1. the image of the Antichrist.
2 Luther's interpretation of the prophecy of the prophet Daniel Cap. 11 about the Antichrist.
3. that the pope is a living devil in disguise.
4. from the Pope Julio, the other.
5) From where the Roman bishop got the name that he is called Papa, Pabst.
6. that everyone owes it to the pope, the bear wolf, to defend and resist.
The papacy is a mixed majesty.
8. of the pabst's triple crown.
9. the tyranny of the popes against their successors.
10. from the pope Julio.
11. about the Pabst's stinginess.
12. from the pope Alexander.
13th epitaph of Pabst Alexander Buhlschaft.
14. from Pabst Gregorii all-to-monastic piety.
15. from the pope Clemens.
16. how a pope must be.
17 Of Pabst's Sword.
18. of one who surrendered to the devil that he might become pope.
19. that many martyrs lie in Rome.
20. how three popes have been at one time.
21 A pope must be a great villain.
22) Whether Peter was the first pope, and how goods, land and people came to him.
23. from Pope Hadrian and an English cardinal.
24) We know that the pope is the most diligent.
25. the papists' blindness.
How long the papacy shall last and stand.
27. painting of the pabst's godless nature and tyranny.
How and by what means the papacy has arisen and increased.
29. the case of the pope.
30 What overthrew the papacy.
31: The Pabst's Violence and Practices.
The Pabst's wickedness and evilness cannot be sufficiently explained with words.
The pope is not an authority nor a primate in the church.
34. one question.
35. of the pope's goods.
The Pabstthum is stolen property.
37. Constantini Donation.
38 The Pabst's Ascent.
39) The Pope's bragging with his newly made cardinals, and how God has blessed such.
40: How Gerson attacked the papacy.
The first chapter of St. Paul's to the Romans.
42. of the pabst's evil wiles.
43. the pabst is a table or belly servant.
44. the pope is a devil.
The hatred of the Pabst and his followers against the gospel is unceasing.
46. of the papist practices.
47 The Papists' Blindness.
48: The Pabst's Treachery.
49 Pabst's Case in Our Time.
50. the pabst's crown.
The pope is not the head of the church.
52. comparison of the Pabst with the bird cuckoo.
The pope is the cuckoo, and the Christian church is the lark.
54. the papists' impenitence and obduracy.
God is hostile to the papacy.
56. the papists' bloodthirstiness.
57. who is the pope.
The pope is the right Antichrist.
The ordination of priests in the papacy.
D. Luther's simplicity and lowly person harmed the pope.
61 The pope falsely boasts that he has followed in St. Peter's footsteps; therefore the power is taken from him justly.
The image of Pabst was found underground in the Mansfeld mine.
63. that one should preach harshly against the pope.
The papal bishops do not have the same authority as the apostles.
The first is the "Antichrist of the Papists".
66 Of Junker Pabst.
The pope has a desire to get, therefore he hinders the concilium.
68 Pabst's regiment is best for the world.
69 Pope Clement the Seventh's attacks against the Lutherans.
70. of the pabst's deceit, how and from what he strikes coin.
71. from St. John's head.
72. the stationirer fraud.
73. deception of an antonite.
The first of these is a book on the subject.
The Pope's and the Cardinals' court has corrupted their cause and promoted Luther's doctrine. Luther's teaching.
76. from the Agnus Dei.
77 The Sanctuary.
78. from the sanctuary of the donkey on which Christ rode on Palm Day.
79 From another fraud.
80: The Pabst's robbery.
81. of the Pabst's errors.
The papists' outrageous lies.
83 From Antonites.
84 Des Pabsts Geiz und Treudelmarkt.
85 Of Pope's Right.
Of the keys and pouches of the pope on which he hung.
The first of these is a book on the subject of the "Pabst's Abominations in his Decrees.
The power of papist idolatry.
The first of these is the "Bishop Benno's Idolatry and the Glory of the Papists".
90. of an official and his caplan.
The papist tyrants rage against Christ and his Word.
The Papists' Hatred of Luther.
The first time he was a member of the German Catholic Church.
94 Papists do not allow themselves to be reformed.
Why the dispute is primarily with the papists.
96. what to quarrel with the papists about, and what and how much to yield to them.
The papists' false doctrine and blindness.
The first is the first of the two.
99. the pabst's tyranny.
100. of the rosary in the papacy.
101 The Pabst's paucity.
102 Blindness in the Papacy.
The first is a new version of the original, which is now available in English.
In the papacy, the statutes of men were held in higher esteem than the Word of God.
The Pabst's Three Churches and Tyranny.
The first is a new version of the original.
The arguments of the papists are full of holes.
The hypocrisy and hypocrisy of the papists, who now want to whitewash their idolatry and godlessness.
109. from sorbonnists.
The Pope's hope for the restitution of the papacy.
111. of the papist measuring servants plates.
112. the papists' ignorance in good arts.
113. world fraud of the papists.
Violence is the defense of the papists.
115. 116. The Papists' Abomination.
117 Comparison of the Empires, Christ, the Pope and the Turk.
118. the fornication of the priests.
What the pope and his followers in Rome thought about the immortality of the soul.
120. pope Gregory has ordered the thirtieth to hold soul missions for the deceased.
Tetzel's ungodly boldness with his indulgence gave D. Luthern cause to write.
The pope is a heretic, exalting himself above God's word.
The Pabstical denies the power of godliness.
The Roman church ship.
The blasphemy of Tetzel and the ingratitude of the world.
The first is the first of the two.
127 The Pabst's Faith.
The pope devastates all the order of God.
The papists' spiritual state is a godless state, and yet they want to govern and reform the church.
130 The fornication of the papists.
131. vain glory of the popes.
If the article about the resurrection of the dead is to be believed in the papacy.
The book of the birth of the desolate abomination of the Antichrist, who is the son of hypocrisy, the son of the devil.
134. of the lies of the antichrist.
135. of the pope's and his ignorance and blindness in the matters of god.
136. Daniel's prophecy from the pope.
The Papal Church is not the Christian Church.
138 The Papists' Deception.
139. of the papist mass, as they are now flowering.
140. 141. The Papists' Murder.
142: The Pabst's Mouth.
The first is the first of a series of new, more complex, and more complex.
The abominations of the papists should not be forgotten.
145. from the feast of Corpons Christi.
146 Pillars of the Pabstium.
147 The Papist Prayer.
The year of jubilee.
149. the pope's stubbornness, fierceness and persecution.
150: The Papist Tyranny.
151. oath of those who are to recant and renounce their error.
152. a form of the oath of revocation.
153 The Malice of the Papists.
Whether the pope is about a concilium.
155 M. Veit Ammerbach's pretense that the pope should be the external head of the church.
The papists' lies are public.
The pope is a lion and a dragon.
158 The Malice of the Papists.
The papists' tyranny and despotism.
160. exhortation to patience in such tyranny.
161. belly servants, who do it the way you want it, hang the coat to the wind.
The bitter hatred of the papists.
163. persecution and rampage of the papists.
164. beginning of Luther's teaching with indulgences.
Luther was undaunted against the pope.
166: That D. Luther is silly, and yet he leads his cause against the devil.
1. the image of the Antichrist.
(Cordatus No. 1354. 1355.)
The body of the Antichrist is at the same time the pope and the Turk, because the body consists of body and soul. The spirit of the Antichrist is the pope, his flesh is the Turk, who attacks the church physically, but the latter spiritually. But both are from One Lord, the Teusel, since the pope is a liar and the Turk is a murderer. Bring the Antichrist into one and you will find both [namely lying and murdering] in the pope.
But as the Church from the beginning remained victorious over the holiness of the Jews and the power of the Romans, so she is still victorious today and will always remain so against the hypocrites, that is, against the pope, and against the power of the Turk and the emperor. Let us only pray.
2nd Interpretation by D. Luther's interpretation of the prophecy of the prophet Daniel, Cap. 11, v. 36, 37, about the Antichrist.
(Cordatus No. 1409. 40. 1676. 1441.)
The passage in Daniel [11, 37]: "And he will not respect his fathers God" etc. is a certain description of the Antichrist. He will not respect God, that is, religion, love of women, that is, the world regiment and the household. For by woman is meant procreation; he who despises this despises all men. Whoever disgraces preachers and women will not fare well. The same means: they despise all [people] and everything on earth, the office of teaching and the position of procreation; he [the Antichrist] despises God and people.
Daniel said that the Antichrist will respect neither God's nor women's love, i.e. the pope will have neither God nor a legitimate wife, he will despise religion, the world regime and the household. Because the woman is, so to speak, before the household. Thus, the whole world government is for the sake of the woman, and to raise offspring through the woman. And this means that the Antichrist will despise the laws, the orders, statutes, all rights, good customs,
He will despise kings, princes, rulers, and all that is in heaven and on earth, and will only lift up his little feet.
Daniel was a mighty prophet whom Christ loved, and he spoke most accurately about Christ and the Antichrist, that he would reign between two seas at Constantinople, but the place is not holy and he does not worship the god Maosie (sic!) in such a way, nor does he forbid marriage. He also says [Dan. 11, 45.] to be abandoned by his lord. This is already the case with the kings who fall away from him. Therefore only believe that the pope is the antichrist. 1)
The Turk and the pope are not different in the form of religion and differ from each other only in words and ceremonies. The Turk holds his own ceremonies and those of Moses, but the priest holds ceremonies that are partly Christian and partly those that sprout from his own brain, but of both they claim that they serve the worship of God and the forgiveness of sins, and just as the Turk acts against the ablutions of Moses, so the priest acts against baptism and the sacrament. And just as the former does not remain with Moses, so the latter does not remain pure with Christ.
(The following is omitted because contained in Cap. 75, § 1.)
3. that the pope is a living devil in disguise.
I believe, said D. Martinus, that the Pope is a disguised and incarnate devil, because he is the end-Christ. For as Christ is a true natural God and man, so also the Antichrist is a devil incarnate. Therefore, it is true that the Pope is said to be an earthly god, who is neither pure God nor pure man, but a mixture of two natures; an earthly god, that is, a god of this world.
But why does he call himself an earthly god? as if the right one were some and all.
1) The meaning of this paragraph: Daniel's prophecy of the Antichrist is not to be drawn on the Turk but on the pope, Constantinople is not a holy place, the Turk has not the mass etc.
mighty God not also God on earth! It is indeed an abominable great wrath of God of the kingdom of Pabst, namely an abomination of desolation, who stands in the holy place, as Christ says, and quickly says: "Whoever runs it, let him take notice of it", Matth. 24, 15.
It must be a great wrath of God that a man may exalt himself above God in the Church of God after Christ has come and been revealed. If it had happened among the Gentiles, before Christ's future and revelation, it would not have been such a miracle. And although Daniel, Christ himself, St. Paul and Peter diligently warned us of such a poisonous beast and pestilence, we Christians have been so foolish and senseless that we have worshipped all his lies and idolatry, and let ourselves be persuaded that he is a lord over the whole world, under the title and name of St. Peter's heir, when Christ and St. Peter have left no dominion on earth.
4. Bon Pabst Julio the Other.
The Conversation of Pope Julio the Other is a finely funny poem, and at the same time true in itself, and well worth that one does not let it perish, but keeps and reads it diligently for and for. For it describes with splendid, magnificent words the papacy, especially in Julio, who before others has been a horrible, mighty beast of wonder, even a godless man, a cruel raging king and aggressive warrior, who has been allowed to undertake, dare and submit to everything, so that he might be an earthly god: he has defeated the Venetians, but with the help of the Emperor and the King of France. Now that he was powerful, he opposed the French before Ravenna with great boldness and a mighty army, in his own person, since he was defeated on Easter Day. If he had been powerful against the French at that time, he would have attacked the king of Hispania and the emperor, fought against them, and subdued them.
Summa, he is the last flame in the lamp, if it is now about to go out and go out, and has been the last undertaking of the devil, who flashed with spell and sword
and thundered, waging war by the power and might of others; as Daniel says, that he was mighty, but not by his own power and might; as is now learned. For about this time ago it was said that the pope was mightier in one finger than all the German princes. What do you think, said the whales, that the pope asks for Germania or Germany? But the insolent whore, the abominable stain and filth, has been attacked by the Spirit of God's mouth and has fallen in many hearts in such a way that one no longer thinks anything of him: which no emperor with the sword and force would have been able to do, nor to bring about. For the devil throws on knives and into scabbards; but when he is struck with the word of God, the pope becomes a chrysalis and a death flower, 1) that is, such a flower that goes out with the sun in the morning and sets again with it, like the same gele flower, from which a stubby, bald monk emerges in the evening.
5) From where the Roman bishop got the name, that he is called Papa, Pabst. 2)
When Martin was asked, "Where did the Roman bishop come to be called Pabst? He said: "I do not know of any reason to indicate where he got such a name, unless it came from a little word by reversing the letters, as if he were a father of fathers. For example, among the ancients, bishops were called Papa, as Jerome Augustine, who was bishop of Hippo, writes: the holy one; who was less than Jerome. And in the legend of Cyprian, who was a martyr in the Church before Jerome, it is said that the judge said to Cyprian: "Are you Cyprian, whom the Christians call their Papam?
So it seems to me that it is a name that has been common to all bishops: just as the children call their fathers Aebbe (from where it may have come); so the bishops are also the fathers of the churches. And since we may interpret it this way, we want to, as St. Paul says 1 Tim.
1) The thistle, Wohlgemuth (Origanum vulgare). (Förstemann.)
2) Similar thoughts in Lauterbach, 16 Feb. 1538, p. 30.
6, 10. that avarice is a root of all evil, of Rome also say that the pope is a poison of souls and father of abominations.
But who could have thought of him thirty years ago, when nothing but all good things could be said of him? With great reverence and adoration? He would have been banished and condemned a hundred times over, if only he had been. Whoever would have secretly thought what is now publicly said and written about him, would have been cursed by everyone: because at that time the pope could throw him into hell and pull him out again.
6. that everyone owes it to the pope, the bear wolf, to defend and resist.
Anno 1539, the 9th of May, D. Martin held a very sharp and serious public disputation in the school in Wittenberg, lasting three hours, against the horrible and monstrous beast, the Pope, the bear wolf, who surpasses all tyrants in ferocity, as he alone wants to be exiled, without all laws, to live and do freely and securely according to all his desires, and to be worshipped, with the loss and damnation of many poor souls; Therefore, whoever loves God's honor and the salvation and happiness of souls should resist and defend him with all his strength, power and ability.
The pope boasts in his filth: He has power, authority and right over all regiments in heaven and earth, a lord over all lords. How can a man speak like that? Neither God nor kings can stand that. He is an ass king, as they say of the king of France. His tyranny has risen too high, he has been allowed to trample emperors and kings underfoot, he has oppressed the whole world and brought it under him with the word: You are Peter. No one was allowed to persuade him and say: "Why are you doing this? Because our Lord God had blinded the world with powerful errors, as Daniel says: Until the wrath is over and out.
I hope he will have done the greatest and the most; and even if he does not fall, he will not increase and rise any more. The old popes were more pious and pure; but since they began to follow the regiment and
The papists, who were afraid that they would have to become servants again, could no longer tolerate or suffer their brother. And the papists are never to be trusted again, even if they promise, prescribe and certify peace. On the day of Nuremberg they devised and held a disputation, so that in the meantime they might drive us away and overrun us. Therefore let us pray and watch in this state of peace, that by this light of the gospel God's name may be hallowed etc.
The papacy is a mixed majesty.
Since four of them were ordained to the preaching ministry, the doctor admonished them with all diligence to faithfully watch over the army of Christ and to look after it. And since the papal bishops are not the church, but the church's adversaries and enemies, there is no doubt that where God's word is pure, there is also the Holy Spirit and his ministry and work. For the pope and his bishops are not shepherds of the church, but a mixed and patched-together majesty, an imperial papacy and a papal emperorship.
8. the pabst's triple crown.
The pope has three crowns: The first is strictly against God, for he condemns religion. The other, against the emperor; for he condemns the secular government. The third is against the common people, because he condemns the household, has forbidden the priests and his scribes the imperial right, marriage and household.
The pope is the real rat king of the monks and nuns and platelets, started about six hundred years ago, but two hundred years after that, as the sects broke in and took over, increased and increased a lot.
9. the popes' tyranny against their successor popes.
(Cordatus No. 1475.)
There were three popes at the same time at the time of Emperor Sigismund, who deposed them all by the council. There were also once three popes
one after the other. 1) When the first died, his successor had him dug up and ordered that his fingers be cut off and abolished his laws and decrees. But the third one had the head of the second one cut off and let the torso fall into the Tiber. These holy fathers used such laws against each other.
10. from the Pabst Julia.
(The first paragraph in Lauterbach, Jan. 29, 1538, p. 16.)
Thus, when Pope Julius heard of the defeat at Ravenna, he began to blaspheme against heaven: "Be good French in a thousand devils' names, is this how you defend your church? turned around, looked at the earth: "Saint Suicerus, pray for us. And soon he sent Matthias Lang, the Cardinal of Salzburg, to Maximilian.
(The following Cordatus No. 914-920.)
Although Pope Julius was a born warrior and was educated for war and for fighting the Emperor, the Venetians, the King of France and the Romans, he was finally so humiliated that he was forced to almost worship Maximilian, whom he had despised as a poor needy man, but was himself very rich (for he left very great treasures at his death).
The King of France, Louis, asked all the universities for advice whether he was at liberty to break the Pope's arrogance by force of war. If I had taught at the same time, I would have been summoned to Paris with the greatest honors, but I was still too young, and it was not fitting that the King of France should have the name, as if he had thrown down the Pope with his power and wisdom. For [Rom. 4, 17.] God calls that which is not to be, and makes something out of nothing.
God humbles or destroys everything by His Word alone, saying, Jerusalem, cease to be a city; of holy Rome, be destroyed; king of France, be destroyed.
1) The oui in this place should be deleted together with the comma after sius. - The three popes John XXIII, Gregory XII and Benedict XIII were deposed at the Constance Council.
rich, let yourself be captured; Pabstthum, descend, and everything happens! Thus Clement, the richest pope of all, had to fall, even if he would have had the treasures of Julius, and the brother of Leo perished by poison, whom Leo had made king of Naples and whom he wanted to make emperor.
Clement was a complete scoundrel, because he was a Welshman and a Florentine, which is as much as three Welshmen, then he was a bastard of the Medici family, which makes a sevenfold scoundrel, and although there was not a more unworthy man in the world, the Word of God oppressed and destroyed him.
It was said that since the time of Peter at Rome there had not been a more powerful pope than Julius, and now he lies in ashes. Ah, priests are supposed to preach and pray.
Once the devil said about the pope Peter: you are called the strange Peter, you have frizzy hair and frizzy senses. That is too much for one bite.
He who does not have frizzy hair, take a wife, he will nevertheless get frizzy senses, and these 2) will well pass away, for it will be said: As she wills. He who takes a wife loses his best days. The clergymen have had the best days up to now, now they get their wives.
