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IX.

CHAP. prophet Hosea. Hosea. In this he points out how great a proportion of the messages of the prophets are easily applicable to our own times; exposes the false candour of leaving the papists unmolested in their errors; and throughout makes powerful attacks upon them.' He here again shews what it was that he rejected under Free Will. the name of free will. "Reason restrains men

Answer to

of Louvaine

from many vices, and prompts them to many outward virtues; but this will not prove the existence of free will-that is, that man, without the grace of the Spirit of God, can govern himself, act rightly, and recommend himself to God; which is the point that the upholders of free will contend for." 2

Several sermons were also published which he preached at different places this year, during his absence from Wittemberg.3

The divines of Louvain, having, on account the Divines of the "great increase of heresy," at this time published articles of religion, which comprised all the principal points of the Roman catholic doctrine, and were sanctioned in the Low Countries by an imperial rescript, Luther wrote in reply to them. He also addressed a long letter to the elector and the landgrave against the liberation of Henry of Brunswick.5 Though he writes thus, he declares, however, " I have not a heart of iron or stone: I rejoice in no man's calamity: it becomes not a Christian to

Letter on

Henry of

Brunswick.

1 Opera, iv. 398. Witt. Seck. iii. 583-587.

2 Seck. iii. 587. This explanation will fully support bishop Atterbury's assertion:"Luther's doctrine of free will is, when fairly expounded, the same with the church of England's as such we own it, and shall defend it." Answer to Consid. P. 104. 3 Seck. iii. 588. 4 Opera, ii. 542. Witt. Seck. iii. 589, 590. 5 Ibid. 590, 591.

imprecate evil on an enemy, not even on a Turk
or a Jew, on the pope or his cardinals; but
rather to supplicate God on behalf of all."—
"We know," he says again,
"that the pope
and the papists have doomed us all to destruc-
tion, both body and soul; but we wish and desire
to promote both their bodily welfare and the
salvation of their souls. Our conscience at-
tests the truth of this. Our feeling also is,
that, if God should permit them, as they madly
wish, to extirpate us, we should esteem it glo-
rious to suffer for him and his word. O God,
how great an honour would that be, and how
happy should we think ourselves, to shed our
blood in return for the blood of our Lord Jesus
Christ! But the consequences would be heavy
indeed to our enemies and murderers. They
would find God to be a righteous avenger.
Cease then," he says,
ye infatuated men, to
fan a flame which God will direct against your-
selves." 1

66

A. D 1545.

posed on

The elector and the landgrave both scru- No repulously abstained from checking him in what straint imhe thought proper to write and publish so Luther. high an opinion did they entertain of his wisdom, and of the effect of his writings. Even when king Ferdinand, having read his book "Against the Pope," published this year, observed that," if the language were but softened, it was not in other respects to be found fault with;" the elector replied, "Dr. Martin is a man of a singular spirit, which suffers not itself to be restrained in these matters.

No

doubt he has weighty reasons for this strong language. He is stirred up in an extraordinary manner against the papacy, to overthrow it,

Seck. iii. 591, 592.

CHAP.

IX.

not to amend it-for that is impossible. Mild language therefore would be out of place.”— When the offensiveness of a picture prefixed to the book was further represented, the elector still replied, that "Luther's spirit was extraordinary, and he had further views in the particular means he employed, than all could penetrate; on which account neither his (the elector's) father, John, nor his uncle Frederick would at all prescribe to him; nor would he himself presume to do it."-Though certainly it is to be wished, for the sake of posterity at least, and I conceive also for the sake of his own contemporaries, that Luther had moderated his style, yet the wisdom and forbearance of the three electors in not venturing out of their proper province, to direct, or even to regulate the movements of their subject—an extraordinary man, evidently raised up for an extraordinary service-are greatly to be admired; and we know not how much they might have marred the work, had they attempted to do otherwise.

1 Seck. iii. 556. Sleid. 349.-Bishop Atterbury is disposed to make considerable allowances for the severity of Luther's language: and there is weight in what he says, though we would beware of carrying the apology too far. "As for the heat with which he treated his adversaries, it was sometimes strained a little too far; but in the general it was extremely well fitted by the providence of God to rouse up a people, the most phlegmatic of any in Christendom. Europe lay then in a deep lethargy, and was no otherwise to be rescued from it, but by one that would cry mightily, and lift up his voice with strength....Invectives too were in those days the fashionable way of writing "-introduced by "the restorers of learning in Italy." "If Luther therefore mingled a little gall with his ink in his books of controversy, he followed but the humour of the age; and, considering the stupidity, the malice, and the obstinacy of his readers, he cannot but be thought excusable." His lordship would

A. D: 1545,

ed Works.

mate of his

This year Luther wrote the preface to the first volume of his collected works. Dr. Milner has in an early part of his history given an Preface to interesting and important extract from it: I his collectshall only here add a few sentences, which conspire with many other passages, in his various compositions, to shew the very modest estimate which he formed of his own writings. "I long and stoutly held out," he says, "against His esti those who wished to have my books, or rather own Comthe confused mass of my lucubrations, col- positions. lected and published together. I opposed this, both because I would not have attention drawn off from ancient writers by my new publications, and because now, through the grace of God, there exist many orderly works, particularly the Common Places of Melancthon, by which the divine and the pastor of the church may be throughly furnished, especially since the sacred writings themselves may now be

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make the same apology for the reformer that was made for S. Chrysostom: Profecto illorum temporum vitia secari atque uri, non levibus medelis curari voluere.. "If he offended that way, yet it was an useful, not to say a necessary failure" and "there was but this single fault that Erasmus, though an enemy, could object to him." Answer to Consid. &c. pp. 72, 73.-Yet the bishop contends that it was not till after the insolence of Cajetan, who " descended to bitter reprehensions and base terms, telling him that princes have long hands, and so bidding him begone;" (F. Paul, p. 8.) nor till," instead of the redress he expected from Rome, he found his books burned there, himself condemned without a hearing, and his adversaries Eccius and Prierias supported in all the ribaldry of language their passions could suggest; that he became chargeable with even this fault. "I believe," he says, "that part of the first volume of his works, which contains whatever he wrote in his two leading years, will, though sifted by an enemy, hardly afford, throughout, one single indecency." Pp. 12, 13, 44, 45.

1 Milner, iv. 357, 358. (332, 333.)

СНАР.

IX.

had in almost every language; while my compositions, prompted and even compelled by the course of events, are a sort of rude and undigested chaos, which I myself can hardly reduce to any order." He had wished them therefore" to sink into oblivion, and give way to somewhat better." He was obliged, however, to yield to the importunities of his friends, (who urged that, if he did not collect and arrange them, some would attempt it after his death, who knew not the circumstances and Occasions of the several pieces,) as well as to the pleasure and commands of the elector.Then follows the passage given at some length by Dr. Milner, in which Luther entreats the reader to peruse his writings" with discrimination, and even with great compassion," considering what an infatuated papist he had originally been, and with what difficulty he had surmounted his prejudices.

In like manner he says in the preface to his Commentary on the book of Genesis: "I am not one who can be said to have accomplished what he aimed at, or even to have made an approach towards the accomplishment of it: I must take my station in the last and lowest rank, as one who scarcely dares to say, 'I desired to accomplish it.' I speak every thing extemporaneously, and in a style adapted to the common people. Not that I am conscious of having spoken what is false: but I have aimed only at avoiding obscurity, and making myself fully understood." -Seckendorf remarks, however, that when he says he speaks "extemporaneously," he does not mean, without premeditation, and the examination of the best

1 Opera, vi. Witt. in præf.

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