power, but to attack the Dominicans, armed with all the terrors of inquisitorial authority.*

The friars of St. Augustine, Luther's own order, though addicted with no less obsequiousness than the other monastic fraternities to the papal see, gave no check to the publication of these uncommon opinions. Luther had, by his piety and learning, acquired extraordinary authority among his brethren; he professed the highest regard for the authority of the pope; his professions were at that time sincere; and as a secret eninity, excited by interest or emulation, subsists among all the monastic orders in the Romish church, the Augustinians were highly pleased with his invectives against the Dominicans, and hoped to see them exposed to the hatred and scorn of the people. Nor was his sovereign, the elector of Saxony, the wisest prince at that time in Germany, dissatisfied with this obstruction which Luther threw in the way of the publication of indulgences. He secretly encouraged the attempt, and flattered himself that this dispute among the ecclesiastics themselves, might give some check to the exactions of the court of Rome, which the secular princes had long, though without success, been endeavouring to oppose.

Many zealous champions immediately arose to defend opinions on which the wealth and power of the church were founded, against Luther's attacks. In opposition to his theses, Tetzel published counter-theses at Francfort on the Oder; Eccius, a celebrated divine of Augsburg, endeavoured to refute Luther's notions; and Prierias, a Dominican friar, master of the sacred palace and Inquisitor-general, wrote against him with all the virulence of a scholastic disputant. But the manner in which they conducted the controversy did little service to their cause. Luther attempted to combat indulgences by arguments founded in reason, or derived from scripture; they produced nothing in support of them, but the sentiments of schoolmen, the conclusions of the canon law, and the decrees of popes. The decision of judges so partial and interested, did not satisfy the people, who began to call in question the authority even of these venerable guides, when they found them standing in direct opposition to the dictates of reason, and the determinations of the divine law.§

Lutheri Opera, Jenæ, 1612, vol. i. præfat. 3. p. 2. 66. Hist. of Council of Trent by F. Paul, p. 4. Seckend Com Apol. p. 16. F. Paul, p. 6. Seckend, p. 40. Palavic. p. 8. + Seckend, p. 30. Guicciardini has asserted two things with regard to the first promulgation of indulgences: 1. That Leo bestowed a gift of the profits arising from the sale of indulgences in Saxony, and the adjacent provinces of Germany, upon his sister Magdalen, the wife of Francescetto Cibo, Guic. lib. 13. 168.-2. That Arcemboldo, a Genoese ecclesiastic, who had been bred a merchant, and still retained all the activity and address of that profession, was appointed by her to collect the money which should be raised. F. Paul has followed him in both these particulars, and adds, that the Augustinians in Saxony had been immemorially employed in preaching indulgences; but that Arcemboldo and his deputies, hoping to gain more by committing this trust to the Dominicans, had made their bargain with Tetzel, and that Luther was prompted at first to oppose Tetzel and his associates, by a desire of taking revenge for this injury offered to his order. F. Paul, p. 5. Almost all historians since their time, popish as well as protestant, have, without examination, admitted these assertions to be true upon their authority. But notwithstanding the concurring testimony of two authors so eminent both for exactness and veracity, we may observe,

1. That Felix Contolori, who searched the pontifical archives on purpose, could not find this pretended grant to Lco's sister in any of those registers where it must necessarily have been recorded. Palav. p. 5.-2. That the profits arising from indulgences in Saxony and the adjacent countries, had been granted not to Magdalen, but to Albert, archbishop of Mentz, who had the right of nominating those who published them. Seck. p. 12 Luth. Oper. 1. præf. p. 1. Palav. p. 6.-3. That Arcemboldo never had concern in the publication of indulgences in Saxony; his district was Flanders and the Upper and Lower Rhine. Seck. p. 14. Palav. p. 6.-4. That Luther and his adherents never mention this grant of Leo's to his sister; though a circumstance of which they could hardly have been ignorant, and which they would have been careful not to suppress.5. The publication of indulgences in Germany was not usually committed to the Augustinians. The promulgation of them, at three different periods under Julius II. was granted to the Franciscans; the Dominicans had been employed in the same office a short time before the present period. Palav. p. 46.-6. The promulgation of those indulgences, which first excited Luther's indignation, was intrusted to the archbishop of Mentz, in conjunction with the guardian of the Franciscans; but the latter having declined accepting of that trust, the sole right became vested in the archbishop. Palav. 6. Seck. 16, 17.-7. Luther was not instigated by his superiors among the Augustinians to attack the Dominicans their rivals, or to depreciate inculgences because they were promulgated by them; his opposition to their opinions and vices proceeded from more laudable motives. Seck.

