Life of Luther by Julius Koestlin

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Luther himself abandoned afterwards the conclusions he drew from the
Old Testament in this respect, and, as a consequence, rejected the
admissibility of a double marriage for Christians. Friends of the
evangelical and Lutheran belief can only lament the decision he
pronounced in this matter. With that belief itself it has nothing
whatever to do. Instead of drawing his conclusions from the moral
aspect of marriage, as amply attested by the spirit of the New
Testament, though not indeed exactly expressed, Luther on this
occasion clung to the letter, and failed, of course, to find any
written declaration on the point. At the same time he mistook, in
common with all the theologians of his time, the difference, in
point of matured morality and knowledge, between the New Covenant
and the standpoint of the Old, which was that also of his best
adherents.

The simple Christian common sense of the Elector John Frederick, and
his practical view of the position, preserved him this time from the
error into which the theologians had fallen. He lamented that they
should have given an answer, and would have nothing to do with the
business.

Philip, however, rejoiced at the decision, and obtained, moreover,
his wife's consent to take a second one.

In the following March the Protestants held another conference at
Schmalkald, with a view of coming to an agreement as to their
conduct in the attempts at unity in the Church. The Elector summoned
Melancthon thither, but excused Luther, at his own request. Philip
then invited the former, under some pretext or other, to the
neighbouring Castle of Rothenburg on the Fulda. Arrived there, he
was obliged to be a witness with Butzer, on March 4, 1540, to the
marriage of the Landgrave with Margaret. Philip thanked Luther some
weeks after for the 'remedy' allowed him, without which he should
have become 'quite desperate.' He had kept the name of his second
wife a secret from the Wittenbergers; he now told Luther that she
was a virtuous maiden, a relative of Luther's own wife, and that he
rejoiced to have honourably become his kinsman.

Very soon, however, the news of this unheard of event got wind. The
Evangelicals were not less scandalised than their enemies, who in
other respects were glad to see the mischief. The first to demand an
explanation was the Ducal Court of Saxony, the Duke being so nearly
related to Philip's first wife, and on the eve of a quarrel with
Philip about a claim of inheritance. The Landgrave's whole position
was in jeopardy; for bigamy, by the law of the Empire, was a serious
offence. Luther heard now with indignation that the 'necessity' to
which Philip had thought himself justified in yielding had been
exaggerated. The latter, on the other hand, finding concealment no
longer possible, wished to announce his marriage publicly, and
defend it. He went so far as to imagine that even if the allies
should renounce him he might still procure the favour and
consideration of the Emperor. Unpleasant and very painful
discussions arose between him, John Frederick, and Duke Henry of
Saxony.

Meanwhile, the day was now approaching for the conference at
Hagenau. Melancthon was sent there too by the Elector. But on
reaching Weimar on June 13, where the prince was then staying, he
suddenly fell ill, and it seemed as if his end was close at hand. He
was oppressed with trouble and anxiety about the wrongdoing of the
Landgrave. The Elector himself wrote reproachfully to Philip, saying
that 'Philip Melancthon was disturbed with miserable thoughts about
him,' and he now lay between life and death. Luther was sent for by
the Elector from Wittenberg. He found the sick man lying in a state
of unconsciousness and seemingly quite dead to the world. Shocked at
the sight, he exclaimed, 'God help us! how has Satan marred this
vessel of Thy grace!' Then the faithful, manly friend fell to
praying God for his precious companion, casting, as he said, all his
heart's request before Him, and reminding Him of all the promises
contained in His own Word. He exhorted and bade Melancthon to be of
good courage, for that God willed not the death of a sinner, and he
would yet live to serve Him. He assured him he would rather now
depart himself. On Melancthon's gradually showing more signs of
life, he had some food prepared for him, and on his refusing it
said, 'You really must eat, or I will excommunicate you.' By degrees
the patient revived in body and soul. Luther was able to inform
another friend, 'We found him dead, and by an evident miracle he
lives.'

