswick, who invited Melancthon to dinner, and especially of Cardinal Albert, the Archbishop and Elector of Mayence. Luther, unlike Melancthon, was clear and certain on one point, that an agreement with their opponents on the questions of belief and religion was absolutely out of the question. But he now spoke out his opinion most decidedly as to a 'political agreement,' in spite of their differences of belief,—an agreement, in other words, that the two Confessions and Churches should peacefully exist together in the German Empire. This he wished, and almost hoped, might come to pass. In the Emperor Charles he recognised—he, the loyal-minded German—a good heart and noble blood, worthy of all honour and esteem. He did not dare to hope that the Emperor, surrounded as he was by evil advisers, should actually favour the Evangelical cause, but he believed at any rate so far in his clemency. In that spirit he once more by letter approached the Archbishop. Since there was no hope, he wrote, of their becoming one in doctrine, he begged him at least to use his influence that peace might be granted to the Evangelicals. For no one could be, or dared be, forced to accept a belief, and the new doctrine did no harm, but taught peace and preserved peace. He endeavoured further to appeal to the Archbishop's conscience as a German. 'We Germans do not give up believing in the Pope and his Italians until they bring us, not into a bath of sweat, but a bath of blood. If German princes fell upon one another, that would make the Pope, the little fruit of Florence, happy; he would laugh in his sleeve and say: "There, you German beasts, you would not have me as Pope, so have that."... I cannot hold my hands; I must strive to help poor Germany, miserable, forsaken, despised, betrayed, and sold—to whom indeed I wish no harm, but everything that is good, as my duty to my dear Fatherland commands me.'

Luther then would not only not hear of surrender, but looked upon as useless any further negotiations in matters of belief. He could not understand why his friends were detained any longer at Augsburg, where they had nothing to expect but menace and bravado on the part of their opponents. On July 15 he wrote to them: 'You have rendered unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.... May Christ confess us, as you have confessed Him.... Thus I absolve you from this assembly in the Name of the Lord. Now go home again—go home!'

But they had still to wait for a Refutation, which the Emperor caused to be drawn up by some strict Catholic theologians, among whom were Eck, the old and ever violent and active enemy of Luther, and John Cochlaeus, originally a champion of Humanism, but who had, since the beginning of the great contest in the Church, distinguished himself by petty but bitter polemics against Luther, and now assisted Duke George in the place of the deceased Emser. Meanwhile the spiritual and temporal lords caused the Protestants to fear the worst. For Melancthon, these were his worst and weakest hours. He even sought to pacify the Papal legate, by representing that there was no dogma in which they differed from the Roman Church. He thought it possible that even large concessions might be made, so far at least as regarded the rites and services of the Church. For these were external things, and the bishops belonged to the authorities whom God had placed over the externals of life.

Luther therefore had still to wait with patience. He continued his encouraging letters, nor did even menaces disturb him. He remembered that too sharp an edge gets only full of notches, and that, as he had already been told by Staupitz, God first shuts the eyes of those He wishes to plague. To begin a war now would be dangerous even to their enemies; the beginning would lead to no progress, the war to no victory. To Melancthon he spoke, using a coarse German proverb, about a man who 'died of threatening.'

He drew his richest and most powerful utterances from his one highest source, the Scriptures. In his own peculiar manner he expressed himself once to Bruck, the chancellor of the Saxon Elector, his temporal adviser at Augsburg, and a man who did much to further the Reformation. 'I have lately,' he wrote, 'on looking out of the window, seen two wonders: the first, the glorious vault of heaven, with the stars, supported by no pillar and yet firmly fixed; the second, great thick clouds hanging over us, and yet no ground upon which they rested, or vessel in which they were contained; and then, after they had greeted us with a gloomy countenance and passed away, came the luminous rainbow, which like a frail thin roof nevertheless bore the great weight of water.' If anyone amidst the present troubles was not satisfied with the power of faith, Luther would compare him to a man who should seek for pillars to prevent the heavens from falling, and tremble and shake because he could not find them. He was willing, as he wrote in this letter, to rest content, even if the Emperor would not grant the political peace they hoped for; for God's thoughts are far above men's thoughts, and God, and not the Emperor, must have the honour. In a letter to Melancthon he explained calmly and clearly the duty of distinguishing between the bishops as temporal princes or authorities, and the bishops as spiritual shepherds, and how, in this latter capacity, they must never be allowed the right of burdening Christ's flock with arbitrary rites and ordinances.

He now published a series of small tracts, one after the other, in which, with inflexible determination, he again asserted the evangelical principles against Catholic errors. In this spirit he wrote about the Church and Church authority; against purgatory; about the keys of the Church, or how Christ dispenses real forgiveness of sins to His community; against the worship of the saints; about the right celebration of the Sacrament, and so forth. Regardless of the pending questions of dispute, his thoughts reverted likewise to the needy condition of the schools: he wrote a special tract, 'On the duty of keeping Children at school.' His Commentary on the 118th Psalm was now followed by one upon the 117th. He also worked indefatigably at the translation of the Prophets. Thus steadily he persevered in his labours, suffering more or less in his head, always weak and 'capricious.' At the conclusion of his stay at Coburg he told a friend that, on account of the 'buzzing and dizziness' in his head, he had been obliged, with all his regularity of habits, to make a holiday of more than half the summer.

On August 3 the Catholic Refutation was at length submitted to the Diet. It showed indeed, as did the imperial proclamation convoking the Diet, that it was far from the Emperor's intention to have the opinions of both sides fairly heard and judged in a friendly and impartial spirit: on the contrary, he demanded that the Protestants should declare themselves convinced by it, and therefore conquered. The Landgrave Philip replied to this demand by quitting Augsburg on August 6, without the leave and contrary to the command of the Emperor, and hastening home, openly resolved, in case of need, to meet force by force. But the Emperor, though urged by Rome to take violent measures, was not prepared, as indeed Luther had guessed, for such a sudden stroke. He preferred to adopt a more peaceful and mediating course, and to attempt once more to settle the differences by a mixed commission of fourteen, and afterwards by a new and smaller committee, in which Melancthon alone represented the Evangelical theologians.

