Just about this time, as Jonas announced to Luther, Duke John Frederick had the arms of the Reformer cut in stone for a signet ring, and Luther was requested, through his friend Spengler of Nüremberg, to explain their meaning. They were peculiarly appropriate to the times. Luther, as long ago, to our knowledge, as the year 1517, instead of his father's arms, which were a crossbow with two roses, had taken as his own one rose, having in its centre a heart with a cross upon it. This, he now explained, should be a black cross on a red heart; for, in order to be saved, it is necessary to believe with our whole heart in our crucified Lord, and the cross, though bringing pain and self-mortification, does not corrupt the nature, but rather keeps the heart alive. The heart should be placed in a white rose, to show that faith gives joy, comfort, and peace, and because white is the colour of the spirits and angels, and the joy is not an earthly joy. The rose itself should be set in an azure field; just as this joy is already the beginning of heavenly joy and set in heavenly hope, and outside, round the field, there should be a golden ring, because heavenly happiness was eternal and precious above all possessions.
[Illustration: FIG. 41.—LUTHER'S SEAL. (Taken from letters written in 1517.)]
[Illustration: FIG. 42.—LUTHER'S COAT OF ARMS. (From old prints.)]
Shortly after this, Luther received the great news that the summary of belief of German Protestants, or Augsburg Confession, had been submitted on June 25 to the Emperor and the Estates, in the German language. The Emperor, only the day before, had been anxious that it should not be read aloud, but only received in writing. Publicly, and in clear and solemn tones, the Saxon chancellor read the statement of that evangelical faith, which, only nine years before, at Worms, Luther had been required to retract. Luther was highly rejoiced. He saw fulfilled the words of the Psalmist, 'I will speak of Thy testimonies also before kings,' and he felt sure that the remainder of the verse, 'and will not be ashamed' (Ps. cxix. 46), would likewise be accomplished. He wrote to his Elector, saying it was, forsooth, a clever trick of their enemies to seal the lips of the princes' preachers at Augsburg. The consequence was, that the Elector and the other nobles 'now preached freely under the very noses of his Imperial Majesty and the whole Empire, who were obliged to hear them, and could not offer any opposition.' How sorry he felt not to have been present there himself! But he rejoiced to have seen the day when such men stood up in such an assembly, and so bravely bore witness to the truth of Christ.
Tidings also now arrived of a certain clemency and generosity even on the part of the Emperor, and of the peaceful disposition of some of the princes, such as Duke Henry of Brunswick, who invited Melancthon to dinner, and especially of Cardinal Albert, the Archbishop and Elector of Mayence. Luther, unlike Melancthon, was clear and certain on one point, that an agreement with their opponents on the questions of belief and religion was absolutely out of the question. But he now spoke out his opinion most decidedly as to a 'political agreement,' in spite of their differences of belief,—an agreement, in other words, that the two Confessions and Churches should peacefully exist together in the German Empire. This he wished, and almost hoped, might come to pass. In the Emperor Charles he recognised—he, the loyal-minded German—a good heart and noble blood, worthy of all honour and esteem. He did not dare to hope that the Emperor, surrounded as he was by evil advisers, should actually favour the Evangelical cause, but he believed at any rate so far in his clemency. In that spirit he once more by letter approached the Archbishop. Since there was no hope, he wrote, of their becoming one in doctrine, he begged him at least to use his influence that peace might be granted to the Evangelicals. For no one could be, or dared be, forced to accept a belief, and the new doctrine did no harm, but taught peace and preserved peace. He endeavoured further to appeal to the Archbishop's conscience as a German. 'We Germans do not give up believing in the Pope and his Italians until they bring us, not into a bath of sweat, but a bath of blood. If German princes fell upon one another, that would make the Pope, the little fruit of Florence, happy; he would laugh in his sleeve and say: "There, you German beasts, you would not have me as Pope, so have that."… I cannot hold my hands; I must strive to help poor Germany, miserable, forsaken, despised, betrayed, and sold—to whom indeed I wish no harm, but everything that is good, as my duty to my dear Fatherland commands me.'
