Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1521-1530.djvu/171

 tried to keep me from it and has been greatly displeased by it, all of which I have known full well. Besides, I have never yet attacked Duke George as severely as I have the Pope, the bishops and the King of England; indeed, I have submitted to him most humbly and made him humble offers, so that I think I have spared him far too much. I ought long since to have taken a better grip on such a raving tyrant's wool. I know that all my writings are of such a kind that on first appearance they seem to come from the devil, and people are afraid the heavens will soon fall; but afterwards it is a different story. These are new times, and the great men, who have not been accustomed to such treatment, are attacked; what God has in mind will appear in His own time.

I do not wish to excuse myself, as though I were not human ; nevertheless I can boast with St. Paul that although I am too harsh, perhaps, yet I have always told the truth and no one can accuse me of hypocrisy. If I am to have a fault, I would rather it should be that I speak too harshly and blurt out the truth too thoughtlessly, than that I have ever once been a hypocrite and kept the truth to myself. But if the freedom and harshness with which I write makes the great lords angry, let them leave my doctrine undisturbed and mind their own business ; I will do them no wrong. If I sin in this way it is not for them to forgive — for I am only doing what is right — ^but for God alone.

Your Grace will take this in true kindliness and be con- fident that Christ is Lord even of His enemies, and can pro- tect us, as He has promised to do when we pray, so that we, without doubt, shall not be harmed by the firebrands of Syria and Samaria.^ God have you in His keeping.

Martin Luther.

574. THE ESTATES OF THE EMPIRE TO FRANQS CHIERE-

GATO. RTA., ill, 455* Nusembebq, February 5, 15^

Giieregato laid the Pope's Letter of Instruction (supra, no. 558) before the diet, January 3, 1523, and it was referred to a committee which was to draft an answer and lay it before the Council of Regency. The reply was reported to the diet, January ^ and adopted, after

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