The Protestants had now to consider seriously the question of a possible submission which Melancthon had hitherto been anxiously pondering with himself. Luther's view of the entire standpoint and interests of the Romish Church was now confirmed by the fact that her representatives attached less importance to the more profound differences of doctrine in regard to the inward means of salvation, than to the restoration of episcopal rights and forms of worship, such as, in particular, the mass and the Sacrament in both kinds, which formed the principal difficulties during the negotiations. On the other hand, no one had taught more clearly than Luther the freedom which belongs to Christians in outward forms of constitution and worship, and which enables them to yield to and serve each other on these very points. But he had none the less earnestly cautioned against making concessions to ecclesiastical tyrants, who might make use of them to enslave and mislead souls. In this respect Melancthon now showed himself entirely resolved. He longed for a restoration of the Catholic episcopacy for the Evangelicals, not only for the sake of peace, but because he despaired of securing otherwise a genuine regulation of the Church in the face of arbitrary princes and undisciplined multitudes. In fact the Protestants on this commission were willing to promise lawful obedience to the bishops, if only the questions of service and doctrine were left to a free Council. As regarded the service of the mass the point at issue was whether the Protestants could not and ought not to accept it with its whole act of priestly sacrifice, if only an explanation were added as to the difference between this sacrifice and the sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross. Other Protestants, on the contrary, especially the representatives of Nuremberg, became suspicious and angry at such a way of settling matters, and especially at the behaviour of Melancthon. Spengler at Nuremberg wrote accordingly to Luther. The situation was all the more critical, since the negotiations, according to the wish of the Emperor, were to proceed uninterruptedly, and there was no time to obtain an opinion from Coburg.

Luther now, to whom the Elector submitted the Articles which were to bring about an agreement, sent a very calm, clear answer, entering into all the particulars. He gave a purely practical judgment, though resting upon the highest principles. Thus, with regard to the mass, he says that the Catholic liturgy contained the inadmissible idea that we must pray to God to accept the Body of His Son as a sacrifice; if this were to be explained in a gloss, either the words of the liturgy would have to be falsified by the gloss, or the gloss by the words of the liturgy. It would be wrong and foolish to run into danger unnecessarily about so troublesome a word. He warned Melancthon especially against the power of the bishops. He knew well that obedience to them meant a restriction of the freedom of the gospel; but the bishops would not consider themselves equally bound, and would declare it a breach of faith if everything that they wished were not observed. He then quietly expressed his conviction that the whole attempt at negotiation was a vain delusion. It was wished to make the Pope and Luther agree together, but the Pope was unwilling and Luther begged to be excused. Firmly and calmly he relied on the consciousness, whatever happened, of his own independence and strength. Thus he wrote to Spengler: 'I have commended the matter to God, and I think also I have kept it so well in hand that nobody can find me defenceless on any point so long as Christ and I are united.' To Spalatin he wrote: 'Free is Luther, and free also is the Macedonian (Philip of Hesse).... Only be brave and behave like men!' We have taken this from letters rich in similar thoughts, addressed by Luther on August 26 to the Elector John, Melancthon, Spalatin, and Jonas, and from other letters written two days after to the three last-named friends and to Spengler. He likewise wrote for Brenz on the 26th a preface to his Exposition of the Prophet Amos. This preface shows us how Luther himself judged his own words which he sent forth with such power. His own speech, he says, is a wild wood, compared with the clear, pure flow of Brenz's language; it was, to compare small things with great, as if his was the strong spirit of Elijah, the wind tearing up the rocks, and the earthquake and fire, whereas Brenz's was the 'still, small voice.' Yet God needs also rough wedges for rough logs, and together with the fruitful rain He sends the storm of thunder and lightning to purify the air.

If, however, Protestantism was then threatened by danger from mistaken concessions, the danger was soon averted by the demands of its opponents, who went too far even for a Melancthon. The proceedings of the smaller committee had likewise to be closed without any result. On September 8 Luther was able at last to tell his wife that he hoped soon to return home; to his little Hans he promised to bring a 'beautiful large book of sugar,' which his cousin Cyriac, who had travelled with Luther to Augsburg and Nuremberg, had brought for him out of that 'beautiful garden.' On the 14th he received a visit from Duke John Frederick and Count Albert of Mansfeld upon their return from the Diet. The former brought him the signet ring, which, however, was too large even for his thumb; he remarked that lead, not gold, was fitting for him. He only wished he could see his other friends also escaped from Augsburg; and although the Duke was ready to take him away with him, he preferred to remain behind at Coburg, in order, as he wrote to Melancthon, to receive them there and wipe off their perspiration after their hot bath.

At Augsburg negotiations were re-opened with Melancthon and Bruck; the Nuremberg deputy even thought it necessary to complain in the strongest terms of an 'underhand unchristian stratagem' against which Melancthon would no longer listen to a word of remonstrance; and Luther, who heard of these complaints through Spengler and Link, expressed indeed his full confidence to his Saxon theologians, and was particularly anxious not to wound Melancthon, but earnestly and pressingly begged him and Jonas, on the 20th of the month, to inform him about the matter, to be on their guard against the crafty attacks of their enemies, and to renounce finally all idea of a compromise. While, however, these letters were on their way past Nuremberg through Spengler's hands, it was already known there that the new attempt, especially that against the constancy of Jonas and Spalatin, had shipwrecked, and Spengler consequently did not forward them to their address. The Evangelical States adhered to their Protest of 1529 and to the Imperial Recess of 1526.

The Emperor made known his displeasure at this result, but found that even those princes who were most zealous against the innovations, were not equally zealous to plunge into at least a doubtful war for the extirpation of heresy, and the aggrandisement, moreover, of the Emperor's authority and power, and accordingly he resolved to put off the decision. On the 22nd he announced a Recess, which gave the Protestants, whose Confession, it was stated, had been publicly heard and refuted, time till the 15th of the following April for consideration whether, in the matter of the articles in dispute, they would return to unity with the Church, Pope, and Empire. The Emperor, meanwhile, engaged to bring about the meeting of a Council within a year, for the removal of real ecclesiastical grievances, but reserved until that period the consideration of what further steps should eventually be taken. The Evangelicals protested that their Confession had never been refuted, and proceeded to lay before the Emperor an apology for it, drawn up by Melancthon. They accepted the time offered for consideration. So far then the promise was given of the political peace which Luther had wished and hoped for. Referring to the other dangers and menaces before them, he said to Spengler: 'We are cleared and have done enough; the blood be upon their own head.'

