The mediaeval Church ordained four other sacraments, namely, confirmation, marriage, consecration of priests, and extreme unction. But Luther refuses to acknowledge any of these as a sacrament. Marriage, he says, in its sacramental aspect, was not an institution of the New Testament, nor was it connected with any especial promise of grace. It was but a holy moral ordinance of daily life, existing since the beginning of the world and among those who were not Christians as well as those who were. At the same time he takes the opportunity to protest against those human regulations with which even this ordinance had been invaded by the Romish Church, especially against the arbitrary obstacles to marriage she had created. Even these were made a source of revenue to her, by the granting of dispensations. For the other three sacraments there was no especial promise. In the Epistle of St. James (v. 14), where it speaks of anointing the sick with oil, the allusion is not to extreme unction to the dying, but to the exercise of that wonderful Apostolic gift of healing the sick through the power of faith and prayer. With regard to the consecration of priests, Luther repeats the principles laid down in his address to the nobility. Ordination consists simply of this, that out of a community, all of whom are priests, one is chosen for the particular work of administering God's word. If, as in consecration, the hand is laid upon him, this is a human custom and not instituted by the Lord Himself. But in truth, says Luther, the outrageous tyranny of the clergy, with their priestly bodily anointing, their tonsure, and their dress, would arrogate a higher position than other Christians anointed with the Spirit; these are counted almost as unworthy as dogs to belong to the Church. And most seriously he warns a man not to strive for that outward anointing, unless he is earnestly intent on the true service of the gospel, and has disclaimed all pretension to become, by consecration, better than lay Christians.
In conclusion Luther declares: he hears that Papal excommunication is prepared for him, to force him to recant. In that case this little treatise shall form part of his recantation. After that he will soon publish the rest, the like of which has never been seen or heard by the Romish see.
In the beginning of October, probably on the 6th of that month, the book was issued. Luther had heard some ten days before that Eck had actually arrived with the bull. He had already caused it to be posted publicly at Meissen on September 21. Early in October he sent a copy of it also to the university of Wittenberg.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE BULL OF EXCOMMUNICATION, AND LUTHER'S REPLY.
At Rome, the bull, now newly arrived in Germany, had been published as early as June 16. It had been considered, when at length, under the pressure of the influences described above, the subject was taken up in earnest, very carefully in the Papal consistory. The jurists there were of opinion that Luther should be cited once more, but their views did not prevail. As for the negotiations, conducted through Miltitz, for an examination of Luther before the Archbishop of Treves, no heed was now paid to the affair.
The bull begins with the words, 'Arise, O Lord, and avenge Thy cause.' It proceeds to invoke St. Peter, St. Paul, the whole body of the saints, and the Church. A wild boar had broken into the vineyard of the Lord, a wild beast was there seeking to devour &c. Of the heresy against which it was directed, the Pope, as he states, had additional reason to complain, since the Germans, among whom it had broken out, had always been regarded by him with such tender affection: he gives them to understand that they owed the Empire to the Romish Church. Forty-one propositions from Luther's writings are then rejected and condemned, as heretical or at least scandalous and corrupting, and his works collectively are sentenced to be burnt. As to Luther himself, the Pope calls God to witness that he has neglected no means of fatherly love to bring him into the right way. Even now he is ready to follow towards him the example of Divine mercy which wills not the death of a sinner, but that he should be converted and live; and so once more he calls upon him to repent, in which case he will receive him graciously like the prodigal son. Sixty days are given him to recant. But if he and his adherents will not repent, they are to be regarded as obstinate heretics and withered branches of the vine of Christ, and must be punished according to law. No doubt the punishment of burning was meant; the bull in fact expressly condemns the proposition of Luther which denounces the burning of heretics.
All this was called then at Rome, and has been called even latterly by the Papal party, 'the tone rather of fatherly sorrow than of penal severity.' The means by which the bull had been brought about, made it fitting that Eck himself should be commissioned with its circulation throughout Germany, and especially with its publication in Saxony. More than this, he received the unheard of permission to denounce any of the adherents of Luther at his pleasure, when he published the bull.
Accordingly, Eck had the bull publicly posted up in September at Meissen, Merseburg, and Brandenburg. He was charged, moreover, by a Papal brief, in the event of Luther's refusing to submit, to call upon the temporal power to punish the heretic. But at Leipzig, where the magistrate, by order of Duke George, had to present him with a goblet full of money, he was so hustled in the streets by his indignant opponents, that he was forced to take refuge in the Convent of St. Paul, and hastened to pursue his journey by night, whilst the city officials rode about the neighbourhood with the bull. A number of Wittenberg students, adds Miltitz, made their appearance also at Leipzig, who 'behaved in a good-for-nothing way towards him.'
At Wittenberg, where the publication of the bull rested with the university, the latter notified its arrival to the Elector, and objected for various reasons to publish it, alleging, in particular, that Eck, its sender, was not furnished with proper authority from the Pope. Luther for the first time felt himself, as he wrote to Spalatin, really free, being at length convinced that the Popedom was Antichrist and the seat of Satan. He was not at all discouraged by a letter sent at this time by Erasmus from Holland to Wittenberg, saying that no hopes could be placed in the Emperor Charles, as he was in the hands of the Mendicant Friars. As for the bull, so extraordinary were its contents, that he wished to consider it a forgery.