Meanwhile, these novelties in Luther's doctrines, which interested all Germany, excited little attention and no alarm in the court of Rome. Leo, fond of elegant and refined pleasures, intent upon great schemes of policy, a stranger to theological controversies, and apt to despise them, regarded with the utmost indifference the operations of an obscure friar, who, in the heart of Germany, carried on a scholastic disputation in a barbarous style. Little did he apprehend, or Luther himself dream, that the effects of this quarrel would be so fatal to the papal see. Leo imputed the whole to monastic enmity and emulation, and seemed inclined not to interpose in the contest, but to allow the Augustinians and Dominicans to wrangle about the matter with their usual animosity.

The solicitations, however, of Luther's adversaries, who were exaspe rated to a high degree by the boldness and severity with which he am madverted on their writings, together with the surprising progress which his opinions made in different parts of Germany, roused at last the atten tion of the court of Rome, and obliged Leo to take measures for the security of the church against an attack that now appeared too serious to be despised. For this end, he summoned Luther to appear at Rome [July, 1518], within sixty days, before the auditor of the chamber, and the Inquisitor-general Prierias, who had written against him, whom he empowered jointly to examine his doctrines, and to decide concerning hem. He wrote, at the same time, to the elector of Saxony, beseeching him not to protect a man whose heretical and profane tenets were so shocking to pious ears; and enjoined the provincial of the Augustinians to check, by his authority, the rashness of an arrogant monk, which brought disgrace upon the order of St. Augustine, and gave offence and disturbance to the whole church.

From the strain of these letters, as well as from the nomination of a Judge so prejudiced and partial as Prierias, Luther easily saw what sentence he might expect at Rome. He discovered, for that reason, the utmost solicitude to have his cause tried in Germany, and before a less suspected tribunal. The professors in the university of Wittemberg, anxious for the safety of a man who did so much honour to their society, wrote to the pope, and after employing several pretexts to excuse Luther from appearing at Rome, entreated Leo to commit the examination of his doctrines to some persons of learning and authority in Germany. The elector requested the same thing of the pope's legate at the diet of Augsburg; and as Luther himself, who, at that time, was so far from having any intention to disclaim the papal authority, that he did not even entertain the smallest suspicion concerning its divine original, had written to Leo a most submissive letter, promising an unreserved compliance with his will, the pope gratified them so far as to empower his legate in Germany, cardinal Ca jetan, a Dominican, eminent for scholastic learning, and passionately de voted to the Roman see, to hear and determine the cause.

Luther, though he had good reason to decline the judge chosen among his avowed adversaries, did not hesitate about appearing before Cajetan; and having obtained the emperor's safe-conduct, immediately repaired to Augsburg. The cardinal received him with decent respect, and endea voured at first to gain upon him by gentle treatment. The cardinal, relying on the superiority of his own talents as a theologian, entered into a formal dispute with Luther concerning the doctrines contained in his theses. But

p. 15. 32. Lutheri Opera, 1. p. 64. 6. 8. A diploma of indulgences is published by Herm. Vonder Hardt, from which it appears, that the name of the guardian of the Franciscans is retained, together with that of the archbishop, although the former did not act. The limits of the country to which their commissions extended, viz. the diocess of Mentz, Magdeburg, Halberstadt, and the territories of the marquis of Brandenburg, are mentioned in that diploma. Hist. Literaria Reformat. pars iv. p. 14.

In the former editions I asserted, upon the authority of Father Paul, that Cajetan thought it beneath his dignity to enter into any dispute with Luther; but M. Beausobre, in his Histoire de la VOL. II.-17