Yet another attempt at union came to Luther at Coburg from quite a different quarter. Strasburg, and three other South German towns, Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau, differing as they did from the Lutherans in the Sacramental controversy, had laid before the Diet a Confession of their own—the so-called Tetrapolitana. They too, like Zwingli, refused to recognise any partaking of the Body of Christ by the mouth and body of the receiver, but at the same time, unlike him, they based their whole view of the Eucharist on the assumption of a real Divine gift and a spiritual enjoyment of the 'real Body' of Christ. On the strength of this view, Butzer, the theological representative of Strasburg, sought to make further overtures to the Wittenbergers. He was not deterred by Melancthon's mistrustful opposition or by Luther's leaving a letter of his unanswered. He now appeared in person at the Castle of Coburg, and on September 25 had a confidential and friendly interview with Luther. The latter still refused to content himself with a mere 'spiritual partaking,' and, though demanding above all things entire frankness, did not himself conceal a constant suspicion. However, he himself began to hope for good results, and assured Butzer he would willingly sacrifice his life three times over, if thereby this division might be put an end to. This fortunate beginning encouraged Butzer to further attempts, which he made afterwards in private.

The day after the reading of the Recess, the Elector John was able at length to leave the Diet and set forward on his journey home. The Emperor took leave of him with these words: 'Uncle, Uncle, I did not look for this from you.' The Elector, with tears in his eyes, went away in silence. After staying a short time at Nuremberg, he paid a visit, with his theologians, to Luther. They left Coburg together on October 5, and travelled by Altenburg, where Luther preached on Sunday, the 9th, to the royal residence at Torgau. After Luther had also preached here on the following Sunday, he returned to his home.



CHAPTER VI.

FROM THE DIET OF AUGSBURG TO THE RELIGIOUS PEACE OF NUREMBERG, 1532. DEATH OF THE ELECTOR JOHN.

No sooner had Luther resumed his official duties at Wittenberg, than he again undertook extra and very arduous work. Bugenhagen went in October to Lubeck, as he had previously gone to Brunswick and Hamburg. The most important advance made by the Reformation during those years when its champions had to fight so stoutly at the Diets for their rights, was in the North German cities. Luther, soon after his arrival at Coburg, had received news that Lubeck and Luneburg had accepted the Reformation. The citizens of Lubeck refused to allow any but Evangelical preachers, and abolished all non-evangelical usages, though an opposition party appealed to the Emperor, and actually induced him to issue a mandate prohibiting the innovations. To organise the new Church, the Lubeckers would have preferred the assistance of Luther himself; but failing him, their delegates begged the Elector John, when at Augsburg, to send them at least Bugenhagen. Under these circumstances Luther agreed that Bugenhagen should be allowed to go, although the Wittenberg congregation and university could hardly spare him. His friend was wanted at Wittenberg, said Luther, all the more because he himself could not be of any use much longer; for what with his failing years and his bad health, so weary was he of life that this accursed world would soon have seen and suffered the last of him.

Nevertheless, he again undertook at once, so far as his health permitted, the official duties of the town pastor, who this time was absent from Wittenberg for a year and a half, until April 1532; Luther, accordingly, not only preached the weekly sermons on Wednesdays and Saturdays, on the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. John, but attended continuously to the care of souls and the ordinary business of his office. He would reproach himself with the fact that under his administration the poor-box of the church was neglected, and that he was often too tired and too lazy to do anything. The pains in his head, the giddiness, and the affections of his heart now recurred, and grew worse in March and June 1531, while the next year they developed symptoms of the utmost gravity and alarm.

All this time he worked with indefatigable industry to finish his translation of the Prophets; in the autumn of 1531 he told Spalatin that he devoted two hours daily to the task of correction. He brought out a new and revised edition of the Psalms, and published some of them with a practical exposition.

In addition to these literary labours, which ever remained his first delight, Luther's chief task was to advise his Elector upon the salient questions, transactions, and dangers of Church politics, which, with the Recess of the Diet and the period thereby allotted for their consideration, had become matters of real urgency. And, in fact, it was to his valuable and conscientious advice that the Protestants in general throughout the Empire looked for guidance.

On November 19 the Recess of the Diet, passed in defiance of the Protestants, was published at Augsburg. They accepted the time allowed them for consideration, but the Emperor and the Empire insisted on maintaining the old ordinances of the Church, and the Protestants were now required to surrender the ecclesiastical and monastic property in their hands. The latter observed, moreover, that the Recess contained no actual promise of peace on the part of the Emperor, but that the States only were commanded to keep peace. In fact, the Emperor had already promised the Pope on October 4 to employ all his force to suppress the Protestants. He immediately subjected the Supreme Court of the Empire—the so-called Imperial Chamber—to a visitation, and instructed it to enforce strictly the contents of the Recess in ecclesiastical and religious matters. Thus the campaign against the Protestants was to begin with the institution of processes at law, with reference particularly to the question of Church property. Furthermore, to secure the authority and continue the policy of the Emperor during his absence, his brother Ferdinand was to be elected King of the Romans. John of Saxony, the only Protestant among the Electors, opposed the election. He appealed to the fact that the nomination was a direct violation of a decision of imperial law, the Golden Bull, which declared that the proposal for such an election, during the lifetime of the Emperor, must first be unanimously resolved on by the Electors. The Emperor had a Papal brief in his hands which empowered him to exclude John, as a heretic, from electing, but he did not find it prudent to make use of it. The election actually took place on January 5, 1531.

The Protestants now sought for protection in a firm, well-organised union among themselves. They assembled for this purpose at Schmalkald at Christmas 1530.

The more imminent, however, the danger to be encountered, the more necessary it became to determine the question whether it was lawful to resist the Emperor. The jurists who advised in favour of resistance, adduced certain arguments, without, however, stating any very clear or forcible reasons of law. They quoted principles of civil law, to show that a judge, whose sentence is appealed against to a higher court, has no right to execute it by force, and that if he does so, resistance may lawfully be offered him; and they proceeded to apply this analogy to the appeal of the Protestants to a future Council, and the action taken against them, while their appeal was still pending, by the Emperor. They were nearer the mark when they argued that, according to the constitution of the Empire and the imperial laws themselves, the sovereignty of the Emperor was in no sense unlimited or incapable of being resisted; but then the difficulty here was, that the right of individual States to oppose decrees, passed at a regular Diet by the Emperor and the majority of the members present, was not yet proved. There was a general want of clearness and precision connected with the theories then being developed of the relations of the different States and the interpretation of their rights. Upon this matter, then, Luther was called on again, with the other Wittenberg theologians, to give an opinion. The jurists also, especially the chancellor Bruck, were associated with them in their deliberations.

