  Pope Paul III., who succeeded Clement VII. in October 1534, seemed at once determined to bring about in reality the promised Council. And in fact he was quite earnest in the matter. He was not so indifferent as his predecessor to the real interests of the Church and the need of certain reforms, and he hoped, like a clever politician, to turn the Council, which could now no longer be evaded, to the advantage of the Papacy. With this object, and with a view in particular of arranging the place where the Council should be held, which he proposed should be Mantua, he sent a nuncio, the Cardinal Vergerius, to Germany. In August 1535 Luther was desired by his Elector to submit an opinion on the proposals of the Pope. He thought it sufficient to repeat the answer he had given two years before, namely, that the prince had then fully expressed his zeal for the restoration of Church unity by means of a Council, but at the same time had required that its decisions should be strictly according to God's Word, and declared that he could not give any definite consent without his allies. Luther still declined, moreover, to believe that the project of a Council was sincere. The university of Wittenberg had been removed during the summer to Jena, on account of a fresh outbreak of the plague, or at all events an alarm of it, and there they remained till the following February. Luther, however, would not listen to the idea of leaving Wittenberg. This time he could stay there in all rest and cheerfulness with Bugenhagen, and make merry with the idle fears of others. To the Elector, who was full of anxiety about him, Luther wrote on July 9, saying that only one or two cases of the disease had appeared; the air was not yet poisoned. The dog-days being at hand, and the young people frightened, they might as well be allowed to walk about, to calm their thoughts, until it was seen what would happen. He noticed, however, that some had 'caught ulcers in their pockets, others colic in their books, and others gout in their papers;' some, too, had no doubt eaten their mother's letters, and hence got heart-ache and homesickness. The Christian authorities, he said, must provide some strong medicine against such a disease, lest mortality might arise in consequence,—a medicine that would defy Satan, the enemy of all arts and discipline. He was astonished to find how much more was known of the great plague at Wittenberg in other parts than in the town itself, where in truth it did not exist, and how much bigger and fatter lies grew the farther they travelled. He assured his friend Jonas, who had gone away with the university, that, thanks to God, he was living there in solitude, in perfect health and comfort; only there was a dearth of beer in the town, though he had enough in his own cellar. Nor did Luther afterwards give way to fear when compelled to acknowledge several fatal cases of the plague, and when his own coachman once seemed to be stricken with it. He himself was a sufferer, throughout the winter, from a cough and other catarrhic affections. 'But my greatest illness,' he wrote to a friend, 'is, that the sun has so long shone upon me,—a plague which, as you know well, is very common, and many die of it.' The Papal nuncio now arrived at Wittenberg, and desired to speak to Luther in person. After an interview at Halle with the Archbishop Albert, he had taken the road through Wittenberg on his way to visit the Elector of Brandenburg at Berlin. On the afternoon of November 6, a Saturday, he entered Wittenberg in state, with twenty-one horses and an ass, intending to take up his quarters there for the night, and was received with all due honour at the Elector's castle by the governor Metzsch. Luther was invited, at the nuncio's request, to sup with him that evening, but as the former declined the invitation, he was asked with Bugenhagen to take breakfast with him the next morning. It was the first time, since his summons by Caietan at Augsburg in 1518, that Luther had to speak with a Papal legate—Luther, who had long since been condemned by the Pope as an abominable child of corruption, and who in turn had declared the Pope to be Antichrist. So important must Vergerius have thought it, to attempt to influence, if even only partially, the powerful adviser of the Protestant princes, and thereby to prevent him from check-mating his plans in regard to a Council. And in this respect Vergerius must have had considerable confidence in himself. The next morning Luther ordered his barber to come at an unusually early hour. Upon the latter expressing his surprise, Luther said jokingly, 'I have to go to the Papal nuncio; if only I look young when he sees me, he may think "Fie, the devil, if Luther has played us such tricks before he is an old man, what won't he do when he is one?"' Then, in his best clothes and with a gold chain round his neck, he drove to the castle with the town-priest Bugenhagen (Pomeranus). 