the weapons which they employed were so different, Cajetan appealing to papal decrees, and the opinions of schoolmen, and Luther resting entirely on the authority of scripture, that the contest was altogether fruitless. The cardinal relinquished the character of a disputant, and assuming that of judge, enjoined Luther, by virtue of the apostolic powers with which he was clothed, to retract the errors which he had uttered with regard to indulgences, and the nature of faith; and to abstain, for the future, from the publication of new and dangerous opinions. Luther, fully persuaded of the truth of his own tenets, and confirmed in the belief of them by the approbation which they had met with among persons conspicuous both for learning and piety, was surprised at this abrupt mention of a recantation, before any endeavours were used to convince him that he was mistaken. He had Hattered himself, that in a conference concerning the points in dispute with a prelate of such distinguished abilities, he should be able to remove many of those imputations with which the ignorance or malice of his antagonists had loaded him; but the high tone of authority that the cardinal assumed, extinguished at once all hopes of this kind, and cut off every prospect of advantage from the interview. His native intrepidity of mind, however, did not desert him. He declared with the utmost firmness, that he could not, with a safe conscience, renounce opinions which he believed to be true; nor should any consideration ever induce him to do what would be so base in itself, and so offensive to God. At the same time he continued to express no less reverence than formerly for the authority of the apostolic see; he signified his willingness to submit the whole controversy to certain universities which he named, and promised neither to write nor to preach concerning indulgences for the future, provided his adversaries were likewise enjoined to be silent with respect to them. All these offers Cajetan disregarded or rejected, and still insisted peremptorily on a simple recantation, threatening him with ecclesiastical censures, and forbidding him to appear again in his presence, unless he resolved instantly to comply with what he had required. This haughty and violent manner of proceeding, as well as other circumstances, gave Luther's friends such strong reasons to suspect, that even the Imperial safe conduct would not be able to protect him from the legate's power and resentment, that they prevailed on him to withdraw secretly from Augsburg, and to return to his own country. But before his departure, according to a form of which there had been some examples, he prepared [October 18] a solemn appeal from the pope, ill-informed at that time concerning his cause, to the pope, when he should receive more full information with respect to it.

Cajetan, enraged at Luther's abrupt retreat, and at the publication of his appeal, wrote to the elector of Saxony, complaining of both; and requiring him, as he regarded the peace of the church, or the authority of its head, either to send that seditious monk a prisoner to Rome, or to banish him out of his territories. It was not from theological considerations that Frederic had hitherto countenanced Luther; he seems to have been much a stranger to controversies of that kind, and to have been little interested in them. His protection flowed almost entirely, as hath been already observed, from political motives, and was afforded with great secrecy and caution. He had neither heard any of Luther's discourses, nor read any of his books; though all Germany resounded with his fame, he had never once admitted him into his presence.§ But upon this demand which the cardinal made, it became necessary to throw off somewhat of his former reserve. He had been at great expense, and had bestowed much attention on founding a new university, an object of considerable importance to

Reformation, vol. 1. p. 121, &c. has satisfied me that I was mistaken. See also Seckend. lib.i. p. 46, &c. Luth. Oper. vol. I. p. 164. Id. ibid. p. 160. Sleid. Hist. of Reform. p. 7. Seckend p. 45. Luth. Oper. 1. 163. Beckend. p. 27. Sleid. Hist. p. 12.

every German prince; and foreseeing how fatal a blow the removal of Luther would be to its reputation,* he, under various pretexts, and with many professions of esteem for the cardinal, as well as of reverence for the pope, not only declined complying with either of his requests, but openly discovered great concern for Luther's safety.t

The inflexible rigour with which Cajetan insisted on a simple recantation, gave great offence to Luther's followers in that age, and hath since been censured as imprudent, by several Popish writers. But it was impossible for the legate to act another part. The judges before whom Luther had been required to appear at Rome, were so eager to display their zeal against his errors, that, without waiting for the expiration of the sixty days allowed him in the citation, they had already condemned him as a heretic. Leo had, in several of his briefs and letters, stigmatized him as a child of iniquity, and a man given up to a reprobate sense. Nothing less, therefore, than a recantation could save the honour of the church, whose maxiin it is, never to abandon the smallest point that it has established, and which is even precluded, by its pretensions to infallibility, from having it in its power to do so.

Luther's situation at this time was such as would have filled any other person with the most disquieting apprehensions. He could not expect that a prince so prudent and cautious as Frederic, would, on his account, set at defiance the thunders of the church, and brave the papal power, which had crushed some of the most powerful of the German emperors. He knew what veneration was paid, in that age, to ecclesiastical decisions; what terrors ecclesiastical censures carried along with them, and how easily these might intimidate and shake a prince, who was rather his protector from policy, than his disciple from conviction. If he should be obliged to quit Saxony, he had no prospect of any other asylum, and must stand exposed to whatever punishment the rage or bigotry of his enemies could inflict. Though sensible of his danger, he discovered no symptoms of timidity or remissness, but continued to vindicate his own conduct and opinions, and to inveigh against those of his adversaries with more vehemence than ever.§

But as every step taken by the court of Rome, particularly the irregular sentence by which he had been so precipitately declared a heretic, con vinced Luther that Leo would soon proceed to the most violent measures against him, he had recourse to the only expedient in his power, in order to prevent the effect of the papal censures. He appealed to a general council, which he affirmed to by the representative of the catholic church, and superior in power to the pope, who, being a fallible man, might err, as St. Peter, the most perfect of his predecessors had erred.