11. the pabst's stinginess.
(Cordatus No. 1258. 3)
The pope once decided to reform the Franciscans, who brought 80,000 florins and gave them to him as a gift [to prevent the reformation]. When he saw them, he is said to have said: Who can fight against so many armed men? Money makes peelers.
12. from the pope Alexander.
(Cordatus No. 1536.)
The pope Alexander was a Maran, 4) who do not believe anything. He was followed by Julius, a
2) In the original: to this instead of these.
3) Cf. Cap. 30, §10, where the same narrative is found according to Lauterbach.
4) According to the above, there can be no doubt about the meaning of the word, namely, a complete unbeliever. But about the derivation of the word are the mei-
so great an enemy of it that he had all the doors and windows on which its coats of arms were affixed torn out. This is what Cordatus saw.
13. epitaphium Lucretiae Scorti Alexandri.
(Cordatus No. 1537.)
Conditur hoc tumulo Lucretia.
Thais, Pontificis Filia, Sponsa, Nurus.
[In German]:
Epitaph of Lucretia, Alexander's whore: By this hill is covered Lucretia. A Thais, 1) the pope's daughter, bride,
Daughter-in-law.
14. Bon Pabst Gregorii overly monkish piety. 2)
(Cordatus No. 1321.)
Pope Gregory was such a superstitious monk that he handed over his very faithful steward to the devil for the sake of three florins he had found in his cell and had them thrown into his grave. Such people were all the great saints in the monasteries, people without any equity. This is always the case when Christ is taken away from those who want to live godly; then Satan drives thus.
15. bom Pabst Clemens.
(Cordatus No. 608 and 609.)
Pope Clement is the richest of all and yet very unfortunate, a bad boy who said: Before he would stop persecuting us, he would rather send the Turk upon us. And remember this when I am dead. Pray.
The pope forges the most ungodly plots; they will have no progress and he will not succeed, just as the king of Hungary, Ferdinand, did not. There is no worse knave
The names are different. Some derive it from Llaurus, because the Moors are said to have been called Maran by the Spaniards, others from the biblical Maranatha, according to others from the name of a chaliph Marawan.
1) Tbais, a famous beautiful wooer at Athens. - Cf. § 21 of this chapter.
2) Cf. cap. 27, § 120.
after the devil than the pope, and he has wealth, power and prestige. An Our Father serves against him. He has experienced that Rome was drowned, plundered and died out, and yet this good Clement has not been moved at all by these examples. This must be to me a fellow who is not frightened by any terrors and undertakes evil without ceasing. And when the king of France, with whom he had made an alliance, is thrown down by the emperor, he will invite the Turk to be our guest. He will miss it. He is a Florentine bastard and an enemy of God etc.
16. how a pope must be.
(Cordatus No. 1586.)
To a pope does not belong a pious man, but a rogue and villain. For whoever wants to take on this regiment must be the next villain after the devil.
17. the pabst's sword.
Doctor M. Luther once said over the table: "The pope and the papists, because they see that they are becoming disgraced and can no longer cover and protect themselves with the Holy Scriptures, cry out: We no longer want to have St. Peter's key, but we want to reach for St. Paul's sword; that is, they have bloodthirsty advice that they would like to murder and kill us all.
18. of one who surrendered to the devil that he might become pope.
One of them would have liked to become a priest, and surrendered to the devil so that he would promote him to the priesthood and help him; but with the condition he wanted to be the devil, not before, because if he held mass in Jerusalem. Now it happened about the time he had become pope that he held mass unknowingly in a chapel in Rome, which was called Jerusalem; there the devils came flying frequently. When he asked what the name of the chapel was, and when it was revealed to him, he remembered the pact and alliance with the devil, confessed it publicly, and ordered that, immediately after the mass had been said, he should be sent to a small church.
He hoped that he would still be saved, because the ravens had taken the body away, and because they had left the heart there. Which happened, because he had repented, and (as they say) atoned with such death and done enough.
19. many martyrs lie in Rome.
In Rome, said D. Martinus, in St. Calixti Church, lie buried 176,000 holy bodies, and 45 popes, martyrs; they lie under the ground cramped; the same place they are called
the cave.
Item: In Rome I have seen in a large alley, which goes straight to St. Peter's Cathedral, a pope publicly carved in a stone, like a woman with a scepter, papal cloak, carrying a child on her arm; no pope passes through the same alley, so that he may not see such an image.
For a woman named Agnes, who was a native of Mainz, was led by a cardinal to England as a boy and finally brought to Rome. There she was elected pope by the cardinals, but she was disgraced and it was revealed that she had a child in public in the same alley. It just happened to the boys, the devil mocked them with his little creature. It amazes me that the popes can suffer such an image; but God blinds them, so that one sees what pabstry is, vain deceit and the devil's work.
20. three popes have been for one time.
At the time of John the Great, there were at one time three popes who ruled at the same time until the thirtieth year, and each excommunicated and excommunicated the other with his subjects and relatives. John the Twenty-third held court in Rome, Peter de Luna in Arragon. Benedictus remained in the French mountains. And there was a terrible split, which meant that the papacy would fall soon after. Since Emperor Sigmund could not stand this, he called a concilium at Costnitz. But the Cardinals did not want to allow a reformation, but opposed it.
1) and said incongrue: It would be no Sebis- mam, Spältz. Said the emperor: Ei, do you not know the Priscianum yet? One should say: Schisma, schism, not Schismam, Spältz. Then a cardinal answered: Because we are masters over the rights, we are also masters over the Priscianum and the Grammatica,; and in the Concilio all three popes were deposed and the fourth mentioned. But Pope John, who had handed over the papacy, thinking that he hoped that he would be elected pope again, died of sorrow when it did not happen: likewise Benedictus; Peter remained stiff-necked.
Pope John was rejected because of his many evil deeds and tricks, because he had murdered his father and sold the bishoprics etc. And when these and such horrible articles were publicly read to him over thirty times, he said: "Oh, I have done many things worse than all these, namely, that I came here from Rome over the mountains of Rome; if I had stayed in Rome, you would have left me unseated.
21 A pope must be a great villain.
The Pabstacy, said Doctor Martin, has always been ruled by the worst of boys, as is also their doctrine; for as the Creator is, so are his creatures; as the devil is, who is the founder of the Pabstacy, so is also the Pabst.
And Pope Alexander the Sixth told Historiam what kind of life he had led: for he had had two sons and a daughter named Lucretia, with whom both father and son had committed adultery and incest. Both father and son would have committed incest. One brother would have killed and strangled the other on a horse for the sake of a whore. The Cardinal Valentinus would have stabbed the other Duke of N. N. and had become a duke, and wrote of him: O Caesar, o nullo: Emperor or nothing.
After that, the father Alexander, together with his son, asked all the Cardinals, the Columneser, to guests, and wanted to forgive them with poison, so prepared in a special bottle, from
1) The following to Orairurmtiea is missing (probably with good reason) in Stangwald. In Bindseil it is found in III, 231.
The father died of it, but the son drank tree oil, let himself hang up by his legs, and thus broke off the poison again. Finally the son, after he had committed many evil deeds, was captured by the king of Castile in Hispania, and when he was about to be judged, he cried out beforehand in prison: Misericordia! and asked for confession. Then a monk was sent in to hear his confession; he strangled the monk and took off his clothes.
cap on, and so got away.
I have heard this, said Martinus, for certain in Rome. So they did it: therefore their wickedness was ripe to be put to shame. And it is unheard of that Pope Leo held a council in our time, in which it was first decided that one should believe in the resurrection of the dead, 1) and that no cardinal should have more than five little hairs and little boys.
Summa, no one shall be pope, unless he is a cunning, surpassing rogue and villain. The bishop of N. N. should be made pope at the next election, he deceives country and people. The Duke of B. is said to have said: "The bishop of N. N. buys a lot of cloth for the pope. N. buys a lot of cloth for his skirt, and even if he buys a lot of it, the rogue still sticks out above and below. Duke Frederick, Elector of Saxony etc.. a praiseworthy, wise prince, has been thrown over the fool and deceived by the same bishop, who has had a coin struck, on which is written: "The Lord is my helper, before whom should I fear? Thus the Epicurean swine misuse and mislead the finest and best comforting sayings in the Holy Scriptures, since one knows that their seriousness is not, but the contradiction, mocking our Lord God even more, the desperate boys. "But he that dwelleth in heaven laugheth at them again, and the Lord mocketh them: he will speak unto them in his wrath, and with his fury he will smite them, and bruise them with an iron scepter, and break them as pots"; as the other Psalm, v. 4. 5. 9. says.
1) The same information again Cap. 27, § 132.
22) Whether Peter was the first pope, and how the goods, land and people came to him.
All histories say that Peter was the first pope of Rome; but it is all a sham. After him, Lucius, Cletus and Clemens are said to have been there at one time, ruling one after the other. For at that time the church was still very small and thin, and these three preached in vain 2) houses among pious Christians, like deacons; not publicly, they did not rebuke the authorities. After that, the emperors gave them privileges, mainly for this reason: for the emperors had found from experience that Italy would not let itself be ruled by them, because the whales cannot suffer a head, nor have peace among themselves; therefore the emperors handed it over to the bishops of Rome, who all ruled well, except for Pope Hildebrand, the rogue, who fell to the whales and paid the Germans with ingratitude. For the first fifteen emperors, eight of them of the tribe of Emperor Carl the Great, and seven of Germans and Franks, were pious and were able to conquer the whales. Now, however, they have a right stick at the Carolo, which can finely pattern them with the Spaniards and teach mores.
23. from Pope Hadrian and an English cardinal.
Pope Hadrian was demanded to the papacy by Emperor Carolo, whose preceptor he had been, but he did not reign long, for he was of lowly lineage, the son of a burgher of Louvain. In England there was a cardinal, the son of a butcher, to whom a jester once said: "God be praised that we have such a cardinal: if he now becomes pope, we will be allowed to eat meat during fasting and on other forbidden days; for St. Peter, as a fisherman, forbade eating meat, so that he would sell his fish at a higher price; but this butcher's son will keep over the meat, so that he will make money out of it.
2) So Stangwald instead of "vain".
(This paragraph in Lauterbach, 8 Jan. 1538, p. 4. 1)
On January 8, Luther mentioned Pope Hadrian, who exalted his praiseworthy actions when he held his triumphal procession in Italy. Therefore, two cities were painted on a tablet, one his father city, the other Leuven, where he had been graduated. [At the first one] was written: I have planted. The second city boasted: I have watered. Then the emperor's image above these cities answered: I have given the flourishing; because he had chosen him to be the pope. Someone who came along mockingly wrote on it: Here God has done nothing.
24 The pope is the most diligent.
(Contained in Cap. 54, § 27.)
25. the papists' blindness.
(Here are 12 heals omitted, an entrance brld by Aurifaber to the following).
(Lauterbach, May 26, 1538, p. 86.)
Luther: Cochlaeus denies the power of the pope from the gift of Constantine, but claims to prove it from the Gospel by this argument: 'Every governor has full power of his prince; Peter or the pope is the governor of Christ, therefore he has the same power.' He proves this from the passage: "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me." (Matth. 28, 18.) To this must be answered: Peter is the governor on earth, not in heaven, because Christ says (Matth. 16, 19.): "What you bind on earth you throw." He does not say: what thou bindest about heaven. For He says to Peter, Follow Me, feed My sheep; I have come to serve; My kingdom is not of this world, that is: obtained by human powers. (Joh. 17, 19. 18, 36.) Therefore the pope is a red 2) Jew, who only praises the physical in Christ, as they say: Petra dedit Petro, Petrus diadema Rodolpho. [The rock gave to Peter, Peter gave the crown to Rudolph.
1) In Cap. 44, § 21 at the end, in the section which we have omitted, Aurifaber incorrectly says that the city of Utrecht had the triumphal arch made, but Lauterbach that Hadrian had the panel painted when he held his triumphal procession in Italy.
2) i.e. a Turk, because they are said to come from Edom. (Gen. 25, 30.) (Seidemann.)
Rudolph also dared to do it fresh, like Bonifacius the Eighth. The conversation of Julius has the chaff very well waffled, that is, the fable of the gift of Constantine, only that people did not dare to say it.
How long the papacy shall last and stand.
(Lauterbach, Oct. 13, 1538, p. 150.)
In the decrees [of the pope] many and indeed very good passages are taken from the fathers and inserted, but the pope robs them of their prestige and determines the right for himself alone, and so he goes along in the name of God and rules, and his kingdom shall last 666 3) years according to the number of the beast, as John says (Revelation 13, 18.). For the heartache began soon after Gregory the First. After that the Constantinopolitan bishop and the one at Rome quarreled about the primacy until Carl the Great, when the Roman pope appeared, who became a lord over all kings.
27. painting of the pabst's godless nature and tyranny.
In very old books, several figures and paintings of the pope have been found, in which his deceitfulness, impiety, godlessness, idolatry and tyranny are depicted, because some people saw his great evil, but were not allowed to protest against it; they only secretly showed it with figures and pictures, so that one could notice and understand it. How some of these were found in Nuremberg and elsewhere and went out in print.
28 How and by what means the papacy has grown and prospered.
After the persecution in the Church ceased, the popes soon grabbed the reigns, out of honor and avarice. The first one was Hildebrand, or Höllebrand. After that they frightened all people with the ban. For the ban was such a terrible thing that it also affected the children, even the servants had to take the ban upon themselves. Just as
3) Original: 660.
The pope's deceptions and practices, in turn, were very friendly and sweetly received, through which they sought great favor and the people's approval: they promised and praised the forgiveness of all sins, even the greatest and most serious ones. If someone had weakened the Virgin Mary or crucified Christ, the pope could forgive it if he only gave money. This majesty and power of the Pope was disgraced and taken away from him by God through my pen, said Father: for he made everything out of nothing, and can disgrace everything out of nothing.
29. the case of the pope.
The papacy, he said in 1539, must again take the blame and pay. For instance, only the life and the abuse were attacked, that the pope and his people led such a wickedly shameful life; now, however, we are attacking his doctrine and the essence and the foundation on which it stands with all our might. He is also eaten by monks, his lice and his own creatures. That is why Campey, the Cardinal, rightly said: "The great innumerable multitude of monks causes great misfortune and does much evil, namely disrupts and dissolves the most beautiful monarchy of the papacy, which is established with great counsel and concern.
I think his prophecy is fulfilled, that the rat king will be paid by his own people. Theology cannot defend him nor protect him; for the canonists, his jurors and jurors, may well presume to protect him somewhat, out of long custom, that the papacy has so long stood and been in use, but it is of no avail. For the custom that applies to rights should be in accordance with reason and fairness; it is even a cold argument. He went on to say, "Oh, dear God, what is the pope to judge, since he neither knows nor understands anything about business? He is a foreign judge who knows nothing about cases that take place in the world and in the home. That is why he has judged and spoken so foolishly in matrimonial matters, which marriage state he has forbidden his scribes, since he has ordered it to be held as a sacrament. Since marriage would be a sacrament, then
they should not be with the pagans, because the sacraments do not concern the unbelieving pagans. We in the church do not want to have anything to do with matrimonial matters, for as far as conscience is concerned, 1) to instruct it; for they are vain worldly affairs and do not concern the jurisdiction of the church, and do not belong in its jurisdiction and judgment seat.
30 What overthrew the papacy.
The pope is now rightly and justly oppressed and plagued, because he has gone against God's word. For if he had only confessed twenty-one years ago that some had sinned and done wrong under the title and name of the church, or had only done too much, and had ordered the Elector of Saxony etc. and me to be silent, with the offer that he wanted to reform his own etc., and had condemned corners and heresies, and only left me satisfied; it would not have come so far: but he wanted to defend himself, flashed and thundered. Then the truth burst out, so that even the papists themselves are not all satisfied with the pope. So it goes, for against the Lord no counsel helps. Now Philippi books, in which the most noble articles of our Christian doctrine are briefly, neatly and finely written, are also coming into French-speaking countries, and the adversaries are accepting them. Must therefore be plagued more by his own people and princes than by us. Now he acts as if he does not care about money, always lets them accept it, if only he can maintain his authority and reputation: he intends to get it all back in time.
We, however, grab him by the throat, because we challenge his highest authority and doctrine: to it we rush in, and make him equal to the other bishops. I did not do that in the first place. Just as John Huss only punished the abuses and lives of the pope and his smeared ones. Although the Cardinal of Camers, in his book of vespers, attacked and overawed the pope enough and publicly disputes the pope's violence in Paris.
1) The same statement Cap. 43, § 83.
31. the pabst's violence and practices.
Before that time, the pope was very proud and hopeful, despising everyone, as Cajetanus the Cardinal, his legate at Augsburg, said to me: What do you mean that the pope asks for Germany? The smallest finger of the pope is stronger and more powerful than all the princes in Germany. But now, because he sees that the emperor does not fight for him, he flees the concilium, makes him a quandary between the emperor and the French, without which two he cannot be nor exist in this discord. For when the emperor has died, the Frenchman will be able to attack and take the empire, as he had almost five votes of the princes in the last election. If they abandon him, he will call upon the Turk, king in Persia, yes, the devil in hell himself, whom he has a parte, ante and before him, and on his side. He does not hand over the quarrel with the Emperor and the French, but keeps it with the two one, and is neutral, carries on both armpits.
After that he said about the unspeakable wickedness of the pope: As one, who had been notary Rota 1) in Rome for nine years, had publicly confessed that only the grossest lies and vile things were acted outwardly, in the same court; but inwardly, in the Pabst's chamber, in the narrow council, atrocious practices and intrigues were carried out against kings and protesting estates.
Pope Julius the Other has ever well solved, who rebelled against God and man in the most hopeful way; so that he held a terrible, great, miserable battle with the French early on Easter Day, in which much blood was shed and many good people perished and remained dead; as has been reported above 2) once already. Even though the French kept the field and the victory, it was with great bloodshed and heartache, because he lost his best men, since the pope hoped that he would certainly prevail and keep the field.
1) Perhaps Liborius, licentiate at Magdeburg. Cf. Kummer p. 372. (Lauterbach p. 9.) Cf. Tischreden Cap. 77, § 1.
2) In z 10 of this Cap.
After that he blasphemed God in heaven. For when the message came to him that his people were defeated, and he sat and prayed his Horas Canonicas, he took the book and threw it against God's ground, saying: "Be now French in all the devils' names, Sancte Sui- cere, ora pro nobis. And so it happened, for he turned Emperor Maximilian away from the French by fraud and practices, and was weakened by the Swiss, after he had taken such a great damage in the same battle.
He read a beautiful mass to the devil on Easter Day, when twenty thousand Christians perished. Oh, what should the boys fight for the church, who do not care about the church, but that they get a lot of money and property, land and kingdoms, that is their greatest concern. If he could bring it about this very day, so that he might preserve his authority, he would gladly do so.
