Life of Luther

by Julius Köstlin

This checked the feverous desire of Germans for war against their fellow-countrymen, and brought to a practical result the negotiations for a treaty which had been conducted early in 1582 at Schweinfurt, and later on at Nüremberg. They amounted to this: that all idea of an agreement on the religious and ecclesiastical questions in dispute was abandoned until the hoped-for Council should take place, and that, as had long been Luther's opinion, they should rest content with a political peace or modus vivendi, which should recognise both parties in the position they then occupied. The main dispute was on the further question, how far this recognition should extend;—whether only to the Schmalkaldic allies, the immediate parties to the present agreement, or to such other States of the Empire as might go over to the new doctrine from the old Church—which still remained the established Church of the Emperor and the Empire in general—and, perhaps further, to Protestant subjects of Catholic princes of the Empire. There was also still the question as to the validity of Ferdinand's election as King of Rome. Luther was again and again asked for his opinion on this subject.

He was just then suffering from an unusually severe attack, which incessantly reminded him of his approaching end. In addition, he was deeply concerned about the health of his beloved Elector. Early in the morning of January 22 he was seized again, as his friend Dietrich, who lived with him, informs us, with another violent attack in his head and heart. His friends who had come to him began to speak of the effect his death would have on the Papists, when he exclaimed, 'But I shall not die yet, I am certain. God will never strengthen the Papal abominations by letting me die now that Zwingli and Oecolampadius are just gone. Satan would no doubt like to have it so: he dogs my heels every moment; but not his will will be done, but the Lord's.' The physician thought that apoplexy was imminent, and that if so, Luther could hardly recover. The attack however seems to have quickly passed away, but Luther's head remained racked with pain. A few weeks later, towards the end of February, he had to visit the Elector at Torgau, who was lying there in great suffering, and had been compelled to have the great toe of his left foot amputated. Luther writes thence about himself to Dietrich, saying that he was thinking about the preface to his translation of the Prophets, but suffered so severely from giddiness and the torments of Satan, that he well-nigh despaired of living and returning to Wittenberg. 'My head,' he says, 'will do no more: so remember that, if I die, your talents and eloquence will be wanted for the preface.' For a whole month, as he remarked at the beginning of April, he was prevented from reading, writing, and lecturing. He informed Spalatin, in a letter of May 20, which Bugenhagen wrote for him, that at present, God willing, he must take a holiday. And on June 13 he told Amsdorf that his head was gradually recovering through the intercessions of his friends, but that he despaired of regaining his natural powers.

Notwithstanding this condition and frame of mind, Luther continued to send cordial, calm, and encouraging words of peace, concerning the negotiations then pending, both to the Elector John and his son John Frederick.

Concerning Ferdinand's election Luther declared to these two princes on February 12, and again afterwards, that it must not be allowed to embarrass or prevent a treaty of peace. If it violated a trifling article of the Golden Bull, that was no sin against the Holy Ghost, and God could show the Protestants, for a mote like this in the eyes of their enemies, whole beams in their own. It must needs be an intolerable burden to the Elector's conscience if war were to arise in consequence,—a war which might 'well end in rending the Empire asunder and letting in the Turks, to the ruin of the Gospel and everything else.'

An opinion, drawn up on May 16 by Luther and Bugenhagen, was equally decided in counselling submission on the question as to the extension of the truce, if peace itself depended upon it. For if the Emperor, he said, was now pleased to grant security to the now existing Protestant States, he did so as a favour and a personal privilege. They could not coerce him into showing the same favour to others. Others must make the venture by the grace of God, and hope to gain security in like manner. Everyone must accept the gospel at his own peril.

Luther began already to hear the reproach that to adopt such a course would be to renounce brotherly love, for Christians should seek the salvation and welfare of others besides themselves. He was reproached again with disowning by his conduct the Protestant ideal of religious freedom and the equal rights of Confessions. Very differently will he be judged by those who realise the legal and constitutional relations then existing in Germany, and the ecclesiastico-political views shared in common by Protestants and Catholics, and who then ask what was to be gained by a course contrary to that which he advised in the way of peace and positive law. That the sovereigns of Catholic States should secure toleration to the Evangelical worship in their own territories was opposed to those general principles by virtue of which the Protestant rulers took proceedings against their Catholic subjects. According to those principles, nothing was left for subjects who resisted the established religion of the country but to claim free and unmolested departure. Luther observed with justice, 'What thou wilt not have done to thee, do not thou to others.' With regard to the further question as to the princes who should hereafter join the Protestants, it certainly sounds naive to hear Luther speak of a present mere act of favour on the part of the Emperor. But he was strictly right in his idea, that a concession, involving the separation of some of the States of the Empire from the one Church system hitherto established indivisibly throughout the Empire, and their organisation of a separate Church, had no foundation whatever in imperial law as existing before and up to the Reformation, and could in so far be regarded simply as a free concession of the Emperor and Empire to individual members of the general body; who, therefore, had no right to compel the extension of this concession to others, and thereby hazard the peace of the Empire. Something had already been gained by the fact that at least no limitation was expressed. A door was thus left open for extension at a future time; and for those who wished to profit by this fact, the danger, if only peace could be assured, was at any rate diminished. If we may see any merit in the fact that the German nation at that time was spared a bloody war, unbounded in its destructive results, and that a peaceful solution was secured for a number of years, that merit is due in the first place to the great Reformer. He acted throughout like a true patriot and child of his Fatherland, no less than like a true Christian teacher and adviser of conscience.

The negotiations above described involved the further question about a Council, pending which a peaceful agreement was now effected. In the article providing for the convocation of a 'free Christian Council,' the Protestants demanded the addition of the words, 'in which questions should be determined according to the pure Word of God.' On this point, however, Luther was unwilling to prolong the dispute. He remarked with practical wisdom that the addition would be of no service; their opponents would in any case wish to have the credit of having spoken according to the pure Word of God.

In June bad news came again from Nüremberg, tending to the belief that the Papists had thwarted the work of peace. Luther again exclaimed, as he had done after the Diet of Augsburg, 'Well, well! your blood be upon your own heads; we have done enough.'

Towards the end of the month, when the Elector again invited his opinion, he repeated, with even more urgency than before, his warnings to those Protestants also who were 'far too clever and confident, and who, as their language seemed to show, wished to have a peace not open to dispute.' He begged the Elector, in all humility, to 'write in earnest a good, stern letter to our brethren,' that they might see how much the Emperor had graciously conceded to them which could be accepted with a good conscience, and not refuse such a gracious peace for the sake of some paltry, far-fetched point of detail. God would surely heal and provide for such trifling defects.

On July 23 the peace was actually concluded at Nüremberg, and signed by the Emperor on August 2. Both parties were mutually to practise Christian toleration until the Council was held; one of these parties being expressly designated as the Schmalkaldic allies. The value of this treaty for the maintenance of Protestantism in Germany was shown by the indignation displayed by the Papal legates from the first at the Emperor's concessions.