Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1507-1521.djvu/101

 because my powers are exhausted by old age, but the challenge you vociferate to all athletes, as though you were another Dares,^ has impelled me again to approach the wrestling ring to defend the truth and the Apostolic See.

Since I could not see the grotmds of the notice which, it is said, you have published, and although you have brought no proof to your propositions, and some of them may bear both a true and a false sense, I did not wish at first to contend with you save by supporting and defending the opposite sense of your false propositions, so that you may tell us on what grounds you rely. Wherefore, having run through and balanced your opinions, I have prepared the way for our future contest by a Dialogue, in which we, who are to con- tend, are the interlocutors. Let us invoke God's blessing! Farewell and learn better !

69. LUTHER TO WENZEL LINK AT NUREMBERG.

Enders, i. 210. Wittenbeik, July lOt IS 18.

The date of this letter is a puzzle. It is not known in MS.; the earliest edition by Aurifaber, followed by De Wette, dates "die la Fratrum," which would be September i. Enders believes that "XII" was put by mistake for "VII" and dates accordingly "day of the seven brothers," i, e., July la As Luther always used Arabic numerals this mistake could hardly have been made by him, but may have been introduced by Aurifaber. But the letter speaks of Luther's leaving Wittenberg; if this refers to the projected trip to Augsburg, as Enders thinks, the letter could hardly have been written before September i, as Luther certainly did not know he was summoned thither until that date. Smith, op, cit., p. 47. If it refers to the summons to Rome, the letter could not have been written as early as July 10, for Luther first received the summons to Rome in August. Smith, loc. cit., and Enders. i. 2i4ff. But I believe the reference is to a projected journey to Dresden, which Luther actually undertook late in July, cf. infra, no. 117, and about which the Count of Mansfeld would be more likely to be informed than about the citation to Rome. For the earlier date also speak two facts: first, that the Resolutions were not yet very far along in the press, although they were finished on August 28 (infra, no. 76), and that the "recent^ sermon on the ban was one of the causes of the citation to Augsburg, which was determined upon on August 23.

Greeting. I would have sent my Resolutions, reverend


 * Virgil: Aeneid, v. 369?.

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