Of course; because they have often erred. For, since the council of Constance decided in many points against the clear text of Holy Scripture, Holy Scripture forces me to say that councils have erred.
Eck declared that it could not be proved that general councils had erred. Luther said he could prove they had. The disputation that they said they would avoid was beginning. The emperor, seeing this, arose, and all the assembly with him. Eck cried out in a loud, clear voice: “The diet will meet again to-morrow to hear the emperor’s opinion.” It was night; each man retired to his home in darkness. Two imperial officers escorted Luther. Some supposed that his fate was decided and that they were leading him to prison, whence he would never return till he was brought out to be burned at the stake. A great tumult arose. Some cried out, “Are they taking him to prison?” “No,” replied Luther, “they are only accompanying me to my hotel.” At these words the excitement subsided.
UNDER IMPERIAL BAN
Luther had produced a profound impression on the chiefs of the empire, and many lords and princes were won to his cause. On the next morning the emperor submitted to the estates of the empire the proposition to immediately dismiss Luther, and then on the expiration of his self-conduct, to proceed against him as a heretic. On May 26th, after a majority of the diet had departed from Worms, an imperial edict against Luther was passed, and published as the “unanimous act of the Electors of the States.” In order to make it appear that the emperor’s signature was affixed when all the members of the diet were assembled, it was dated May 8th. It decreed against Luther the imperial ban; after applying to him the usual severe expressions of the papal bulls, it said:
Under the pain of incurring the penalties due to the crime of high treason, we forbid you to harbor the said Luther after the appointed term shall be expired, to conceal him, to give him food or drink, or to furnish him, by word or by deed, publicly or secretly, with any kind of succor whatever. We enjoin you, moreover, to seize him, or cause him to be seized, wherever you may find him, to bring him before us without any delay, or to keep him safe in custody, until you have learned from us in what manner you are to act toward him, and have received the reward due to your labors in so holy a work.
Thus the diet of Worms added to the pope’s excommunication the ban of the emperor. The bold stand of the poor monk, in the face of the combined civil and ecclesiastical powers of the age, is one of the sublimest scenes in history, and marks an epoch in the progress of freedom. The disaffections with the various abuses of Rome and the desire for free preaching of the Gospel were so extensive that the Reformation, both in its negative and positive features, spread in spite of the pope’s bull and the emperor’s ban, and gained a foothold before 1530 in the greater part of Northern Germany.
Among the principal causes of this rapid progress were the writings of the reformers, Luther’s German Bible, and the evangelical hymns, which introduced the new ideas into public worship and the hearts of the people.
On leaving Worms, after having gone some distance, Luther dismissed the imperial herald and proceeded leisurely, attended by only two friends. Toward night on May 4th, as he was in a lonely part of the wood, a band of armed horsemen suddenly appeared and surrounded the carriage. His friends supposed themselves attacked by bandits; one of them fled for his life, the other, Amisdorf, went on to Wittenberg with the news that Luther was violently dragged away and his fate was unknown. As the weeks passed and nothing was heard of him, the people were filled with anxiety. Even his enemies rejoiced with trembling when they heard that he had disappeared, for things were in such a state that “Luther dead might well be more troublesome to them than Luther living.”
Luther has left no record of his feelings when he was dragged from his carriage, mounted on a horse and spirited away. If he at first supposed himself to be a real captive he was soon informed that he was in the hands of friends. He was taken in the darkness and silence of the night to the castle at Wartburg, eight miles distant, by the order of the Elector Frederick, as a means of protecting him, where he spent the next ten months. He doffed his monk’s gown, put on the garb of a country gentleman, let his beard grow, and was known as “Junker George.” His time was spent in meditation, translating the New Testament into German and writing.