said nor written anything repugnant to the Scriptures, Fathers, Councils, Decretals, or reason; that his propositions were true, and that he was prepared to defend them, but, nevertheless, that he would submit them to the judgment of the three Imperial Academies of Basle, Fribourg, and Louvain, or of Paris (33).

9. The Cardinal still insisted on the three primary conditions. Luther asked time to answer in writing, and the next day presented a document, in which he advanced many opinions, not only against the value of indulgences, but also against the merits of the saints, and good works, propping up his opinions by false reasoning. Cardinal Cajetan heard him out, and then told him not again to appear before him, unless he came prepared to retract his heresy. Luther then left Augsburg, and wrote to the Cardinal, saying, that his opinions were founded on truth, and supported by reason and Scripture, but, notwithstanding, it was his wish still to subject himself to the Church, and to keep silence regarding indulgences, if his adversaries were commanded to keep silent, likewise (34). The Cardinal gave him no answer, so Luther, fearing sentence would be passed against him, appealed from the Cardinal to the Pope, and had the appeal posted on the Church doors (35). Van Ranst censures Cajetan for not imprisoning Luther, when he had him in Augsburg without a safe conduct, knowing him to be a man of such deceitful cunning, and so extinguishing, in its commencement, that great fire, which consumed so great a part of Europe, by introducing to the people a religion so much the more pernicious, as it was so favourable to sensual license. Luther himself, afterwards, deriding the whole transaction, says (36): "I there heard that new Latin language, that teaching the truth was disturbing the Church, and that denying Christ was exalting the Church." It is then he appealed, first to the Pope, and afterwards from the Pope to the Council (37).

10. The Legate, seeing the obstinacy of Luther, wrote to the Elector Frederick, telling him that this friar was a heretic, unworthy of his protection, and that he should send him to Rome, or at all events banish him from his States. The Elector immediately transmitted the letter to Luther, who, on his escape from the power of the Legate, began to make the most rabid attacks on the Pope, calling him tyrant and Antichrist: "He (the Pope) has refused peace," said he, "then let it be war, and we shall see whether Luther or the Pope shall be first hurt." Notwithstanding his boasting, the Legate's letter to the Elector terrified him, and he indited a most humble letter, declaring himself guiltless of any crime against Faith, and praying for a continuance of his protection (38). Hermant says

(33) Nat. Alex. ar. 11, sec. 4, n. 1; Gotti, c. 108, sec. 3, n. 10. (34) Nat. Alex. loc. cit.; Van Ranst, p. 302. (35) Van Ranst, p. 302. (36) Luther, t. 1; Oper. p. 208. (37) Gotti, sec. 3, n. 11. (38) Gotti, c. 108, sec. 3, n. 12; Van Ranst, p. 302; Nat. Alex. sec. 4, n. 1; Hermant, c. 229.

the Elector protected Luther, not only on account of his affection for his newly founded University of Wittemberg, on which he shed so much lustre, but also through hatred to the Elector Albert, of Mayence, Luther's most determined enemy (39). This protector of Luther, however, met with a dreadful death, as if to mark the judgment of God. While hunting, he was attacked with apoplexy, accompanied with dreadful convulsions; Luther and Melancthon immediately posted off to assist, or rather to ruin him, in his last agony, but they could not obtain from him a single word; he had lost the use of all his senses, the most dreadful convulsions racked every one of his limbs, his cries were like the roar of a lion, and he died without sacraments, or without any signs of repentance.

11. On the 9th of November, 1518, Leo X. published a Bull, on the validity of indulgences, in which he declared that the Supreme Pontiff alone had the right of granting them without limitation, from the treasures of the merits of Jesus Christ; that this was an article of Faith, and that whoever refused to believe it should be excluded from the communion of the Church. Ecchius, a man of great learning, and Pro-Chancellor of Ingoldstad, began to write about this time, and subsequently, in 1519, he had a conference with Luther, through the instrumentality of Duke George, uncle of the Elector Frederick, a good Catholic. This conference took place in Duke George's city of Leipsic, and in his own palace. After debating on many questions there, they agreed to leave the whole matter to the decision of the Universities of Erfurt and Paris. The University of Paris, after an examination of the writings on each side, received the doctrine of Ecchius, and condemned that of Luther. One hundred and four of his propositions were censured, which excited his ire to a great pitch against that University. The following year there was another conference between Luther, accompanied by Carlostad and Ecchius, in which, in six discussions, the doctrines of free-will, of grace, and of good works, were argued by Carlostad. Luther followed, and disputed on Purgatory, the power of absolving sins, reserving cases, the primacy of the Pope, and indulgences. In this conference, his doctrines were not so heretical as soon after the dispute, for then the force of truth obliged him to admit the Papal primacy, though he said it was of human, not divine right; he also acknowledged a Purgatory, and did not altogether reject indulgences, solely condemning the abuse of them. The same year his doctrines were condemned by the Universities of Cologne and Louvain (40).