'Here go,' he said, as he stepped into the carriage, 'the Pope of Germany and Cardinal Pomeranus, the instruments of God!' Before the legate he 'acted,' as he expressed it, 'the complete Luther.' He employed towards him only the most indispensable forms of civility, and made use of the most ill-humoured language. Thus he asked him whether he was looked upon in Italy as a drunken German. When they came to speak about the settlement of the Church questions in dispute by a Council, Vergerius reminded him that one individual fallible man had no right to consider himself wiser than the Councils, the ancient Fathers, and other theologians of Christendom. To this Luther replied that the Papists were not really in earnest about a Council, and, if it were held, they would only care to treat about such trifles as monks' cowls, priests' tonsures, rules of diet, and so forth; whereupon the legate turned to one of his attendants, who was sitting by, with the words 'he has hit the right nail on the head.' Luther went on to assert that they, the Evangelicals, had no need of a Council, being already fully assured about their own doctrine, though other poor souls might need one, who were led astray by the tyranny of the Popedom. Nevertheless he promised to attend the proposed Council, even though he should be burned by it. It was the same to him, he said, whether it was held at Mantua, Padua, or Florence, or anywhere else. 'Would you come to Bologna?' said Vergerius. Luther asked, thereupon, to whom Bologna belonged, and on being told 'to the Pope,' 'Gracious heavens,' he exclaimed, 'has the Pope seized that town too?—Very well, I will come to you even there.' Vergerius politely hinted that the Pope himself, would not refuse to come to Wittenberg. 'Let him come,' said Luther; 'we shall be very glad to see him.' 'But,' said Vergerius, 'would you have him come with arms or without?' 'As he pleases,' replied Luther; 'we shall be ready to receive him in either way.' When the legate, after their meal, was mounting his horse to depart, he said to Luther, 'Be sure to hold yourself in readiness for the Council.' 'Yes, sir,' was the reply, 'with this my very neck and head.' Vergerius afterwards related that he had found Luther to be coarse in conversation, and his Latin bad, and had answered him as far as possible in monosyllables. The excuse he urged for his interview was that Luther and Bugenhagen were the only men of learning at Wittenberg, with whom he could converse in Latin. He evidently felt himself unpleasantly deceived in the expectations and projects he had formed before the meeting. Ten years later, when his conflict with Evangelical doctrine had taught him thoroughly its real meaning and value, this high dignitary himself became a convert to it. In the meantime, while the eyes of all were fixed upon the approaching Council, the state of affairs in Germany was eminently favourable to the Evangelicals. The Emperor, during the summer of 1535, was detained abroad by his operations against the corsair Chaireddin Barbarossa in Tunis, and Luther rejoiced over the victory with which God blessed his arms. The King of France was threatening with fresh claims on Italian territory. The jealousy between Austria and Bavaria still continued. With regard to the Church, King Ferdinand learned to value Lutheranism at any rate as a barrier against the progress of the more dangerous doctrines of Zwingli. John Frederick journeyed in November 1535 to Vienna, to receive from him at length, in the name of the Emperor, the investiture of the Electorship, and met with a friendly reception. Under these circumstances the Schmalkaldic League resolved, at a convention at Schmalkald in December 1535, to invite other States of the Empire, which were not yet recognised in the Religious Peace as members of the Augsburg Confession, to join them. The Dukes Barnim and Philip of Pomerania had now accepted this Confession. Philip also married a sister of John Frederick. Luther performed the marriage service on the evening of February 27 at Torgau, and Bugenhagen pronounced, the next morning, the customary benediction on the young couple, Luther being prevented from doing so by a fresh attack of giddiness. The following spring a convention of the allies at Frankfort-on-the-Main received the Duke of WÜrtemberg, the Dukes of Pomerania, the princes of Anhalt, and several towns into their league. Outside Germany, the Kings of France and England sought fellowship with the allies. Ecclesiastical and religious questions, of course, had first to be considered; and Luther with others was called on for his advice. King Francis, so many of whose Evangelical subjects were complaining of oppression and persecution, was anxious, as he was now meditating a new campaign in Italy, to secure an alliance with the German Protestants against the Emperor, and accordingly pretended with great solicitude that he had in view important reforms in the Church, and would be glad of their assistance. They were invited to send Melancthon and Luther to him for that purpose. With these he negotiated also in person. Melancthon felt himself much attracted by the prospect thus opened to him of rendering important and useful service. The