Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1521-1530.djvu/231

 itants communicate in both kinds according to the accursed Lutheran custom.^ It has, moreover, been ordered there, that for the future the relics of the saints are not to be ex- hibited publicly m the churches, but to be kept concealed; and all the images in the churches are to be destroyed.

620. LUTHER TO ERASMUS.

Enders, iv, 319. WnrENBERc (about April 15), 1524.

Grace and peace from our Lord Jesus Christ. I have been

silent long enough, excellent Erasmus, having waited for you,

as the greater and elder man, to speak first ; but as you refuse

to do so, I think that charity itself now compels me to begin.

I say nothing about your estrangement from us, by which you

were made safer against my enemies, the papists. Nor do I

■ especially resent your action, intended to gain their favor


 * or mitigate their hostility, in censuring and attacking us in

! various books. For since we see that the Lord has not given

f you courage or sense to assail those monsters openly and con-

{ fidently with us, we are not the men to exact what is beyond

\^your power and measure. Rather we^have tolerated and even

respected the mediocrity of God's gift in you. The whole

world knows your services to letters and how you have made

them flourish and thus prepared a path for the direct study

of the Bible. For this glorious and splendid gift in you we

ought to thank God. I for one have never wished you to leave

f yonr little sphere to join our camp, for although you might

\ have profited the cause much by your ability, genius and elo-

I quence, yet as you had not the courage it was safer for you

I to work at home. We only fear that you might be induced

f&y our enemies to fall upon our doctrine with some publica- tion,* in which case we should be obliged to resist you to your face. We have restrained some who would have drawn you into the arena, and have even suppressed books already writ- ten against you. We should have preferred that Hutten's Expostulation had not been written, and still more that your Sponge had not seen the light.* Incidentally I may remark,


 * Iii I^atin.

Jonas and others had tried to get Erasmus not to attack I^uther. See Ziekendraht; Dtr Streii Mwisehen Bratfims %md Luther, 1909, pp. aoff.
 * Erasmus's Diatribe on Pr$$ Will was published September, 1524. Melanchthon,

•C/. supra, no. 600.

�� �� �