NATIONS ARE ROUSED TO ENTHUSIASM.

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Thou dost well to exhort me to be modest; I feel how much I need to be so; but I am not master of myself; I know not what spirit hurries me along; I am not conscious of wishing evil to any one. But my enemies press upon me so furiously that I am not sufficiently on my guard against Satan's seductions. Pray then for me.”

1

Thus did Luther and the Reformation hasten to fulfil the design towards which God was calling them. The unsettlement of men's minds passed from one to another, so that those even who seemed likely to prove most faithful to the hierarchy began to bestir themselves. "Even those," said Eck ingenuously enough, "who hold from the pope the best benefices and the richest canonries, remain as still as fishes. Many of them even cry up Luther as a man replenished with the Spirit of God, and call the pope's defenders sophists and flatterers."2 The Church, vigorous as it still appeared, sustained as it was by this world's treasures, and governments, and armies, yet being really emaciated and enfeebled, without love to God, without Christian life, without zealous affection for the truth, found itself in the presence of simple, but courageous men―men who, knowing that God is with those who contend for the truth, had no doubt of victory. We have seen how mighty at all times is the power of an idea in penetrating into the masses of mankind, rousing their inmost feelings, and, should the occasion require, hurrying thoasands upon thousands into the battle-field and to death. But if a merely human idea is endued with so much force, what may not be expected when the idea has come from heaven and when God himself opens men's hearts to receive it. The world has not often seen such a power in operation: still, it did see it in the early days of Christianity and in those of the Reformation, and it will see it likewise in days that are yet to come. Men who despised this world's wealth and grandeur, who were content to live a life of hardship and poverty, were beginning to bestir themselves in the holiest of causes;-the doctrine of faith,

1 . . Compos mei non sum, rapior nescio quo spiritu, cum nemini me male velle conscius sim .. (L. Epp. i. p. 555.)

2 Reynaldi Epist. J. Eckii ad Cardinal. Contarinum

-the doctrine of grace. All the religious elements began to ferment in society while thus unsettled; and the fire of enthusiasm urged many souls boldly to launch forth into this new life, this epoch of renovation, which now began to open out so magnificently, and into which Providence was precipitating the nations.

BOOK SEVENTH.

THE DIET OF WORMS.

1521. (January-May.)

ORIGINATING in the mental conflicts of one humble soul in a cell of a monastery at Erfurt, the Reformation had gone on in a course of perpetual enlargement. An obscure person, with the Word of life in his hands, had stood up in the presence of the great things of this world, and they had reeled and staggered at the sight. That Word he had opposed, first, to Tetzel and his numerous array, and the greedy salesman, after a brief struggle, had taken to flight: next, to the Roman legate at Augsburg, and the disconcerted legate had suffered his prey to escape: somewhat later, to the champions of literature in the halls of Leipsick, and the theologians had seen with amazement the weapons of the syllogism fall to pieces in their hands; finally, he had with this Word confronted the pope; the pontiff starting from his slumbers, had stood up from his throne, and would have blasted this troublesome monk with his thunderbolts, but that Word paralyzed all the might of the chief of Christendom. There yet remained another conflict for it to sustain. It had still to triumph over the emperor of the West-over the kings and princes of the earth; and then victorious over all this world's grandeurs, to establish itself in the Church, and reign there as the very Word of God.

A solemn diet was about to be opened: being the first general meeting of the empire at which the young Charles was to preside. Nuremberg, where, in virtue of the golden bull, it was to have been held, being desolated by the plague, it was summoned

to meet at Worms, on the 6th of January, 1521.1 Never had so many princes been known to attend the diet; all fain to appear at this first act of the youthful emperor's government; all pleased to have an opportunity of showing off their power. The young landgrave, Philip of Hesse, among others, he who was afterwards to act so important a part in the Reformation, arrived at Worms in the middle of January with six hundred knights, including some who had become famous for their gallantry.