It soon appeared, that Luther had not formed rash conjectures concerning the intentions of the Romish church. A bull, of a date prior to his appeal, was issued by the pope, in which he magnifies the virtue and efficacy of indulgences, in terms as extravagant as any of his predecessors had ventured to use in the darkest ages; and without applying such palliatives, or mentioning such concessions, as a more enlightened period, and the dispositions in the minds of many men at that juncture, seemed to call for, he required all Christians to assent to what he delivered as the doctrine of the catholic church, and subjected those who should hold or teach and contrary opinion to the heaviest ecclesiastical censures.

Among Luther's followers, this bull, which they considered as an unjustifiable effort of the pope, in order to preserve that rich branch of his revenue which arose from indulgences, produced little effect. But, among the rest of his countrymen, such a clear decision of the sovereign pontiff

Seckend. p. 50. Seckend, p. 57

↑ Sleid. Hist. p. 10. Luth. Oper. i. 172.

Sield. Hist. 12. Luth. Oper. i. 179.

Duth. Oper. 1. 16.

against him, and enforced by such dreadful penalties, must have been attended with consequences very fatal to his cause; if these had not been prevented in a great measure by the death of the emperor Maximilian, [January 17, 1519,] whom both his principles and his interest prompted to support the authority of the holy see. In consequence of this event, the vicariat of that part of Germany which is governed by the Saxon laws, devolved to the elector of Saxony; and under the shelter of his friendly administration, Luther not only enjoyed tranquillity, but his opinions were suffered, during the interregnum which preceded Charles's election, to take root in different places, and to grow up to some degree of strength and firmness. At the same time, as the election of an emperor was a point more interesting to Leo than a theological controversy, which he did not understand, and of which he could not foresee the consequences, he was so extremely solicitous not to irritate a prince of such considerable influence in the electoral college as Frederic, that he discovered a great unwillingness to pronounce the sentence of excommunication against Luther, which his adversaries continually demanded with the most clamorous importunity.

To these political views of the pope, as well as to his natural aversion from severe measures, was owing the suspension of any further proceedings against Luther for eighteen months. Perpetual negotiations, however, in order to bring the matter to some amicable issue, were carried on during that space. The manner in which these were conducted having given Luther many opportunities of observing the corruption of the court of Rome : its obstinacy in adhering to established errors; and its indifference about truth, however clearly proposed, or strongly proved, he began to utter some doubts with regard to the divine original of the papal authority. A public disputation was held upon this important question at Leipsic, between Luther and Eccius, one of his most learned and formidable antagonists; but it was as fruitless and indecisive as such scholastic combats usually prove. Both parties boasted of having obtained the victory; both were confirmed in their own opinions; and no progress was made towards deciding the point in controversy.*

Nor did this spirit of opposition to the doctrines and usurpations of the Romish church break out in Saxony alone; an attack no less violent, and occasioned by the same causes, was made upon them about this time in Switzerland. The Franciscans being intrusted with the promulgation of indulgences in that country, executed their commission with the same indiscretion and rapaciousness which had rendered the Dominicans so odious in Germany. They proceeded, nevertheless, with uninterrupted success till they arrived at Zurich. There Zuinglius, a man not inferior to Luther himself in zeal and intrepidity, ventured to oppose them; and being animated with a republican boldness, and free from those restraints which subjection to the will of a prince imposed on the German reformer, he advanced with more daring and rapid steps to overturn the whole fabric of the established religion. The appearance of such a vigorous auxiliary, and the progress which he made, was, at first, matter of great joy to Luther. On the other hand, the decrees of the universities of Cologne and Louvain, which pronounced his opinions to be erroneous, afforded great cause of triumph to his adversaries.

But the undaunted spirit of Luther acquired additional fortitude from every instance of opposition; and pushing on his inquiries and attacks from one doctrine to another, he began to shake the firmest foundations on which the wealth or power of the church were established. Leo came at last to be convinced, that all hopes of reclaiming him by forbearance were vain ; several prelates of great wisdom exclaimed no less than Luther's personal

• Luth. Oper. i. 199.

↑ Sleid. Hist. 22. Seckend. 59