THE LIFE AND TIMES timid, did not disapprove of the reformer ; it waited patient!}'.
But the nobility and the people did not wait.
The nation was reanimated.
Luther's yoice had shaken it ; it was won over, and rallied round the standard that he had uplifted.
Nothing could be mere advantageous to the reformer than this publication.
In the palaces and castles, in the homes of the citizens, and in the cottages of the peasants, all was now prepared.
Luther was defended bj all classes, as with a breastplate, against the sentence of excommunication about to fall upon the head of this prophet of the people.
All Germany was on fire.
The papal bull, heretofore so dreadful to *the populace, was now ardently desired.
Let it arrive, cried they; not by such means will this conflagration be extinguished."
Eck had proceeded to Borne to secure the condemnation of Luther, as we have seen.
Even before the publication of the " Appeal," vague rumors announced his success.
This report still further aroused the militant spirit of the enthusiastic monk.
Determined to be beforehand with the pope, and to judge his judge, his tireless j^en now produced his terrible book on the Captivity of Babylon, in which he openly repudiated the authority of the j^ontifF, maintained that the church was captive, and that Jesus Christ, constantly profaned in the idolatry of the mass, and set aside in the impious formulas of the ritual, Avas held a prisoner in the iron clutches of the pope.
He explains in the preface with daring freedom the manner in which he found himself daily driven more and more to extremities by the conduct of his adversaries
: " Whether I will or no, I become each day more expert and learned ; driven about as I am, and kept in constant and active exercise by so many adversaries at once.
" I wrote on indulgences two years ago, but in a way that makes me repent I sent forth what 1 had written to the public.
At that time I was still prodigiously attached to the papal power, so that I dared not totally reject indulgences.
I saw them, moreover, sanctioned by great numbers of intelligent persons—in fact I was left to roll the great stone myself.
But since then, thanks to Sylvester, ;ind the other brothers who so Avarmly defended them, I have found -that they were nothing more than mere impostures, invented by the flatterers of Rome to ruin men's faith and their pockets.
AVould to God that I could induce all booksellers, and all readers who possess my writings on the indulgences, to put them into the fire, and to replace them by this single proposition
Indulgences are delusive trash, invented by the parasites of Home!
" After that, Eck, Emser, and their gang came to tackle me on the question of the pope's supremacy.
I am bound to admit, in gratitude to these learned personages, that the trouble which they took in this matter was not without its effect, and that a considerable effect on my advancement towards ecclesiastical emancipation.
"Previously I had merely denied that popery THE LIFE AND TIMES was fouuded on divine riglit, admitting that it had human sanction on its side.
But, after having heard the ultra-subtle subtleties on which these poor people based the rights of their idols, I have arrived at a sounder conclusion, and am convinced that the reign of the pope is that of Babylon, and of Nimrod the miglity hunter.
I request all booksellers and readers, that nothing may be wanting to the success of my good friends, to burn also whatever
I have written thus far concerning the papal supremacy, and to remember only this simple proposition : The pope is the mighty htinter, the hidden devil of the Eoman see /"*
At the same time, in order that it might be seen that he wa*s assailing popery pe>' se, rather than the pontiff personally, Luther vrrote a letter, both in German and Latin, to Leo X., in which he repudiated all personal ill-will to himself.f
Like its companion pamphlet, the " Appeal to the German Nobility," the "
Captivity of Babylon" created a profound sensation.
The excitement Avas intense.
The nobles and the people, the castles and the free towns, rivalled each other in zeal and enthusiasm for Luther.
At Nuremberg, at Strasburg, even at Mayence, there was a constant struggle for his last pamphlets.
The celebrated painter Lucas Kranach made designs for his works,+ and the sheet yet wet was brought from the press under some one's cloak, and passed eagerly from shop to X Seckenclorf, jj. 148.
The pedantic bookmen of tlie German trades' unions, the poetical tinmen, the Hterary shoemakers devoured the good news.
Worthy Hans Sacks, the cobbler poet, raised himself above his wonted commonjDlace ; he left his shoe half made, and wrote his most high-flown verses, his best productions.
He sang in undertones, the Nightingale of Wittemherg, and the refrain was taken up by the listening populace, and it soon resounded through Germany.* o Michelet.
The last writings of the Wittemberg doctor had stung Rome to the quick.
The fierce clamors of the ruffled churchmen obliged the easy Florentine to abstain for a day from the indolent pleasures— the chase, the theatre, music, chats with Angelo concerning frescoes, and dilettante criticisms on Tuscan love poems—to which he gave his life.
The pontiff, angry at the incessant interruption which this irrepressible monk caused in the lazy peace of his ecclesiastical career, determined to end this heresy by one of those coups de main which had so often driven liberty and free lips from the sanctuary in the good old time.