Luther then would not only not hear of surrender, but looked upon as useless any further negotiations in matters of belief. He could not understand why his friends were detained any longer at Augsburg, where they had nothing to expect but menace and bravado on the part of their opponents. On July 15 he wrote to them: 'You have rendered unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's…. May Christ confess us, as you have confessed Him…. Thus I absolve you from this assembly in the Name of the Lord. Now go home again—go home!'
But they had still to wait for a Refutation, which the Emperor caused to be drawn up by some strict Catholic theologians, among whom were Eck, the old and ever violent and active enemy of Luther, and John Cochlaeus, originally a champion of Humanism, but who had, since the beginning of the great contest in the Church, distinguished himself by petty but bitter polemics against Luther, and now assisted Duke George in the place of the deceased Emser. Meanwhile the spiritual and temporal lords caused the Protestants to fear the worst. For Melancthon, these were his worst and weakest hours. He even sought to pacify the Papal legate, by representing that there was no dogma in which they differed from the Roman Church. He thought it possible that even large concessions might be made, so far at least as regarded the rites and services of the Church. For these were external things, and the bishops belonged to the authorities whom God had placed over the externals of life.
Luther therefore had still to wait with patience. He continued his encouraging letters, nor did even menaces disturb him. He remembered that too sharp an edge gets only full of notches, and that, as he had already been told by Staupitz, God first shuts the eyes of those He wishes to plague. To begin a war now would be dangerous even to their enemies; the beginning would lead to no progress, the war to no victory. To Melancthon he spoke, using a coarse German proverb, about a man who 'died of threatening.'
He drew his richest and most powerful utterances from his one highest source, the Scriptures. In his own peculiar manner he expressed himself once to Brück, the chancellor of the Saxon Elector, his temporal adviser at Augsburg, and a man who did much to further the Reformation. 'I have lately,' he wrote, 'on looking out of the window, seen two wonders: the first, the glorious vault of heaven, with the stars, supported by no pillar and yet firmly fixed; the second, great thick clouds hanging over us, and yet no ground upon which they rested, or vessel in which they were contained; and then, after they had greeted us with a gloomy countenance and passed away, came the luminous rainbow, which like a frail thin roof nevertheless bore the great weight of water.' If anyone amidst the present troubles was not satisfied with the power of faith, Luther would compare him to a man who should seek for pillars to prevent the heavens from falling, and tremble and shake because he could not find them. He was willing, as he wrote in this letter, to rest content, even if the Emperor would not grant the political peace they hoped for; for God's thoughts are far above men's thoughts, and God, and not the Emperor, must have the honour. In a letter to Melancthon he explained calmly and clearly the duty of distinguishing between the bishops as temporal princes or authorities, and the bishops as spiritual shepherds, and how, in this latter capacity, they must never be allowed the right of burdening Christ's flock with arbitrary rites and ordinances.
He now published a series of small tracts, one after the other, in which, with inflexible determination, he again asserted the evangelical principles against Catholic errors. In this spirit he wrote about the Church and Church authority; against purgatory; about the keys of the Church, or how Christ dispenses real forgiveness of sins to His community; against the worship of the saints; about the right celebration of the Sacrament, and so forth. Regardless of the pending questions of dispute, his thoughts reverted likewise to the needy condition of the schools: he wrote a special tract, 'On the duty of keeping Children at school.' His Commentary on the 118th Psalm was now followed by one upon the 117th. He also worked indefatigably at the translation of the Prophets. Thus steadily he persevered in his labours, suffering more or less in his head, always weak and 'capricious.' At the conclusion of his stay at Coburg he told a friend that, on account of the 'buzzing and dizziness' in his head, he had been obliged, with all his regularity of habits, to make a holiday of more than half the summer.