Luther, after this, was taken to Eisenach by his prince, to advise
him on the news which he expected to receive there from Hagenau. At
Eisenach he and the chancellor Bruck had an earnest consultation
with envoys from Hesse. Against these, both Luther and Bruck
insisted that the proceedings which had taken place between Philip
and the theologians in respect to his marriage should be kept as
secret as a confession, and that Philip must be content to have his
second marriage regarded, in the eyes of the world and according to
the law, as concubinage. He must make up his mind, therefore, to
parry, as best he could, the questions which were being noised
abroad about him, with vague statements or equivocations. He would
then incur no further personal danger. But any attempt to brazen it
out would inevitably land him in confusion and embarrassment, and
only increase and continue the damage done to the Evangelical cause
by this affair.

The Diet at Hagenau made no further demand on Luther's activity. It
was there resolved to take in hand again, at another meeting to be
held at Worms late in the autumn, and after further preparation, the
religious and ecclesiastical questions at issue. Peaceably-disposed
and competent men were to be appointed on both sides for this
purpose. Thus Luther was now at liberty to leave Eisenach towards
the end of July, and return home, dissatisfied, as he wrote to his
wife, with the Diet at Hagenau, where labour and expense had been
wasted, but happy in the thought that Melancthon had been restored
from death to life.

At Worms the proceedings, in which Melancthon and Eck took a
prominent part, were further adjourned to a Diet which the Emperor
purposed to hold in person at Ratisbon early in 1541. Here, on April
27, a debate was opened on religion.

Luther entertained very slender expectations from all these
conferences, considering the long-ascertained opinions of his
opponents. He pointed to the innocent blood which had long stained
the hands of the Emperor Charles and King Ferdinand. Still, during
the Diet at Worms, the thought arose in his mind that, if only the
Emperor were rightly disposed, a German Council might actually
result from that assembly. He saw his enemies busy with their secret
schemes of mischief, and feared lest many of his comrades in the
faith, such as the Landgrave Philip, might treat too lightly the
matter, which was no mere comedy among men, but a tragedy in which
God and Satan were the actors. He rejoiced again, however, that the
falsehood and cunning of his enemies must be brought to nought by
their own folly, and that God Himself would consummate the great
catastrophe of the drama. And in regard to the fear we have just
mentioned, he declared that he, at any rate, would not suffer
himself to be dragged into anything against his own conviction.
'Rather,' said he, 'would I take the matter again on my own
shoulders, and stand alone, as at the beginning. We know that it is
the cause of God, and He will carry it through to the end; whoever
will not go with it, must remain behind.'

Between the Diets of Worms and Ratisbon he entered in 1541, with all
his old severity, and with a violence even beyond his wont, into a
bitter correspondence which had just then begun between Duke Henry
of Brunswick--Wolfenbuttel, a zealous Catholic, and morally of ill
repute with friend and foe, on the one side, and John Frederick and
the Landgrave Philip, the heads of the Schmalkaldic League, on the
other. He published against Duke Henry a pamphlet 'Against Hans
Worst.' The Duke had taunted him with having allowed himself to call
his own sovereign Hans Wurst. Luther assured him, in reply, that he
had never given this name to a single man, whether friend or foe;
but now applied it to the Duke, because he found it meant a stupid
blockhead who wished to be thought clever and all the time spoke and
acted like a simpleton. But he was not content with calling him a
blockhead; he represented him as a profligate man, who, while
libelling the princes and pretending to be the champion of God's
ordinances, himself practised open adultery, committed acts of
violence and insolent tyranny, and incited men to incendiarism in
his opponents' territories. He would let the Duke scream himself
hoarse or dead with his calumnies against John Frederick and the
Evangelicals, and simply answer him by saying, 'Devil, thou liest!
Hans Worst, how thou liest! O, Henry Wolfenbuttel, what a shameless
liar thou art! Thou spittest forth much, and namest nothing; thou
libellest, and provest nothing.' At the same time this pamphlet of
Luther was a literary vindication of the Reformation and
Protestantism; here, said he, and not in the popedom, was the true,
ancient, and original Christian Church. Luther himself, on reading
over his pamphlet after it was printed, thought its tone against
Henry was too mild; a headache, he said, must have suppressed his
indignation.

