e
effected, I would do so without delay, but the opposition of my
opponents has spread my writings further than I had ever hoped, and
they have laid too deep hold on the souls of men. There is now much
talent, education, and free judgment in our Germany: were I to retract,
I should, in the opinions of my Germans, cover the Church with still
greater shame; but it is my opponents who have brought disgrace in
Germany upon the Romish Church." He concludes his letter politely. "Do
not doubt my readiness to do more, if it should be in my power. May
Christ preserve your Holiness. M. Luther."

There is much concealed behind this measured reserve. Even if the
conceited Eckius had not immediately after stirred up the indignation
of the whole university of Wittenberg, this letter could hardly have
availed at Rome as a sign of repentant submission.

The thunderbolt of excommunication was launched; Rome had spoken.
Luther, now restored to himself, wrote once more to the Pope; it was
the celebrated letter, which, at the request of the indefatigable
Miltitz, he antedated, the 6th of September, 1520, in order to ignore
the bull of excommunication. It is the noble expression of a determined
spirit which contemplates its opponent from its elevated position,
grand in its uprightness and noble in its sentiments! He speaks with
sincere sympathy of the Pope, and of his difficult position; but it is
the sympathy of a stranger: he still mourns over the Church, but it is
evident that he has already passed out of it. It is a parting letter
written with cutting sharpness and confidence, but in a tone of quiet
sorrow, as of a man separating himself from one whom he had once loved,
but found unworthy.

Luther had in the course of these years become quite another man; he
had acquired caution and confidence in intercourse with the great, and
had gained a dear-bought insight into the political and private
character of the governing powers. To the peaceful nature of his own
sovereign nothing could be more painful than this bitter theological
strife, which, though sometimes advantageous to him politically, always
disquieted his spirit. Continual endeavours were made at court to
restrain the Wittenbergers, but Luther was always beforehand with them.
Whenever the faithful Spalatinus warned him against the publication of
some new aggressive writing, he received for answer, that it could not
be helped; that the sheets were already printed, already in man