Elector, however, refused him permission to go, and rebuked him for having already entangled himself so far in the affair. Melancthon's expectations were certainly very vain: the King only cared for his political interests, and in no case would he grant to any of his subjects the right to entertain or act upon religious convictions which ran counter to his own theory of the Church. Moreover, John Frederick's relations with King Ferdinand had by this time become so peaceful, that the Elector was anxious not to disturb them by an alliance with the enemy of the Emperor. Melancthon, however, was much excited by his refusal and reproof; he suspected that others had maliciously intrigued against him with his prince. Luther, at first moved by Melancthon's wish and the entreaties of French Evangelicals, had earnestly begged the Elector to permit Melancthon 'in the name of God to go to France.' 'Who knows,' he said, 'what God may wish to do?' He was afterwards startled on his friend's account by the severe letter of the Elector, but was obliged to acknowledge that the latter was right in his distrust of the affair. An alliance with England would have promised greater security, inasmuch as with Henry VIII. there was no longer any fear of his return to the Papacy, and with regard to the proceedings about his marriage, a reconciliation with the Emperor was scarcely to be expected. Envoys from him appeared in 1535 in Saxony and at the meeting at Schmalkald. Henry also wished for Melancthon, in order to discuss with him matters of orthodoxy and Church government, and Luther again begged permission of the Elector for him to go. But it was clearly seen from the negotiations conducted with the English envoys in Germany, how slender were the hopes of effecting any agreement with Henry VIII. on the chief points, such as the doctrine of Justification or of the mass, since the English monarch insisted every whit as strictly upon that Catholic orthodoxy, to which he still adhered, as he did upon his opposition to Papal power. Luther had already in January grown sick to loathing of the futile negotiations with England: 'professing themselves to be wise, they became fools' (Rom. i. 22). He advised therefore, in his opinion submitted to the Elector, that they should have patience with respect to England and the proper reforms in that quarter, but guarded himself against deviating on that account from the fundamental doctrines of belief, or conceding more to the King of England than they would to the Emperor and the Pope. As to contracting a political alliance with Henry, he left that question, as a temporal matter, for the prince and his advisers to decide; but it seemed to him dangerous, where no real sympathy prevailed. How hazardous it was to have anything to do with Henry VIII. was shown immediately after by his conduct towards his second wife Anna Boleyn, whom he had executed on May 19, 1536. Luther called this act a monstrous tragedy. Among the German Protestants, however, the negotiations respecting the Sacramental doctrine were happily brought to maturity in a duly formulated 'Concord.' Peace also was secured with the Swiss, and therewith the possibility of an eventual alliance. Now that Luther had once felt confidence in these attempts at union, he took the work in hand himself and proceeded steadily with it. In the autumn of 1535 he sent letters to a number of South German towns, addressed to preachers and magistrates—to Augsburg, Strasburg, Ulm, and Esslingen. He proposed a meeting or conference, at which they might learn to know each other better, and see what was to be borne with, what complied with, and what winked at. He wished nothing more ardently than to be permitted to end his life, now near its close, in peace, charity, and unity of spirit with his brethren in the faith. They also should 'continue thus, helping, praying, and striving that such unity might be firm and lasting, and that the devil's jaws might be stopped, who had gloried hugely in their want of unity, crying out "Ha! ha! I have won."' These letters plainly show how glad was Luther now to see the good cause so advanced, and to be able to further it yet more. Both in them and in his correspondence with the Elector about the proposed meeting, he advised not to enlist too many associates, that there might be no restless, obstinate heads among them, to spoil the affair. He knew of such among his own adherents—men who went too far for him in the zeal of dogma. The conference was appointed to be held at Eisenach in the following spring, on May 14, the fourth Sunday after Easter. Luther's state of health would not permit him to undertake a journey to any distant place or in the winter. Just at this time, moreover, in March 1536, he had been tormented for weeks by a new malady, an intolerable pain in the left hip. Later on, he told one of his friends that he had with Christ risen from the dead at Easter (April 16), for he had been so ill at that time, that he firmly believed that his time had come to depart and be with Christ, for which he longed. The South Germans