On the question about Ferdinand's election as King of Rome, Luther strongly advised his Elector to give way. The danger which, in the event of his refusal, menaced both himself and the whole of Germany appeared to Luther far too serious to justify it. The occasion would be used to deprive him of the Electorship, and perhaps give it to Duke George; and Germany would be rent asunder and plunged into war and misery. This, said Luther, was his advice; adding, however, that as he held such a humble position in the world, he did not understand to give much advice in such important matters, nay, he was 'too much like a child in these worldly affairs.'

But a change had now come in his views about the right of resistance; a change which, though in reality but an advance upon his earlier principles, led to an opposite result. He taught that civil authorities and their ordinances were distinctly of God, and by these ordinances he understood, according to the Apostle's words, the different laws of different States, so far as they had anywhere acquired stability. With regard to Germany, as we have seen, his good monarchical principles did not as yet prevent his holding the opinion that the collective body of the princes of the Empire could dethrone an unworthy Emperor. The determining question with him now was what the law of the Empire or the edict of the Emperor himself would decide, in the event of resistance being offered by individual States of the Empire, which found themselves and their subjects injured in their rights and impeded in the fulfilment of their duties. The answer to this, however, he conceived to be a matter no longer for theologians, but for men versed in the law, and for politicians. Theologians could only tell him that though, indeed, a Christian, simply as a Christian, must willingly suffer wrong, yet the secular authorities, and therefore every German prince having authority, were bound to uphold their office given them by God, and protect their subjects from wrong. As to what were the established ordinances and laws of each individual State, that was a matter for jurists to decide, and for the princes to seek their counsel. Accordingly, the Wittenberg theologians declared as their opinion that if those versed in the law could prove that in certain cases, according to the law of the Empire, the supreme authority could be resisted, and that the present case was one of that description, not even theologians could controvert them from Scripture. In condemning previously all resistance, they said, they 'had not known that the sovereign power itself was subject to the law.' The net result was that the allies really considered themselves justified in offering resistance to the Emperor, and prepared to do so. The responsibility, as Luther warned them, must rest with the princes and politicians, inasmuch as it was their duty to see that they had right on their side. 'That is a question,' he said, 'which we neither know nor assert: I leave them to act.'

Luther gave open vent to his indignation at the Recess of the Diet and the violent attacks of the Catholics in two publications, early in 1531, one entitled 'Gloss on the supposed Edict of the Emperor,' and the other, 'Warning to his beloved Germans.' In the former he reviewed the contents of the Edict and the calumnies it heaped upon the Evangelical doctrines, not intending, as he said, to attack his Imperial Majesty, but only the traitors and villains, be they princes or bishops, who sought to work their own wicked will, and chief of all the arch-rogue, the so-called Vicegerent of God, and his legates. The other treatise contemplates the 'very worst evil' of all that then threatened them, namely, a war resulting from the coercive measures of the Emperor and the resistance of the Protestants. As a spiritual pastor and preacher he wished to counsel not war, but peace, as all the world must testify he had always been the most diligent in doing. But he now openly declared that if, which God forbid, it came to war, he would not have those who defended themselves against the bloodthirsty Papists censured as rebellious, but would have it called an act of necessary defence, and justify it by referring to the law and the lawyers.

These publications occasioned fresh dealings with Duke George, who again complained to the Elector about them, and also about certain letters falsely ascribed to Luther, and then published a reply, under an assumed name, to his first pamphlet. Luther answered this 'libel' with a tract entitled 'Against the Assassin at Dresden,' not intended, as many have supposed, to impute murderous designs to the Duke, but referring to the calumnies and anonymous attacks in his book. The tone employed by Luther in this tract reminds us of his saying that 'a rough wedge is wanted for a rough log.' It brought down upon him a fresh admonition from his prince, in reply to which he simply begged that George might for the future leave him in peace.

The imminence of the common danger favoured the attempts of the South German States to effect an agreement with the German Protestants, and the efforts of Butzer in that direction. Luther himself acknowledged in a letter to Butzer, how very necessary a union with them was, and what a scandal was caused to the gospel by their rupture hitherto, nay, that if only they were united, the Papacy, the Turks, the whole world, and the very gates of hell would never be able to work the gospel harm. Nevertheless, his conscience forbade him to overlook the existing differences of doctrine; nor could he imagine why his former opponents, if they now acknowledged the Real Presence of the Body at the Sacrament, could not plainly admit that presence for the mouth and body of all partakers, whether worthy or unworthy. He deemed it sufficient at present, that each party should desist from writing against the other, and wait until 'perhaps God, if they ceased from strife, should vouchsafe further grace.' The new explanations, however, were enough to make the Schmalkaldic allies abandon their scruples to admitting the South Germans, and they were accordingly received into the league.

Thus then, at the end of March 1531, a mutual defensive alliance for six years of the members of the Schmalkaldic League was concluded between the Elector John, the Landgrave Philip, three Dukes of Brunswick Luneburg, Prince Wolfgang of Anhalt, Counts Albert and Gebhard of Mansfeld, the North German towns of Magdeburg, Bremen, and Lubeck, and the South German towns of Strasburg, Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau, and also Ulm, Reutlingen, Bibrach, and Isny. Even Luther no longer raised any objections.

By this alliance the Protestants presented a firm and powerful front among the constituent portions of the German Empire. Their adversaries were not so agreed in their interests. Between the Dukes of Bavaria, and between the Emperor and Ferdinand, political jealousy prevailed to an extent sufficient to induce the former to combine with the heretics against the newly-elected King. Outside Germany, Denmark reached the hand of fellowship to the Schmalkaldic League; for the exiled King of Denmark, Christian II., who had previously turned to the Saxon Elector and been friendly to Luther, now sought, after returning in all humility to the orthodox Church, to regain his lost sovereignty with the help of his brother-in-law, the Emperor. The King of France also was equally ready to make common cause with the Protestant German princes against the growing power of Charles V.