I hope that God's judicial process against the pope and his people will continue as it has begun, because the first three petitions in the Lord's Prayer are mostly against him: let the pope's name be blasphemed and cursed, let his kingdom be destroyed and fall, let his will be disgraced and hindered. I do not hope that there will be more monks and nuns. If his feet are cut off, he must crawl, because in 3) the length cannot be so.
The Pabst's wickedness and evilness cannot be sufficiently explained in words.
I would like to attack the pope's canons and decrees, the pope's patched coat. There is neither a name nor a swearword that could be used to call the pope hostile enough, as he is well worth it. Even if one calls him stingy, godless, idolatrous, it is still all too little. One cannot obtain nor excuse his great tricks. Therefore Christ denounces him in one word and calls him an "abomination of desolation standing in the holy place" (Matth. 24, 15). And St. Peter paints it finely and paints it with strange and peculiar colors.
3) The word "in" is missing from the outputs.
Likewise St. Paul calls him 2 Thess. 2, 4. an "abominable man, who exalts himself above all that is called God". Daniel also pointed it out, and says Cap. 11, 36. 37.: He will become the most honorable, and will not respect the God of his fathers.
We have read and re-read this before, and yet understood nothing of it. But now, because such an abomination is shown to us, both in God's word and with experience, we become so spiteful that I get such thoughts about it, which I do not like, namely, that this knowledge of the word will fall again, and the bright light of the gospel will go out. For the gospel clearly says that Christ will come at midnight, when there will be no day nor light.
The pope is not an authority nor a primate in the church.
The Pope cannot have the primacy, nor be the supreme head in Christendom, for it is impossible that he could visit and govern all the churches if he were Elias, Elisaeus, Peter or Paul.
34. question.
If the emperor gave to the pope his right to proclaim and appoint a concilium, should he (the pope) also be obeyed? D. Martinus answered: The emperor, as a verbum personale and ordinary authority, does not have the power to hand over to the pope, as a verbo impersonali (who is not an authority). For the pope is such a person or thing, like an interest that stands on no ground or immovable good. Nor would it be a translation, a transfer of power from the emperor to the pope, but rather a devastation; for if the emperor transferred his power and authority to the pope, he would diminish and devastate the empire. Now, however, he has neither power nor right to do so, for the empire is not his own, nor does he inherit it.
Summa, if one denies that the pope is an authority (as he is not), then everything is taken away from him. For what he
1) Thus Stangwald. In the editions: "to describe".
He did not have it by right, but stole and robbed it. Therefore it is nothing to say that the emperor got the empire from the pope, because he could not give him what he never had. For Carolus Magnus gave nothing to the pope, nor did he concede anything, as they falsely boast; but, since he had ruled up to the eighth rank, even without the pope, Heinricus, Duke of Saxony, called the Birdman, was elected emperor, and ruled up to the fourth rank, without which emperor's foreknowledge and will no pope was elected. But under Emperor Henry the Fourth, things changed; for since his father, Emperor Henry the Third, had decreed that no bishop should be elected without the prior knowledge and approval of the Emperor, Pope Hellbrand could not stand this, and 2) with Pope Gregory the Seventh, he caused all misfortune; since that time, things have gone as one has seen and experienced. So it goes in the world.
35. the pabst's goods.
(Cordatus No. 1476. 1477. 1478.)
To the one who asks whether Constantine's donation is true, I answer: it is fictitious. But I have read that Constantine distributed many things among the poor and appointed bishops to them, who finally became lords. He did not give them land and cities. And the whole world wonders where the pope got such a great dominion.
The popes were formerly not lords of the emperors, but were preserved by the emperors. For Lothar, Duke of Saxony and Emperor, bought the right of election from them; for it was a perpetual war in the election. Finally, however, they took this right again by fraud and caused that they would be confirmers of the emperors. This happened first with the election of Carl the Great, whom they elected emperor in such a way that he had the right of succession for his heirs. At
2) Because Hildebrand and Pope Gregory VII are one and the same person, Henry IV is the subject of this sentence. Otherwise, this sentence would have to be changed to: "has as pope Gregory the Seventh" etc. - Bindseil III, 244 has the same reading as Aurifaber.
The emperorship remained with them for a while, but when there were no more descendants, the popes assumed the right to vote.
After that came the Emperor Otto, who appointed seven Electors, put an end to the war, otherwise there would have been a constant dispute with the Popes.
The Pabstthum is stolen property.
(Cordatus No. 643.)
1) The papacy is vainly stolen property, and must be stolen again, for it is of no use to any custom of the church, nor of the world regiment. This is what they learned under Ferdinand.
37. Constantini Donation.
Emperor Constantius' donation is a great lie, by which the pope arrogates to himself and wants to have half of the Roman Empire. And even if it were true, it would not have been in the emperor's power, he would not have had the power to forgive; it is also not due to the pope, according to the saying of Christ: "But not you" etc., Luc. 22, 26.
38 The Pabst's Ascent.
Aristotle says that the course of nature is very slow in the beginning, but very fast in the end, and tends to fall. So the papacy has risen to the highest level these fifteen years. Thirty years ago, no priest was allowed to have two fiefs or benefices that did not suffer from each other; now, however, they have innumerable many, and a bishop now has three bishoprics.
39. the pabst's pomp with his newly made cardinals, and how god will
have blessed.
Doctor Martin Luther said: "That the Pope would have made thirty cardinals in one day, to whom many thousand horsemen would have gone beyond the Tiber with great pomp, they would have shot with many rifles,' received most gloriously. Then came our Lord
1) Cf. Cap. 56, § 4.
God also with thunder and lightning, so that they were all terrified, so that in one church the child of God's mother had fallen from her arms (as Pasquillus writes) and had gone to heaven, lest [it] also be made a cardinal.
On the same day, a priest had lost the blessed host over the altar where he was celebrating mass, and had spilled the chalice from fright and sorrow, and the pope had cried out loudly that one of the same cardinals would become a pestilence and poison of the Roman See. This happened shortly before the gospel was revealed and brought to light.
(The following Cordatus No. 790.)
When my first theses were presented to the pope, he is said to have said: This was written by a drunken German. He will change his mind about indulgences when he sobers up. In the same way, all others despised me in the beginning with haughty pride.
40) How Gerson attacked the papacy.
In 1542, M. Luther said: "You do not know in what great darkness we are under the papacy. Gerson 2) was the best, who only began to attack the pope, although he was not yet sure where he was in it; however, he came to find the distinction in hac Quaestione: Utrum in omnibus sit obtemperandum potestati Papae. And said: Non esse peccatum mortale, non obtemperare. And still hung on: si non fieret ex contemptu. He was not allowed to consider that he had even made the rupture; however, he was somewhat comforting to the people, that is why they called him Doctorem consolatorum. But he was also condemned by the pope as a heretic and put under ban. That is why Cardinal Cajetanus also called me a Gersonist at the Imperial Diet in 1518, 3) since I appealed to the pope for a Christian free concilium.
2) On Gerson, compare the note in Walch. St. Louis edition, vol. X, Col. 1751.
3) Cf. z 154 of this Cap.
And whoever wants to blame me for having yielded too much to the pope at first, let him see what darkness I was still in at that time. Those who have not been in the papacy consider the teaching and warning of the Antichrist completely unnecessary; but those who have been in it consider it necessary that the youth be diligently reminded of it.
The first chapter of Saint Paul to the Romans.
I believe that St. Paul described a register of great, horrible sins and disgraces Rom. 1, 21. ff. more prophetically than historically. Now it is fulfilled in Rom. The pope does not make so many cardinals in vain. Each one has an annual income of thirty thousand florins, which he gives for the pallium, so that the pope may be confirmed and strengthened by the money and prestige of the cardinals! Therefore Daniel says Cap. 11, 36: "The king shall reign according to all his pleasure and will.
(From here to end of § at Lauterbach, Sept. 26.
1538, S. 135.)
The course of the Evangelii in Denmark and England. On September 26, letters arrived from Denmark and England in which many good things were reported about the course of the Gospel: In Denmark, the king is establishing both the churches and the university in the best godly order; in England, the papists have been overcome in many disputations; everything is united against the private mass and the marriage of priests; these continue to exist only weakly; rather, everyone can go out freely from the monasteries; the pilgrimages to the saints are being eradicated. Oh, St. Thomas with his golden shoe suffers misery. Luther replied: "Since the Cardinal was expelled from England, the foundation of the papacy has been violated, for the Cardinals are the cornerstones of the papacy in every nation, just as we have four Cardinals in Germany, so also France and Spain. So confident is the pope in his holiness and power even today that he despises even the highest God, however much he is debilitated and revealed with his godlessness. How great is the blindness of the
People who conceded everything to the pope, that he could do whatever he wanted! Clement made Hippolytus a cardinal, who had 60,000 ducats in cash every year, even though he was only a private person, holding no office or rule. Wasn't that an appalling tyranny? Finally, they suppressed and usurped everything, and the wretched people believed everything of their prestige, so that they worshipped Pope Clement as the most holy, who was a godless, hypocritical villain, a son of his sister, unbaptized and a man of war.
42. of the pabst's evil wiles.
New newspapers were written to England in 1539 about how the pope had corrupted the king's most secret and inner councillors and bribed them with money so that they should secretly kill the king as a renegade Mameluke; the kingdom promised them. For one of them was the king's blood friend, who was always at his side. And the pope boasted that he was an heir to the kingdom, because it was his fiefdom, and therefore he was justified in doing so; but when such a secret plot was revealed, they were captured and beheaded.
43. the pabst is a table or belly servant.
(Cordatus No. 50.)
After the pope ceased to be a teacher, he became a table servant, which all his decrees testify. In these he does not deal with theological matters; having become a belly servant, he is zealous about three things. First, that he does everything to strengthen his rule; second, that he incites kings and princes to each other by the greatest hatred, as often as he wants to harm one of the great ones. In this he is obviously wicked. Thirdly, he plays the devil most secretly with great zeal, since, as if he were benevolent, he dissolves the hatred that he had aroused among them shortly before. And he does not do this until he has achieved what he wanted. Furthermore, that he perverts the truth of the Word of God, he does not do this as a pope, but as the Antichrist and the true opponent of God.
44. the pope is a devil. 1) (Cordatus No. 183.)
According to the real devil, the pope is in truth a devil, which is easily proven by this Clement, because he is evil, since he is an Italian; and even more evil he is, because he is a Florentine; the most evil he is, because he is a bastard. Add some more evil if you can.
The hatred of the Pabst and his followers against the gospel is unceasing.
The hatred of Pabst and all his followers, the papists, against the gospel does not cease, nor can it be reconciled, which has burned from the beginning of the world and cannot be quenched. For even those at Babel did not cease, but cried out for and for: Away with you always. In the same way, the Jews did not stop raging against Christ and the apostles until they were exterminated. So do the papists today; they strive day and night more to exterminate the Lutherans than to resist and ward off the Turk. Therefore, let us be courageous and pray, said D. Martinus.
46. from the papist practices.
(Lauterbach, June 28, 1538, p. 92.)
On June 28, Luther said a lot about the treachery of the papists, who were hoping for the emperor's arrival and were gathering money from the monasteries and bishoprics everywhere and were recruiting soldiers, pretending that it was for the sake of the Turk. They want to attack us secretly on all sides. As the bishop of Mainz said: It is still about a small, and did not want to leave Mainz to be closer to the emperor. But the attack has fallen. God protected with his angels. Ps. 2. the pious pray. The counsels of the wise come to naught.
47 The Papists' Blindness.
(Lauterbach, Sept. 26, 1538, p. 136.)
When our Lord God wants to punish someone, He makes him blind to God's
1) Cf. § 10 of this Cap.
Word completely despised. The papists are of this kind today, who make the confession for us that our teaching is the word of God, but they cannot admit the conclusion, against their conscience: When God speaks, He must be heard; God speaks the teaching of the Gospel; therefore you must hear. They answer: He must not be heard, but the Church must be heard. It is truly a strange conclusion that they allow the two prefixes and yet do not want the conclusion. But so they break through, as it is written in the decree of the Council of Constance: Even if Christ, who is the truth, said it, it would not be contrary to this that custom is to be kept as a law. So one must solvate the arguments if one wants to be right. If this is not the sin of the Antichrist against the Holy Spirit, then I do not know how to define this sin, because they are now sinning knowingly and willingly and are defending the sin against the most tangible truth of the Word of God in the most stubborn way. Who, I pray you, would not resist the devil here, the most impudent liar? I am not surprised that John Huss, even though he stood alone, died so joyfully when he heard such great ungodliness of the papists.
48 Of the Pabst's Treachery.
(Contained in Cap. 54, 8 6.)
49 Pabst's Fall in Our Time.
It is a very great miracle at this time that the pope's majesty has fallen, that several parts. For this all monarchs, emperors, kings, princes and lords had to fear and tremble: not one of them was allowed to do even the slightest thing nor to make a fuss against the pope, who only frightened them all with a wave and a finger and drove them in. The same God is now fallen that all monks are also hostile to him; although he is their patron, protector, even creator and God, and they his creature. But that they still hold above him, they do so for the sake of their enjoyment, otherwise they would be much more fierce and evil against him than we are. His wickedness and
But mischievousness is now even apparent, because it is on the day that he sent out 120,000 crowns 1) to order murder burners.
50. the pabst's crown.
(Cordatus No. 607 and 606.)
I saw in Italy the whole suit of the pope in a monastery, but it was only a bishop's cap [infula]. Therefore, I said to a monk if this was the crown of the pope. He answered: O no, and he said that his crown was triple, which he called "the empire of the world" (that is a fatal name), and the whole of Germany could hardly pay for it. He is said to have pierced the emperor in Bologna with stones and jewels.
All Italians surpass the Germans in pomp, speed or agility and finesse, and by games and gestures they can move the people watching them to do whatever they want.
The pope is not the head of the church.
The pope is not the head of the Christian church, otherwise the church would be a beast with two heads, since Christ alone is its head, as St. Paul says. The pope is the head of the false and devilish church.
Collation or comparison of the Pabst with the bird cuckoo.
Doctor Martin Luther said: "The cuckoo has the nature and manner to suck the warbler's eggs and lays its eggs in the nest, so that the warbler has to hatch them; then, when the young cuckoos have crawled out of the shell and are big, the warbler cannot cover them, so the cuckoos become leprous, and finally the young cuckoos eat their mother, the warbler. After that, the cuckoo does not like the nightingale, said D. Luther. The pope is the cuckoo, he eats the eggs of the church and shits out vain cardinals. After that he wants to eat his mother, the Christian church, in it.
1) Thus in all editions. It should probably read: "suspended".
If he is born and bred, a pious, Christian, righteous teacher cannot tolerate or suffer the catching, preaching, and teaching.
The pope is the cuckoo, and the Christian church is the lark.
Doctor Luther said in 1542: Where the lark is, there the cuckoo also likes to be, because he thinks he could sing a thousand times better than the lark. So also the pope sits down in the church, and there one must hear his singing, so that he overshouts the church. But just as the cuckoo is nevertheless useful, because it indicates that summer is near, so the pope also serves to announce to us that the last day is not far away.
54. the papists' impenitence and obduracy.
(Lauterbach, February 13, 1538, p. 27.)
Afterwards Luther said of the frightening blindness of the papists, who run and rush to hell with earnestness. For they themselves see our just cause and innocence, they also admit that they are wrong, but they deliberately decide and counsel against us. They simply want us dead and do not want to mend their ways at all. But since they despair, they want to drag us down with them. But it will be an unequal course, they to hell, we to heaven. Therefore Paul rightly calls them Üðçëãç÷üôåò [Eph. 4, 19.] who have ended their pain, 2) who defend the recognized error and want to eradicate the truth. Never did Caiphas and the Pharisees hold the idea of righteousness from the law in such a way. For all heresies have the conviction of truth, but the papists have lost the thought of righteousness and conviction, condemn themselves and sin knowingly and intentionally against the Holy Spirit. They want to defend the public whore [as] a pure virgin. If the last day does not come, it will never come. I consider
2) In the German Bible: "Which are nefarious". From the above speech we see that Luther could very well have translated more literally if he had wanted to. But he gives the sense incomparably more accurate and understandable in his translation.
Often at night in great distress and fear, how one could help them, so that they would repent and remain in good and honor. But it will not be. They themselves do not want to repent and simply thirst for our blood, as the bishop of Mainz is said to have said: What are you arguing about? We know well that we are wrong. And when the bishop of Salzburg negotiated with Philip, he gave a threefold way and manner of unification: First, if you Lutherans do what we want, you cannot do it. Second, if we follow your doctrine, we do not want to. Third, a treaty between the two parts is impossible, because neither gives way to the other. Therefore, one will destroy the other. You are weak and few, we are many and sure. I would never have believed that I should have experienced such words. God help us from troubles and from all evil. 1)
God is hostile to the papacy.
(Contained in Cap. 43, § 15.)
56. the papists' bloodthirstiness.
Cardinal Campegius said in Augsburg in 1530: "Do you Germans want to withdraw from the Pope's yoke and not be subject to him? Well then, let us make Germany swim in blood. These are my thoughts, said D. Martinus, higher than we can attain, for the pope and Francis certainly have something in mind now.
57) Who is the pope. 2)
In the Pabst's and his soup-eater's books it is publicly stated what the Pabst is, namely, not only a man, but also God; that is, the Pabst is an earthly god, a man mixed with the Godhead. Yes, a real earthly god, like the devil, who has nothing heavenly. This argument was once brought up in a public theological disputation by a Doctor Juris, M. K. D. Wenzlaus Link answered and said: Yes, the pope is the god of the jurists, not of the theologians.
1) For the conclusion of this section, cf. the other relation in Walch, old edition, Vol. XVI, Col. 2069, Z16.
2) This § is most likely spurious, a combination of § 23 and § 27 of Chapter 54.
The pope is the right Antichrist.
That the Pope is the true Antichrist, said D. Martinus, appears clear and public from the fact that those who transgress his statutes are punished much more severely than those who do against God's law, commandment and word. Thus the pope sits in the temple of God, yes, of the one who is preached and called God; that is, what concerns the service of God, over which he exalts himself and wants to be God. But he is not God according to the same essence, that is, he is not raised into heaven. That is why he is actually called the antichrist, because he sits in the temple and in the church of God, and exalts himself above everything that is called and is called God and worship. The Turk is not the Antichrist, for he is not and does not sit in the Church of God, but is an evil beast; but the Pope sits in the holy Church and arrogates to himself the service and honors that are due to God alone. For no one is an antichrist except God's Church.
. The Ordination of Priests in the Papacy.
In the papacy, priests were not ordained to preach the Word of God, but only to say mass and administer the sacrament. For when the bishop ordained them, he said: "Accept, I give you authority to say mass, to consecrate, and to sacrifice for the living and the dead. We ordain priests according to the command of Christ and St. Paul, namely, to preach the true, pure Gospel and Word of God. But they, the papists, do not think of anything in their ordination to the office of preaching, to teach God's word; therefore, their ordination is wrong and unjust; for all worship that is not ordered by God, nor established from and according to God's word and command, is good for nothing, indeed, it is vain idolatry.
