man of so humble, peaceable a disposition ever filled the world with
contention. We cannot but see that he would have loved privacy, quiet

diligence in the shade; that it was against his will he ever became a
notoriety. Notoriety: what would that do for him? The goal of his march

through this world was the Infinite Heaven; an indubitable goal for him:
in a few years, he should either have attained that, or lost it forever!

We will say nothing at all, I think, of that sorrowfulest of theories, of
its being some mean shopkeepergrudge, of the Augustine Monk against the

Dominican, that first kindled the wrath of Luther, and produced the
Protestant Reformation. We will say to the people who maintain it, if

indeed any such exist now: Get first into the sphere of thought by which
it is so much as possible to judge of Luther, or of any man like Luther,

otherwise than distractedly; we may then begin arguing with you.
The Monk Tetzel, sent out carelessly in the way of trade, by Leo

Tenth,--who merely wanted to raise a little money, and for the rest seems
to have been a Pagan rather than a Christian, so far as he was

anything,--arrived at Wittenberg, and drove his scandalous trade there.
Luther's flock bought Indulgences; in the confessional of his Church,

people pleaded to him that they had already got their sins pardoned.
Luther, if he would not be found wanting at his own post, a false sluggard

and coward at the very centre of the little space of ground that was his
own and no other man's, had to step forth against Indulgences, and declare

aloud that _they_ were a futility and sorrowfulmockery, that no man's sins
could be pardoned by _them_. It was the beginning of the whole

Reformation. We know how it went; forward from this first public challenge
of Tetzel, on the last day of October, 1517, through remonstrance and

argument;--spreading ever wider, rising ever higher; till it became
unquenchable, and enveloped all the world. Luther's heart's desire was to

have this grief and other griefs amended; his thought was still far other
than that of introducing separation in the Church, or revolting against the

Pope, Father of Christendom.--The elegant Pagan Pope cared little about
this Monk and his doctrines; wished, however, to have done with the noise

of him: in a space of some three years, having tried various softer
methods, he thought good to end it by _fire_. He dooms the Monk's writings

to be burnt by the hangman, and his body to be sent bound to
Rome,--probably for a similar purpose. It was the way they had ended with

Huss, with Jerome, the century before. A short argument, fire. Poor Huss:
he came to that Constance Council, with all imaginable promises and

safe-conducts; an earnest, not rebellious kind of man: they laid him
instantly in a stone dungeon "three feet wide, six feet high, seven feet

long;" _burnt_ the true voice of him out of this world; choked it in smoke
and fire. That was _not_ well done!

I, for one, pardon Luther for now altogether revolting against the Pope.
The elegant Pagan, by this fire-decree of his, had kindled into noble just

wrath the bravest heart then living in this world. The bravest, if also
one of the humblest, peaceablest; it was now kindled. These words of mine,

words of truth and soberness, aiming faithfully, as human inability would
allow, to promote God's truth on Earth, and save men's souls, you, God's

vicegerent on earth, answer them by the hangman and fire? You will burn me
and them, for answer to the God's-message they strove to bring you? You

are not God's vicegerent; you are another's than his, I think! I take your
Bull, as an emparchmented Lie, and burn _it_. _You_ will do what you see

good next: this is what I do.--It was on the 10th of December, 1520, three
years after the beginning of the business, that Luther, "with a great

concourse of people," took this indignant step of burning the Pope's
fire-decree "at the Elster-Gate of Wittenberg." Wittenberg looked on "with

shoutings;" the whole world was looking on. The Pope should not have
provoked that "shout"! It was the shout of the awakening of nations. The

quiet German heart, modest, patient of much, had at length got more than it
could bear. Formulism, Pagan Popeism, and other Falsehood and corrupt

Semblance had ruled long enough: and here once more was a man found who
durst tell all men that God's-world stood not on semblances but on

realities; that Life was a truth, and not a lie!
At bottom, as was said above, we are to consider Luther as a Prophet

