The hostile relations between Luther and Duke George of Saxony found expression at the end of 1525 in a correspondence, which throws some light on the origin and extent of the tension and on the character of both men. The letters exchanged were at once printed and spread rapidly through the German lands, one serving to enlist recruits to Luther’s standard, the other constituting a furious attack on the innovations.[610]
Luther’s letter of Dec. 21, 1525, to the Duke, “his gracious master,” was “an exhortation to join the Word of God,” as the printed title runs. Sent at a time when the peasants, after their defeat, had deserted Luther, and when the latter was attaching himself all the more closely to those Royal Courts which were well disposed towards him, the purpose of the letter was to admonish the chief opponent of the cause, “not so barbarously to attack Christ, the corner-stone,” but to accept the Evangel “brought to light by me.” He bases his “exhortation” on nothing less than the absolute certainty of his mission and teaching. “Because I know it, and am sure of it, therefore I must, under pain of the loss of my own soul, care, beg and implore for your Serene Highness’s soul.” He had already diligently prayed to God to “turn his heart,” and he was loath now “to pray against him for the needs of the cause”; his prayers and those of his followers were invincibly powerful, yea, “stronger than the devil himself,” as the failure of all George’s and his friends’ previous persecutions proved, “though men do not see or mark God’s great wonders in me.”
It is hard to believe that the author, in spite of all he says, really expected his letter to effect the conversion of so energetic and resolute an opponent; nevertheless, his assurances of his peaceable disposition were calculated to promote the Lutheran cause in the public eye, whatever the answer might be. He will, he says in this letter, once again “beseech the Prince in a humble and friendly manner, perhaps for the last time”; George and Luther might soon be called away by God; “I have now no more to lose in this world but my carcase, which each day draws closer to the grave.” Formerly he had, it is true, spoken “harshly and crossly” to him, as God also does “to those whom He afterwards blesses and consoles”; he had, however, also published “many kindlier sermons and booklets in which everyone might discern that I mean ill to no one but desire to serve every man to the best of my ability.”
The letter partook of the nature of a manifesto, intended to place the Catholic-minded Prince publicly in the wrong, if it did not, as was hardly to be expected, draw him over to the side of the innovators.
The Duke replied, on Dec. 28, in a manner worthy of his status in the Empire and of the firm attitude he had maintained so far. “As a layman” he refused to enter upon a “Scriptural disputation” with Luther; it was not untrue that Luther had attacked him “harshly and contrary to the ordinance of God and the command of the Gospel”; Luther might, if he chose, compare his former severity with that of God, but he certainly would not find, “in the Gospels or anywhere in Scripture,” abusive epithets such as he employed; for him, as a sovereign, to have had to put up with such treatment from a man under the ban of the Empire, had cost him much; he had been compelled to put pressure on himself to accept “persecution for justice’ sake.” Luther’s “utterly shameful abuse of our most gracious Lord, the Roman Emperor,” made it impossible for him to be Luther’s “gracious master.”
Formerly, so George admits, when Luther’s writings “first appeared, some of them had pleased him. Nor were we displeased to hear of the Disputation at Leipzig, for we hoped from it some amendment of the abuses amongst Christians.” Luther, however, in his very hearing at Leipzig, had advanced Hussite errors, though he had afterwards promised him privately to “write against them” in order to allay any suspicion; in spite of this he had written in favour of Hus and against the Council of Constance and against “all our forefathers.”
He, for his part, held fast to the principle, “that all who acted in defiance of obedience and separated themselves from the Christian Churches were heretics and should be regarded as such, for so they had been declared by the Holy Councils, all of which you deny, though it does not beseem you nor any Christian.” Hence he would “trouble little” about Luther’s Evangel, but would continue to do his best to exclude it from his lands.
“One cause for so doing is given us in the evil fruit which springs from it; for neither you nor any man can say that aught but blasphemy of God, of the Blessed and Holy Sacrament, of the most Holy Mother of God and all the Saints has resulted from your teaching; for in your preaching all the heresies condemned of old are revived, and all honourable worship of God destroyed to an extent never witnessed since the days of Sergius [the monk supposed to have taught Mohammed]. When have more acts of sacrilege been committed by persons dedicated to God than since you introduced the Evangel? Whence has more revolt against authority come than from your Evangel? When has there been such plundering of poor religious houses? When more robbery and thieving? When were there so many escaped monks and nuns at Wittenberg as now?”[611] etc.
“Had Christ wanted such an Evangel, He would not have said so often: Peace be with you! St. Peter and St. Paul would not have said that the authorities must be obeyed. Thus the fruits of your teaching and Evangel fill us with horror and disgust. We are, however, ready to stake body, soul, goods and honour in defence of the true Gospel, in which may God’s Grace assist us!”
After urgent admonitions offered to Luther “as New-Year wishes,” more particularly to sever his connection with the nun, he promises him his assistance should he obey him: “We shall spare no pains to obtain the clemency of our most gracious Lord the Emperor, so far as is possible to us here, and you need have no fear of any ill on account of what you have done against us, but may expect all that is good. That you may see your way to this is our hope. Amen.”