“The devil is an evil spirit ... as I do not fail to realise day after day; for a man waxes cold, and the more so the longer he lives.” Thus to Count Albert of Mansfeld in 1542.[1462]—He was “in pain and very morose,” he tells Jonas in 1541, “feeling disgusted with everything, especially with his illnesses.”.[1463] In 1544, and frequently about that time, he declares that he was quite tired of the devil and of his struggles with him; his only wish was to see the “end of his raging,” and to “die a good and wholesome death.”[1464] “God Himself may see to my soul’s lodging”; He loved souls, says Luther, and it was a good thing that his salvation was not in his own hands, otherwise he “would soon be gobbled up by Satan”; but God’s care and the “many mansions” in His gift were a sufficient consolation (1539).[1465]
On one occasion, in 1542, he mentioned that, unless he had escaped from certain “thoughts and temptations,” he would have been drowned in them and would have long ago found himself in hell; for such “devilish thoughts” breed “desperate people,” and “contemners of God.”[1466]
“Though, towards the end of life, such temptations are wont to cease,” he says, in 1540, yet other inward worries remain: “I am often angry with myself because I find so much in me that is unclean. But what can I do? I cannot strip off my nature. Meanwhile Christ looks upon us as righteous because we desire to be righteous, abhor our uncleanliness, and love, and confess the Word.”[1467]—Others, like Spalatin, in their old age, felt the bite of conscience more strongly than did Luther; they had not been through the same violent struggles and mental gymnastics as Luther, nor had they learnt how to suppress the voice from within. It was to Spalatin, then sunk in melancholy, that, in 1544, Luther addressed the words already quoted: He (Spalatin) was “too timid a sinner” (“nimis tener peccator”). “Unite yourself with us great and hardened sinners, in a believing trust in Christ!”[1468]
Earlier Undated Statements
Many utterances and confidences of Luther’s still exist, about the meaning of which there can be no doubt, though it is difficult correctly to place them. Some of these concern the subject now under discussion; several may well date from Luther’s later years, and thus throw light on his interior in his old age. We shall give first of all his statements concerning St. Paul in their bearing upon himself.
Speaking once of a pet view of his in which he seems to have found great consolation, viz. that even Paul had not believed firmly (neque Paulum fortiter credidisse), Luther went so far as to question the apostle’s belief in the “crown of justice” which he professed to look for, as “laid up for him in heaven” (2 Tim. iv. 8). Jonas, who was present, had declared “he could not bestow any credence on this statement of Paul’s.” Luther replied: It is quite true that Paul did not believe it firmly, “for it was above him. I too am unable to believe as I preach, although they all think I believe these things firmly.” He goes on to allege the Divine Clemency, and jestingly says: Were we to fulfil the will of God perfectly we should be cheating God of His Godhead; and what would then become of the article of the forgiveness of sins?[1469] At any rate he would fain have believed his own doctrines more strongly and vividly.
“Temptations against the faith,” says Luther, “are St. Paul’s goad and sting of the flesh [2 Cor. xii. 7], a great skewer and roasting-spit which pierces right through both spirit and flesh, both body and soul.”[1470]—And elsewhere: “At times I think: I really do not know where I stand, whether I preach aright or not. This was also St. Paul’s temptation and martyrdom, which, as I believe, he found it hard to speak of to many.” Yet, so Luther opines, Paul sufficiently hinted at it in the words “I die daily” (1 Cor. xv. 31).—The fact is, the Apostle is far from attributing to himself doubts on the faith either here or elsewhere. Luther, however, would gladly have us believe, that, with his doubts, he had been through precisely that experience to which St. Paul refers when he says, “I die daily”; he, too, has his agonies, he, too, has descended into hell.[1471] Not merely in this does he resemble Paul, but also in his inability to distinguish between the Law and the Gospel: “Paul and I have never been able to manage this.”[1472] He saw also another point of similarity between himself and the Apostle of the Gentiles. For, like him, St. Paul, too, “had been much bothered by the objection, that, one should listen to the Fathers (cp. Rom. ix. 5) and not oppose the whole world single-handed.”[1473]
Not Paul alone, according to Luther, but all the other Apostles too had been assailed by doubts.
He was always consoled to find new and illustrious companions in his misery. Christ, he declares, had foretold this to the Apostles; He had also spoken to them of this sort of persecution: “Your conscience will grow weak so that you will often think: ‘Who knows whether I have been right? Alas, have I not gone too far?’ Thus in the eyes of the world and to your own conscience you will seem to be in the wrong”; it had, however, been the duty of the Holy Ghost to comfort the Apostles in all such trials.[1474]
And did not “even the man Christ have His momentary failing in the Garden?”[1475] Did not Christ then confess: “‘I know not how I stand with God, or whether I am doing right or not.’ This occurred even in the case of Christ.”[1476] “All who are tempted must set Christ, Who also was tempted in everything, as a model before their eyes; but it was much harder for Him than for us and for me.”[1477] Luther fails to take into account the world-wide difference between the sadness of Christ, Who could never waver in the Truth, and his own doubts and wavering in the faith.