My work has been to restore a buried literature, and recall divines from their hair-splittings to a knowledge of the New Testament.
Do not mistake me. Theology itself I reverence and always have reverenced. I am speaking merely of the theologasters of our own time, whose brains are the rottenest, intellects the dullest, doctrines the thorniest, manners the brutalest, life the foulest, speech the spitefulest, hearts the blackest, that I have ever encountered in the world.
You say that I can not die better than among my brethren. I am not so sure of that. Your religion is in your dress; your religious orders, as you call them, have done the Church small service.
What a thing it is to cultivate literature! Better far to grow cabbages. Bishops have thanked me for my work, the Pope has thanked me; but these tyrants, the mendicant friars, never leave me alone with their railing.[43]
I wish there could be an end of scholastic subtleties, and Christ be taught plainly and simply. The reading of the Bible and the early Fathers will have this effect.
Wrangling about the nature of the Second Person of the Trinity, as if Christ were a malignant demon, ready to destroy you if you made a mistake about His nature! Reduce the articles of faith to the fewest and simplest. Let our divines show their faith by their works, and convert Turks by the beauty of their lives.
May not a man be a Christian, who can not explain philosophically how the nativity of the Son differs from the procession of the Holy Spirit? The sum of religion is peace, which can only be when definitions are as few as possible, and opinion is left free on many subjects. Our present problems are said to be waiting for the next Ecumenical Council. Better let them wait till the veil is removed, and we see God face to face.
Luther's party have urged me to join them, and Luther's enemies have done their best to drive me to it by their furious attacks on me in their sermons. Neither have succeeded. Christ I know; Luther I know not. I have said nothing, except that Luther ought to be answered and not crusht. We must bear almost anything rather than throw the world into confusion. The actual facts of things are not to be blurted out at all times and places, and in all companies. I was the first to oppose the publication of Luther's books. I recommended Luther himself to publish nothing revolutionary. I feared always that revolution would be the end, and I would have done more had I not been afraid that I might be found fighting against the Spirit of God.
As to Luther himself, I perceived that the better a man was, the less he was Luther's enemy. Can it be right to persecute a man of unblemished life, in whose writings distinguished and excellent persons have found so much to admire? The Pope has no worse enemies than his foolish defenders. He can crush any man if he pleases, but empires based only on terror do not last.
By burning Luther's books you may rid your book-shelves of him, but you will not rid men's minds of him.