Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1507-1521.djvu/92

 me when you begin to prefer war to peace and fury to friendship.

May the Lord give to you and to me good sense and may he vouchsafe what is good to both of us. Behold, though attacked, I lay aside my arms, not because I fear you, but God; after this it will not be my fault if I am compelled to defend myself publicly. But enough. Farewell.

62. LUTHER TO WENZEL UNK AT NUREMBERG.

Enders, i. 215. (Wittenberg, May 19, 15 18.)

This letter, the preface to Luther's Asterisks, is dated in Enders, August 10, 1 5 18. This is a late guess, as the Asterisks were not printed until 1545, when the date was added. Knaake (Weimar, i. 279!) dates this letter March 23, 15 18, and this is followed by the St. Louis Walch edition. Clemen, in Zeitschrift fiir Kirchengeschichte, xxvii. 100, argues for an intermediate date. In my judgment, the true date is ^ven by comparing this letter with that of Luther to Eck, of the same date, no. 61.

It seemed good to me to go over the Obelisks concocted by our friend Eck against my Theses, which you sent me, one by one, and to add Asterisks to those of my propositions, which are a little obscure. If you wish, you may commu- nicate them to Eck,^ clear as they now are, that he also may understand how rash it was to attack others' work, especially when he did not understand it, and particularly how treacher- ous and unjust it was to provoke so bitterly an unsuspecting friend, and one who assumes that everything will be taken for the best by his friend. But the Scripture is true: "All men are liars."' We are men and will remain men. . ..

��63. LUTHER TO JEROME SCULTETUS, BISHOP OF

BRANDENBURG.

Enders, i. 147. Wittenberg, May 22, 1518.

After writing his Resolutions in defence of his Theses, Luther sub- mitted them to his superior, the Bishop of Brandenburg. Cf. supra, no. 50. On the assumption that he sent this letter with them, the date affixed to the letter has been disregarded, and the missive put

'Link showed the Asterisks to Pirckheimer, but begged him not to show them to anyone else. W. Reindell: W, Linck, p. ^57. 'Psalm cxvi. 11.

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