60. M. Luther's simplicity and lowly person harmed the pope.
My simplicity and poor little person (I don't want to say just cause, said D. Martinus) did the damage to the pope. For there
I began to preach and write, the pope despised me. For he thought: "It is a single man, a poor monk etc. I have defended this doctrine before many kings and emperors, princes and lords; what then should a single man do? But if he had paid attention to me, he would have soon been able to exterminate me in the first place.
61 The pope falsely boasts that he has followed in St. Peter's footsteps; therefore the power is taken from him justly.
St. Peter's office was not to rule and force the people by force; but, as he himself says 1. Ep. 5, 2. 3.: "Feed Christ's flock, which is commanded you, not for shameful gain, not as those who rule over their people" etc. And Christ says, "Petre, follow me, feed my lambs," John 21:15, 19; does not say, I give you all authority in heaven and on earth. But now the pope wants to be Christ's governor and follow St. Peter's footsteps; and yet does not want to serve, but to be served, wants to be an earthly god and a god of this world, and to rule and reign over all kings, emperors, princes etc. with great splendor, glory and power.
Therefore such power is taken away from him, and he is now despised. For in former times, if he so much as breathed with one finger, emperors, kings and princes were terrified and trembled; so they were afraid of him. Now, however, no peasant or citizen is afraid of all the power of the pope or of all papist bishops, and would not give a single stone to them; indeed, almost all people despise the pope with all the smeared: he laughs or cries, is merciful or ungracious to them, all this applies equally to them. And even though before this time many pious hearts had noticed that the pope's teaching was false and that his dignity and dignity were nothing, they were not allowed to say it, nor were they able to make it public, because they were all restrained and hindered; but now it cannot be hindered, because his wickedness and mischievousness in deceiving people is too much revealed.
The image of Pabst was found underground in the Mansfeld mine.
In 1538, in the Mansfeld mine, a slate stone was found sixty fathoms under the ground, with the image of the Pope on it, that he was sitting in a choir cap and had a triple crown on his head; as one usually finds slate stones in mines, which have all kinds of images of fish. This slate stone was sent to Wittenberg for inspection by D. M. Luther; there he interpreted it in such a way that it meant the revelation of the Pope as the true Antichrist. This slate was then sent to the King of France, Francisco.
63. that one should preach harshly against the pope.
Doctor Luther said: "Many complain about this and think that I am too vehement and quick against the papacy; on the other hand, I complain that I am, unfortunately, much too lenient 1). But I wish that I could speak thunderbolts against the papacy, and that every word would be a thunderbolt.
The papal bishops do not have the same authority as the apostles.
(This § is indeed in Lauterbach, Oct. 15, 1538, p. 152, but nevertheless omitted because entirely contained in Cap. 19, § 7, Lauterbach, May 21, 1538, p. 84.)
65: The fictitious Antichrist of the papists.
(Lauterbach, Oct. 13, 1538, p. 150. In another redaction again Cap. 27, § 134.)
It is a completely futile delusion of the Antichrist that he should reign as a single man and private person, which the spectacles aimed at with the scattering of money, which would kill the saints, Elijah and Enoch. It happened to the Papists according to the prophecy Weish. 1, (v. 5. ff.): "Which shall be punished with the sins that are pronounced upon them."
1) So Stangwald instead of "geschwinde".
66 Of Junker Pabst.
(Lauterbach, Apr. 19, 1538, p. 64.)
On April 19, a paper was brought on which a pope, a cardinal and a monk were described, whose image columns had been sent from Innsbruck. But Luther added [some] true, hostile plots and spoke with sobs: "Oh, who should be silent and have patience in the face of such great malice and recognized error! Whoever wants to honor the blood of Christ must rage against the pope who desecrates it. One cannot be enough of an enemy to this dragon of hell, especially those who truly love Christ. For now he sins knowingly, not out of error. What happens out of error is error, there is still hope. That is why I have added the seventh verse, which is spiteful enough: "I know and hold this for myself. By these words I strike his conscience. For he praises Christ and his gospel only because of the profit, means nothing sincerely. And this name: Bon christian is a mockery at Rome: Ah, a good fool. Ah, we should stay with the article: I believe in Jesus Christ. This one should be honored, thanked and praised, but through him the pope becomes a proud and glorious tyrant. The blood that Christ shed for our souls, the pope turns against our souls. Therefore Christ rightly cries out against them with terrible and harsh words, Matth. 23. And he read the whole chapter. Such a valediction would also be necessary now.
The pope has a desire to get, therefore he hinders the concilium.
Since there was talk about the Concilium 1) and how the pope was fleeing it, it would be best for the emperor, France and all of Germany to unanimously cite the pope to the Concilium, so that he would defend his teaching etc. D. Martinus answered: "The pope does not allow this, and knows a way for it, so that the concilium is not promoted and has a continuation; therefore he does not allow the emperor and Francis to become one and to get along. And since
1) Cf. Cap. 54, §26.
If a concilium were to be held, no Protestant would come to it. Therefore, it would be a sin if a Christian is not heartily hostile to the prankster, the pope.
68 Pabst's regiment is best for the world.
(Cordatus No. 146.)
The pope is without a doubt the best ruler for the world; for he knows so well the rule according to which the world is deceived, that he is also a lord of the fields, of the meadows, of the money, of our houses and of all things; likewise also of the bodies (which can be seen in his measuring monkeys, who ravish one virgin after the other and respectable women), and when he has thus arranged everything according to his lusts, then he gives the world eternal damnation as a reward. So the world wants to have 2).
69. Pope Clement the Seventh's attack against the Lutherans.
I, said D. Martinus, "I also saw and noticed before the Diet of Augsburg that Pope Clement, a man of sins, has many plots. For since we know the devil and what he has in mind, how should we not also know his most beautiful member, whom he has on earth, and what he intends? But now this pope's most noble plot has been that he, through his deceitfulness and practices, has been able and driven the emperor to the point that he left Italy, since it was going well enough for him, and moved into Germany, and overtook and exterminated the Lutherans by his power.
The Pabst's deception, how and from what he strikes coin.
(Cordatus No. 45 and No. 1404.)
The pope virtually beats the abundance out of all things in the world of money, only infant baptism excepted, because the little children are born naked and without money; otherwise he would not have spared them either.
The princes make money out of metal, but the pope makes it out of all things, out of the mass,
2) In the original "the" instead of that.
from ceremonies, from fasting, that is, from hunger, from indulgences, that is, from a concocted lie.
71. bon St. John's main.
In Rome, St. John the Baptist's head is rejected, since all teachers write and chronicles indicate that the Saracens have opened his tomb, taken out the body and even burned it to powder. Let the pope with his lies always go to the executioner. He did the same with other saints.
72. the stationirer fraud.
- (Cordatus No. 791 and 792.)
When a nobleman said to an indulgence merchant that if he could redeem his ancestors, he would give him two florins, the latter said, "Who was your father? The latter answered: "A pious, honorable man. The merchant answered, "So he is not in hell. Does he also perform miracles at his grave? He answered, No. Then said he, Then he is not in heaven, but in purgatory. And the soldier [the nobleman in war service] bought him with a lump. After that [the merchant] continued to ask in the same way, and the interrogated man bought fourteen souls with fourteen cents. Finally he asked: "Lord, am I sure that they are blessed? He affirmed this with an oath. But the nobleman said, "Sir, you like gold; give me back the coins, and I will give you a florin. When the grocer had counted them, he took the pennies and said: "The souls are now in heaven and will never come out; I need money more than you do.
My father 1) asked Tetzel in Stolpe, since he demanded a penny for the salvation of a soul, what kind of penny he wanted, seven marks or a silver penny? After a long time of hesitation, he answered: "Come back tomorrow and I will tell you.
1) This speech is to be regarded as a narration of the slide. Ant. Lauterbach at Luther's table, which Cordatus nnt heard and distinguished. The father of Ant. Lauterbach was probably Matthäus Lauterbach, mayor of Stolpe. (Seidemann. Lauterbach. S. V.)
73. bon an Antonius lord.
(Cordatus No. 793.)
Once a brother of St. Anthony was wandering in a forest, and having lost his master [a relic merchant] who had the holy relics with him, he persuaded the peasants that the two little bells 2) had as much sanctity as the relics, because they had always lain with the relics. All this could be believed.
74. Bom Pabstthum and his drudgery.
If the papacy had stood for another ten years, all the monasteries in Germany would have become desolate and fallen to Rome; for in Italy, in the richest monasteries, there are only two or three persons, who are sparsely kept and fed, the other income being given to the cardinals. In Rome, at St. Calixt's, more than eight thousand martyrs are buried in a crypt, as they say, and there is great sanctity there; but there are only two Minorites and gray monks inside, who give the pope everything that is liked and desired, leaving them content with sixty ducats.
There is such an abominable idolatry: When one wants to say mass, the people run to him with great crowds who desire to be present, and if one consumes half an hour, he gets a whole handful of pennies, and there is such a crowd with the abomination of the sacrificial mass that two priests stand at the same time over an altar against each other, and say mass: they are mightily finished with their craft, and have forged a mass in a hui. When they leave, two others step over and say mass, but each must bring his own chasuble.
So Pabst went to the Treudelmarkt, got a ten thousand guilders for one forz (with breeding), that is, for his lies. But now we want to give the ungrateful peasants, burghers, noblemen etc. the highest treasure for free, so they do not want to have it. Ah, what gives, that counts.
2) The Antonian Lords, a mendicant order, had a little bell on their necks when they terminiren (begged). About them, cf. Walch, alte Ausgehe, Vol. XIX, p. 789.
(The following Cordatus No. 1740.)
Oh that everyone who presides over the ministry of the Word had been in Rome and seen the Pabst's fair!
The Pope's and the Cardinals' court has corrupted their cause and promoted Doctor Luther's doctrine.
The pope and his people relied on their great power, so they also overthrew themselves; for if they had handled things carefully, they would not have stormed, potz tausend fa mi re; quid non obtinuissent? But the papacy was to fall. When I moved against Rome, Rome was called Fontem Justitiae; but I saw that Ronl was a whore or whorehouse. Cardinal Campegius said in Augsburg in 1530: "Cardinal Cajetanus spoiled this thing in 1518, because he wanted to go through with his head. There one should have skilfully, with cunning and artificial grasps with the thing gone around.
And said D. Luther: The pope is now overthrown in the German land, without still having some elders inside: this does not happen for the sake of his authority, but that some princes still protect him. For when Peter Paul Vergerius was the Pope's legate in the German lands in 1533, the ruffians, as the Pope's mother, almost threw him to death with dirt. After the Imperial Diet in Augsburg, Cardinal Campegius went to Vienna with King Ferdinando, where they made a little man from rags as a cardinal, and put him on a dog, which had the pope's letters of indulgence and seal hanging from its neck, and a pig's bladder with peas under its tail, and so the dog had to run through the streets of Vienna as a spectacle. The next day, the cardinal had a whore come to him at night, and she had stolen the cardinal's cross from him. This cardinal, because he was rich, was killed with poison by the son of the pope.
76. agnus Dei.
The Agnus Dei, as it was called, was worn before the Sacrament only once, because the pope was alive. In Pope Leo's time
It was consecrated when it was destroyed by fire and burned. This happened only because of a dispensation that Leo consecrated again.
77 The Sanctuary.
The bishop of M. boasted that he had a flame burning from the bush that Moses had seen. To the dark star at Compostel in Hispania is pointed the flag for a sanctuary, which Christ had in hell, likewise the crown of thorns, the holy cross, nails etc.
78. from the sanctuary of the donkey on which Christ rode on the day of the palm tree.
(Lauterbach, May 9, 1538, p. 77.)
On May 9, Frederick Mecum said a lot about the excessive pride of the Italians against the Germans and told an example of how a Mass priest in Rome had persuaded some Germans with sweet words in the confession of the ears: I have always known that the German nation is very God-fearing and loves religion, but the Italians are scoffers; he has a very great treasure, but hidden, [a] sanctuary. If he wanted to keep it secretly with him and give something for it, he would let him have it secretly for the great salvation of Germany, but on this condition that he should not reveal it to anyone in Italy, because the lives of both would be in danger. When he had promised with an oath, he gave him a thigh of Christ's donkey wrapped in silk. This is the sanctuary where the Lord Christ sat bodily on and touched the donkey's leg with his leg. He happily brought his secret treasure to Germany. When he reached the borders of Germany, he began to boast to his companions and finally came out with it and showed his treasure. Another was there, then a third, a fourth, who boasted of it, and that the gift was given to them on condition that they keep silent. When a fifth heard this, who also had one leg, he began to curse: Did the donkey have five feet? Luther answered: This was the glory of the Italians, to mock the barbaric Germans like this. But by God's grace, Germany feels and sees the wickedness and one can
The Italians, the hopeful spirits, can do no better than to despise them and consider them worthless people, as they have done to us, and do as that schoolmaster did against an unpolished monk who rejected all study of science in a sermon. [Then he gave all the boys Latin with this distortion: Monachus a devil, diabolus a monk.
(This § is transferred to Cap. 27, § 138, where it belongs).
80: The Pabst's robbery.
I believe, said D. Martinus, that the pope, out of special concern, has placed the feasts of St. Sylvester and St. Thomas Cantuariensis on the eighth day after the holy day of Christ and Christmas, because the former brought and won the English kingdom, and the latter the Roman kingdom for the pope.
St. Thomas, the apostle, is nothing respected by the pope against St. Thomas of Cantuarias: 1) because the pope is most concerned that he may keep the goods, and when the empire is finished, he has always snatched the empire. That is why I have shown all his robbery in the Pope's keys, which painting will hurt and displease him, since the deed agrees with the words. It is time for this wickedness to be revealed. I hope now that the last day will not be long, that it will come to ruin.
81. of the Pabst's errors.
The Pabst's errors, although they were very gross before the gospel came to light again, yet we worshipped them, which we are now ashamed to remember, as, with the sanctuary, Joseph's pants, St. Francisci Niederwat, so one has pointed out here in Wittenberg. And said D. Martinus said: "There have been very few preachers who could have counseled the poor consciences; indeed, they imposed fasting on pregnant and nursing women without dispensation.
1) D. i.
The papists' outrageous lies.
The papists' lies are so palpable that they are now ashamed of them. As in former times a citizen of Oschatz, a host, ate meat in public during Lent, and H[archduke] Georg persuaded him to do so, he confessed it without all shyness and fear, and proved such his right, that he had it power, with his butter and indulgence letter; with that the duke was satisfied. Item, a citizen of S. had his wife buried without all vigils and masses, invoking his confessional letter, in which all her sins were forgiven during her life, therefore she was not allowed any vigils and masses.
In Orleans, France, there was a woman who, while still alive, ordered that if she died, no vigils or masses should be said for her, and she was buried in a monastery. Then the monks pretended that her spirit was dying, crying and weeping, and asked that masses be said for her, because she was in purgatory because of her sin. Finally, the fraud and deception were revealed by a boy, and [the monks] were expelled from the country by the king. In sum, the pope does not want to let up, but wants to be disgraced, and his lies are not human, but devilish.
83 From Antonites.
At Lichtenberg, D. Martin of the large estate and magnificent building of the Antoniherren, so that [it] would be hard to end at this time with three tons of gold. In the old days, there was the shameful Treudelwerk, they moved around like knapsacks, lured people to themselves with belts, bags and knives.
Tetzel was bribed with money by the Antonites on St. Anneberg, and praised them in such a way that such an influx of people followed them three miles away. So they were persuaded by his words that if they did not honor the sanctuary, all the shafts and ore mines would fall into ruin and the tunnels would disappear.
Oh dear God, which nobleman, citizen, peasant etc. thanks our Lord God once for having redeemed us from such drudgery, through which a great treasure and a great blessing have been created?
countless amounts of money have been made by daily chance? Now they become ungrateful, and they dare to deprive the godly not only of the incomes, but also of the substance and goods that are endowed for proper worship.
84 Des Pabsts Geiz und Trendelmarkt.
The pope takes annually in England from each one a petriniche, that is, two pennies, which has made nine times a hundred thousand florins.
Many altarists had barely forty pennies annually, and were nevertheless able to maintain themselves abundantly from the accidentals and Kretzschmerei, vigils, soul and sacrificial masses. The parish of Wittenberg had hardly thirty guilders of money and income, and yet carried over three hundred guilders annually. The snowing in has been great. I know that the bishop of Mainz received two thousand florins annually, which he had from the Consistory, from fines for adultery and fornication. It actually belongs to the princes; if they were wise, they could get hold of such money.
85 Of Pope's Right.
I also wanted to know the spiritual or ecclesiastical laws, said D. Martinus, and read Summam Angelicam. Then said D. H.: They should not be called angelic, but devilish, for the sake of the great superstition and sophistry, which is in there, so that no one can judge from it. So the pope, said D. M., with his cases, which he reserves for him in the shrine of his heart, has thus left them, that he has nevertheless reserved them for him. So all his rights are uncertain, so even he has vexed us with his devilish lies, under the appearance of key power. That is why St. Paul not unreasonably calls these times horrible times, when out of God's wrath the popes at Rome ruled by so many lying signs, needed their curtisan pieces. England was free, but St. Peter's pence brought the pope nine tons of gold annually. Yes, St. Peter describes the pope with very fierce and serious words 2. ep. 2, 3.: "There are (he says)
sly people in avarice." He is not talking about bad and human avarice.
Just look at what Pope Urban the Sixth, Gregory the Ninth and Boniface the Twelfth did before the Concilio at Costnitz. Although the Romanists were to a certain extent humiliated and frightened in the same Concilio, they regained their composure and became proud, just as they are now frightened again and driven to the chorus. Tetzel made it so crude that it had to be grasped. He wrote: "Indulgences would be a reconciliation between God and man, and that they would be useful, since a man would not repent without all remorse and suffering.
Of the keys and pouches of the pope on which he hung.
(Lauterbach, Feb. 17, 1538, p. 30.)
On February 17, a picture was brought to him of the pope hanged with Judas and Judas' bag. He answered: "This will hurt the pope, who has been kissed by the emperor and kings on his knees, and will now be hanged on his keys. It will hurt the papists very much, because,their conscience will be hit and the matter will speak for itself. That is why the bag with the bishop's hat and Cardinalinful is very well armed, because there was such an incomprehensible and inscrutable, unheard-of avarice with the pope that he did not only seize the annates, the pallia etc. of all countries, but also the sacraments, the indulgences, the brotherhood, the blood of Christ, the marriage. Therefore the bag is full of robbery, and rightly is he contradicted, as Revelation (18:6) says: "Pour ye in twofold." He has banished me and burned me and put me in the devil's butt, so I will hang him by his own key. 1)
1) To this Stangwald makes the following remark: This painting was painted and printed by Doctor Martin Luther himself in Wittenberg in the year 45 with this title: Digna merces Papae Satanissimi et Cardinalium suorum (Well-deserved reward of the demonized pope and his cardinals). And under it set these rhymes:
If the pope and the cardinal on earth are to be punished in time, you would have deserved blasphemy, as their right is painted here.
