it, and yet are so insane that they are ready to
eat up the Turk, and at home themselves set house and sheep-cote
on fire and let them burn up with the sheep and all other
contents, and none the less worry about the wolf in the woods.
Such are our times, and this is the reward we have earned by our
ingratitude toward the endless grace which Christ has won for us
freely with His precious blood, grievous labor and bitter death.

[Sidenote: Prayer Better than Good Works]

XVI. Lo! where are the idle ones, who do not know how to do good
works? Where are they who run to Rome, to St. James, hither and
thither? Take up this one single work of the mass, look on your
neighbor's sin and ruin, and have pity on him; let it grieve you,
tell it to God, and pray over it. Do the same for every other
need of Christendom, especially of the rulers, whom God, for the
intolerable punishment and torment of us all, allows to fall and
be misled so terribly. If you do this diligently, be assured you
are one of the best fighters and captains, not only against the
Turks, but also against the devils and the powers of hell. But if
you do it not, what would it help you though you performed all
the miracles of the saints, and murdered all the Turks, and yet
were found guilty of having disregarded your neighbor's need and
of having thereby sinned against love? For Christ at the last day
will not ask how much you have prayed, fasted, pilgrimaged, done
this or that yourself, but how much good you have done to others,
even the very least. [Matt. 25:40, 45]

Now without doubt among the "least" are also those who are in sin
and spiritual poverty, captivity and need, of whom there are at
present far more than of those who suffer bodily need. Therefore
take heed: our own self-assumed good works lead us to and into
ourselves, that we seek only our own benefit and salvation; but
God's commandments drive us to our neighbor, that we may thereby
benefit others to their salvation. Just as Christ on the Cross
prayed not for Himself alone, but rather for us, when He said,
"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do," [Luke
23:14] so we also must pray for one another. From which every man
may know that the slanderers, frivolous judges and despisers of
other people are a perverted, evil race, who do nothing else than
heap abuse on those for whom they ought to pray; in which vice no
one is sunk so deep as those very men who do many good works of
their ow