On the 15th of June, 1520, Leo penned his bull of excommunication.
Luther had long been prepared for the anathema of the pope.
He had even anticipated by his last pamphlet the jDontifical maledictions.
It may be regarded as an important circumstance in his life, that God allowed him sufficient intervals between the various severe trials of his strength and knowledge to prepare for their approach.
Had the thunders of the Vatican burst suddenly upon his ears at the outset of this revolution, his habits of early reverence might have laid him open to all the terrors which they were intended to inspire, but now experience had taught him to estimate their force he was not ignorant that they might injurc him, and even lead to consequences from which the generahtj of men would shrink with extreme dread.
But he knew what he had to meet; no shadowy forms flitted before his vivid imagination ; the pope had no longer the likeness of a heavenly crown upon his head
; the dungeon of which he held the keys was the dungeon of an ordinar}^ gaoler ; and the condemnation he pronounced depended for its vitality solely upon his power to open and shut the doors of the common prison.
And for this Luther cared little.* He immediately informed Spalatin of the arrival of the bull at Wittemberg, and spared no expression of utter contempt for this now useless instrument of papal tyranny.
" I despise it," he said, " as a Ij'ing and imj^ious document ; the hands are the hands of Leo, hut the voice is the voice of Eel'.
You see Christ himself condemned therein.
I shall treat it as an impudent forgery.
I am' freer than ever, being confirmed in the conviction—and I needed no confirmation—that the pope is antichrist, and that his throne was set up for Satan."t
The reception of the bull in Germany was sullen and ominous.
Even the heads of the various arch-episcopal sees were no more than coldly acquiescent.
The German prelates had been provoked at the pontifical appointment of the braggart Eck to bear the anathema into their countryjmd promulgate it.
It had heretofore been the custom * Stebbing'.s Hist. Eef., Vol.
THE LIFE AND TIMES to forward the bulls directly to the bishops ; therefore the selection of this upstart schoolman was unprecedented, and the dignitaries of the church stooped only to the most formal and ceremonious action.
But Eck, blooming Avith his mushroom honors, and swelhng with pride, hastened exultingly ou^ flourishing in his hand that papal curse before which he expected to see his hated rival succumb.
The cowardly nuncio was not destined to walk through the empire on roses.
He had posted his bull at Mersebiu-g, at Brandenburg, and elsewhere.
But in the first of these cities it is said to have been posted so high that no one could read it ;•• and in Leipsic so great a revolution had occurred in the public sentiment since the disputation, that the students of the university went through the streets chanting satirical verses about Eck, and they placarded the city in ten difi'erent places with sharp attacks upon the new-fledged nuncio and his stolen thunder.t
Eck was so terrified at these proceedings that, like his predecessor Tetzel, he fled for safety into the cloister of St. Paul
; nor was his fear lessened by the arrival at Leipsic of two hundred students from Wittemberg, who, with the true esprit de coiys of university men, at once fraternized with their Leipsic brethren, and strolled arm in arm through the town boldly inveighing against the Ingolstadt doctor.:}:
On learning of his fright, Luther said, Avish to see him shiin, but I desire that his schemes may fail."'^ Eck managed to escape under cover of the night, and he gained an asylum at Coburg for a little, after which he repaired to Erfurth.
He did not venture to approach Erfurth his bull received rough usage.
Avas seized by the students, and having been torn in pieces, the fragments were flung into the river with a witticism : " Since it is a hull, let us see it swim"— playing on the word hulla, which means a huhhle, the seal appended to the bull, and hence the bull itself.f
" Now," said Luther when told of this occurrence, " the pope's bull is a real bull."
Meantime the excitement at Wittemberg was intense, and the general indignation was increased by the report that the edict of the pope was being carried into execution.
Luther's writings were seized and put under seal at Ingolstadt.
Booksellers who ventured to expose his writings upon theii* shelves for sale were imprisoned at various jilaces, and his printers at Mentz had their press destroyed by the pontifical authority.
All eyes were fixed upon the reformer to see what his next step would be.
The bold monk had adopted as his motto that grand old Latin legend. Nulla vestigia retrorsum, No steps backwiird, and on the 4tli of November, 1520, he published his " Treatise against the Papal Bull," directo L. Epp.,
THE LIFE AND TIMES ing this terrific broadside full against the pontifical throne.'^ 17th of November he appealed solemnly, and in the presence of a notary and five witnesses, fi'om Leo's judgment to a future council
; and on the 10th of December, 1520, he marched with great pomp, at the head of a multitude of learned doctors, students, and burghers, to the eastern gate of Wittemberg, and there making a better application of the great Roman principle, built the first auto da fc of the Reformation
; and as the flames leaped high to kiss the heavens, Luther, dressed in the full insignia of his order, approached the pile, and flinging the canon law, the decretals, the papal extravagants, some writings of Eck and Emser, and the recent bull into the jubilant flames, exclaimed with a sonorous voice,
THOU HAST VEXED THE HOLY OnE OF THE LOED, MAY EVERLASTING EIRE VEX AND CONSUME THEE !"