Mart. Luther, D. 1545.
The first of these is a book on the subject of the "Pabst's Abominations in his Decrees.
It is a great, terrible wrath of God: in so many of the pope's decrees, not a single saying of the Holy Scriptures or an article of the Catechismi is contained. For the pope wanted to arrange his church like an external worldly regime; therefore he blasphemously taught that a lousy monk's cap, 1) if put on a dead person, would bring forgiveness of sins, thus comparing it to the merits of Christ, the only Savior. This abominable idolatry and blasphemy was not only permitted by the pope, but also confirmed.
88. from the papist idolatry force.
The idolatry and superstition in the papacy has had great power and effect, because it has penetrated by force. That is why Daniel says of the Antichrist: "And he will succeed until the wrath is out," I hope that the same wrath is now out, that God will resist the pope, if only our own security and contempt of God's word will not promote such evil.
The first of these is the "Bishop Benno's Idolatry and the Glory of the Papists".
When it was written by the visitators how Bishop Benno's idolatry in Meissen was destroyed, D. Martin said. Martin: Dear God, how the papists will now cry out and praise imperial foundations! For the bishops want to be princes of the empire: the emperor has even been forced to confirm and strengthen the papacy against himself. After that they took up the sword, like Pabst Julius. For when they had attained power and prestige, they laid aside the habit and the clerical garments and became princes and emperors; like the Cardinal of Salzburg and Mainz, they were the most powerful. But praise be to God, who lays his judgment upon them and against them, as the Scripture says. So the Lord will do to them as they thought to do to us. For I see their stubbornness, that the best people, as soon as they are elected bishops-
1) Cf. cap. 30, § 30.
and have sworn and done the law to the priest, they are hardened like Judas, for Satan leads into them when they have taken the dunked bite.
90. of an official and his caplan.
There was an official, said D. Martinus, who had a vicar and priest who said mass for him. The latter, because he had not said mass for a vain time, as he was ordered, his master was so angry with him that he wanted to remove him from office, so that he would give him twenty guilders. The priest was frightened and saddened, for he had no money, and asked him to give him a fortnight's respite, but he would raise the money. When the fourteen days were up and he had found another master, he bought two brooms and brought them to the official's house. What, said the official, do you bring brooms? Do you know that I asked for money? What more, said the priest, I have brought the two brooms, I will give one to you, and the other I will keep for myself, so that each man may turn in at his own door, and my master will not demand any money from me; and so he went away.
The Papist Tyrants Rage Against Christ and His Word.
(Except for the last paragraph Cordatus No, 1485, 1486.)
The papists and tyrants may fall into the pit they are preparing for themselves, for we have humbled ourselves enough, suffered, our brothers have been burned etc. They do not want to be advised, but God will defend His King, to whom He said [Ps. 110, 1.]: "Sit at My right hand." He has built him a high castle: if they shoot up with a rifle, he strikes down with thunder and lightning.
The adversaries have innumerable, inconstant, and daily new advice. Always they cry out: [They] err, err, exterminate them. But it goes out at their neck. They will not be able to stay, but we have this single advice with God: the King Christ must stay. He has overthrown great kings; I would rather stay with him than with the Turk and our emperor.
But our Emperor Carl is peaceful, seeks peace, so let us pray for him. For the pope is undoubtedly following him deceitfully, deals with evil secret practices, would like to make the Frenchman emperor, tries to bring England and the Venetians into such an alliance, because he sees that it is for him, thinks: If I ever fall, then the emperor must also fall. May our dear Lord God prevent, break and destroy his plans, amen.
The Papists' Hatred of M. Luthern.
(Cordatus No. 1195. 1196.)
I am not surprised that the papists hate me; I deserve it for their sake, and Christ rebuked the Jews more politely than I rebuked the papists, and yet they killed him. But they believed that they killed Christ according to their law. [It does not hurt that they hate me. But I, too, will speak to the pope on the last day and will demand an account of why he challenges the word of God and his sacraments.
The pope kills the priests because they enter the sacrament of marriage, which God has instituted, and likewise he also acts against his canons, which only prescribe to deprive such of the office. Thus, H[er. zog] G[eorg] drives people from their residences for the sake of the Word and the Sacraments. In Oschatz he drove out ten fathers of houses with thirty-seven children, whose groans will cry out over him, as Jesus Sirach says [35, 18. 19.]: "The tears of widows flow down their cheeks, but they cry out over themselves against him who forces them out." 1)
The first time he was a member of the German Parliament, he was a member of the German Parliament.
D. M. Luther said in 1546 at Eisleben over the table: "I have been too soft and too limey for the priests and monks, I have given them the benediction and I am too soft and too limey for them.
1) In the original: The widows' tears fall below them and yet rise above them. - For the last paragraph, see Luther's letter to the Christians driven out of Oschatz, January 20, 1533, Walch, St. Louis Edition, Vol. X, 1956.
was their protection. But I fear that another will come after me, who will do it much more roughly than I, who will have a blunt sickle and shear other plates. As Christ also says John 5:43: "I came in my Father's name, but ye would not have me: if another shall come in his name, him will ye receive." And did D. M. Luther make this verse, once of himself:
Pestis eram vivens, moriens ero mors tua Papa. And Gregorius Sabinus has thus redirected them;
Qui dum vixit, erat tua pestis Papa, Lutherus,
Hic tibi causa suo funere mortis erit.
" (This paragraph in Cordatus No. 441.)
While I live, I am the pillar of the pope and his defender, but after my death he will suffer a blow, he will not resist. Then they will say: If we had Luther now, who could advise, now is the hour in which to advise, and they will not; when the hour is over, God will not want.
94) Papists do not allow themselves to be reformed. 2)
The pope and his people cannot suffer to be reformed, for the word "reforming" is more hostile in Rome than the thunder from heaven or the last day; as a cardinal said: Let them eat, drink etc. and do what they want, but that they want to reform us, that is not to be suffered by us, there we must dispute. Thus we Lutherans are not satisfied if they permit the sacrament in both forms and priestly marriage, but we also want to have the doctrine of faith and justification, how one becomes righteous and blessed before God, pure and unadulterated, which casts out all idolatry and idolatry; when this is cast out, the foundation on which the papacy is built also falls. The papacy feels and fears this reformation. However, the papists in Germany are fearfully fed up. For when we returned from Schmalkalden, the priests at Erfurt asked what had been decided there, whether it would be to their salvation.
2) Similar thoughts Cap. 27, § 105 and § 96.
or ruin? Philip said to them, "Gentlemen, look at the example of Augsburg. But the priests in the land of Franconia make friends for them with the unrighteous mammon, namely, they unite with some princes.
95) Why the dispute is primarily with the papists. 2)
(Cordatus No. 1829.)
Wicklef and Huß have only challenged the life of the pope, therefore they could not raise it, because they were also sinners like the papists; but I have attacked the doctrine, thus I have beaten them, because here it is not about life, but about the doctrine.
(This paragraph in Lauterbach, 2 Feb. 15M, p. 20.)
The rule of the papacy began and grew without laws, only through superstition and arbitrariness, as Daniel (12, 1.) says: "And the king will do what he wills", not according to the law; his will is instead of the law, as the Decretals and the Canons Cuncta indicate, and the chapter of the cases that the pope reserves for himself, and the shrine of his heart, which is bound around him, very well testify to his utmost arbitrariness. He then leafed through a book printed under the papacy, in which all the bishoprics, monasteries, and annual expenditures and the simonia were described. He was amazed at the size of this empire and its destruction.
This word, when God says: "Grow and multiply", Gen. 1, 28, God has not said to any monk, priest, pope, bishop; nor can they puff up their statutes, statutes and humanity so high that God's word is nothing compared to their clamor.
96. what to quarrel with the papists about, what and how much to yield to them.
(Cordatus No. 422.)
They did not want to allow us three things at Augsburg: Free marriage, free worship, and the Lord's Supper in both forms. But now they would allow it if we wanted.
1) Cf. cap. 78,§1.
It must come to this, that each one is allowed to believe, as he knows it in his conscience to answer for before God. If they allow us to do this, we must also let them follow their consciences if they do not want to follow us. How did the Christians have to do in the time of the Arians? Like Paul in his persecution of the Jews? And the Swiss would not have agreed to this day if they had not scuffled with each other. I was worried that the papists would also be like that. But if they kill the preachers here and there, they will get tired of it.
97 The Papists' False Doctrine and Blindness. (Cordatus No. 1427.)
That a man who does as much as is in him deserves eternal life de congruo was also believed in Gerson's time to be true until Luther, and there is no difference between this doctrine and that of the Arians except that the words are changed.
The first is the first of the two.
Doctor Martin Luther said in 1541 that Pabst's kingdom had been a terrible blindness and wrath of God, which ruled and reigned in the world in such powerful errors and public lies that no man understood and noticed it; yet the Christian church had been so abundantly warned against it by the Lord Christ and the apostles. So there has never been a lack of people in the papacy who have had beautiful ingenia and great testimony of their art and skill. That is why I am often surprised that there has been so much darkness in the papacy. But I cannot judge myself from this, because by the saying of St. Paul, 2 Thess. 2, 11. 12. where it is written: "Because they did not believe the truth, God gave them strong errors. Therefore, the abomination and darkness of the Pabst could not have been greater.
The pope has two pillars or foundations on which he stands; one is called: "Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven," Matth. 16, 19. Item, that the Lord Christ says to Petro: "Feed the people.
He extended these two sayings so that he had free power and authority to do whatever he wanted in the church and in the worldly government. Therefore he taught what he dreamed and changed the doctrine. He condemned and saved whom he willed; then he deposed emperors, kings, princes and rulers according to his will and pleasure. Just as if Christ had given the loosening and binding to such an outward worldly power and authority, which belongs only to the conscience of the afflicted and to the doctrine of faith. Fie on you, that we have not seen nor understood the definition of this power!
After that, the pope's decree came, which was full of lies and tyranny, in which the pope shamelessly roared: Non est praesumendum, quod tantae celsitudinis apex errare possit: One should not take it in mind that the great majesty of the pope could err. Have made of him Deum Mixtum, half a god. Item, all judges' thrones have had to leave him satisfied, and no church has been allowed to judge the pope. Item, there was another Canon: Quod autoritas sacrae scripturae pendeat a sede Romana, that is, that the Holy Scripture is valid, it must have from the See of Rome. After the pope had persuaded the people in this way, he might teach what he wanted, and brought it about that a Christian denied the bloodshed of the Lord Christ, and put on a monk's cap, and sought blessedness in it. This is such an abominable case, which would be enough of heathens.
But this kingdom of the Antichrist should not have been revealed, and yet, truly, there was no lack of fine people who should have grasped it; but the powerful errors did not let one come to the knowledge. As Daniel also says: Erit tempus, quo prosternetur veritas. The superstition and superstition of the Jews was not as great as that of the Pabst. For they had the law as their basis and foundation, and wanted to protect and manage their worship from God's law, which they had superstitiously violated: but the pope is without God.
He is a man of the word of God, yes, against the word of God, and presses the word of God under himself, and dares to teach what he pleases, so that he may fulfill the prophet Daniel's prophecy, which speaks of the pope in such a way that he will want to be exlex, that is, without law, and do what he only desires; that is his rhyme: Sic volo, sic jubeo, sit pro ratione voluntas.
Therefore, the canonists have said: If the pope leads innumerable souls into hell, one should not say to him: Why do you do this? Fie on you! That is why no one was allowed to complain against the pope. And I am now called the worst enemy of the pope, yes, the greatest heretic, and it serves me right: for why have I attacked the pope's nature, substance and doctrine? I have not challenged the morals or only the abuses, but I have straightway grabbed the pope's throat, and have now done so honestly for twenty years, so that his authority and power in the church have fallen and perished by the spirit of the Lord's mouth, and the pope has no more protection, nor any hope, but only to the secular sword. For he is despised by his own, and if the concilium is now overthrown, he lies down in the mud. It will not get any better, and nothing will be done with the concilium.
At Schmalkalden, the princes and princes of the Pabst's legates mocked him; and if by God's word the Pabst's authority had not thus fallen, the princes should have been cheated by the devil. But we do not ask much after this liberation, and become ungrateful to God; but severe punishments and a great wrath of God will follow; only that I still comfort myself that the last day will not be long outside. For the prophecy of Daniel has been completely fulfilled, who described the pope so clearly and distinctly, as if the pope had been in his time, and he should have painted and described him.
99. the pabst's tyranny.
Occam writes that Constantine was the first true Christian emperor, for when he gave the empire to the pope, he took it from him.
and has thus become emperor legally and justly, confirmed and confirmed by the pope, refers to the saying where Christ says: "All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me" etc., Matth. 28, 18. The pope has drawn the same upon himself because he wants to be Christ's governor. 1) Thus, in his decree, he says: "Whoever doubts in a word or work of the Roman Church, and does not believe what it says and does, is a heretic; D. Wimpfeling would almost have been killed because he doubted whether Augustine had been a monk. So we were trapped that we were not allowed to protest against the slightest thing.
100: The Rosary in the Papacy.
Doctor Martinus told a story of which St. Bernard writes: How a Carthusian wandered over the field and fell among the murderers. Since he had not prayed the rosary that day, as he used to do every day, he fell down on his knees and prayed. Then the highwaymen saw a very beautiful virgin standing by him, who had a ribbon or hoop in her hand, and always took one rose after the other from Carthusian's mouth, and the tenth rose was always red, which she placed between them, and thus made a beautiful wreath out of it. When the robbers saw this, they left him alone and did nothing to him, letting him go.
Oh, dear Lord God, what have we not been allowed to believe? Everything has been believable, and there has been nothing so untruthful and false that we have not believed. This is where the pope would like to bring us again, pretending and posing as if he wanted to hold a concilium. But let us pray, and let it go as God wills. If he condemns us, let us condemn him again and publicly declare him to be the Antichrist. He will have to be put to shame with all his plots. They have much to do now, especially the Epicurer at M[ainz]. 3)
1) Cf. § 25 of this Cap. the second paragraph.
2) to bulge or swell is: "to shout with full cheeks". Cf. § 101 of this chapter at the beginning.
3) Thus Bindseil III, 269.
101 The Pabst's paucity.
(Lauterbach, Jan. 16, 1538, p. 12.)
Truly, great was the tyranny of the pope, who flashed without laws and shouted with full cheeks: In vain holds the four Evangelia, who does not keep the vows of the Roman church. These are the pompous and proud words, as Peter says. These are the seven thunders in Revelation [St. John], the threats of the pope. The celibacy is the image, Revelation 10, where a strong angel, clothed with a cloud, i.e., with a hidden secret, has a rainbow on his head, i.e., commandments; shining like the sun, i.e., he has a glow; and holds an open book, i.e., he extols the gospel. This must be open. There the figure of the Pabst is very well portrayed, which is a king of appearance and a confluence of impious persons [colluvies]. But God is not something corporeal and personal, as the kingdom of the pope is disguised.
102 Blindness in the Papacy.
(Lauterbach, Feb. 22, 1538, p. 36.)
On February 22, he spoke of the exceedingly great and terrible blindness of the papists. For thirty years ago no one read the Bible, and it was unknown to all. The prophets were unnamed and impossible to understand. For I had not seen a Bible when I was twenty years old. I thought that there were no other gospels or epistles than those written in the postils for Sundays. Finally I found a Bible in the library, and as soon as I entered the monastery, I began to read, reread, and overread the Bible, which astonished D. Staupitz very much. In this darkness the pope ruled with the greatest superstition and deception, and I would never have dared to attack his angelic splendor, if Paul had not shown with the most glorious testimonies and refutations that such a great blindness of the pope would be, and if Christ, the Majesty Himself, had not put him down with such great flashes, Matth. 15, 9: "In vain do they serve me, because they teach such doctrines,
which are nothing but the commandments of men. If Isaiah (29, 13.) had said it badly and Christ had not quoted this passage, they would have despised it completely. In short: the papists are refuted by the most certain refutation of the holy scripture. I know their error by God's grace from the front and from the back in every respect. I still sweat and fear when I attack the shining majesty of the pope, since they themselves acknowledge that the entire Scripture stands against them. 1) For when a certain Cardinal had much counsel against me in the beginning of the Gospel at Rome, a fool is said to have said this: My lord, follow my advice, remove Paul first from the choir of apostles, he does us the greatest harm above all. The superstitious deception in the papist worship has certainly deceived many saints. But in the struggle of conscience it does nothing.
The first is the first of the twelve councils in the Gospel.
(Lauterbach, Feb. 24, 1538, p. 39.)
Johannes Huß was remembered, who did nothing against the papacy that would be worthy of death, because he still taught twelve evangelical counsels and many other things. It is truly an abominable error to divide the Scriptures into commandments and counsels and then to teach them: Every man can and should keep the commandments of God; but the counsels are free, by them one is not bound. From this source came the certainty among the people and the hypocrisy of superfluous good works, that the monks, by keeping the counsels, had a greater righteousness than the people. They flee common poverty and domesticity, but invent a voluntary poverty according to their liking; they despise the conjugal chastity of the laity and everyday chastity, but they exalt the chastity of virginity and widowhood. They say of the common faithful that they live in strife, and they choose for themselves the chastity of the virgins and widows.
1) The same narrative contained in Cap. 1, § 95.'
2) Instead of ünAunt, tuglunt will probably be read here.
a special status without controversy, and yet they are the most revengeful people. St. Augustine and Gregory are of the opinion that our works are propitiatory in satisfaction, not in redemption. St. Paul, however, clearly teaches that the forgiveness of sins takes place through the promise, in vain, which blots out sins and satisfies the conscience. Otherwise, the Church has no consolation. If God had not preserved His Church under the forgiveness of sins, no one would have been saved. Nevertheless, the text of the Gospel, Holy Communion, baptism and absolution remain.
104. human statutes have been more and more highly respected in the papacy, than
God's Word.
(Lauterbach, Nov. 4, 1538, p. 157.)
Afterwards, he read the written statutes of the nuns, which were composed very coldly, and sighed: "This has to be held high, while in the meantime the word of God has been despised. See what torture there was in the papacy, where they insisted so strictly on the canonical prayers, that Hugo, that great man, wrote the frightening saying: If someone neglected a syllable in his chorus and did not observe a syllable in the other chorus, he would have to give account for it on the last day. I believe that Hugo said this in good faith, for the discipline of children, but that it was subsequently misused to corrupt consciences. For the conscience is not yet in the children, they must be brought up in discipline; later, when the conscience comes, Moses must be stoned.
105. the pabst's threefold churches and tyranny, 3)
(Lauterbach, Nov. 17, 1538, p. 171.)
