CENT. whole human race, the remaining quantity, that was XVI. shed in the garden and upon the cross, was left as a SECT. I. legacy to the church, to be a treasure from whence

indulgences were to be drawn and administered by the Roman pontifs [x]: such a man was not to be reasoned with. But MILTITZ proceeded in quite another manner, and his conferences with the Saxon reformer are worthy of attention. He was ordered, indeed, to demand of the elector, that he would either oblige LUTHER to renounce the doctrines he had hitherto maintained, or, that he would withdraw from him his protection and favour. But, perceiving that he was received by the elector with a degree of coldness that bordered upon contempt, and that LUTHER'S credit and cause were too far advanced to be destroyed by the efforts of mere authority, he had recourse to gentler methods. He loaded TETZEL with the bitterest reproaches, on account of the irregular and superstitious means he had employed for promoting the sale of indulgences, and attributed to this miserable wretch all the abuses that LUTHER had complained of. TETZEL, on the other hand, burthened with the iniquities of Rome, tormented with a consciousness of his own injustice and extortions, stung with the opprobrious censures of the new legate, and seeing himself equally despised and abhorred by both parties, died of grief and despair [3]. This incendiary being sacrificed as a victim to cover the Roman pontif from reproach,

[x] Such, among other still more absurd, were the expressions of Cajetan, which he borrowed from one of the Decreials of Clement VI. called (and that justly for more than one reason) Extravagants.

P] Luther was so affected by the agonies of despair under which Tetzel laboured, that he wrote him a pathetic letter of consolation, which, however, produced no effect. His infamy was perpetuated by a picture, placed in the church of Pinna, in which he is represented sitting on an ass, and selling indulgences.

XVI.

T. I

proach, MILTITZ entered into a particular con-CEN T. versation with LUTHER, at Altenburg, and, with-scr. le out pretending to justify the scandalous traffic in question, required only, that he would acknowledge the four following things: 1st, That the "people had been seduced by false notions of "indulgences: 2dly, That he (LUTHER) had "been the cause of that seduction, by representing indulgences as much more heinous than "they really were: 3dly, That the odious con“duct of TETZEL alone had given occasion to "these representations: and 4thly, That, though "the avarice of ALBERT, archbishop of Mentz,

46

had set on TETZEL, yet that this rapacious tax"gatherer had exceeded by far the bounds of his

commission." These proposals were accompanied with many soothing words, with pompous encomiums on LUTHER'S character, capacity, and talents, and with the softest and most pathetic expostulations in favour of union and concord in an afflicted and divided church; all which MILTITZ joined together with the greatest dexterity and address, in order to touch and disarm the Saxon reformer. Nor were his mild and insinuating methods of negotiating without effect; and it was upon this occasion that LUTHER made submissions which shewed that his views were not, as yet, very extensive, his former prejudices entirely expelled, or his reforming principles steadily fixed. For he not only offered to observe a profound silence for the future with respect to indulgences, provided the same condition were imposed on his adversaries; he went much farther; he proposed writing an humble and submissive letter to the pope, acknowledging that he had carried his zeal and animosity too far; and such a letter he wrote some time after the conference at Altenburg [.] He even consented to publish a circular

[] This letter was dated the 13th of March, 1519, about two months after the conference of Altenburg.

XVI.

SECT. 1.

CENT. circular letter, exhorting all his disciples and followers to reverence and obey the dictates of the holy Roman church. He declared that his only intentions, in the writings he had composed, was to brand with infamy those emissaries who abused its authority, and employed its protection as a mask to cover their abominable and impious frauds. It is true, indeed, that amidst those weak submissions which the impartial demands of 'historical truth oblige us to relate, there was, properly speaking, no retraction of his former tenets, nor the smallest degree of respect shewn to the infamous traffic of indulgences. Nevertheless, the pretended majesty of the Roman church, and the authority of the Roman pontif, were treated by LUTHER in this transaction, and in his letter to LEO, in a manner that could not naturally have been expected from a man who had already appealed from the pope to a general council.