12. In the year 1519, the Emperor Maximilian I. died, and there was an interregnum of six months, during which Luther gained many adherents in Wittemberg, not only among the youth

(39) Hermant, c. 229; Nat. Alex. sec. 4, n. 1; Van Ranst, p. 302. p. 303; Varillas, l. 3, p. 48.

(40) Van Ranst,

of the University, who afterwards scattered themselves through all Saxony, but some of the Professors, and even some of the clergy, secular and regular, became his disciples. Leo X. seeing his party every day gaining strength, and no hope of his retractation, then published in Rome his famous Bull, "Exurge Domine," in which he condemned forty-one of his principal errors as heretical (see Third Part of this history), and sent his Commissaries to publish it in Germany, ordering, at the same time, his books to be publicly burned in Rome. His Holiness, however, even then exhorts Luther and his followers to return to the fold, and promises to receive with clemency whoever returns before the expiration of two months, at the expiration of which, he orders his Commissaries to excommunicate the perverse, and hand them over to the secular power. The two months being passed, he published another Bull, declaring Luther a heretic, and also that all who followed or favoured him incurred all the penalties and censures fulminated against heretics (41). Luther, as soon as he heard of the publi cation of the first Bull of 1520, and the burning of his books in Rome, burned in the public square of Wittemberg the Bull, and the Book of the Decretals of the Canon Law, saying: "As you have opposed the saints of the Lord, so may eternal fire destroy you;" and then, in a voice of fury, exclaimed: "Let us fight with all our strength against that son of perdition, the Pope, the Cardinals, and all the Roman sink of corruption; let us wash our hands in their blood (42)." From that day to the day of his death, he never ceased writing against the Pope and the Catholic Church, and from the year 1521 to 1546, when he died, he brought to light again, in his works, almost every heresy of former ages. Cochleus, speaking of Luther's writings, says (43): "He thus defiled everything holy; he preaches Christ, and tramples on his servants; magnifies faith, and denies good works, and opens a license to sin; elevates mercy, depresses justice, and throws upon God the cause of all evil; finally, destroys all law, takes the power out of the hands of the magistrate, stirs up the laity against the clergy, the impious against the Pope, the people against princes."

SEC. II. THE DIETS AND PRINCIPAL CONGRESSES HELD CONCERNING THE
HERESY OF LUTHER.

13. Diet of Worins, where Luther appeared before Charles V., and remains obstinate. 14. Edict of the Emperor against Luther, who is concealed by the Elector in one of his Castles. 15. Diet of Spire, where the Emperor publishes a Decree, against which the Heretics protest. 16. Conference with the Zuinglians; Marriage of Luther with an Abbess. 17. Diet of Augsburg, and Melancthon's Profession of Faith; Melancthon's Treatise, in Favour of the Authority of the Pope, rejected by Luther. 18. Another Edict of the Emperor in Favour of Religion. 19. League of Smalkald

(41) Hermant, t. 1, c. 230. Script. Luth. Ann. 1523.

(42) Gotti, c. 108, n. 13.

(43) Cochleus de Act. &

broken up by the Emperor. 20. Dispensation given by the Lutherans to the Landgrave to have two Wives. 21. Council of Trent, to which Luther refuses to come; he dies, cursing the Council. 22. The Lutherans divided into fifty-six Sects.

23. The Second Diet of Augsburg, in which Charles V. published the injurious Formula of the Interim. 24, 25. The Heresy of Luther takes Possession of Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and other Kingdoms.