Idol-breaker; a bringer-back of men to reality. It is the function of
great men and teachers. Mahomet said, These idols of yours are wood; you

put wax and oil on them, the flies stick on them: they are not God, I tell
you, they are black wood! Luther said to the Pope, This thing of yours

that you call a Pardon of Sins, it is a bit of rag-paper with ink. It is
nothing else; it, and so much like it, is nothing else. God alone can

pardon sins. Popeship, spiritual Fatherhood of God's Church, is that a
vain semblance, of cloth and parchment? It is an awful fact. God's Church

is not a semblance, Heaven and Hell are not semblances. I stand on this,
since you drive me to it. Standing on this, I a poor German Monk am

stronger than you all. I stand solitary, friendless, but on God's Truth;
you with your tiaras, triple-hats, with your treasuries and armories,

thunders spiritual and temporal, stand on the Devil's Lie, and are not so
strong!--

The Diet of Worms, Luther's appearance there on the 17th of April, 1521,
may be considered as the greatest scene in Modern European History; the

point, indeed, from which the whole subsequent history of civilization
takes its rise. After multiplied negotiations, disputations, it had come

to this. The young Emperor Charles Fifth, with all the Princes of Germany,
Papal nuncios, dignitaries spiritual and temporal, are assembled there:

Luther is to appear and answer for himself, whether he will recant or not.
The world's pomp and power sits there on this hand: on that, stands up for

God's Truth, one man, the poor miner Hans Luther's Son. Friends had
reminded him of Huss, advised him not to go; he would not be advised. A

large company of friends rode out to meet him, with still more earnest
warnings; he answered, "Were there as many Devils in Worms as there are

roof-tiles, I would on." The people, on the morrow, as he went to the Hall
of the Diet, crowded the windows and house-tops, some of them calling out

to him, in solemn words, not to recant: "Whosoever denieth me before men!"
they cried to him,--as in a kind of solemnpetition and adjuration. Was it

not in reality our petition too, the petition of the whole world, lying in
dark bondage of soul, paralyzed under a black spectral Nightmare and

triple-hatted Chimera, calling itself Father in God, and what not: "Free
us; it rests with thee; desert us not!"

Luther did not desert us. His speech, of two hours, distinguished itself
by its respectful, wise and honest tone; submissive to whatever">whatsoever could

lawfully claim submission, not submissive to any more than that. His
writings, he said, were partly his own, partly derived from the Word of

God. As to what was his own, human infirmity entered into it; unguarded
anger, blindness, many things doubtless which it were a blessing for him

could he abolishaltogether. But as to what stood on sound truth and the
Word of God, he could not recant it. How could he? "Confute me," he

concluded, "by proofs of Scripture, or else by plain just arguments: I
cannot recant otherwise. For it is neither safe nor prudent to do aught

against conscience. Here stand I; I can do no other: God assist me!"--It
is, as we say, the greatest moment in the Modern History of Men. English

Puritanism, England and its Parliaments, Americas, and vast work these two
centuries; French Revolution, Europe and its work everywhere at present:

the germ of it all lay there: had Luther in that moment done other, it had
all been otherwise! The European World was asking him: Am I to sink ever

lower into falsehood, stagnant putrescence, loathsomeaccursed death; or,
with whatever paroxysm, to cast the falsehoods out of me, and be cured and

live?--
Great wars, contentions and disunion followed out of this Reformation;

which last down to our day, and are yet far from ended. Great talk and
crimination has been made about these. They are lamentable, undeniable;

but after all, what has Luther or his cause to do with them? It seems
strange reasoning to charge the Reformation with all this. When Hercules

turned the purifying river into King Augeas's stables, I have no doubt the
confusion that resulted was considerable all around: but I think it was

not Hercules's blame; it was some other's blame! The Reformation might
bring what results it liked when it came, but the Reformation simply could

not help coming. To all Popes and Popes' advocates, expostulating,
lamenting and accusing, the answer of the world is: Once for all, your

Popehood has become untrue. No matter how good it was, how good you say it
is, we cannot believe it; the light of our whole mind, given us to walk by

from Heaven above, finds it henceforth a thing unbelievable. We will not
believe it, we will not try to believe it,--we dare not! The thing is

_untrue_; we were traitors against the Giver of all Truth, if we durst
pretend to think it true. Away with it; let whatever">whatsoever likes come in the

place of it: with _it_ we can have no farther trade!--Luther and his
Protestantism is not responsible for wars; the false Simulacra that forced

him to protest, they are responsible. Luther did what every man that God