Just at this time he had to encounter a fresh and violent attack of
illness. He described it, in a letter to Melancthon, who was then at
Ratisbon, as a 'cold in the head;' it was accompanied not only with
alarming giddiness, from which he was now a frequent sufferer, but
also with deafness and intolerable pains, forcing tears from his
eyes, something unusual with him, and making him call on God to put
an end to his pain or to his life. A copious discharge of matter
from his ear, which occurred in Passion Week, gave him relief; but
for a long while he continued very weak and suffering. To his
prince, who sent his private physician to attend him, he wrote on
April 25, thanking him, and adding, 'I should have been well content
if the dear Lord Jesus had taken me in His mercy from hence, as I am
now of little more use on earth.' He attributed his recovery to the
intercessions which Bugenhagen had made for him in the Church.

Whilst he was still feeling his head thus full of pain and unfit for
work, he was called upon to give his opinion on the preparations for
the religious conference at Ratisbon, and afterwards upon its
results.

Bright prospects seemed now to be opening for the victory of the
Gospel. Men of understanding and really desirous of peace had for
once been commissioned, by the Catholics as well as by the
Protestants, to conduct the debate. The chief actors were no longer
an Eck, though he, too, was one of the collocutors, but the pious,
gentle, and refined theologian Julius von Pflug, and the electoral
counsellor of Cologne, Gropper, who vied with him in an earnest
desire for reform and unity. Contarini also was there, as the Papal
legate--a man influenced by purely religious motives, and a convert
to the deeper Evangelical doctrine of salvation. Melancthon and
Butzer were also there. The questions of most importance from the
Evangelical point of view were first dealt with--namely, those which
related, not to the external system and authority of the Church, but
to man's need of, and the way to obtain, salvation, to sin, grace,
and justification. And it was now unanimously confessed that the
faithful soul is sustained solely by the righteousness given by
Christ; and for His sake alone, and not for any worthiness or works
of its own, is justified and accepted by God.

Never before, and never since, have Protestant and Catholic
theologians approached each other so nearly, nay, been so unanimous,
on these fundamental doctrines, as on that memorable day. And the
Catholics, in this, distinctly left the ground of mediaval
scholasticism, and went over to that of the Evangelicals. How
distinctly this was done will be apparent to any one who compares
the propositions accepted at the Conference of Ratisbon with the
Catholic reply to the Augsburg Confession of 1530.

Nevertheless, we do not find that Luther felt particularly elated by
the news from Ratisbon. The formula which embodied their agreement
seemed to him a 'roundabout and patched affair.' In connection with
faith, as the only means of justification, too much, he thought, was
said of the works which must spring from it; in connection with the
justification given to the faithful through Christ, too much was
said of the righteousness which each Christian must strive to
attain. He, too, had always taught and demanded both works and
righteousness. But the present arrangement of clauses seemed to him
calculated to lessen and obscure again the primary importance of
Christ and of Faith, as the sole means of salvation. And we see what
objection was uppermost in his mind, in his allusion to Eck, who
also was obliged to subscribe the formula. Eck, said Luther, would
never confess to having once taught differently to now, and would
know well enough how to adopt the new tenets to his old way of
thinking. They were putting a patch of new cloth upon an old
garment, and the rent would be made worse. (Matt. ix. 16.)

Luther was spared, however, a decision as to the acceptance or
non-acceptance of an agreement. For among the Catholic Estates of
the Empire he found, so far as he had followed the debate of the
Diet, too strong an opposition to hope for real union. Moreover,
the collocutors themselves were unable to agree when they came to
further questions, as, for example, the Mass and Transubstantiation;
they still shipwrecked, therefore, on those points which were of the
most vital importance for the external glorification of the
priesthood and the Church, and the surrender of which would have
meant the sacrifice of a dogma already ratified by a Conciliar
decree.

On June 11 an embassy from Ratisbon appeared before Luther in the
name of those Protestant states which were most zealous for unity.
Prince John of Anhalt was at their head. Luther was requested to
declare his concurrence with what had been done, and assist them in
giving permanent effect to the articles agreed to at the Conference,
and arranging some peaceful and tolerant compromise with regard to
those points on which agreement had been impossible. Luther was
quite prepared to acquiesce in such toleration, provided only the
Emperor would permit the preaching of the articles referring to the
doctrine of salvation, leaving it open to the Protestants to
continue their warfare of the Word on the points still remaining in
dispute. The Emperor, however, would only sanction those articles on
the understanding that a Council should finally decide upon them,
and that, in the meantime, all controversial writings on matters of
religion should cease. By the Catholic Estates at the Diet they were
strenuously opposed. Luther's own opinion remained substantially the
same as before--namely, that any trust or hopes were vain, unless
their enemies gave God the honour due to Him, and openly confessed
that they had changed their teaching. The Emperor must see and
acknowledge that within the last twenty years his Edict had been the
murder of many pious people.