13. THE first Conference was in the Imperial Diet, assembled in Worms. Luther still continued augmenting his party, and pouring forth calumnies and vituperations against the Holy See. At the request of the Pope, Charles V. then wrote to the Elector of Saxony, to deliver up Luther, or, at all events, to banish him from his territories. The Elector, on receipt of the letter, said that as the Diet was now so near, it would be better to refer the whole matter to its decision. Luther was most anxious to appear in this illustrious assembly, hoping, by his harangue, to obtain a favourable reception for his doctrine, especially as at the request of his patron, the Elector, he obtained not only permission to attend, but also a safe conduct from the Emperor himself. The Diet assembled in 1521, and Luther arrived in Worms, on the 17th of April. Ecchius asked him, in the name of the Emperor, if he acknowledged himself the author of the books published in his name, and if it was his intention to defend them. He admitted the books were his; but as to defending them, he said, as that was an affair of importance to the Word of God, and the salvation of souls, he required time to give an answer. The Emperor gave him a day for consideration, and he next day said, that among his books some contained arguments on religion, and these he could not conscientiously retract; others were written in his own defence, and he confessed that he was guilty of excess in his attacks on his adversaries, the slaves of the Pope, but that they first provoked him to it. Ecchius required a more lucid answer. He then turned to the

Emperor, and said he could not absolutely retract anything he had taught in his lectures, his sermons, or his writings, until convinced by Scripture and reason, and that both Pope and Councils were fallible judges in this matter (1).

14. The Emperor, perceiving his obstinacy, after some conversation with him, dismissed him. He might then have arrested him, as he was in his power, but he disdained violating the safe conduct he himself had given him. Notwithstanding, he published, on the 26th of May, an edict, with consent of the Princes of the Empire, and of its Orders and States, in which he declared Luther a notorious and obstinate heretic, and prohibited any one to receive or protect him, under the severest penalties. He moreover ordained, that, after the term of the safe conduct expired, which was twenty days, he should be proceeded against wherever found (2); and he

(1) Nat. Alex. sec. 14, n. 4; Varill. t. 1, l. 4, dalla, p. 175; Van Ranst, p. 304. (2) Nat. Alex. loc. cit.; Van Ranst, p. 205.

would not have escaped, were it not for the Elector Frederick, who bribed the soldiers who escorted him, and had him conveyed to a place of security. A report was then spread abroad, that Luther was imprisoned before the expiration of the safe conduct, but the Elector had him conveyed to the Castle of Watzberg, near Alstad, in Thuringia, a place which Luther afterwards called his Patmos. He remained there nearly ten months, well concealed and guarded, and there he finished the plan of his heresy, and wrote many of his works. In the works written here, Luther principally attacked the scholastic Theologians, especially St. Thomas, whose works, he said, were filled up with heresies. We should not wonder he called the works of St. Thomas heretical, who centuries before had confuted his own pestilential errors (3).

15. In the year 1529, another Diet was held in the city of Spire, by the Emperor's orders, in which it was decided, that in these places in which the edict of Worms was accepted, it should be observed; but that wherever the ancient religion was changed, and its restoration could not be effected without public disturbances, matters should remain as they were until the celebration of a General Council. It was, besides, decided that Mass should freely be celebrated in the places infected with Lutheranism, and that the Gospel should be explained, according to the interpretation of the Fathers approved by the Church. The Elector Frederick of Saxony, George of Branderburg, Ernest and Francis, Dukes of Luneburg, Wolfgang of Anhalt, and fourteen confederate cities (thirteen, according to Protestant historians), protested against this Decree, as contrary to the truth of the Gospel, and appealed to a future Council, or to some judge not suspected, and from this protest arose the famous designation of Protestant (4).

16. The same year another Conference, composed of Lutherans and Zuinglians, or Sacramentarians, was held in Marpurg, under the patronage of the Landgrave of Hesse, to endeavour to establish a union between their respective sects. Luther, Melancthon, Jonas, Osiander, Brenzius, and Agricola appeared on one side, and Zuinglius, Ecolampadius, Bucer, and Hedio, on the other. They agreed on all points, with the exception of the Eucharist, as the Zuinglians totally denied the Real Presence of Christ. Several other Conferences were held to remove, if possible, the discussion of doctrine objected to then by the Catholics, but all ended without coming to any agreement. In this the Providence of God is apparent; the Roman Church could thus oppose to the innovators that unity of doctrine she always possessed, and the heretics were always confounded on this point (5). About this period Luther married an abbess of a convent. His fellow-heresiarch Zuinglius, also a priest,

(3) Hermant, c. 230, 231; Van Ranst, loc. cit. (4) Nat. Alex. t. 9, sec. 4, n. 9, ex Sleidano, l. 6; Van Ranst, p. 306; Hermant, t. 2, c. 244. (5) Van Ranst, p. 306; Nat. Alex. loc. cit. n. 10.