readily accepted the invitation. The Strasburgers passed it on to the Swiss, and specially desired that Bullinger from Zurich might take part in the conference. The Swiss, however, who had received no direct invitation from Wittenberg, declined the proposal; they wished to adhere simply to their own articles of faith, which they had just formulated anew in the so-called 'First Helvetian Confession,' and which had expressly acknowledged at least a spiritual nutriment to be offered in the Sacramental symbols. They could not see anything to be gained by personal discussion. But they requested that their Confession might be kindly shown to Luther, and Bullinger sent him special greetings from himself and the Evangelical Churches of Switzerland. The preachers who were sent as deputies to Eisenach from the various South German towns, journeyed by way of Frankfort-on-the-Main, where just then the Schmalkaldic allies were assembled. On May 10 they went on, eleven in number, to Eisenach; they represented the communities of Strasburg, Augsburg, Memmingen, Ulm, Esslingen, Reutlingen, Furfeld, and Frankfort. At the last moment the whole success, nay even the very plan of the conference, was imperilled. Melancthon had already been anxious and despondent, fearing a fresh and violent outburst of the controversy as a consequence of the impending discussion. Luther had just been freshly excited against the Zwinglians by a writing found among the papers Zwingli left behind him, and which Bullinger had published with high eulogiums upon the author, and also by a correspondence that had just appeared between Zwingli and Oecolampadius. Butzer, however, and his friends still wished to maintain their intimacy with these Zwinglians, and this correspondence was prefaced by an introduction 'from his own pen. Furthermore, letters had reached Luther, representing that the people in the South German towns were not really taught the true Bodily Presence in the Sacrament. In addition to this, severe after-effects of his old illness again attacked him, rendering him unfit to travel to Eisenach. Accordingly, on May 12 he wrote to the deputies begging them to journey as far as Grimma, where he would either appear in person, or, if too weak, could at all events more easily communicate by writing to them and his friends. The deputies, however, came straight to him at Wittenberg. In Thuringia they were joined by the pastors Menius of Eisenach and Myconius of Gotha, two of Luther's friends who with him were honestly desirous of unity. The constant personal intercourse kept up during the journey served greatly to promote a mutual understanding. Thus on Sunday, May 21, they arrived at length at Wittenberg. The next day, the two Strasburgers, Capito and Butzer, held a preliminary interview with Luther, whose physical weakness made any lengthy negotiations very difficult. He expressed to them candidly and emphatically his desire, repeated again and again, that they should declare themselves at one with him. He would rather, however, leave matters as they had been, than enter into a union which might be only feigned or artificial, and must make bad worse. With regard to the Zwinglian publications, Butzer answered that he and his friends were in no way responsible for them, and that the preface, which consisted of a letter from himself, had been printed without his knowledge and consent. With regard to the doctrine of the Sacrament, the only question now left to decide was whether the unworthy and godless communicants verily partook of the Lord's Body. Luther maintained that they did: it was to him the necessary consequence of a Bodily Presence, such as took place simply by virtue of the institution and sure promise of Christ, by which faith must abide in full trust and belief. Butzer expressed his decided assent to the doctrine of objective Presence and presentation; but the actual reception of the Lord's Body, as offered from above, he could only concede to those communicants who, at least through some faith, placed themselves in an inward spiritual relation to that Body and accepted the institution of Christ, not to those who were simply there with their bodies and bodily mouths. To enable one to speak of a partaking of the Body, he was satisfied with that faith which was not exactly the right faith of the heart, and was connected with moral unworthiness, so that such guests ate to their own condemnation. He thus acknowledged that the unworthy, but not the man wholly devoid of faith, could partake of the Body and Blood of Christ. Luther, therefore, could feel assured that Butzer agreed with him in rejecting every view which held that, in the Sacrament, the Body of Christ was present only in the subjective representation and the imagination, or that faith there rose up out of itself, so to speak, to the Lord, instead of merely grasping at what was offered, and thereby being quickened and made strong. But it is unmistakable, that Luther and Butzer conceived in different ways both the manner of the Presence and the manner of partaking,—each of