A more powerful motive than this, however, had induced the electors, the dukes, the archbishops, the landgraves, the margraves, the counts, the bishops, the barons, and the lords of the empire, as well as the deputies from the cities, and the ambassadors of the various kings of Christendom, on this particular occasion, to cover the roads leading to Worms with their brilliant trains of attendants. It had been given out that the diet was to be occupied with the nomination of a council of regency, to govern the empire during Charles's frequent absence, with the subject of the jurisdiction of the imperial chamber, and other weighty questions; but public attention was chiefly directed to another matter, mentioned likewise in the emperor's letters calling the diet; this was the Reformation. The cause of the monk of Wittemberg threw the great interests of the political world into the shade, and formed the grand topic of conversation among the noble personages who were pouring into Worms.

Every thing portended that the diet would be difficult to manage and of a stormy character.2 3 Charles, still very young, had

1 Sleidan, tom. i. p. 80.

2 Es gieng aber auf diesem Reichstag gar schlüpferig zu. 326.)

The anomalous constitution and heterogeneous materials of this deliberative assembly, might well make it difficult to manage, under almost any circumstances. The emperor, who from his magnificent titles, to which Charles V. had added "Majesty," (see Dr. Robertson,) might have been supposed absolute monarch of Germany, possessed less real power than even the president of the United States of America over that confederation, and the authorities by which the imperial power was limited and controlled, were extremely diverse. Some were ecclesiastical, some secular: some were of the nature of absolute monarchies, others aristocratical, others democratical, and all these had been stimulated into activity by the revival of learning, the invention of printing, the recent institution of new universities and academies, the importance to which trade, manufactures, and the arts had grown, and, finally, by religious discussions. There was nothing singular in the pact or agreement which Charles had been made to subscribe at his election, it having been the custom of the princes to require some such guarantee from their emperors, but Charles's immense hereditary possessions made it peculiarly requisite in his case. TR.

DEATH OF CHIEVRES AT WORMS.

555

not yet adopted any precise political system; the able and active Chièvres, his governor and prime minister, died at Worms: persons pursuing different objects of ambition appeared upon the scene, many opposing passions met and thwarted each other; Spaniards and Belgians emulously sought to insinuate themselves into the councils of the young prince, the nuncios multiplied their intrigues, the German princes spoke boldly out. A struggle might be foreseen, the results of which would mainly depend on the secret proceedings of the various parties.

How was Charles to act, placed as he was between the pope's nuncio and the elector to whom he was indebted for his crown? How was he to avoid dissatisfying either Aleander or Frederick. The one solicited the emperor to execute the bull of the pope, while the other besought him to undertake nothing against the monk until he had first heard him. Wishing to satisfy both these parties, the young prince, while residing at Oppenheim, had written to the elector, desiring him to bring Luther to the diet, assuring him at the same time, that no injustice should be committed. with regard to him, that no violence should be done to him, and that learned men would confer with him there.

This letter from Charles, accompanied with letters from Chièvres, and the count of Nassau, threw the elector into great perplexity. At any moment, the pope's alliance might become necessary to the emperor, and then it was all over with Luther. Were Frederick to take the Reformer to Worms, it might possibly be merely to conduct him to the scaffold. Yet Charles's orders were precise. The elector appointed Spalatin to communicate the letters he had received to Luther. "The adversar

66

In addition to other reasons for courting the pope's friendship, Charles appears to have required it in helping him to tax the Spanish clergy. Speaking of the year 1519, Dr. Robertson says: The pope having granted the king the tenths of all ecclesiastical benefices in Castile, to assist him in carrying on war with greater vigour against the Turks, a convocation of the clergy unanimously refused to levy that sum, upon pretence that it ought never to be exacted but at those times when Christendom was actually invaded by the infidels; and though Leo, in order to support his authority, laid the kingdom under an interdict, so little regard was paid to a censure which was universally deemed unjust, that Charles himself applied to have it taken off." This fact proves further, that mere resistance to the pope was by no means thought so heinous an offence in the catholic world, and, as was remarked in a former Note, that the advocacy of the grand doctrines of the Gospel was what mainly brought upon Luther go many enemies, and so much bitter hostility. TR.