He then spoke of the most insolent audacity of the pope, who would have made a threefold church: the essential, the assembly of the faithful; the representative, the college of cardinals; the exercising (vir-
3) Cf. to the beginning of this § Cap. 58, § 3.
tualis), the pope's decree. This practicing church is above all others, as [the decree says]: Cuncta noverit mundus etc. [The whole world shall know]. [The whole world shall know.) Likewise [the Decret): Si Papa infinitas animas in mancipium gehennae duceret etc. [If a pope led innumerable souls into the bonds of hell). To them the answer is: Christ says (Matth. 28, 20.): "Teach them to keep all that I have commanded you." The pope's reputation has increased only because Peter and Paul were in Rome. By this excellent pretense, the Antichrist has taken over his empire, so that the emperor and the supreme Elector of the Palatinate have been forced to perform the service of a groom, have had to hold the reins and saddle of this beast. Therefore he was so proud that also a Cardinal at Augsburg said to me: What do you think that a Cardinal asks for Germany? Now he is forced to see that the greater part of Germany has fallen away, as well as England, Denmark, and that he is not respected by his own defenders. He is martyred by the spirit of the mouth (Job 15:30), but he will be destroyed by the coming of the Lord. Duke George, the excellent defender of the pope, wants to reform him. O how intolerable a word is: reformation; as the Cardinal of Piacenza said of the Bohemians at the Council of Florence: "Let the Bohemians, those beasts, eat and drink what they want; but that they want to reform us, that is not to be suffered; for if we give in to them in one article, then it is all over for our church. They will think [so]; and is also true. For they see the conclusion very well: if a single piece is wrong, the whole being, in its whole extension, will become wrong. For he who is once evil is thought to be always evil. That is why they, who are in possession, do not want to give way and defend the most obvious errors. Therefore, it is no wonder that Satan is angry with me, because he does not leave his church, but fights firmly for it, biting the heel of the pious, but Christ will crush his head. He must reign in the midst of his enemies, as the Papists, the Anabaptists and the raging sacramentalists. Therefore let us pray; it is
is not a minor matter, but Satan is angry. If a war should start in Germany, which God wants to prevent, then devastation will follow.
The first is a new version of the original.
(Lauterbach, Nov. 17, 1538, p. 171.)
Of all the errors in the papacy, two were the most prominent, namely, one's own satisfaction and the fulfillment of the law, which contradict each other and also the merit of Christ. For when the conscience hears: The law must be fulfilled by perfect obedience; this you have not done; therefore do enough for it: then there has been a constant torture. But that monk in the battle of death did right, who at last broke through all the statutes of men, seized Christ's image, and said, What are my works and merits, and those of the whole world? I take hold of his merit and works [osculor] and trust in them. St. Paul has argued with the righteousness of the law against the people of God, as he also struggles with the strongest arguments in Romans 9, 10 and 11. It must have caused him much grief, so that he also wished to be banished for his brothers, that the joy must have been very strange to him, because he brought forward great, vehement speeches [instantias], [such as] (Rom. 9, 14.), where he speaks: "Is God then unjust, that He rejects His people?"
The arguments of the papists are full of holes.
(Lauterbach, Nov. 25, 1538, p. 181.)
Because the papists have a bad cause, they try to defend themselves with the most erroneous arguments, which prove nothing. Therefore, their arguments are to be rejected altogether. The nature is this: All praise is an invocation; the saints are to be praised; therefore they must be invoked. I deny the upper proposition, because not every praise is an invocation. Likewise: Every act of concupiscence is illicit; the act of marriage is an act of concupiscence, thus. I ant, words on the sub-sentence: It is not an act of desire, but this sexual
Action is God's order, although it happens to be impure because of original sin, but in itself it is permitted and pure. Likewise: The doctrine of the forgiveness of sins is necessary; the indulgence is the forgiveness of sins, thus. I answer: The indulgence is not the forgiveness of sins, but a satisfaction for the forgiveness of sins, which is a fiction.
The papists' mischievousness and hypocrisy, who now want to whitewash their idolatry and godlessness.
Pastors, teachers and preachers should diligently watch and have good regard for the deceitfulness and deceitfulness of the papists, who are neutral and want to cover up and deny their lies and superstition finely, and gloss over them, and not be taken for it, as if they had ever erred, or disturbed a water, and done wrong and taught. They have learned to speak our language to some extent and to follow it; they also need the words we need, like parrots: it is all hypocrisy and deception with them, they think much differently in their heart, and remain in their godless nature, as the work testifies; therefore nothing is to be believed of them, it is all deceit and bluster, which they make to deceive and seduce simple hearts.
And if we could not convince them with their own books and living witnesses, then they must be right and we must be wrong for punishing them and accusing them of many horrible errors and idolatries. Therefore, be careful, and do not believe their glittering good words badly, so that they cover up the mischief, and would like to burn themselves white. But who can tell all gross errors? Scotus, their most distinguished teacher and greatest sophist, writes: That a man by his natural powers and free will can do enough for God and His law, which concerns the substance and essence of the word in himself, without the grace of the Holy Spirit, ex merito congrui, by which he is sent, that God certainly gives him, which cannot be lacking, grace and loves him; then it follows after meritum condigni that he deserves it,
to be worthy. Say further: For if a man, saith he, can love the less good, much more can he love the greater than God is. 1)
109. from sorbonnists.
The sophists in Paris at the Sorbonne have written against me about the saying of Matth. 5, namely: If the twelve councils should be commandments there, it would be annoying and even too burdensome. Likewise they say: A Christian must doubt, not about the promise of God, but about what concerns him, and about his person. But now they began to excuse themselves and to burn white, as if there were no difference of doctrine between us and them, but only a dangerously useless quarrel about words: in the main there would be no repugnance, quarrel nor disagreement, but one would be united in the same.
One should answer them and ask them: Why have they killed, murdered, hanged, drowned, burned, banished and driven into misery with wife and children so many fine, excellent, pious people for the sake of quarreling about words? Woe to them, they are given into a perverse mind, do not want to be punished now by God-fearing teachers and preachers. They are coarse, clumsy and godless asses, the papists. Like that parish priest who complained to the bishop that he should not baptize properly, and when he appeared, the bishop gave him an infant 2) to baptize, that he might hear what words he needed. Then he began and said: Ego te Baptiste in nomine Christe. Then the bishop scolded him for being such an unlearned, coarse fellow, and for not being able to speak the words properly. Then the priest threw the cloth to the ground and said, "As the child and the baptism are, so are the words.
The Pope's hope for the restitution of the papacy.
(Contained in Cap. 27, § 135.)
111. of the papist measuring servants plates.
It is nevertheless a miraculous thing and invention, said D. Martin, that the Pabst's ge-
1) Cf. Walch, old edition, vol. VIII, 1814. cap. 2, § 181.
2) Tocke or Docke - doll.
smeared creatures, monks, priests and religious, commonly all have to wear plates and crosses, since God has forbidden it in Moses. Perhaps our Lord God wanted to indicate with this sign that one could and should beware of them.
112. the papists' ignorance in good arts.
The majority and largest house among the papists, especially in monasteries, have been very unlearned asses, some of whom have hardly been able to read properly. One of them sang elama for clama; and when he was scolded by the others for singing elama, he repeated it in a higher voice and shouted out loud several times: Elama; until he said: I can never shout.
Another read elicere for dicere. Item, an unlearned collegiate at L. who said on a doctorate in the thanksgiving: Inclyti Senati, who afterwards became a bullfinch at M.
113. world fraud of the papists.
At Bamberg, they annually assign for sanctuary a book in which Emperor Henry and his husband, Cunegund, are said to be described, since they both vowed to remain virgins. When Birkheimerus came there and took a fancy to see the book, what kind of contract they had made with each other, since they had contracted sponsalia. When he obtained this through great practices, the canons opened the book for him; it had been the Topica Ciceronis. It was such a cheating with them. Otherwise monks read in a monastery: Mumsimus for sumpsimus. When a young monk from the Grammatica punished them for it, the other fathers said: You young licker, do you want to punish us? so we have read Mumsimus for a long time, it should and must be called Mumsimus and remain so.
Violence is the defense of the papists.
The papists have lost the cause, argue only with violence, by which they mean to preserve and win. With them, violence is next to foolishness, but with us, wisdom is the only way.
heit with weakness. But their thing will fall from itself. For where will they take monks and priests? There are many students here, but I don't believe that there is one among them who would let himself be smeared and keep his mouth shut, and let the pope throw his dirt into it; Mathesius and M. Plato would do it. Both of whom were Luther's table companions at that time.
(This paragraph in Cordatus No. 429.)
God deals with the papacy as he does in a dry summer, in which he lets the springs dry up, so all scholars in the papacy dry up.
Rom, said D. Martinus, has learned people, but in the holy scripture one finds there big asses. As one interpreted this saying Marci 16, 17. thus: Signa eos, qui crediderint etc.,
that is: Draw me those, so believe there etc. Took a noun for a verb, draw for sign. Then spoke D. Jonas said: The descendants have the best time to hope. Yes, said D. Martinus, I am worried, the best has now happened, there will now follow sects and groups.
115 The Papists' Abomination.
M. W. Calixt 1) told M. M. Luther a story about a disputation that had been held in Rome, in which he had been next to thirty magisters or more. There they had disputed the authority of the pope, who boasted that with his right hand he commanded the angels in heaven, but with his left hand he pulled souls out of purgatory, and that his person was mixed with the divinity. But he, Calixtus, would have disputed this, namely, that the Pope alone had the power to bind and loose on earth, Matth. 16, 19. And since they, the others, had vehemently disputed this, he would have decided that he had spoken it disputatorily, not that he certainly considered it so. M. Luther said: "That in many hundreds of years there has not been a papist bishop or priest, who has taken care of the poor schools, baptism and
1) Wolfgang Calixtus, in 1529 preacher in Cronswitz. Cf. Walch, old edition, vol. XXI, 287. De Wette III, 481; V, 301.
They would have accepted the sermon with earnestness, for they were too much burdened with the fact that they were enemies of God.
(Cordatus No. 768.)
Jonas said that he had heard from many teachers [doctoribus] that they wanted a reformation of the church, but no one among them had dared to say anything against the pope. Luther said: "I also knew that it was said about him [the Pabst] that he said: Do not touch me! And Staupitz said to me: "If you write something against the pope, you will have the whole world against you; for the church is founded by blood, watered with blood and propagated. But whoever has a fearful conscience to do something against the pope, just read his canons, think about the abomination of the mass and the like, and he will become stronger.
116. a different.
(The first. paragraph Cordatus No. 804.)
The book of John Cappella on the conformity of Christ and Franciscus is so full of lies that its author seems to have been possessed by the devil, not only spiritually but also physically. Among other things, he also says that Christ ceded judgment to Franciscus, that he himself should judge the brothers according to his Rule. These are lies that require more faith than the articles of faith.
In Lüneburg, in a monastery, there still stands to this day a carved large altar, in which the birth, all works and miracles of Christ, also his entry into Jerusalem, imprisonment, suffering, death, descent into hell, resurrection and ascension into heaven were carved, and also next to it Francis' birth, miracles, suffering, death and ascension into heaven were set and made; so that St. Francis' works of the Lord were counted and considered equal to Christ's miracles and sufferings; which was a great blasphemy.
Item: The pope, as they say, is supposed to have taken all Lutherans and their wives into his grace, if they only preach and teach what he wants, and consider their wives to be whores and cooks. Fie on you, said
D. Martinus, what can the devil do! He lets adultery go unpunished. To disrespect marriage is human, but to condemn it is to despise God. Witzel will do the same with his wife; I would not advise a pious woman to stay with him like that.
(The following Cordatus No. 1272.)
The pope is a mocker of God and of men; for he ridicules religion and the world regiment and all respectability in general. He has proven this very well, since his illegitimate son married the illegitimate daughter of the emperor.
117 Comparison of the Empires, Christ, the Pope and Turks.
(Enthaltm in Cap. 7, § 92.)
118. the fornication of the priests.
One told D. M. Luther that a reformation had been made among the canons of C. and N., and the canons had been forced to leave their cooks and to do away with them. This would have lasted for fourteen days, because they could neither abstain nor refrain from them any longer. Therefore they took her back to them; but they, the cooks, did not want to, so they promised them that they would keep her with them and defend her. Then they had to dress them again, so that they were not known.
And it is said that a small blacksmith or locksmith said: He had to work very hard in fourteen days, day and night, just to make keys. For every woman wanted to have a key to the priest's house, because they had put away the whores etc.
Then D. Martinus said: "I wish that our Lord God would not be mocked in this way: one should not act so lightly with God's order and commandment. For since the godly can hardly stand, how will the scoffers, the godless and blasphemers fare? But the godless papists have their god, the pope. As a great doctor said, "If I serve the pope faithfully, I will be blessed and have enough left over for salvation; for if I am given a monk's
If you show me the cap when I die and tell me the rest of the works of the monks on which I rely, I will be blessed.
So I also thought, since I was a monk, if I had left the cell without a shepherd 1) I would have committed a great mortal sin and would have despaired. Is it not a great, horrible abomination that one should trust and rely on such foolish work? since one should give such honor to the Lord Christ alone. One should be sorry for the papacy for the sake of this one piece and error.
What the pope held with the Semen of Rome about the immortality of the soul. 2)
(This first paragraph in Cordatus No. 298.)
Once, when two young people were reciting a comedy (or something like that) in front of Leo the Tenth about the immortality of the soul, and one of them claimed that it was immortal and the other that it was mortal, the holy father answered that the former was right, but the words of the latter made a happy face. This was the saying of this God of the earth, that the truth of the true God makes no one happy, but all sad.
The Christian church should have such evil-doers and epicureans as rulers. Thus it was decided at the Concilio in Basel that the priests should wear long skirts down to the ankles, high shoes, wide plates, and no red or green dress: and one should not dispute whether the soul is mortal or immortal.
The pope is a king without God and marriage. For what is divine he has taken away; then he has changed what God has ordered and established in the world, as, marriage.
120. pope Gregory has ordered the thirtieth to hold soul monks for the deceased. 3)
The Trigesimä, thirty masses for the dead, were invented by Pope Gregory,
1) Scapular, shoulder dress. Cf. Walch, St. Louis Edition, Vol. XIII, 2427, § 12.
2) Cf. this narration also in the Genesis. Walch, St. Louis Edition, Vol. I, Col. 1243, § 109.
3) Cf. cap. 27, § 14. Cf. also Walch, old edition, vol. XIX, 1387 f., U 165. 166.
and stood at eight hundred years. He was so holy, even superstitious, that he condemned a brother who had forgotten three florins, which he had not calculated in his office when he died, over the table and had such money thrown into the grave and thirty masses said to have delivered him from purgatory. O of the great abomination!
Tetzel's ungodly boldness with his indulgences gave M. Luthern cause to write.
Tetzel made it so crude, 4) that it had to be grasped, for he wrote and taught that the indulgence of the pope was the reconciliation between God and man. On the other hand, that the indulgence would nevertheless be strong and valid, since man would have neither newness nor sorrow, or would do penance. Yes, if one had impregnated the Virgin Mary, he could forgive him. He could also forgive the sin that one would be willing to commit in the future. Item: that the indulgence cross, which the pope would have erected, would be like the cross of the Lord Christ, and would have the same power etc. Such and such abominations caused me to sit down and write against them, not for the sake of some man or money.
The pope is a heretic, exalting himself above God's word.
(Lauterbach, Feb. 24, 1538, p. 40.)
Augustine and others make this distinction between a heretic, a schismatic, and a bad Christian: a heretic is one who deviates from the articles of faith; a schismatic is one who holds the same faith but disagrees because of some customs; a bad Christian is one who holds both but lives evil. They dare not call us heretics, but schismatics. But the pope is a heretic for me and I for him, because he is the opponent of Christ, and I the opponent of the pope (antipope). For he, the pope, unashamedly teaches that the priesthood of Christ is transferred to the governor of Christ, and thus denies the eternal priesthood of Christ.
4) Cf. § 85 of this Cap. at the end.
Just look at the two cuncta 105 of this chapter] in his decree, where he rises with great majesty above the authority of the Scriptures. In the interpretation of Scripture, he admits the Fathers, but when it comes to judging individual cases, he prefers the prestige of the apostolic chair, because he himself wants to be the Lord of Scripture, over whom no one is to judge. That is why he already flashes against me, also against his own canons. For he himself says: Custom shall give way to truth, in the 19th Distinction, and adds the example of King Hezekiah, who destroyed the bronze serpent (2 Kings 18:4). However, he does not follow this canon at all. For he does not want to give way to the truth in his countless, palpable errors. This is the most serious thing, that the youth does not see these errors, nor does he know them, nor does he think differently, as if it had always been so in the course of the Gospel. God led me strangely into the game of attacking the dragon, so that I disturbed monks and nuns and hanged the pope over it. If we had respected the word of God, those errors and idolatries would not have arisen. Let us, I beg you, follow this advice of God: "This is what you shall hear. (Matth. 17, 5.) Let us stay with the dear son and doctor.
The Pabstical denies the power of godliness.
The papacy has a beautiful, glittering worship, praises God's word, faith, Christ, sacrament, love, hope, etc., but denies the power of all this, teaches that it is radically contrary and alien. That is why St. Paul says in 2 Tim. 3, 5 that they "deny the power of godliness"; does not mean that they do not have godliness after their life, or that they deny godliness, but that they deny their power with false and superstitious teaching.
The Roman church ship.
D. Martinus showed a tablet on which was painted how the pope with his superstition and idolatry has betrayed the whole world; namely: the church little ship was full of monks and priests, who handed and threw
The pope sat with the patriarchs, cardinals and bishops in the back of the ship, overshadowed and covered with the Holy Spirit, and looked toward heaven. This is a very old painting, conceived and poetized by a Pauline monk in Venice, which we have all believed to be an article of faith, indeed, against the Christian faith.
So it was with the Veronica in Rome, which is only a black board hung with two silk cloths, since only one is taken away and shown. Thus, the people are persuaded with a fictitious picture, as if it were properly painted, and yet it is only a black panel, on which nothing is not written. So are the heads of St. Peter and St. Paul in Rome, carved in the courtyard of St. Peter's Cathedral, over which these verses are written against the morning and the exit of the sun:
Ecclesiam pro mari rego, mihi climata mundi Sunt mare, scripturae retia, piscis homo.
This is:
The church I rule for the sea, The whole world is for the sea me. The holy scripture is the net of mine, there to fahn people to be the fish.
This is Pabst's glory and triumph.
The blasphemy of Tetzel and the ingratitude of the world.
When Tetzel's blasphemy was spoken of, and he spoke of his lies with splendid, pompous words, D. Martinus said: "We are in the utmost blindness and blasphemy. Martinus said: "We are stuck in extreme blindness and blasphemy; now, because we have been redeemed from this through the Gospel, by the pure grace of God, we are also ungrateful on our part, even full, provoking God to anger from both parts with horrible blasphemies and ingratitude.