As for Luther, we find no notice on his part of the schemes and negotiations connected with these political events, much less any active participation in them. There was just then a rupture pending between Henry VIII. of England and the Emperor, and the former was preparing to secede from the Church of Rome. Henry was anxious for a divorce from his wife Katharine of Arragon, an aunt of the Emperor, on the ground of her previous marriage with his deceased brother, which, as he alleged, made his own marriage with her illegal; and since the Pope, in spite of long negotiations, refused, out of regard for the Emperor, to accede to his request, Henry had an opinion prepared by a number of European universities and men of learning, on the legality and validity of his marriage, which in fact for the most part declared against it. A secret commissioner of the former 'Protector of the Faith' was then sent to the Wittenbergers, and to Luther, whom he had so grossly insulted. Luther, however, pronounced (Sept. 5, 1531) against the divorce, on the ground that the marriage, though not contrary to the law of God as set forth in Scripture, was prohibited by the human law of the Church. The political side of the question he disregarded altogether. He expressed himself to Spalatin, in a certain tone of sadness, about the Pope's evil disposition towards the Emperor, the intrigues he seemed to be promoting against him in France, and the animosity of Henry VIII. towards him on account of his decision on the marriage; and added, 'Such is the way of this wicked world; may God take our Emperor under His protection!'

With Charles V. and Ferdinand the question of peace or war was, of necessity, largely governed by the menacing attitude of the Turks; in fact it determined their policy in the matter. Luther kept this danger steadily in view; after the publication of the Recess he promised the wrath of God upon those madmen who would enter upon a war while they had the Turks before their very eyes. Ferdinand in vain sought to conclude a treaty of peace with the Sultan, who demanded him to surrender all the fortresses he still possessed in a part of Hungary, and reserved the right of making further conquests. He was even induced, in March 1581, to advise his brother to effect a peaceful arrangement with the Protestants, in order to ensure their assistance in arms. Attempts at reconciliation were accordingly made through the intervention of the Electors of the Palatinate and Mayence. The term allowed by the Diet (April 15) passed by unnoticed. The Emperor also directed the 'suspension of the proceedings, which he had been authorised by the Recess of Augsburg to set on foot in religious matters, till the approaching Diet.'

The negotiations were languidly protracted through the summer, without effecting any definite result. An opinion, drawn up jointly by Luther, Melancthon, and Bugenhagen, advised against an absolute rejection of the proposed restoration of episcopal power; the only thing necessary to insist upon being that the clergy and congregations should be allowed by the bishops the pure preaching of the gospel which had hitherto been refused them.

About this time Luther had the grief of losing his mother. She died on June 30, after receiving from her son a consolatory letter in her last illness. Of his own physical suffering in this month we have already spoken. On the 26th, he wrote to Link that Satan had sent all his messengers to buffet him (2 Cor. xii. 7), so that he could only rarely write or do anything: the devil would probably soon kill him outright. And yet not his will would be done, but the will of Him who had already overthrown Satan and all his kingdom.

Soon afterwards, the desire of the Catholics for coercive measures was stimulated afresh by the news of a defeat which the Reformed cities in Switzerland had sustained at the hands of the five Catholic Cantons, notwithstanding that the balance of force inclined there far more than in Germany to the side of the Evangelicals. The struggle which Luther was perpetually endeavouring to avert from Germany, culminated in Switzerland in a bloody outbreak, mainly at Zwingli's instigation. Zwingli himself fell on October 11 in the battle of Cappel, a victim of the patriotic schemes by which he had laboured to achieve for his country a grand reform of politics, morality, and the Church, but for which he had failed to enlist any intelligent or unanimous co-operation on the part of his companions in faith. Ferdinand triumphed over this first great victory for the Catholic cause. He was now ready to renounce humbly his claim upon Hungary, so that, by making peace with the Sultan, he might leave his own and the Emperor's hands free in Germany. Luther saw in the fate of Zwingli another judgment of God against the spirit of Munzer, and in the whole course of the war a solemn warning for the members of the Schmalkaldic League not to boast of any human alliance, and to do their utmost to preserve peace.

But the events in Switzerland gave no handle against those who had not joined the Zwinglians, nor were even the latter weakened thereby in power and organisation. The South Germans had now to cling all the more firmly to their alliance with the Lutheran princes and cities; the Zwinglian movement suffered shortly afterwards (Dec. 1) a severe loss in the death of Oecolampadius. Finally the Sultan was not satisfied with Ferdinand's repeated offers, but prepared for a new campaign against Austria in the spring of 1532, and towards the end of April he set out for it.

This checked the feverous desire of Germans for war against their fellow-countrymen, and brought to a practical result the negotiations for a treaty which had been conducted early in 1582 at Schweinfurt, and later on at Nuremberg. They amounted to this: that all idea of an agreement on the religious and ecclesiastical questions in dispute was abandoned until the hoped-for Council should take place, and that, as had long been Luther's opinion, they should rest content with a political peace or modus vivendi, which should recognise both parties in the position they then occupied. The main dispute was on the further question, how far this recognition should extend;—whether only to the Schmalkaldic allies, the immediate parties to the present agreement, or to such other States of the Empire as might go over to the new doctrine from the old Church—which still remained the established Church of the Emperor and the Empire in general—and, perhaps further, to Protestant subjects of Catholic princes of the Empire. There was also still the question as to the validity of Ferdinand's election as King of Rome. Luther was again and again asked for his opinion on this subject.

He was just then suffering from an unusually severe attack, which incessantly reminded him of his approaching end. In addition, he was deeply concerned about the health of his beloved Elector. Early in the morning of January 22 he was seized again, as his friend Dietrich, who lived with him, informs us, with another violent attack in his head and heart. His friends who had come to him began to speak of the effect his death would have on the Papists, when he exclaimed, 'But I shall not die yet, I am certain. God will never strengthen the Papal abominations by letting me die now that Zwingli and Oecolampadius are just gone. Satan would no doubt like to have it so: he dogs my heels every moment; but not his will will be done, but the Lord's.' The physician thought that apoplexy was imminent, and that if so, Luther could hardly recover. The attack however seems to have quickly passed away, but Luther's head remained racked with pain. A few weeks later, towards the end of February, he had to visit the Elector at Torgau, who was lying there in great suffering, and had been compelled to have the great toe of his left foot amputated. Luther writes thence about himself to Dietrich, saying that he was thinking about the preface to his translation of the Prophets, but suffered so severely from giddiness and the torments of Satan, that he well-nigh despaired of living and returning to Wittenberg. 'My head,' he says, 'will do no more: so remember that, if I die, your talents and eloquence will be wanted for the preface.' For a whole month, as he remarked at the beginning of April, he was prevented from reading, writing, and lecturing. He informed Spalatin, in a letter of May 20, which Bugenhagen wrote for him, that at present, God willing, he must take a holiday. And on June 13 he told Amsdorf that his head was gradually recovering through the intercessions of his friends, but that he despaired of regaining his natural powers.

