EPILOGUE
With these prattlings of mine, Most Illustrious Prince, in token of my willingness to serve your Lordship to the best of my poor ability, I commend myself to your Illustrious Lordship, being ready to bring a worthier offering, if ever my mental powers shall equal my desires. For I shall always remain a debtor to every neighbor of mine, but most of all to your Lordship, whom may our Lord Jesus Christ, in His merciful kindness, long preserve to us, and at last by a blessed death take home to Himself. Amen.
Your Most Illustrious Lordship's
Intercessor,
Brother Martin Luther,
Augustinian at Wittenberg.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Written by Luther for the last edition of 1535.
[2] Compare to the Preface to the Complete Works (1545), page 11 of this volume.
[3] Antilogistae; the hunters of contradictions and inconsistencies in Luther's writings, such as John Faber, who published, in 1530, his Antilogiarum Mart. Lutheri Babylonia. Compare also reference in preceding note.
[4] As over against Christ and the saints in His train, the devil and his followers are represented here, as frequently in Luther, under the figure of a dragon with a scaly tail.
[5] Omitted, through on oversight, from the Latin editio princeps. See Introduction, p. 105.
[6] On the political influence of Frederick, as a factor in the
German Reformation, see Hermelink, Reformation und
Gegenreformation (Krüger's Handbuch der Kirchengeschicte, 3.
Teil), p. 67.