"Woe, woe to the impious governers of Christendom! Within less then seven years the world shall be made desolate. The Turk will overrun the land. No sinner shall remain alive. God will purify the earth by blood, and all the priests will be put to death. The saints will reign. The day of the Lord is at hand. Woe! woe!"
Opinions are divided throughout the university and the town about them. The Elector himself says he would rather yield up his crown and go through the world a beggar than resist the voice of the Lord. Dr. Melancthon hesitated, and says we must try the spirits whether they be of God. The Archdeacon Carlstadt is much impressed with them, and from his professorial chair even exhorts the students to abandon the vain pursuits of carnal wisdom, and to return to earn their bread, according to God's ordinance, in the sweat of their brow. The master of the boys' school called, from the open window of the school-room, to the citizens to take back their children. Not a few of the students are dispersing, and others are in an excitable state, ready for any tumult. The images have been violently torn from one of the churches and burnt. The monks of the Convent of the Cordeliers have called the soldiers to their aid against a threatened attack.
Gottfried and others are persuaded that these men of Zwickau are deluded enthusiasts. He says, "The spirit which undervalues the word of God cannot be the Spirit of God."
But among the firmest opponents of these new doctrines is, to our surprise, our charitable mother. Her gentle, lowly spirit seems to shrink from them as with a heavenly instinct. She says, "The Spirit of God humbles—does not puff up."
When it was reported to us the other day that Nicholas Storck had seen the angel Gabriel in the night, who flew towards him and said to him, "As for thee, thou shalt be seated on my throne!" the mother said,—
"It is new language to the angel Gabriel, to speak of his throne. The angels in old times used to speak of the throne of God."
And when another said that it was time to sift the chaff from the wheat, and to form a Church of none but saints, she said,—
"That would never suit me then. I must stay outside, in the Church of redeemed sinners. And did not St. Paul himself say, as Dr. Luther told us, 'Sinners, of whom I am chief?'"
"But are you not afraid," some one asked her, "of dishonouring God by denying his messengers, if, after all, these prophets should be sent from him?"
"I think not," she replied quietly. "Until the doctors are sure, I think I cannot displease my Saviour by keeping to the old message."