Notwithstanding this condition and frame of mind, Luther continued to send cordial, calm, and encouraging words of peace, concerning the negotiations then pending, both to the Elector John and his son John Frederick.

Concerning Ferdinand's election Luther declared to these two princes on February 12, and again afterwards, that it must not be allowed to embarrass or prevent a treaty of peace. If it violated a trifling article of the Golden Bull, that was no sin against the Holy Ghost, and God could show the Protestants, for a mote like this in the eyes of their enemies, whole beams in their own. It must needs be an intolerable burden to the Elector's conscience if war were to arise in consequence,—a war which might 'well end in rending the Empire asunder and letting in the Turks, to the ruin of the Gospel and everything else.'

An opinion, drawn up on May 16 by Luther and Bugenhagen, was equally decided in counselling submission on the question as to the extension of the truce, if peace itself depended upon it. For if the Emperor, he said, was now pleased to grant security to the now existing Protestant States, he did so as a favour and a personal privilege. They could not coerce him into showing the same favour to others. Others must make the venture by the grace of God, and hope to gain security in like manner. Everyone must accept the gospel at his own peril.

Luther began already to hear the reproach that to adopt such a course would be to renounce brotherly love, for Christians should seek the salvation and welfare of others besides themselves. He was reproached again with disowning by his conduct the Protestant ideal of religious freedom and the equal rights of Confessions. Very differently will he be judged by those who realise the legal and constitutional relations then existing in Germany, and the ecclesiastico-political views shared in common by Protestants and Catholics, and who then ask what was to be gained by a course contrary to that which he advised in the way of peace and positive law. That the sovereigns of Catholic States should secure toleration to the Evangelical worship in their own territories was opposed to those general principles by virtue of which the Protestant rulers took proceedings against their Catholic subjects. According to those principles, nothing was left for subjects who resisted the established religion of the country but to claim free and unmolested departure. Luther observed with justice, 'What thou wilt not have done to thee, do not thou to others.' With regard to the further question as to the princes who should hereafter join the Protestants, it certainly sounds naive to hear Luther speak of a present mere act of favour on the part of the Emperor. But he was strictly right in his idea, that a concession, involving the separation of some of the States of the Empire from the one Church system hitherto established indivisibly throughout the Empire, and their organisation of a separate Church, had no foundation whatever in imperial law as existing before and up to the Reformation, and could in so far be regarded simply as a free concession of the Emperor and Empire to individual members of the general body; who, therefore, had no right to compel the extension of this concession to others, and thereby hazard the peace of the Empire. Something had already been gained by the fact that at least no limitation was expressed. A door was thus left open for extension at a future time; and for those who wished to profit by this fact, the danger, if only peace could be assured, was at any rate diminished. If we may see any merit in the fact that the German nation at that time was spared a bloody war, unbounded in its destructive results, and that a peaceful solution was secured for a number of years, that merit is due in the first place to the great Reformer. He acted throughout like a true patriot and child of his Fatherland, no less than like a true Christian teacher and adviser of conscience.

The negotiations above described involved the further question about a Council, pending which a peaceful agreement was now effected. In the article providing for the convocation of a 'free Christian Council,' the Protestants demanded the addition of the words, 'in which questions should be determined according to the pure Word of God.' On this point, however, Luther was unwilling to prolong the dispute. He remarked with practical wisdom that the addition would be of no service; their opponents would in any case wish to have the credit of having spoken according to the pure Word of God.

In June bad news came again from Nuremberg, tending to the belief that the Papists had thwarted the work of peace. Luther again exclaimed, as he had done after the Diet of Augsburg, 'Well, well! your blood be upon your own heads; we have done enough.'

Towards the end of the month, when the Elector again invited his opinion, he repeated, with even more urgency than before, his warnings to those Protestants also who were 'far too clever and confident, and who, as their language seemed to show, wished to have a peace not open to dispute.' He begged the Elector, in all humility, to 'write in earnest a good, stern letter to our brethren,' that they might see how much the Emperor had graciously conceded to them which could be accepted with a good conscience, and not refuse such a gracious peace for the sake of some paltry, far-fetched point of detail. God would surely heal and provide for such trifling defects.

On July 23 the peace was actually concluded at Nuremberg, and signed by the Emperor on August 2. Both parties were mutually to practise Christian toleration until the Council was held; one of these parties being expressly designated as the Schmalkaldic allies. The value of this treaty for the maintenance of Protestantism in Germany was shown by the indignation displayed by the Papal legates from the first at the Emperor's concessions.

The Elector John was permitted to survive the conclusion of the peace, which he had been foremost among the princes in promoting. Shortly after, on August 15, he was seized with apoplexy when out hunting, and on the following day he breathed his last. Luther and Melancthon, who were summoned to him at Schweinitz, found him unconscious. Luther said his beloved prince, on awakening, would be conscious of everlasting life; just as when he came from hunting on the Lochau heath, he would not know what had happened to him; as said the prophet (Isaiah lvii. 1, 2), 'The righteous is taken away from the evil to come. He shall enter into peace; they shall rest in their beds.' Luther preached at his funeral at Wittenberg, as he had done seven years before at his brother's, and Spalatin tells us how he wept like a child.

John had, throughout his reign, laboured conscientiously to follow the Word of God, as taught by Luther, and to encounter all dangers and difficulties by the strength of faith. He has rightly earned the surname of 'the Steadfast.' Luther especially praises his conduct at the Diet of Augsburg in this respect; he frequently said to his councillors on that occasion, 'Tell my men of learning that they are to do what is right, to the praise and glory of God, without regard to me, or to my country and people.' Luther distinguished piety and benevolence as the two most prominent features of his character, as wisdom and understanding had been those of the Elector Frederick's. 'Had the two princes,' he said, 'been one, that man would have been a marvel.'



PART VI.

FROM THE RELIGIOUS PEACE OF NUREMBERG TO THE DEATH OF LUTHER.



CHAPTER I.

LUTHER UNDER JOHN FREDERICK. 1632-34.