Oh, dear God, do not punish us according to our sins; help us to mend our ways. If then we are scolded and patronized for our ingratitude, let us easily recover from our loss; but our adversaries must be overthrown and fall to the ground, for they overdo it with their blasphemy.
The first is the first of the two.
Satan, the worst enemy of the Lord Christ and His gospel, has suffered all idols to be worshipped, onions, garlic, serpents, priests, farts and such shameful abominations; as St. Paul Rom. 1:21, 23. They have "given to creatures the glory that is due to God alone, and have changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image like that of corruptible man, and of birds, and of four-footed and creeping animals"; nor has the wicked forgotten the monk's cap, that one puts it on the dead, and thereby eradicates sin.
This superstition and idolatry is such a great abomination that if I had not seen it with my eyes, and if it had been written alone, that it had been so, I would not have believed it. And it has come about that almost all kings have accepted an order: The king in France St. Michael's order; England St. George's order; the emperor the golden coat etc. Thus such abominable errors have captured and taken over the hearts of all men. This has been the devil's desire, joy and pleasure. The pope knew this well and proved it when he fulfilled the will of his creator, the devil, and despised God and man. And now, the brighter the gospel comes to light, the more brazenly he sins. He has filled all the kingdoms with cardinals, who are weaklings, effeminate and unlearned asses, lying in king's courts, in women's rooms and courting. He has taken over all countries with cardinals and bishops. Our Germany is even filled with bishops, for there are probably forty bishoprics, except for the abbeys and monasteries, which are richer than the bishoprics. Again, only about 28 principalities are found in Germany. Thus, the bishops are much more powerful than the princes in Germany. That is why the papists are so defiant, relying on their money and force; and we do not see that in these twenty years a single bishop has converted and reformed.
The bishop of M., since he had the prophets
read in our Bible, is said to have said: If I find nothing in it, but how we are scolded as priests? And it is true that the writings of the prophets are like thunderbolts against the false prophets and bishops. That is why the papists' great troop supports 1) and maintains the pope's kingdom and captures and imprisons all countries. But the German princes do not pay attention to this and do not want to notice how the pope devours and eats up the whole world, according to the prophecy of Daniel.
127 The Pabst's Faith.
The pope thinks: Should I give way to a single monk who wants to take away my crown and majesty? Oh, that is not for me to advise. Oh! I would give both my hands, which I would not like to lose one of, so that I could believe in Christ as firmly and surely as he, the pope, believes that Christ is nothing.
The pope devastates all the order of God.
The pope, the antichrist of Rome, is subject to destroy everything that is God's and to set up his abominations. Because he condemns church, worldly and house regiment. These three hierarchies and orders of God, without which the world cannot exist, he shits. Because from the household come fruits of the body, children and multiplication of many persons. Of worldly government come laws, order, rights, protection and protection from unrighteous violence. From the church eternal life and blessedness. Therefore, God is not unreasonably angry with the pope; it is no wonder that sometimes a city perishes, becomes theurial, war breaks out, and all kinds of plagues, pestilences and diseases come. But in all these there is more mercy than wrath. For though one or some perish and die, yet many remain alive. If one is a murderer and a slayer, there are many who protect him; if one year there is war because of the wickedness of the land, there are many years of peace.
1) So Stangwald instead of "stötzelt".
The papists' spiritual state is a godless state, and yet they want to govern and reform the church.
The papists boast that they are the Church and that the authority of the Council is with them; they want to have the power to assemble it, to recognize and conclude it, and they want to reform everything; since they have neither knowledge nor understanding of the Holy Scriptures, know less about them than a child, and are much worse than the Sadducees, 1) who, to some extent, kept a fine outward discipline and conduct; but these, the Papists, are utterly godless, blasphemers and sodomites, and still want to reform the church with outward ceremonies and customs: But if the doctrine is not reformed, it is in vain that one dares to reform the ceremonies and the life. . For superstition, superstition, and pretended holiness or hypocrisy cannot be known but by word and faith, since there are two kinds of holiness: one essential or internal, which is righteous in itself; the other accidental, or external, or hypocritical. So, St. Francis was righteous, essentially and inwardly holy, through faith in Jesus Christ, but after that he was deceived by outward and hypocritical holiness. It is neither a natural nor a formally accidental thing, but an abominable, unnatural monster.
Oh, dear Lord God, shall we go to heaven with our clothes on, since we have to stay outside with this flesh, skin and hair, as it is now? We must not take on ourselves caps or ropes; we would have caps and orders enough, and enough to do, each in his profession and state: a preacher with his teaching; a magistrate with his governing; a schoolmaster with his teaching and instructing, to keep the boys in good discipline and obedience. Thus the whole world is filled with monks' caps, more than we can bear. My cap, which I now have to wear, has more than a hundred thousand folds; and so every man's profession weighs him down and weighs him down.
1) Cf. § 131 of this Cap.
130 The fornication of the papists.
Pope Paul the Third had a sister. Before he became pope, he gave her to the pope as a bridegroom, and thus earned that he was made a cardinal. Then he immediately left his wife and took her from him, for he was in wedlock and had begotten a son, who is now a cardinal. The popes have done such disgraceful deeds that go far beyond human thoughts. The priests had to give him, as a whore landlord, a florin from their cooks when they had a child, which was called a milk penny, and likewise a florin from the mother. And finally, all priests were allowed to have whores with them, without all shame and disgrace, from which they fled like the devil from incense. As it is also forbidden in the spiritual law. .
I know of a city where the priests' cooks were held in great honor at weddings and in bathhouses, and they were called Frau Dechantin, Frau Pröbstin, Frau Sängerin etc. according to the offices their masters held. Therefore, D. Staupitz jokingly reproached the bishop of M[ainz], saying: He would be the greatest whoremaster in Germany, because no whoremaster, even in the richest house of muhmen, would not have more than fifty florins annually for interest, but he would have five hundred florins, and probably more. The bishop laughed and said, "Yes, that's how they pay the clerks in the chancellery.
(This paragraph in Lauterbach, Sept. 12, 1538, p. 130.)
A canon at Wuerzburg took away by force from a bridegroom his just married wife and said: "If it pleases you, allow it, then you shall have mercy on me, your Lord; but if not, then you must still suffer it. He replied, "These are sodomitical [sins] that cry out to heaven, as it is said in Genesis 6 (v. 2), "They took as wives whom they pleased," nor did they shun blood relations.
131. vain glory of the popes.
What is it that the papists boast that they are the church § since they are the church's enemies?
and know nothing of the Holy Scriptures, much less understand them. Popes, cardinals, bishops have never read the Bible, it is alien to them, indeed, they are lazy, idle, rich guards, who rely on their power, consider and care for nothing less than God's will; as Erasmi's Dialogus by Pope Julio indicates. The Sadducees were much more pious than the Papists, who were outwardly pious; but the Papists are utterly godless, blasphemers and sodomites. Our dear Lord God protect us from their holiness. Let us pray against security, for out of it comes ingratitude, then contempt, soon blasphemy, and finally persecution. Thus the devil leads us to the utmost.
132) When the article of the resurrection of the dead is to be believed in the papacy. 1)
In the Lateran Council, which was held in the year after Christ's birth in 1515 during the life of Pope Julii and was completed after his death under Pope Leo, it was first recognized and decided that one should believe in the resurrection of the dead, and that a cardinal should have five boys as paramours and eunuchs; which, however, Pope Leo subsequently changed. There must be something behind it, from which a devastation will follow. Therefore let us pray; they will have to fall who still want to defend this.
The book of the birth of the desolate abomination of the Antichrist, who is a son.
of hypocrisy, the son of the devil.
(As Stangwald notes p. 846, this pasquill is not by Luther, but by another theologian, therefore omitted).
134) The lies of the Antichrist. 2)
(Lauterbach, March 27, 1538, p. 49.)
After that, someone said of the Antichrist's imaginings, whose kingdom, as they would have dreamed, would come not long before the Last Day-
1) This § in other relation, Cap. 27, § 21, para. 4.
2) Another redaction of this §, also by Lauterbach, is Cap. 27. § 65.
with many signs and punishments, so that the people would live so without understanding that they would not become aware that the Antichrist was already reigning. Luther answered: They are fiction, but much agrees with Daniel. For the judgment of the pope is fire. He attacks with fire. The Turk strikes with sabers. The Antichrist punishes with fire and will be punished with fire according to the proverb: You have thirsted for blood, drink blood. The pope is already trembling and in a certain way he is excelling and cloaking the fox, because he himself is being gnawed by his defenders. Henry, the Duke of Brunswick, seizes the bishopric of Hildesheim, the emperor has invaded the two bishoprics of Liège sand] Frankstein, and the pope agrees. The pope has to suffer this and you will see even greater things, although the pope hopes for the end of the sickness attack and that he can flash against the invaders.
135. of the pope's and his ignorance and blindness in the matters of god.
(Lauterbach, March 27, 1538, p. 48.)
Then Erasmus of Rotterdam was remembered, a very good and very learned man, who, however, having been corrupted by Venice and Rome, had turned to Epicurism, which he kept hidden. However, he praised the Arians more than the orthodox (Catholicos). For he dared to claim that Christ was called God only once in the whole New Testament, John 20 [v. 28]: "My Lord, and my God"; by concluding: "Behold, Christ is called God only once, more often man and son of man. If Christ were more often called God and Son of God, and not man, the Manichaeans would be given the opportunity. How should our Lord God do it? Well, Erasmus is gone. I have forgiven him all his attacks, but I cannot stand his Catechism, in which he teaches nothing certain, but confuses and casts doubt on everything and wants to make the youth doubtful. This is what the Roman court and Epicurism set up. We also have in Germany a whole society of Epicurians: the Crotus, Mutianus,
Justus Menius. 1) In short, the Italians are nefarious and epicurean. No pope nor cardinal has read the Bible in six hundred years. They understand less of the Catechism than my little daughter. God protect us from such blindness and leave us his divine word. The papists realize their shame and fear their own conscience. They do not fear us because they take heart and say: Olim passi graviora, dabit deus his quoque finem. [Aen. I, 199.] [I.e. We have endured heavier things in the past, God will put an end to this thing too? The seizure will cease one day. Hence the saying arose among the papists: Peter's little ship sways, but it does not sink. But the heart has slipped away from them through their own conscience. They innocently strangled the pious Johannes Huß, who did not deviate from the papacy by the width of a nail. He only taught and plucked at life and morality; he sinned nothing against Pabstism, just as Christ committed nothing against the Pharisees and yet had to die. But now Johannes Huß must be smelled, according to the prophecy of Johannes Hilten in Eisenach, who is also killed in our time; he is said to have said while dying: Another will come and you will see him. That prophecy happened when I was a young man. In short, the perilous times are already here, as Paul laments, "For there will be a time" etc. [Luther read the whole text and said: "When I read this passage, I thought of Turks and Jews and not of Rome, since he clearly tells us to go away from the pope and paints us the monks honestly. No one believes that these are words of the Holy Spirit who reminds us. Peter in his letter [2 Petr. 2, 13. ff.] describes them excellently as proud in words, since nothing is behind,öéëÞäïíïõò [devoted to pleasure],
who live there without shyness, without work.
136. Daniel's prophecy from the pope.
Daniel, Cap. 12, 1. [11, 36.], has foretold of a tyrant, who "will want to be
1) Seidemann: Cf. my references in Burkhardt p. 198 s.
against the God of gods, and against everything that is called God", that is, against all divine order, and against all worship, and what is called God, whom we honor, and who is preached in the church. This is the right description of the pope, because he is against the church, the police and the household. He is against the church, the police and the household, against God's word, the authorities and the married state.
The Papal Church is not the Christian Church.
The Bishop of Mainz said: 2) I know that we have an unjust and evil thing, and that Luther's teaching is right, nevertheless we do not want to accept it. Likewise, the Cardinal of Salzburg, Bishop Lang, said: 3) We know and it is written in our consciences that it is right and just that the priests may become married, and that marriage is better than the abominable and shameful fornication practiced by the priests, but we do not want to change it; for the Emperor will not let Germany be disturbed for the sake of consciences.
What is that different from despising God? They are devilish words. God, in turn, also mocks them; as we see that emperors, kings, princes and all imperial cities fall away from them, and they can neither protect nor excuse themselves any more than with the name of the church, and nevertheless rage and rage against their own conscience. For they know well that the church is subject to God's word, and cannot be anywhere except where Christ is taught and preached. Now they must confess, even against their thanks, that our teaching is Christ's teaching. Why then will they not hear us?
The boys know that the papacy is not. The boys know that the papacy is not God's church, yet they all cry out in unison; and they know that they cannot exist or protect themselves with this title, yet they want to protect themselves with it. The church is where Christ is taught and preached. We teach Christ, as they themselves say, and yet they do not want to hear us; therefore the papacy is not God's church. Nor will we yield nor allow God to be over the church, and not the church over God.
2) Cf. Cap. 9, § 4.
3) Cf. § 54 of this Cap. towards the end.
138 The Papists' Deception.
(Lauterbach, May 12, 1538, p. 81.)
In these days came from England the servant of D. Johannes Thixtollus, Remigius, who said many praiseworthy and glorious things about the country and the government, how they hoped with great desire for the gospel; even some bishops taught sincerely against the abominable abomination of Pabstism. The name of the Wittenbergers, Luther's and Philip's, was highly famous, and those were already held in honor who had only been in Wittenberg and could tell something about it. He said of the very well cultivated land of their region, and told of the frauds of the monks at Candelbrugk, who had made a Crucifix with changeable countenances, [movable] mouth, lips; it could bend, had features and buttons on the back, and many people would have been moved to the highest veneration; but now in the last few weeks the intrigues had been revealed by the visit of the king, and shown publicly by the bishop in London. And at last, he said, this image had been led through the streets everywhere and destroyed. Luther replied: "The image should be kept in memory, as our Elector has an image of the Holy Virgin, who carries the infant Jesus in her arms, which would also be movable by its features, because it would not have wanted to look at the praying people, but turned towards its mother, so that they would seek mediation there, 1) and then it turned with outstretched arms towards the praying people.
139. from the papist mass, as they are now flowering.
(Cordatus No. 531.)
We have very great refuters of our apology. Faber writes against the article of justification. Eck against the power of the pope and human traditions; Cochläus against the marriage of priests and for the invocation of the saints. Now they call the mass a mysterious sacrifice. Let them go here.
1) Instead of quaereret, with Bindseil III, 252, quaererent might be read.
I want to coat their stilts. Those boys recant everything; for they have called the mass a justifying, sufficient and propitiatory sacrifice, and which would be above all good for sale. But if it is a secret, that is, a sealed one, then it is not a true sacrifice, and the people will withdraw their hand.
140 The papists' murderousness.
(Cordatus No. 250.)
Under Leo the Tenth there were two monks in the Augustinian monastery, 2) who, moved by the infamy of the papacy, had spoken something against the pope in their sermons; and behold, in one night assassins entered, cut off the heads of both of them and stuck their cut-out tongues in their buttocks. Julius treated Egidius, a very learned Roman, more humanly, although he had spoken very sharply against him, as he once did in a sermon to the Roman citizens, which he began: "Go to the castle which is against you, for it is called the Castle of the Holy Angel [Engelsburg], the Pope's trust and confidence, the fortress. This one, who was also an Augustinian monk, Julius made Cardinal. Cordatus was present at this sermon. 3)
141 Another of the Papist Murderers.
(Lauterbach, Aug. 6, 1538, p. 110.)
On August 6, a letter arrived from Bucer, in which it was announced that the Council in Vicenza had ended, and that the Cardinals had left, and that in many large cities the Gospel was being preached publicly with great constancy, in Piacenza, Bologna, and that the Pope was very angry. He had called a German, named Corfontius, to Rome with a safe escort 4). When he arrived there and wanted to go to the pope, he was thrown from the bridge into the Tiber. He answered: "This is the faithfulness of the papists. Blessed is he who does not trust the scoundrels in this way.
2) In Rome.
3) For this section, see Cap. 77, 81, third paragraph.
4) In the original: dona üäs. From it refers afterwards: üäs8 Italy, the French loyalty.
But if those in Italy remain firm in preaching the gospel, it will cost much blood. Behold, they have plotted against us from day to day in Germany with marvelous plots, that we are not safe from them for an hour, since they have decided, only this summer, on various cunning war plots against us in many places. If the Lord had not watched over us, we would have long since slept through it. As in these days, the landgrave has occupied Münster as a lord, with the bishop's permission. The imperial forces tried to capture this city in every possible way.
142: The Pabst's Mouth.
The 37th Psalm was read at the table, in which David speaks of the trouble when the wicked are rich and prosperous, mocking the poor and afflicted saints, as if God knew and respected them nothing. But they and their holy works, what they teach and say, must be a delicious thing, and entirely heavenly, divine wisdom and holiness; their person boasts like a fat belly; they do what they only think of; they destroy everything, and speak evil of it, and speak and blaspheme higher. What they speak must be spoken from heaven; what they say must be valid on earth etc.
Thus is the teaching of the pope about his power: You are Peter etc. and about indulgences etc., so that they challenged Johann Hussen and me, and brought them on the plan; for they stopped, pressed hard on it, closed and said: Because the pope says it, one must believe it. Although Johannes Huß has not yet understood correctly what the papacy is, he has only recognized some abuses, and has argued from the life of the person of the pope. But we go from the person and life to his doctrine, which we dispute, and say: If the pope were St. Peter, he would be a godless knave and devil.
The first is the first of a series of new books.
(Cordatus No. 508.)
When someone asked how St. James had come to Compostella, he replied:
How it happened that eighteen apostles were buried in Germany, when Christ had only twelve. For in Tolosa 1) six are buried, one of them is Matthias, who is also buried in Trier, likewise in Rome. And what do they boast of the milk of the Virgin Mary? Of the hay from the manger of Christ? When a priest had stolen this from the box of a stationer 2) and put coals in it for him, and the latter wanted to show it in the pulpit, he found coals instead of the hay; then the stationer lied out of it quite nicely: he had not taken the right box, because in this one the coals were contained, with which Laurentius would have been roasted. Not only did we believe such big lies, but they were also honored with all our money and goods. Now they despise not only the word but also its servants, so much so that poor people are dying of hunger. And in this they do not accept any admonition. The visitators do not do anything, because one waits for God as a visitator of such great ingratitude.
The abominations of the papists should not be forgotten.
(Cordatus No. 1469.)
One should not give it to the papists and expose them again, because they want to burn themselves white again. They should be disgraced with facts, examples and their own teachings. Just read Gabriel 3) about the Canon of the Mass, which
1) Here is an error in the Latin manuscript: Nam Tolosae et sepulti sunt, which gives no sense. The assumptions, which Mr. D. Wrampelmeyer makes, do not give any satisfaction. Therefore, we have seen ourselves compelled to leave it in this case with the reading of Aurifaber's table speeches, which at least gives a sense. Tolosa may not mean Toulouse, but the city in Spain. Whether there should be apostle graves there, we do not know of course. That Luther would count Toulouse or Tolosa to Germany does not follow, just as little as that he would have counted Rome, which is mentioned immediately after, to Germany. Luther only wants to say that there are such fictitious sanctuaries in great numbers at all ends of the world: what wonder that in Germany alone eighteen apostles are buried, or St. James in Compostella?
