Referring to Luther’s words on bloodshed, we hear, for instance, Thomas Murner speaking of “the furious bloodhound, Martin Luther of execrable memory, the blasphemous, runaway monk and murderous bloodhound, who wants to wash his hands in the blood of the priests!”[1347]
How far Hieronymus Emser allowed himself to go in his hostility to Luther is plain from his first tract, “A venatione Luteriana Ægocerotis assertio,” of Nov., 1519, in which he replies to an attack of Luther’s on an epistle he (Emser) had sent to Provost Johann Zack. Luther, in the title, had addressed him as the “he-goat” (“ad Ægocerotem”) on account of the goat’s head figuring in his coat of arms. Emser retorts: “It is plainly beyond your ability to send out into the world any writing of yours that is not replete with houndish fury and bristles, as it were, with canine fangs. Your father is Belial, the ancestor of all insolent monks.” He paints a frightful picture of Luther’s career and character the better to prove that such a man had no right to sit in judgment on him.
Luther’s “An den Bock zu Leyptzck,” dating from the beginning of 1520, was replied to by Emser in his “An den Stier zu Wittenberg,” whereupon Luther retorted with “Auff des Bocks zu Leypczick Antwort,” to which Emser replied in his pamphlet: “Auff des Stieres tzu Wiettenberg wiettende Replica,” and his larger work “Against the Unchristian book of M. Luther to the German Nobility”; this Luther countered by his “Auff das ubirchristlich ... Buch Bocks Emssers.”
During the years 1521-1522 Emser wrote no less than eight tracts against the Wittenberg Professor. The Humanist and clever man of letters has left therein many a witty page; a refreshing sincerity is one of his characteristics.[1348] On the whole, however, what F. A. Scharpff says applies to these and the later polemics of this zealous champion of the Church: They “are composed in a tone of violent personality, nor does either combatant seek any longer to restrain the ‘Old Adam,’ as both at the outset had pledged themselves to do.”[1349]
Another of Luther’s earliest literary opponents was Johann Eck, the author of the “Obelisks,” on the Indulgence Theses. Like the works of Tetzel and Prierias, this tract is chiefly concerned in a calm discussion of the matter in dispute, though it does not refrain from occasionally describing this or that opinion of Luther’s as a “rash, corrupt, impudent assertion,” as an insipid, unblushing error, a ridiculous mistake, etc. The severest remark, however, and that which incensed Luther beyond all the rest was, that certain passages in the Indulgence Theses, owing to a confusion of ideas, made admissions “containing Bohemian poison,” i.e. savouring of the errors of Hus.[1350] Subsequent to this Eck, however, wrote to Carlstadt a letter which was intended for Luther, where he says in a conciliatory tone: “To offend Martin was never my intention.”[1351] Nor did he at first print his “Obelisks,” but merely sent the tract to his bishop and his friends. Luther, on the other hand, had the work printed in August, 1518, together with his own “Asterisks,” and, after circulating them privately among his acquaintances, finally published them together. In the “Asterisci” he speaks of the behaviour of Eck, his quondam “friend,” as most insidious and iniquitous (“insidiossissimum iniquissimum”), and mocks at his “grand, not to say high-flown,” preface. He says: “Hardly was I able to refrain from laughter”; Eck must have written his “Obelisks” during the Carnival; wearing the mask of genius he had produced a chaos. His writing adduced nothing concerning the Bible, the Fathers and the Canons, but was all arch-scholastic; had he, Luther, wished to peripateticise he could, with one puff, have blown away all these musty cobwebs, etc.[1352]
Johann Eck, who was professor of theology at the University of Ingolstadt and at the same time parish-priest and preacher, enjoyed a great reputation among the Catholics on account of his works against Luther, particularly those on the Primacy, on Purgatory, the Mass and other Catholic doctrines and practices, no less than on account of his printed sermons and his general activity on behalf of the Church.
The indefatigable defender of the Church composed amongst other writings the “Enchiridion locorum communium adv. Lutherum et alios hostes ecclesiæ” (1525). The work was of great service and formed an excellent guide to many.
In this well-arranged and eminently practical book the questions then under debate are dealt with for the instruction of Catholics and the confutation of heretics; excerpts from Scripture and from the Fathers are in each instance quoted in support of the Catholic teaching, and then the objections of opponents are set forth and answered. Not only were the Church, the Papal Primacy, Holy Scripture, Faith and Works, the Sacraments, the Veneration of the Saints, Indulgences, Purgatory and other similar points of doctrine examined in this way, but even certain matters of discipline and the ecclesiastico-political questions of the day, such as payments to Rome, the ornaments of the churches and the ceremonies of Divine Worship, the use of Latin in the Mass, the disadvantage of holding disputations with heretics, and even the question of the Turkish war. Hence the work amounted to a small arsenal of weapons for use in the controversial field. The tone is, however, not always moderate and dispassionate. The author was clear-sighted enough to avoid the pitfall into which other writers lapsed who cherished undue hopes of a settlement by give and take. In much that he says he still speaks from the mediæval standpoint, for instance, concerning the death penalty due to heretics; this he defends on the strength of the identical passages from the Old Testament to which Luther and his followers appealed for the putting to death of blasphemers and apostates from the true faith.
Eck had the satisfaction of seeing his “Enchiridion,” within four years, reprinted four times in Bavaria, twice at Tübingen, and at Cologne, Paris and Lyons. Before 1576 it had been reimpressed forty-five times. In the midst of his other literary works and his fatiguing labours as preacher and professor at the University of Ingolstadt, the scholar never forgot his useful “Enchiridion,” but amended it and added to it as occasion demanded. In 1529, in a new edition which he dedicated to Conrad von Thuengen, bishop of Würzburg, he looks back in the dedicatory preface on the ten years that had passed since his disputation at Leipzig, and voices his grief at the immense advance the apostasy had made with the course of time.
“People have outgrown themselves,” Eck exclaims, “they exalt themselves against God just as Lucifer once did, but like him too they fall into the abyss and come to despise the teaching of God.” “Whoever does not hold fast to the tradition of the Church and to the unanimous consent of the Fathers and the Councils must fall into the cesspool of the worst errors.” These words are characteristic of Eck’s unwavering adherence to authority.