Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1507-1521.djvu/523

 be here in two days, honorably escorted by nobles and by six doctors. We hear that in Erfurt he was respectfully ^^ ceived by the professors of law and the liberal arts and that he preached there. The rumors are so uncertain and various that I can only vouch for one, and that is that the rascally herald who escorts him in his fierce hatred for us acts madly and makes of Martin's journey a triumphal progress. Had we known that he, whose disposition is well known to us, had been selected for this business, we would have done our best to stop it, but the imperialists — who knows for what reason? — kept the person of the herald and the time of his departure secret.

We are busy day and night with the Emperor, the con- fessor and the members of the privy council, in order to keep the authority of the Holy Father unhurt and to turn Luther's coming to the good of the Church and of God. In- deed, we need all our strength to counteract the secret un- derhanded efforts of the Saxon Elector and the universal uprising, which has already made the imperialists wish that Luther had never started on his journey and has made them recognize that we always represented the truth and their duty.

The Emperor appears very steadfast, and says that the imperial mandate shall be obeyed. To-day after midday di- vine service he promised us to do more than he had yet done ; at the very worst he will hold to the aforesaid mandate, which, as I previously related, provided that if Martin will not recant the condemned books and others repugnant to the Catholic Church and the present laws and customs, they shall be burned anyway, but that Martin himself, in virtue of his safe-conduct, shall be allowed to return home, after which he will be treated as a heretic, and the princes and people summoned to crush him. If only that happens it will be all the better. . ..

Four days ago the confessor told me that the herald had informed the Emperor, that as he was conducting that mon- ster with him he could not prevent all the world, young and old, boys and girls, from flocking to him. Now we had ten times prayed the Emperor, in as far as practicable, to have

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