The Conference accordingly remained fruitless. The Diet, however,
did not close without achieving an important result for the
Protestants; for the Emperor granted them, at their request, the
Religious Peace of Nuremberg.

The main reason that induced Charles so far to toleration and
leniency was the trouble with the Turks. With regard to these,
Luther now addressed himself once more to his countrymen with words
of earnestness and weight. He published an 'Exhortation to prayer
against the Turks,' teaching and warning his readers to regard them
as a scourge of God, and make war against them as God commanded.
From this time also dates his hymn

Lord, shield us with Thy Word, our Hope,
And smite the Moslem and the Pope.

When a tax was levied for the war with the Turks, Luther himself
begged the Elector not to exempt him with his scanty goods. He would
gladly, he said, if not too old and too infirm, 'be one of the army
himself.' In 1542 he brought out for his countrymen a refutation of
the Koran, written in earlier days, that they might learn what a
shameful faith was Mahomed's, and not suffer themselves to be
perverted, in case by God's decree they should see the Turks
victorious, or even fall into their hands.

CHAPTER VI.

PROGRESS AND INTEENAL TROUBLES OF PROTESTANTISM. 1541-44.

The Reformation, against which the Emperor had so repeatedly to
promise his interference, and with which he was compelled to seek
for a peaceful understanding, continued meanwhile to gain ground in
various parts of Germany.

[Illustration: Fig. 45.--JONAS. (From a portrait by Cranach, in his
Album at Berlin, 1543.)]

Luther hailed with especial joy its victory in the town of Halle,
which had formerly been a favourite seat of the Cardinal Albert and
the chief scene of his wanton extravagances, and where now one of
Luther's most intimate and most learned friends from Wittenberg,
Justus Jonas, was installed as reformer and Evangelical pastor. Here
the final impetus was given to the movement, among the mass of the
population, of whom the large majority had long espoused the cause
of Luther, by those money difficulties which played such a serious
and grievous part in the life of Albert. When, in the spring of
1541, the town was called on to pay taxes to the amount of 22,000
gulden, to defray the Cardinal's debts, the citizens made the
payment conditional on their Council appointing an Evangelical
preacher. Jonas was accordingly invited to the town, and received at
once, on his arrival, a regular appointment through the magistracy
and a committee of the congregation. In Passion Week, when Luther
was recovering from his illness and Albert had to attend the Diet at
Ratisbon, Jonas for the first time took his place in the principal
church in the town, then recently rebuilt, in the pulpit which the
Archbishop had had erected with elaborate carvings in stone. Soon
after the two other churches in the town received Evangelical
preachers. The general regulation of Church matters was entrusted to
Jonas, and remained under his control. Luther, however, supported
his friend with his advice, and continued on terms of trusted
intimacy with him till his death. He did not conceal his joy that
the 'wicked old rogue,' Albert, should have had to live to see this,
and praised God for upholding His judgment upon earth. The
collection of countless and wonderful relics with which the
Cardinal, twenty years before, had sought to carry on the traffic in
indulgences, so hateful to Luther, he now wished to exhibit in like
manner at Mayence, his town of residence. Thereupon Luther, in 1542,
published anonymously, but with the evident intention of being
recognised as its author, a 'New Paper from the Rhine,' which
announced to German Christendom a series of new, unheard-of relics,
collected by his Highness the Elector, such as a piece of the left
horn of Moses, three tongues of flame from his burning bush, &c.,
and lastly a whole drachm of his own true heart and half an ounce of
his own truthful tongue, which his Highness had added as a legacy by
his last will and testament. The Pope, said Luther, had promised to
anyone who should give a gulden in honour of the relics, a remission
for ten years of whatever sins he pleased. Contempt of this kind was
all that Luther found the exhibition deserved. Albert remained
silent.

