HE TURNS REFORMER.

79

to the church; the Augustinians of Germany abandoned it almost without an exception.*

Had he paused at the proper time, had he continued to leave untouched the venerable landmarks of Catholic faith, and confined himself to the correction of local disorders, all Catholics would have applauded his zeal. Instead of being reckoned with Arius, Pelagius, Wicliffe, and other heresiarchs, he would then have found a niche in the temple of Catholic fame, with an Ambrose, a Gregory VII., and a Bernard! His great talents, properly regulated, might have been immensely beneficial to the Church of God. But, standing on the brink of a precipice, he became dizzy, and fell; and, like Lucifer of old, he drew after him one-third of the stars of God's kingdom on earth. The old Catholic tree bore some evil fruits of abuses-generally local and unauthorized, as we shall see in the proper place and, instead of pruning it discreetly and nurturing its growth, he recklessly lopped off all its branches, and even attempted to tear it up by the roots, under the pretext, forsooth, of making it bear fruit!

The question has often been asked, was Lnther sincere? We have no doubt of his sincerity nor much of his piety, until he turned reformer. Perhaps, too, he might have been, to a certain extent, sincere during the first year of his reformative career. God only can judge the human heart; and it would be rash in us to attempt to fathom what only He can search with unerring accuracy. Still we have some facts whereon to base a judgment in the particular case of the German reformer.

There is little doubt that he had some misgivings at first. He himself tells us that "he trembled to find himself alone against the whole Church." He testifies on this subject as

* Several of the members, however, seem to have subsequently returned to the communion of the Church, and among them Staupitz, the superior. + "Solus primo eram." Opp. in Præf. Edit. Wittenb. Quoted by D'Aubigné.

wish to undergo the judgment of God."+

He regretted at first that his Theses had become so and had made so great a stir among the people. sign," says he "was not to make them so public. I to discuss the various points comprised in them with s our associates and neighbors. If they had condemned I would have destroyed them; if they had approved of I would have published them." "He was disturbe dejected at the thought "—of standing alone against the -"doubts, which he thought he had overcome, retu his mind with fresh force. He trembled to think that the whole authority of the Church against him. To wi himself from that authority-to resist that voice which and ages had humbly obeyed-to set himself in opposi that Church which he had been accustomed from his i to revere as the mother of the faithful: he, a despicable -it was an effort beyond human power." §

Luther himself tells us how he struggled against th ing; how he lulled to rest that still small voice of cons within his bosom. "After having triumphed, by me the Scriptures, over all opposing arguments, I at las came, by the grace of Christ (!) with much anguish, lab great difficulty, the only argument that still stoppe namely, 'that I must hear the Church;' for, from my 1 honored the Church of the Pope as the true Church

* Opp. Lutheri. Germ. Edit. Geneva, vol. ii, fol. 9.

† Ibid., vol. i, p. 364.

Epist. Collect. De Wette, vol. i, p. 95.

D'Aubigné, vol. i, p. 257.

|| Luth. Opp. Lat. i, 49. Ibid.,

He foresaw the dreadful commotions of which he would be the author, and trembled at the thought! "I tremble-I shudder at the thought, that I may be an occasion of discord to such mighty princes."*-Still he recklessly persevered!

But these scruples were but "a remnant of popery:" soon he succeeded in lulling his conscience into a fatal security. An awful calm succeeded the storm. The pride of being at the head of a strong party; the praises of the students and professors of the Wittenburg university;. the flattery of friends, and the smiles of the powerful elector of Saxony; soon quieted the rising qualms of conscience. The following facts, selected almost at random from a mass of evidence of the same kind, may contribute to throw additional light on the question of his sincerity.

On the 30th of May, 1518, which was Trinity Sunday, he wrote a letter to Pope Leo X., of which the following is the concluding passage:

"Therefore, most holy father, I throw myself at the feet of your holiness, and submit myself to you with all that I have and all that I am. Destroy my cause or espouse it; pronounce either for or against me; take my life or restore it, as you please: I will receive your voice as that of Christ himself, who presides and speaks through you. If I have deserved death, I refuse not to die: the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. May He be praised for ever and ever. May He maintain you to all eternity! Amen."+

The sequel tested the sincerity of this declaration. But even while he was penning it, or very shortly afterwards, he preached from the pulpit of Wittenburg against the power of the Pope to fulminate excommunication, and he was engaged in circulating inflammatory tracts breathing the same spirit.I

* "Inter tantos principes dissidii origo esse valde horreo et timeo." Ep. i, 93. Luth. Epist. vol. i, p. 121. Edit. De Wette.