Political peace had been the blessing which Luther hoped to see obtained for his countrymen and his Church, during the anxious time of the Augsburg Diet. Such a peace had now been gained by the development of political relations, in which he himself had only so far co-operated as to exhort the Protestant States to practise all the moderation in their power. He saw in this result the dispensation of a higher power, for which he could never be thankful enough to God. For the remainder of his life he was permitted to enjoy this peace, and, so far as he could, to assist in its preservation. In the enjoyment of it he continued to build on the foundations prepared for him under the protecting patronage of Frederick the Wise, and on which the first stone of the new Church edifice had been laid under the Elector John.

A longer time was given him for this work than he had anticipated. We have had occasion frequently to refer not only to his thoughts of approaching death, but also to the severe attacks of illness which actually threatened to prove fatal. Although these attacks did not recur with such dangerous severity in the later years of his life, still a sense of weakness and premature old age invariably remained behind them. Exhaustion, caused by his work and the struggles he had undergone, debarred him from exertion for which he had all the will. He constantly complained of weakness in the head and giddiness, which totally unfitted him for work, especially in the morning. He would break out to his friends with the exclamation, 'I waste my life so uselessly, that I have come to bear a marvellous hatred towards myself. I don't know how it is that the time passes away so quickly, and I do so little. I shall not die of years, but of sheer want of strength.' In begging one of his friends at a distance to visit him once more, he reminds him that, in his present state of health, he must not forget that it might be for the last time. No wonder then if his natural excitability was often morbidly increased. He always looked forward with joy to his leaving this 'wicked world,' but as long as he had to work in it, he exerted all his powers no less for his own immediate task than for the general affairs of the Church, which incessantly demanded his attention.

The mutual trust and friendship subsisting between the Reformer and his sovereign continued unbroken with John's son and successor, John Frederick. This Elector, born in 1503, had, while yet a youth, embraced Luther's teaching with enthusiasm, and leaned upon him as his spiritual father. Luther, on his side, treated him with a confidential, easy intimacy, but never forgot to address him as 'Most illustrious Prince' and 'Most gracious Lord.' When the young man assumed the Electorship, and appeared at Wittenberg a few days after his father's death, he at once invited Luther to preach at the castle and to dine at his table. Luther expressed indeed to friends his fear that the many councillors who surrounded the young Elector might try to exert evil influences upon him, and that he might have to pay dearly for his experience. It might be, he said, that so many dogs barking round him would make him deaf to anyone else. For instance, they might take a grudge against the clergy and cry out, if admonished by them, what can a mere clerk know about it? But his relations with his prince remained undisturbed. He saw with joy how the latter was beginning to gather up the reins which his gentle-minded father had allowed to grow too slack, and he hoped that if God would grant a few years of peace, John Frederick would take in hand real and important reforms in his government, and not merely command them but see them executed.

The Elector's wife, Sybil, a princess of Juliers, shared her husband's friendship for Luther. The Elector had married her in 1526, after taking Luther into his confidence, and being warned by him against needlessly delaying the blessing which God had willed to grant him. On what a footing of cordial intimacy she stood with both Luther and his wife, is shown by a letter she wrote to him in January 1529, while her husband was away on a journey. She says that she will not conceal from him, as her 'good friend and lover of the comforting Word of God,' that she finds the time very tedious now that her most beloved lord and husband is away, and that therefore she would gladly have a word of comfort from Luther, and be a little cheerful with him; but that this is impossible at Weimar, so far off as it is, and so she commends all, and Luther and his dear wife, to the loving God, and will put her trust in Him. She begs him in conclusion: 'You will greet your dear wife very kindly from us, and wish her many thousand good-nights, and if it is God's will, we shall be very glad to be with her some day, and with you also, as well as with her: this you may believe of us at all times.' In the last years of his life Luther had to thank her for similar greetings and inquiries after his own health and that of his family.

In the tenth year of the new Elector's reign Luther was able publicly and confidently to bear witness against the calumnies brought against his government. 'There is now,' he said 'thank God, a chaste and honourable manner of life, truthful lips, and a generous hand stretched out to help the Church, the schools, and the poor; an earnest, constant, faithful heart to honour the Word of God, to punish the bad, to protect the good, and to maintain peace and order. So pure also and praiseworthy is his married life, that it can well serve as a beautiful example for all, princes, nobles, and everyone—a Christian home as peaceful as a convent, which men are so wont to praise. God's Word is now heard daily, and sermons are well attended, and prayer and praise are given to God, to say nothing of how much the Elector himself reads and writes every day.' Only one thing Luther could not and would not justify, namely, that at times the Elector, especially when he had company, drank too much at table. Unhappily the vice of intemperance prevailed then not only at court but throughout Germany. Still John Frederick could stand a big drink better than many others, and, with the exception of this failing, even his enemies must allow him to have been endued with great gifts from God, and all manner of virtues becoming a praiseworthy prince and a chaste husband. Luther's personal relations with the Elector never made him scruple to express to him freely, in his letters, words of censure as well as of praise.

In his academical lectures Luther devoted his chief labours for several terms after 1531 to St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians. He had already commenced this task before and during the contest about indulgences, his object having been to expound to and impress upon his hearers and readers the great truth of justification by faith, set forth in that Epistle with such conciseness and power. This doctrine he always regarded as a fundamental verity and the groundwork of religion. In all its fulness and clearness, and with all his old freshness, vigour, and intensity of fervour, he now exhaustively discussed this doctrine. His lectures, published, with a preface of his, by the Wittenberg chaplain Rorer in 1535, contain the most complete and classical exposition of his Pauline doctrine of salvation. In the introduction to these lectures he declared that it was no new thing that he was offering to men, for by the grace of God the whole teaching of St. Paul was now made known; but the greatest danger was, lest the devil should again filch away that doctrine of faith and smuggle in once more his own doctrine of human works and dogmas. It could never be sufficiently impressed on man, that if the doctrine of faith perished, all knowledge of the truth would perish with it, but that if it flourished, all good things would also flourish, namely, true religion, and the true worship and glory of God. In his preface he says: 'One article—the only solid rock—rules in my heart, namely, faith in Christ: out of which, through which, and to which all my theological opinions ebb and flow day and night.' To his friends he says of the Epistle to the Galatians: 'That is my Epistle, which I have espoused: it is my Katie von Bora.'

His sermons to his congregation were now much hindered by the state of his health. It was his practice, however, after the spring of 1532, to preach every Sunday at home to his family, his servants, and his friends.