these, indeed, in a mysterious sense and one very difficult to be defined. Luther could scarcely have failed to observe the difference, which still remained between them, and the defect from which, according to his own convictions, the doctrine of the South Germans still suffered. The question was, whether he could look beyond this, and whether in the doctrine for which he had fought so keenly, he should be able and willing to distinguish between what was essential on the one hand, and what was non-essential or less essential on the other. On the Tuesday all the deputies assembled at his house, together with his Wittenberg friends, and Menius and Myconius. Butzer having spoken on the deputies' behalf, Luther conferred with them separately, and after they had declared their unanimous concurrence with Butzer, he withdrew with his friends into another room for a private consultation. On his return, he declared, on behalf of himself and his friends, that, after having heard from all present their answers and statement of belief, they were agreed with them, and welcomed them as beloved brethren in the Lord. As to the objection they had about the godless partakers, if they confessed that the unworthy received with the other communicants the Body of Christ, they would not quarrel on that point. Luther, so Myconius tells us, spoke these words with great spirit and animation, as was apparent from his eyes and his whole countenance. Capito and Butzer could not refrain from tears. All stood with folded hands and gave thanks to God. On the following days other points were discussed, such as the significance of infant baptism, and the practice of confession and absolution, as to which an understanding was necessary, and was arrived at without any difficulty. The South Germans had also to be reassured about some individual forms of worship, unimportant in themselves, and which they found to have been retained from Catholic usage in the Saxon churches. On the Thursday the proceedings were interrupted by the festival of the Ascension. Luther preached the evening sermon of that day on the text, 'Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.' Myconius relates of this sermon, 'I have often heard Luther before, but it seemed to me then as if not he alone were speaking, but heaven was thundering in the name of Christ.' On Saturday Butzer and Capito delivered themselves of their commissions on behalf of the Swiss. Luther declared after reading the Confession which they brought, that certain expressions in it were objectionable, but added a wish that the Strasburgers would treat with them further the subject, and the latter led him to hope that the communities in Switzerland, weary of dispute, desired unity. The spirit of brotherly union received a touching and beautiful expression on the Sunday in the common celebration of the Sacrament, and in sermons preached by Alber of Reutlingen in the early morning, and by Butzer in the middle of the day. The next morning, May 29, the meeting concluded with the signing of the articles which Melancthon had been commissioned to draw up. They recognised the receiving of Christ's Body at the Sacrament by those who 'ate unworthily,' without saying anything about the faithless. The deputies who signed their names declared their common acceptance of the Augsburg Confession and the Apology. This formula, however, was only to be published after it had received the assent of the communities whom it concerned, together with their pastors and civil authorities. 'We must be careful,' said Luther, 'not to raise the song of victory prematurely, nor give others an occasion for complaining that the matter was settled without their knowledge and in a corner.' Luther himself began on the same Monday to write letters, inviting assent from different quarters to their proceedings. Among his own associates, at any rate, his intimate friend Amsdorf at Magdeburg had not been so conciliatory as himself: Luther waited eight days before informing him of the result of the conference. Thus, then, unity of confession was established for the German Protestants, apart from the Swiss, for none of the Churches which had been represented at the meeting refused their assent. Luther now advanced a step towards the Swiss by writing to the burgomaster Meyer at Basle, who was particularly anxious for union, and who returned him a very friendly and hopeful answer. Butzer sought to work with them further in the same direction. But they could not reconcile themselves to the Wittenberg articles. They—that is to say, the magistrates and clergy of Zurich, Berne, Basle, and some other towns—were content to express their joy at Luther's present friendly state of mind, together with a hope of future unity, and besought Butzer to inform Luther further about their own Confession and their objections to his own. Butzer was anxious to do this at a convention which the Schmalkaldic allies appointed to meet at Schmalkald, in view of the Council having been announced to be held in February 1537. |
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