Had the court of Rome been prudent enough to have accepted of the submission made by LUTHER, they would almost have nipped in the bud the cause of the reformation, or would, at least, have considerably retarded its growth and progress. Having gained over the head, the members would, with greater facility, have been reduced to obedience. But the flaming and excessive zeal of 'some inconsiderate bigots renewed, happily for the truth, the divisions, which were so near being healed, and, by animating both LUTHER and his followers to look deeper into the enormities that prevailed in the papal hierarchy, promoted the principles, and augmented the spirit, which produced, at length, the blessed [a] reformation. X. One

[a] See, for an ample account of LUTHER'S conferences with MILTITZ, the incomparable work of SECKENDORF, intitled, Commentar. Histor. Apologet. de Lutheranismo, sive de Reformatione Religionis, &c. in which the facts relating to LUTHER and the Reformation are deduced from the most precious and

authentic

SECT. I.

putes at

tween Ec

Cralostadt.

X. One of the circumstances that contributed C E N T. principally, at least by its consequences, to render XVL the embassy of MILTITZ ineffectual for the restoration of peace, was a famous controversy of an The disincidental nature that was carried on at Leipsic, Leipsic in some weeks successively, in the year 1519 [b]. the year A doctor named ECKIUS, who was one of the most 1519, beeminent and zealous champions in the papal kius and cause happened to differ widely from CARLOSTADT, the colleague and companion of LUTHER, in his sentiments concerning Free-will. The result of this variety in opinion was easy to be foreseen. The military genius of our ancestors had so far infected the schools of learning, that differences in points of religion or literature, when they grew to a certain degree of warmth and animosity, were decided, like the quarrels of valiant knights, by a single combat. Some famous university was pitched upon as the field of battle, while the rector and professors beheld the contest, and proclaimed the victory. ECKIUS, therefore, in compliance with the spirit of this fighting age, challenged CARLOSTADT, and even LUTHER himself, against whom he had already drawn his pen, to try the force of his theological arms. The challenge was accepted, the day appointed, and the three champions appeared in the field. The first conflict was between CARLOSTADT and ECKIUS

authentic manuscripts and records, contained in the library of Saxe Gotha, and in other learned and princely collections, and in which the frauds and falsehoods of MAIMBOURG's History of, Lutheranism are fully detected and refuted.As to MILTITZ, his fate was unhappy. His moderation (which nothing but the blind zeal of some furious monks could have hindered from being eminently serviceable to the cause of Rome) was represented by ECKIUS, as something worse than indifference about the success of his commission; and, after several marks of neglect received from the pontif, he had the misfortune to lose his life in passing the Rhine at Mentz.

[b] These disputes commenced on the 25th of June, and ended on the 15th of July following.

XVI.

CIENT. ECKIUS concerning the powers and freedom of SECT. I. the human will [c]; it was carried on in the castle of Pleissenburg, in presence of a numerous and splendid audience, and was followed by a dispute between LUTHER and ECKIUS concerning the authority and supremacy of the Roman pontif. This latter controversy, which the present situation of affairs rendered singularly nice and critical, was left undecided. Hoffman, at that time rector of the university of Leipsic, and who had been also appointed judge of the arguments alleged on both sides, refused to declare to whom the victory belonged; so that the decision of this matter was referred to the universities of Paris and Erfurt [d]. In the mean time, one of the immediate effects of this dispute was a visible increase of the bitterness and enmity which ECKIUS had conceived against LUTHER; for from this very period he breathed nothing but fury against the Saxon reformer [e], whom he marked out as a victim

[c] This controversy turned upon liberty, considered not in a philosophical, but in a theological sense. It was rather a dispute concerning power than concerning liberty. Carlostadt maintained, that, since the fall of man, our natural liberty is not strong enough to conduct us to what is good, without the intervention of divine grace. Eckius asserted, on the contrary, that our natural liberty co-operated with divine grace, and that it was in the power of man to consent to the divine impulse, or to resist it. The former attributed all to God; the latter divided the merit of virtue between God and the creature. The modern Lutherans have almost universally abandoned the sentiments of Carlostadt.

[d] There is an ample account of this dispute at Leipsic given by Val. Ern. Loscherus, in his Acta et Documenta Reformationis, tom. iii. c. vii. p. 203.

[e] This was one proof that the issue of the controversy was not in his favour. The victor, in any combat, is generally too full of satisfaction and self-complacency, to feel the emotions of fury and vengeance, which seldom arise but from disappointment and defeat. There is even an insolent kind of clemency that arises from an eminent and palpable superiority. This indeed ECKIUS had no opportunity of exercising.

Luther