Part 5 (2/2)

The time to keep silence has passed and the time to speak is come, as saith Ecclesiastes [Eccl 3:7] I have followed out our intention[1]

and brought together so the reform of the Christian Estate, to be laid before the Christian nobility of the Gern to help His Church through the efforts of the laity, since the clergy, to whorown quite indifferent I a to your Reverence, that you ment on it and, if necessary, improve it

I know full well that I shall not escape the charge of presuh and great Estates on ive advice to people of such high intelligence I shall offer no apologies, no matter who may chide me Perchance I owe my God and the world another piece of folly, and I have now made up my mind honestly to pay that debt, if I can do so, and for once to becoe,--no one need buy me a cap or cut me my comb[2] It is a question which one will put the bells on the other[3] I must fulfil the proverb, ”Whatever the world does, a monk must be in it, even if he has to be painted in”[4] More than once a fool has spoken wisely, and wise men often have been arrant fools, as Paul says, ”If any one will be wise, let him become a fool” [1 Cor 3:18] Moreover since I am not only a fool, but also a sworn doctor of Holy Scripture, I alad for the chance to fulfil my doctor's oath in this fool's way

I pray you, ent, for I know not how to earn the grace and favor of the iht to do so with great pains Henceforth I neither desire nor regard their favor God help us to seek not our own glory, but His alone! Austinians, on the Eve of St John the Baptist (June 23d), in the year fifteen hundred and twenty

To

His Most Illustrious and Mighty Imperial Majesty,

and to

the Christian nobility of the German Nation,

Doctor Martin Luther

Grace and power froracious and dear Lords

It is not out of sheer frowardness or rashness that I, a single, poor man, have undertaken to address your worshi+ps The distress and oppression which weigh down all the Estates of Christendom, especially of Germany, and which ain, and to pray for help[5], have forced me even now to cry aloud that Godnation a helping hand Ofttimes the councils[6] have made some pretence at reformation, but their atteuile of certain one from bad to worse I now intend, by the help of God, to throw soht upon the wiles and wickedness of these men, to the end that when they are known, they reat a hindrance

God has given us a noble youth to be our head and thereby has awakened great hopes of good in many hearts[7]; wherefore it is meet that we should do our part and profitably use this tirace

In this wholeis that we take earnest heed not to enter on it trusting in great h all power in the world were ours; for God cannot and will not suffer a good work to be begun with trust in our oer or reason Such works He crushes ruthlessly to earth, as it is written in the xxxiii Psal saved by the hty th”

[Ps 33:16] On this account, I fear, it caood Emperors Frederick I[8] and II[9], and many other German emperors were shah all the world feared theht more than on God, and therefore they had to all In our own times, too, as it that raised the bloodthirsty Julius II[10] to such heights? Nothing else, I fear, except that France, the Germans and Venice relied upon themselves The children of Benjamin slew 42,000 Israelites[11] because the latter relied on their own strength

That itEmperor Charles, wenot with men, but with the princes of hell, who can fill the world ar and bloodshed, but ar and bloodshed do not overco of physical force and hu God; we must seek God's help with earnest prayer, and fix ourelse than the ard to the deserts of evil reat prospect of success, but e get well into it the evil spirits will stir up such confusion that the whole world will swi will come of it Let us act wisely, therefore, and in the fear of God The reater our disaster if we do not act humbly and in God's fear The popes and the Romans have hitherto been, able, by the devil's help, to set kings at odds with one another, and they ht and cunning, without God's help

I THE THREE WALLS OF THE ROMANISTS

[Sidenote: The Three Walls Described]

The Roreat adroitness, have built three walls about them, behind which they have hitherto defended themselves in such wise that no one has been able to reform thehout all Christendom

_First_, when pressed by the temporal power, they have made decrees and said that the temporal power has no jurisdiction over them, but, on the other hand, that the spiritual is above the temporal power

_Second_, when the attempt is made to reprove them out of the Scriptures, they raise the objection that the interpretation of the Scriptures belongs to no one except the pope Third, if threatened with a council, they ansith the fable that no one can call a council but the pope

In this wise they have slyly stolen froo unpunished, and have ensconced thehold of these three walls, that they may practise all the knavery and wickedness whichsee Even when they have been compelled to hold a council they have weakened its power in advance by previously binding the princes with an oath to let theiven the pope full authority over all the decisions of the council, so that it is all one whether there are many councils or no councils,--except that they deceive us with puppet-shows and sham-battles So terribly do they fear for their skin in a really free council! And they have inti theainst God not to obey them in all these knavish, crafty deceptions[14] Now God help us, and give us one of the trumpets hich the walls of Jericho were overthrown [Josh 6:20], that we may blon these walls of straw and paper, and may set free the Christian rods or the punishht the craft and deceit of the devil, to the end that through punishment we may reforainst the first ill direct our first attack

[Sidenote: The First Wall--the Spiritual Estate above the Temporal]