So, "a child of peace," as one said, he departed, and rests in peace, through the high and only merits of the only Son of God, in whom, in his last testament, he confessed was "all his hope."
It was a solemn day for Wittemberg when they laid him in his grave in the Electoral Church, which he had once so richly provided with relics. His body lying beneath it is the most sacred relic it enshrines for us now.
Knights and burghers met the coffin at the city gate; eight noblemen carried it, and a long train of mourners passed through the silent streets. Many chanted around the tomb the old Latin hymns, "In media vitæ," and "Si bona suscipimur," and also the German, "From deepest need I cry to Thee," and—
"In Fried und Freud fahr ich dahin."
"I journey hence in peace and joy."
The money which would in former times have purchased masses for his soul, was given to the poor. And Dr. Luther preached a sermon on that promise, "Those who sleep in Jesus, God will bring with him," which makes it needless, indeed, to pray for the repose of those who thus sleep.
Gretchen asked me in the evening what the hymn meant,—
"I journey hence in peace and joy."
I told her it was the soul of the prince that thus journeyed hence.
"The procession was so dark and sad," she said, "the words did not seem to suit."
"That procession was going to the grave," said Thekla, who was with us. "There was another procession, which we could not see, going to heaven. The holy angels, clothed in radiant white, were carrying the happy spirit to heaven, and singing, as they went, anthems such as that, while we were weeping here."