But his greatest theological work, which he intended for the service of all his countrymen, was the continuation and final conclusion of his translation of the Bible. After publishing in 1532 his translation of the Prophets, which had cost him immense pains and industry, the Apocrypha alone remained to be done;—the books which, in bringing out his edition of the Bible, he designated as inferior in value to the Holy Scriptures, but useful and good to read. Well might he sigh at times over the work. In November 1532, being then wholly engrossed with the book of Sirach, he wrote to his friend Amsdorf saying that he hoped to escape from this treadmill in three weeks, but no one can discover any trace of weariness or vexation in the German idiom in which he clothed the proverbs and apophthegms of this book. Notwithstanding the length of time which his task occupied, and his constant interruptions, it has turned out a work of one mould and casting, and shows from the first page to the last how completely the translator was absorbed in his theme, and yet how closely his life and thoughts were interwoven with those of his fellow countrymen, for whom he wrote and whose language he spoke. In 1534 the whole of his German Bible was at length in print, and the next year a new edition was called for. Of the New Testament, with which Luther had commenced the work, as many as sixteen original editions, and more than fifty different reimpressions, had appeared up to 1533.

With regard to the wants of the Church, Luther looked to the energy of the new Elector for a vigorous prosecution of the work of visitation. A reorganisation of the Church had been effected by these means, but many more evils had been exposed than cured, nor had the visitations been yet extended to all the parishes. The Elector John had already called on Luther, together with Jonas and Melancthon, for their opinion as to the propriety of resuming them, and only four days before his death he gave instructions on the subject to his chancellor Bruck. John Frederick, in the first year of his rule, did actually put the new visitation into operation, in concert with his Landtag. The main object sought at present was to bring about better discipline among the members of the various congregations, and to put down the sins of drunkenness, unchastity, frivolous swearing, and witchcraft. Luther and even Melancthon were no longer required to give their services as visitors: Luther's place on the commission for Electoral Saxony was filled by Bugenhagen. His own views and prospects in regard to the condition of the people remained gloomy. He complains that the Gospel bore so little fruit against the powers of the flesh and the world; he did not expect any great and general change through measures of ecclesiastical law, but trusted rather to the faithful preaching of the Divine Word, leaving the issue to God. It was particularly the nobles and peasants whom he had to rebuke for open or secret resistance against this Word. He exclaims in a letter to Spalatin, written in 1533: '0 how shamefully ungrateful are our times! Everywhere nobles and peasants are conspiring in our country against the Gospel, and meanwhile enjoy the freedom of it as insolently as they can; God will judge in the matter!' He had to complain besides of indifference and immorality in his immediate neighbourhood, among his Wittenbergers. Thus he addressed, on Midsummer Day 1534, after his sermon, a severe rebuke to drunkards who rioted in taverns during the time of Divine service, and he exhorted the magistrates to do their duty by proceeding against them, so as not to incur the punishment of the Elector or of God.

The territories of Anhalt, immediately adjoining the dominions of the Saxon Elector, now openly joined the Evangelical Confession, of which their prince, Wolfgang of Kothen, had long been a faithful adherent; and Luther contracted in this quarter new and close friendships, like that which subsisted between himself and his own Elector. Anhalt Dessau was under the government of three nephews of Wolfgang, namely, John, Joachim, and George. They had lost their father in early life. One of them had for his guardian the strictly Catholic Elector of Brandenburg, the second, Duke George of Saxony, and the third, the Cardinal Archbishop Albert. George, born in 1507, was made in 1518 canon at Merseburg, and afterwards prebendary of Magdeburg cathedral. The Cardinal had taken peculiar interest in him ever since his boyhood, on account of his excellent abilities, and he did honour to his office by his fidelity, zeal, and purity of life. The new teaching caused him severe internal struggles. His theological studies showed him how rotten were the foundations of the Romish system, but, on the other hand, the new doctrine awakened suspicions on his part lest, with its advocacy of gospel liberty and justification by faith, it might tempt to sedition and immorality. But it finally won his heart, when he learned to know it in its pure form through the Augsburg Confession and the Apology of Melancthon, while the Catholic Refutation drawn up for the Diet of Augsburg excited his disgust. His two brothers, whose devoutness of character their enemies could no more dispute than his own, became converts also to Protestantism. In 1532 they appointed Luther's friend Nicholas Hausmann their court-preacher, and invited Luther and Melancthon to stay with them at Worlitz. George, in virtue of his office as archdeacon and prebendary of Magdeburg, himself undertook the visitation, and had the candidates for the office of preacher examined at Wittenberg. Luther eulogised the two brothers as 'upright princes, of a princely and Christian disposition,' adding that they had been brought up by worthy and Godfearing parents. He kept up a close and intimate friendship with them, both personally and by letter. A disposition to melancholy on the part of Joachim gave Luther an opportunity of corresponding with him. While cheering him with spiritual consolation, he recommended him to seek for mental refreshment in conversation, singing, music, and cracking jokes. Thus he wrote to him in 1534 as follows: 'A merry heart and good courage, in honour and discipline, are the best medicine for a young man—aye, for all men. I, who have spent my life in sorrow and weariness, now seek for pleasure and take it wherever I can.... Pleasure in sin is the devil, but pleasure shared with good people in the fear of God, in discipline and honour, is well-pleasing to God. May your princely Highness be always cheerful and blessed, both inwardly in Christ, and outwardly in His gifts and good things. He wills it so, and for that reason He gives us His good things to make use of, that we may be happy and praise Him for ever.'

During these years, the negotiations concerning the general affairs of the Church, the restoration of harmony in the Christian Church of the West, and the internal union of the Protestants, still proceeded, though languidly and with little spirit.

With the promise, and pending the assembly, of a Council, the Religious Peace had been at length concluded. Before the close of 1532 the Emperor actually succeeded in inducing Pope Clement, at a personal interview with him at Bologna, to announce his intention to convoke a Council forthwith. He urged him to do so by frightening him with the prospect of a German national synod, such as even the orthodox States of the Empire might resolve on, in the event of the Pope obstinately opposing a Council, and in that case, of a possible combination of the entire German nation against the Papal see. He knew, indeed, well enough, that the Holy Father, in making this promise, had no intention whatever of keeping it. The Pope now sent a nuncio to the German princes, to make preparations for giving effect to his promise; the Emperor sent with him an ambassador of his own, as well for his control as his support.