ess evident even to the Pope; and Luther
received a summons to appear at Rome, and answer for his theses (1518).
Once again in Rome, it is unlikely he would ever have been allowed to
return. His university and the elector interfered, and a legate was sent
to Germany to hear and determine the case. Cardinal Cajetan was the
legate, and he was but little fitted to deal with Luther. He would enter
into no argument with him, but merely called upon him to retract. Luther
refused, and fled from Augsburg, whither he had gone to meet the papal
representative. The task of negotiation was then undertaken by Miltitz,
a German, who was envoy of the Pope to the Saxon court, and by his
greater address, a temporary peace was obtained. This did not last long.
The reformer was too deeply moved to keep silent. "God hurries and
drives me," he said; "I am not master of myself; I wish to be quiet, and
am hurried into the midst of tumults." Dr. Eck and he held a memorable
disputation at Leipsic (1519), in which the subject of argument was no
longer merely the question of indulgences, but the general power of the
Pope. The disputation, of course, came to no practical result; each
controversialist claimed the victory, and Luther in the meantime made
progress in freedom of opinion, and attacked the papal system as a whole
more boldly. Erasmus and Hutten joined in the conflict, which waxed more
loud and threatening.

In 1520 the reformer published his famous address to the "Christian
Nobles of Germany." This was followed in the same year by a treatise "On
the Babylonish Captivity of the Church." In these works, both of which
circulated widely and powerfully influenced many minds, Luther took
firmer and broader ground; he attacked not only the abuses of the papacy
and its pretensions to supremacy, but also the doctrinal system of the
Church of Rome. "These works," Ranke says, "contain the kernel of the
whole Reformation." The papal bull containing forty-one theses was
issued against him; the dread document, with other papal books, was
burned before an assembled multitude of doctors, students, and citizens,
at the Elster Gate of Wittenberg. Germany was convulsed with excitement.
Eck (who had been the chief agent in obtaining the bull) fled from place
to place, glad to escape with his life, and Luther was everywhere the
hero of the hour.

Charles V. had at this time succeeded to the empire, and he convened his
first diet of the sovereigns and state