2) Reliquaries. Cf. No. 791 in § 72 of this chapter" where 8tutionuriu8 grutlus stands for Ablaßkrämer.
3) Gabriel Viel from Speier, the last important nominalist scholastic, provost at Urach and since 1484 teacher of theology at Tübingen, died 1495.
is the best book of the papists, nor how shameful thing is in it! It was my best book before times.
145 Of feast of Corporis Christi.
(Cordatus No. 1470.)
The Corpus Christi feast, the most apparent of all, has suppressed the institution of Christ by its pretense and ceremonies. Beware of such services.
146 Pillars of the Pabstium.
The pabst is the true antichrist, 1 Tim. 4, 1. His castle and fortress is Maosim, that is, the mass; as Daniel says when he calls him a destroyer of religion and the household, worship and women, Dan. 12, 1. 2. 3. [1l, 36. 37. 38.] What? The papacy has abolished the grace of religion and faith.
147 The Papist Prayer.
The papists pray these words daily: God is love etc. And no one is further from love than they themselves.
148 Of Jubilee Year.
(Cordatus No. 612.)
The jubilee year in the old confederation was a very common service, namely every fifty years. The pope followed this with the golden gate, which is rightly called so because it brought the pope innumerable gold. Since this very large profit had always increased, it pleased the pope more and more. That is why he postponed the jubilee years from one hundred years to the fiftieth, then to the twenty-fifth, and also to the fifteenth, yes, even to the seventh year, so that he would always have fresh money, so that the years were also too long for him. This he did, and all praised it etc.
149. the pope's stubbornness, fierceness and persecution.
(Cordatus No. 1500.)
The fire in Neudruck 1) is the sign of a great wrath of God; because the citizens
1) Perhaps Neumarkt, now part of Halle, is meant. (Wrampelmeyer.)
say that within two hours everything stood and was consumed by fire and collapsed, and the fire was no different than if there had been three soldiers in each house who had set it on fire with powder, and even in that way such a conflagration could not have happened. And yet the papists do not go into themselves, but erect a church again at the greatest expense to the disgrace of the gospel, as if their worship were eternal and the gospel would perish, just as those at Erfurt do, who restore two towers of an eternal building. But they will see that their audacity will come to an end through the gospel.
(Here 9 lines are omitted because containedm in Cap. 4, § 3.)
150: The Papist Tyranny.
On April 3, letters arrived from an honest citizen, 2) in which it was stated how Duke George 3) was cruelly tyrannizing, and wanted to force all his subjects under the papist statutes, to obey the same, but especially to the Sacrament under one figure. And whoever did not want to do it, and died because of it, should be dragged by the gravedigger on a cart or a bow out to the unconsecrated early in the morning, buried without ringing and singing, chanting and chanting; as recently happened to D. Specht, who was nevertheless Christianly different. For one.
Secondly: Eighty persons were examined and interrogated by the council on account of the Lutheran doctrine, and sought and urged among them that they wanted to renounce it; but by the grace of God, they had almost all constantly made their confession. But he, the same citizen, would have answered: I have confessed, and confess gladly, for it is my greatest consolation, but I have not yet received the sacrament in both forms, but I will do so, and I appended it to the same letter: My date is out to the gate, God strengthen me. Then Doctor Martinus said, "May God grant this," and read a note in which a very frightful
2) Gengelbach in Leipzig. Bindseil 1, 137.
3) Thus Bindseil 1, 138.
The bishop of Merseburg had driven him to recant the Gospel and to condemn the Sacrament, taken in both forms, as the highest heresy, along with the entire Lutheran doctrine, and he thanked God that he had repented, and had again come to terms, offered to suffer everything about it. This I swear by God and His holy Gospel. 1)
Thirdly, he read a printed document, issued by the bishop of Meissen, in which he announced that he wanted to confirm children at Easter; therefore they should come to Meissen at the same time and have the children confirmed, praised and praised the confirmation very much, but childishly enough, not to mention unchristian. Martinus said: "This will not end well, they will go to ruin with it, because they are doing against their conscience, because they have confessed that we are not heretics; they say that our doctrine is God's word, but they do not want to suffer it, much less accept it; they are going straight against the peace that is given by the imperial majesty, but they will not achieve anything with it. God's power is wondrous; the more they rage, the more Christ rules, as Psalm 110, v. 2, says: "Rule among your enemies. As if he wanted to say: You must have me, you will or you will not. This they will learn within a few years, if the world stands otherwise, as the gospel will take revenge against the godless nature of the pope, the bishops and the cathedral pontiffs, who persecute the recognized truth, as they themselves say it is true, and speak: Because we do not like it, we do not want to accept it, nor allow others to accept it. So they do not want to give way at all; they are worried that they will lose their power and goods. For the sacrificial measure and the celibate state are the two pillars of the priesthood, on which it is founded and built; which Christ our Samson made strong, and shall fall with great hurt to the world.
1) This is the oath formula imposed by Duke George on his subjects. Cf. Walch, old edition, Vol. XIX,
151. oath of those who are to recant and renounce their error.
(This § is Walch, old edition, Vol. XIX, 2277, No. XXVII.)
152. form of the oath of revocation.
(Here a paragraph is omitted because contained in Walch, old edition, Vol. XIX, 2276, No. XXVI.)
Then D. S. asked: 2) Whether D. Martinus was crying that Duke George was seriously pursuing the gospel? Said the doctor: Yes, he is so blinded that he cannot stand the truth. In the first he publicly resisted the truth out of a hatred which he himself knew to be the right truth; but because he knowingly strove against it, out of pure malice, God has struck him with blindness and madness, so that now in broad daylight, like a blind man groping toward the wall, he can no longer see or recognize the truth, must accept lies for truth, darkness for light.
But there are two cases. 3) The first happens out of weakness, as St. Peter fell, which God can well credit and forgive. For he says: "Well then, because you know me for a Lord, believe my word and give me honor, go away, be forgiven, do it no more. The other case is done out of stubbornness and willfulness, as when one confesses and says, "Yes, this is God's word; nevertheless fight and strive against it. That is the devil, there is no more counsel nor help.
One of them said: Duke George 4) nevertheless keeps a good regiment, is a fine, wise prince who governs well? Answered D. Martinus: Let it be that he is a fine prince of the world, what does our Lord God care about that? For with such an appearance and such a masquerade he is wont to deceive the world and to make it a nose that looks only at such worldly virtues, which also many godless kings, princes and lords, even among the Gentiles, have had; as, Saul, Ahab, Aristides, Augustus, and such like rulers, have been fine skilful worldly men, who governed well.
2) D. Sebaldus of Nuremberg. Bindseil 1, 140.
3) Cf. Cap. 13, §51, third paragraph; Cap. 9, 856.
4) Thus Bindseil 1, 140.
and had great fortune, as our Lord God casts such outward temporal gifts into the Rapuse. 1) But David, the pious, God-fearing king, though he was fortunate enough, for he had conquered the Philistines, the Moabites, the Edomites, the Syrians etc.; yet he was miserable at home in his house, a miserable, sorrowful man, all was full of trouble, because of adultery and murder: there the brother slept with the sister, one murdered the other: Absalom stirred up rebellion against his own father, whom he drove out of the kingdom. And even though his reign was not as happy and respectable as that of the other godless kings, as far as the outward appearance was concerned, he still had God's word pure, which he honored and promoted with faithful diligence, thus breaking the heart of our Lord God, which the others did not do, therefore they also had to go to ruin and perish miserably.
153 The Malice of the Papists.
(Cordatus No. 1363. 1364.)
If I had not been a doctor, the devil would have given me a lot of trouble; for it is not so easy to attack things and to accuse the whole papacy, and nevertheless I would have gladly obeyed the pope and all the bishops, but since they do not want my obedience unless I deny Christ and his gospel, I would rather challenge them than make God a liar.
In baptism and in the first commandment, we all vow to hold fast to God, and in all the temptations we overcome, this vow of ours is renewed. Otherwise I would have died long ago.
Whether the pope is about a concilium.
Doctor Luther said that Gerson was the first one whom our Lord God started to enlighten in this last time of the world, and he has been comforting to many people and consciences. But the pope condemned him, because he started to dispute,
1) Cf. cap. 2, § 129.
whether the pope was about a concilium; and wrote a Dialogum about it, which pleased me exceedingly. He introduces two persons, as the Detrectatorem and Adulatorem, the disputed ones of the pope. He would have liked to have found a medium that one should not give the pope too much, nor too little.
At Augsburg, Anno 1518, when I appealed to a concilium from the pope, the Cardinal called me a Gersonist; then I answered: I do it by command and order of the Concilii at Costnitz, because the same has first opposed the pope, and the pope has deposed three. Then the Cardinal said: O est reprobatum illud Concilium, it is no longer valid; for the pope wanted to be above the Concilia and above God's word. But because now the bright light of the Gospel shines, there is a great contempt for the divine word. And this is what the Lord Christ says John 3:19: "This is the judgment, that the light came into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light." However, in the same place he also says: "Believe in the light, because you have it, so that you may be children of the light", Joh. 12, 35. But we do not listen and do not let ourselves be told, we also do like the Jews. Luther once said this to Hieronymo Besoldo of Nuremberg.
D. Martinus also said at another time to M. Veit Dietrich: that Panormitanus Canonista pretended that privati hominis sententia praeferenda sit toti Concilio, si sit rationalis, aut melior, testimoniis Scripturae confirmata; and introduced the example of Paphnutii. But for the sake of his opinion he was excommunicated by the pope. cirt.
155 M. Veit Ammerbach's pretense that the pope should be the external head of the church.
There was a professor artium at Wittenberg, named M. Vitus Ammerbachius, who pretended that in the Christian church there should nevertheless be an external head, and that one should recognize and accept the pope for such a head. M. Luther said: "Graecia has never been under the pope, India, nor Scythia, like St. Hierony.
mus writes, since yet many more devout Christians have been. How do they come with the lazy argument, quod Ecclesia debet habere externum caput, videlicet Romanum Pontificem? But the whole Historia Ecclesiastica is against it, the whole Occidens has not been sub Papa, Totus Orions also not. It is only a Superbia with Ammerbach. O Lord God, who thus falls, that is a case above all cases. I am sorry for him, he will fall into other errors more. They are poor people, they do not think of the hour that will come to them.
Luther further said: "Wittenberg nevertheless gives quite a lot of swarms. But how to do it? It is said, as St. John says in his first epistle, Cap. 2, 19: "They went out from us, but were not of us." The false apostles and brothers had to come from the apostles. Where does the devil come from? From angels. Where do the harlots come from? From virgins. Where do the jacks come from? From pious people. The evil thing must come from the good. Where did Cain come from? From Adam and Eve.
The papists' lies are public.
(Lauterbach, May 21, 1538, p. 84.)
The papists boast much against us of this example: Arius also ruled for a long time, more than four years, 1) and then he was ruined; the same will happen to the Lutherans. To them I answer: Arius ruled with his sect for about three hundred years, but because it was a heresy, it fell. Our opponents, however, are forced to approve our [doctrine] against their will; both the cause itself and the truth are there, but their lies come to light.
The pope is a lion and a dragon.
It is impossible that the pope can rest, if he already tolerates and bites the inflicted damage; however, he intends to avenge such dishonor with clandestine stratagems and tricks,
1) This time refers to the person of Arius, the other, three hundred years, to his followers, the Arians.
how and when he can. But it is easier to overcome a lion than a dragon. Thus St. Augustine says of the devil that he was a lion in the time of the martyrs and a dragon in the time of the heretics. Therefore let us watch and pray; for though we have martyred him in body, yet his soul still lives. Let us pray without ceasing and with confidence, for it is of great need, "for we have to contend, not with flesh and blood, but with the evil spirits in the air," Eph. 6:12.
The king of England despises the pope's body, has rejected his ban and canonization, and has thrown off his yoke; but he still keeps his doctrine, still holds it dear and valuable. But the pope will not give it to him, he will bewitch him and sneak behind him with deceit and secret tricks and practices. For this king's apostasy is a bad example for Pabst's kingdom. After that, the other kings should do the same.
158 The Malice of the Papists.
It is unspeakable how great and insolent the wickedness and godlessness of the papists is. For, although they must confess that our doctrine is the right, true word of God, they dispute it and persecute it. If they taught it, it would and should be right; but because we say and teach it, it must be wrong. This is the regnum mundi, the kingdom of the world, and the devil's office, where the consequence is denied, and what goes before is admitted. This is a sin that comes not from error but from hardened malice. For even natural reason must say and conclude: If God has commanded it, then one should keep it justly. Neither would N. N. or any other prince and lord suffer that a magistrate should despise his commandment.
The papists' tyranny and despotism.
In 1539, February 21, D. C[aspar] Z[euner] 2) came to D. Martino, whom he comforted.
2) Aurifaber does have "Cellarius" as a marginal gloss, but because Rebenstock I, 78d. and Bindseil I, 143 agree: ^tnno 1539. 21 Januarii Oasxar 2in6rus vocatus in xastoreni ^riderZensern, we think the latter is more correct.
and courageously made him his appointment: because it would be God's work, he should be called upon to promote and bless the work he had begun, and to give capable servants and to raise them in pure doctrine. He also promised him that by order of the Elector, the visitators would come there in the most beneficial way and do the execution, so that he would resist the little snappers who wanted to seize the spiritual and church properties.
The devil gets in the way everywhere, so that he hinders the course of God's word. With us he does it through ingratitude and security and false brethren; thus he makes people hostile to us, thus he ropes them away from us. With foreigners and in foreign nations he does it through tyranny and murder. For in France so many people have been killed and strangled for the sake of the teaching of the Gospel that the king has finally had to forbid it to the theologians in the Sorbonne and the lords of parliament in Paris. Likewise the heretics in Hispania, if they seized one, the emperor was unable to exorcise him.
In Paris, 1) for the sake of a few words, which were in accordance with God's word, they pulled a pious, honest citizen up to a high place in front of his house, tied him to a gallows with a chain around the middle of his body, put a fire under him, let him roast for a while, and after that, when he was well tortured and martyred, let him fall into the fire, so that he completely burned to powder; his wife, who was pregnant, and his little children had to see such horrible spectacles, and after that all their goods were confiscated and taken away from them, so that he should have said once: It would be too much to give the Mother of God the honor that is due only to her Son, who alone is our only mediator and intercessor.
169. exhortation to patience in such tyranny.
It is better, said D. Martinus, that we overcome it with patience, rather than that Germany
1) Stangwald: Anno 1535.
should cause a commotion and make a noise. For Germany is a large body, and if it becomes quite active, it cannot go without great harm. As we saw and experienced in the Peasants' Revolt (1525), for the sake of a cold cause, how in such a short time such a great outrage got out of hand and increased, be silent, if the princes and estates would do together, since we were silent about it. Oh, the papists have not done with it. Even if they were to extinguish us Wittenbergs or Saxons, they would still prepare and arouse a great fire from a small spark. Therefore let us pray for peace and that they may be converted. But they would rather perish and perish with us, they are so hostile to us.
161. belly servants, who do it the way you want it, hang the coat to the wind.
It was said of D. Peter G., 2) pastor of D[resder], who was a great persecutor of the gospel, that he had improved; for he claimed that he had had to do much against his will, forced to do so; but now he wanted to follow the gospel and preach the same, so that he would remain in office. Such companions, said D. Martinus, are the papist ventriloquists, hanging their coats after the wind blows, following the time and the weather, seeking only their own, not God's glory, nor man's salvation. Nothing can be built on them.
The bitter hatred of the papists.
Doctor Martino was sent a printed booklet from the Imperial Diet, in which a gruesome agenda, and next to it writings, were full of blood. When he had read it, he said with great astonishment: "This is a miracle of God, who has allowed such letters to come to light, in which the bloody plot and atrocious tyranny of the papists is revealed, and that such great lies, invented against the wholesome teachings of Christ, are made known.
2) Bindseil 1, 144: D. Peter Eisenberg.
Praise be to God, who watches for His own who sleep, but stops and prevents the enemies' bloody plots, runs and practices.
163. persecution and rampage of the papists.
Two cities in France over which Sadoletus had been placed were burned to the ground for the sake of the Gospel, so that even the infants were not spared. That is why Calvinus would have fled to Switzerland, admonishing them that they would not consent to such atrocious tyranny and that they would renounce the alliance before the king. Then said D. Martinus said: "These are terrible and cruel deeds; Calvinus is a learned man, but very suspicious of the error of the Sacrament. Oh dear God, keep us by your word.
164. beginning of Luther's teaching with indulgences.
When Johann Tetzel proclaimed his indulgence in the castle of Wittenberg in 1517, Andreas Carlstadt sent out propositions in which he argued that no one could be granted an indulgence if he first confessed in the castle church. Against this D. Luther had opposed it, disputing that it was a privilege and not a mandate; Carlstadt had become quite angry and said to Luther: "If he knew that he was speaking in earnest, I would accuse you of being a heretic before the pope.
Doctor Luther has been fearless against the pope.
(Contained in Cap. 24, z 114.)
166: That D. M. Luther is silly, and yet leads a fine cause against the devil.
On the Sunday after Michaelmas, Anno 1541, D. Martinus was very cheerful, and joked with
his good friends over tables, respected his art and skill very little, and said to one over tables: I am silly, but you are a prankster and much more learned in rebus oeconomicis et politicis than I am. I do not take care of things, but have to deal with the Ecclesia and must look at the devil's entrenchment. I believe that, if I were to give myself to the world, I would also notice it. I believe everyone, therefore I can be cheated; but as soon as I present myself before someone, he takes nothing from me. And he said to those who were sitting at the table: Do not blame me, I am happy and in good spirits, for today I have heard many evil newspapers and now I have also read an evil letter. Now it is right that the devil should befall us in this way.
We have a good won cause, and God is with us in the game, who will soon lead it out gloriously; for they, the papists, are overdoing it and are desperate boys. The pope wants to be judge over us, since he is part, and we have accused. Bishop Albrecht of Mainz wants to burn his own cities, and has now taken by force a prisoner in one city who was a Protestant. So other people attach themselves to the Turk and give him tribute. God will make up and judge the earth, and you will soon know. Just keep God quiet, they all have to go down. Thus, D. Staupitz used to say to me, even if he was sad and distressed: God grant patience, yet nothing remains unpunished, and all history testifies that God comes and finally punishes. It is already from this that one wants to consider Luther a prophet and apostle, because he prophesied that there is nothing good in a papist. This is now found in the murder-burning. Let us wait a little. Although they are now burning themselves white because of it, but it does not help, Abel's blood cries out against them.