About the same time the Elector John Frederick undertook a novel,
important, though a dangerous, and to Luther an objectionable step,
in connection with a bishopric then vacant. The Bishop of Naumburg
had died. The Chapter of the Cathedral, with whom lay the election
of his successor, were accustomed to guide their choice by the wish
of the Elector, as their territorial sovereign. They now elected,
without waiting to hear from John Frederick, who had seceded from
Catholicism, the distinguished Julius von Pflug. The Elector, on the
contrary, was anxious, as his privilege was hurt by this neglect, to
nominate a bishop of his own choice, and, moreover, a member of the
Augsburg Confession. His Chancellor, Bruck, protested earnestly
against this step, and Luther could not refrain from endorsing his
remonstrance. If the common herd of Papists, he said, had been
content to look on and see what had been done to priests and monks,
they and the Emperor would not care to see the same things done with
the Episcopate. The Elector thought this pusillanimous; he wished to
be bolder and more spirited than Luther. It was a pity only that his
pious zeal lacked the more circumspect judgment of his advisers, and
that the interests of his own authority were also concerned. He
declined even to accept the advice of the Wittenberg theologians,
who suggested that, at all events, the bishopric should be given to
the eminent prince of the Empire, George of Anhalt, but chose
Nicholas von Amsdorf--a man of better promise, not, indeed, solely
from his theological principles, but as being likely to be more
dependent on his territorial sovereign, though perhaps, as an
unmarried man and a member of the nobility, less repugnant than any
other Protestant theologian to the Catholics. On January 18, 1542,
the Elector brought him in solemn state to Naumburg before the
chapter there assembled.

Luther was glad, nevertheless, to see an Evangelical bishop. He took
care to introduce him in Evangelical manner. According to the
Catholic doctrine, as is well known, the Episcopate is transmitted
from the Apostles by the act of consecration, with the laying on of
hands and anointing, which can only be done by one bishop to
another, and only a bishop can then consecrate priests or the
clergy. The Reformers would easily have been able to continue this
so-called Apostolical succession through the Prussian bishops who
went over to them. But, as they never acknowledged the necessity of
this with regard to the inferior clergy, neither did they with
regard to the new bishop. Luther himself consecrated Amsdorf on
January 20, together with two Evangelical superintendents of the
neighbourhood, and the principal pastor and superintendent of the
Evangelical congregation at Naumburg, with prayer and the laying on
of hands, in the presence of the various orders and a multitude of
people from the town and district assembled in the Cathedral. The
congregation were first informed that an honest, upright bishop had
now been nominated for them by their sovereign and his estates in
concert with the clergy, and they were called upon to express their
own approval by an Amen, which was thereupon given loudly in
response. In this manner at least it was sought to comply with a
rule especially enjoined by Cyprian: namely, that a bishop should be
elected in an assembly of neighbouring bishops and with the consent
of his own congregation. Luther gave an account of the ceremony in a
tract, entitled 'Example of the way to consecrate a true Christian
bishop.'

[Illustration: FIG. 4e.-AMSDORF. (From an old woodcut.)]

Bruck's apprehensions meantime were only too well founded. The
complaints raised against this consecration weighed heavily with
even the more moderate opponents of the Reformation, and especially
with the Emperor. It was at the same time very evident that, as we
have elsewhere observed, the Elector, good Churchman as he was by
disposition, frequently displayed too little energy in regard to the
general relations and interests of his Church. Thus the arrangements
required for the bishopric remained neglected, and the new bishop
was furnished with a most inadequate maintenance. Luther complained
that the Electoral Court undertook great things, and then left them
sticking in the mire. Moreover, among many of the temporal lords,
even on the Protestant side, there were signs of spiteful jealousy
and suspicion against the honours and advantages enjoyed by their
theologians. Luther himself proceeded therefore with the utmost
possible caution. He even declined once a present of venison from
his friend Amsdorf, in order not to give occasion for calumny by the
'Centaurs at Court;' though, as he said, they themselves had
devoured everything, without any prickings of conscience. 'Let
them,' he wrote to Amsdorf, 'guzzle in God's name or in any other.'

Scarcely had the Elector's instalment of the bishop (1542) awakened
these bitter feelings of resentment, when a war threatened to break
out between the Elector and his cousin and fellow-Protestant, Duke
Maurice of Saxony, the successor of his late father Henry--a war
which would have imperilled more than anything else the position of
the Protestants in the Empire, and which stirred and disquieted
Luther to his inmost soul.