“Habui nuper sermonem ad populum de virtute excommunicationis, ubi taxavi obiter tyrannidem et inscitiam sordidissimi illius vulgi officialium commissariorum vicariorum," etc.-Epist. ad Wencesl. Link, Julii, 1518.

In 1519 he had a conference with Miltitz, the papal envoy, to whose perfect satisfaction he arranged every thing, promising to keep silence in future as to the questions in controversy. The good nuncio embraced him, wept with joy, and invited him to a banquet, at which he loaded him with caresses. While this affecting scene was enacted, Luther, in a private letter to a friend, called him "a deceiver, a liar, who parted from him with a Judas-like kiss and crocodile tears;" and, in another letter, to Spalatin, he wrote: "Let me whisper in your ear; I do not know whether the Pope is Antichrist, or only his apostle," etc. And yet, in less than a month after this very time, on the 3d of March, 1519, he wrote to the Pope in these words of reverence and submission:

"Most holy father, I declare it in the presence of God, and of all the world, I never have sought, nor will I ever seek, to weaken by force or artifice the power of the Roman church or of your holiness. I confess that there is nothing in heaven or earth that should be preferred above that church, save only Jesus Christ the Lord of all."‡

The same man who wrote this, impugned the Primacy of the Pope the very same year in the famous discussion with Doctor Eck at Leipsic! Was he could he be sincere in all this? But, further, when on the 3d of October, 1520, he became acquainted with the bull of Leo X., by which his doctrines were condemned, he wrote these remarkable words: "I will treat it as a forgery, though I believe it to be genuine."§

The following evidence will greatly aid us in judging of the motives which guided Luther in pushing forward the work of the Reformation. What those motives were he surely was the best judge. Let us then see what himself tells us on this subject.

In his famous harangue against Karlstadt and the image breakers, delivered from the pulpit of the church of All

* Epist. Sylvio Egrano, 2 Feb., 1519.

+ Epist. Spalatino, 12 Feb., 1519. See Audin, Life of Luther, p. 91, and D'Aubigné, vol. ii, p. 15–16.

Epist. i, p. 234.

¡ D'Aubigné, vol. ii, p. 128.

Saints at Wittenberg, he plainly says that, if his recreant disciples will not take his advice, "he will not hesitate to retract every thing he had either taught or written, and leave them;" and he adds emphatically: "This I tell you once for all."* In an abridged confession of faith, which he drew up for his partisans, he says in a vaunting tone: "I abolished the elevation of the host, to spite the Pope; and I had retained it so long to spite Karlstadt."+ In the new form of service, which he composed as a substitute for the Mass, he says in a similar spirit: "If a council were to order the communion to be taken in both kinds, he and his would only take it in one or none; and would, moreover, curse all those who should, in conformity with this decree of the council, communicate in both kinds."-Could the man be sincere who openly boasted of being governed by such motives?

We might continue to discuss the question of his sincerity, by showing how he said one thing to Cardinal Cajetan, and in the diet of Worms in 1521, and other things precisely contradictory to his friends, at the same time: how, before Cajetan, he appealed first to the universities, then to the Pope, better informed, and subsequently to a general council:¶ and how, when all these tribunals had decided against him, he would abide by none of their decisions, his reiterated solemn promises to the contrary notwithstanding! Did the Spirit of God direct him in all these tortuous windings of artful policy? Do they manifest aught of the uprightness of a boasted apostle? Do they not rather bespeak the wily heresiarch-an Arius, a Nestorius, or a Pelagius?

We say nothing at present of his consistency: we speak only of his sincerity and common honesty. No one has ever yet been found to praise his consistency. He was, confess

* "Non dubitabo funem reducere, et omnium quæ aut scripsi aut docui palinodiam canere : hoc vobis dictum esto." Sermo docens abusus non manibus, etc. + Confessio Parva.

Forma Missæ.

|| Ibid., vol. i, p. 376.

§ D'Aubigné, vol. i, p. 357.

¶ Ibid., vol. i, p. 389, and again, vol. ii, p. 134.