After this solemn and unprecedented ceremony, Luther returned calmh^ to the city, the crowd of professors, doctors, students, and citizens testityiug their warm approval by tremendous plaudits.t
The pope had excommunicated Luther; thus it was then that Luther excommunicated the pontiff".
H(^ had already written to Leo this awful sentence " Is there under the spreading firmament of heaven any thing more fetid, corrupt, and detestable than the Komish court ?
It infinitely exceeds the Ottoman Porte in its heathenish vices. t Corpus Ref., D'Axibigne, Seckendovf, aud others. gate of heaven, now it is the mouth of hell, a mouth which the wrath of God keeps open so wide, that on witnessing the unhappy people rushing into it,
I cannot but utter a warning cry, as in a tempest, that some at least may be saved from the terrible gulf.
This, Oh Leo, is why I inveigh with such unwearied energy against 3'our death-dealing see."* The same day that he burned the bull, he said of the decretals, that " they resemble a body Avhose face is as meek as a young maiden's, but whose limbs are full of violence, like those of a lion, and whose tail is filled with wiles like a serpent.
Among all the laws of the j^opes, there is not one Avord which teaches us who Jesus Christ is."t On this same occasion he again said,
" My enemies have been able by burning my books to injure the cause of truth in the minds of some, and to destroy souls ; for this reason I consume their books in return.
A serious struggle has just commenced.
I have been playing with the pope ; now I wage open war.
I began this work in God's name ; it will be ended without me, and by his might.
If they dare burn my Avritings, in which more of the gospel is to be found, I speak without boasting, than in all the works of the whole line of popes, I can with much greater reason burn theirs, in which no good can be discovered."
"has tliree crowns: the first is against God, for he condemns o Letter to Leo X.
0pp. OV.) XXII., Ii93, H9G.
THE LIFE AND TIMES religion ; the secoucl is against the emperor, for he condemns the secular authority ; the third is against society, for he condemns marriage,
I have been accused of inveighing too severely against this triple-headed papal tyrant ; alas, would that I could speak against it with a voice of thunder, and that each of my words was a thunderbolt."On the day following this nniqne protestant auto dafe, Luther found his lecture-room even more densely thronged than usual.
Ascending the pulpit, he exclaimed with astonishing energy, " Be on your guard against the laws and statutes of the Eoman pontiff.
I have burned his decretals ; but that is mere child's play, a typical ceremony.
It is time, and more than time, that the pope were burnt ; that is, the see of Rome with its thronging corrupt doctrines and abominations,
"If you do not contend with your whole heart against this impious Roman government, you who n^wknow the true church cannot hope to be saved.
If you reject it, you must expect to incur every kind of vexation, nay, danger hydra-headed, and even to lose your lives.
But it is far better to be exposed, for the sake of truth, to such physical perils, than to keep silence at the risk of damnation.
I live I will denounce to Christendom the sore and plague of Babj'lon, for fear that many now with us should fall back like the rest into this gaping pit of iniquitous Eome."t
" We are assured by the candid contemporaneo L. 0pp. (W.) XXII., 1313.
L0pp. (L.) XVII., 333, ons student wlio has handed down this account to us, that the effect produced on the assembly by this discourse was prodigious.
' Not one among us,' he relates, 'unless he be a senseless log, doubts that this is the truth, pure and undefiled.
It is evident to all believers, that Dr. Luther is a prophet of the living God, called in these unhappy times to feed the wandering sheep."*
Luther's protestation was infectious.
Carlstadt raised his voice against the " furious lion of Florence," the gentle pen of Melancthon depicted the Eoman coiTuption with unwonted sternness, and the icy solitude of the far-off Alps was broken by the resounding voice of that Zwingle, afterwards so famous in ecclesiastical history.
Besides these, mj-riads of new champions stepped into the arena and swelled the chorus until Rome shook before the earthquake of dissent.
Selfish trade cried, "Peace;" ignorant men muttered the credo without intermission " Let us convince this heretic by the fagot and the stake;" owlish monks burrowing in the gloom of the cloister, breathed maledictions upon this renegade who came to disturb them with his flashing torch
; timid men, like Erasmus and poor Stauj)itz, stood shivering at the hubbub ; "but still," wrote Luther to the somewhat ahenated vicar-general of the " the tumult becomes more and more tumultuous, and I do not think it will ever h& appeased, except at the last day."t